{"id":9720,"date":"2018-03-05T18:11:31","date_gmt":"2018-03-06T00:11:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/?p=9720"},"modified":"2018-03-05T18:11:31","modified_gmt":"2018-03-06T00:11:31","slug":"days-of-joy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/2018\/03\/05\/days-of-joy\/","title":{"rendered":"Day(s) of Joy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I have been a pastoral musician now for about twenty-one years. Early on, when I was still learning what that meant, I was called upon quite often to lead music for Mass and for other prayer and retreat experiences. Among the songs I frequently played back then was Carey Landry&#8217;s, <em>And The Father Will Dance<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/M0Bu5cOHY4o\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>I LOVE that song.\u00a0 I love playing it.\u00a0 I love singing it. I love the energy it would stir up. I especially love the lyrics, particularly those from the refrain, which are paraphrased from <a href=\"http:\/\/usccb.org\/bible\/zephaniah\/3\">Zephaniah 3:17<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">And the Father will dance as on a day of joy.\u00a0<\/span><\/em><br \/>\n<em><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> He will exult over you and renew you by His love.\u00a0<\/span><\/em><br \/>\n<em><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> And the Father will dance as on a day of joy.\u00a0<\/span><\/em><br \/>\n<em><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> He will exult over you and renew you by His love.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p>When I was a younger man, it gave me great comfort to know that God delighted in God&#8217;s people. To me, it meant that, despite my failings and imperfections, God love for me sometimes manifested itself in an omnipotent jig. As a young person, especially a self-centered one, this was great news.<\/p>\n<p>It hasn&#8217;t been until now, though, that I have been able to catch a glimpse of that scripture\/song from God&#8217;s perspective. As you likely already know, Erin and I have four kids, ranging in ages from 5-13. On occasion, someone will ask us what parenting is like.\u00a0 We tell them the usual things: that parenting is rewarding, exhausting, challenging, life-giving, etc. One of the aspects of parenting that we will also share, and one that we didn&#8217;t see coming, is how much fun it is. Our kids have a perspective on life and on the world that is both fascinating and hilarious. We love watching them develop, whether it&#8217;s through school or through one of their many extra-curricular activities.\u00a0 Just this week, we saw one kid begin to come out of a schoolwork-related funk, watched another kid play well in a basketball game, cheered on another kid as she won an essay contest, performed her solo well at contest, and earned top honors at a speech meet, and tried to keep up with the youngest kid as he and his preschool visited a local vet. At every stop, I had an occasion to cheer on each kid and get more excited for them than they probably got for themselves.<\/p>\n<p>Our lives are so difficult sometimes that it&#8217;s easy to forget the immense love God has for us and how much it pleases God to watch us grow. I&#8217;m going to try and remember that the next time I&#8217;m tempted to sink into self-pity, thinking what a terrible person I am and what awful things I&#8217;ve said and done. God knows I am a healthier person when I&#8217;m rid of that sin and self-loathing, and offers the Sacrament of Reconciliation as the way to let those things go. Besides, I&#8217;m way more fun serving as a muse for the Holy One&#8217;s foxtrot.<\/p>\n<p>-Shannon<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p class=\"excerpt\">I have been a pastoral musician now for about twenty-one years. Early on, when I was still learning what that meant, I was called upon quite often to lead music for Mass and for other prayer and retreat experiences. Among the songs I frequently played back then was Carey Landry&#8217;s, And The Father Will Dance.&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-p\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/2018\/03\/05\/days-of-joy\/\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,91,90,64,7,21,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-jesusjusticejoy","category-joy","category-ministry","category-music","category-reflection","category-scripture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9720"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9724,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9720\/revisions\/9724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddwalkministries.com\/oddblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}