I’d like to be your girlfriend, I mean, pianist.
When I was 13, Kerinda Miller found out I could “play the piano,” and encouraged me to come play with the Burn Band, aka Digital Hymnal (shout out to John McClain).
Fact is, I couldn’t play the piano, not in any traditional sense. I never did learn to read music, and I had only the faintest idea of how to play a guitar chord on the piano.
The merest of concerns considering the huge spiritual stakes in play: The guitarist was cute, and I wanted in.
So I learned how to play “G” and a few others on the piano and learned how to fiddle around while the cute guitarist played praise songs cutely and occasionally smiled at me.
I’m not being facetious when I say that joining a praise band in order to get to know your future husband is a spiritual experience.
I normally don’t have the courage to try new things, or things that involve embarassment, but God and the Millers gave me a good hard shove, and off I went to band practice and a few piano lessons.
It was my privilege to play piano for six years with a group of nutty people who loved God and helped a group of earnest adolescent kids express their adoration to him. I still miss playing music–I worship most intently when my fingers are on keys–but I’m grateful for the awesome responsibility of intentionally worshipping every week for those years. It wasn’t easy, but it was full and good. And, since God has a sense of humor and allows us to mingle our teenaged desires to be obedient to him and to spend time with hot guitarists, I’m grateful for the friend/husband I made along the way.
October 2nd, 2007 at 7:18 pm
Josh James Brown was pretty cool though too.
October 2nd, 2007 at 11:00 pm
no he wasn’t.
also, i think i know what you mean about worshiping most intently when your fingers are on keys. i feel like i’m kind of in the same place you were in (minus the attraction to the guitarist). and i feel like even though sometimes i have no idea what i’m doing, really…there’s something very powerful about creating the music as an act of worship. sometimes i feel like i don’t even hear the words to the songs but that my heart is worshiping with the notes and feel of the music that i’m offering up to God. it’s a neat feeling.
October 3rd, 2007 at 3:17 pm
There is certainly something reassuring about having the guitar (or whatever instrument) in front of you, sort of like a security blanket. Those were certainly some great times.
October 3rd, 2007 at 10:49 pm
Oh, I remember the good ol’ days when we were a bunch of rowdy kids who met in what is now the new life cafe. Good times. I remember sitting right near the front to the left making fun of your husband. Good times indeed. How’d you guys manage to do all of that for a bunch of unruly, ungrateful kids? =)