Not long ago I sat down at my piano, thinking I would play an old childhood favorite tune that was bouncing around my head. To my surprise, I found it not only difficult but almost impossible to play. I’d also discovered something similar with singing: I’ve lost most of my nearly 3 octave range and dropped from a 1st soprano to a contralto. I spent more than an hour just going over scales, cords, and fingering. What in the world is going on? I was back to the basics I thought I’d mastered as a child.

Turns out that old phrase, “use it or lose it” is truer than I’d ever imagined. I hadn’t practiced my piano – sight-reading, scales or anything else in many, many years. Nor had I exercised my voice and practiced good breathing and scales to maintain my range. I’d listened to plenty of piano and vocal music, looked at music books, and studied various musical styles. But I hadn’t put my fingers on the keys and run my scales. I hadn’t taken those music books and practiced playing or singing the music in them.

Have you considered how many things this could apply to in your own life? What are some “basics” you learned early on that you quit practicing because you thought, “I have this down now.” Or perhaps, like me with piano and voice, those things are no longer at the forefront of your life?

Growing up I had practiced to please my piano and vocal teachers, or to prepare for a recital or other performance. Once I was no longer performing or taking lessons, I ran out of reasons to practice. So I didn’t. But practice isn’t about performance, and it doesn’t “make perfect.”

Practice is about improvement and deepening understanding and joy and connection. And practice makes progress. Progress toward a goal we’ll probably never achieve – at least this side of heaven.

The writer of Hebrews said, “You have been believers so long now that you ought to be teaching others. Instead, you need someone to teach you again the basic things about God’s word. You are like babies who need milk and cannot eat solid food. For someone who lives on milk is still an infant and doesn’t know how to do what is right. Solid food is for those who are mature, who through training have the skill to recognize the difference between right and wrong.” (Hebrews 5:12 – 14)

I often wonder if this passage could describe me. Am I like a baby stuck on milk? How often am I truly practicing the basic things of God – connection with Him, meditation on His Word, repentance of my wrongdoing and injury to God or others, forgiveness of those who offend or violate me, putting the full weight of my life and my will into God’s hands every day? As a child I memorized Scripture for contests, in order to get the grand prize. Even as an adult, memorizing Scripture was more a competition done with friends than it was a discipline for my benefit. When I fail to recite those passages occasionally, at least, I tend to forget them altogether. How can I “hide His word in my heart” (Psalm 119:11) if I’m not actively memorizing it regularly?

In 12-step programs, Steps 4 – 12 only work if Steps 1, 2 & 3 have been solidly worked and are continually practiced on a daily basis. They are the foundation on which the rest of the steps not only build but rest.

In Mathematics, Algebra is fundamental to understanding Calculus. And if you don’t practice Algebra at least occasionally, what happens? Can you remember, without Googling it, how to solve a quadratic equation?  When was the last time you practiced your cursive writing? Your signature, sure, but what about the rest? Can you write a 2-page letter in – legible – cursive? I seriously doubt I can.

So if all these educational basics fall into disrepair in our minds when we don’t practice, what makes us think that we can grow deeper in our relationship with God, have an ever fuller understanding of and deeper insights into Scripture, find abiding joy in all things, and have hope in the bleakest of times if we aren’t daily practicing the basic things of God’s word?

Life, like a rushing river, will always pull us in its direction rather than God’s. Just like my piano skills, and the audience of Hebrews, we will find if we are not practicing them daily we need to go back to the basics to move forward.