Date night

It was a Sunday. My husband took me to the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens for classical music and a picnic. That morning, I played a piano piece in church. Playing is a nerve-wracking experience and I force myself to do it because I feel responsible for the gifts God gave me. I have to use them even if they aren't perfect. In fact, it is humbling to be transparent with my faulty gifts - but I'm called to be a city on a hill not a lamp under a bush. God is in charge of the light, I'm simply supposed to stand instead of crouch. Earlier in the week, the heartbreak had come. And so it was providence that the song I practised all week in preparation was Be Still My Soul. God knew I would need to hear it over and over that week for its truth to settle me. So I played it that week and I played it that morning. 

As Matt and I sat under the fading light and listened to various excerpts from Beethoven and Vivaldi's four season, the conductor threw in Jean Sibelius' Finlandia.  I invite you to pop open a side window and listen to it (if you're impatient, forward to minute 4.5). The beginning drums of dark anticipation, then moves into the sound of heartbreak. Halfway through it surprises you with a brightness; an inspirational charge to move forward resolved and confident and daringly joyful. But what shocked me most came just as the song tips past mid-point. The melody for Be Still My Soul. Apparently, it was taken from Finlandia. So imagine me sitting there, as the light faded, hearing the same notes I played that morning in worship to God, hearing the same notes He had soothed me with all week. It was as if, in the middle of this gorgeous piece of music, God had put a hidden message to me. The notes are repeated again in stunning epic fanfare at the end of the song. And then we see this: light in the darkness.