I do not know why this is so.
We did not spend "summers at the seashore" growing up. I do not have any spectacular memories of significant events that happened there. In fact, I was thirteen before I even saw the ocean.
I think, for whatever reason, it is on the beach that I am able to hear the background music of my life - that carefully chosen tune that the Lord is directing and the Heavenly Host is playing.
The music is large and bold, deep and broad, and good.
The score.
It is what my heart wants, needs, to hear. The music that makes the body want to lift up arms and dance with reckless abandon. When I hear it, life some how all makes sense and the hard parts feel worth it.
It is the way I think, albeit even more deeply, that we are supposed to live everyday. The way we were created to live.
I have always been impressed with music written for movies. That a composer is able to write from the story and make the viewer's emotion match the storyteller's desire, is pretty amazing. The music in a movie tells us how to feel before the action even takes place. I think when Jesus says "abide in me" (John 15:9) and that "his sheep hear his voice" (John 10:3), it is because He wrote a musical score that we are meant to be listening to as we walk out our days. While our feet are on this earth, our ears are supposed to be listening to the Word. He tells us how we are to feel while our story unfolds.
It is turning down the volume of the rest of our lives in order to hear that song that is so, so difficult.
Psalm 89:15-16
Blessed are the people who know the joyful sound! They walk, O Lord, in the light of Your countenance. In Your name they rejoice all day long...
