A few years ago at a Dixie Melody Boys concert, a great Southern Gospel quartet for many years, Ed O'Neill, the bass singer, said that today in concerts, after having been in Gospel music for sixty years, is like walking into a Georgia cotton field with all the white hair. That was a funny comment but one that resided in me. Let me explain!
A ministry that has opened to my quartet, The Pathway Quartet, and to me when all of us cannot make schedules work and I fill as a soloist, is doing concerts in regional assisted living facilities. I realize I have never invested much time in large groups of elderly and somewhat infirmed people but have found that investment via the concerts to be simply amazing. As an aside, having sung in many concerts in the last several years, a reality of my personality is that I want to go and sing and depart. That internal drive in me has caused me to miss the real reason for singing Gospel music too many times with many people.
Here is one thing I have learned and learned well which, therefore, has caused me to force myself to disconnect from that drive in me to go, do and leave now to being early, do your best and stay after to really get to know those folks God has put before me to sing to. Thus the point most learned is that in performing with your heart the music of the Gospel, you touch people in a much deeper place and especially if they are older. Many of them have no family to spend time with, many are literally put into those places and pretty much forgotten. It is what I have come to call a "lost population." Many of the songs they have heard through their lives and I love to watch them strive to sing along with us or me. Singing Gospel music touches people is a most intimate way I have learned so investing time with these sweet people after the music is done is vital to the whole experience. Those that do not take this time are missing the real love. That is so very sad.
Just last night as I sang to a group of about twenty-five elderly folks at an Assisted Living facility, I got to meet some really sweet, precious people, to hear their stories, to give a hug when they asked one, to be part of their lives for an hour. Who got the blessing? Well, I certainly did and with each of these events I realize in my own heart how blessed I am to get to do that ministry for that is exactly what it is; a ministry!
My vault of memories grows with each concert event. Last night there was a new deposit of memories. One I will share ... this precious lady was just to my left sitting as I sang. Her eyes never left me the entire time and she had this sweet, magnetic smile and spoke volumes with those deep blue eyes. She had really dressed up for the concert with a white sweater with red birds on the front. During one of the songs I reached down and gently shook her hands and she teared up. I realized she was holding a little stuffed dog all tucked in her hands. She held it up to me as I shook her soft hand. When the concert was over I returned to her and she held "Pet" up to me with a broad smile on her face asking if I wanted to hold "Pet." I held the little brown stuff animal, dog, and I could tell it thrilled her to death that I would take that ten seconds to do that. In that moment I knew all over again why a ministry like I get to be part of is so important and I was recharged!
We all have had or will have aging parents or grand parents in that same situation unless they are taken home via death as will each of us. Will we be forgotten or dumped on some paid facility to care for them? I think that a worthy question for each of us will face this same life reality. I will take this opportunity to thank my sister-in-law and her wonderful husband for the care they showed so wonderfully in caring for my wife's father to keep him at home. As well I want to tell both my sisters just how much I love them for caring for our mother to keep her at home. Home is so very important to these people I realize more and more. So anything I can do to make these many I am now getting to meet feel a piece of "home" it is certainly worth the time, effort and energy of our Quartet's part to deliver for I see so clearly how much these folks appreciate the effort and the caring.
This whole ministry has been simply amazing in its rewards coming from just taking a few minutes to share, to listen, to smile with them. Each of these people have rich histories and are pocked with many highs and some terrible lows. Many have various physical encumbrances but when we come together in the concert venue, there is a common denomination of enjoyment, warmth and togetherness; sort of like a small taste of Heaven and we get to be part of that taste!
A special insight for me is in seeing family members or spouses sitting next to their parents or spouse housed in these locations. You can see the angst, the love, the disbelief, the joy of just getting to be with them one more time. I watched a beautiful daughter last night, about fifty, push her mom in a wheelchair to the concert. The entire time I was singing I watched the daughter rubbing her mom's hair and shoulders and when she would look up at me her eyes would be heavy with tears but with a smile of appreciation. That is worth more than any money to me in seeing such love before me not ten feet away. I loved that daughter for she loved her mother and the mother was pretty much oblivious as to what was going on which made the whole experience even more precious to me.
My challenge to each of you ... if you have time, find time to spend with these wonderful people in these homes. You will be welcomed and greeted with smiles, stories and joy; those three are what I could call a currency of bliss! You will smile, you will laugh, you will cry, you will rejoice at what you will find and it is all worth it. I also want to recognize the in-house caregivers which too often are unsung and taken for granted. I am seeing some really wonderful caregivers in these concerts showing love and respect for these precious people.
Again, who gets the blessing? You will, I promise. Give someone in your world a little bit of you today, please.
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