I grew up in a house full of music. My mother was a professional musician above all things, including all things domestic. Every house we lived in looked exactly the same inside, every piece of furniture and even down to the thirty-year-old dusty-blue curtains that somehow never managed to ever get hemmed. Furniture served nothing more than to populate the room. What really filled the interior spaces in our home was music. Most mornings I awoke to the squawking and screeching of violin lessons in the living room, resounding throughout the house like an unwelcome alarm clock. Nothing is more annoying at dawn than the attempts of a beginning violin student. All day the music continued. I can vividly remember the fullness of the Hallelujah Chorus often embracing me as I came in the front door after school. Late, late at night, even when my three teenage brothers and I were asleep, there was the haunting sound of a violin, so faint that it bordered on imagination. Mom would get up in the middle of the night and often hid in the bathroom to practice and play her violin, thinking that the exhaust fan would block out the sound. But we all heard it, and I am sure that her never-ending scales and sonatas were woven indelibly in our dreams.
And so, it is no surprise that when our granddaughter was an infant, I would sing her to sleep with a soothing repetition of hymns. I would walk her up and down the hallway, hoping to lull her into a nap. She would lay perfectly still, but when I changed songs, she would wiggle around in my arms until I would go back to her familiar hymns. And I imagined that someday, when exposed to an obscure melody, she will wonder how she knows that song, a familiar tune and those powerful words. The truths and the melody entrenched in her mind and heart will not emerge as a bit of nostalgia, but as the power of a hidden tune.
Music engraves such deep impressions that I can still remember lyrics to songs I learned as a little child, Bible verses set to music, and pieces so majestic I would close my eyes and swim in the depths of worship. Listening to an organ with all stops open always made me feel like standing in the midst of a mighty river, its currents plunging me into the very awe of God.
What is stowed away in the human heart works its way to the surface in times of need. In the Evidence Not Seen, Darlene Deibler Rose narrates the story of her captivity in a Japanese concentration camp, where she was held in solitary confinement. Day after day, surviving in horrific conditions, Scripture verses, the great hymns of the faith, and even Sunday School songs came back to her that she had learned decades before as a little girl. “One by one, He pulled Scripture passages out of the storehouses of my memory, to remind me that they had been hidden there for just such a time as this,” she wrote.
We can never know what lies ahead, but we can be assured of what lies beneath, His steadfast love and everlasting arms supporting us. And in those darkest of nights and bleakest of landscapes, may God’s Word – hidden in your heart, engraved in your mind – emerge into your thoughts like mountains singing and majestic trees clapping their hands. And even in your wanderings, may a sacred melody or a praise song get stuck in your head, repeated over and over again, His Presence that cannot be denied or forgotten, unshakeable and secure, wrapped up in the mystery of music.
And in such a time as that,
may you see and hear nothing at all,
but His voice tucked away,
strengthening and encouraging,
resounding with comfort even when no one else
can realize your joy
or hear those embedded tunes.
Make a joyful noise to the LORD,
all the earth!
Serve the LORD with gladness.
Come into His Presence with singing.
Psalm 100. 1-2
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