Did you ever destroy a musical performance? I have. 

Once when our family traveled as the Gauger Brass, we provided music for more than a thousand people at a banquet in Dayton, Ohio.  I was tasked with giving the pitch for a certain song which started with acapella vocals—simple.  But the note I played was one half-step off.  When the instruments started playing their accompaniment, it all sounded rather hideous.  Concert demolished!

A friend recalls attending a performance of Handle’s Messiah where one of the soloists—a baritone—began the evening with a polite smile on his face. Yet as the lengthy instrumental introduction to his solo went on, the gentleman grew less serene.   Gone was the smile, replaced by a furrowed brow. As the orchestral strains continued,  his mood turned to fear.  Then terror.  Abruptly, the confused soloist stood up and just started singing his part (nowhere near his proper entrance), while the conductor valiantly sought to put the whole thing back on track.

Having just come through the Easter season playing French horn with our church orchestra, I’m reminded that hitting the high notes without squawking is only half the battle.  Maybe the easy half.  The other half is keeping track of when you are supposed to play.  Or not play!

A lifetime of counting measures has brought about a simplified theology of living the Christian life. It goes like this:

• Stay focused so you know where you’re at.
• Play your part when you’re supposed to.
• Don't play when it’s not your turn.
• When it is your turn, do your very best.
• Watch quietly for your next turn.

When you think about it, that’s really all God is asking of any of us, isn’t it? 

Be focused.  Be ready. Be patient.  Our Conductor knows the score!

I have a problem. Maybe you’ve got the same one.  It has to do with our worship.  Can we talk?

Most of us really love to sing. Love to wave our hands in worship.  But we seem to have little capacity for something that Scripture says is a big deal: trembling in the presence of our holy God. That part of worship has largely evaded us.

In our Java-with-Jesus culture, God is increasingly portrayed merely as a benevolent friend.  But He is much more than that.

Hebrews 12:29 reminds us our God is “a consuming fire.” We are told in 1 Timothy 6:16 that He “dwells in unapproachable light.”  In Revelation 19:15 it says of Jesus, “From his mouth comes a sharp sword so that with it He may strike down the nations.” 

Psalms 114:7 urges, “Tremble, O earth, before the Lord, before the God of Jacob.”  Doesn’t sound to me like this is optional behavior.  Indeed, Philippians 2:12  commands us to work out our salvation “with fear and trembling.” 

A consuming fire…unapproachable light…a sharp sword. Did you read that?  So where’s the trembling in our times?

Isaiah 66:2 further clarifies, “This is the one I esteem; he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.”

So I ask again, where’s the tremble?  Our tremble?

I suggest we do not tremble for one of two reasons.  Either we are ignorant of who God is, or we do know and are so arrogant that we simply don’t care, which is just plain reckless.  It seems to me we had better find our misplaced sense of caution.

Because the I Am has not become the "I was."

Because the Almighty has not become the “some mighty.” 

Because He’s not the duke of dudes—He’s the King of kings!

Where's your tremble?  Where’s my tremble?  The refrain of the old spiritual is a corrective we desperately need: Sometimes it causes me to tremble…tremble…tremble.

Ignorant, arrogant, or full of tremble.  

Which are you?

“As snowmen go, it was borderline pathetic.” 

Right then, I knew there was more to this story.  There always is with my friend, Jack. He immediately launched into a description of a snow creature that bore no resemblance whatsoever to the fabled Frosty.  

“The middle section was lopsided. The head was too small.  The pinecone nose looked goofy.”  Jack shook his head with a chuckle.

And what exactly was the occasion for this snowy silliness?  “We had an overnight visit from our nine-year old granddaughter, so we wanted her to have a little fun.”  The Windy City having lived up to its name, a dramatic mid-March snow blanketed the lawn. 

“‘Can we go out and throw snowballs?’ she asked me.  And really, it was the last thing I wanted to do right then,” admitted Jack.   “But I didn’t have the heart to say no. She is nine, ya know,” he said wistfully.   “Won’t be too much longer and staying at our house won’t be cool anymore.”

So out they went into the snow. First there was a sled ride, then there were was a snowball fight.  Finally there came the idea for the snowman. 

“There just wasn’t all that much snow on the ground, so we really had to work at it.  Believe me, I was sweating by the time that big bottom boulder was finally done,” Jack acknowledged. Even then the thing wasn’t right. 

