Tea Kettles, 45 records and The Song of the Redeemed

Good Morning saints and singers.  I hope you had the chance to fellowship with other believers yesterday.  After church, I came home,  grabbed a box of tissue and crawled into my recliner in the hope of  snatching  a few “restorative winks.”  Like many, living in the Miami Valley, I been  struggling with sinus related illness for months now – Uggghhhhh, as Charlie Brown would say.

After nestling under my favorite blanket, I turned on a Christian television program  in an effort to relax and unwind.  Right away a particular Pastor said, “Let’s take a few minutes to go deep.”  Instantly my ears perked up.  Hopefully by now it’s evident I enjoy going “deep.”  Not in an intellectual sense,  but in the spiritual sense that God wants all of us to consider the  core condition of our devotion to Him. By God’s grace, that is the intention of this blog; to assist God in helping you consider the core condition of your devotion to Him.

Occasionally, over the years,  a few people have said the messages I’ve delivered have been a bit too intense for their taste.  For sure it’s never comfortable to expose the splintered edges of our flesh to the bright light of God.  But since I believe time is short, (like an old song says) ”I want to be “ready… to walk in Jerusalem just like John.”  And personally,  I can tell I’ve got a long way to go when I look at myself,  in the mirror of Scripture.

This morning as I sat up to pray (since my nose is stopped up), the prayer picture came quickly. Once again, the picture I saw was against the back-drop of a universe filled with stars.  Isn’t it easy to be grateful for the darkness when it causes the stars to sparkle and shine?  (Back to the picture.) This time,  against the immense universe, I saw a  spinning record - yes a black, vinyl record  (I don’t know if it was  a 45 or a 33).  Nonetheless, I could see the record and the spindle that held it.  And at eye level  – in front of the record, I saw the whimsical figure of an oriental person, with a contagious smile.  I’ll readily admit that some of these pictures are as odd to me as they must sound to you.  Regardless, as I pray on in God’s Presence, it rarely takes more than a minute before His Spirit begins to explain the particular Truth He wants me to carry away from the picture.

Although I had a good idea why God used an oriental face to relay His message, I typed the words ”persecuted church” into the search bar on my computer. Instantly my eye was drawn to this headline: “Christians are the most persecuted group in the contemporary world.” Clicking on the sight, an additional report (released by the Vatican on the Persecution of Christians) stated that 75 out of 100, killed due to religious hatred are Christians.  The Missionary Organization, “Open Door,” explained that this is particularly true in North Korea.  That information along with my awareness of the suffering in China, explained why God had shown me a smiling, oriental face in my prayer picture.  People all over the world are suffering for Jesus sake; tremendous persecution is also taking place in Iran and Saudi Arabia.

As I paused to consider what the record represented in this prayer picture, God brought to mind various ways music is created.  He started with the simple music of a ”whistle.” One of my favorite wedding gifts was a copper tea kettle. If I remember correctly, the tea kettle finally met it’s end one night when I feel asleep waiting for a bottle of formula to warm-up.  Yet in it’s hay-day, how I enjoyed hearing the whistle that let me know I was moments away from enjoying a cup of hot chocolate, coffee or tea.  Need I say, that to hear that happy whistle, the water had to boil?

Next I thought about the term we use when we download music. We say we “burn” it to a CD.   I thought about stringed instruments – guitars, violins – even harps -that have the ability to translate us to pleasant places in our soul and spirt. They are able to give us pleasure because their strings endure  tension. Further, we only hear their melody as friction and pressure are applied to that tension. Finally I acknowledged that even black vinyl records release their melody because a diamond-sharp needle rests it’s full weight against the body of the record.

