Volume
I was nine years old when I unwrapped a most wonderful Christmas present—my first guitar! I immediately started taking lessons from a family friend who taught me the basics and launched me into a life-long love affair with worship. My passion has never been the guitar itself but rather the experience of creating the kind of environment where a spiritul community can experience God and one another together in a powerful way.
Although the acoustic guitar has always defined my musical comfort zone, it is the electric guitar that inspires my musical fantasies! One of the first things you learn about electric guitars is that there are essentially only two classic styles of instrument that every guitar maker emulates: the Fender Stratocaster and the Gibson Les Paul. The picture on this post is the Les Paul, my personal favorite.
There are four knobs at the base of the guitar—two for each pickup. One controls tone and the other volume. Among those four knobs lies a wealth of tonal possibilities. And this is where I’d like to pick up and continue the conversation from my last blog post on finding a new Story for the new year.
The guitar metaphor hit me forcefully a couple days ago, and it looks like this: We have two “pickups” in our lives that affect the tone of our souls. One pickup amplifies the sounds of the world around us—the circumstances, pressures, expectations, and values of our earthly environment; the other pickup amplifies the sounds of a much more profound reality that lies underneath all that noise. It represents the values, perspectives, and opportunities that Jesus called the “kingdom of God.” It was this kingdom reality that he came to earth to illuminate (Mark 1:15)…and it is this reality that we have the opportunity to embrace every day. If we can only hear its voice.
Within the normal, natural flow of our lives, the “volume” of this world’s perspective runs about a 10, while the more trustworthy kingdom perspective runs somewhere between 1 and 3. At least that’s the way I experience it most often. Which, by the way, is one of the many reasons that I am so passionate about taking spiritual retreats: because that environment almost effortlessly and automatically brings down the volume of the unreal and boosts the volume of the real. I need that recalibration constantly! Don’t you?
And that’s the question I’ve been pondering lately. We can only go on retreat so often, so how can we intentionally turn down the volume on all the distracting messages and turn up the volume on what is true and trustworthy? Read my ThriveTips below for some ideas.
ThriveTip
Try turning down the volume on this world’s values and perspectives this year by…
Setting firm boundaries around your work so that it doesn’t occupy your attention in the off-hours.
Spending less time on media and screens.
Setting aside the inner worry and scarcity that skew the true shape of things.
Becoming consciously aware of your breath, which allows the perceived urgency of circumstances to lose their hold on you.
Try turning up the volume on kingdom values and perspectives by…
Taking intentional time for silence, meditation, and prayer each morning.
Reading scripture and spiritual books that reinforce what is true.
Investing in time with spiritual friends who can help you interpret your story in a trustworthy way.
Incorporating Sabbath and retreats on a regular rhythm.
So what works for you in either turning down one volume or turning up the other? Please share it with our community.
Takeaway
Turn up the volume on what is true.