Learning to be a Follower

Lately, James and I haven't been able to do much running or walking because we've both been adjusting to new schedules at school, work, and church.  But tonight he felt motivated to go for a jog and I was more than happy to throw on some ratty sweats and move out!!

  We did the first week of the C25K series and it felt really good to be running a little again.  I was breathing hard, my feet hurt, and I had a nagging stitch in my side most of the time, but it was great!! As I ran I was able to focus on my breathing, clear my mind, and just run for the sake of running.

  When James and I run together I tell him not to hold back and run with me because he can push harder than I can right now.  He is always great about walking, or even running, back to me during the walking portion of our outing, though.  During our running segments I enjoy watching him run and spending time alone with God.

Tonight, I asked Him specifically to show me something to help me through this rough patch of the last few weeks...I needed something I could learn from and apply to my life.  It didn't come like a lightening bolt, a light bulb, or even along with any light at all, for that matter.  

It came at the end of our run and it was getting dark.  We had just finished our last jogging portion and were doing a 5 min. cool down/walk back to the house.  James reached out and grabbed my hand and we tried to walk this way for a bit, but when you've just been running it's hard to get your gates matched up and arms swinging in unison so that it is comfortable.  

James has a shorter, faster gate while mine is longer and slower.  In order to walk together comfortably we need to match our inner hips/feet to be stepping at the same time so that our arms can swing in unison.  

As I did a little skip and worked my gate to match his it hit me.  I needed to be a good follower.  We didn't talk, we just walked together on the way home.  I concentrated hard on matching our gates and holding on to him.  It was lovely...

Sometimes we just need to sit back, slow down, and concentrate on someone else.  Especially in a marriage, it's important that we know our roles.  James is a leader, and in our marriage I wouldn't have it any other way.  I want to follow him because I trust him, but I don't want to just be drug along.  I want to follow well, concentrate and focus on him, and do what I can to be a help and not a hindrance.  

I want to apply the same principals to my relationship with God.  He has a plan, I don't need to go my own way and do my own thing, I need to concentrate on Him, study his movements and teachings, and follow as closely and harmoniously as possible to create the most good.  

It's like breathing....

Have you ever been still...just quiet and still...and listened to the music? 

My life has been permeated with music throughout its entirety.  One of my earliest memories of music is sitting on my grandpa's lap in the choir seating while he sang a swinging tenor and pointed out the words and notes for me to follow along.  I would beg my mom to let me sit in the choir seating with him on Sundays while the choir sang just so I could be up front and singing with my Dee-boy.  My parents and grand parents encouraged me from a young age to sing in church and my mom taught us songs that little ones remember easily during sunday school that I would repeat during church, with no fear of rejection by my church family.  They were always delighted to see the curly haired little girl, standing on the stage, singing about Jesus.  

In my teenage years I had aspirations of being a famous country music singer, and believe me, I had the twang to go with it.  When I was older my voice coach would cringe and tell me to, "Stop with the Tammy," referring to Tammy Wynette, a beautiful singer in my opinion, but definitely without the training my coach was trying to instill in me.  

Throughout high school and college I sang in Latin, Italian, German, Spanish, and occasionally in English, though it is not viewed as "high brow" as foreign languages in the competitive settings.  My coach would sing the assigned songs or play the CD of the demonstrations and I would always try my absolute hardest to mirror their every inflection, facial expression, and movement to convey the feeling of the songs.  

Now that I am older (a whole whopping 24) I am a worship leader in my church.  I am given the responsibility of picking out the songs for our Sunday Worship service, making sure we practice as a band, and then working with the band to lead our congregation in worship.  Think it's simple?  Cuz it's not....

You see, throughout my ENTIRE life of music I have been merely a reflection.  Nothing even close to the real thing. I have always been dissatisfied with it too.  I have been told before to "find my own voice" and make a song my own, but I have never been able to truly let the images and sounds of what a song is "supposed" to sound like leave me long enough to make it my own.  

While I have always seen this as a terrible curse and that something is wrong with me I have come to realize why I have been made this way...and I am no longer fighting it.  

My job is not to break the mold.  My job is not to blaze new trails, create my own music, and be different.  My job is to be a mirror.  My job is to be the moon. My problem in life has not been that I am only a reflection, my problem is that I have been pointed in the wrong direction.  I have been pointed at an artist, a song, a style of music, and all of these things fall incredibly short of what I am supposed to be pointed at.  

I have a great desire to be pointed in the right direction.  I want to reflect what God is.  I want to show people what God looks like.   Music is a gift to us all.  There is power in music, as though the God has given humanity an inner pulse that beats only with the rhythmic cadence of a song.  It's a force that flows through us to other people.

I have said that Sundays are exhausting because God's presence is more that a body should endure.  Our bodies were not made for such glory.  But something I heard the other day stays with me.  We are not bodies with a soul.  We are a soul with a body. Our souls are all given a gift when we become Children but I really think that God gives it to us as infants - we're just not able to truly tap into it until we can truly tap into Him.  My gift was music.  It is not only His gift to me, but my gift to Him.  I want to sing for One who loves me, the greatest love song I can give - the song of my own life.  I only hope that it pleases Him.  

Dani
DV

"I want to sit at Your feet/ Drink from the cup in Your hand/ Lay back against You and breathe/ Feel Your heart beat./ This love is so deep/ It's more than I can stand./ I melt in Your peace/ It's overwhelming." -Kari Jobe

Something I'm the BEST At

I am the BEST procrastinator in the world.  

I will put anything off, at anytime, just so I don't have to do it right now.  I never understood why I had this huge flaw, but now I think I know.

I heard someone the other day say that some people are DREAMERS and some people are LIVERS....not like the organ but...well, you get it.

Dreamers are people who have all these hopes, dreams, big aspirations, and plans, but they never seem to actually get anything done towards those dreams.  They know their goals, but they can't seem to grasp how to get to them.  When that happens they just....dream.  They dream instead of doing!!!  

Livers are ones who can say, "This is my life. That is where I want to go. This is how I get there," and then they do it!  Livers are people who get things done, they see that you only get places in live through your own hard work and perseverance.  

I am a dreamer.  I want to be a doer.  I'm not even sure if a person can change that about themselves, but I'm going to try.  Starting today I am going to do.  

I heard a quote by an anonymous author yesterday that says,

LIVE by the SUN, 

Love by the MOON.

It means that you should be living your life while the sun is up.  Be like the elderly who get up at the crack of dawn and DO while they can.  And then do your dreaming while you have to sleep!!! Don't waste your sunlight doing time on your dreaming!!