In Gennesaret

Many of you cried with me when I posted about all of my piano music getting ruined. Thank you for your compassion. I even had a high school friend send me music she had been holding onto since high school. Bless her – really. Such a blessing. But I’m happy to report some good news on that front. I didn’t actually throw away all of that music; I set it aside to refer to as I reordered. And I pulled out the spoiled copy the other day of the one book I had replaced, trying to find the fingering I had written into one song. And lo and behold, it was readable! The pages opened. Stiff and yucky, but still somewhat useable. So I checked some other music – apparently, being out of the box and sitting in my somewhat dry house improved their condition somewhat. There are several pieces in there that are at least still salvageable enough for me to play from for a while. Among those is the book containing the first song I ever played for an offertory at the church I grew up in – a “Love of J...

 I just started watching a new series starring Samuel L. Jackson called "The Last Days of Ptolemy Gray." Jackson's elderly, dementia-ridden character is offered a treatment that will allow him to remember everything that has ever happened to him.  . . . and let's stop right there with that  striking idea. EVERYTHING. Everything that has ever happened to you. Do you want to remember everything that has ever happened to you?  Sweet Jesus, I do not . There is a blessing in forgetfulness. In a short article I read many years ago, an editor wrote about his mother's dementia and what a remarkably pleasant person she had become. Apparently, she had suffered a lot in her life and had many resentments that built up and made her a difficult woman to be around. But when she lost those memories, she found joy in life again, and others found joy in her as well. There is a blessing  in forgetfulness, people. I do not  want to remember everything that ever happened to me....

I make the programs for CSDC's shows -- because Jenn hates doing it, and I'm all about supporting my sisters-in-Christ through self-sacrifice and godly servanthood, you know. That's why I was at the theater this morning, printing more for the closing performance this afternoon and strike party this evening. It takes a while to print fifty color programs with three double-sided pages. So while I was waiting for the printer to catch up with my folding and stapling, I wandered into the stage area, beckoned by the ghost light . . . where I was greeted by the lovely vision in this photo. It was beautiful . And I stood staring in the silence for a few minutes, breathless.   There's just something about a stage, isn't there? The air of the room felt palpable with moments from the past. I heard echoes of actors who have tread on those boards, creating characters  . . . imaginary people more real than some people you know . . . new personalities who didn't exist before ....

“The people of God in Isaiah’s time had starved their imagination by looking on the face of idols.” So said my new, late friend Oswald Chambers in his Feb 10 th devotional. “Is your mind focused on the face of an idol? Is the idol yourself? Is it your work? Is it your idea of what a servant should be, or maybe your experience of salvation and sanctification?” Idolatry seems to be an unpopular term these days. We feel quite comfortable with those first couple of the Big Ten Commandments: No other gods. No wooden idols. Check. I’m good. But several years ago, I read Addiction and Grace by Gerald May and got a whole new perspective on this idolatry business. Addiction, he contends, is basically the modern word for idolatry. It’s putting something else in the place that God supposed to have in our life. The top priority. On the throne. And really, we are all addicted to something. May lists fifty-some different possible idols we could have in our lives. Not just the obvious ones l...