Federico Eriksson

I started playing guitar wanting to learn how to shred like my heroes. I was playing with rock bands and touring but put that aside to start a family. When I thought that I was able to start playing again with other musicians, stage four cancer derailed those plans.

Suddenly, I was fighting for my life and had to give it my all to survive. But the chemo therapy caused havoc in my nervous system and I had lost all dexterity in my hands to the point that I was not able to write my name; when the hospital needed my signature for treatments I had to grab the pen with both hands and move my arms to write my name. I also had to deal with Peripheral Neuropathy in my hands, fingers, feet, and parts of my legs.

I felt that my music career  was over, I couldn’t event hold a chord down and I thought that I would never be able to play again.

I was sitting next to my bed in tears, holding my guitar and using my right hand to position the fingers in my fretting hand to form a chord and I couldn’t do it! I couldn’t feel my fingers except for this numb sensation and somehow I did feel the pain of my raw fingertips that had cuts from pressing the strings.

I was feeling sorry for myself and started crying bitterly as the room was getting darker. The sun had just set so the light became dim, and the tears in my eyes and my sorrow made it darker.

As tears clouded my eyes, I started seeing a vision. In the midst of my tears I saw what seemed to be the light of a candle and a hand holding it. I saw the hand bringing the light under my bed and the room became darker. Then the hand brought the light over the bed and the room became brighter. This repeated several times and I was so startled that I even stopped crying but still couldn’t see clearly because my eyes where still full of tears.

As I witnessed this, I remembered a teaching from the Bible.

Luke 8:16 “No one lights a lamp and hides it in a clay jar or puts it under a bed. Instead, they put it on a stand, so that those who come in can see the light.”

At the same time I felt and heard a voice in my head asking me, why was I so sad and upset that I couldn’t play guitar anymore? Especially since I had not played guitar outside of my bedroom in years because I was too busy with work.

As I heard this I was shocked, I felt embarrassed because that was the truth. However, I was still overwhelmed with sadness thinking that I would NEVER be able to play guitar again.

Then this voice in my head, that was more of a knowing or understanding than actual words, said to me that He would perform the miracle so that I could play again. But He would do it for me to share this ‘light’ with others, like the teaching in the Bible said.

I didn’t know exactly what that meant or how I could do it. I just understood that He didn’t want me to just play guitar for myself; I had to share the music with others.

A friend invited me to his church and I had never been to a church like this before, there was amazing music before the service and then the preacher shared a message. As I heard the band play, my mind imagined that I was playing guitar on stage, shredding on my guitar. Physically I couldn’t play, but that didn’t stop my imagination from dreaming on. At the end of the service, there was an announcement on the screens saying that they needed musicians to play and gave information on how to audition.

My eyes grew big and my jaw dropped. Was this intended for me? It sure felt like it! It was at that moment that it was very clear for me, He wanted me to play guitar for His glory and to brighten people’s lives and lead them back to Him through my guitar.