It’s too hard

I get a music lesson every Thursday morning. Because I’m retired, I’m able to go early and use a practice room to practice playing and warm up my instrument before the lesson. The practice room I used this morning had this hand painted sign in it: Mistakes are Proof that you are Trying…

I started thinking about the implications of the sign and decided that it is true only when you are trying. For example, my grandmother had a piano. One time when I was visiting I must have made a comment about being able to play the piano so she asked me to play something. The reality was that I kinda knew where to find middle C and whatever that diddie is where you roll your knuckles across three black keys before striking a white key. Anyway, I sat down at my grandmother’s piano and pecked out enough notes of a simple song she had on the piano to get by. I had to take a step back and admit that while I had a very limited knowledge of the piano, I wouldn’t consider my skill level to be piano player capable. I would have to put in a whole lot more time and effort before I’d consider myself a pianist.

So this morning, I’m in the practice room working on the assignment that I was given the week before. After my lesson started, the teacher told me that she was giving a test at that time on the floor below the practice rooms and could hear me practice. She was pleased with what she heard. So, in this case, as opposed to my exaggerated claim at my grandmothers house, she knew that even though she heard mistakes, she knew I was trying to improve.

Earlier this morning, during my quiet time studying, I read this:

“What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? ‘Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.’” - Romans 4:1-3 ESV

The first several chapters of Romans describe how hopelessly unable to save ourselves we are and that our salvation is based on the grace of God. In Chapter 4, Paul uses Abraham to point out his faith in God was ascribed as righteousness. Abraham was advanced in age with a wife who was beyond child bearing years and was told by God to look up and count the stars and know that his descendants would be a greater number. Believing that would take faith. Abraham, eventually, did and it was attributed to him as righteousness.

This brings me to melding together the concepts of trying and the faith that Abraham had with God and the grace that God provided or success. This is similar to how my practice or trying will, I hope, eventually lead to my success playing. It is reassuring both in my playing and faith walk that mistakes are proof that I am trying.

But there is also the question of not trying, or worse, giving up. There are many things that I realize that I don’t have enough expertise to safely attempt. Electricity, and wiring, usually falls in that category. Last weekend one of the GCFI outlets in our kitchen tripped and wouldn’t reset. I resigned myself to needing to call an electrician for what I assumed would be at least a $200 expense. The more I thought about it, I convinced myself that I could safely replace an outlet with its 3 wires. I took the cover off the outlet to see if there was information on the outlet to help me get the appropriate replacement and, when I did, I heard a crackle under the hot wire nut behind the outlet. I checked and found the wires loose in the wire nut. I tightened the wire nut and my outlet was fine.  Not only did I successfully save myself the time and expense of an electrician but I gained a positive experience to spur me to consider trying the next time.

If you wait to work on your faith walk, thinking you need someone to guide you to learn, you could cause yourself delay and additional cost in your relationship with God. Trying is worth the effort even if it involves making mistakes.

Life is like learning to play a musical instrument.