I am writing to you simply because it seemed right to do so. I have been serving you in a reduced capacity for the past 9 months and am starting to work my way back into a more typical routine.
Some new people have come in our midst in that time. If you regard yourself as one, peace, welcome, and joy to you. I look forward to getting to know you better and working with you.
What was I doing? I was working on an instructional design certificate through UW-Stout. Instructional design is many things in practice, but, in theory, concerns itself with curriculum designs intended to solve many kinds of problems and their implementation. Many people associate instructional design with using technology well to deliver or augment instruction or training of various kinds. But technology is just one of many tools an instructional designer has in their toolkit. Doing this certificate is helping me in my work during most of the rest of the week, where I help develop supplemental educational materials for people preparing for a particular study-abroad program. (If you’re curious about this, let’s talk. It’s neat stuff with some big ideas having nothing to do with technology.)
Admittedly, this may sound odd coming from your church’s director of music ministry, but it is an outgrowth of what motivated me to pursue music (through to a PhD in music) in the first place: an almost-life-long zeal for thinking about how to set up learning experiences for many kinds of musical activities including performance, composition, improvisation, theory, history, and more. This zeal has shaped my work with St. Dunstan’s up to this point, even in the face of transition and pandemic. It just turns out that, for me, the zeal extends beyond just music. Now my vocation has multiple, visible facets, like so many people striving to mend this world.
Ongoing concerns about COVID-19 pose challenges for doing musical activities safely. Even though we are not the same place as we were in December 2020 (when I preached a sermon about making music in times of crisis), I still believe that continuing in the combination of grace, flexibility, and creativity that I preached then can and will carry us with God’s help. New plans and possibilities will take shape in the weeks and months ahead. Watch this space or get in touch (at ) if you’d like to help imagine and plan!
We are blessed with so much knowledge, skill, and opportunity, and I look forward to us living into where the Spirit leads us.
