The Drumbeat
Montreal/Cornwall
October 23, 2004
I love a marching band. To be part of a crowd that is gathered along a street to watch a parade, and to hear, in the distance, the coming band, before I can see it, has always been a peak event in my life. I remember, as a boy, crouching along Rosser Avenue in Brandon, waiting for the parade that came with the fair each year. I’ve always enjoyed watching the Rose Parade, from Pasadena, on January 1, not only for the beautiful flower covered floats, but for the incredible marching bands that are part of that parade. To me, a marching band is incredibly impressive, as a group of people is marshaled, following their leader, to move at a particular pace and play wonderful music at the same time. I played in one band that marched, once in Souris, but that was hard- we were not a true marching band.
What stands out in such bands is their drum section. Some marching bands, in fact, are mostly drums, but most are not. The drummer, guided by the director or drum major, sets the pace, with different music calling for a different beat and pace.
Listen to some drumming for the Purdue University Band. (tracks 1, 3, 4-7).
Do you know that you have a drummer inside you? We speak of the idea, in life, of ’marching to the beat of a drum’. As the Purdue University Band has a drum section, led by a drum major, setting the pace for the entire marching band, you have someone or something inside you that sets the pace for you and for your life. Like the drum section of a marching band, or the drummer for a Dragon Boat, you have a drumbeat that is going every day. You might not even be aware of it, but it’s there. It drives you. It moves you. It’s at your core.
What is it? Do you know what your drumbeat is? Have you thought about what drives you? Have you considered what your drumbeat is? The Greek philosopher Socrates, believed that the unexamined life was not worth living. Reflection is something that is very important in our lives. It should be a priority in the life of every human. You need to know what drives you and what sets your drum beating at your heart-of-hearts. It’s easy for any of us to think we know what it is. It’s easy for any of us to want it to be something and to evade the reality that what we want and what it is are two different things.
Your drumbeat could spring from any number of things:
- a childhood hurt or slight
- seeking honour
- insecurity about personal value
- a need to get even
- a need to be right
- humility
- quest for wealth
- desire for prestige
- desire to serve others
- belief that to abandon any task, however unsuccessful, is to fail
- need to have a good retirement, however you define that
- desire to serve God and seek His kingdom
- feeling of always getting the short end of the stick, being shunned or pushed aside
- competition with a sibling, friend, neighbour, family member
The list can be very, very long- as long as there are different individuals on earth, actually, of the many kinds of motivators, or sources for our drumbeat, that are possible. What our drumbeat is shows and is evident! No matter what you or I say, the true drumbeat comes out and is clear to those looking for it.
I want you to listen to a drum cadence for a few minutes and ponder- examine, as Socrates said, your life, going inside and seeing what drives you- what is your drumbeat?
Play track 2- 5 minutes.
I know what drives me. I’d like it all to be the highest of ideals and values. But, in reality, I’m driven by a fairly great insecurity, in life itself. I’ve learned that this is a common driver for an adoptee- I did a research paper on this a few years ago and was encouraged to know this. But it’s not the best driver- it can prevent taking bold action, or it can lead to taking action no matter what the consequences might be. I have to be careful.
Peter, the apostle and friend of Jesus, writes of two drumbeats that Christians can follow.
1 Pet.4.1-6- there are two basic ‘drumbeats’ described in this passage. There is the pagan drumbeat- the beat of the world and the unbelieving- and there is the gospel drumbeat- God and Christian’s drumbeat, at its highest level.
In the Bible, a ‘pagan’ is someone who doesn’t believe in the True God, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The word simply means ‘unbeliever’. That’s not to say that these people don’t have beliefs that they live by- they do. But they are not the same beliefs of those who know and follow Jesus. In the times when the Bible was written, ‘pagans’ believed in gods that were not really real. They lived their lives in ways that they thought pleased the gods they believed in. These are the gods and patterns that we have to leave behind, yet which we can carry along with us.
