"Lord, make me an instrument of your peace."
It is a blistery day here on the mountain at Sewanee. The leaves are changing and the trees creak all around us. My robe blows behind me on my way to the simple eucharist and I feel a little like Charlton Heston as Moses at the sea in Cecil B DeMille's The Ten Commandments. As I sat in the Chapel of the Apostles I attempted to center myself but kept being distracted by the sound of the organ. It is necessarily to make known at this point that no one was sitting at the organ console, nor was it turned on. As the service progressed I noticed the large doors to the chapel kept swinging open. The strong winds were whipping around the chapel and causing the doors to open and close periodically. These small bursts of wind would enter the chapel and swirl to the rafters. On their journey some would make its way into the organ pipes, causing the mechanism to sound.
I sat contemplating this phenomenon and felt a strong comparison to my own life. The spirit of God is often described as a breath, as in Genesis or as a mighty rushing wind as in the book of Acts. I was drawn to put myself in the place of the organ. As an amateur organist myself I love controlling those mechanism. Opening and closing the stops to force certain sounds and timbres from the instrument. In this I am controlling the creation, the development of the melodies and harmonies of the music. What would happen if I were to allow myself to be like the organ today? Not in control but being completely reactionary to the wind that passes by and flows through. What would happen if I were to let go and let God make his music in me?
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, harmony;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen
