28. Song

My 31 Free Writes for October play out like a serial love story in an old time magazine. It’s the saga of a young woman and how God leads her to the love of her life. Each day offers new developments in a romance only the Lord could write.

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Ah, the things you do for love.

People have climbed mountains for love.

Some have built magnificent palaces for their beloved.

Others have traveled for thousands of miles on their honeymoon so they can sing a song in a Bible School chapel service.

Starry eyed and enraptured by my beloved’s companionship, I agreed to a honeymoon road trip that would take us from suburban Chicago to Seattle and back in two weeks. That over 4,000 miles of uninterrupted company. We had lots of time to talk and see a vast portion of the northwestern states. And practice our song. The one we were scheduled to sing at his former Bible School in Seattle.

David came up with this idea of visiting some of his favorite places on the West Coast, maybe even singing at his alma mater’s chapel service. I was game for it. Anything to be close to my love. (I know, mushy-gushy….)

One of our common interests is music and singing. I’ve kidded with David that he can sing any other part but he has to leave the melody for me. He’d bounce between bass and baritone with a visit to the alto part just for fun. Mr. Trombone was used to harmony. I was trained as a soprano – strictly melody. This worked out perfectly for us.

We sang about God’s cattle on a thousand hills as we drove through South Dakota’s plains. Willie Nelson’s tune, On the Road Again, was the theme after each rest stop. Home on the Range and a ditty about tumbling tumbleweeds were crooned while crossing Wyoming and Montana. But we always would fit in a practice of the beautiful and relatively new song, There is a Redeemer, by one of our favorite Christian artists, Keith Green. Keith had passed away, along with two of his children and 9 other people in a terrible small plane crash that summer. I still miss him.

It’s true that a song can be enjoyed simply using the melody line, but it will get boring after a while. Why would the whole music department pump out just the melody and not use the entire gamut of harmonious variations possible with all instruments participating?

One vow we made to each other was to work together for unity in our marriage.  I’ll honestly say that it took a few years for me to understand that unity didn’t mean unison where both people sang the same note.

The beauty of a godly marriage is that God allows for a duet of differing parts to be rendered for the same song. We began to see how harmony augments melody.
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Our Johnson Opus #1 is still being written and refined. Swelling with dramatic overtones. Shushing to tender pianissimo undertones. Two parts agreeing in harmony with the Grand Designer of love and marriage to bring out the best in each other to the glory of God.
 
Ephesians 4:3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

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