Still here…
...just taking a short hiatus. I've recently found energy to write new music and it is so wonderful to spend creative currency on producing and not just talk of producing. (Not to say I don't enjoy that as well). Perhaps I'll post some more here in blogland. You have to promise to listen properlike with headphones and not on your laptop's shitspeakers.Now go let your heartache.
Letters from faithful giants.
I do not know who put me in the world, nor what the world is, nor what I am myself. I am in a terrible ignorance about everything. I do not know what my body is, or my senses, or my soul, or even that part of me which thinks what I am saying, which reflects on itself and everything but knows itself no better than anything else. I see the terrifying spaces of the universe enclosing me, and I find myself attached to one corner of this expanse ...
‘at’ll do pig…. ‘at’ll do
I am of the belief that any profound cinematic experience is a possible window to the soul. In other words, if a particular film or scene hit you in the stomach there is something there to be known that informs who you are, who God is, how you experience beauty, etc. So with said prologue: I headed up north to catsit for the folks and found myself riffling through their VHS collection and to my delight found "Babe." I was weeping for the last 10 ...
There’s a hole in my heart, full of theology
A professor at my seminary (quite ironically) proposed the idea that theology is sin; for when we attempt to intellectually or systematically box-up God, we fail to have faith to believe in something mysterious, unconfined, holy. I believe as such and have feverishly tried to undo my fundamentalism with all its mind-shrinking dogma, but as I assess my two years at seminary thus far, I fear I have experienced little joy in this gray area of the ...
The film that runs inside my head.
...tells me this:- my experience of life will never change- beauty and delight have no value- God is primarily interested in changing my behaviorSo in other words, God wants me to change in order to experience a good life of beauty and delight, but I don't believe such things are possible nor do they have any value. And I'm up front telling the congregation otherwise. Hypocrisy wasn't supposed to look like this.
Honey listen to him, he is a doctor
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.”- Dr. Seuss
I could sing of your love forever.
A member of the worship team approached me after a delightful service this past week and preemptively deadpanned, "I know it isn't about the experience, BUT, I really enjoyed----" "Wait wait wait!!!" I interjected, "not about the experience? Not about how you feel? Why are you doing this then?" Ok, I wasn't that hard on him, but I'm starting to run up against this "worship experience guilt" quite often now and I'm just gonna call the shit out ...
The hour of my salvation.
I was at The Round on Monday and an old friend, Noah, was performing. I've noticed something different about him in this past year. I can't be certain but he seems to have that oh so odd and desirable peace of mind; he has found rest in his faith I believe (as Keith Green once put it). One of his songs was this jubilant, nearly awkward piece that climaxed with the declaration: "this is the hour of my salvation." Another love song chimed, "Julie, ...
God must hate emotions
I've caught myself and others criticize any worship that is done for emotional purposes. In other words, if I choose to sing and dance into the emotional beauty of the moment I am somehow whoring out God; he mustn't be interested in my words of adoration or praise if I am benefiting. Consequently, we believe that the best worship occurs when one forgets about the self and focuses on God. This certainly does occur at times, and our humility and ...
Time to drop the assumption that God’s blessing looks like greenbacks.
Recently, a friend voiced concerns over the burgeoning evangelical push for better environmental practices. The gist of the argument was that apparently much of Europe hopes we attend to the issues of global warming and in so doing, diminish our superpower economy. We wouldn't want that now, would we. I wonder how it came to be that our economic prowess and "blessing" became the dominant value particularly for those still hoping in the severely ...