Hello
Emmanuel,
As
some of you know me, you know my passion for sports and competition. I’d much rather kick your butt in ping-pong
than to attend an orchestra concert.
Competition is therapeutic for me.
It isn’t for everyone, however.
No one in my immediate family relates to me in this area. They think I’m a crazy guy when I yell at the
tv screen (‘no one on that football team can hear you Dad’). At the same time, I’m a pastor. I have found that being a competitor doesn’t
work in the realm of leading a church. So
I do have to find other outlets of expression…
Yesterday
I had the privilege of driving to Hillsboro to watch Joey play in the Land of
Grant Honors Band. It is a band made up
of students from 3 different counties.
It was good music and very talented kids.
Something
one of the directors said to us really struck me. He invited us to fight to keep music programs
in schools. He said music is what makes
us human.
I
chewed on that for a while. I do have a
passion for the Liberal Arts programs.
Music, art, drama, etc; needs to stay in schools and yet there seems to
be a tolerance, to some degree, to let them be the first to go away when money
gets tight.
One
of the unique qualities that make us human is the creativity in which we can
express ourselves. Music and religion
are two of those areas. It occurred to
me that such modes of expression allow the passion of the church to be made
known. If we translate that reality to
schools and young people, what happens if modes of expression is taken from
them? I haven’t searched for any empirical
data, but I imagine that if we don’t teach and encourage our kids to express
themselves, it can’t result in anything positive.
I
don’t think God wants us to raise robots.
Certainly, the push to improve our math and sciences is important. We don’t want to fall behind the rest of the
world in these areas. However, God has
given us a unique spirit that desires creativity and expression: music, art, drama, literature and dance are
all ways that we can let loose our spirit and shout in constructive ways how we
feel. It is more than just ‘playtime’. It is therapeutic. It is good for the soul.
I’ve
never been one to throw myself into music.
Yes, I can play and I can sing, but it has never been my mode of
expression necessarily. When it comes to
the arts, creative writing is really my area (I write a sermon every week to
convince you of something). Regardless,
the church (and schools) can be and should be a place that encourages the
spirit to express itself.
I
thank God for giving us the opportunity for expression. Let’s encourage it in one another.
God
is Good,
Pastor
Joe
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