Prepared Piano

Good morning, friends!

Let me wish you a Joyous Advent, a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year 2011! I praise God that we have had a full year of blessings and look forward to the future with great hope.

Our term for this month is prepared piano. You may say, "What an odd topic to choose for this month!" To be honest, I was a bit apprehensive about it myself. However, my heart was stirred within me as God began showing me His cues through prayer and scripture reading. So, as I collect my thoughts and share what He has shown me, I pray that God will cause you to see Him in a new light and that you will be empowered in your worship of Christ, the Dayspring, the Rod of Jesse, the Desire of nations, the Key of David, the newborn King!

First, let us explore what is meant by the term prepared piano? Coined by American composer John Cage in the 1940s for his Bacchanale, the term refers to any piano in which the pitches, timbres and dynamic responses of individual notes have undergone some alterations with screws, rubber erasers and other objects placed between the strings. This level of preparation takes a great deal of planning, forethought, and practice. The result can be stunning or horrid depending on tastes but one fact remains that a serious transformation always takes place in the sound of the piano in question and therefore, in the impact it has on audience members.

I have been doing a lot of thinking during this holiday season from Halloween to New Year's. I also see how people, church people, are divided about what to celebrate and what not to celebrate. Some people are offended by such terms as "Season's greetings" and "Happy Holidays." Others are consumed by the incessant trips to malls and other shopping centers. Yet others are looking forward to the perpetual events and traditions that constitute a cultural Christmas -- presents, turkey dinners, Santa Claus rides, Christmas pageants, etc...

How are we to celebrate this coming – this Adventus of the Messiah? Are we to fuss over traditions for the sake of appeasing consciences and maintaining status quo? Are we to be primarily concerned and consumed by political correctness, etiquette, decorations and lights, food gatherings, social outings? Nothing wrong with any of the aforementioned things per se; however, they all focus on the outside.

Just like a prepared piano, we, too, must focus on the inside. Being the Master preparer, Jesus travails and traverses between the strings of our hearts in order to transform us, His earthen and clay vessels, and thoroughly prepare us to worship and welcome Him. He pulls, twists, pricks, prods, digs, urges, stirs, prompts, molds, and shapes the strings of our hearts in such a way that we are rendered prepared masterpieces “created in Christ Jesus to do good works which He prepared in advance for us to do.” (Ephesians 2:10)
I think of the lyrics of a worship song I learned while a freshman at Biola,

“Lord, prepare me to be a sanctuary
Pure and holy, tried and true,
With thanksgiving, I’ll be a living sanctuary for you.”

How can we be refined, prepared, tried, purified? By allowing God to reveal to us the areas that have kept us chained, confessing them to God and others, and turning from old sinful habits while embracing the call to obedience. When we feel harassed, insulted, infringed upon, we are simply being prepared to extend grace to others. When the exorbitant bills are due and there is still more month at the end of the money, we are being prepared to hope and exercise faith/trust in God. When we are stretched too thin by deadlines and responsibilities, we are being prepared to receive the solace and comfort that the peace of Christ provides. When tears and heartaches become our daily food, we are being prepared to experience full joy in our Redeemer and Friend. When we are served with divorce papers, marital unfaithfulness, and betrayals, we are ultimately being prepared for God’s unfailing love. He is preparing us, dear friends, in good and bad times.

So, let us follow in the footsteps of David who humbly said in Psalm 139:23-24,

“Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.”

Let me share the questions that God has directed me to ask myself:

1. Can I find a quiet space during this busy season to commune with God?
2. Is my heart truly prepared to meet Christ this Christmas?
3. Have I been thinking more highly of myself or more highly of God?
4. Do I think that I can justify myself by following the law or do I embrace the blood of Christ?
5. Am I trusting God to save me and keep my feet from slipping?
6. Do I belittle others because of their wrongdoing?
7. Do I honestly and completely recognize that without God’s intervention I am capable of committing heinous crimes the like of murder and sexual perversion?
8. Am I submitting/surrendering my sinful tendencies and desires to God so that He can do away with them on a continual basis?

Answering those questions honestly will bring to us an awareness of our guilt and our need for God’s amazing grace.

Let Him prepare our hearts for His ultimate coming!

Enharmonics

Happy November!

