Tis the season for holiday music. If you’re anything like me, it’s all you’ll listen to till at least mid-January (I am not very good at accepting the end of the holidays and the start of the holiday-less part of winter…). My favorites are the Charlie Brown Christmas album and every piece in the Nutcracker. This season, a classic and an old favorite caught my eye (ear?) and made me think about a few things in a new way: The Little Drummer Boy! I so wish the story it details was actually in the scriptures. It isn’t, but I like to imagine it isn’t far off from what might happen if a little drumming visitor actually came to visit baby Jesus.
Come, they told me / A newborn King to see / Our finest gifts we bring / To lay before the King / So to honor Him … when we come.
Baby Jesus, / I am a poor boy too, / I have no gift to bring / that’s fit to give the King / shall I play for you, … on my drum?
Mary nodded / the ox and lamb kept time / I played my drum for Him / I played my best for him / then He smiled at me, … me and my drum.
(By Katherine Kennicott Davis)
I have been pulling myself out of a recent habit of deep self-criticism. Complaining to myself about myself in almost any aspect of life: my role as a wife, my work, my internship, how I act in social situations, my everyday chores, my appearance… It’s easy enough to become insecure but pile the voice of criticism on top of this and it’s a slippery slope to hopelessness. In many cases, the voice of criticism is what causes insecurity in the first place. This is something I’m convinced we all wrestle with many times in life–especially as women–and it seems it’s less likely that we master the skill of silencing the voice of criticism over time than it is that the voice just finds different things to criticize. So, we practice silencing it over and over, taking every thought captive to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). Now what on earth does this have to do with The Little Drummer Boy? When I heard it again this Christmas season, I had a memory of a time I heard it when I was in high school, very involved in multiple music-related extracurricular activities at the time, and I started tearing up. It shocked me and I had no idea why I got emotional–I just forced it out of my head until I’d moved on to another thought. I never thought about it after that because it was so embarrassing to me at the time. Recalling that memory a bit over a decade later, during this time of self-criticism I’m trying to escape, brought some truth to my reaction of the past: something about the boy’s earnest playing despite his recognition that he has nothing fit for the King struck me as comforting in my own feeling as though my best efforts in everything are not fit for my King.
In high school I could not articulate that I felt pressure from all the standards, other kids, teachers, and dreams I had, leaving me with a sense of inability to accomplish anything worth something significant. Whether that sense was self-perception or truth is a different question. The message of The Little Drummer Boy reminds the listener that Jesus recognizes we are not built with this ability to accomplish the perfection He deserves, but it doesn’t matter in the end because He does not ask this perfection of us anyway–He asks for our earnest effort in serving Him because we love Him, and He loves us. My failure to accomplish a major, long-hoped for goal may feel like the end of the world to me in the now, but Jesus knows this will be so insignificant once I’m in heaven in the end, and prefers my praising Him in spite of it, instead of my scrambling to pick up the pieces to turn it into something. If I pursue treasures on earth without praising the King, I lose it all when I go to meet Him. If I pursue Him on earth even without accomplishing anything of earthly noteworthiness, I gain the world when I leave this one behind (Matthew 6:19-21). In this same passage, Jesus even assures us that when we pursue treasures in heaven, our hearts will begin to truly care about these eternal treasures more than the fleeting ones on earth! These “treasures” are not only material things–they are what we pour our time, effort, money, and care into; and because of the way they mature into either things that “moths and rust destroy” or things that last eternally, we need to pay attention to what it is that we put our best into. Are we pursuing goals to glorify and serve the King or ourselves? Are we questioning the worth of our mundane actions because they feel insignificant to our public image? Are we feeling disapproving of the season we’re in because it doesn’t “look like” one that brings great glory to Christ?
Ultimately, in feeling insignificant we are kind of correct: All our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment (Isaiah 64:6, ESV). Yet, why would God continually pursue our hearts if we could give Him nothing of use? Because He loves us so very much and wants us and our best anyway. Jesus tells the Pharisees in Matthew 22 that the first and great commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind (vv. 34-40). While this encompasses many further commandments, it simply tells us love for the Lord must come first-–the way you can do so will be shown to you from there! It seems oftentimes the best we can give to God in our love for Him is what He’s already naturally gifted us with, or what is right in front of us—for the little drummer boy, and myself, this best offering is usually simple acts of praise. “I played my best for him.” I get the most reflective and clear vision of Christ and all He encompasses in my enjoyment of music, both sacred and non-sacred (church music and orchestra rehearsal). When nothing else seems fit for my King, I praise Him, and He always gladly accepts. Praise the Lord! I know He loves me when He happily welcomes what to me often looks like the smallest thing I could offer. He sees me through the sacrifice of His worthy son, not my good deeds. For others, this best offering might be prayer, or service to others, or art, or the career they’ve chosen. For some (most of us at one point or another), this is the simple act of obedience, in doing what is right in front of you in earnest, and doing it your best—the dishes, the laundry, making your family dinner, another day at the job you dread, taking care of your health, serving in church, witnessing to friends and family: Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God (1 Corinthians10:31). In Exodus’ detailing of the Tabernacle, over and over it mentions people using their ordinary skills to make the Lord’s perfect dwelling place. What is it that you might be missing as an act of worship and service to the King that simply requires humility and your best?
In the final days of the year, I would prefer to think about this rather than all the things I may consider for a new year’s resolution and then probably forget about. Going into another year and pondering the idea that I don’t need to put the pressure on myself of being fit for the King, but also not believing the lie that God doesn’t want me because my best is hardly fit for Him—I can know that if I love Him by doing what I can do for Him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength, He is pleased with me! Every earnest effort for His cause means something to Him, and everything we can offer to Him in our reverence and love is readily accepted. These things build our relationship with Him, which in the end is what He truly wants the most. ‘Play your best’ for Him—whatever that may be in your season!
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