School of Music & Adoration Inaguration

Dear Readers,

I went to the school with Morgan to meet with Brother Pixley yesterday, which had come from San Jose (a three hour bus ride) for the Inauguration of “Escuela de Musica y Albanza”, or in English “The School of Music and Adoration.” The service was on Wednesday August 27th, @ 5:00pm at Faith Moravian church. Brother Rodolfo Allen was the one to deliver the message. Oddly it seemed as though he would just sit behind the pulpit and tell the congregation what was coming next. Kind of like a master of cerimonies. Anyways, the service started by me accompanying Morgan on Schubert’s “Ave Maria”. Then brother Pixley shared a few words about what EMA is and what we hope to accomplish, followed by two liturgies and three hymns and a benediction.

Funny story about one of those hymns though. One of the hymns for the service was “Joyful, Joyful, We adore thee.” It was not a difficult hymn, but it calls for the left hand to play and Octave and a third about eight times. Morgan’s fingers can comfortably reach an octave, so she asked me to play and I said “sure.” I sat down to go over the hymn and realized the keyboard we were playing on had a record function. So instead of me slaughtering the hymn because the lack of practice time, I recorded the left hand and then the right and then when it came time for us to sing the hymn in the service we just faked it and pushed play. No one attending the service knew because they were all trying to figure out how to read the music and try not to make mistakes. It was just funny how it turned out. God has a since of humor to you know.

Well anyway you can get the music recorded or live, we want every church in Limon to be filled with music once again. This situation kind of reminds me of a Zits comic strip I once saw. It was depicting a marching band standing on the football field in four out of the five pictures, not playing at all. The fifth picture was the director saying over a megaphone “this is the sound you will hear if they cut music in our schools.” Though it was not the government cutting the music, the 7.7 earthquake of 1991 drove the musicians out of Limon. We want the people of vivacious culture to once again have music in worship. Could you imagine walking into church on Sunday morning and not a single musician there? Even if the message was one of the best you have ever heard, would it be the same without the music? This is the part of the culture that Morgan and I are here to restore.

The following article is something we have sent to be published in the onward newsletter, but since some of the readers don’t receive the onward newsletter I selected to post it here as well.

Hola from Puerto Limon Costa Rica!

The school year is off to a wonderful start with 35 regularly attending musicians enrolled in our fledgling program at Escuela de Musica y Alabanza, or School of Music and Adoration. Our first trimester of class is proving that the students are quick and able learners. This creates much anticipation for the second trimester which starts in October. In fact, the excitement is so great that many people have already registered.

At our inauguration we were asked to share a few words about our calling to Costa Rica. We could include everything we said but instead we would simply like to share the heart of our sentiments: We’re here for the money.

All joking aside we are here to worship, serve, and witness through music. Most of all we are here because in the midst of our busy lives we heard a call and trusted in God. We believe that there are great things in store for the people of Limon and we hope to share in the revitalization of this home away home. After all, in Proverbs 3:6 it says “if you trust in God, he will clear the road for you to follow.”’

In this time of growth we bring to you several prayer requests:

- Pray for our continuing transition into life in Limon as well as our health as we adjust to the culture.

- For our families as they realize how far away we are and our prolonged absence over the course of the year.

- For the development team as they plan for the construction of our new building.

- For healing in a city that has long been neglected

Your Antiock Servents, Roman Brady & Morgan Smith