I always feel giddy when November comes along because it means so many wonderful things to me. Things like the fast approaching end of the fall semester, autumn leaves, new holiday recipes, reconnecting with friends and family members, and my favorite holiday --namely, Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving brings with it memories of cooking with my sweet Grandma Cone who has gone to be with the Lord. If ever there was a grateful spirit, she embodied it. She touched everyone with her positive attitude, her thankfulness, her amazingly delicious pies, and her warm smile. She taught me many things about life. Yet, of all the lessons she taught me, the one that has stuck with me the most is the need for truthfulness in all my dealings.

On a beautiful but cold Tuesday afternoon, I remember taking some apples to her Covina home in order to help her with her baking in anticipation of the Thanksgiving feast to be held at her house two days later. That afternoon, she told me how hypocrisy is a filthy practice that has infiltrated the church and that, no matter how much it hurts, I must speak truth and reject all notions of deception. She told me, "Lou, it is true that things are not always what they seem, but that should not be how you function. What you are inside is what I want to see all the time and so must the rest of the world. If you need to change, as all of us must, you can only change if what is inside of you is exposed."

I miss my grandma so very much!

As I think of hypocrisy, the musical term that comes to mind is "enharmonic equivalent." Enharmonic equivalents are notes that are named or spelled differently in musical tonation but produce the exact same pitch or sound. I am reminded of a musical moment that happened recently at OBU. A wonderful colleague of mine showed a passage of music to one of my students. It was an excerpt from my song called From Ashes to Beauty. The passage, though theoretically spelled in the right way, could have been read more easily had I chosen to write it like the ordinary chord progression that it truly is.

I wonder, how many of us are like that? We are one thing at work and another at home. We speak malicious words against people behind their backs but quickly sport a smile when they are in our presence. We are "holy" on Sunday mornings and diving head first into a sea of wickedness as soon as we leave the church building. Quite often we go there even while in the pew. Still, the sin of hypocrisy is not new to us. We are told that the level of deception was so high among the Thessalonians that the apostle Paul wrote,

"Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction."
(2 Thessalonians 2:3)

I came across a speech given by Mark Twain to the Society of American Authors on November 15, 1900. In his speech, he addressed the two-faced life human beings tend to live. It goes like this:

"I am constructed like everybody else and enjoy a compliment as well as any other fool, but I do like to have the other side presented. And there is another side. I have a wicked side. Estimable friends who know all about it would tell you and take a certain delight in telling you things that I have done and things further that I have not repented. The real life that I live, and the real life that I suppose all of you live, is a life of interior sin. That is what makes life valuable and pleasant. To lead a life of undiscovered sin! That is true joy."

I must remind us all that leading a life of undiscovered sin could not be more bereft of joy. We may be happily enjoying anonymity but deep inside we know that sin hurts, pricks, pokes, and picks away at our souls leaving us extremely miserable in the solitude of our hearts. Solomon speaks of that in Proverbs 28:13,

"He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy."

The word of God further clarifies in 1 John 1:9,

"If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."

Let us remember that there is One who sees through us. Jesus, our wonderful Master, has eyes of flame. No matter how we try to cover them up, Christ knows all the details, flaws, and failures of our lives and still extends grace. He can penetrate beneath the veneer to touch hearts, expose sin, heal pain, forgive, and quench the thirst of our souls. So, let us open our eyes and hearts. Let us wake up from the slumber of deception. Let us leave the sea of hypocrisy and walk in the light of truth.

May Christ remain our guiding light in our quest for truth!

Meno

It is with great joy that I welcome the month of October since it is my birthday month. Can you believe that a whole month has already gone by since our last issue? I hope that the past several weeks brought you at least a few moments of silence and relaxation. I also pray that you will continue to find great encouragement in the thought that God is in control of everything in your life. He is in control of the crazy schedule, the mounting pile of laundry, the exorbitant bills, the incessant pace of deadlines, the relational heartaches, and everything else that may jostle you. May you rest in God and feel thoroughly blessed and secure in the hollow of His masterful hands!

This month, my attention turns to the musical term "meno." It is an Italian word that simply means "less" in English. In music, meno can be used as a means to achieve contrasts especially in terms of nuances of tempo, articulation, and dynamics. In fact, boredom is settled easily in the minds of audience members when all they hear is a sameness of delivery in the performer's approach to sound production and communication. Just as God included variety in His creation, we are also inclined to seek a variety of colors, tastes, shapes, and textures in our music. To that end, meno provides the type of moderation that is required in order to achieve a product that is rich in timbre and meaning.

