Saturday, January 11, 2020

I received a Victrola for Christmas.

The last "stereo" I had was from circa 19ReallyLongTimeAgo, and sadly, I had to donate it to the City of Frankfort's solid waste department, and their recycling electronics program, because it had become a serious fire hazard, quite literally.

It had been a CD/Cassette player with FM/AM radio, complete with speakers, and the CD player had died many moons ago. When I finally got rid of it, it chewed my cassette tapes (yes, I still have cassette tapes ... DON'T JUDGE!), and the radio and speakers only worked intermittently.

I've been without the ability to play music, save for the Pandora and iHeartRadio options on my TV. So, this replica Victrola was such an awesome gift to me!

I've been enjoying, all over again, the sound vinyl makes when played.  There's something to be said for the digital age, but those crackling sounds on those old records? It's beauty to my ears! Well, and music too!

Tonight, while I've needed to enjoy some time not running all over creation, I've been feeling a bit stir crazy. So, I decided to figure out how the rudimentary tape deck worked on the Victrola, and I popped in an old accompaniment tape.

Oh!  Y'all!  If you are not aware of accompaniment tapes, are you truly a child of the 80s who attended church?  It was the era of Special Music at church, where any old person could sing at full force and praise Jesus!

One of my all-time favorite songs to sing is called BREATH OF HEAVEN, and for more times than I care to count, I have sung this during a Christmas Eve service at an old church back in Michigan. With a lot of these old accompaniment tapes/CDs, the quality of the music is super dated, but I was surprised at how timeless the music sounded.

It's a haunting melody that carries the listener right into a prayer Mary, the soon to be Mother of Jesus, prays to the Father. She is doubtful He chose correctly ... she is wondering if He made a mistake ... you can feel her fear and doubts.

Singing the nuances of the song came back to me like riding a bike (let's be honest here, I'm not sure riding an actual bike would come to me so quickly!). And so I started singing the lyrics, trying to put some of the emotion of Mary into that first verse.

And then the second verse came around, and suddenly, the song started to feel more real to me...relevant. I wonder sometimes what He thinks of the mess I make of things day in and day out....how I react to my kids sometimes .... how I react to my family and friends.  I mean, He could have easily chosen someone else to do what I do. So, why me?

It's a sobering song, and these lyrics rock my world ... they make me stop and think through my life and Mary's life .... how she just took Him at His word, and despite her doubt and lack of confidence, brought the Savior for all mankind into this world.

It was a great reminder to me this evening ... mere weeks after celebrating His birth.