Worth Remembering ...

If God brings you to it, He will bring you through it.
Happy moments, praise God.
Difficult moments, seek God.
Quiet moments, worship God.
Painful moments, trust God.
Every moment, thank God.

Starting the Trip to Go Full Circle.

Have you ever embarked on a journey, a working journey? One where you know you'll be back where you started from but everything will seem different because of what you learned while you were on that journey?

That's how I feel right now. I feel like there are jugglers inside of me and all their balls are in the air. I should be in bed. But I am so torn up inside over my decision about the worship team and trying out a different church. These are two really huge decisions for me. I just keep telling myself that they aren't permanent.

I also feel like I'm questioning a lot of things in my spiritual life. One of the questions I have I will be posting on my daily life blog because I have a more diverse readership over there.

I've also been reading a lot of different blogs of people who don't believe in God at all. In fact, they think that those of us who do are stupid and foolish. Yet, I read their writings and do not see any peace ... I only see hatred, anger, bitterness and sadness. They are blazing their trail of athiesm with the fire of their angry wit. I would not want to live my life that way.

I have to trust God that he will take care of me on my "questioning journey" and bring me back to the home of his arms after my mental travels.

Worship Team ... resolution?

Tonight I sent the following e-mail to the worship team leader:

Hi John, I've really been struggling lately with my health and energy levels. And, while I have immensely enjoyed being on the worship team, for now, it's just too much for me. I offer you a heartfelt apology because I feel like I'm letting you guys down. I hope you understand. I'm sorry ... Jeanette

This was so difficult for me. After I sent it, I sat here and cried for about five minutes. Have I ever mentioned that I intensely dislike change?

Yet, I really think God is calling me to attend a different church. There is a church (church 2) that has intrigued me for quite awhile. The thought of church 2 tickles my mind at intermittent intervals. I really feel a calling to try it out. If my intuition is wrong and I return to attending church 1 (and the worship team) then I haven't burned any bridges by "rocking the boat" and I can address the other stuff at a later date.

So, why do I feel like Seinfeld did when he tried out another barber? (sniffle)

Worship Team ... To Stay Or Go.

The first Sunday in August, I joined the worship team at church (Link). Making that commitment was a huge thing for me as I do not make or take my commitments lightly.

For the last month, however, I have been re-evaluating whether the decision to join was the right one or whether I should find another place to serve within the church.

Time Commitment -- The rehearsal time required seems to be growing by leaps and bounds. On Thursday nights there have been a couple of times when I arrive home around 11 PM. By way of justification, the team leader has been incorporating new songs, which adds to the rehearsal time. But, most of the rehearsal time is used by the band. They spend a lot of time fine tuning rhythm or chords. Necessary for them, but unnecessary for me. I'm just a vocalist. And, my energy level has not been that great lately and is practically gone at that time of night.

Favoritism -- We have a lead singer, *John. There are three back up vocalists, *Sam, *Ron and me. Then we have a keyboardist who also attempts to sing, *Linda. The other player in this scenario is *Kelsey, the sound guy.

*For anonymity, all names have been changed.

Because Linda's primary function is keyboards, she often sings intermittently and doesn't always pay attention to tone. Which means that she often sings off key. She's an alto and stretches for notes that are out of her range and usually hits them flat. The sound guy, however, mixes her nearly as loud as the lead singer. Because of my perfectionist nature this has, in all honesty, bothered me some.

Last night, however, the sound guy approached the back up singers (except Linda) and told us that we needed to take note of how John works his microphone and when we get "hot" vocally, we need to pull our microphones away. Then he looked at me and said, "You know, when you hit your high notes, pull the mic away." I said, "I do ..." (remembering specifically that there were a couple of occasions I had the mic at least 12" away from my mouth last service.) He then extrapolated about how last week we were hitting some high notes and it just "overpowered the sound system." He went on to say that he would turn us up in our monitor so that we could hear ourselves better, but we have to help him by working our mics and then he would help us. I didn't say anything more, thinking maybe he was right. It struck me as odd, though, that he was complaining about the strength of my voice when just three weeks ago they switched my mic to a more sensitive one so they could hear me better.

Emotionally, as a performer, I felt deflated and unenthusiastic throughout rehearsal. (Note: Do not critique a performer BEFORE they perform.) I also feel unenthusiastic and trapped by thoughts of future rehearsals and performances. I love singing but not in an unfriendly environment.

That feeling was not improved by the many gremlins and bugs we encountered throughout rehearsal last night. Our monitors were not calibrated properly and all we could hear were instruments and even those sounded like they were in a tunnel. John kept messing up the songs because he was so distracted by the bad sound. Nothing Kelsey did was able to fix the problem. In fact, Kelsey seemed rather apathetic to our requests to turn down the instruments and turn up our vocals.

I prayed all through rehearsal, trying to figure out what was going on. Is this an ego issue for me? Maybe partly. But, then, I'm oversensitive to that possibility, because when I joined I was afraid that I would have ego problems by doing this.

As I left rehearsal last night, I drove home listening to the CD of last week's service. To my ear, there was no point that mine or Sam's vocals were overpowering or over modulated. In fact, it was one of the best mixes I've ever heard of our group. The one thing that WAS noteworthy is that Linda's vocals were tempered to about the same level as the rest of the background vocals and at some points, her vocals were drowned out.

Did I mention that Linda and Kelsey are married?

