My favorite Sunday of the year, Easter is about life and joy and defeating death. It is about family and friends and music. We enjoyed Easter music today that included at least six brass instruments. Those serve to lift the music up to another level.
As a non-singer, I have always been intrigued by musical harmony. I certainly know how to read music and play the piano, but I do not know how to read the notes and make my voice hit that sound! That is a complete mystery to me! I sometimes wonder if I had had lessons in chorus as a youngster if that would have made any difference.
I always equate musical harmony with heaven! It is not that I think all choir members are saints. I somehow doubt that. But put them all together with a talented director and accompanist, and what you get is the closest I've ever come to experiencing the "heavenly host", as I imagine them to sound.
People have a tendency not to always get along. They criticize one another. They go to war. They abuse. They bully and shoot and hurt in ways too countless to name.
But put peoples' voices together in musical harmony, and you have got something very heavenly. There is just something majestic and glorious about the blending of male and female voices, sopranos, bass, tenor, alto, all singing their parts.
Today's singing included an antiphonal introit. It included singing Handel's Messiah (pictured above). Members of the congregation are always invited to join in, if they wish, and many do.
When one focuses on their part, and sings their note, the whole is infinitely grander than the individual parts.
I imagine that is the potential that God sees in humanity. And I am confident that the potential harmony will become a reality in the next realm.
If nowhere else on earth, heaven is embodied in the music.
Happy Easter. He is risen indeed!
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