Faith

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When Faith Matters
© 2005
by

Stephen A. Peterson


While a student at Indian University—Bloomington in my Freshman year, I was assigned to a six student string group/section and took music related courses and physics courses that were part of my major area of concentration. The course in physics turned out to be especially meaningful, though at times frustrating, when I could not determine the answer to complex problems. The professor, Dr. Woods, answered many of the “what” facts about sound (what a decibel was) and many of the “how” facts (how fast sound travels), but he could never explain any of my “whys”. “Why does sound work that way?” sort of questions.

As a music major, Dr. Woods assigned an exercise whereas I was to choose a practice room or practice rooms in the School of Music Building. I was to study the affects of sound and how it resonated around the room. Because of the number of music students, rooms had to be reserved a week in advance of its use. For me to better understand sound, I was challenged to note how sound resonated using the major instrument groups—namely, brass, percussion, string and woodwind in these practice rooms. This required me to work with members of my orchestration class which had members in each of the sections. So for roughly 6 weeks, I studied how sound differed with these instruments. I heard how certain practices rooms brightened and intensified sound, or softened and muted them, sharpened and then muffled some sounds. I identified new sound I had never heard before and how they blend in a musical composition. I was able to understand what composers understood about musical instruments. Once a composer recognizes instrumentation, sounds and ranges, he or she composes according to how he or she views composition.

In time, following Dr. Woods’ physics class, I realized I could not explain the “why” of resonation any more or better than he could explain the “why” of sound. I thought Dr. Wood was only teaching me the physics of sound but actually he was teaching me faith. We will never, ever know all there is to know about God and why God does the things that He does. Yet God has given us enough to know who He is and how we may obtain eternal life. It is up to us to have enough faith to realize that God does what He does for our good. I also learned that faith has not to do with being blind, as many suggest it is. Faith is realizing where knowledge ends is where faith begins. And faith is based upon knowledge not ignorance.

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