Some families are musical. A friend’s five children all learned stringed instruments and now have their own chamber orchestra. Growing up we knew a family of nine, all of whom sang and played. They traveled to churches and put on lively, impressive concerts. Then there’s the Osmonds, the Cashes, the Jacksons and countless others, all musically gifted.

Our family is musical, too, although not quite like those above. But Nate and I attended more kid-concerts than we could count, and tonight I got to attend one more. Birgitta, our number seven, has always loved to sing and dance. She and our next-door-neighbor, Stefanie, formed their first group when they were eight and six, calling themselves the Cool Cats. They wrote their own songs and choreographed their own dances. My personal favorite was the duet, “Mazagine, Magazine!” Their brothers put written programs together and corralled audiences from the neighborhood.

Once these two were in high school, they tried out for the show choirs at Hersey High, hoping to parlay their childhood experience into a more professional gig. Both made it and were able to begin singing while dancing, in earnest. Tonight, although Birgitta is no longer a high schooler, we attended a performance of the boy-girl show choir group, “On Stage.”

(Birgitta in center)

Each past performance has been impressive as the kids danced aerobically while singing with gusto, never losing their wind. They’ve won endless awards and outdone themselves every year with each program more spectacular than the last. Although nothing like this existed when I was in high school, I wish it had. Never mind that my parents thought dancing was “worldly” and ought not to be done. I knew in my heart if Mom had found an acceptable way to dance, she would have.

It’s important to encourage kids in the direction they’re already programmed to go. The famous Scripture verse that says we should train up our children “in the way they should go” means exactly that. Some people say it means we ought to train our kids in spiritual things and when they’re old, they won’t turn away from God, but it makes sense the other way, too.

God creates each individual with talent, tendencies and desires. Birgitta wanted to sing and dance, and it’s been obvious from the time she was very young. Nate and I have been thankful for the creativity within her and tried to encourage her to develop it. Having a healthy outlet in the school show choirs, managed with excellence by those in charge, was exactly what she needed, being both athletic and imaginative. As people used to say about Ginger Rogers, she did everything Fred Astair did, but in high heels and backwards. The show choir kids did all that, and added risers.

If we encourage our children toward their natural bents, when they’re old, they’ll be glad they didn’t waste them. To use the talents God gave is to lead a satisfying life.

^“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22:6)

(2nd from left)

Jack and I are once again prowling the beach in a foot of snow. As I stepped over the top of the dune this morning, my boot sunk in deep enough to fill it, a chilly feeling. Nevertheless, the vista was gorgeous.

While we were in Florida, the monster snow mounds that had been so formidable have shrunk considerably. Although Mary and I confidently walked on the first two “ice-ranges”, we dared not venture out to three and four. Now the situation is more unstable than ever as Lake Michigan is again churning, eating away at the icy foundations under the snow.

Truth be told, the water beneath what appeared to be sturdy ice all winter was never stable. As we tentatively stepped onto what looked rock-solid, the ice could easily have turned into floating icebergs. Crevices and cracks in the surface that were visible clued us into what was happening underneath. As the local creek flowed from the woods toward the lake like it has for centuries, it ducked under the ice but never stopped flowing.

As Mary said at the time, “We see it moving in the woods, heading for the lake. It has to go somewhere, but where?” It was invisible.

Now, with the icy snow in mid-melt, we see. The water movement was no less real when it was invisible, but we doubted its reality. Massive chunks of glacier-like mini-cliffs are “calving” into the lake now, testifying to the state of flux that always existed. Mary was right. The water had been heading for the lake directly under our feet, gently, slowly, but steadily flowing. And moving water always carves away at what’s nearby.

Much of life is about the invisible. Emotions, thoughts, promises, the future. God, too, is invisible. After thinking about it, I’m inclined to believe the most critical part of life is what’s happening under the surface. Whatever’s going on beneath our outward exterior is the foundation of who we are. And interestingly, our unseen-ness eventually becomes seen.

If we cheat when no one is watching, eventually we get caught. If we overeat, even in secret, eventually we get fat. If we harbor hatred toward someone, eventually we explode. If we walk on ice with water flowing beneath it, eventually we fall in the lake. If we never spend time with God, eventually we’ll be far from him. Reality is about the “eventually”.

It’s so difficult for us to believe the invisibles. As my boot filled with snow and my foot got cold, I knew many people were walking around in flip-flops in climates that were sweltering. But when my feet were freezing, their warmth wasn’t real.

If we don’t believe in the invisibles, we’ll miss out on a great deal of what’s important. As for me, I still struggle with believing what I can’t see except for one thing. Long ago I decided to put my trust in the unseen God. Watching what he orchestrates on my local beach is enough to make me a believer. But there are other reasons I depend on him, like the many changed lives that are visible, people who make every move based on the personal lordship of that same God and then live victoriously.

As I paced through the weeks of Nate’s cancer last fall and now walk through the months of widowhood, my invisible God has sustained me and provided for me in a thousand visible ways. How could I ever doubt that he’s really there?

”Since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” (Romans 1:20)

There’s a passage in the Bible that tells the story of Jesus entering Jerusalem on a colt while his followers praised him as the Son of God. The Pharisees commanded Jesus to reprimand them, but he declined. He told them that would be useless, because “if they were quiet, the stones would cry out!”

During my last two days of travel (much of it through the Smoky Mountains), stones, rocks, cliffs and boulders were my companions. While driving through tunnel-like rock-cuts with walls of stone rising on both sides of the highway, I thought about that incredible statement of Jesus.

I’d absolutely love to hear the Smoky Mountains cry out their praise to the Lord. It would be a grand symphony unparalleled by the finest orchestra, and loud, too! Maybe as the winds blow through even now, words of praise are already tucked into the whooshing, but our ears are simply unable to hear them.

The imposing rock-walls all along the route are a geologist’s dream, since sedimentary rock has been laid bare by dynamite and cliff-shaving equipment. Layers of rock that lay buried for thousands of years are now exposed, decorated by waterfalls frozen mid-tumble. Most layers are skewed, having been heaved to and fro during the global flood of ancient times.

Another “rocky” Scripture tells us there will come a time on earth when people who’ve rejected God will realize their error and recognize his judgment coming. Their desperate plea will be to experience death under a rock slide rather than face God’s unfiltered wrath. However, if they saw the fifty foot deep rock slide covering North Carolina’s I-40 highway right now, they might withdraw their request. Workers say it’ll take six months to clear the fall-out of boulders that tumbled down, some as big as houses. Being buried there would be excruciating.

All of us can, at times, end up between a rock and a hard place, but calling out for rocks to come and crush us is something else again. The truth is, God wants no one to end up under a rock pile, especially not by personal request. He’d rather we join him throughout eternity in his celestial home, safely out of the way of rock-damage. There will be rocks in heaven though, because Scripture describes the walls of the heavenly city as being made of the best kind of rocks: jewels.

Anyone can be sure of living there one day. All that’s needed is to follow the example of the people who sang Jesus’ praises when he rode on that colt so many years ago. They acknowledged him as King of heaven and Lord of glory, which is the key that unlocks heaven’s gates to all of us.

Jack and I are home now, after adding 2524 miles to the Highlander’s odometer. But I won’t soon forget the beauty of the Smokys or the Lord of all stones. He not only controls the rocks, he is one:

“The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer. (2 Samuel 22:2)

“The whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God: …‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!’ Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, rebuke your disciples!’ ‘I tell you,’ he replied, ‘if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out’.” (Luke 19:37-40)

“Every man …said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb.” (Revelation 6:16)