Learning New Songs
I’m listening to my roommate practice her guitar. She got it as a present and now she is learning how to play. Before I went to dinner tonight, she was sitting there with her guitar and a chord cheat-sheet practicing a worship song. The pauses between chord changes reminded me of when I first learned to play and how exciting it was to learn more and more everyday. Well, when I got back to the room after dinner, I could see her guitar stuff lying on the floor like she had been practicing forever. When she walked back into the room (after I jumped out and scared her to death since she didn’t know I was back in the room… quite hysterical… I thought she had pooped in her pants), she was excited to play the song she had been practicing for me so I could hear her progress at changing chords.
She sat down and said she was still nervous when she started to play. I listened and watched as she played the song quicker than before and with determination. The look on her face as she was nodding her head to help herself keep a rhythm was one of excitement mixed with uncertainty each time she had to change chords.
Isn’t that what my face looked like when I jumped into my relationship with Jesus Christ. Didn’t He often look at me and watch as I excitedly learned more about Him from His word, not always certain of how to translate it into my life. Wasn’t He more excited to see me start taking those first steps towards Him in the same way I am to see Kara figure out her own strumming pattern.
She just told me that, while I was out of the room, she only practiced the song three times and that it just “clicked”. I had that moment too, both in learning to play the guitar and learning to live like Jesus (which is something that I still have to practice everyday, just like anything else in life). But what clicked for me was that, it doesn’t matter if every now and then I forget a chord and have to look it up. It really doesn’t affect my eternity if I forget to say “in Jesus’ name” at the end of my prayer one day. I am learning. I wouldn’t think less of Kara if she messes up because I know what it is like to learn guitar and Jesus will never think less of me because He knows what it is like to be a human. He has done it before.
And on top of it all, He loves me. I still have, and always will have, moments where I look at the Bible or I listen to a sermon and think “I may never get that good at this being-a-Christian thing” but I know that isn’t what it is about. My whole life is just going to be a series of learning to play new songs. And when I mess up or misread a chord or skip a verse, the Lover of my soul and my Savior is watching me, knowing that one day none of these mistakes will matter and that they never change how He loves me.
She sat down and said she was still nervous when she started to play. I listened and watched as she played the song quicker than before and with determination. The look on her face as she was nodding her head to help herself keep a rhythm was one of excitement mixed with uncertainty each time she had to change chords.
Isn’t that what my face looked like when I jumped into my relationship with Jesus Christ. Didn’t He often look at me and watch as I excitedly learned more about Him from His word, not always certain of how to translate it into my life. Wasn’t He more excited to see me start taking those first steps towards Him in the same way I am to see Kara figure out her own strumming pattern.
She just told me that, while I was out of the room, she only practiced the song three times and that it just “clicked”. I had that moment too, both in learning to play the guitar and learning to live like Jesus (which is something that I still have to practice everyday, just like anything else in life). But what clicked for me was that, it doesn’t matter if every now and then I forget a chord and have to look it up. It really doesn’t affect my eternity if I forget to say “in Jesus’ name” at the end of my prayer one day. I am learning. I wouldn’t think less of Kara if she messes up because I know what it is like to learn guitar and Jesus will never think less of me because He knows what it is like to be a human. He has done it before.
And on top of it all, He loves me. I still have, and always will have, moments where I look at the Bible or I listen to a sermon and think “I may never get that good at this being-a-Christian thing” but I know that isn’t what it is about. My whole life is just going to be a series of learning to play new songs. And when I mess up or misread a chord or skip a verse, the Lover of my soul and my Savior is watching me, knowing that one day none of these mistakes will matter and that they never change how He loves me.
This is a good one Hannah. I love it. Its funny how the simplest things really show us some of the deepest things of God. He is so awesome.
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