The Decision -- I realize that we are singing for God's glory. However, to be the best we can be, I really think we need to work as a team on our sound. That means that the mix of the vocals should be precise and unbiased. I believe Kelsey's critique was unfounded, unwarranted and based on a personal bias towards his wife.

I'm meeting with Sam this afternoon to provide him a copy of last week's service. If he feels the same as I do after listening to it, I think the next step is to talk to John about how we feel. If nothing is resolved, it will be back to the prayer board to determine if the worship team is the right place for me to serve.

Warning: Fragile Heart

Have I mentioned that God is teaching me to trust?

Do you have any idea how difficult that is for someone who trusted someone with their tender heart and it was very badly abused? Yet, God keeps plugging away. Little pushes at a time.

Yesterday, mid-morning, my fiance and I had a conversation via telephone. I had received an upbeat voice mail from him and called him back to share excitement. He was at lunch with his parents and other people and he concluded the conversation extremely abruptly, making me feel as if he were blowing me off.

This wounded my heart, because he is not usually like that. The worst part of it was, that it reminded me of how I used to be treated by my X. But, even worse than that, I instinctively reacted the way I used to react with my X. I retreated into a place of loneliness and sadness. Gradually, anger took over, and I turned off all my phones. Then I became sad again.

Twelve hours later, I saw on my caller ID that my precious fiance had called. I called him back and he immediately knew something was wrong by the tone of my voice. I told him and we both started crying. I learned that he hadn't heard much of anything I had said because of our cell phone connections and the loudness of the restaurant he had been visiting. He had never, ever intended to hurt me. And, I realized I should have called him back immediately instead of waiting 12 hours. Then, I wouldn't have felt hurt all day and he wouldn't have felt bad that he didn't know I was hurt all day.

Isn't that how God wants us to interact with Him? Immediately coming to Him with our problems? Never waiting.

The more I trust, the more vulnerable I become. The lyrics to a Jewel Kilcher song come to mind as I sit here finishing this post. Ironically, the song is the same title as my post. Warning: Fragile Heart

Old Question. New Answer.

If one likes to be honest with people, how much of a struggle is it when you're having a down period and someone perkily inquires, "How are you today??"

I don't ever want to drag someone down and the overused answer of "fine" is hardly ever true. I have tried different variations of "alright", "okay" or "getting by." But those all create huge concerns to people that I don't necessarily want to share the nitty gritty of my life with. Yet, I still can't seem to answer "fine" just to get past them without seeming rude.

My latest attempt at answering this question is to name the day of the week. So, that conversation goes like this:

Greeter: "How are you today?"
Answer: "Well, it's Thursday."

Amazingly, this seems to inspire great waves of conversation. One woman actually replied to me the following:

Greeter: "Yes. Hey, it IS Thursday! Wow, just another day to the weekend! Thanks for the uplifting thought."

I kid you not. I figure next I'll move on to listing geography. This opens up so many more answers! Like this:

Greeting: "How are you today?"
Answer: "Oh, I'm feeling like Oklahoma today, I think."

But, then, yesterday I was inspired by an e-mail devotion I received. Why not quote scripture references? This might go like this:

Greeter: "How are you today?"
Answer: "Oh, I'm definitely feeling 2 Corinthians 4:8-11 today."

(sigh) Hmm. Well, we are supposed to be witnesses, right?

Everyone On Their Own Merit.

In my neighborhood it seems a lot of the children have become old enough to ride skateboards. It is an ongoing issue and seems to be gaining momentum. My home is on the corner of the entrance to the community, so there are a lot of cars that go past my home. Directly across the street from my home are a couple of stairs, kitty-corner from my home is a stairway of about 8 stairs and beside my home is a curb. For this reason, the area just outside my home is a very popular skateboarding destination for neighborhood kids.

The homeowner's association has declared skateboarding within the community to be against the rules and regulations. This very issue has been addressed repeatedly with no solution in sight. The skateboard wheels are destructive to the stairs. It is very noisy. It is a busy street and a car could harm them if they are hit.

I am perpetually going out and requesting the children move on and find another place to do their activities. Unfortunately, my requests are never well-received. They will circle around, wait five minutes and come back. Usually accompanied by a defiant "Why do we have find another place to play?" question. (sigh) So, the other day, I came up with The Grand Idea to take the violator's picture.

The kid whose picture I snapped the other day initially copped an attitude. Asking me why he wasn't allowed to skateboard there. Said I couldn't just take his picture. I responded with, you can't just skateboard there. He asked why not, I told him it was against the community rules. That there were signs posted. blah blah blah. I was frustrated and had, unwittingly, grouped all skateboarders into the pigeonhole of "nuisance".

I asked God to protect my home from vandalism and for guidance on how to handle this new challenge. A couple minutes later, the kids came back and rang my doorbell. At first, I wasn't going to answer, I hate conflict. But then I felt compelled to talk to them. As it turns out, I am so grateful that I did talk to them. I gained a new respect for them ... children on the brink of being teenagers. They had some valid points and we reached a mutual respect. I also learned that the neighborhood does NOT have signs, so even if we called the sheriff (as the community newsletter instructs us to do), they would not be able to enforce anything.

Skateboarding is not a crime. Skateboarders are not criminals. They are just kids trying to have fun. I need to try harder to not be the "mean-old-lady-who-lives-there". And, we need to have signs posting the rules. Just as we are all walking our path of life, these kids are learning their way, too.