Getting to Know You

I haven't changed jobs very much.  Oak Grove is only my third full-time position.  I was at Embry Hills for three years and Decatur First for thirteen.  This week I've been thinking some about getting to know Oak Grove.

It takes a long time to really get to know a place.  General guidance is that you learn the most during your "year of firsts."  By a year in, you'll have experienced everything the church typically does at least one time.  That was true for me at Decatur First.  By a year in I had a good handle on a lot of things about how the church operated.  I mostly knew where to go for what and what all the expectations were for the programming I would oversee.  And so, a year in, I knew enough to begin adding my own fingerprints (see previous post) to the ministry.  I knew where the bathrooms were, and I knew that the first floor wasn't, in all cases, the ground floor (though it was in some cases).  I could start new programs, and if something wasn't going well I could troubleshoot from a position of knowledge rather than ignorance.

In addition to learning about the nuts and bolts of the church, I got to know a lot of people that first year.  But with so many, it was like drinking from a fire hose.  I was lucky to catch a couple of names here or there.  What I mean is I got to know a little about a lot of people.

Actual picture of me trying to learn all the people.

The good news is that while the fire hose was wide open on Sunday when I was trying to get to know people, during the week I could really apply myself to figuring out the church and the ministry.  I could have long talks with the directors of the other work areas and the pastors.  I could study the budget and thumb through the catalogs of music previously sung at the church.

It looked something like this except I was
a lot heavier than that guy is.

My transition to Oak Grove went...nothing like that.  As I type this, the sum total of normal traditional services I have attended at Oak Grove stands at...1.  I attended once a full year before I started my work.  I've been able to do precious little of the information gathering and getting to know the institution or the general population of the church.  And with gatherings limited in number, I've been able to get to know a relatively small number of people.

But I've been able to get to know them relatively well...and much more quickly.  This Sunday there are about 25 youth participating in a virtual youth choir and about 30 adults participating in virtual chancel choir.  I know each of them reasonably well...far better than I knew the Chancel Choir a couple of months into my time at Decatur First.

One thing in particular I know VERY well is their voices.  Individually.  Honestly I didn't know the individual voices at Decatur First super well even at the time I left.  I knew some of them very well, sure, but since we sang as a choir for the most part, there were a lot of singing voices I wouldn't be able to identify.  I think I can pretty much identify my entire chancel choir by their singing voice right now.

WARNING: Music dorkery ahead. If you don't want to dork out about music, skip to the green arrow!

That's led me to a point of personal growth I did not expect.

Once I have all the videos on my computer, the first step of making the virtual choir is to phase all the voices together (line them up so they are singing at the same time).  The second step is to separate them into parts and adjust the voices so they sound like a choir rather than a bunch of individuals.  The way I do this is to guess where everyone needs to be based on history then pull down any voices I hear popping out.  Then I go to each voice, pull it way up, and then fade it down until I don't hear it.

From time to time I still don't wind up with the right sound.  I think that's because pulling the voices down like that sometimes leaves you with the lowest common denominator, which isn't what choral sound wants to be.  When this happens, I find myself asking what is missing from the sound.  Is it too thin?  Too muffled?  Does it need more core?  More fundamental?  More ring?

That's where the deeper knowledge of the voices comes in really handy.  You may have heard voices categorized into flutes and reeds, like organ pipes.  While that's a significant oversimplification, it is helpful.  If the sound is too shrill I can add a little more of the flute-y voices to compensate.  If the sound is muddled I can add a little more of the reedy voices to compensate.

What's most interesting to me about this is that if I only add more of one voice (a reed, for example), I will hear that person stick out.  But if I add all the reeds together, it changes the sound without sacrificing the unification of the sound, which is very cool.

So while I still don't like virtual choirs, since a big (BIG) part of my job right now is putting them together, I may as well learn something, and what I'm learning is something of the miracle that is diverse voices forming a unified sound in an up-close an personal way I've never been able to experience before.