Instead of three symmetrically shaped spheres, there were misshapen lumps.  Instead of white snow, there was a mottled skin of leaves and dirt and pine needles. 

“Frosty would not have been proud,” said my friend.  But maybe Jack’s judgment was hasty. 

Ephesians 5:16 urges us, “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.”  From where I sit, it seems to me that a snowman and sled ride and snowballs with a nine-year-old truly represented the best use of Jack’s time.  It’s hard to envision Jesus—who insisted the disciples, “let the children come to me”—passing up such an opportunity.

“It was the last snowman of the season,” Jack mused.  “And who knows when we’ll build another?  She’s getting so big.  Nine years old….”   Abruptly, he grew quiet, and so did I. Started thinking of my own little grandkids.

Silence. More silence.  He whispered, “Ya know, there really is gonna come a day when we’ll have built our last snowman.”   And then Jack looked away, for which I was grateful.  My eyes were doing something that reminded me of melting snow.

Honestly, I was not trying to photobomb anyone.  The doors to the Metra train whooshed apart, and I padded down the steps into a dense crowd.

I’ve ridden the train for three decades now, so I instantly knew upon exiting that something was going on. It was somebody’s big moment.  Worthy of a photo or two.  Or three.  Flashes were firing and phones were clicking and there was laughter and a palpable excitement. 

Me, I was just trying to walk toward my car and get home. I didn’t want to pry, so I snaked my way through the crowd and found an exit.

In retrospect, I'm thinking there’s little doubt I showed up in several of the pictures those folks snapped.  I'm in the background, maybe half out of frame.  Or blurry.  Just a nameless section of wallpaper for somebody’s grand occasion. 

Have you ever thought about the people that show up in the background of the pictures you take?   To you, they are nameless, almost faceless. But every single one of them has a story—even as they “invade” your story.

Ponder with me the fact that you and I with our individual lives are definitely part of some kind of larger scene Jesus is directing.  At His invitation, we play a small part of His story.   But we are not the center of the action.  He is.  John had it right when he said of Jesus, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

Just like a crowd scene wouldn’t be a crowd scene without lots of people, Jesus somehow has determined He wants us in the scene with Him.  But we dare not ever take His invitation as an assignment to the leading role.

We are background.  Jesus is foreground.

We are “extras.”  He is the star.

He must increase but you and I really must decrease. 

Anything else would be photobombing Jesus Himself!

It was a desperate search.  A Hail Mary.  I was looking for a misplaced check.  A big one. Previous attempts had turned up nothing. 

So there I was, pulling out the large drawer under our bed.  The one where I keep my cards.  All of them.  That’s when I knew this was going to take some time.

There were cards from my wife, Diana: birthday cards and Christmas cards and Valentine’s cards and cards for no other occasion than her simple desire to express her love. By far, these took up the most space.  It was fun to read through many of them (though the ticking grandfather clock several feet away reminded me I hadn’t time to look at them all).

There were cards from our kids.  Some with little squiggly letters when they could barely write their names.  Notes and letters and jokes and drawings.

There were cards from my parents, many of them homemade or accompanied by kind notes and letters.  And I was touched to see cards from my mother and father-in-law, both of whom are now in heaven. 

An emerging category of cards was also there: those from our little grandchildren.  These were really hard to resist reading. To me, owning these is better than owning stock certificates.

With the drawer nearly empty and the elusive check still eluding me, I decided it wasn’t all a waste. After all, I ended up sorting the cards and stuffing them into cardboard folders (more organization than I’ve shown in thirty-plus years).

Before my hike down memory lane concluded, there were two unexpected moments. The first happened when, having concluded the check was simply not in that drawer, I finally found it wedged at the oddest angle in the very back, almost defying gravity (time out for a prayer of thanks).

The second moment came when staring at the piles of cards cascading all around. It was this humbling sense that, “I guess I really am loved.”  A wife who sends me love cards…kids who say kind things…grandkids and parents who express their affection. The cumulative effect was almost overpowering.

I don't know how long it’s been since someone told you were loved.  Maybe it’s been way too long.  Maybe the one you love the most can no longer even send you a card because they aren't around, or their mind has gone.  Then let me say it for them.  You are loved! They would want you to read that—hear that.

And as much as they want you to know that, God wants you to know it even more. In Jeremiah 31:3 God says to you, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.”

How can you really know that?  John 3:16 tells us, “God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”

You are loved.

Really.

Loved.