Dear Friends:

If all musical instruments sounded alike, how would you know the difference between a flute and a harp? If a bugle call isn't clear, how would you know how to get ready for battle? (1 Cor 14:7-8).
It seemed like a good idea when I started out -- my destination was clearly in mind and the brisk walk there and back through downtown Washington, DC would cleanse me of the fuzzy residue from my "red-eye" arrival.

Seven blocks into my journey, I was frozen to the bone and kind of lost. Well . . . really lost, because lost is one of those things that you either are or you aren't.

It was 80 degree weather when I left California. I checked the weather, but the reports hadn't counted for a late winter storm blowing in and dropping the temperature into the 30s with a windchill.

Neither had I figured that the circle rotaries on the DC thoroughfares would be so disorienting to an inexperienced pedestrian.

A cell phone call for directions to my assistant back in California yielded only that she was on break. On I strode.

Something familiar to my ear rose over the wind and the traffic. It was the sweet sound of "Amazing Grace," played on a trumpet with a rich tone and fluid technique that identified the soloist as a professional.

The street, lined with brick and brownstone row houses, conducted the melody with nearly fiber-optic precision. There is no better homing signal than John Newton's old hymn and I followed it into the stiff wind.

The praise sharpened my senses. My surroundings up to now had seemed like a dreary winter-fatigued gray. Now I noticed yellow daffodils in planters and some white blossoms on still leafless trees silently protesting the lingering winter.

The still-unseen trumpeter warbled a transition from "Amazing Grace" into a genuine surprise of "Master, The Tempest is Raging," a dramatic, old gospel song that immediately transported me back heart and soul into the little church that my grandfather had built beside the creek in Soquel, California.

That's where I learned the song fifty years or so ago. That's where I learned about Jesus who commanded the wind and the waves.
Master, the tempest is raging!
The billows are tossing high!
The sky is o'ershadow with blackness,
No shelter or help is nigh;
Carest Thou not that we perish?
How canst Thou lie asleep,
When each moment so madly is threatening
A grave in the angry deep?
.
Refrain
.
The winds and the waves shall obey Thy will,
Peace, be still!
Whether the wrath of the storm tossed sea,
Or demons or men, or whatever it be
No waters can swallow the ship where lies
The Master of ocean, and earth, and skies;
They all shall sweetly obey Thy will,
Peace, be still! Peace, be still!
They all shall sweetly obey Thy will,
Peace, peace, be still!
        -- Mary Baker, 1874
.
When people who love you teach you a song and sing it with you, the words become your own, a connection between heart and home which is always at the side of the Father, regardless of the immediate circumstances facing you here.

That reminder took my mind off of the cold and unfamiliar surroundings. I pushed ahead with purpose through Dupont Circle and up Connecticut Avenue. I spotted a gleam of brass on a street corner across the busy way and I crossed over to the source of this blessing.

The horn player was a grizzled, old black man dressed in jeans, a checked shirt and a down vest. He was wearing a wool watch cap to keep his head warm. It was 37 degrees according to a bank sign that I'd passed -- much colder than that with the wind factored in as my stinging bare hands attested.

He had not missed a note the whole time that I'd been listening. His tone was clear and his phrasing was articulate and elegant with a hint of the blues. He was holding the horn and fingering the valves with his right hand.

There was a hymn book in his left hand. At first, I thought that he was sight-reading from it, but the smoothness of his playing indicated a comfortable familiarity with the melody. It occurred to me that he was reading the words in worship as he went along.

It is extremely difficult to play a brass instrument in frigid weather. Your lip loses elasticity. The cold brass makes it difficult to stay in pitch. The valve oil thickens and makes the action sluggish. Icy fingers lose their dexterity. I know this as a veteran French horn player.

What I was hearing was nothing short of a miracle of heart and talent. I was delighted.

The battered trumpet case was open and there were a few coins and bills inside. I pulled a five dollar bill from my wallet, folded it several times to protect it from sailing off with the wind, and dropped it in with a "Thank you."

The horn player paused for about two beats. He grinned at me and exclaimed, "Thank you, Jesus!" Then he went right back to playing his testimony. He segued back into "Amazing Grace" as I walked away.

In a hundred years, I wouldn't have thought to put those two songs together. It took an artist listening to the Creator's heartbeat to do that.

A couple of days later I struck up a conversation with a cab driver who picked me up in Georgetown. I could tell from his demeanor, deep warm voice and picture of Jesus on the dash that he too was on first-hand speaking terms with the Lord.

The cabbie told me that he'd gone to work at age 10 in the tobacco fields of Southern Virginia. He'd been a driver all his adult life. With his wife, he'd raised and educated three children all of whom were professionals.

Somehow we got on to the topic of music and I told him about the trumpet player and the hymns. The cabbie knew "Master, the Tempest is Raging." "I always liked that song," he said.

I told him where I'd learned it and talked about the good people who had taught it to me. I said, "The thing about the old hymns of the church is that once you have learned them, no matter where you have wandered off, if you hear those melodies or sing them, they will always lead you home."

"That's right," the cabbie said, "that's right -- all the way home to Jesus."

Why am I writing this little story for you? Because joy is meant to be shared and because we all walk down mean and cold streets from time to time when an unforgiving wind blows in our face and we can lose our way for awhile.

But there is a song that won't be silenced and a prayer in the second verse that will always be heard by our Savior.
Master, with anguish of spirit
I bow in my grief today;
The depths of my sad heart are troubled
Oh, waken and save, I pray!
Torrents of sin and of anguish
Sweep o’er my sinking soul;
And I perish! I perish! dear Master
Oh, hasten, and take control.
The old horn player knew that it takes amazing grace to answer that prayer, but that grace is always there. In the loving largesse of the Father, we find the ways and the means to bring us all the way home. "That's right -- all the way home to Jesus!" Amen.
Master, the terror is over,
The elements sweetly rest;
Earth’s sun in the calm lake is mirrored,
And heaven’s within my breast;
Linger, O blessed Redeemer!
Leave me alone no more;
And with joy I shall make the blest harbor,
And rest on the blissful shore.

"O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him" (Ps 34:8).

Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

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Please note that the content and viewpoints of Mr. Hansen are his own and are not necessarily those of the C.S. Lewis Foundation. We have not edited his writing in any substantial way and have permission from him to post his content.

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Kent Hansen is a Christian attorney, author and speaker. He practices corporate law and is the managing attorney of the firm of Clayson, Mann, Yaeger & Hansen in Corona, California. Kent also serves as the general counsel of Loma Linda University and Medical Center in Loma Linda, California.

Finding God's grace revealed in the ordinary experiences of life, spiritual renewal in Christ and prayer are Kent's passions. He has written two books, Grace at 30,000 Feet and Other Unexpected Places published by Review & Herald in 2002 and Cleansing Fire, Healing Streams: Experiencing God's Love Through Prayer, published by Pacific Press in spring 2007. Many of his stories and essays about God's encompassing love have been published in magazines and journals. Kent is often found on the hiking trails of the southern California mountains, following major league baseball, playing the piano or writing his weekly email devotional, "A Word of Grace for Your Monday" that is read by men and women from Alaska to Zimbabwe.