I grew up in a small town, but I never saw myself staying there for long. I spent my childhood impatiently waiting for the moment I could trade the boring, slow movement of rural america for the rush of a bigger city; the twangy banjo music at the county fair for stadium concerts with rock stars and concert halls filled with classical music and musicals; the boring clothes from Sears and JC Penney for … ok who am I kidding? I’ve never been good at clothes. But I digress.
My tastes and thoughts have always leaned toward the modern and new or the ancient and grand, or at least toward amenities that weren’t available in northwest Ohio. So you can imagine my shock as I’ve entered into my middle age and my favorite band is a bluegrass group called Nickelcreek. Brian and I discovered them when I went to the MusicNow Festival at Music Hall a few years ago and Chris Thile, one of the members of Nickelcreek, was headlining a performance. I was there to hear something else the symphony was playing. I don’t even remember what it was now, because I went home with Chris’s virtuosic mandolin playing in my head, searching through his career on Google to listen to every recording with every group he’s played with.
The thing about Chris Thile is that he has a brilliant knowledge of traditional music, and traditional bluegrass music, and can play it flawlessly. But he also understands at a deep level that music, like so many other things, is living and breathing and continues to evolve and grow. He is able to play bluegrass just like it was played a hundred years ago or a Bach partita on the mandolin instead of the violin, but he chooses to use those as starting points to move forward and create new music with the old building blocks. He shucks the parts that don’t make sense anymore or that impede progress. Because of that, I have a new appreciation for older bluegrass, the twangy county fair stuff, because I can see where it can go in the future. I have a renewed appreciation for Bach because I see how I can use those pieces to create something new.
As we listen to Jesus’ parables and see him pull the rug out from under the elders of his time, we hear him take the old testament law to their natural conclusion and then use the building blocks to create something new. The basic tenets of one God who loves us and created us are still there, but there is a new major guiding principle: if any of the laws are getting in the way of loving each other, you should love each other first and ask questions later. “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this, all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35
It is amazing that 2,000 years later, this still feels modern and forward-thinking. Many of us have spent the last two millennia debating what the Bible does and doesn’t say about various rules and regulations, causing wars and genocide and personal turmoil for thousands of people. In the end, it is much simpler, and feels better, too, to listen to the clear words Jesus said. “Love one another.” As Paul explained to the Romans, “Love is the fulfillment of the law.”
Yours in Christ,
John Johns, Music Director