Three Bell Chime: My New Story

Wild Horse Canyon from the top of the hill.

Two weekends ago, I got to go back to Wild Horse Canyon for this year's Sunset Men's Retreat. I had enjoyed myself so much last year, that I knew I had to go again the following year. Then we found out Donald Miller was going to be the speaker (author of Blue Like Jazz). My excitement level began to rise. He's from Portland and I already had a few of his books. Jay, our worship leader, then asked if I could play for the weekend. Cha-Ching! So now, not only would I be able to hear a great speaker, I would also be able to serve during the event. The icing on the cake was that we got to go up to the camp a day early, hang out, and practice. It couldn't get any better than that.

The whole worship team, Pastor Ron and Donald Miller.

But it did. Don talked about how individuals like ourselves are in the middle of our own personal/faith stories and asked us, "What is the story that you are telling?" and that it all boiled down to asking ourselves who do we want to be/do and going for it. I was moved. Not to say that my story is all that bad, but there are definitely some areas that are rough around the edges. So I began to make a list... a list of all of the things I wanted to do. One thing stuck out. Song writing. For some reason, I felt it was time I stop writing for myself and start writing for God.

God must have been ready for me to give him the reigns. Other members in the team started saying they wanted to be a part of writing worship and making music to share with the church and possibly record. I don't know if I was ready for that but it's in full swing now. I'm just eager to see what happens. As Don said, there may be some conflict, fear, and doubt involved, but if you hang on to your story, God can do awesome things. Personally, I can't wait to see what happens.