Are We Working To Get It Right?
Good Morning Friends,
The last couple of days our Moorings Bell Choirs and Moorings Presbyterian Church hosted the Kinjo Gakuin University Handbell Choir from Japan. They have thirteen members and a director, Toshikazu Yoshida. The choir was started by an American missionary and music teacher back in 1970. They are Japan’s first bell choir and one of the finest in the world. If you doubt me take a look and be amazed at this link to a performance of Cárdás. They performed it at Moorings last night and received a standing ovation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5T1c4t2AYww&index=1&list=RD5T1c4t2AYww
We have known their current director for about 24 years meeting him first in Edmonton Canada at an International Handbell Symposium. And their visit reminded me not just of music but of a time when our family was in Japan and we learned more about the art of origami. Now bear with me here and I will make the connection for you. My mom had taught me as a child a few of the simple designs in paper folding. In Japan, some people are really masters at taking small pieces of paper and folding them to make various figures. The object, and here is the connection with handbells is to get it perfect. Some of the designs I could never have figured out by myself. I needed help. Like our journey as Christians, like the performance of a bell choir, the work takes patience, practice and endurance. One has to preserver, one has to ask for and receive help, one has to study the manual for its patterns, in the case of origami, and to practice the most difficult parts over and over again until it is right with handbells. And that brings us to today’s question. Are We Working To Get It Right?
Scripture: Paul wrote, “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.”
Philippians 1:6 (NRSV)
So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory. Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. But now you must get rid of all such things–anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!
Colossians 3:1-11 (NRSV)
Message: As a body of believers we are folded in and amongst each other for the work of the Church, the called out assembly of believers. Like origami, the work of the church can be counter intuitive. But what holds us together, keeps us together and what could break us apart is not so evident in the living of it. Certainly others help us in the process but what is surprising is that this is especially true when we bear each other’s burdens. The law of Christ keeps us together. Friends, only when we set aside our selfish needs does the real bonding occur. Here acts of service fold us together while slander and arguments unfolds us. When we help others we understand that origami is just a symbol of the real thing. Here we see that Scripture folding into scripture is just the image of the real thing. Here we hopefully realize that the pattern in the paper forms a virtual reality of the world that cannot ever compare to the flesh and blood truths in the Body of Christ. The challenge is to fold along the line where our head is in heaven but our boots are on the ground. Music, when we get it right can bring us to such a place as well. Here God is glorified.
Pray that we realize that salvation though Jesus Christ holds us together. Pray that we realize that salvation offers freedom from the past, a purpose for the present and hope for the future. Pray that we pray together. Pray we love one another lifting each other up with esteem. Pray we have a spirit of servant hood being fruitful in works, patient and thankful. Pray we are worthy of being filled with the knowledge of His will. Pray we not listen to those who pervert the pattern of Christ. Pray we not seek to please people or even the process of law but trust in the love of Christ. Pray we not be torn apart. Pray we become the Body of Christ. Pray we become His instruments for worship taken to the world.
Pray that God is glorified in our lives. Pray that we realize that we are part of something greater. Pray that we use both our gifts and faith. Pray we offer our bodies, minds and will in the struggle for unity. Pray we celebrate the diversity but not the chaos. Pray we know what to do and where and when we are to do it. Pray we combine the talents we have been given and the experiences of our lives with our very personalities to discover how we can make music. Pray we recognize our dependency on others is necessary. Pray we establish good relationships. Pray we realize that we are like a handbell choir with each of us playing different notes. Pray we realize that we cannot get puffed up by our own importance but that we also cannot take ourselves out of the music thinking it does not matter. Pray we learn to make beautiful music. Pray we get it right.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 