Ken Medema on music,travel,life.

Sunday, July 12, 2009

INTERLUDE


A dream come true.


Over the last 30 years or so I have sometimes thought about how wonderful it would be if musicians in the church had a place and a time to come together and just simply talk, play, learn, laugh, in other words all those things we never take time to do. I have always put these thoughts aside as impractical until just this year. Last fall, I spent a week with a few musician friends at a ranch near Houston. During that week, we did all those things that I have dreamed musicians could do together. We talked a lot, we played, we ate, we laughed, we shared ideas, we wept, we experienced early mornings and late nights together and left the gathering refreshed and renewed. Well, as we talked together there arose the idea of a Church Musicians' Mid-Career Retreat; a time of rest, refreshment, renewal, and recommitment to our lives and work.


Wonder of wonders--- it is happening this August. Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, is the place where 20 or so church musicians will gather for the first of what we hope will be many such retreats. We will be blessed with the presence of two facilitators to guide us along the way. Paula D'Arcy is a therapist, contemplative, and fabulous speaker and writer, and Tom Pace is the senior pastor of St. Luke's United Methodist Church in Houston Texas. These two will help us make our way through the three days of retreat where we hope to lay down our burdens, open our souls find new hope, renew our love for the task we are called to do and find some laughter as we go. If this goes as we hope it will, it will be the prototype of retreats in years to come. I have even dreamed that there would be several of these each year in various places around the country. I would love to see hundreds of church musicians given the opportunity for a few days of rest and renewal in a small intimate setting where one can get beyond casual conversation and musical posturing and into the business of seeing, loving, and helping each other.

I am really excited about this and probably will write about it a few times between now and early August when it will take place. As I write this, the song "Time" from my CD "Sea Change" comes to mind again and again.

"Time to feel a thousand new emotions, time to give myself in deep devotion, time for grief and time for pain and sorrow, time to rise and face my new tomorrow".

That's what I hope will happen for us in retreat and that is what I hope will happen for you sometimes during these days of Summer. Please find a little time to be renewed, to rest, to do nothing, to hear the birds, to feel the wind, to hold somebody longer than you think you need to.

1 comment:

  1. I am glad for you, Ken. Be refreshed and grow wiser. Go with God.

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