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Messages from the Pastor

Let it Rip

5/12/2022

 
Pastor Paul
When I was in 3th grade at West Main Street School in Milford, auditions for the school chorus did not go well.  I attempted the song requested and my throat wouldn’t cooperate (too much yelling during dodgeball an hour earlier).  So the music teacher (more politely than Simon Cowell) told me that I should try again next year. So, a year later I auditioned again.  This time my voice or my ear or something else decided to play tricks and once again I failed to make the cut.  The real cut however came from the teacher: “Paul you really shouldn’t sing in public – you don’t have the voice for it.”

Those words shaped my view of my singing ability that remains in remnants to this day.  I will do most anything in front of an audience as an amateur thespian, a pastor and a teacher have often delivered.  But the one thing that I do in public that causes me sweaty palms, anxious stomach, and interrupted sleep – sing a solo!  As President of the Jonathan Law Drama Club in 1968-70 I sabotaged efforts to produce musicals in favor of various straight plays (because there was no way this boy was going to sing!)  When I joined an amateur community theater group while I would sing in the chorus and jump into roles that didn’t require singing at all, I can remember my anxiety whenever I did have to sing.  It made performance work rather than joy.
Then I started attending church on a regular basis.  At first, my singing was subdued.  As a non-music reader and unfamiliar with the church corpus of hymns, I missed more notes than I nailed proving that I didn’t “have the voice” for public singing.  Barely audible I plodded through although it wasn’t any worse than most people around me who also seemed to have had the same music teacher in grammar school!  One Sunday a guest preacher did something we didn’t regularly do – he read a psalm, Psalm 100 – Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness; come into his presence with singing.  It didn’t say to sing on key or in time, or hitting each note.  It only requires joy!  The words sat with me so that each time we opened the hymn book the spirit reminded me that the reason for, the object and audience of my singing is God – not the people in the pews around me or even myself – but God.  God already knows my voice gifted to me in my creation. There was no divine judgment on the quality of my singing – only God’s pleasure and appreciation of the joy and gratitude that propelled it! 
Now the place where I sing most unashamedly, most lustily and least concerned about others is in church. It is part of my worship and praise of God.  It helps me to express deep things deeply to the One whom I praise.  My joy has led to acceptance of my singing resulting in having learned (somewhat) to read music – enough so that unfamiliar hymns are welcomed rather than dreaded!  The Psalmist has become the antidote to my music teacher and singing has ceased to cause me the tears of fear and stress replacing them with tears of joy. 
Are you planning to worship with us this Sunday? Come and make a joyful noise to the Lord!


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