“If in doubt, sing louder!” I told the volunteer church choir at a rehearsal. The look on their faces said, “Oh, really? Why would I do that?” They knew that I had been a professional musician, but they also knew that I had zero choir-directing experience. I explained, “If in doubt, you hold back, even if you are singing your part correctly, it will sound wrong. So, if you are going to make a mistake, make it a good one, and we’ll fix it!”
As I write this column, I am in the last third of a two-week vacation. What exotic or exciting destination did I visit? Well, first, my yard, then my office, and soon I will be visiting my garage. Mine was a “staycation” involving yard maintenance, office and garage de-cluttering, and an unanticipated repair project in the master bathroom. No, it has not been the most restful vacation I’ve ever taken, but it has been refreshing, nonetheless.
A relative recently asked for my opinion on her pastor’s Bible commentary recommendation to her. Of course, the commentaries he recommended are those he uses for his own personal study. I considered his list of three and, whereas they would provide a reader with some interesting information on the Bible, in my opinion, they were not the best for helping someone better understand the message of the Bible.
The Book of Acts describes an encounter between Phillip, a newly minted deacon, and an Ethiopian court official, who was sitting in a chariot reading Isaiah 53. The Spirit of God directed Phillip to ask him if he understood what he was reading. “How can I, unless someone guides me? About whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or someone else?” Phillip told him from the Scriptures the good news about Christ Jesus, and that man put his faith in Christ.
I did something last week that I had not done in decades – I tested a 9-volt battery by touching its posts to my tongue. Have you ever done that? My friends and I used to do it for kicks when we were kids. The unpleasant tingling sensation I felt told me that the battery was still good. Afterward, with a brain that may have just received a 9-volt kick start, I pondered that age-old question, “Why?”
Every day for the past two weeks, I have received an email claiming to be from Sirius XM, warning me that my subscription is about to be terminated due to lack of payment. All I must do to correct my perilous situation is submit my payment information to the sender. It is a scam, that fact validated by their atrocious spelling, and by the daily emails I receive from Sirius XM informing me of musical programming I might like.
Technology is great…when it works! The church I serve as pastor livestreams its worship services and occasionally there is a glitch in the technology and our livestream is, well, a dead-stream. That happened this past Lord’s Day and was only discovered at the end of the worship service. My immediate thought? “Okay, nobody leaves! We’re going to do this worship service again!” Of course, that was my frustration talking and the thought was never vocalized. Instead, I perused the coming week in my mind to determine when I could at least record the sermon and make it available.
My wife has a gift for making up rhymes. She will observe something interesting or unusual and a moment later some clever verse will spill from her lips, usually to an improvised tune. I think to myself, we should be writing these down, but the moment passes, and her verse is lost.
In our weekly COMPASS leadership prayer meeting, one brother prayed for a growing sense of community in our congregation. A strong sense of community is what characterized that first congregation described in Acts 2, a sense of community so strong that it was attractive to those outside the church. Their sense of community was not self-motivated but the evidence of their unity in the Spirit together with Christ through faith in His gospel. Because that same Spirit unites believers together in Christ today, that strong sense of community is possible in any gospel-believing congregation. A recent article in The Atlantic offers a less hopeful message.
Recently, our skies were the canvas for some spectacular natural phenomena – a solar eclipse and the northern lights. Despite having been born and raised in Canada, I cannot recall ever having seen the Northern Lights, yet people here in north Florida were posting stunning photos of them. My wife and I even doused the porchlight and stood in the driveway gazing into the northern night sky but saw not a glimmer. I woke up very early the next morning and decided to try again. It was raining. I still have not seen the Northern Lights.
