{"id":155,"date":"2015-05-05T17:21:45","date_gmt":"2015-05-05T17:21:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?p=155"},"modified":"2015-05-05T17:25:44","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T17:25:44","slug":"gods-gift-of-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?p=155","title":{"rendered":"God’s Gift of Music"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Refuge<\/a>

Refuge Worship<\/p><\/div>\n

My son recently became a member of our church’s youth band.\u00a0\u00a0He was so excited<\/em> about the opportunity.<\/p>\n

Music has always been an important part of his life. He didn’t speak until after he was four years old, but he sang…a lot.\u00a0 Sometimes\u00a0the songs he sang gave us insight into how he was feeling.\u00a0 Sometimes they were just the ones he was repeating for the day. But\u00a0they always soothed\u00a0and relaxed him.\u00a0 And when it cam to his tantrums, music seemed to be the only way to help him calm down.\u00a0 I know I sang ‘Hush Little Baby’ thousands of times in those first few years.<\/p>\n

He has continued to sing throughout the years.\u00a0 He sings at home, at school, at stores, in the shower.\u00a0 There is a least one concert a night at our house.\u00a0 Fortunately for those of us in earshot, God gifted him with a beautiful voice.<\/p>\n

I love hearing him sing.\u00a0 And I have to admit\u00a0that whenever\u00a0I get to hear him sing in worship, I cry.\u00a0 I cry because his singing reminds me\u00a0of all the wonderful things God has done in his life.\u00a0 Here is a boy who lived and thrived when doctors weren’t sure he would.\u00a0 Here is a boy who not only sings, but speaks and communicates when doctor’s told us not to count on it.\u00a0 Here is a boy who wants to ‘lead others in worship’ when I was worried he wouldn’t understand being in a relationship with God.\u00a0 Here is a boy who, when he sings songs of praise, accepts the truth in the lyrics with an open heart of faith.<\/p>\n

So as he\u00a0sings in\u00a0worship, I thank God for\u00a0His precious gift and\u00a0pray that\u00a0I\u00a0learn to boldly sing His praises and accept His grace, love, and mercy with childlike faith just\u00a0like my son….<\/p>\n

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My son recently became a member of our church’s youth band.\u00a0\u00a0He was so excited about the opportunity. Music has always been an important part of his life. He didn’t speak until after he was four years old, but he sang…a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/V__C39F.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=155"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":165,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions\/165"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}