Songs of Praise: A Magnificat Playlist

This past Sunday, we spent time with Mary’s Magnificat — her bold, beautiful song in Luke 1 where she praises God, confronts injustice, and imagines a world transformed by mercy. Mary’s song is courageous, disruptive, and full of hope for a world made right.

Because Mary responds to God with music, we spent part of worship listening to contemporary songs that help us enter her emotional and spiritual landscape. This week’s Resource of the Week is the full playlist, organized into five movements that mirror the structure of the Magnificat and bring its themes into our world today. Below is a guide to how these songs illuminate different parts of Mary’s song.

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Songs of Vulnerability and Honest Fear
“He has looked with favor on the lowly state of his servant.”

Before Mary sings about justice, she is still a young woman facing something overwhelming. These songs help us hear the Magnificat beginning from a place of fragility and courage held together:

• Elastic Heart — Sia
• Fast Car — Tracy Chapman
• What’s Up — 4 Non Blondes
• Sound of Your Voice — Griff

These tracks echo Mary’s emotional landscape: stretched thin, uncertain, longing for assurance, and trying to take the next faithful step.


Songs of Courage, Consent, and Praise
“My soul magnifies the Lord . . . the Mighty One has done great things for me.”

Mary’s praise is the praise of someone who has counted the cost and still says “yes.” These songs capture that complicated, forward-leaning trust:

• Thank U — Alanis Morissette
• Thank U Lord — Faith Evans
• Are You Ready — Blanca
• Tell Him — Lauryn Hill
• Walk On — U2

Each of these songs reflects gratitude that lives alongside uncertainty, and the quiet bravery of stepping into a future led by God.


Songs That Expose the World’s Love of Power
“He has scattered the proud . . . brought down the powerful from their thrones.”
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Mary’s song includes a clear critique of systems of domination. These songs help us hear her words not as metaphor, but as a real challenge to the world as it is:

• Everybody Wants to Rule the World — Tears for Fears
• Smells Like Teen Spirit — Nirvana
• We’re Not Gonna Take It — Twisted Sister
• My Favorite Mutiny — The Coup
• Fight the Power — Public Enemy

These tracks highlight the patterns of pride, control, and exploitation that Mary insists God disrupts.


Songs of Liberation and Hope for a New World
“He has lifted up the lowly . . . filled the hungry . . . sent the rich away empty.”

The Magnificat is a song of liberation — a vision of a world turned right-side-up. These songs echo that longing for justice, healing, and freedom:

• Freedom — Beyoncé
• Rise Up — Andra Day
• Redemption Song — Bob Marley
• A Change Is Gonna Come — Sam Cooke
• Blowin’ in the Wind — Bob Dylan
• Glory — Common & John Legend
• Talkin’ ’Bout a Revolution — Tracy Chapman

Each track helps us feel the Magnificat’s hope that oppression will not have the last word.


Songs of Communal Struggle and God’s Promise
“He has remembered his mercy . . . according to the promise made to our ancestors.”

Mary’s song is not just personal. It is part of a long story of people crying out for God’s justice. These songs connect the Magnificat to global movements for liberation—especially the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.

• Hamba Nathi — South African hymn
  “Hamba nathi” means “Go with us, Lord.” It emerged in the Black South African church during apartheid, a violently enforced system of racial segregation (1948–1990s). People sang it in worship and in the streets as a plea for God’s presence in the struggle for freedom. It became a spiritual anchor for communities resisting state violence and injustice. Like Mary’s song, it is a prayer from within oppression: Walk with us into the struggle; do not leave us alone.
• Azania — Catrina Brenaé
  “Azania” is a name used by South African liberation movements to envision a future free and decolonized South Africa. It symbolizes the world as it should be—where Black South Africans have dignity, land, future, and political power. Songs invoking “Azania” were expressions of resistance and unshakeable hope. Like the Magnificat, they proclaim what God’s justice will look like when the oppressed rise.
• Angels — Chance the Rapper​

These songs help us hear the Magnificat as a living prayer: God goes with those who suffer, joins them in the struggle, and keeps the promises made to generations before us.


This Week’s Invitation
As you move through Advent, let these songs accompany you. Play them while you cook, commute, rest, or pray. Let them help you inhabit Mary’s courage, her honesty, her longing, and her vision for a world remade by God’s mercy and justice. May these songs deepen your hope, broaden your compassion, and open your imagination to the upside-down kingdom Mary proclaims.