Given voice…
When I was ordained in the Autumn of 1992, the service began with the trumpet voluntary played by a particularly gifted young musician in the church. Although I didn’t know it, the preacher was set to preach on a text about a trumpet too. He preached on Gideon’s story in Judges 6, and gave me this verse in particular as a ‘charge’ for my ministry:
The Spirit of the Lord clothed himself with Gideon and blew upon the trumpet.
With those words he ‘launched’ me on my formal preaching ministry, and bade me blow the trumpet for all I was worth.
I love the idea that the Spirit of God, who inspired prophets, ruffled the surface of pre-creation water and came down as tongues of fire, might need to clothe himself with anyone! There it is, though – the clear note of the trumpet needs to be sounded, and the Spirit needs a mouth, a pair of lungs and a willing soul to do it for him. Today I am praying, together with my sister and brother preachers everywhere, that I might be that soul.
The picture below shows a friend of mine who used to play the trumpet for a living as one of the finest musicians in the Grenadier Guards. He now works at a college for preachers…Nuff said!
