Chris' grandpa died yesterday. I am so grateful that we went to visit him this last Sunday and talked with him, prayed with him, joked with him, held his hand and hugged him in his bed. It's difficult to know how to feel times like this. He was not doing well at the end of his life although he was still extremely pleasant. He was such a delightful, sweet man. I didn't know him very long or very well relatively speaking but as much as I knew him he was wonderful. He was my grandpa too. He always said what a pretty girl I was and gave me compliments and just seemed to relish being with people when he was around, even if he was tired sometimes. I will never forget last Easter when Chris and I brought Sumita to his parent's house for dinner and he chatted it up with her and told her he liked her and her tattoos (you must see Sumita to know why this means so much, most people would be a little wary of her from her looks). He also talked with the African people that Chris' parents had over. He was just so open and it was grand. We will miss him very much but I feel that he is with Jesus now.
As I think about his life and death I think about mine as well. To know there is an end makes me realize how strangely short this life is and how much I should cherish it and use it to do things that are good, to be good (through God's strength and grace). I've been substitute teaching since last November and I've thought about what I want my "career" to be but as it were I have also been given a word from God that helped me not fret about this. I know I want to work with children but I also know that I don't want my career to consume me. In fact, I feel more and more like putting all my energy into a job is not what God asks of me at all. I feel most alive when I am serving in ministry whether that be Jesus Kitchen or leading musical worship or learning about different cultures within the Church. I love being part of the neighborhood we live in and taking walks in it and visiting people who live nearby. I feel called to create music and write. I feel called to care about the "least of these" and do something about it. I feel called to live in a way that is not just surviving but is honest about struggles while transcending them by the Grace and Power of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. There is so much more life in that than trying to pursue being an "expert" at something. I just want to live and in the end I want my life to have glorified God and helped others in that process. All this is much easier said than done but I think the key thing is to keep perspective. When I think about the big picture of things it makes my decisions about now clearer. I need so much grace to be who God really made me to be and I am glad that I do not live (or even die) on my own strength.
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Thursday, October 7, 2010
MUSIC and the gift
I love music. I have been falling more in love with music lately. It just inspires me, awes me...I love it. I love hearing different kinds of music and hearing bits of pieces of each person's soul as they sing or play. It is an amazing expression. I love how it can convey so much.
I just watched some youtube videos from 89.3 the Current. I watched Mumford and Sons, Haley Bonar, and Chastity Brown. Earlier I watched a Paul McCartney video "Good Morning Sunshine" from a concert he gave not too long ago (I was playing it to help Chris get out of bed!). It also, for some reason, had a space/astronaut theme which is perfect for Chris. Hehe. I also saw a youtube video from the band Dark Dark Dark for their song Daydreaming. So, yes, I've been watching a lot of music videos....but it's for the music mostly...I need to get out and see a live show soon.
Anyhow, this is more or less a jumble of thoughts just like my last post, but I just want to put my thoughts and feelings down somewhere and I decided that I would just do it rather than worry if it is consistent and coherent.
Since I've been writing and playing music more it has made me love music more as well. It's truly a gift from God. I have been reading from Madeleine L'Engle's book about Faith and Art and she says how the we are given gifts that we may serve them, not that gifts are given to us to serve us. As she states:
"The important thing is to recognize that our gift, no matter what the size is, is indeed something given us, for which we may humbly serve, and, in serving, learn more wholeness, be offered wondrous newness." (p.237, Walking on Water)
I think what she says here is so key to being an artist. I feel I have only begun to serve my gifts, but I am given life in return when I do it. It's also good for me to be part of the worship team because it causes me to be disciplined and humbled in a setting of friends and other believers.
When I was about 16 I was part of a small youth group and one of the leaders of this group told me a nasty lie (he didn't know it was nasty but it was). He said that he believed that music can't glorify God unless it is specifically written to do so. I didn't believe him at the time but I thought about what he said anyway. Now I know without doubt that he was wrong but it makes me mad to think that sometimes people like him limit the glory of God so rigidly and wrongly. God can be glorified by any true piece of art whether or not that person knows God, because:
"Provided, he is an artist of integrity, he is a genuine servant of the glory which he does not recognize, and unknown to himself there is 'something divine' about his work.'" (p.25, Walking on Water, L'Engle quoting Rev. A.M. Allchin of England).
Certainly, some "Christian art" is not art or Christian at all. Sometimes people are not given the gift, even if they are a Christian, that non-Christian or atheist might have in abundance (this I am paraphrasing from L'Engle again).
