Jazz & Abiding
A great ambience is playing a jazz record, like Charlie Parker or Duke Ellington, and sitting in the moment and listening to the music as the sounds collide in a revolutionary experience. I realize Jazz can be a hit or miss experience for people, but I appreciate the improvisational sounds and the colliding dissonance as it lures me closer to resolve. Because I never continued in my trumpet lessons, a great loss and missed opportunity, I cannot play the music, but I do value and know a little something about the genre. Yet, sitting and talking about it or even writing about it can only do so much. It is not until I sit and savor the music, do I fully become connected. This can be said of any hobby, interest, or relationship.
This is why Jesus’ words to, “Abide” is critical for our well-being. While it is easy to learn or know stacks of knowledge about God or even be the most strict and legal rule follower it does not nurture and deepen our relationship with Him. To Abide is to sit with, meditate/pray, read His word, and engage in His agenda. Open yourself up to the Spirit’s prompting and see what you discover. Below is Psalm 42 for you to read. I encourage you to begin by praying and asking for the Spirit’s guidance as you read. Treat this as an invitation to Abide. As you read, notice what stirs in your soul. Be aware of what words stick out to you and pray for clarity in their revealing. What do you need to learn from God and then open yourself to hear and learn. Maybe read through a second time from a different translation to discover what might be highlighted to you from a different angle. Enjoy the time! Maybe even do it again tomorrow with a different verse. Remember the end goal isn’t to know more stuff, but to experience and deepen your relationship with God. Have fun!
Psalm 42
As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” 4 These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival.
5 Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation 6 and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore, I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. 7 Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. 8 By day the Lord commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me a prayer to the God of my life. 9 I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?”
10 As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?”
11 Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation, and my God.
