On Procreation: No, not that kind of procreation

When I was a kid stocking stuffers meant a handful of little candies. I’m not complaining. What kid doesn’t like candy? But now there is stocking stuffer inflation to the point where there must be something substantive in that overgrown sock, something you cannot simply eat. Recently I encountered a box store’s post-Christmas clearance wall and stared for a while at its unsold stocking stuffers. There were no hard candies, but plenty of crafts, toys, and even musical instruments. In three bins next to each other were harmonicas, kazoos, and slide whistles, all marked down to $1.25 or less per item. Jackpot!
Soon our house sounded like the set of some drifter movie as harmonica solos filled the air. I told the kids they could play it while breathing in and out: a marvel to anyone whose heart isn’t three sizes too small. My youngest began crafting original musical compositions, and (I’m sure I’m biased) they weren’t that bad. Her tunes sounded like the stereotypical ballads grizzled men might play as they sat in an empty train car heading nowhere in particular or gathered round a campfire after a long day on horseback.
The kazoo was also a great find. Any song that my children knew was immediately playable on the kazoo. It turns out kazoos are harder to play than they appear. I’m no good at it. Maybe it has to do with the fact I can’t whistle, either. But my oldest, who is learning how to play the piano, played dozens of songs on his kazoo. He soon came up with the idea to play both the piano and kazoo at the same time. That is, with a little help from his sister holding the kazoo in place for him. Too bad the store didn’t have on clearance one of those harmonica/kazoo neck holder thingies like Bob Dylan uses.
The harmonica and kazoo experience reminded me of the sheer joy of creating music. There are no right or wrong notes. There are no mistakes in rhythm. It’s creation for creation’s sake. It’s pure excess. And as such it taps into one of God’s greatest gifts to humankind—procreation.
Procreation is normally limited to the topic of bringing forth children into the world, but that isn’t the only thing humans generate. When we say we create something, we are really talking of conceiving it (another baby term) or procreating it. We aren’t creating anything ex nihilo. We’re bringing forth something that was inside us, although we didn’t know it until the harmonica touched our lips, the paintbrush spread on the canvass, or the pen scratched the paper.
Technology has made it easy to share what we create. My son can post Star Wars fan fiction for others to see. My wife can share media of what my kids made at school or at home. But this ease of distribution has come at a cost. Due to the newfound competition our imaginations have become truncated and our limits shouted at us by so much great content available. No longer do we have to make music ourselves to listen to it; we can just stream Pandora endlessly. Besides, professional musicians are much better at the whole music thing than we are. We don’t have to come up with our own pictures or stories to share at bedtime with our children or entertain our friends. Instead, we sign-in to Netflix and binge watch the new series everyone is talking about. Besides, professional storytellers are far better at the whole story thing than we are.
And in this exchange of constantly glutting ourselves on the best instead of putting on our aprons to make something average by scratch, we lose a part of what it means to be human. To procreate. To bring forth that which will bring forth even more. To enlarge this circle whose center is everywhere and circumference is nowhere that some might call new life in Christ, partaking of God’s own life by his Spirit.
Don’t wait to be handed a cheap harmonica before you write your own songs again. Turn off the television and share a story from the past with a loved one. Get out a journal and capture some thoughts that have been bouncing around in your head lately. Put down your phone and tablet, endlessly scrolling for something to get upset about, and instead ask curious questions about the person living right with you. Inspire. Create. Live. And Share

You’ll never know the potential God has placed within you unless you tap into it. Really, you are tapping into him in you. What did you think it meant for Jesus to grant abundant life or for his Spirit to be in you? Certainly not to laze around the house all your days consuming what someone else made. Make something all your own and share it. Bonus points if you can share it with the least among you out of love. For that is where your passion and the world’s calling meet. One theologian calls that a vocation. I call it fun.