The Comfort of the Familiar

Last fall my colleague, Beth McGinnis, and I announced plans to start the Birmingham Girls Chorus. We had no idea whether anyone would like to sing, but we felt that there was a need in our community for elementary and middle school aged girls to have a chorus. Two girls came to the first rehearsal, and over the next few weeks twelve girls eventually gave us a try. Nine stayed with us throughout the year, and ended our inaugural season by singing from Aaron Copland's "Old American Songs" with the Southeastern Chamber Orchestra on May 16.

While some people are natural-born risk-takers, most children are a little frightened by the unfamiliar. Each girl who came into our rehearsal room had a look of nervousness on her face, which gradually gave way to a look of comfort as our weekly singing became a familiar part of her busy schedule. Among the many parts of the choral rehearsals, the music we were learning came to be a familiar destination for each girl on Thursday afternoons. As the weeks went by, I would hear them enter the room, full of after-school snacks and pent-up energy, singing the music they were memorizing. That sound let me know that we were building a musical family, a room-full of familiar, and that the girls were internalizing the words, notes and techniques that were part of our weekly visit.

We learned several songs in those initial months, and we talked about the words we were singing, and the way they were treated by the composer. Among those songs was "And God Shall Wipe Away All Tears," by Canadian composer Eleanor Daley. Hear it here. Its words, from Revelation 21:4, have great meaning to a child, among whose crucial needs are a reliable tear-wiper. As familiarity grew, the girls in our chorus began to love the music and words, and feel at home in them.

Now that our first year has concluded, there is a lot to celebrate. The girls have given several successful performances, and have demonstrated great musical growth over the course of the year. Although there have been few disappointments, certainly the biggest was the fact that one of the initial two girls couldn't sing in our recent concert. She and her family were stationed at the bedside of her beloved grandmother, awaiting an end to a long battle with leukemia. Since no one can guess when such a battle will end, they had to stay in Georgia during the weekend of the concert.

This afternoon I drove to west Georgia and attended the funeral for this young singer's grandmother, and as I drove I thought about how strange and frightening a funeral can be for a child. It was the quintessential un-familiar experience. As the service proceeded, I heard the pastor and staff of the church lead the funeral with music and a preaching style that were different than those in our church, and I watched from my seat in the back of the congregation as my young friend sat between her parents, leaning on her father's familiar shoulder as she processed so many new experiences.

The pastor gave an impassioned sermon, indicating that the deceased was a deeply loved member of the congregation. He referred to numerous biblical texts as he spoke with love, sympathy and humor to the large gathering. As he neared the end he said, "I would like to offer one more scripture before I conclude," and you could see that he was turning to the final pages of his well-worn Bible. He looked directly down where the family was seated, and read to us all: "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying. Neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away."

I was relieved and moved to see that even in this frightening and tragic circumstance, the comfort of the familiar came to this young singer at just the right moment. The familiar words were deep inside her heart, deeper than they would have been if she had only read them, because she had sung them week by week, and made them her home.

The season of Pentecost began last week, and we were reminded of strange wind and fire, and voices speaking in unfamiliar ways. I don't imagine that the people who witnessed the first Pentecost found it any more unfamiliar than my young friend found today's funeral experience. But I am certain that the Spirit came again today, offering to play the promised role of Comforter at just the right moment, and showing that the Spirit had actually been there all along in the song that lived in her heart.