This moderation or restraint implies that great control is being exercised somewhere. It could be from the performer or it could emanate from another authority such as a studio instructor or a conductor. Some directives that are often given to performers are:

*Less shouty
*Less strident
*Less wordy
*Less mechanical
*Less flashy
*Less analytical
*Less notey
*Less bangy

One that I particularly like is, "Less showy. Why don't you try to let the music speak for itself?"

That particular directive makes me realize that I need to trust the music itself. I need to let go of my need to control it myself and simply let it come out through me as I trust the process given to me. Yet, how often do I try to muscle it out, or try very hard to sell it out to the audience? How often do I see well-meaning students deliver a poor performance simply because they would not get out of the way and let the music flow out of them? How often do I hear trumpet players miss the highest point of the Haydn concerto because they were pressing too much and not letting the air carry their sound? In all of those cases, if less of self could be applied, a much more effective harvest would be reaped.

The issue at hand is that in both music and life, we tend to focus on the result and forget about the process. We believe that we must achieve more of X. It seems imperative that we make it happen since it appears that nobody else is going to do it for us. We have learned to become our own "gods," accustomed to the wielding of our own whims and desires as the underlying fortitude of our labor. If we are honest, none of us would deny that our world functions with the prevailing notion that “more is better.” “More is better" is the phrase that feeds our hunger for a life of entitlement. We are convinced that we can only become happy if we have more. In music, we want more high notes, more virtuosity, more recognition, more applause, more crowd, more excitement, more of more. In life, we want more stuff, more money, more power, more drinks, more entertainment, more sex, more license to do as we please, more of self. We are infatuated with the desire for more, a desire that will lead us straight to our death. It is an addictive behavior that will never satisfy.

It is sad to thing that such thinking has also entered the life of the bride of Christ. We, who call ourselves followers of Christ, should be different. Yet, we, too, want more programs, more church members, more of this music vs that music, more of this style of preaching as opposed to that one, more money, more ease, more fun, more of everything. We churchshop until we find the one that matches our escalation formula for personal success and fulfillment instead of finding a place where God is calling us to serve. It seems to me that Christ has called us to a life of sacrifice that replaces "more" with another four-letter word: meno or less. When we use less of self, then there is room for more love from Him, more strength from Him, more of His hand in our interactions. Our focus on meno adds new meaning to the phrase, "Less is more" as it relates directly to the words spoken by John the Baptist on behalf of our Savior in John 3:30,

"He must become greater; I must become less."

What a perfect example of selflessness!

So, as we seek to do our work as musicians and thinkers, our lives need to be about more of Him and less of us. How unpopular! How selfless, yet, how true! My prayer for you, dear friends, is to exude Christ more and more as you endeavor to be more fruitful with your talents, time, toil, and treasure. I pray that whatever success you experience will serve as a sacrifice of praise to our Redeemer, Savior, and King. I also pray that even our friendship will be about Christ more and more and less and less about us.

"Grant to us, O generous Lord, a grateful heart that will keep us content with your provision in our lives. Annihilate greed in us so that we may be free from the bondage of entitlement and the need to accumulate more of everything. Help us to be generous when your blessings overflow. Amen."

May our love for Christ be undying and may our love for each other be worshipful!

In Christ alone!

Lento

This morning, I am very grateful for my alarm which woke me up right on time. Yet, soon after I got out of bed, my mind started racing as I quickly went through the activities of the day in my head. I soon realized that I needed to pause and think about God because otherwise, I could easily go through the whole day without ever giving Him a thought. As often happens, He led my mind and heart to meditate on the Italian term "lento." Please, allow me to share some of what I have gleaned.

The musical term lento (slow, sluggish) requires a deliberate effort to make ourselves slow down. Music professors often wear themselves out telling their students over and over that they rush especially in difficult passages. In order for true lento to take place, the approach of the artist must contain such intensity and cohesiveness that the music is held together beautifully. In contrast, the tempo of the life of a musician can be so frenzied that agitato and prestissimo are the more appropriate terms to be used to describe it. Our Lord, however, does not intend for us to live such harried lives because it is difficult to hear His voice in those cases. Slowing down offers us the opportunity to hear His voice with utmost clarity. The cohesiveness that results from that will afford us great musical and spiritual victories.

