POWIP Piece of Work In Progress – Former Abode of Dan Collins

Dare You to Move

In a sure sign even the keenest minds can suffer momentary lapses of reason, Dan has granted the wish of your not-so humble scribe to make his online house mine as well. Silly boy. Too much maple syrup, perhaps?

Anyway, better write fast before he regains his senses.

I'd prefer to have my first post here (I'm usually at Goldfish and Clowns) be focused on something other than present miseries, but regrettably they are presently taking the top spot in my life. A tenuous, tense workplace situation going down yesterday has left me feeling more than a little scared. And angry. Stating the obvious, not a good combination. Or place to be.

This afternoon, I put half of my modest guitar collection on consignment at a store in San Jose I enjoy doing business with for a couple of reasons. Well, three: good prices, great service and the fact it makes no mystery of being owned by Christians without shoving anything down anyone's throat. It also has a heartbreakingly large assortment of guitars.

Although buying anything was out of the question, I dragged Mrs. Dude into the new instruments area of the store and from there into the 'if you have to look at the price tag you can't afford it' room. Actually, there's two rooms: the one where you can actually touch the guitars, and the one behind glass where mere mortals fear to tread as you just know you'd trip, bump something and shortly thereafter be the proud owner of five-figure kindling. Needless to say, given how I am neither wealthy nor altogether sure of my present employment I maintained a wide separation from the latter. Best to keep it within the realm of at least theoretical affordability should I develop a bad case of the butter fingers.

Being a rock'n'roll child of the '70s, I gravitated toward a black Gibson Les Paul Custom with three pickups instead of the usual two, this being the instrument wielded by Peter Frampton during his halcyon days of Frampton Comes Alive. I pretty much wore the grooves off of my copy back when it was near mandatory listening for anyone who had not bowed the knee to Baal... er, disco. It alternated on my turntable with In Another Land by Larry Norman and the other few -- very few -- Christian rock records around at the time that fueled my new-found faith. That, and my denim-covered King James Version Bible. Yeah, I was a Jesus freak-Catholic hybrid from the get-go. But I digress; back to the guitar.

I've long had this guitar on my "someday" list, one of the thoughts that crossed my mind as I played some of my modest licks. The other thought was of far greater importance.

It's said that music is God's language, and I believe this to be true. I'll never blame Him for my playing, but I get by. I do sometimes feel His presence when I play. This afternoon, I felt a gentle tug on my heart. Quite a difference from the bitter rant aimed in His direction from yours truly the past day and a half. Thankfully, He didn't respond in like kind. Rather, it was a reminder of what once was, back when I was listening to Frampton work his magic with a guitar much like the one I was presently playing. A reminder of when I was on fire for Jesus and had total trust in Him that anything and everything would work out.

So what happened?

God hadn't gone anywhere.

Maybe I should move back to where I belonged.

Trusting Him.

I'm working on it.

Jerry Wilson

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