Getting to Know Dana Dirksen
For many longtime listeners you know Dana Dirksen as the creator, composer, and singer of the Songs for Saplings and Questions with Answer music mostly through her work that has become part of your own family’s story.
Some of you have known the Dirksen family for years. You may remember when the kids were little, when Songs for Saplings was just beginning, or when the first songs were being written and recorded.
Those who know Dana personally know that her heart is a beautiful reflection of Christ, overflowing with love, hospitality, and joy.
This month, we sat down with Dana, to get to know her better and hear about what’s happening in her life and in the Ministry of Songs for Saplings these days.
Question: How are you spending your time nowadays?
Dana: Personally, one of my favorite things these days is being a grandma. I have 5 grandboys and I especially love summers in Oregon with them. Swimming in lakes, camping, playing at parks, and just having lots of time together outside. Basically, all the things that are really fun with grandkids and were considerably more exhausting when I was the mom!
At church for the past seven years Tuesday mornings have also been a really special part of my week. I lead music for the pre-school kids at “The Creek" while their moms enjoy Bible study together at “The River”. I remember the years of being a young mom, and how much it meant to have time with other adults to pray together, study God’s Word, and be encouraged. I love that now I get to help young moms in that way. And I get to sing and be silly with their kids, which turns out to be a pretty great job!
I also spend a lot of time painting. Oil painting portraits are my favorite. I love trying to capture not only what someone looks like, but something of who they are. Of course, there’s usually a point in every portrait where I’m convinced I’ve completely ruined it, so apparently painting is also teaching me perseverance.
Question: What’s Going on With Songs for Saplings?
Songs for Saplings continues to be a big part of our lives. James still volunteers as the Executive Director in charge of getting projects organized, fundraising, and music distribution. I’m still recording new translations of our music. This year my daughter and I traveled to Sweden to work with the team recording Questions with Answers Volume 2 in Swedish, and just finished also just finished the final recording session in Northern Virginia for a new Spanish-language Volume 2 It’s pretty amazing that after all these years I still get to make music, travel, meet wonderful people, and call it “work”.
Overall, these days are a mixture of family and grandkids, painting, music, ministry, and getting to invest in the next generation. I’m very grateful.
What have you been learning or enjoying recently?
Dana: I really love learning new things. Unfortunately, I want to learn ALL the things at once, which means I’m usually a beginner at about six things at any given moment.
Painting has been my biggest obsession lately. I especially love oil portraits, and I’ve been studying some of the great portrait painters and trying to figure out how they make it look so effortless. Then I sit down at my easel and am reminded that apparently it is not effortless.
I’m still learning languages, and am currently studying Mandarin.
I think I just really enjoy being a student. There’s always something new to learn, and thankfully I’ve reached the age where I’m pretty comfortable being bad at something for a while--at least more comfortable than I used to be!
Do you have a favorite God story from your life recently?
Dana: I remember when our first child was only a few months old, I had a sudden realization that someday I might get to be a grandma! I remember how happy that thought made me. It was a little premature considering I hadn’t even figured out how to be a mom! Now, all these years later, I have five grandchildren.
Each one of them feels like a miracle and a gift from God. I don’t think I could have imagined back then how much I would love being their grandma, or how much joy they would bring into my life.
So, I think sometimes our ‘God stories’ are the things we only recognize when we look back. There I was, holding my first baby and hoping that maybe someday there would be grandchildren—and now there are five little people I get to know and love and watch grow up.
“It makes me so thankful for God’s kindness and for gifts I could never have fully imagined when I was younger.”
Remember How Songs for Saplings Began?
For some of you, the story of Songs for Saplings is a familiar one. You may even remember parts of it firsthand.
Before there were translation teams, recording trips, and children singing these songs around the world, it started simply—with Dana, her family, and a desire to help children learn the truth about God through music.
Watch this video and here Dana tell the story in her own words:
From the Staff: If you have been part of Songs for Saplings for many years, thank you! Your prayers, encouragement, generosity, and willingness to share these songs have helped make so much of this possible.
What’s your favorite thing about Songs for Saplings?
Dana: One of my favorite things about Songs for Saplings is the global aspect. It is amazing to watch people around the world take these songs and make them their own, using them to teach and disciple their own little ‘saplings’.
I’ve gotten to visit Songs for Saplings clubs in remote villages in Malawi, work with the Church in Ukraine and hear how the songs are being used at summer camps, and work alongside translators, musicians, pastors, and families in Sweden, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Poland, China, Zambia, France, England, Malawi, Kenya, Cameroon, Canada, and all over the US. Sometimes I have to stop and think about how incredible that is. Songs that started at my kitchen table are now being sung by children in languages I can’t even understand!
And what I especially love is that we aren’t doing the ministry for them. We give people tools, and then we stand back and get out of their way while they use it in their own churches, communities, and families far better than we ever could.
What would you like to say to those who support Songs for Saplings?
We make all of our music and other resources available for free for everyone to use. So I would say to everyone who supports Songs for Saplings, “Thank you! You are part of discipling over two hundred thousand kids!“
Your generosity is helping believers around the world disciple the next generations in the deep things of God. Who God is, what He has done, and all the glorious things he has in store for His children.
I’m incredibly grateful that I get a front-row seat to watch it happen, and so grateful to our supporters who make it possible.”
Thank You for Being Part of the Story
Since 2003, friends and supporters of Songs for Saplings have helped make this work possible.
Some have been here from almost the very beginning, and some of you joined along the way.
Together, you have helped these songs travel far beyond the Dirksen family’s kitchen table and into homes, churches, missions, camps, schools, and communities around the world.
If you would like to help Songs for Saplings continue creating and translating Scripture-rich music for the next generations, we would be grateful to have you be part of what comes next.
Songs for Saplings is a registered 501(c)(3) organization with EIN 47-3108962.
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