Making Music

Long ago I was a piano teacher to 35 young people. I enjoyed it, and was amazed at how much my students taught me. One of the things that constantly baffled me was that my students wanted to play the piano, and I knew how to play, but they didn’t always want to follow my instruction. They thought there should be easier ways or that I was trying to make piano playing more difficult for them. For example, they could see the value of learning the notes and would do that, but few of them could see the value in learning timing and would refuse to count. Yet playing the right timing is just as important as playing the right notes.

You’ve all heard someone play a scale. You’ve heard the step, step, step of the inclining or declining notes and know that scales don’t sound much like music. But change the timing on a declining scale and you have, “Joy to the world, the Lord has come.” The exact same notes, but the timing changes the mundane scale into a beautiful Christmas hymn.

From these experiences with students I began to wonder how often I do the same thing to my Father in Heaven. He knows where I need to be and what I need to learn and is directing me. I can’t always see the value or benefit of what I am learning and may even fight against it or refuse to do what I need to do, just as some of my piano students did. If I resist and insist on doing it my own way, I run the risk of living a life with mundane scales repeated over and over. But if I submit and follow Him, He will teach me everything I need to know to make beautiful music in my life.