I had an odd realization today. Odd because I didn't see it coming, and odd because I feel like I should have already realized my sudden realization.Today I realized that God uses specific gifts he has given us to bring himself glory, and by us using those gifts we are able to communicate the glory of God to other people. Now I know...that's profound...I'll give it a second to sink in. Good? Ok, let us continue. So here's why I feel stupid...do you have any idea how many times I've probably rambled on about this exact thing? I couldn't even tell you. This particular phrase is one of the most cliche uses of Christian verbatim, and I'm completely guilty of it. But honestly, I believed it wholeheartedly, I just hadn't realized it fully. Today, however, my belief became tangible for me.

I work at a preschool and my kids were in the middle of practicing songs for graduation when I realized that I had my guitar in the car. The teacher I work with had been wanting me to bring in my guitar for a long time, but honestly I just hadn't felt like dealing with it before. Today however, I thought, "meh why not", she wanted to do America the Beautiful with the kids and I figured I could probably figure it out. So I got my guitar, figured out the chords, and sat down with the kids to do the song. We went through it and when we were done she randomly got all emotional. Which was kind of surprising so I of course got all embarassed and then she felt it necessary to go get all the other teachers and kids which made it even more uncomfortable. By this point I just wanted to dissapear and it was funny because afterwards I just kept thinking, "This is why I hate singing outside of worship." All of a sudden you feel like you're performing and the attention isn't on God, it's on your ability to dazzle the "audience". And that's when I got blinded by my realization...

She came up to me a little later and started talking to me about singing and guitar and all that jazz and she said "You totally surprised me, I was just sitting here and I started tearing up because you sang it so beautiful, you sang it with such meaning. It just moved me so much." Which sidenote, was really funny that God would use this because it was America the beautiful of all songs, a song that I ironically refused to sing in a church setting because of my unwillingness to associate God with the wealth of America. Go figure. But anyways, I sing with meaning because I love God, not because I love America. It doesn't matter what I'm playing on the guitar or what I'm singing about, I feel God in music, I feel God in the areas that he has gifted me and the areas that he has given me passion. For me, it's all connected, secular or christian, I feel God in music. What surprised me however, is that the meaning and passion I feel was somehow translated to her in the process. I guess I ignorantly thought, "Well I know why I'm doing this, but other's won't see God in it, they'll just see a song and whether or not I botch said song." But then she completely surprises me and says, "Ya know I would really love to hear you sing some Christian songs." And it hit me, she understood, she totally understood. Maybe she didn't know that she did, but...she did. She knew for me, music was more than music, she could feel something behind it driving me. And she knew from previous conversations that I loved God, and she connected the two.

This blew my mind. And made me feel somewhat ashamed, because how often do I talk about someone using their gifts to glorify God? It's not that I had forgotten this, I just had such a narrow understanding of this truth. For me, someone used their gifts to glorify God in appropriate Christian settings. They sang songs about Jesus, they painted pictures of forgiveness, they lead small groups. In this way they were using their gifts to glorify God, by using them to do "Godly" things. What a narrow-minded naive view of God and his power. What if God gifted us with certain talents for the sole purpose of using them for His glory as we walk in them every day? What would it look like if we used our talents to communicate God's glory in every setting? What about the people who aren't there to hear our songs about Jesus, or watch us effectively lead a small group? When are they going to see God? When we decide to throw out the obligatory "God bless" after awkward small talk? What if we simply discovered our talents and lived them with passion and excellence? This isn't an attempt to cheapen the efforts of using our talents in christian settings, I think that is absolutely essential. It's saying that what if we didn't stop there? What if we utilized every inch of our ability's to scream out our satisfaction in God and His mind-blowing creation? It's about living with meaning, acting with purpose, showcasing our satisfaction in God...that's what moves people, that's what displays God's glory.

Today I realized that I could show someone God by loving what he's created and what he's given me. And in this single moment, God was probably showcased more than in any of my previous attempts to talk about my church or the obligatory Christian one-liners. In this single moment...my satisfaction said more than my words ever could.

"So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God."
-1 Corinthians 10:31