Music Prayers

The other day I had a great conversation with Mark Schultz. We talked about his family, his world tour, and why he always writes songs that make us all cry, but the reason he called me up was to let me know that he had just finished recording his very first instrumental album. (Many of you know that Mark is a very gifted pianist.) I was like, "Wow Mark, instrumental? You have such a way with words, why would you want to take them out of the music?"

He said, "Well, ya' know when I get a couple of extra minutes I like to sit down at the piano and, before long I'll poke out a melody that begins to well up so much emotion inside that I feel like the piano is a part of me... like an extension of who I am."

I bet that those of you who play an instrument  understand exactly what he means. I sure do. A piano player myself, I can feel the energy of God flow through my body, down my arms, into my hands, and through every fingertip; on its way to making a joyful noise that gives glory and honor to HE who makes it all possible.

VERY Long Story Short: When I was young I was sick. And ever since I've been better, one lasting side effect of that has been my ability to recall words. It's very difficult to say exactly what I feel and think of words that I want to use. For some reason the words don't come to me. So I shared this with a pastor back in college and he told me to think of it like this: "You are an artist... words are too limiting"

Since then, I like to play what I call music prayers. A music prayer is when you don't say anything, but just play music and speak to God though each note and progression. Music is such an expressive art, You can say so many things depending on volume, intensity, speed, style, pitch, expression, and the list goes on and on.

Try to play a Music Prayer this week. It doesn't have to be an improvisation. Maybe to start,  pick a piece of music that you like to sing, but just play the music. Concentrate on each note and let each one be a word in your music prayer. Let me know how it goes by commenting on this blog post. It might take a few tries to find your prayer style, and that's Ok! Grab your guitar, piano, saxophone, drum set, violin, harmonica, trumpet, what ever it is that you play,...and pray. I find that sometimes it's much easier to say exactly what I want to say, by not saying anything at all.

Cody Collier is a graduate of Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA and serves as Worship Leader at Goshen First Church of God in Goshen IN, and as Midday Radio Host at Family Friendly 104.7/93.7 WFRN.