I Corinthians 12:4-26; Genesis 2:4b-7
It is all about air–breath, wind. It is all about the intentional, focused movement of air to create a sound.
It is such a gift this morning to have our guest musicians with us. With the exception of the timpanist, these musicians make music by focusing their breath, by exhaling through pursed lips to create a vibration, which is then magnified by their instruments. The shape of the pathways through which the air travels determine the kind of sound the instruments make. The trombonist lengthens and shortens the pathway by moving his slide, changing the pitch. The french horn player and trumpeter depress and release valves to change notes. All of them adjust the pressure of the air and the shape of their lips to change sounds and pitches.
These musicians and their instruments are remarkable. They take something ordinary–breath–and focus it with intentionality to make beautiful music. Thank you for being here, and thank you for choosing to focus your breath to inspire us today.
Our organ makes music in much the same way: through the intentional, focused movement of air to create vibrations that move through pathways. What is different is that the complexity and also the possibilities are multiplied exponentially. Trumpeters can vary the sound by changing the length of the pathway, the intensity of the air or the shape of their mouths–but they are limited to one pathway. Cheryl is working with multiple paths–using a combination of keys and pedals and stops to open certain passages and close others. As a result, she can make the organ sound like a french horn or a flute, or even like an entire orchestra.
Another difference is the source of the air. It does not come from human breath; instead it comes from human ingenuity, taking the air that is around us all the time and focusing it to create vibrations. According to Wikipedia, the first pipe organ, in the third century BCE, used water pressure to force air into the pipes. Five hundred years later, the water pipes were replaced by an inflated leather bag. Around the 7th century CE, bellows began to be used.
While early organs did not rely on human breath, they probably caused plenty of humans to be out of breath, as it was exertion that kept the air moving. A 14th century century organ in Baberstadt, Germany, which had twenty bellows to move the air, required ten men to operate them. Eventually, the bellows began to be powered by steam engines, and then were replaced by wind turbines run by electric motors.
There is no one in our basement manually compressing the air to make our organ run. There is only Cheryl at the console, using her feet and her hands, her head and her heart to shape the way the air moves through an elaborate combination of pathways to create beautiful music. Thank you, Cheryl, for offering your skill, passion and dedication to inspire us.
There’s one more instrument we are using today: the human voice. Like the trombone and the pipe organ, the human voice makes sound by focusing air–or breath– to create vibrations that resonate through a pathway. The vibration happens primarily in the larynx, the voice box. The muscles of the larynx adjust the length and tension of the vocal folds–or vocal chords–to create the vibration needed for a desired sound. The tongue, cheeks, lips and palate work together to shape that passageway through which the vibration travels.
One thing that distinguishes the human voice from these other instruments is that this incredibly complex process of creating sound is largely instinctual. Babies know how to cry. By the time they are toddlers, they make infinitesimal adjustments in their vocal folds and the shape of their mouths to imitate sounds they have heard. We don’t have to make a conscious decision to pull a stop or step on a pedal. When things are working well, our bodies know what to do.
In choir practice, with Rick’s guidance, we bring these unconscious processes to conscious awareness. We practice breathing in ways that make our sound more full. We raise our soft palates to shape the space through which the vibration moves, in order to create a warmer sound. We bring an additional layer of intentionality as we focus our breath to make music. Thank you, Rick, for teaching us to raise our soft palates; thank you choir, for breathing deep and making beautiful music.
The organ is remarkable in its complexity–so many pipes and stops and pedals to create so many possible sounds. The human voice is remarkable both in its complexity and in its flexibility. The organ can make so many different sounds because it has so many different pathways through which to direct the air. The human voices makes so many different sounds by making small but elaborate adjustments to a single pathway.
I am in awe of the human body, and our Creator. I am inspired by the human ingenuity that used copper and wood and leather to create this glorious organ. And I am amazed by the beauty and majesty of the music we make when we bring all our instruments–brass, organ and voice–together.
Awe. Inspiration. Amazement. And there is more. In the book of Genesis, God creates a human being from the dust of the earth, then breathes life into this creature. The Hebrew word used here for breath–ruach–is also the word used for spirit. Our ancestors in faith recognized a deep connection between breath (or air or wind) and spirit. Our insights into the way air is used to make music point us to truths about how the Spirit moves in our lives.
In I Corinthians, Paul compares the way the Spirit resides in community to the human body–different parts that need each other. It’s only a short leap from there to seeing the pipe organ as a metaphor for the spirit in community. If we decide that the flute stop is the best one and allow it to dominate, we turn this magnificent instrument into a poor substitute for an actual flute. If we decide some keys aren’t necessary, our capacity for melody is constrained.
To make beautiful music, we need every stop and every key and every pedal working together in harmony. We need each one to lead at certain times, and we need each one to back away to allow another voice to soar. Like an organ, our church community is a complex system, with intricate relationships and potential both for discord and for glorious music.
If we as a community are like a pipe organ, and if the Spirit is the wind that moves through us to create our music, who is the organist? Since we are a faith community, we immediately answer “God.” What does that mean? We say the only feet and hands God has are ours. How do we use our hands and feet, our wisdom and insight, to make music with this instrument that is our church? We try to discern how God would have us work together. We study scripture, with special attention to Jesus’ teaching and actions; we slow down to listen for the holy voice deep within us; we come together to listen for community wisdom. To be God’s hands and feet playing this amazing organ which is our church requires skill and passion, dedication and practice.
The church community as a pipe organ. It is an apt metaphor. Like all metaphors, it ultimately falls short. It’s easy to conclude that, if the church is an organ, each of us must be a single pipe or stop or pedal, capable of playing one note, gifted with one spiritual gift we are called to use. God’s Spirit, though, is much more generous and much more dynamic than that. The Spirit blesses each one of us with many gifts, some which appear readily, some which require attention and care to develop, some which awaken when we least expect them.
In order for an instrument to use air to make music, it must focus that air in an intentional way. And so it is with us. God’s Spirit moves in and around us always. We are called to be intentional in how we focus the spiritual gifts we have been given.
Just yesterday, Mary, Bettina, Rick, Nicola, Bill, Ted and others I didn’t see focused their gifts of the spirit to care for the earth, at Framingham Earth Day. Heather, Kelly and Gabe focused their passions to get more than 133 guns off the streets and out of homes in Framingham, volunteering at the Gun Buyback Day. Cindy and Fran directed their acting gifts to creating a more inclusive world as they performed at the Awakenings Conference in Holyoke. Today, how will you receive the gifts the Spirit offers you? How will you intentionally focus them to bring hope, justice and beauty to our world?
We are talking about the organ today because this amazing instrument needs restoration in order to make the best music it can. In order for us to use the gifts the Spirit gives us, we too need restoration–time to care for our bodies, minds and spirits, time to look within, time to learn new skills, time to relax. That is one reason it is so good to be in community–we can take turns singing and speaking and working for justice, so that each of us can be restored in order to offer the best of our gifts.
Together, we are like a pipe organ, an intricate, robust instrument that combines our multiple gifts to create glorious music of hope. Individually, each of us has many gifts of the spirit, and we are called to focus those gifts intentionally to bring love, justice and hope to our world. We all need restoration, and because we work together, we can each take time to care for ourselves.
It is all about air–breath, wind–ruach. It is all about Spirit–the Spirit that moves through our organ and our voices to make beautiful music, the Spirit that moves in and around and through our lives, blessing us with gifts and possibilities, calling us to bring beauty and hope, justice and love to our world. Let us rejoice and respond! Thanks be to God. Amen.