So, I've gone off on a tangent, but I think it's worth restating these points because they have been really eye-opening for me in some ways. When I was in Indonesia on a mission trip a few years ago instead of feeling called overseas one of the things I felt God telling me was to continue to do art - writing, music, etc. I realize now how important it is that I do this - to worship with the gift. I love realizing that I am serving the gift that is placed in me. I think often when I was younger I was reluctant to share the gift because I thought I would only be serving myself with it. Now I see that is not true at all. Now I see that it is a service to others even if I benefit from it. It's sad because now looking back I see that perhaps I felt that way not just because of immaturity but even the way that some artists and musicians use their gift to serve themselves and that is what our larger culture has believed as well even if it isn't said.
"To serve a work of art, great or small, is to die, to die to self. If the artist is to be able to listen to the work, he must get out of the way, or, more correctly, since getting out of the way is not a do-it-yourself activity, he must be willing to be got out of the way...in order to become the servant of the work.
To serve a work of art is almost identical with adoring the Master of the Universe in contemplative prayer...not to find self, but to lose self in order to be found." (pp.234-234 Walking on Water)
I just watched some youtube videos from 89.3 the Current. I watched Mumford and Sons, Haley Bonar, and Chastity Brown. Earlier I watched a Paul McCartney video "Good Morning Sunshine" from a concert he gave not too long ago (I was playing it to help Chris get out of bed!). It also, for some reason, had a space/astronaut theme which is perfect for Chris. Hehe. I also saw a youtube video from the band Dark Dark Dark for their song Daydreaming. So, yes, I've been watching a lot of music videos....but it's for the music mostly...I need to get out and see a live show soon.
Anyhow, this is more or less a jumble of thoughts just like my last post, but I just want to put my thoughts and feelings down somewhere and I decided that I would just do it rather than worry if it is consistent and coherent.
Since I've been writing and playing music more it has made me love music more as well. It's truly a gift from God. I have been reading from Madeleine L'Engle's book about Faith and Art and she says how the we are given gifts that we may serve them, not that gifts are given to us to serve us. As she states:
"The important thing is to recognize that our gift, no matter what the size is, is indeed something given us, for which we may humbly serve, and, in serving, learn more wholeness, be offered wondrous newness." (p.237, Walking on Water)
I think what she says here is so key to being an artist. I feel I have only begun to serve my gifts, but I am given life in return when I do it. It's also good for me to be part of the worship team because it causes me to be disciplined and humbled in a setting of friends and other believers.
When I was about 16 I was part of a small youth group and one of the leaders of this group told me a nasty lie (he didn't know it was nasty but it was). He said that he believed that music can't glorify God unless it is specifically written to do so. I didn't believe him at the time but I thought about what he said anyway. Now I know without doubt that he was wrong but it makes me mad to think that sometimes people like him limit the glory of God so rigidly and wrongly. God can be glorified by any true piece of art whether or not that person knows God, because:
"Provided, he is an artist of integrity, he is a genuine servant of the glory which he does not recognize, and unknown to himself there is 'something divine' about his work.'" (p.25, Walking on Water, L'Engle quoting Rev. A.M. Allchin of England).
Certainly, some "Christian art" is not art or Christian at all. Sometimes people are not given the gift, even if they are a Christian, that non-Christian or atheist might have in abundance (this I am paraphrasing from L'Engle again).
So, I've gone off on a tangent, but I think it's worth restating these points because they have been really eye-opening for me in some ways. When I was in Indonesia on a mission trip a few years ago instead of feeling called overseas one of the things I felt God telling me was to continue to do art - writing, music, etc. I realize now how important it is that I do this - to worship with the gift. I love realizing that I am serving the gift that is placed in me. I think often when I was younger I was reluctant to share the gift because I thought I would only be serving myself with it. Now I see that is not true at all. Now I see that it is a service to others even if I benefit from it. It's sad because now looking back I see that perhaps I felt that way not just because of immaturity but even the way that some artists and musicians use their gift to serve themselves and that is what our larger culture has believed as well even if it isn't said.
"To serve a work of art, great or small, is to die, to die to self. If the artist is to be able to listen to the work, he must get out of the way, or, more correctly, since getting out of the way is not a do-it-yourself activity, he must be willing to be got out of the way...in order to become the servant of the work.
To serve a work of art is almost identical with adoring the Master of the Universe in contemplative prayer...not to find self, but to lose self in order to be found." (pp.234-234 Walking on Water)
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