Voices rising

I went to an outdoor concert in our city a few weeks ago with my wife in the new park by the basketball arena downtown. The park is pretty big but it feels like it’s hidden in our midst. What I mean is you can hardly see into it very well when you’re driving by, not the part we were in anyway where the amphitheater stands. When we walked into the place we were immediately greeted by about 3000 of our neighbors, all fans of the band we were there to see. It was pretty wonderful. It was one of those shows where everyone in the crowd seems to know all the words to all the songs, so they’re singing along so loud you’re not sure where the band ends and the crowd begins. It was an unusually cool and comfortable Thursday night in late summer in the Bluegrass and I think everyone there for the show was as happy as a person can be. It was a great scene from the love affair that this life is supposed to be. A whole bunch of people gathered together for music played by performers who took the time to write some songs and come play them for us so that we could sing along. The whole evening felt like something snuck into our lives on a weeknight for the sake of beauty and fun. It reminded me of the woman in one of Jesus’ parables who snuck some yeast into a whole bunch of flour to make it rise on the sly. Love takes many shapes and that night I thought love showed up in the shape of a crowd of happy people whose voices rose as one soaring through the sky.