Be My Hope ~ A Collection of Sung Prayers

When I was a teenager, maybe 14 or 15, my brother got his hands on a guitar. It had only 5 strings, but hey, it was free, and I got my hands on it whenever I could.

I discovered a guitar chord chart in the back of the worn and dog-eared songbook I'd stolen from my youth group. I wore dents deep into my fingertips learning the D, G, C, Em and A chords, while leaving Bb, Eb and F major to finer players.

Once I had a few chords in my pocket, I spent endless hours leafing through songbooks, learning to move from one chord to the next without too much awkward lag time. Between this and playing piano for school and church choirs, so many of my youthful musical pinings were satisfied.

I discovered around this time a draw toward songwriting as well. I remember scribbling lyrics on notepads, church bulletins, the back side of math assignments. When I was 15, my mom gave me a blank book titled 'Harmonious Melodies' for my birthday. I immediately filled the pages with overwrought songs dripping with spirit, syrup and angst.

I read through these 40-year-old songs from time to time, and feel a hint of embarrassment, but also see in them, the first steps on the path toward some of the deepest gladness I know:  I get to express myself, my heart for God, through music. Sitting at my piano, noodling around on a simple melody, this is where I have always felt most at home, most my true self. I believe that God knows this about me, planted this desire in me. And in that place where what I long for meets with what God longs for, I find hope and peace and a way to be in the world.

This has been my way to be in the world for most of my life. Saying to God, saying to my own heart, through a simple song, what I cannot always say with my speaking voice. Lament and praise, hope and despair, longing and gratitude. I've come to see them as sung prayers. I've always been a little distracted verbally... those who know me well understand that my tendency is to start any story with a bit of focus, see something shiny, trail off, and then derail. But that doesn't happen when I sing one of the prayers I've written. My head is not so busy, my spirit is calm.

I've been so fortunate since I first started scribbling in that blank book to find myself in faith communities that offered a safe cocoon for my songwriter's heart. Brian Gerards and Gary Hotchkiss at Wood Village Baptist Church took me under their wings and let me know that what I had to offer was enough. Jack and Judy Bevilacqua, who led the young adult group (the YAGS!) that I was part of for my 20s and 30s, nurtured things in me that are still bringing life and hope and transformation. I showed up on Sundays at the church, on Thursday nights at their house with my guitar and often, a new song I'd written.. I was invited to be courageous, to share what I'd written, to invite my friends in community to sing these prayers with me. During a season of my life where I was without a church home, I remember Gary Hotchkiss saying to me. 'Kathy, what you need is a small little church where people can love and know you, and where you can offer them your music'. God got me to that little church 8 years ago when I walked through the red doors at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Gresham. Rev. Jennifer Creswell invited me to sing, to play, to write, to be fully who I am both behind the piano and away from it. I have written more songs and prayers since coming to St. Luke's than in all the years before.

Often, after sharing something I'd written in a worship setting, people would ask 'do you have a recording of that song?'  Over and again, I'd have to say 'no'. After awhile, I grew tired of this response and all my excuses behind it, and recently, decided to do something brave, something my introverted self had to dig deep to make way for.

I asked my friend Jim Dalgleish to help me record some of my songs. I asked my friend Jack Bevilacqua to play his guitar on the recording. I asked around to see if anyone might want to help with the financial piece of getting it done. The answers to my questions were 'yes', 'yes', and 'yes'. There is an assumption I've lived with for most of my life as an accompanist, as a person who sits up front and sings and plays: that I am comfortable with being up front, that I have an extroverted side that makes this possible. That is just not true for me. I am only comfortable because I am tucked safely behind the shelter of a piano, speaking the language that comes most naturally to me. To consider recording, and to ask for help took all kinds of courage. The heartening response fills me with gratitude.

Recording in my living room/dining room with Jim and Jack has been an adventure, a kick in the pants, an experience that has invited me to hear from God, again, that it is enough... it is enough to take what I've been given and offer it back. It is enough to express myself the best way I know how. That I am enough. I've learned so much through this DIY homemade recording process. I learned that it is best to tune Nana's upright piano before recording. I've learned that WD-40 can work in a pinch to take the squeak out of a wonky string, but you've gotta aim that little red nozzle precisely. I've learned that the dogs are fine in their crates in the van for a few hours while the session is ongoing. I've learned that Jack and I have developed an unspoken language through years and years of playing together that we can rely on even in the anxious setting of recording. I've learned that in the mixing, there is no button or dial to make my voice sound like Adele (smile). I've learned that notes we flubbed, vocal pitches that went sharp or flat, ambient noises like the refrigerator motor, the clock I forgot to take off the wall or the furnace kicking on are just part of the funky, imperfect charm.

When I quiet myself and talk to God about this recording, it does not take long at all for the tears to pool in my eyes. Tears of gladness, tears of recognizing again what I have always known... that God knows my heart, that God knows the vulnerability, the risk that comes with sharing my songs. And, maybe the deepest truth, is that through these songs, I am not just expressing myself to God... God is expressing God's self... to me.

Be My Hope ~ A Collection of Sung Prayers, is the CD Jack and Jim and I put together, and I am glad to finally be able to say, 'yes, I have a recording of that song'. The picture on the CD is one I took in 2007 when I was in Scotland. We visited Urquhart Castle, and in strolling the castle ruins, I was struck by the sight of a fresh and vibrant bunch of yellow blooms showing off halfway up the castle wall. I was captured then by the image of hope in the ruins. With God, there is always hope in the ruins. Years later I would write a song based on Psalm 71, with this refrain: 'Be my stronghold, my castle keep, my fortress, my hope, be my hope.'

Be my hope. God is my hope. You are invited to sing these prayers with me. May God be your hope as well.