“Maybe, he’ll play his saxophone for the Lord one day,”  she suggested.

I scoffed. Wasn’t it enough to just believe this atheist man could get saved? Couldn’t he just be a Christian who was also a jazz musician? Did I have to believe God for two impossible things?

Oh, she called it, though. She had the vision, and the faith to back it up. He didn’t exactly lose his love of jazz, or the jazz influence in his playing, but a jazz career became an empty pursuit for him—one day at a time, as he began pursuing a life with Christ.

It reminds me of a line from a song Doug has sung countless times as a worship leader:

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace.*

When we love Jesus, things should start looking different. We should be seeing differently. As what we have loved starts to change places in our heart with Whom we now love, a lot should change. Doug did still “love” jazz, but he stopped pursuing it; he stopped giving jazz his money and his time, because he began to invest himself in his new Love. He poured himself into the pursuit of Christ.

So, at the very first church he attended, after the first or second service he attended, he found his heart longing to play his saxophone for Jesus. He didn’t know how he would be received, if they would welcome this newcomer, but he was compelled by love. Like the proverbial drummer boy, he had nothing to give that was fit for a King, so he played his best for Him.

You may look at yourself and say you, too, have nothing fit to offer a King. Or, perhaps, you have heard Doug play and think, “Well, he has a lot of talent. I’m not very good at anything.” Doug didn’t see himself that way. Remember, he was aspiring to be like the greatest saxophonists in jazz history. He knew he didn’t measure up to even his own standards. He just saw what was in his hands, the one thing he could do, and offered it to the Lord with all his heart.

So, what’s in your hands? 

*”Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” by David Hamilton and Helen Hewarth Lemmel