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Whenever I open my copy of Tabernacle Hymns, Number Four, published in 1941, I can hear my mother's strong soprano voice. On the inside of the tattered cover is a handwritten list of hymn titles, most with corresponding page numbers. A few, like "In the Garden," "Mansion Over the Hilltop," and "Oh, How He Loves You & Me," (which are not in the hymnal) are listed simply because my mother, while she was alive, loved singing them.

Whether you can carry a tune or not, worship songs, traditional or contemporary, invite us into God's presence. With that in mind, we asked our readers to list their favorite hymns and praise songs. More than 500 responded, and here are the top ten:

by John Newton

Folk/pop singer Judy Collins, PBS host Bill Moyers, and grieving family members of the 1998 Swissair crash off Nova Scotia, each have had "Amazing Grace" experiences, as author D. Bruce Hindmarsh notes in the preface to his book, John Newton and the English Evangelical Tradition (Eerdmans, paperback ed. © 2001).

In 1970, Collins recorded the hymn on her album, Whales and Nightingales; within weeks it topped the charts. Moyers explored the history of the song in his popular 1989 PBS special, "Amazing Grace." Most poignant is the story from the crash that killed all 229 passengers aboard Swissair 111.

"The grief of the family members who gathered at the small village of Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia, and looked out over the rocks toward the waves where their loved ones had died was unspeakable," Hindmarsh writes. "In the midst of all this sorrow, a family spontaneously began to sing 'Amazing Grace.' Everyone at the water's edge, including the firemen and rescue workers, were transfixed until the hymn was finished."

If he had been there, John Newton would have joined in.

The eighteenth century British slave trader escaped numerous brushes with death without acknowledging God's providence. But during one tumultuous night on the sea in 1747, he began to read The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis. One phrase—"the uncertain continuance of life"—along with a passage from Proverbs, "Because I have called and ye have refused,. … I also will laugh at your calamity" brought a repentant Newton to his knees.

Eight years later, Newton left the sea behind him. Eventually he was ordained in the Anglican church. "Amazing Grace" was one of 281 hymns Newton wrote for a Thursday evening prayer service. The words of the song may indeed have been autobiographical, but they were also based on David's prayer in 1 Chronicles 17:16, 17.

by Carl Boberg/S.K. Hine

A green countryside, a sudden thunderstorm, and the glistening beauty afterward inspired Swedish pastor Carl Boberg to write the original nine verses of "O Great God" in 1886. The hymn was subsequently translated into German and Russian. Rev. Stuart K. Hine, a British missionary in the Ukraine, often sang the Russian version with his wife in their ministry. Eventually, the Hines translated three stanzas into English, and in 1948 Rev. Hine penned an original fourth verse. The hymn gained popularity in North America in the 1950s at Billy Graham crusades. George Beverly Shea remembers singing it 99 times with the crusade choir in the New York meetings of 1957.

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