Original

Made with Mr. Sketch Scented Markers! Tweaked in Photoshop. Lean in real close and you can smell it….

I didn’t mean for this to look like the cover of Tell Another Joke at the ol’ choppin’ block. But that is one of my favorite pieces of artwork. I guess it’s in my subconscious.

This morning I was reading the parable of the talents in Matthew 25. I was thinking, what was so wrong with that guy who was scared and buried his master’s money in a hole, what was the big deal? I sat there and started to analyze it, and I realized why his master called him wicked and lazy and cast him away. It was because he let his life be paralyzed by fear. He had the same master as the other two slaves, and he was given the same substance as them (money). But he did not have the same understanding as they did. He did not know his master. He saw him as cruel, hard, unfair, unjust. And rather than take the chance on doing something that might displease the master, he did absolutely nothing. He was scared and lived his life in passivity for fear of failure. Unfortunately, I can really relate to this man. I’ve been timid in many areas, and rather than take a chance and doing something, so many times I’ve taken the easy way out and avoided the consequences of possible failure by doing nothing. Especially when it comes to my creative dreams. For years and years and years the desire has been growing stronger in me to create music. I’ve been playing rhythm guitar for church most of this time, and it’s not satisfying my desires. I want to create music of my own, that expresses what’s in my heart. It’s not enough to sing someone else’s lyrics, to play their chords. There’s something new within me. I found a keyboard synthesizer at a music store that I want. I’ve been drooling over it in my mind. I fantasize about it every day. It can do anything. It can sound like anything, record, sample, sequence, it’s the top of the line. I totally can’t afford it at all. And I’ve been thinking, I will start making my dream come true when I can afford this thing someday. Then, and only then, I will be able to truly express myself, write beautiful, powerful music. When I get this keyboard. It’s going to be great. Someday. This morning after reading that parable I realized I have been waiting on a pipe dream to do what God wants me to do. Why can’t I do what I’m supposed to do now? Why does it have to be way off? And I had a change of heart. I want to start now. With what I have in my house. It may not be much, but I have an instrument. I have my guitar. Maybe I should just (and this is a new idea for me) learn how to play it better….maybe um…practice? A little? Maybe I can learn to use this thing I already have, instead of thinking it’s not worth much. And I started to get excited about it for the first time. And I looked at it in its case and I thought, wow, I have an Instrument! Not just some thing I carry back and forth to church, but an Instrument! And when I took it out, it looked different to me, and it felt different, like something I had never seen before, and I started to play it, and it sounded different too. And I thought, wow, maybe I can play this thing unto God, and I realized that even one note played on one worn-out guitar string is more blessed than an amazing song written on something that I don’t have, because once I have it, I would want something else. And I don’t want to be discontent. I want to use what I have…….then I started thinking about an upright bass, and how intriguing they are, and wondering how I could get my hands on one of them, and maybe if I had one of those I would practice all the time…..Oh my.