Tag: rhythm

Lent 2018 | Day #21: Timing

Whenever I get out of sync with God everything is going to feel off. We are going to be disconcerted by that lack of connection with God’s rhythm.

I have been playing guitar for about 10 years. I started as a necessity, but over the years I have grown to love playing. I have also learned some music theory along the way. One of the tips that I have come across over the years has been to practice with a metronome. If you don’t know what that is, it’s a device or app that keeps time. You tell it how fast you want it to go, usually to make the tempo of a song, and then you play along with it. The idea is that as you play with a metronome your sense of timing improves. And more specifically, it evens out.

During our worship team practices, we have started incorporating a metronome. The challenge is staying in step with it. We were having difficulty with a song and I told our team, “The metronome has no feelings. It just keeps right on ticking.” It is our job to get on the beat with this relentless pulse.

What I found surprising with my own description is that our faith is like that. God is the steady, consistent beat of the universe. He does not change and everything takes its cue from Him. Whether we understand it or not.

So often we ask God about his timing. Why was he late or early? Why didn’t he show up when we needed him to? What I am starting to realize is that it’s not God’s timing that is off, it’s mine.

Whenever I get out of sync with God everything is going to feel off. We are going to be disconcerted by that lack of connection with God’s rhythm. I am still thinking through how do we practice staying in step with God. I don’t have anything “new” to offer. However, I get the feeling that one good place to start is by doing a better job of practicing some of the time-tested spiritual disciplines handed down through the centuries. Disciplines like prayer, scripture reading, contemplation. There are many others, these are the ones that I know I need to constantly be working on to feel like I’m locked into God’s spiritual metronome for my life.

This is one of the primary reasons I have grown to love the Liturgical calendar, even though I don’t belong to a liturgical church. There is something precious about making the passage of the years to a steady, repeating rhythm. We are in the season of Lent. It will pass and a new one will come. But, I also know that Lent will come again. And I will be able to go through this process of reflection again next year. Embrace the rhythm and work to get back on track when you fall behind or get ahead of what God is doing.

Lent Day #17 | Rhythm

If there is one word that does not describe me, it would be rhythm. I can walk and chew gum. I can a great variety of activities that require coordination, but I can’t dance or keep the beat of a song. This reality makes for a frustrated guitarist! But, I pick along as best as I can (pun intended!).

One of the lessons that I have learned in the course of my faith journey is that faith has an ebb and flow. There are highs and there lows. The most constant reality is change. How we handle the changes that will come determines the richness of our experiences. It is quite fortunate for us all, that wisdom and age (normally, but not always) grow together. Lent has become one of the harmonies of my life. It is a reminder of the passage of time, but also the possibility for growth.

As in all things, superstition and abuse can take something useful and distort it and even destroy it. I, however, want to see this season of preparation and contemplation for what it is–an opportunity to turn my affections toward God. This does not mean that sin has ceased to creep at the door. Rather, my awareness of sin and its effects is heightened and brought into stark relief against the sacrifice of Christ on Easter. Every year, this time comes and we have another change to take steps toward deeper faithfulness and obedience.

The power of the Christian calendar is in its intentionally drawing our attention to God’s work in the world through the church. Can this calendar become a crutch or even a hindrance? Yes, it can. The task is working toward a balance and a consistency in our faith walk. Rhythm. Finding it and remaining faithful to it is one of the keys to a life lived with God.

The famed G. K. Chesterton found a unique way to describing our problem and our predicament. It has always captured my imagination and I share it with you in the hope that it captures yours.

“Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.” (emphasis added)

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