Nowadays, my mind continuously dwells on my duties at school. I must say that as a teacher, I look at the approaching month of May both with a sense of dread and anticipation. Dread, because looking at my calendar reveals a schedule which is packed with all kinds of activities, finals, papers and exams to grade, concerts to attend, and a growing list of time-sensitive projects. Anticipation, because May is the month that puts an end to this busy season of my life.
Whether or not you are currently engaged in academic life, you can probably agree with me that busy-ness threatens to bury us under its deathlike grip. Its relentless and frenetic pace has the power to throw people from side to side in a dizzying whirlwind as they go from one thing to another with very little room to breathe in between. I have to admit that I, for one, lose focus and clarity of thought when my life is similarly packed. I find myself thinking, saying, and doing things like:

"I'd better slow down because I'm not getting it."
"I need to catch my breath."
"This is too fast for me."
"Sigh."
"Just keep breathing."
"Okay, gotta wait, gotta stop, gotta rest my body a little tonight."

The reality of the matter is the human body is not a machine. Despite the tendency to rush through almost everything and to go non-stop, people find that their bodies and minds will sooner or later require a drastic change of pace. It is that very principle that gives a driver the wisdom to slow down before exiting the highway. Without slowing down, he/she will not have the clarity of mind to spot the exit sign, to steer the car in a safe manner, to recognize landmarks which will confirm his/her arrival at the proper destination, to avoid hitting other cars or killing pedestrians. When we do not slow down as people, we often get sick because one way or another our bodies require that alteration of speed.

Failure to slow down causes us to stop caring about what truly matters. There is such a profusion of noise, clamor, speed, and traffic in the hyperactive lifestyle promoted by our culture that it is often tempting to tune out the desperate cries of people who are in legitimate need. We do not have the time to pay attention to people who are slowing us down. We lose discernment and our perspectives are often skewed when in times of incessant activity. Do we feel so overwhelmingly busy that we simply cannot get everything done? Do we find ourselves wishing that there were more than 24 hours, more than 7 days, more than 52 weeks, and more than 12 months? Are the things that keep us so busy merely distractions that mar our ability to focus?

God thinks that we will benefit greatly if we do slow down. In fact, He wants us to stop and be still because in the stillness we are led to know Him. A passage that clearly illustrates that truth is Psalm 46:10,

"Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."

Knowing God is the best thing we can do. We can be armed with the courage to face turmoil, conflicts, fear, weaknesses, destruction, malice, and certainly busy-ness because we know that there is someone who has the power to end and control all of it. Knowing God leads us to honor Him and to live in harmony with other human beings since He has called us to peace.

"Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful." Colossians 3:15

So, my friends, be encouraged. Take time to pause even if it is just for a minute. Take some deep breaths and slow down. You will worry less, you will stumble less, and you will be grateful more often.

Stage Fright

As I continue on my quest to do an in-depth study of a specific virtue each month, my understanding of God's grace has deepened. My study of courage for the month of April has been a reminder that I am truly undeserving of God's favor and that any sign of bravery on my part can only be the work of the God-Head: the unending love of the Father, the ultimate sacrifice of the Son, and the ongoing empowering/indwelling of the Holy Spirit. He is everything and I am nothing. As I submit my nothingness to His abundance, I need not fret because He is certainly "my refuge, my strength, my anchor, my bulwark, my ever-present help in trouble, my song in the night."

The deeper I delve into this focus on courage as a virtue, the more I am reminded by God's Word that our lives are plagued with fear. One particular fear to which many musicians can relate is that of stage fright or performance anxiety. Uninvited though it may be, this guest always comes at the most inopportune moment. At times, it seems that the more important the performance, the more likely it is to show its ugly head. As I reflect on the ways in which I have been affected by stage fright in my career, I see some connections that not only apply to music but also link other areas of living with the principles taught by the Bible.

One such connection is the fact that poor preparation always leads to performance anxiety. Poor preparation is unique as it always relates to time management. It could be that I did not have enough advance notice to be ready for the performance. Sometimes I was given the wrong information concerning what specific piece to learn. It might be a matter of procrastination which robbed me of the adequate or necessary time to thoroughly prepare myself. It could be still that I was simply inefficient during the practice sessions choosing to use the wrong approach as I rehearsed which renders me completely ineffective in performance. Or, it could be that I opted to do nothing to prepare myself and simply hoped that I could wing it.

