Day 3: Music

Oh my word. I could probably write about the lessons I've learned about music from my family for all 31 days. It may will definitely come up again. God is first. Family second. Music is third. A strong third.

I mentioned on the first day that when my family gets together, we sing. We also shoot guns (at targets), but that's a story for another day. At some point, the guitars and egg shakers come out and we sing our way through hymns, old songs my grandparents and great-grandparents taught all of us, new songs, and every song my cousin Matt or Uncle Tony has ever written. We all know them. And we know all the harmony and echo parts too. You'd think it would get old, but it just doesn't. It's always wonderful. Whether we're around a fire outside, or around a futon in the basement of my aunt and uncle's house, it doesn't matter. The songs are the same. The people are the same. That's what home feels like to me. I lived in the same house from the summer of 1987 until May of 2011, but that's not what I think of when I think of home. I think of music. But not just any music. Our music.

My mom's family is mostly all musical in some capacity. On my dad's side, dad sings and his brother plays every instrument. Just about. That's how it felt when I was growing up, at least. He mostly plays the fiddle, and he gave me a violin for Christmas one year. I took lessons for a couple of years, and I wish I had stuck with it. Just like those pesky piano lessons. I want to play everything now and I wish I had learned when I was younger.

My love of music came from both sides of my family, and I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. If you find yourself with nothing, and everything seems lost, you still have a voice and a song in your heart. Regardless of the circumstances, music just always IS.

Day 25: Time

I am not good at time. I'm notoriously late to everything. My friends used to tell me to get places 30 minutes before they actually started so I'd be there on time. One time I actually showed up at the time they told me, and they were all shocked. Good times. I'm a teensy bit better about it these days, but not really. The truth is, I have NO concept of how long it takes me to do anything. Also. I tend to forget to start things until the last minute. Whether that is getting ready or cleaning or getting out of bed...everything. I know that I function better and I'm happier when I have plenty of time to do things and get places. But sometimes my procrastinating, lazy side wins out. I hate that. I don't want to be known for that forever. Today, I failed at changing my habits. I didn't allow enough time for everything I needed to do this morning.

My mom and sister will be here tonight, and my room is currently a giant pile of clothes. So when I get home today, I'm going to put those clothes away and change the sheets on my bed and try to make some open space for them to live in this weekend. They'll only be here for a few days, but there is something deep inside of me that wants to be a good hostess. So I'll try with the space I have. I hope to one day have a house where people feel welcomed and loved. Where the girls in my Sunday School class can come and bake cookies and pile up on the furniture and sleep over. Where students can spread out and eat snacks and stay up all night talking (girls) or wrestling in the basement (boys) during weekend retreats. I don't care what it looks like or if it's brand new or has the nicest appliances and newest style of hardwood floors. I just want it to be open. And feel like home. The older I get, the more I appreciate the stuff that really matters, and it's not stuff at all. It's people. People matter. I want my life to reflect that. THAT'S what I want to be known for forever. Not for being late. But for noticing people and making them feel like they matter.

if home's where my heart is, then i'm out of place

"If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, 

the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world."

CS Lewis

"But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, 

but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God"

Ephesians 2:13,19

"But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ"

Philippians 3:20

I'm homesick. Not for Tennessee (although I think about it a lot), but for Heaven. For HOME. For a place with no imperfections. No pride. No jealousy. No insecurity. No uncertainties. No pain. No questions. Just Jesus. I want to be there.

Moving stretched me. It still does everyday. I love living in Georgia. If for no other reason (and there are TONS), I love living here because I believe God called me here. He orchestrated the events that led to me being here. He's still orchestrating the events of my every day.

But sometimes I ache for familiarity. For people who know my history and have lived it with me. For a place where I know where everything is and how to get there and how to tell you how to get there too. For songs that I know all the words and notes and rhythms to. For food that came from the woods and the garden that I walk through barefoot while the sun goes down. For the smell of tomatoes and cucumbers and okra and potatoes and just good dirt. For miniature iron skillets and homemade biscuits and headlamps and tractors and getting up before the sun to go hunting and staying up later than the moon to go frog gigging and fox calling. For sleeping less and feeling more. For family and blood ties and puzzles and heat lightning. For lemonade in jars and haunted attics and wrap around porches. For memories. For family. My heart aches to return. And sometimes I do. But it's never the same. Not like I remember. Things changed. Life happened. Home is different. I'm different. Everyone else is too. The originals are gone and new ones have joined us. Sometimes I grieve over the changes, and sometimes I rejoice. Don't you do that sometimes too? Grieve for the past and rejoice in the now?

If I miss all of those things that much, I miss Heaven more. That might not make sense to you because I've never been there. But the Bible says my citizenship is in Heaven because I have been adopted into the family of God. I miss my earthly family, but I miss my Heavenly family more. I ache for rest and for a place of no striving...a place of just being with Jesus. If my experiences of growing up in a family that loves me is a glimpse of what it's like to be in Heaven, then I cannot wait to go.

Of course, I will stay here until God calls me Home. And I will try to seek His will for my time here. If He had no purpose for me, I'd already be Home. The same is true for you. He has a plan for you. If you're still here, He's not finished with you. Let's not waste the time that we have because it's not very much.

"Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit'--yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. 

What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes."

James 4:13-14