Food for the Wilderness
Daily Devotion – April 14, 2020
Bryan Gatten
A large part of my musical landscape has always been based in improvisation. I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately, since we have all been forced to improvise through almost every aspect of life during the last month.
This led to me to remember Sunday evening services last year when Pastoral Intern Daniel and I were putting together a taize-style, meditative service. One area in which we broke with tradition was instead of having a time of complete silence, I would improvise music on the guitar and people could meditate on the Word, prayers, or anything else on their hearts and minds. Nothing in that time was planned beforehand; I often would have no idea what I was about to play mere seconds before, until the first note sounded. Part of the reason for having music in that spot was practical: there were other noises in the building and they tended to distract from the meditation when there was complete silence. But soon it seemed like the right thing to do regardless of outside noise. The moment in the service where things were improvised, where the music was not planned and things were not timed exactly, became a powerful element. It meant that each service was firmly rooted in the present, that the one that was happening would be the only one like that, not to be repeated. It quickly became a favorite part of the service. This would go on for 4 or 5 minutes and we would continue the service.
In this time of stress and chaos, I thought I might improvise in a similar manner and share it. Please feel free to use this as a basis for meditation or prayer, or simply to let something give your brain a few minutes of rest. (click the link or video to hear Bryan’s musical offering)