O.K. I know I'm running a little behind, I think the "12 days of Christmas" were a little overly ambitious. I didn't take into account working, shopping, wrapping, entertaining company, and other various wonderful things that happen this Holiday season.
Anyway- 3rd Day- True Love- right....right.....uhhhh.... On the Third day of Christmas my true love sent to me, Three Christmas Cantatas.
As you may or may not know I am married to a wonderful musician. He sings! He plays tuba! He rocks drums! He strums guitar! As a matter of fact, Chad decided in February, "I think I need to learn how to play guitar" so he picks it up and in a month he is playing at our Spring church retreat. Now he leads worship with it in our contemporary service every Sunday. As a non-musical person, that blows my mind. I don't play anything other than the radio. I can sing a little, I guess, but it's not that great and I would NEVER do it in front of anyone! Anyway, both times we've moved to a new church, question number #1 to Youth Pastor's wife is- "Do you play piano?" (Answer: Does chopsticks count?) Question #2: "Do you sing in the choir?" (Answer: No, and trust me, that should make you very, very happy.)
Well, our dear friend is the music minister at our church. Three years ago she asked me if Chad and I would narrate the Christmas Cantata. (She asked me 3 days before, but that is another story all together....) So we did. I was so nervous- It was like she asked me to sing a solo. Last year, she asked me again. I did it. (A lot of nerves going on again) Well for a THIRD year, I received the honors again.
If you read music (which I don't) I think it would be easier. Picture it. Music measures (might as well be Russian) with words printed above them. LOTS of words. It's like Mission Impossible. You MUST finish reading this paragraph in 12 measures or the singing starts and your book WILL self-destruct. So when the music starts I start reading, trying my best to not stumble all over myself, read the wrong part, loose my place, or say words like "genitals" instead of "Gentiles". All this with 300+ people starring at me. With music ticking down like a time bomb. No problem.
Don't get me wrong, I love having a front row seat to a 50 voice choir. It blows your socks off! i love contributing to the church in any way, the music is beautiful, the message of the Christmas Story set to music is amazing, I just get really, really nervous. I want the Cantata to be meaningful and perfect. I don't want to mess up what Dale and all these musicians have worked so hard to perfect.
So this Sunday, I stood and brought the Christmas story in words while my musically talented brothers and sisters brought the message in song. It was beautiful. After the musical, I got two comments that really stuck with me. One was that I had become the "Voice of Bethel" and they really look forward to hearing me speak every year. The other was "I think they pick you because you aren't too Southern! We can actually understand what you are reading!"
That made me chuckle!! I hear you, I'm very active with many things at church....even help with music at VBS every summer (because my good friend is great with kids music), BUT don't ask me to sing..you might be sorry!
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