As I was considering the ways music is actually created, a memory popped up – a happy one.  All of a sudden I was translated to a pleasant place;  as a little girl, I was back in my grandparents den in Jackson Mississippi.  There my Grandparents sat watching my two younger sisters and me  laugh, and sing as we slid across their linoleum floor in our white socks. And we did these “sock ballets and operas”  to the various 45′s Grandpa played on his portable record  player.  He loved to play, “Mockingbird Hill,”  “The Unicorn” (by the Irish Rovers) and last but not least – even today, “The Chipmunk Song” by Alvin and the Chipmunks.  If you don’t mind indulging me, I’ll go ahead and tell you that I put that 50 year old record on my own player the other day and laughed hysterically while my own Grandchildren ran in circles singing.  There may be nothing new under the sun, but there’s nothing in the world that gives you as much pleasure as watching children play and sing in the safety of your presence.

And isn’t it true that just as music from an instrument makes way for singing at the expense of  tension and friction,  the most beautiful songs sung by human instruments seem to have been refined as a result of hardship? As someone else has said, “You gotta have heart.”

What about you? Do you like to sing?  The songs we choose to sing reveal so much about how we’re feeling.  When we’re happy, we like to sing upbeat songs. Sometimes we whistle.  And when we’re sad, if we sing at all, we want the consolation of a sad song.  As Elton John has put it, “…sad songs say so much.”

Singing reveals what’s in our heart; happiness, hopelessness.  That may be why Scripture strongly suggests we do it. This is the time of year when stores are taking inventory.  As simple an idea as it is, I find that God always uses difficulty in my life to show me the amount of faith resting on the shelves of my heart.  He doesn’t need to send difficulty to find out how much faith I have.  He already knows.  I’m the one who can be clueless - as I face the onset of each new problem. We say we trust God, yet how hard it is to get that faith from our heart to our face. One thing I can tell you for sure: When things are going poorly, it’s hard for me to smile much less sing. Yet it appears it’s not an option for us.  Listen to these verses from Psalm 149 (ESV) :  ”Praise the LORD! Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise in the assembly of the godly! …Let them praise his name with dancing, making melody to him with tambourine and lyre! For the LORD takes pleasure in his people; he adorns the humble with salvation. Let the godly exult in glory;let them sing for joy on their beds.”

Hmmmmm…wonder if He might be referring to beds of affliction there at the end?  I don’t know for sure. But I do know this: God sings. Now there’s something to look forward to.  Listen to any large choir, Pavarotti, or Bocelli and then try to imagine the music of Heaven behind the voice of God, our Father. Zephaniah 3:17, “The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.”

I’ll close by going back quickly to the prayer picture. I know what sweet wine has been pressed from the suffering in my own life. For that reason I’m certain the song of the redeemed – rising from persecuted souls, must be ever ascending in unimaginable cords of beauty. No wonder the face I pictured was smiling. We can be sure persecuted saints around the world see the Lord taking pleasure in His people. Surely they behold His face.

Are you enduring the heat of affliction?  Are you stressed to the breaking point as a result of tension and pressure in every direction you turn?  Sounds like conditions may be exactly right for making some music beautiful music; for singing God a sacrifice of praise.  We overcome the enemy by the word of our testimony – do we not?  Why not sing it?

It’s easy to sing in the sunshine. But how God loves a lullaby; a song of praise sung to Him – however softly – in our night seasons when everything’s dark.  Our choice to sing tells Him we feel safe in the security of His great love.  Our choice to sing proves we trust in the goodness of His purposes. It’s our singing that will draw Him near.  And God is anxious to wrap the arms of His Presence around every child that loves and trusts Him with a lullabye of His own. There in lies the hope of endurance for every saint facing persecution  – God’s Presence. II Chronicles 5:13,  (NKJV),^“ indeed it came to pass, when the trumpeters and singers were as one, … and when they lifted up their voice with… instruments of music, and praised the LORD, saying:  “For He is good, For His mercy endures forever,” that the house, the house of the LORD, was filled with a cloud,”

You and I may not have voices fit for the opera, but we can make a joyful noise. What do you say we start by ” whistling while we work” in the field of souls He’s called us to.