Accept with a willing heart, again

On Sunday, July 28, 2002, just a week after my fifty-third birthday, I was sustained as the choir accompanist in our ward.

When the bishop called me a couple weeks earlier, I explained that I really couldn't play all that well beyond the hymn arrangements in the hymnbook, and that perhaps I was not the right person for the job. We agreed that I'd think and pray about it for a few days. My thoughts returned naturally to when I was sixteen years old and received my patriarchal blessing, which among other things said, "Accept with a willing heart the responsibilities of service, and God will magnify you until you will be capable of confounding the wise and learned and will melt the defense of the unrighteous, and even though they accept not the message which you bear, yet they will testify of the power which is within you."

I had relied on that promise as a sixteen-year-old when I accepted my first calling as an organist. Did I have less faith now?

I talked with President Lance Wood, a counselor in our stake presidency. He said that Bishop Frederickson had asked the stake presidency if he could extend the calling, since I was serving as a member of the high council. The stake presidency had given approval if I felt I had time to fulfill both callings. Interestingly, President Wood's wife was also the choir accompanist in their ward, and he said she really struggled with some of the arrangements and put in a lot of time practicing. He did not think it would be unreasonable to decline the calling.

I also talked with Coila Robinson, the choir director, which the bishop said I could do. The call had not been her suggestion. As far as she was aware, the idea had originated with the bishop.

I spent a lot of time counseling with the Lord in prayer. I discussed what I was thinking and feeling with Claudia. I prayed some more.

After much thought and prayer, I con­cluded that if the Lord's servant was extending me a call then I could not in any good conscience, and for the first time ever in my life, turn down a call from the Lord. So I decided to accept, going for­ward with faith that the Lord would make me equal to the task. As President Thomas S. Monson has taught on many occasions, "Whom the Lord calls, the Lord qualifies."

I guess I was in need of some further stretching at this point in my life.

A couple months later, on the Sunday afternoon of general conference, I wrote in a letter to our missionary daughter Camilla, "Last Sunday the ward choir sang for the first time since its summer break, and I had my debut as the choir accompanist. We sang a song entitled 'Listen to the Prophet,' an appropriate number for the week before conference, and I felt I was greatly blessed in being able to master music beyond my present abilities. The Lord delights to honor those who honor Him, as I'm sure you’re finding out there in the mission field."

Camilla had been an assistant choir accompanist in our ward before she left on her mission.

A month later, now in the middle of November, I wrote Camilla again: "In sacrament meeting I played the organ for the first time since becoming choir accompanist (I had played the piano before) as the congregation sang the first two verses of 'Now Let Us Rejoice,' joined by the choir for an oblagato part on the third verse. It was very impressive, and the choir sounded better and I played better than ever before in practice."