Here is a song by Andrew Peterson about the rewards of Fatherhood or Motherhood. The song has been around awhile, but I think this video was done recently. Unfortunately, the only version on YouTube has captions in Portuguese. Oh well, there is no better time than now to start learning another language.
A few days ago some friends (yes, I have a few) came over to the house and we jammed on our respective instruments. We had a guitar, a mandolin, my concertina, recorder and tin whistle. None of us are very accomplished on said instruments, but rather quickly we were able to produce music. Each one of us has spent much time on our own practicing tunes and songs, but as a group we seemed able to do so much more. Had any of us not practiced ahead of time, our contribution to the group would have been minimal, maybe even detrimental to the group (more so than my whistle playing was). Interestingly, no matter how much one of us wanted to play better, we could only play within the limits of our practice. Practice is important, but while playing tunes and practicing alone is enjoyable, I found great satisfaction in being able to create music with others.
Our spiritual relationships and communities operate in the same way. Our time spent alone with Jesus and nurturing our relationship to God is vital for us to be able to positively affect our community of believers. We must daily dwell on the things of God through prayer and the reading of His word. If we show up at church having not “practiced” our spiritual walk daily, we will have nothing of value to offer. We can want to benefit the body of believers with all the sincerity in the world, yet our music will not be music at all.
Maybe this is why church is so unfulfilling to so many. We try to fill the void with more, more, more church, but the root cause of the need is that we haven’t had enough spiritual “practice”. I am not implying that you must be a mature, seminary graduate in order to positively influence your community of believers. My friends and I are but infants at playing our instruments, but we were able to create harmonious music. However, we did have to learn how our respective instruments work, train our fingers where to go and learn some of the same tunes.
The Christian life doesn’t just happen. Our relationship with Christ requires effort, nurturing and practice. While some of the most fulfilling times of your life may come through jamming with your community, you can’t jam every day.
For those of you wondering what a Concertina is and why I would want to play it, check out this video of Niall Vallely wearing one out. Ok, I admit that even after watching this you may still wonder why I like playing the Concertina. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_5HqVSMFyc
A more traditional use of the concertina for Irish music can be seen in this video of Noel Hill. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ3Lt6CaG48