Another is that stage fright stems from the performer's wrong focus on the audience. When I think of who is potentially hearing me sing, then I start re-evaluating the choices I had made and the technical principles I had drilled into my body and mind. I get distracted and tempted to change things or to improvise in order that I might impress my audience. Then, doubt enters my mind: did I choose the right pieces? Are there enough high notes on this program? Is my outfit stylish enough? Such superfluous thinking renders me completely ungrounded and nervousness starts to reign in my heart.

A final connection is the fact that self-focus is the most deadly choice in terms of performance stress. When I focus on myself in performance, I almost always get plagued with fear before the performance is over. Since no performance is perfect, then each time a little flaw comes up, I hear it in my head as though a commentator was giving the audience a blow by blow report on my performance. At that point, I hear a little voice inside of me putting me down:

I knew you couldn't do it.
What made you think you were good enough?
Nobody's ever gonna want to hear you again.
You might as well quit right now.
Your voice is gonna crack at any moment now.
The tenor who sang before you was so much better.

And on, and on, and on... For others, it may be different but the truth of the matter is every time we focus on ourselves our minds play tricks on us and we end up completely disoriented. Nervousness then becomes the message we bear instead of the one prescribed by the composer.

This morning, I am reminded that life is a performance which inspires a great deal of fear in people. We are all guilty of being the prey of our nerves. We are afraid of introducing ourselves to people. We are afraid of being single and afraid of getting married. We are afraid of being barren and afraid of having too many children. We are terrified about public speaking. We worry that people might not like us or not accept us. We whine about the treatment we receive from others. We triple-guess ourselves before every step we take for fear of making the wrong move. We are afraid of not taking advantage of a deal only to have buyer's remorse after a shopping spree. We are constantly afraid. Especially nowadays, we are accustomed to hearing so much depressing news that we are afraid of flying, driving, and even walking in a park. We are afraid of our spouses, other family members, neighbors, friends, and co-workers. We are sometimes afraid of goingto a store or a bank for fear of being shot by robbers. We are afraid of natural disasters, an economic collapse, betrayals, and the list could go on.

Living rightly and boldly requires excellent preparation, the right audience, and the right focus. The answer is found nowhere else but in God.

a) The training/instruction God provides in His Word is more than excellent preparation for a life well-lived. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 reads,

"All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

So, we can rest assured that the Master teacher is ready to instruct us at all times through His word if we would only go to Him. In fact, Psalm 32:8 tells us that,

"I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you and watch over you."

What more could we need?

b) We need to realize that our audience is the audience of One: God and only God. When we go onstage to perform, the people in the seats are merely observers, they are not our main audience. So, it matters not if they do not clap nor like our offering because God is applauding. In life, we should strive to no longer desire the empty praises of human beings but seek to honor God with our actions. His approval should be our number one priority. Psalm 5:12 declares,

"For surely, O Lord, you love the righteous; you surround them with your favor as with a shield."

c) The right focus is the worship of God in every circumstance. If I focus on myself, then I commit idolatry. We need to focus on God in good times and bad times. In good times, we ought to praise His name with thanksgiving in our hearts. In bad times, we must thank Him for the affliction because we know that godly sorrow will lead to righteousness. Psalm 16:8 instructs us rightly,

"I have set the Lord always before me, because He is at my right hand, I will never be shaken."

Have you ever been shaken? I know I have. Yet, should we fear? No, absolutely not. Whom shall I fear? No one. Why should we not fear? Because He promised He would never leave nor forsake us regardless of how it seems on the outside. He says that He holds everything in His hand. He is in control.

May God preserve us and embolden us to fight the good fight until the day of the Lord!

Memory

Today, we just entered what is considered to be the holiest week in the Church Calendar. Throughout this week, my prayer for us is that we will continue to prepare our hearts for the upcoming celebration of Easter, the resurrection of our Savior. We all know the Sunday School answer to the why question of Jesus' death. Yet, do we live as though we truly remember that He came to die for our individual sins as well as our collective sin? It is only human of us that we all too easily forget; however, God is in the business of reminding, of jogging our memory as His word tells us to remember, remember, remember. As the Lenten season continues and the celebration of Easter approaches, I am once again reminded of the ultimate price that my Savior paid on my behalf. He was crushed for my iniquities and was made to suffer because of the load of my guilt and shame.

