ACL

from my message on Oct 14, from Psalm 98, Ephesians 5:18b-20, Mk 14:26

(video clip of ACL, Austin City Limits with crowds rushing through the gates in Zilker Park to attend one of the many concerts presented at multiple stages)

How many of you have attended ACL?  Well, I am glad that you have chosen to be here today.  How many of you have watched the TV show Austin City Limits?  It has been going on for more than 30 years now.  This marks the second sermon in  a series based on shows found at PBS.  The worship team has challenged me to start with things going on in our culture and work back to the scriptures and Christian tradition.  Today with ACL, the message is this:  music takes us beyond our limits.  Music takes us beyond ourselves.  Music takes us into the presence of the Holy One. 

The parish of St. Thomas had a school and a worshiping congregation.  The school needed a choirmaster.  The church needed an organist.  They advertised for candidates.  Their top pick took 3 weeks to consider the offer before turning it down.  The second choice also declined to accept.  One of the persons on the search committee wrote in his diary, "Since the best man could not be obtained, we will have to go with a mediocre choice."  The third choice accepted the position, Johann Sebastian Bach! 

When I do the spiritual gifts inventory with you, the most common response I get is, "I can't sing.  I'm not very musical."  Bach came in third!  I love what the psalmist says, "Make a joyful noise to the LORD."  All of creation is called to shout praise to God.  Not just trained musicians, but everyone and everything in all creation.  When Bach was hired at St. Thomas in Leipzig in 1722, the move was on in churches toward an operatice style with professional singers.  The St. Thomas search committee was looking for someone to reverse that trend.  They wanted to give the music back to the congregation.  Bach wrote his chorales with that express intent.  Yes the choir would sing, but there were sections for the congregation to respond back.  It was like a dialogue.  Music takes us beyond ourselves into the very presence of God.  All of us, all of creation is called to praise.

The psalmist also says, "Sing to the LORD a new song."  I know that we love our old favorites.  Some of you say to me, "Why can't we sing the old songs?"  I sometimes wonder, do you mean from the Cokesbury hymnal, or the 1935 hymnal, or the 1968, or the 1992?  We like what is familiar to us.  We get comfortable with it.  But I was preparing for this message (aren't you glad!), I came across a sermon by another pastor.  He had an interesting question, "What is the latest hymn that has impacted your faith?"  That is a pretty good measure of one's progress in discipleship--the learning of new songs.  We are trying to help people along a path of discipleship, and one of the ways we can tell someone is growing in their relationship with Christ is the learning of new songs.  As we were introducing this path of discipleship concept in the worship services several months ago, Diana, our director of music and worship, taught us a new song.  It has impacted my soul,
(singing)
It is the cry of my heart to follow you,
It is the cry of my heart to be close to you,
It is cry of my heart to follow,
All of the days of my life.

Why do we need new songs?  Because God is not through revealing God's self.  The mystery of God will never be fully captured.  God is the ultimate composer.  Occasionally, God will give me a song to write.  I have never claimed that it was my creation.  It is more like overhearing the song that God is already singing.  There will always be new songs about God.  They take us our of ourselves into the very presence of God.

Ephesians has that wonderful line that as a church we are to sing, "Songs and hymns and spiritual songs" to one another.  Already in the early church, you find great diversity and variety in music.  When I was pastor in San Saba, that county seat town, some 100 miles northwest of here, the radio station re-opened.  KBAL, 1400 on your AM dial.  The owners of the new station were members of my church.  I asked them what kind of music they were going to play.  They said, "We are going to play both kinds....County AND Western.  I know at ACL there are so many different genres of music being offered.  I read reviews of bands that say something like, "they are a mix of psychedelic pop, indie garage, thrash bluegrass, and ska with some Southern roots thrown in."  I know sometimes in the church we have "worship wars."  This service has  traditional music.  This service has contemporary music.  Can't we sing songs and hymns and spiritual songs?  Can't we move beyond ourselves into the presence of God? 

Can we move beyond our prejudice, our narrowness, our sin?  Music can help us do that.  This pastor whose sermon has helped me understand this passage talked about another pastor whom he could not stand.  I know you find that hard to believe that pastors could hold such feelings.  But this other pastor had the wrong theology.  His view of God was diametrically opposed to the first pastor.  But the first pastor said, "But he has such a lovely bass voice....I love standing next to him and singing."  That is as close as we can be in this life to another believer with whom we disagree.  Music takes us beyond ourselves into the very presence of God.

Finally, Mark's gospel reports that one of the last things Jesus did in his earthly ministry was to sing.  When they sang a hymn, they went out into the night.  It was Thursday, Maundy Thursday, before Good Friday.  Jesus had celebrated the Passover Feast with his disciples.  They sang a hymn and went out into the night.  The last night of his life upon this earth.

It was night.  Cahty and I had tickets to the opening of the new performance hall at Texas A & M--
Corpus Christi.  The architects who built it were the same architects who built our church plant in Portland down on the coast.  They provided the tickets.  The Corpus Christi Symphony was playing.  The special guest artist was none other than Van Cliburn.  You may have heard of him.  He won an international piano competition Russia several years ago.  He is a Ft. Worth boy, who done good.  He has gone on to host his own competion. He is very tall.  He came out the grand piano.  It was just like Bugs Bunny in the cartoons.  Before he sat down at the piano bench, he flicked out his tuxedo tails.  He played beautifully.  During a break between numbers, all of the lights in the new performance hall went off.  All power went down.  There was a gasp.  It was not intended.  Whether there was a technical glitch in the new space, or someone pulled a plug, or a breaker tripped, I don't know.  It was a bit scary for just a moment.  When the power came back on, Van Cliburn stood, and quieted everyone's anxiety.  In a calm and clear voice, he said, "What a wonderful reminder in our electronic age, that even if the lights went out, the music would still go on."

Music takes us beyond our limits, beyond ourselves.  All of this life is just rehearsal for eternity.  The music will still go on.  I like what the hymn 292 says,
(singing)
And when from death I'm free, I'll sing on, I'll sing on,
And when from death I'm free, I'll sing on,
And when from death I'm free, I'll sing and joyful be,
And through eternity, I'll sing on, I'll sing on,
And through eternity, I'll sing on.

I am reading a Scottish author, Alexander McCall Smith, right now.  He made the following observation:  whenever angels are mentioned, the collective term for angels is usually.....a band.  We are in rehearsal.  We are just practicing for the heavenly choir.

Music take us beyond ourselves.  That is the good news I have to share.