Lenten Disciplines

This may not come as a shock given the title of this blog, but my favorite, best, most reliably effective way to pray is through song. I love to sing, anything from plainsong chant at Evensong to praise music. So yesterday was a gift of grace for me. I woke up feeling awful... congested, sore throat, and the mounting pressure of papers. At Dean's Mass (Tuesday Eucharist here at Seabury), we sang two of my favorite hymns from Lift Every Voice and Sing II... "Lead Me, Guide Me" and "Higher Ground". I love them both, and seeing them on the ordo gave me enough energy to really wake up and pay attention to Eucharist. I definitely left that service feeling renewed. As the afternoon wore on, I made time to play my guitar and sing some of the praise music I know from youth work. This is actually my Lenten discipline: play my guitar everyday. It is really reviving my prayer life, which revives all of me. So today, I am thankful for the energy and grace I find in music - enough energy and grace to get me through writing a paper, even when Tripp and Jeff are distracting me til all hours of the morning!