As a transferring Junior, I had less knowledge and clout than a Freshman. Consequently, the next 48 hours were packed with registration for whatever classes were left after three-fourths of the student body had chosen theirs; constantly getting lost; being late for just about everything. The experience left me frustrated and angry. So, when I heard students were gathering Tuesday evening at the Administration Building steps, I was primed.
I had seen my share of student demonstrations.
I was at the University of Michigan when Kent State occurred. What most saw on television in the aftermath of that debacle, I saw up close and personal; the angry response of colleges students across the nation.
So, on that Tuesday evening in Abilene, Texas, I made my way across campus to the Admin Building with an expectation. But, as a church-associated college, student assemblies at Abilene Christian were decidedly different than I had learned to expect from my first two years at a state college. There were no dramatic speeches, no fists thrusting skyward, and nothing was burned, in effigy or otherwise.
What there was ... was singing.
I love to sing. And I was immediately captured. I sat down on those old stone steps and joined my voice with the hundreds of others gathered there. At first, we sang traditionals, like "Amazing Grace" and "Be a Thou My Vision." But we quickly moved into songs I had never heard, simple melodies driven by great lyrics, but way too informal to have been included in a hymnal (then).
And that's when I first heard it.
I remember that girl's voice, lilting out from the comfortable silence, singing "It only takes a spark ..." Then hundreds of voices chiming in, "... to get a fire going."
"And soon all those around
can warm up in its glowing.
That's how it is with God's love,
Once you've experienced it.
You spread His love
to everyone,
You want to pass it on."
It went on like that, verse after verse. When it ended, I was different. I had stepped through a kind of doorway. I had thought my new life began two days earlier, when my family drove away. But I was wrong. Hearing “Pass It On” for the first time; that marks the true beginning of my ACC experience, and though I didn't realize it then, the real beginning to the rest of my life.
What I could never have imagined as that still-a-little-lost-but-starting-to-get-it college Junior, was that I would one day be friends with the author and composer of that song.
For almost a dozen years, now, it has been my privilege and blessing to worship, fellowship, study scripture, eat meals, and laugh with Kurt Kaiser. My family and I have enjoyed the moving music that flowed from his talented fingers during Sunday worship at DaySpring. But most significantly, to me, is that I’ve shared about 500 Lectionary Breakfasts with Kurt; 500 more intimate hours of prayer, Bible reading and discussion, food, fellowship, and laughter.
It has been a wonderful way to get to know a warm, humble guy who just happened to be one of the cornerstones of modern Christian music ... and a guy who brought about one of the major turns in my life.
It was at one of our Friday Lectionary Breakfasts that I heard Kurt say something that really stuck with me: "You can live your entire life by a wonderful lyric." So true. It’s no hyperbole to say that hearing and singing Kurt’s song that day in 1971 turned me in a new and unexpected direction.
Now, here we are, almost five decades later and Kurt Kaiser has left this world for the next. I will miss him squeezing my shoulder as he parted from us each Friday morning. I will miss getting lost in his playing as he worshiped the Lord with the gifts God gave him. And I will surely miss the way he could be so unexpectedly funny, causing us to erupt in laughter just at the moment we needed it most.
This week’s Lectionary scriptures are about praising, praying, singing, and incorporating our worship into our daily living. It’s almost as if God planned this week’s scriptures to help us celebrate Kurt’s love of the Lord. Hebrews 10:24 encourages us to “...consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds.” That’s what Kurt Kaiser did as he lived his life by the wonderful lyric that fueled it.
I think Kurt would want you, too, to discover your own wonderful life lyric, whatever will lead you closer to experiencing God’s love ... and then, I’m sure, he would want you to “Pass It On.”
_________________________
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 28 (33) (November 18, 2018)
https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu//
1 Samuel 1:4-20
1 Samuel 2:1-10
Daniel 12:1-3
Psalm 16
Hebrews 10:11-14, (15-18), 19-25
Mark 13:1-8
_________________________
This Friday will be our last DaySpring Lectionary Breakfast until the week following Thanksgiving (The “Egg and I” restaurant is expecting us at 8:00, this week, but not the Friday after Thanksgiving). Join us for our usual scripture, prayer, food, and fellowship.
Blessings,
Steve
No comments:
Post a Comment