As musicians, we are constantly required to use our memory. We had to memorize the names of the scale degrees, the order in which they appear, key signatures, nuances, rests, notes, etc. Singers and pianists, in particular, have to commit huge chunks of the literature to memory. It is always fine and dandy to remember all those facts in a theory classroom, a voice studio, or even at a rehearsal. However, the time when memory really matters is during a performance, when the stakes are really high. How often do we go to a piano recital and cringe because the performer has to deal with memory slips? How often, do I personally forget important words while performing an aria or an art song? Almost always, it is because those specific passages were not sufficiently drilled into my heart and absorbed by my body and mind.

Contrary to common belief, memory in itself is quite faithful. The part that is unreliable in us is the process of memorization. As I have been studying patience this past month, the Lord has further instilled in me a desire to seek to memorize as small a chunk as possible and as frequently as possible. As I patiently go over musical passages over and over, I slowly add a couple measures a day. I use the same principle for technical concepts as I do for memorizing music. Then, when it is time for me to perform, I don't have to fret because it is all in me. That process has brought me to this conclusion: memory always serves us what we served it. If we give our memory the gifts of cramming, last-minute pointers, and nervousness, then it will serve us memory slips, disasters, and poor performances. If we give it, instead, steadiness and patient nurturing, then when the pressure is on it will grant us a peace and an assurance that will defy all storms.

When Christ faced the big storms of His life, He recoursed to the Holy Scriptures which, as a man, He had committed to memory. At the onset of His ministry, Jesus used God's word to fight Satan's temptation. When He upturned the trading tables in the temple, He used the Scriptures. Throughout His life, He used God's word to pray, to heal, to comfort, to encourage, to admonish, to revive, and to save. When He faced the most excruciating pain of His life, the spiritual separation between Him and His father, He quoted Psalm 22, one of king David's Psalm, the Psalm of the Cross.

Psalm 22:1a, "My God, my God! Why have you forsaken me?

There He was on the cross dying the most cruel death known to man and He was quoting scripture. Why could He? How could He? It was because the consistency of his memory work had provided him with a real closeness with God to such a degree that when He felt separated from His father He desperately clung to the Holy word of God. Although only seven phrases have been recorded as the last words of Jesus on the cross, I wonder how many chapters from God's word constituted the whole of His meditation. It was God's word which gave Jesus the endurance, patience, and strength He needed to die, be buried, and have victory over death.

Psalm 16:8, "I have set the Lord always before me. Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken."

We all need to memorize scripture. As human beings we change constantly because we tend to be guided by our emotions, and we all know how fickle those are. Since emotions affect the heart which fires signals to the tongue to speak, our words change and our resolve wavers. Unfortunately, our lives are such that we are constantly assailed by spiritual attacks and without God's word in our heart and on our tongue, we are completely defenseless. To borrow the words of Dr. Donald Whitney, "a pertinent scriptural truth, brought to your awareness by the Holy Spirit at just the right moment, can be the weapon that makes the difference in a spiritual battle." So, in order to be victorious, we need to follow the example of Jesus and hide God's word in our hearts so that it can be used by the Holy Spirit to rekindle the flame of our passion. We are all so emotionally run down that, on our own, according to Dr. John Piper, "we do not experience God in the fullness of our emotional potential." In order to remedy that situation, I believe we must spend time exploring the Bible, memorizing the emotions depicted therein, and endeavoring to express those emotions until they become genuinely ingrained in us.

Psalm 119:11, "I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you."

Psalm 119:14, "I rejoice in following your statutes as one rejoices in great riches."


You may have said in the past that you don't have a good memory and that you can't really memorize scripture. I am telling you that you can. We have all memorized our names, our phone numbers, our social security numbers, our addresses, the ignition key to our car, the trajectory of the fork from the plate to our mouths. In short, we easily memorize the things we use daily. My 2-year old daughter has already memorized several chapters from the book of Psalms only because she is in the kitchen when I teach each verse to my 7-year old. She has learned all of that second-hand because scripture memory is part of her environment. It makes me wonder, what is in our environment that we are memorizing second-hand? Is it gossip, slander, impurity, sexual immorality, triviality, laziness, impatience, apathy toward God?