If you skipped here, welcome back!  If you've stuck with me through the dorkery, I hope you enjoyed the ride.

Here's the thing.  As the new director of music ministry at OGUMC I have a lot to learn both about the institution and the people, and the pandemic is forcing me to learn those things in a completely different way from how I did it last time I did it.

But the REAL point here is that getting to know you is important to me--just as important as getting to know the building and the budgets and how to turn the exterior lights on.  It's hard for me to reach out to everyone, so I hope you'll reach out to me.  We can talk on zoom or on the phone or at a distance on the porch.  I may have been at this for almost 6 months now, but I still feel brand new.

An Invitation

It seems like it was years ago, but it was only months.  I was still at Decatur First.  It had become clear that the youth choir would not be able to go on its annual music mission trip in June.  The choir, not one to be easily defeated, set about figuring out how to go on the trip virtually.  In the end I was surprised at how effective it was, both in terms of the mission aspect and in terms of  drawing the choir closer together.  These are, after all, the primary purposes of the trip.  When we set about creating a virtual trip, we started with a single question: what is essential?  I am convinced that answering that question thoroughly and honestly was the key to a successful experience, and it was a lesson I carried with me when I changed jobs.

In retrospect we had already been asking that question of just about everything we were offering in ministry, beginning with our worship services.  What is essential?  What are the sine qua non of worship or mission or, well...church?  And how can we overcome the obstacles of the pandemic to continue offering them?

As it became clear that the pandemic would not be over by Christmas, I set about answering the question again.  Of all the things we have been doing, all the concerts and services and decoration...what is essential?  What can we not do without?

I started just now writing a list of all the things we are losing this Christmas Season, but I deleted it.  It's a bummer that we've lost so much, but none of those things were really essential, I don't guess.  We'll be able to sing Once in Royal David's City next year, right?

But there is one thing I don't want to let go of.

For many years now, as the Christmas Eve services have come to an end, we have taken the light of Christ from the Christ candle and shared it.  I've watched it creep across the congregation, person after person sharing freely and without reservation.  After all, sharing the light with another person doesn't mean losing it yourself!  And then, as the lights in the sanctuary go completely out, I see so many faces illuminated by the warm glow of candles singing together.  Just for a moment, basking in the light of Christ, we come the closest we can on this earth to experiencing the peace we pray for.  Everything else melts away.

The pandemic is going to make this harder, but the pandemic will not take this away.

Tuesday night I recorded Jack and Randy playing Silent Night on their guitars.  Last night I recorded myself singing it by candlelight.  I'd like for you to join me.  Yes, you.  You reading this.  No, I don't care if you think you can't sing.  Everyone can sing Silent Night!  Here's what you do:

1. Go to virtual.oakgrovemusic.org

2. Go to the first youtube video on the page.  It's a guide video.

3. Set up one device to play back through headphones and set another to record (I playback on the computer and record with my cell phone).

4. Light a candle...or several...and grab your family.  Get everyone together and sing.  Let the person with the headphones lead!  And...if the headphones don't work out, that's ok.  Just sing with the video.

5. Go to uploads.oakgrovemusic.org and follow the directions there to upload your video.

Then, on Christmas Eve at the end of the traditional service, the familiar flame will flicker with the soft glow we have come to love.  We will sing together to celebrate what is essential: the light and love of Christ.

Fingerprints

Back in the, uh, dark ages, before DNA evidence was a thing, fingerprints were a common piece of evidence tying a person to a crime.  That's because they are unique to each person and were commonly left behind when the perpetrator was long-gone.  Moreover, while it is of course possible for a person to commit a crime and not leave fingerprints behind by using gloves or wiping the scene down, it is considerably more difficult to create fake fingerprints on a scene, thereby potentially wrongly convicting someone of a crime.  Let me make a disclaimer here.  I'm not an expert in fingerprinting, so everything I just said may be wrong.  Feel free to call me out for incorrect information in the comments. I can take it.

