Music in church has always meant a great deal to me over the years. I have very fond memories of being a member of the children's and youth choir at church. I still remember songs and even scripture from the songs that we sang. I have very warm and fuzzy memories of friends and teachers from my music experience at church.
I was never a soloist, nor, was I good at music at any individual level. The most humiliating moment in my life happened at a piano recital when I attempted to play "Open Arms" by Journey. If you were there, you know the horror. If you missed it, count your self spared from the piano horror of a lifetime! I took for six years, and I am terrible. I just wasn't talented. It came so easy to so many of my friends, but not for me. I really was able to play "Open Arms" because I had practiced it for so long. I had to play something a hundred times when my friends could sit down and do it probably ten times. Some of them could just do it right the first time they read the music. Not me. Imagine how my parents felt when I had to practice "Chariots of Fire." It started off with about a hundred d's.
I steer clear of most musical endeavors now. I can download my iPod and sing and dance in private or in front of BubbaLou. She just tells me to be quiet! The only place I sing with other people, is at church, in the congregation, as I worship my God. This is still where I have warm fuzzies, singing to God at church. I am just grateful that I can just show up and let those who are actually talented lead the way.
It is in church, where so many wonderfully talented musicians have touched my life. Ministers of music and choir teachers have always held a special place in my heart. They taught me songs about my Jesus, they showed me how to sing with the body of Christ, they carried me through times when I was very sad or very glad. What an awesome place they have in the body of Christ. They touch people who they know and who they have never met. They bring everyone who is present before the throne of God in worship. They instill hope and passion into our faith through song.
It is because they touch us in such ways, they probably don't even realize the impact they have on our lives. The impact that God purposed them to have. We don't ever realize what we really mean to people we don't even know. It boggles my mind when I think about it, the way our lives touch others, however briefly, seeds are planted, and impressions are made.
Our church's minister of music, Simeon Nix, just followed a new call to heaven. This coming just three months after our pastor and his son followed their call to heaven. We have heavy hearts, but they are still uplifted and full of hope and purpose, because we know, that someday, we will see them again and hear them all sing again, but for now, they want us to keep singing.
When we loose one of these wonderful people on Earth, we can at least look forward to their music in heaven. Their earthly music lifted to God is only a foreshadowing of that music they will make in heaven. I can only imagine how wonderful it will be.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Heavenly Music
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Life is like soy sauce
Our family has been going through some stressful times the last month. It has been overwhelming with the abnormal-literally. I haven't known quite what to make of it,nor, how to put my normal positive spin on it, so I have been abnormally quiet.
It all came together this morning as I was making yummy blueberry pancakes since the second day of school was cancelled for a "Storm Day." I had my last two blueberry pancakes cooking and had put the finishing touches on my own plate of hot blueberry pancakes when I grabbed something out of the cabinet and realized it was covered with black liquid. Then in that same hundredth of a second that won Michael Phlelps a gold medal, I realized the entire cabinet was covered in black liquid that came from an overturned bottle of soy sauce.
It had covered my box of Stevia. That stuff cost too much to be infused with the taste of soy sauce. I immediately set to work cleaning. It dripped on the coffee pot, it dripped on the counter, it dripped on the floor, and then down the front of my gown. I am not sure how many paper towels I used to clean this mess, but I sure was glad I wasn't out. I cleaned and cleaned as my pancakes sat there getting cold.
It was during this massive clean up, I realized, this is how my life has been lately. I have been up to my knees in soy sauce! But not just me, everyone in the family is standing on soy sauce. Our friends have even been standing in soy sauce. So what to do, what to do?
While I was cleaning out my cabinets, I was able to save what was inside most of the time, but the boxes had to go. Very few things had to be completely tossed out. My cabinet is now clean and is less cluttered-at least that one shelf. Maybe, just maybe, that is what God needs us to let him do.
So I will let God clean this mess up! I will let him go through, and box by box, either wipe off the bottom or throw the box away. He will have the shelves in our souls cleansed and straightened, clear of even the lingering smell of soy sauce. He can find all the drips and stains of our hurts and fears and wash them away completely. He will take the abnormal and make it normal again, giving us ways to cope and overcome. He will put the top on tight so now new spills of soy sauce don't occur and he will always have plenty of paper towels.
You better check the bottoms of your shoes, you might just be standing in soy sauce!
Dan 3:24-27
"Then why do I see four men walking around in the fire?" he asked.
So Nebuchadnezzar went up to the door
All the princes, governors, lieutenant governors,
Sunday, August 3, 2008
So they loaded up the truck....
Saturdays are always so interesting, you just never know what adventures lay ahead when you take that first step out of bed in the morning. Our wee little family tends to live a little spontaneously, so the opportunities for adventure are vast!
Saturday morning started off with hungry tummies and in an effort to fill them, we all voted to head for Mimi's for breakfast. We stopped at two estate/yard sales on the way. One guy had stuff we recognized from an estate sale a couple of weeks ago, he had just changed houses and put higher prices on them. The second one we stopped at had great stuff with pretty good prices. I picked up a pretty wooden vanity bench with plans to recover the cushion. Popsaroo wanted to know where I was going to put it. Like I knew?! That was trivial.
We got back in the car and called Mums to see what good stuff might be at the church yard sale she was at. It had been going on since six and most of the good stuff was gone, but she had found a couple of picnic baskets she could use to carry food to people. She had taken drinks out there in a big wash tub, but she was finished, so she was going to join us at Mimi's for breakfast.
Once we were fat as ticks, I went with Mums to find that last yard sale, I loaded my bench in her van since it fit better and she has materials to recover it with. We found the yard sale and Mums found some stuff she liked at "end of the yard sale day prices." So we loaded up a small rocker, a little shelf, a sewing table that folds, a old telephone, some teacups, and a picnic basket. We stopped at a moving sale and only found a little wicker wall shelf.
We made a few stops after that looking for normal stuff at normal stores. We went by Ole Time Pottery to look for XL twin sheets. We found the cutest wicker dresser and armoir at rock bottom prices. I decided that BubbaLou was in need for real furniture, and once again we loaded up the dresser and armoir, and like a bunch of hillbillies got it all in the van.
It was at this moment, I had a Beverly Hillbilly's moment. I could hear the music and everything. I have to admit, although I do come from Tennessee, I have not experienced a Beverly Hillbilly's moment before. There is a first thing for everything.
We had a tin washtub, a plastic barrel, a pitcher, a rocking chair, a bench, two shelves, a bag of old clothes, several bags and decorative tins, a dresser, an little armoir, several beach umbrellas, a sewing table, an extension cord, some plant stands, an old telephone, a bath rug, a dog leash and travel dog bowl, three picnic baskets, and critters.
I forgot to mention the critters, didn't I. Yes, ants had swarmed under the tin washtub. We found them when we had to make room for the wicker furniture and had to dump the water out of the tin washtub so we could turn it on it's side. Yes, it really had water in it. I also did the ant dance as I was trying to kill and remove the swarm of ants off the washtub and off me. It was quite the site!
On the drive home, all that stuff made music as it would bump into each other...Hillbilly, that is!
Come and listen to a story