Would you consider memorizing a little bit of scripture daily? God wants you to and has equipped you with the necessary skills to do it. You simply need to develop the patience and the tenacity to memorize one verse a day or half a verse every day. You also need some sort of accountability. So, choose someone or two, a passage with specific translation and number of verses, and a regular time to meet and quote scripture to one another. Not only will you grow in God's word and be equipped to do His work wherever you are, you will also develop wonderful friendships with other believers.

Go and memorize God's word and speak it back to Him, you'll be amazed to see how blessed and changed you can become.

Happy Easter!

Whole Rest

Hello friends,

It is but a couple of days before my spring break and I have been patiently anticipating that most blessed respite from my daily grind. Whether or not spring break is in the works for you, I bet the idea of rest is one that is always welcome. I believe that desire for rest is one that has been placed within us by our good Creator to help us remember who He is and who we are. Out of the dust He made us, but He made us in His likeness. Therefore, just as He rested after His work of creating, we also need to rest at regular intervals.

Yet, not all of us like the idea of rest, whether in life or in music. I find that the younger or the more inexperienced the performer, the more uncomfortable he/she is with silence. Even more experienced musicians have to remind themselves that it is okay to observe the rests indicated in the music. It is as if there is this magnetic pull inside of us toward more and more sound. This tendency in us has but conditioned us and our audiences to grow uncomfortable with silence, which partly explains the decline in recital attendance. A loud rock band is more likely to attract huge crowds than the most accomplished classical guitarist because of the sheer volume of sound generated.

In music, rests are signs that indicate a time of silence or a brief interruption in the continuum of a musical execution. They exist to frame specific sections of music and to heighten our aural readiness for what is to come. Whole rests are even more effective in that they require more attentiveness for a whole measure. I recall hearing in a sight-singing class this seemingly innocent question,

"why do we have to have these stupid rests?"

And yes, for those of you who are theory teachers, the question came [unfortunately] from a singer. The wise professor calmly answered,

"...because music would cease to exist without the blessing of silence... there would simply be this unending cacophony...and you'd be out of a job since you must breathe in order to sing."

Ouch! Humorous or hurtful though it was, the previous exchange poignantly made me aware of the fact that without silence, there can be no music. Without music, there can be no heartbeat. And without a heartbeat, there can be no life.

This connection between silence, music, heartbeat, and life points me directly to God's word. Psalm 4:4 says,

"...when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent."

Silence affords us the opportunity to place our hearts before the mirror of Christ so the hidden desires of our hearts can be exposed to us and cleansed by the Master refiner. When that occurs, silence ushers us into a place where we can hear the beauteous voice of Christ, which is music to our ears. The word of the Lord, according to Psalm 19, revives the soul and gives joy to the heart, creating the kind of heartbeat that produces and sustains life. Such a life that even the angels pale in comparison.

Christ offers us the only rest that we truly need but we seem to go in all kinds of directions looking for cheap, unfulfilling, depleting rest. We are a plugged-in culture making continuous noise the source of choise for "rest." We have grown incredibly restless, contentious, and haggard in our pursuit for more relaxation. Whole industries are based on vacation, entertainment, leisure, and pleasure such as resorts, movie theaters, tours, etc... How often do we jokingly say to each other, "I need a vacation from my vacation?" After a long day of work or school, do you find yourself longing to park yourself in front of the TV or mindlessly surfing site after site on the internet? With spring break coming or any other break for that matter, do your plans include a time of restoration with God or do you simply plan activity after activity with an occasional fastfood prayer? Often, these leisure plans require a great deal of money and time, the two "lords" of our era. Are you allowing your time and money to dethrone Jesus with your vacation plans?

It is staggering to think that Jesus is doing something entirely different with His vacation. Ever since He ascended to heaven, the scriptures tell us that He is sitting (resting, vacationing) at the right hand of God. Doing what? He is preparing a place for you and me, watching over us, grieving when we disobey, rejoicing when we honor Him, providing for our needs, working tirelessly to bring His kingdom to completion, orchestrating the events leading to His union with His beloved church. In His vacation, He is hard at work preparing for eternal intimacy with His bride. What are WE doing for our gloriously handsome groom? Are we resting in Him or are we running from Him?

My prayer is that we will cherish His words found in Matthew 11:28-29,

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls."

Jesus, the Music of all ages, the Heartbeat of every believer, the Hound of heaven, beckons us to enter His rest, true rest. Won't we heed His call?