Modest and Cool

This was last Saturday’s outfit: brown linen blouse over a tan t-shirt, beige linen skirt, beige and gold headscarf and pink flowered flip-flops. Alana, you’ve inspired me!

Church Music Musings, Part 2

:::Update::: Wonderful teaching from Dean Taylor on Music.

When you boil down all the thoughts I shared yesterday about church music, it comes to this: I want to sing and I do not sing. My life is empty of genuine musical expression.

Looking back on the last two years of God’ Life Ruination Plan for our lives, I can see how He has weaned us off many less-than-helpful things. One of those things [prepare to be offended] is mass-produced music. We hardly ever pop in a cd any more. The last time my husband purchased any Christian music was on his birthday last August. I do turn on NPR for news in the evenings sometimes and for classical music during the day. Christian radio? Uh, nope. The desire is just not there to find out who put out their latest album.

The desire, however, we have steadily seen growing in our souls is to reclaim our God-given ability to worship and daily rejoice in song. People used to do that regularly when working at chores together. They even, gasp, wrote their own songs.

See, innovation is not the enemy. I love and support local music talent. My brother-in-law is part of one of those semi-famous Pacific Northwest Indy Rock Bands. But when our focus becomes so far-sighted in musical preference, we trample the diamonds at our feet. In the Plain Reader, Mary Ann Savage describes her engagement with her vocal capacity by letting go of even the radio. She and her children learned to sing all sorts songs together, more than just worshipful ones.

Our voices are our offering to God. May it be pleasing to Him!