Today I'm sitting at home on my last
day off for recovery from a very minor surgery listening to Pandora.
I am suddenly hit with the realization that music has a power that I
hadn't given much thought to.
A song would come on and my mind would
immediately transport me to another time and place in my life. It
most often transports me to a time early in my life before I was
married, before I had any children. I heard a song from the late 90s
and I was transported back to high school when some of the guys from
the basketball team I was on would get together early on Saturday
mornings and play some pick games.
My brother and I would some times stay
the night at one our friends house from the team and then head out to
this church with a basketball court at about 8 am. We would listen to rock n' roll
on the way there. Rock n' roll music was not allowed in my parents
house so we found other means of listening to it. I don't even
remember the name of the song, but I get transported back to the
first (or one of the first) times I heard it. It was in the parking
lot of that Baptist church with a basketball court.
I sometimes will hear an old hymn that
has been reworked to be more contemporary. Hearing that tune
transports me back to the second pew on the right side of the church
that I grew up in. Again, my brother and I would be singing the songs
and making up our own words or trying to sing way too low for our
vocal ranges.
Just now a song came on called Remedy
by The David Crowder Band. It takes me right back to a day when I was
super nervous because I was interviewing for a worship leader
position at a church in Belding, MI. I was super excited, and super
unsure of what I was doing. Renee and I were thinking of up rooting
where we were and moving to a small town to lead music at a small
church. It didn't work out, but I can relive the whole event just by
hearing that one song.
Music has a way of getting us through
tough times. I will hear a song that helped me through a very
depressing time as a teenager and it will take me right back there
and I can see how God used that one song to bring me through that
awful time.
One of my favorite songs by a fairly
unknown Christian punk band got me through a time
when I felt completely alone. I hung out with my friends almost every
night, but it didn't matter, I felt like they didn't want me there or
care about me. The song is called Every New Day by Five Iron Frenzy. I remember one time
when I was feeling so alone and unwanted and I was listening to this song
super loud and I was singing at the top of my lungs in my car as I
pulled into a friends driveway. When I finally got into his house he said, “man, you were really jammin out for a
minute there”.
I don't care what kind of music you
listen to, there is something about notes put together to form a song
that causes healing in the human soul. I am so thankful for music.
If you need to reminisce
about your life just turn on some music. You will be transported to
times you may have forgotten that you lived through.
