Magazine for September 2011
Playing our part
II have just finished a rehearsal where I played twenty four consecutive bars that consisted of the note “D”. No fancy rhythms, no octaves, just twenty four bars playing the same note, each one the same length as the previous one.
Well I ask you, is this fair? The saxophones get the tune – in fact everyone else gets the tune apart from me and the percussion (they don’t do tunes anyway but they do get exciting rhythms). But if the incessant drone of my part is removed, is the music just as good or is something missing? If I weren’t there then I would be missed.
I and my bassoon help provide texture and underpin what is going on elsewhere in the band. Much as I would like to have the tune, the music would be much poorer without me.
This of course is what Saint Paul was talking about in his letter to the Corinthians when he talked about the parts of the body. Some are glamorous and others are less so. Your big toe may not be the most attractive part of your body but it is critical to balance and movement. Some have a gift for preaching and others have a gift for leading worship. But many of us have less exciting but equally important gifts such as the gift of encouragement or the gift of helping. Many have the gift of just getting on with things and making sure that routine items have been sorted out without necessarily realising the value of what they are doing.
Humility in our actions is one of the greatest gifts. In the Gospels we read how Jesus washed his disciples’ feet. Can we have any greater example of how to live and how to serve irrespective of the recognition we receive?
David Bradshaw