Reason to Sing:: In Christ Alone

A couple years back I was leading a group of folks on a trip in Kenya. We were there to support work being done with orphans. One of our projects was to help clear branches and small trees by using a machete. A chance to pretend I knew what I was doing with a sword?!? You know I was all about it.  I was trimming smaller branches off larger branches and tossing them in a pile when Travis Baker, one of our Cascade Kid's volunteers, yelled at me to freeze.  One of the things you don't want to hear while working in brush in Africa is, "Don't move! Don't move! Don't move!" He walked up and pulled one of these off of my back... How adorable is that?!? We were so pumped that we had found this little guy that we walked around showing him off.  One of the leaders of the organization came up to us and asked if he could borrow the chameleon. He was pretty excited to show us something amazing.  He walked up to a group of kids nonchalantly and pulled his hand back to reveal the chameleon.  It was like someone had just turned on an industrial fan and blew these kids back 8 feet. There was screaming and running and general mayhem.  Now, I had heard about a King Cobra sighting on my last visit to this region. Some people debate if Black Mambas can live at that elevation in Kenya, but others swear that they've seen them there.  One of the only animals I was confident couldn't harm me in that place was causing mass chaos with the locals. What in the world was going on? Apparently its a pretty common myth that parents tell their children involving the chameleon as a bearer of bad omens and even death. The fact that it was physically harmless didn't matter at all.  This is the importance of framing. Framing is the stories or information that we allow to shape our understanding of the world. We are all listening to different stories that influence if we approach the world with fear, joy, anxiety or anger. Join us this Sunday we we look at the role that singing in worship can play in the framing our experience of God.