February 2018 – The Value of Practicing

     When I was a kid we had a beat up old upright piano in our basement play room. I think it came from somewhere on my mother’s side of the family. One of my sisters, when she was quite young, got it into her head one day to pop off the ivories from a bunch of the keys, so it got even more beat up in appearance. But it played – all the keys worked – and it was relatively in tune. My mother plays a little bit. She had had lessons at kid. So when I was five, it was decided that I too should start piano lessons. It just so happened that the music teacher at the Lutheran high school where my dad also taught lived two houses away from us, so he was enlisted to be my teacher. I don’t remember how long I took lessons. Maybe a year? I can still remember some of the exercises. But I do remember this: I hated to practice. And so I didn’t – at least whenever I could get away with it. And when I did practice, I did so grudgingly, without any enthusiasm and without seeing the point. At some point (again, I don’t remember the exact timeline) my parents gave up, and I stopped having lessons. As a result, I am not able to play the piano today – not for lack of ability and not for lack of talent, but for lack of discipline and motivation. It was not a total loss, though. I learned to read music. And that helped me later when I took up the cello in the fourth grade and trombone in the sixth. I continued to play cello through high school and college. But I never liked practicing, and so my playing didn’t develop as well as it might have.
     Ash Wednesday falls on February 14 this year and begins the 40 days of Lent. At the Ash Wednesday service, we are invited into the discipline of Lent, the traditional practices of the church in this penitential season. As stated in our liturgy, the Lenten discipline involves self-examination and repentance, prayer and fasting, sacrificial giving and works of love. In my experience, the church has tended to leave this up to each individual, without much guidance. At Grace we provide Lenten devotional booklets for use at home. There have been a lot left over in the past couple of years. I know some people take them and use them, but many of us do not. At the same time, I think many of us like the idea of daily devotions – daily reflection on our faith and the words of Scripture – but we’re not sure how to do it, or where to find the time. It’s kind of like my relationship with exercise. I like the idea of it. I know I should do it. And I want to do it. Really. But when it comes down to it, I can easily find excuses for not doing it – even though I know it’s good for me.
     What helps me with exercise is having someone to exercise with. Helen and I have a gym membership and we usually go together. We make a plan, we set aside time, and we hold each other accountable. This helps me with playing my cello too. Once a week I meet with two other people from Grace to play music for an hour. I’ve played my cello more in the past year than I have since my college days. And I’m getting more out of it in terms of enjoyment and satisfaction than I ever have. And this motivates me to – guess what – practice! Last week I spent more than an hour hammering out the famous prelude to Bach’s first cello suite, a piece I learned back in high school but never mastered. There’s not going to be a public performance, but I am nevertheless determined now to master that piece. And maybe the rest of the suite. We’ll see.
     What is true for exercise and music is also true of our faith. Practicing our faith develops our faith. It’s no accident that people speak of “practicing” Christians – those who not only identify themselves as Christian but who exercise their faith on a regular basis. The more you pray, the better you pray. The more you worship, the better you worship. The more you practice your faith, the more it informs your daily life and your relationship with God and those around you. This is so important that we set aside an hour a week to practice together, because it’s so much better that way. And during Lent we set aside even more time – an hour or so for soup and prayer, singing and refection the good news of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection for us and for our salvation. Consider joining us for all of these opportunities to practice our faith together this Lent. You might even find yourself taking one of those devotional booklets home and praying on your own. You never know.
+ Pastor Repp