We all carry some things from here. These aren’t supposed to dominate us, but sometimes they do, and it’s better for us to recognize this reality than to go along as if we’ve got everything together. I know what can dominate me and make my drum beat and have to be realistic about that, rather than simply hiding it and supposing that I’m really always the most spiritual person and entirely dominated by the gospel drumbeat. However, that’s what I want to be dominated by, of course.
Peter goes on to tell us that when we live our lives according to the gospel drumbeat, some people are going to find us strange. Why? What does it say?
We all have to understand that one of the main difficulties that people have with living the Christian life is that they don’t want to be seen as different from others. It’s called peer pressure, and we all face it, at all ages. We have to deal with it in our lives. There’s peer pressure from people on the block where we live, even in the seniors’ home we might live in. We never get away from it. This is where some of the discordant drumbeats come from, actually- from others and their dominating of us, and our allowing that.
God’s Word tells us that we have to make choices about whose drumbeat we will live by and follow. I think it must be hard, in a parade with many bands, for some to hear their own drumbeat. Maybe there’s another band, nearby, whose drumbeat some musicians prefer. But to follow it will be to destroy what their leadership intends to do with their band. In our lives- in your life- if you are marching to the Gospel drumbeat in this life, you ARE different- you cannot get away from it. Some will notice and even make fun of you, or heap abuse on you because of it. You can be tempted to not respond to the Gospel drumbeat, but you need to.
In 1 Corinthians, Paul addressed this reality. In 1 Cor.5, Paul chides the congregation for their tolerance- they were too tolerant! Let’s take a brief look at this; some of their drumbeat wasn’t God’s drumbeat- they thought it was, I supposed, but missed the big picture involved.
Then, in chapters 8-10, Paul discusses the impact of appropriate and inappropriate drumbeats- he doesn’t use that word, of course, but he’s talking about different outcomes for different behaviours- all rooted in what people listened to. They were too lax and tolerant? Why? Their environment bred that into them, but they had to change it when they came to faith.
How do you feel about being different? I don’t mind it. Some of you don’t, either, and some do. It’s something to deal with, over time. That’s why other drum sounds come through and have an impact, because of wanting to blend in, somewhat.
Many Christians fail in living out their faith because they are afraid to show who they are, and what they stand for. They are afraid to go public with their faith. They are afraid of not being accepted- of being thorugh of as being different. So they hide it. Thy may very well live by it in the privacy of their own homes and families- but they keep their faith to themselves, and so they fail. We have to determine how we’ll handle this in our lives, and in our congregation.
Earlier, we had to think about what drumbeat we, individually, marched to, but, equally, we’re on a journey to understand, for our church, what drumbeat we follow. If it’s not the right one, we’ll not end up the right place in life, which would be an incredibly sad situation. We’re in a time for moving forward, and we have to understand our own drumbeat. I know that we all want to serve God, but do we want to basically stay the same, or are we willing to do whatever is necessary to be more fully formed as God and Jesus desire? That is the quest before us. We’ve weathered a lot of storms- there are more to come, I’m sure- but all are toward great good. God only wants good for us.
Even as it’s difficult for you, or me, to look inside and think about what might be driving us, so it is for us, as a group, here. But we need to do that. And in doing that, and responding to that, we’ll find ourselves closer to God’s image. Why do I say that? Because I know the heart that’s here- it’s a heart that does want to beat for God and that does want to rise to the higher level. With that, and Christ’s leading, there’s nowhere to go but up!
Conclusions
So, what am I saying today? I want you to know yourself. Face yourself and understand what has driven you. If something needs to be altered, in order to be more fully Christlike, then let it happen. This week, take time to think and examine yourself more fully than you could do, through a few minutes of drumbeats.
In addition, let us be prepared to examine ourselves, as a church, in order to find what we are now. What holds us back? What baggage might we be carrying? What insecurities do we have? We can and will face them. And as we do, we’ll let them go and move forward to being more fully the Church of Jesus Christ!
