Piano Blessings: Pass It On...

Receiving Piano Lessons

I am not a very good piano player.   I always wished I could have received lessons as a child.  When I was on my mission there was such a great need for piano players in church, and I wanted so badly to help… but I didn't have the talent.  I decided my children would all learn so they could be of better service in their lives in that area.

My dad was a band teacher, and I play the flute.  In Utah I taught flute lessons, so I know how to teach music.  I took my boys to a piano teacher for lessons for a short while.  I watched and learned and realized that I could teach my boys on my own, so I have taught them piano for the past 3 1/2 years.  They are now excellent players and able to play hymns well enough to accompany choirs when they sing.  They continue to memorize hymns and learn new ones.  They are now beyond my knowledge and have just started taking more advanced lessons from Jordan and Mariah's violin teacher.  That beautiful woman is donating her limited time to bless our children's musical future because she was blessed as a young girl by others who helped her.  What a miracle to have her goodness in our lives!  As part of her lesson, she sits on her couch and lovingly talks about the theory of piano with them.  She's passing on her beautiful light!  Gosh I love her.  I feel the Holy Ghost when I am around her.

This morning I read this scripture:  3 Nephi 12:15-16 "Behold, do men light a candle and put it under a bushel?  Nay, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light to all that are in the house: 16) Therefore let your light so shine before this people, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

I thought about our dear piano/violin teacher who has served our family so selflessly.  What a beautiful example of a woman letting her light shine.  Her good works truly do glorify our Father in Heaven.  When we are able, I hope to pass on the goodness that she has shared with us…. and give light as she does.  I hope to pass it on...

Giving Piano Lessons

We have been getting to know a lovely family who is learning more about the gospel.  They have been meeting with the missionaries for a short while.  The mother heard my boys playing the hymns on the piano.  She asked me where they learned to play like that.  I told them that I taught them.  The mother asked me to teach her daughter piano lessons.  I agreed… a bit hesitantly... because I am not a talented piano player myself.  Her daughter liked the piano lessons so much that her mother referred two more little girls to my house for piano lessons!  Then the primary president at church asked me to teach her two daughters as well!

What a blessing!  I am now teaching piano to five little girls, and they're paying me- which in our financial hardship is a much needed blessing!! :-)  The girls are learning very well.  I have told them that as they become more proficient, I will have to send them on to a more advanced teacher… but that won't be for a while yet.

I have taught flute, gymnastics, spanish, and preschool classes, but I NEVER would have considered teaching piano to other children besides my own… unless God placed this opportunity right into my lap… which HE did.

This is definitely a miracle in my life… to be able to help with finances while staying in my home.

It is also a precious blessing for our family to be able to become closer to this wonderful family who is learning the gospel of Jesus Christ.  They came to our home for Family Home Evening on Monday with the missionaries.  Jackson shared a very inspired, spiritual thought from the scriptures, and the missionaries shared a very inspired lesson with all of us after that.  The influence of the Holy Ghost was powerful in our home that night.

This scripture spoke to my heart this morning, and I thought about this family:  3 Nephi 12:6 "And blessed are all they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled with the Holy Ghost."  I feel the presence of the Holy Ghost when we are with this dear family.  Because of their hunger and thirst for righteousness as they search the things God wants for them in their lives, they are a great blessing and miracle in our lives.  I hope to always hunger and thirst for righteousness as they do and be an instrument in the Lord's hands as they have been to us.  I hope to pass it on...