Joshua, the Song Writer

I think it was during Joshua's senior year...I can't really remember...but Joshua started writing.

The physical act of writing has always been so frustrating for Joshua. His fine motor skills are not really that good, so holding a pencil for a long time...making letters fit on a small, thin line...NOT exactly high on his list of things he wanted to do.

But this was different. He started writing "songs." That's what he called them. My mother-in-law had gotten him a guitar one year for Christmas. Joshua can't play...his fingers don't really work that way and the guitar is so big. But he would hold it and strum the fire out of it. And sing.

We called it his "praise and worship" time.

It was LOUD.

One day, I asked him to let me read some of his "songs," and he brought me a stack of papers, his scratchy handwriting all over them.

Y'all.

I nearly died.

The lyrics were beautiful. They made sense. They RHYMED.

I thought, "thank you, LORD, for this great blessing! This is how Joshua is going to be able to make a living!" I just knew that he had to be one of those rare prodigies...someone with physical or mental delays who ends up have a miraculous gift. I thought, "Joshua is going to be FAMOUS!"

They were THAT awesome.

I reveled in my new-found thankfulness and bliss for a couple of weeks...maybe a month...and then, one day in the car, things became crystal clear in an instant.

I like all kinds of music, but I typically only listen to K-LOVE or Christian CD's in my car. This one day, there was one of those telethon things going on, so I switched it over to a Country station. As I was going down the road, I remember thinking..."I don't think I've heard this song before, but the words sound so familiar."

Uh-huh. You know where this is going, don't you?

It took a little investigating, but eventually I figured out that my little stinker was getting on the internet AT SCHOOL...during his computer lab...and he was finding all of these lyrics from songs that he liked...and he was meticulously copying them down in his notebook.

There goes his career as a song-writer...and him buying us a second home in Nashville with all of his earnings!

I'M KIDDING.

So we had a long talk about "how you can't copy someone else's songs." And he started writing some of his own stuff. Some of it is really good...I mean, it's usually Scripture-based and while it may not rhyme, he totally "gets" the meaning of the verses.

He has also written some really sweet tributes to family and friends at different stages in their lives. He wrote a "song" (poem) about one of his former coaches who was dying from a brain tumor. His wife had it printed in the bulletin and had Joshua read it at the funeral.

WOW. What an honor.

And all from a little Downsy boy using the talents God gave him to bless others.

If I ever write a book, I am totally including some of his "work" in it.

"Do you have the gift of speaking? Then speak as though God Himself were speaking through you. Do you have the gift of helping others? Do it with all the strength and energy that God supplies. Then everything you do will bring glory to God through Jesus Christ..." 1 Peter 4:11