This morning we sang the hymn “Stand Up for Jesus.” That hymn takes me back to the summer after my freshman year of high school and to a 76-year-old Aussie named Gordon Hooker. Hooker taught piano at Biola University, and played piano at the Church of the Open Door in Los Angeles. He also taught me.

I took 3.5 years of traditional piano lessons in Pennsylvania, but when we moved to Arizona, I went two years without a piano teacher. Well, actually there was Mrs. Van L, from whom I took lessons for six weeks. She started me on the Blue Danube Waltz, and each week, because I would misplay something, she reassigned it. Finally, on the last week, I played it flawlessly. When I finished, she said, “Let’s do it one more week, just in case you ever need to play it for a recital.” I never went back.

Dad was taking courses at Pepperdine and Biola that summer, renting a converted garage from a Biola professor, whose name I remember as Mrs. McGahey. Something like that. Dad wanted me to take up lessons again, and inquired about it with Mrs. McGahey, who steered him to Gordon Hooker. And so, I ended up flying to LA for two weeks.

Hooker was amazing. I had four lessons from him over those two weeks. He started me on “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” teaching me to incorporate his chording style. He threw some theory at me, stuff which no doubt stuck with college students but didn’t work well with me. But somehow, he got his style through to me. I would practice up to eight hours a day; as soon as I sat down at Mrs. McGahey’s piano, my back would ache.

I got “What a Friend” down, and then we worked on “Stand Up for Jesus,” which used his style in a very different manner. There was a third song, which might have been “Have Thine Own Way, Lord,” but I’m not sure. Mainly, I recall the other two songs.

Two weeks, four lessons. And nearly everything I play is based on what Gordon Hooker taught me. Playing with a band, I go away from chording most of the time, but when I need a full sound, I pull out Hooker’s techniques and let ‘er rip.

That’s what I did today, with “Stand Up for Jesus.” Thanks, Dr. Hooker, for your patience with a high schooler. And thanks, Dad, for not giving up on making a pianist out of me. Playing the piano gives me more joy than anything else I do in church.