I took years and years of piano, but you would never know it.  I labored under the direction of a very strict “hair in a tight bun, runners on the carpet, plastic covering all the furniture, can’t use my bathroom” type teacher.  Piano playing represented pain and fear to me, instead of joy.  I was terrified to make a mistake.

As I write, I’m listening to solo piano music – my favorite background for writing.  And I am amazed.  Hearing them play so effortlessly and beautifully soothes my soul and leaves me in awe.  A huge part of me wishes I could do that.

I tried.  I really did.  But it wasn’t my natural gifting.  And the fact that the fear of my teacher’s scolding made me tremble every time I touched the keys didn’t help.

God gave us all gifts and abilities.  I have only in my forties begun to discover mine.  Up to that point, I struggled to do what I thought I should do, what others were doing.  Somehow in that process I always felt that anything I did was a disappointment – to me, to God, to others.  I saw God as I saw my piano teacher – waiting for me to make a mistake, to reprimand me and tell me how poorly I was doing.  As a result, life, like piano, was a daunting chore of trying to get it right.

But that’s not God’s design.  He’s our Father. He knows so well the gifts and abilities that He’s so graciously given us.  And He wants us to use and enjoy them and to encourage others through them.  When we discover and experience that, there is an indescribable joy inside that bleeds out all over our lives and the lives of others. And God smiles…

Stop trying so hard.  Take a moment and listen.  Those desires and passions in your heart?  God put them there to be used and grown.  They are a part of who you are.  And when you start living life as God designed you, there is a whole different reality that begins to happen.  You realize you are doing exactly what you were created to do.     Others respond to it.  It flows out of you naturally.  It helps and encourages others and draws people’s attention to the God who put those things in you.  And that is an unbelievably good place.

Walk away from your “piano” and find out how to really “play”…

1 Peter 4:10 – Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms. 

Romans 12:4-6 – Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us.