Music at any level can be a true joy. It reminds me of one of the beauties of the beautiful game, soccer. You can be totally ignorant of the laws of the game and still enjoy it. Kids with little understanding of the strategies or techniques of the game can have a truly enjoyable experience on a weekend playing the game, not to mention the entertainment value for the on-lookers. Yet I rewind over and over certain plays from the English league games I watch in complete awe of the level of skill required to do what they do. It requires skill but also determination. A player who is on the field for the whole 90 minutes will often run over 6 miles during the course of the game. Much of that time is spent testing the defence and looking for the best way to attack the goal. A great build-up of several passes and lots of hard work will often come to naught. But if you have the stamina to keep attacking you will eventually be rewarded with a goal. Not that different, I suppose, from all the plays and strategies that go into getting into the end-zone at an American football game. Music, even in its simplest form, can be immensely enjoyable. My granddaughter needed to practice her clarinet tonight. She indicated that she just needed to play some. No particular assignment or anything. Well, while she was getting out her instrument I figured out what notes she could play to accompany a song I like to play on the guitar. She had to learn a couple of new notes but we were soon on our way through the song. Then I decided to see about scaring up the ol' trumpet that had been purchased some years ago. Sure enough, as mis-fortune would have it, I found it. As my granddaughter and I played a couple of simple duets and her enthusiasm became more and more evident, I realized what a great blessing music can be. Will she write or perform great masterpieces? As wonderful as that would be, it does not affect the great time we had this evening in our living room. We are planning for an encore performance in the near future. I remember stories about my Uncles wanting to stay home from the movies to play music with their mom and dad. They eventually made a living with their instruments in New York playing for Broadway plays. But would those times have been any less enjoyable if they had pursued other careers? Nope. And so music has found a way, once again, to enrich my life. Thank you, Lord, for music. You are the author and finisher of my faith and the writer of the most marvellous symphonies.
The title of this blog may change, though you'll never know. While this blog deals with an occasion that is not at all rare in scripture it identifies an occurrence that jumped out at me this morning. Brevity, (sorry for yet another interruption, but it turns out brevity has fewer letters in it than I tried to give it), so, brevity, simplicity and eternal truth all combine to bring us Romans 8:6. "For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace." We must handle such verses with care as we are wont, as occupants on this earth and finite beings in this physical world, to bury and resurrect this, and other, eternal truths, to more comfortably fit our lives. There are times when the absolute truth of this verse warms and fills us with a sense of wonder. Yes, we say to ourselves, this is so true. Then, there are those times when this verse is completely ignored so as not to get in the way of our selfish ambitions. Physiology wins out over our spirit. Our minds are taken captive by our bodies or our desire for a certain thing. It is the point where temptation becomes sin and that is where we most need to hold on to the truth that we know. So hold on tight and don't be shy about pointing out a friend's grip that looks to be slipping. In his heart he knows the same simple, eternal truth you do.
Well, I need to start off with a bit of a disclaimer. The purpose of this entry is not to cast disparagement on my ability to comprehend what someone is trying to communicate to me. However, it will explore the speed, or lack thereof, at which I am able to grasp things. I'm pretty quick on certain aspects of the realities of this world. For instance, if I touch a hot stove the thought of it being hot has not even registered as my hand is quickly repositioned to a cooler location. There is virtually no time at all that expires between the touch and the grasping of the reality that the object of my touching is very, very hot. On the other hand, some things, which are just as real, and just as hot, though not physically, are slow to be comprehended by the same system that brought us the cat-like response of the earlier situation. A while back I began memorizing scripture. The second chapter I undertook to file away in the ol' steel trap was Isaiah 53. Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed ....... Surely our griefs He Himself bore and our sorrows He carried........but He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him and by His scourging we are healed. There are a lot of wonderful thoughts and pictures that come to mind reading through the chapter and while trying to memorize I must have gone over each verse a hundred times or more. So the other night as I read back over the chapter trying to reinforce my memory a bit, it was a surprise to have a portion of one of the verses really hit me. For cryin' out loud, I'd only been over these words a few hundred times. You can't consider every word with any real depth when your goal is to memorize. Repetition is important, not contemplation. Well, when I read, "by His scourging we are healed" I immediately had to stop reading and I placed my hands over my face as my mind and spirit seemed to be operating on a deeper level than before. By His scourging, that would be the scourging that my sin has brought to bear on Him. By His scourging, we are healed. God turned around the darkness of sin and used it as a tool to heal us. The pain He endured took away sin's final victory in my life and healed my spirit. Somehow, this perfect, sinless man used Satan's own tool against him. God's shield of salvation dulled and rendered useless the devil's most powerful weapon. Our sin, directed at the Lamb of God, becomes useless and cannot have its usual effect because it was defeated by God's light. Our sin, when laid at the foot of the cross, cannot take our lives, it can only cause us pain here on earth and that pain is nothing compared to what we will experience in glory. There is a deep peace waiting in those words and I am still unwrapping yet another wonderful Christmas present from my heavenly Father. Hope you get what you've always wanted, too.
