Practice, Practice, Practice...

Psalm 33: Practice, Practice, Practice

There is a really old joke about a young musician that was asked to play in New York City. He had never been there before, so when he got to the city, he stopped an old man on the street and asked him, "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?".  The wise old man, just shook his head and quietly answered, "Practice, practice, practice."

One of the tasks I have set for my retirement days is to improve on my musical skills. When you play for worship, there is a certain anointing that comes. When all goes well, the anointing takes the various skills of the worship worship team and produces an atmosphere of praise and worship for the congregation. However, each musician must bring a certain amount of skill to the band to be able to blend into the whole worship experience. Now my problem is; musical skill requires practice, and there doesn't seem to be any anointing for practice!

I searched the scriptures, but the word "practice" is not used in the sense of repeating and exercising to improve a skill.  The closest I could find is in Hebrews 5 where it talks about the spiritually mature person practicing to be able to discern good and evil: 

Hb 5:12,14 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. ... 

14 But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.

Other scriptures encourage us to practice discipline, like an athlete preparing for a match:

1 Cor 9 26 Therefore I run in such a way, as not without aim; I box in such a way, as not beating the air; 27 but I discipline my body and make it my slave,

(See Lk 18:5)

The scriptures do talk about skillful musicians. For example, David was called to King Saul's palace because he was a skilled musician and his harp playing was able to sooth the king's bad moods.  

1 Sam 16:16b Let them seek a man who is a skillful player on the harp;...

1 Sam 16:23 So it came about whenever the evil spirit from God came to Saul, David would take the harp and play it with his hand; and Saul would be refreshed and be well, and the evil spirit would depart from him.

What it doesn't say is how David became a skilled player.  There are stories about how David watched the sheep and killed the lion and bear, but nowhere does it say that he practices playing the harp.  Certainly, he must have spent hours playing for the sheep. Now when you think about it, sheep would make a pretty good practice audience. They can't boo or hiss, they can only “baaa, baaa” their approval!  

This is not unprecedented in our times. One of my Bible teachers, Ern Baxter, was called to ministry as a young man in the wilds of western Canada. There were not many people there, so he practiced by preaching to the cows. He says he is not sure if any of them got saved, but they did listen intently! I'm sure David's sheep listened as well. I mean, what else did they have to do?

So, where does that leave us? I think we just have to assume that practice is required; it’s just one of those things you have to do. Some things require discipline and don’t seem to have any particular anointing until the end result is realized. My hope is that I will be able to keep at it and practice every day so that I will be able to play skillfully, and thus participate with the Psalmist in Psalms 33 as we participate in the eternal praise that flows up to the throne of God.

Ps 33:2-3 Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre;

Sing praises to Him with a harp of ten strings. 

3 Sing to Him a new song;

Play skillfully with a shout of joy.

Amen