Earbuds

So I turned on the song that my friend sent for me to listen to… turned it up, so I could hear it alright, and proceeded to listen, as I simultaneously did some other things. I was enjoying the music—a Christmas song, so of course I loved it—and didn’t even notice anything lacking or different in the song. I continued to listen for some time, until I decided I wanted it a bit louder. I tried to turn it up, only to realize that it was as loud as it would go. But clearly, it was not at full volume. Finally, my eyes shifted down to the white wire coming from the headphone jack in my computer, and I realized that I was listening to this song full blast—but through the tiny headphones, which were not so loud when nowhere close to my ears. I picked up those two little white ear buds, put them in my ears, and was introduced to an incredibly more full and beautiful sound. The ‘oh, this song is kind of nice,’ turned into, ‘wow, this is actually an incredibly beautiful song,’ and it grabbed my full attention more and more--pulling my thoughts away from the other things I was doing. The fullness of the different instruments coming together in the clarity that the ear buds now offered my ears was incredible compared to the distant, muffled sound I had thought I was enjoying before. Then I thought about life and my relationship with God. Of course, I have a relationship with Him… I have for some time now. And I would even go so far as to say my relationship with Him is okay. But I wonder if I’m quite often just being content with a relationship through a distant headphone wire when He would love to offer me the full, complete beauty of the clear, distinct, yet combined sounds of so many instruments directly into my ears.

After experiencing the latter option regarding my music, I definitely wouldn’t want to go back to the distant, dreadfully lacking sound I had settled for previously…