Choir

 

Nadia painted this during art camp last week

"The only constant in life is change." From September 1986 to February 2020, I sang in an adult church choir. I lived in three different states during those years (Ohio, Maryland, and Pennsylvania) and attended churches from five different denominations (Baptist, Evangelical Free, Presbyterian, Evangelical Congregational, and Wesleyan). When I would consider churches to visit after I moved to a new area, I had a few things I wanted to know about the church before I'd visit it. One of those was whether the church had a choir. My favorite choir was the one I sang in from 1986-1990 and 1992-94. I loved the music the music pastor selected, the choir was large (around 100 people), and we were accompanied by a full orchestra (woodwinds, brass, strings, timpani drums, etc.). Most of the choirs have been much smaller than that. At one point I actually was the director of an adult church choir, but the vast majority of the time I've sung alto (first alto when the altos split). There have been many differences in how the conductors have lead each choir. Some included a time for sharing prayer requests and some haven't. The worship arts pastor who has been my director for the past 7 years had two choir members alternate sharing a devotional at the end of the rehearsal. Some directors spend almost the whole rehearsal working on just one or maybe two pieces of music. Others (such as the woman who was my director from January 2009 to May 2014) had us practice MANY different pieces of music in each rehearsal. Each director has had something different that they spent a lot of time focusing on. The woman I just mentioned really focused on "messy s's" meaning words that ended with an "s" - making sure we cut off at the same time or attaching the final sound of one word to the first sound of the next word. My current director often mentions unifying our vowels (which sound to emphasize in diphthongs). I've been accustomed to singing once a week on a Sunday morning during the school year, having a rehearsal on Wednesday night, and presenting a cantata of some sort at Christmas and Easter. That was something I've missed the past 7 years as we've only sung one song on Sunday mornings - no special programs (cantatas). 

Oliver in the Friends' church building in Sturbridge

It seems at least for now that my time singing in a choir has come to an end. I have confidence that I will be able to do it again in the future, but I think it might not be for another nine years. Sob! Our senior pastor retired two months ago. Our new senior pastor decided that the choir would only sing once a month. There have been many Bible studies I've been interested in joining on a Wednesday night over the past 7 years, but I didn't because it conflicted with choir rehearsal. If the choir is only singing once a month, I would rather be in a Bible study on Wednesday nights. From 2004-2008 I played in a handbell choir and sang in a choir. From 2004-2012 I was asked to play my flute many times at church either to accompany the handbell choir or the choir or as a soloist. I've never played the flute at our current church. Singing in the choir was something I enjoyed musically, spiritually, and emotionally. It also was one of the ways that I could serve in a ministry. I'm trying to figure out how to fill those voids - a musical outlet of some sort and also another ministry to serve in. I considered offering to teach an adult Sunday School class starting in October, but then I found out that Bruce, who had been my SS teacher from 2012 until COVID, is going to resume his class in September. My areas of ministry the past 7 years had been helping in the children's ministry and singing in the choir. I stepped down from the children's ministry in February for another reason. If our kids were younger, I think we would be switching churches right now. That's how highly I value being able to sing in a choir, but Nadia's friends are almost all at this church. Presuming that Ian and Oliver develop friendships with kids at church over the coming years, I don't think we'll switch churches until Oliver graduates from high school. If that doesn't happen, then maybe we'll switch in five years when Nadia graduates. I really, really hope that church choirs don't become a thing of the past.

My observations have been that #1 governments almost always only get bigger over time and #2 when churches eliminate or decrease a program in some way, it rarely ever comes back. One of the reasons that Coolidge is one of Paul's most favorite Presidents is because he actually did take actions to reduce the size of the government. When I was growing up, we went to church on Sunday mornings, Sunday nights, and Wednesday nights on a weekly basis. Over the years I've noticed that many churches have eliminated Sunday nights and Wednesday nights, and also many people only go to the worship service on Sunday morning rather than Sunday School and the worship service on Sunday morning. I haven't attended Sunday School for 17 months due to COVID. I'm grateful that will be resuming in the fall. We've been attending the second service, but I think we'll switch back to attending the first service in the fall and then the kids go to the youth service (N/I) and Oliver can go to Kidzway during the second service while I attend Sunday School. Nadia and Ian attend youth group at a different church on Sunday night and at our church on Wednesday night. Whether Oliver attends AWANA at the Alliance Church or the midweek Kidzway program at our church will depend on where I end up attending a Bible study on Wednesday night. Speaking of choirs, my kids sang in choirs since they were four until COVID. Nadia and Ian sang in the Susquehanna Valley Youth Chorale in the fall of 2019. When COVID hit, Nadia was in the middle school chorus at Meadowbrook Christian School, I was in our church's adult choir, and Ian and Oliver were in the kids' choir at our church. Ian is now too old for our church's kids' choir. I haven't heard if the kids' choir will be resuming at our church or not. If it does, Oliver might be the only member of our family in a choir.