David Ennis piqued the music team this morning with a story from the Washington Post titled Pearls Before Breakfast. Check out this premise: they induced one of the finest violinists in the world, Joshua Bell, to set up shop at a D.C. Metro station — incognito — and play as if he were your average street musician. The Post described it this way:
No one knew it, but the fiddler standing against a bare wall outside the Metro in an indoor arcade at the top of the escalators was one of the finest classical musicians in the world, playing some of the most elegant music ever written on one of the most valuable violins ever made. His performance was arranged by The Washington Post as an experiment in context, perception and priorities — as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?
The short answer: nope. One of the best violinists in the world, playing a $3.5 million Stradivarius, left the crowds utterly unfazed. They asked some who passed by why they didn’t stop to listen and the answers were predictable: too busy, afraid of getting roped into giving money, more interested in the Lotto machine…
This got me thinking of a similar “experiment:” what if the God of the universe came to Earth — incognito — and lived a perfect human life. Would anyone notice? Would anyone be moved? Would anyone be swept away by the greatness that condescended to move among them?
Our capital wasn’t moved by a musician; neither was Jerusalem moved by God in the flesh…
And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.” (Luke 19:41-44)
Jeremiah found Jerusalem much the same in his day, too:
You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear, although the Lord persistently sent to you all his servants the prophets, saying, “Turn now, every one of you, from his evil way and evil deeds, and dwell upon the land that the Lord has given to you and your fathers from of old and forever…” (Jer. 25:4-5)
So we mustn’t think that the world will incline to our message as ambassadors for Christ — not without the Holy Spirit giving them ears to hear the Gospel.
At the end of the day, all we can do is model ourselves after the best violin player in the world.
Joshua Bell took up a place in the world and made the sweetest, most beautiful music he could. And he loved doing it — not because it was well-received, but because he loved the music he was playing.
Our job is to take up a place in the world and proclaim the sweetest, most beautiful news we’ve ever heard: God saves sinners. And we love doing it — not because it will be well-received, but because we love the One who saved us.
Well said, Hugh.
I love the illustration.
Doug Groothius just posted a related analogy. He compared listening to a favorite jazz musician in his car to listening in his study with headphones. He missed much of the subtlety and beauty amidst the noise and distraction of the car. This music could only be appreciated when he could hear all of the subtlety and nuance.
His point makes me think about the need to precisely define terms and make careful distinctions in how we relate Gods sovereignty to evil, as we saw in the Q&A period after Greg’s talk yesterday.
I think you truncated Groothius a paragraph too soon. He continues with a great question:
Great question. It’s easy to leave people hearing nothing but a “noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” Leaving them prostrate before the truth and enraptured by the joy and beauty of heaven — in a warm, attractive, and inviting sort of way — is far more difficult.
Yeah, on his recordings you can hear Monk making odd noises and such as he plays — just something he naturally did. At first I thought it was farm animals in the background.
John Coltrane described the difficulties of playing with Monk:
Since guiroo took the left turn, I will follow. It seems to me Doug Groothius has not listened to all of Joe Satriani’s catalog, although I do appreciate a jazz fan being willing to even recognize Joe as a musician. 😉
For Doug to characterize Joe as a heavy metal instrumentalist whose music does not call for active listening is simply not true. We have a case here where the entire context of Joe’s catalog is not being represented by Doug’s comment (proof texting anyone?).
For those that don’t know Joe. here’s just a sample of Joe’s songs in need of intense listening to get all the nuances of the performances (from the iTunes store):