I think it's a rite of passage for children to make a set of handprints in preschool that include this little poem:

Sometimes you get discouraged,

because I am so small

And leave my little fingerprints

On furniture and walls.

But everyday I'm growing

And soon will be so tall

That all these little fingerprints

Will be difficult to recall.

So here's a little handprint

That you can put away

Not my child's actual handprint.

...or some version of that.  It's very cute.  And yes, I'm fairly certain we have the requisite handprints for both of our children in a keepsake box that they will one day open and wonder why we kept them.  Or maybe by that time they will have children and will understand completely.

And it's true that kids' handprints get all over.  One of my friends, Mark, once wrote that for all the years between birth and about 7 or 8 years old it seemed like there was a sticky film coating everything in the house.  It covers roughly the same years you always have a bottle of pink medicine in the fridge because your child just started it, just finished it, or needs a refill of it.  Sometimes when I look at picture of my children when they were younger I remember how cute and sweet they were.  When I think about the pink medicine (or worse, the white medicine that followed if the pink medicine didn't work), I feel like maybe we were lucky to get through it in one piece.  My children have left literal sticky fingerprints all over us, our house, our vehicles, and presumably every other place they've ever been, is what I'm saying.  And I don't think we are alone.  Kids all over are like:

Ready for a new day!

But there are other sorts of fingerprints.  More subtle and more durable by far.  They last long after last bottle of pink medicine has been thrown away and sticky fingers are wiped off before accessing the refrigerator (full disclosure: this doesn't always happen even now).  These are fingerprints on the heart and soul.  They're left by smiles and joy and tears and anger.  And they aren't limited to children.

We bear the fingerprints of every relationship. Each person we encounter leaves us somehow marked--for better or worse (actually most of the time better and worse if we really think about it).  In the classic nature vs. nurture debate, all these fingerprints are on the nurture side even if they don't always feel especially nurturing.

Of course some people leave more fingerprints on us than others.  Those who are closest to us leave well more than fingerprints.  They can shape everything about us from how we look to how we speak to how we exist in the world!  How many times have I said something to my children and realized it may as well have been my parents talking?  The truth is it probably was my parents talking.

And that's when it gets really scary.  Fingerprints are a two-way street.  Just as surely as people leave their prints on us, so we leave our prints on those we meet every day.  Every. Person.  Fingerprints of happiness, perhaps, or anger...or maybe for more than we'd like to admit, fingerprints of indifference (maybe the most painful of all fingerprints, I think).

The profound power of our fingerprints is frightening, yes.  And yet in their power is opportunity as well.  Just as easily as we can mark others with our indifference, so can we also mark them with our care.  As easily as we mark them with malice, so can we mark them with benevolence and kindness and release.

Maybe not just as easily, I don't guess.  Sometimes it runs counter to human nature to uplift those around us.  Or is it counter to human nurture?  Maybe we would do well to look ourselves over and consider carefully the fingerprints on us.  Who left them?  How have they influenced us?  Which fingerprints will we carefully--or even painfully--wipe away from who we are?  Is that even possible?  Fingerprints don't wash easily, but washing away the right fingerprints can be the most important act of self-care we will ever undertake.

A close second may be paying attention to those around us to see what kind of fingerprints we are leaving on others.  For me that is a mixed bag.  I can see the ways I have acted harshly or reacted in ways I'm not proud of.  I can see the ways I've ignored too many people, especially during a pandemic when checking in is so important.  But I can also see, now and then, fingerprints I'm proud of.  In fact, it was one such set of prints that led me to write this post.

In the end, these fingerprints on the heart and soul, just like those Holmes and Watson might find, are evidence.  The ones left on us are evidence of where we have been, and the ones we leave on others are evidence of the kind of people we are.  And, for better or worse, the fingerprints do not lie.