Hey, everyone!
Hope you're having the day you hoped you'd be having when you started!
But if you're not, just try to keep on the sunny side, always on the sunny side!
Keep on the sunny side of life!
It will help you every day!
It will brighten all the way!
If you keep on the sunny side of life!
Wait.
That's a song. I just quoted a song!
Wow.
Where did that come from?
Oh. I know.
That was an old song from the Carter family, the "First Family of Country Music"!
Tons of what they sang helped bluegrass music gets that awesome "sound".
And in the spring, for some reason, my heart just turns to bluegrass!
I don't really know why. It's hard to explain!
(Kind of like the other day…I saw an ol' possum in the road and later I was wondering why I kept humming George Jones songs to myself all morning…)
I'm not sure why spring is bluegrass music season in my heart, but 'bout the time others’ grass starts to turn green , mine turns blue!
Maybe it's the soaring harmonies of…say…Dolly and Emmylou singing' "Just A Few Old Memories" that I love so much…
And who could forget that syrup-y sweet, unmistakable voice of Lester Flatt?
(“For the finest biscuits ever was, get Martha White Self-rising' Flour!
The one all-purpose flour!
Martha White Self-rising Flour
It's got Hot Rise!”)
And how I wish I could do that Bill Monroe yodel when he sang Jimmie Rodgers’ “Blue Yodel #7”!
(And you can ask Tina! I've tried!)
But when you hear that drivin' Earl Scruggs banjo, isn't there a place in your soul that says, "How could people not believe in a Creator when the world is filled with amazing wonders like this??”
Do remember where you were the first time you heard Earl Scruggs play the banjo?
Bet you do!
Sometimes folks struggle with bluegrass music because they think it borders on the corny.
In fact, some believe it's crossed the border and is somewhere out there in the middle of the corn field itself!
Some say that they can't listen to bluegrass because of all those sappy songs about "mother and dad up in heaven"…
Some think the lyrics are just too sentimental…
just too emotional…
just too…much.
Bill Monroe, a pioneer of bluegrass music, wrote one of those songs about "mother and dad"...
"Mother left this world of sorrow.
Our home was silent and so sad.
Dad took sick and had to leave us.
I have no home. No mother nor dad
Their souls have gone up to heaven
Where they'll dwell with God above.
Where they'll meet their friends and loved ones
And share with all His precious love
There's a little lonesome grave yard.
On these tombstones there they say,
On mother's, 'Gone but not forgotten'
On dad's, 'We'll meet again someday' "
Bill was the last of eight children and grew up on a poor farm in rural Kentucky.
He was severely visually impaired and one eye was directed inward. He was bullied because of it.
His mother died when he was ten.
His dad died when he was still a teen.
In spite of these obstacles and pain, Bill eventually overcame a success and leader of his own band…
"Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys"…
Once he had a young lead singer named Del McCoury, who was struggling to sing the words on that song with the depth of feeling Bill wanted. They were traveling through Kentucky at the time, so they stopped in the tiny town of Rosine, where Bill was born…
He took Del out to a little, hidden graveyard and said…
”I want you to read what's on those gravestones there"
Del said…
"So I read them. It said on his mother’s gravestone, 'Gone But Not Forgotten’
And on his father’s, it said 'We'll Meet Again Someday' “
Just like the song.
When Bill wrote…
"I have no home,
No mother nor dad…"
…he meant it.
Sometimes, if you listen closely to someone's words, you might just hear a hurt that no one else can hear but someone who listens with love.
You might just see a tear that no one else sees but one who cares to see it.
When he wrote his second letter to Timothy, Paul was old, lonely, and about to face his death in prison.
And at the end of it, he added…
"Do your best to come to me quickly… When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, and my scrolls, especially the parchments… Do your best to get here before winter." (2 Tim 4:9,12,21)
Listen. I think I hear him say…
"Please. I need my parchments. I need to read them.
Because I'm working hard to stay encouraged.
I need my coat…
I’m cold…
I need you…
I’m lonely…
Hurry…
Please, Tim…"
Did you hear it?
Do you listen?
Are you a listener?
In a world filled with bloggers, instagrammers, FB'ers, and “former tweeters”…
who will be the listeners?
Almost everyone has a hurt or a sorrow or a burden they carry inside.
Every heart needs someone who will listen.
Will you?
Will you be a listener?