Terry Paul Choyce
November 19, 2006, Brunswick Street United Church
I'd like to show you a work of art by my Aunt Elsie, who is a fabulous painter and calligrapher, and she is still actively doing both at age 82. This says (hold up art)
"Ask not what the world needs, ask rather what makes your heart sing, and go do that. For what the world needs is people with hearts that sing." Philip Hatcher
We are very blessed this morning to have Shauntay Grant with us to sing a few songs of her heart. As the director of the Nova Scotia Mass Choir, she guides many other people in expressing their passion and their faith through music. These people come together to blend their voices, and to create music that can be enjoyed by many people. Tim Dunn, who often comes and sings for us was once a member of this choir.
Most of the people in this choir are not professional singers. They are teachers, clerks, truck drivers, nurses, homemakers, and many other professions. Making a living from singing is very difficult, unless you get lucky and sell many cds and perform in concerts. But there are many ways that you can sing, if that is what you love to do. Every church has a choir that welcomes more voices. When I was a pre-school teacher I sang every day. You can be a waiter at a theatre club, an actor in the local Gilbert and Sullivan group, you can volunteer to sing for the Vets at Camp Hill, or you can ask the folks at One World Cafˇ if you can perform there one night. If you want to sing, there are many opportunities to do so. But there is one huge stumbling block. Singing for others takes courage.
Last week I read a poem to you, and it was easy for me to do. Three weeks ago I sang a short solo, and my knees were shaking and I was very thankful the song was short. I had practised the song over and over, yet I still started it on the wrong note, which made hitting the high notes really hard for me. To sing takes a lot of self confidence. It also takes the ability to let go of your fear of failure or of making mistakes. We all hit a sour note on occasion. If we obsess about the tiny part that sounds wrong instead of the majority that sounds great, we will never sing. In singing, and in life, we have to let go of our expectations of perfection and rejoice in what we can do well. We have to forgive ourselves when we make a mistake, and celebrate when we have the courage to try our best.
Three weeks ago I did the service on the new United Church statement of faith, which is called The Song of Faith. I'd like to read this part of it now:
" We sing of God the Spirit, faithful and untamable, who is creatively and redemptively active in the world. We sing of the Spirit, who speaks our prayers of deepest longing and enfolds our concerns and confessions, transforming us and the world....
Scripture is our song for the journey, the living word passed on from generation to generation to guide and inspire, that we might wrestle a holy revelation for our time and place from the human experiences and cultural assumptions of another era. God calls us to be doers of the word and not hearers only."
God calls us to be doers, not just those who listen. Everyone of us here has something we can do to share the love of God, and to give thanks to God for the talents and skills you possess. Not all of us can sing. Some of us can write, others can bake, others can fix cars or dance or grow gardens or teach or make mugs. No matter what our talent or our passion, God wants us to find ways that we can do them. This does not mean that we need to make them our profession, but they do need to be part of our lives. Each of us is happiest when we are doing something we love to do. Yet many of us spend precious little time doing what we love. We don't let our hearts sing.
Benjamin Disraeli said that "Most people will go to their graves with their music still inside them." Because we are afraid, we find many, many excuses why we cannot do what we love and what we are best at. I spent most of my life making excuses for living a life which was not the real me. By the age of 45 I was depressed, and I was often sick and in pain. From the outside looking in, I had a good life. But I was soul sick. I was wasting my talents, and I had forgotten I had any passions. Making the changes that allowed me to more fully express who I am and what I am best at, took enormous courage and sacrifices. Now I am so glad I made them. Now I am doing what I was born to do, and living the life I dreamed of. Now my heart is singing a symphony.
You do not need to make extreme changes to do what you love, usually. You just have to be open to opportunities to do them. You have to prioritise your time and/or your money to explore ways to do the things that make you feel the most whole and connected to your spirit. When you are doing what you love you can actually feel the power of God inside you. God does not want you to be frustrated and miserable. God wants you to share all of the talents you were given with the world. If you have a child who can play the guitar like Eric Clapton or Julien Bream or Scott McMillan, do you want them to play only in their own bedroom, or even worse, sell their guitar for a bicycle they hate to ride? You want your child to share his or her talent with everyone, and to be proud of what they can do.
So, what is your talent? What is your passion? What personal gift has God given you? And how can you use it? During our musical meditation today I ask you to think about these questions. Because God wants your heart to sing.
I'll end with this quote by Ernest Holmes "All nature is alive and aware with the Divine Presence, and everything in life responds to the song of the heart."
©Terry Paul Choyce. Used with permission from the author.
