Hamlet's Blackberry: Book Review

I recently finished reading a book recommended on Kevin DeYoung'sBest Books of 2010 list called Hamlet's Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age by William Powers.  DeYoung recommended it as the most convicting book he had read all year, so I "picked up" a copy and read through it.  I don't know if I would use the word convicting, but it certainly was a thought-provoking book.  You already read one of the fruits of my thought being provoked,the reason why I never answer my phone.  Really, if I could sum up the whole book, it's the idea that we don't allow time for our thoughts to be provoked any more.  We are trapped in "the crowd" with no easy way out.
Powers separates his book into three sections; What Larks? The Conundrum of the Connected Life, Beyond the Crowd Teachings of Seven Philosophers of Screens, and In Search of Depth Ideas in Practice.  The middle section is his focus, where he takes the teachings and musings of seven "philosophers" like Plato and Shakespeare and discusses how the issues they were having with being connected relate to our world today and how their solutions might help us.  To be honest, I thought this section was the weakest of the three sections of the book.  Plato and Thoreau were really the best chapters, but the rest I could have skipped and still gotten a lot out of the book.
Powers really shines in the opening section (the first four chapters), and really that section alone is worth the price of the book.  If nothing else, it helps you to understand what being constantly connected is doing to you.  There is another book I'm just starting that promises to go into this in more scientific detail, but Powers doesn't need scientific detail because we can all see ourselves as he talks about the issues.  Boiling it down, since we are constantly connected, we flit from info to info.  Think about it, how many windows to you have open on your computer right now?  How about tabs?  Have you ever surfed Facebook, but then the computer dings to tell you you've got email, and there is a link to a blog post you click, so you start reading the post, but off to the side there is something really intriguing, so you click there, but just as you start reading, the phone rings and your spouse asks what time the store closes, so you Google the store to find the store hours, then you click back on Facebook and update your status to reflect how grateful you are that your spouse is running to the store, and then a chat window pops up and you start chatting with that friend you haven't talked to in forever.....  Sound familiar?  What Powers suggests is missing are moments to process.
So, the last section of the book talks about ways that we might find those moments to process.  One of the suggestions I liked was the "no screens" room.  He suggested setting up a room without "screens" and deliberately spending time in that room.  Now, I would change that slightly to allow my nook or Kindle, but that's because I don't have either of them set up for things like email and internet browsing would be horribly slow, and because I don't buy physical books any more and haven't for the last two or three years.  Anyway, just the idea of disconnecting and "getting away" occasionally is valuable.  Take time to ponder.
Now let me quickly go away from the book and draw a conclusion based upon the material.  The subject I want to mention really quick is Bible study.  After I read Hamlet's Blackberry, I was pondering how this applied to my spiritual walk and I suddenly realized just how counter to the way I process information Bible devotionals really are.  Let me explain.  I read a lot of books.  A lot!  As in, more than one a week.  I also read lots of blogs.  I use Google Reader and Flipboard on my iPad (which is synced with Google Reader) to keep up with all of those blogs.  I keep up on Drudgereport daily and read lots of emails throughout the day.  What I don't do is repeat a lot of content.  My reading of Hamlet's Blackberry will likely be the only reading of Hamlet's Blackberry.  I don't typically reread a lot of blog posts.  In other words, my intake of content is constantly new.  Bible study is quite the opposite.  Instead we are called to pour over and reread the same text as we ask the Holy Spirit to write it on our hearts.  This means reading the same material over again.  This means pondering slowly through passages of scripture.  This means training myself to slow down as I read the Bible.  Anyway, just a thought.

TRON Legacy: Album Review

Ever since rumors started surfacing about a new TRON movie, there has been a background discussion about the music being done by Daft Punk.  Having never heard of Daft Punk, that's not really the kind of news that gets me excited.  Subsequent news always seemed to mention the Daft Punk soundtrack and as trailers for the movie were shared online, again, the soundtrack was pointed at.  So, even though I haven't had a chance to see the movie, I thought I would point MOG at the TRON Legacy soundtrack and see what all of the fuss is about.

Let me be blunt, this is one of the best movie soundtracks I've ever heard (BTW, I am a movie soundtrack junkie).  I was blown away by the music here.  So much so that I just did some online research to try to figure out who composed the score with these Daft Punk guys, because the orchestration and the beauty of the music is simply astounding.  Well, the Daft Punk guys did all of the music.  They worked on the score for over two years, as you can tell as you listen to the interweaving of melodies, orchestra and techno music.  This score took time.  So much so that the movie was cut to the soundtrack!  If you understand the movie score process, you know that one of the last things that happens in the film is the soundtrack.  You can see the process in a lot of making of movies.  It usually involves the conductor standing in front of the orchestra with a screen showing the movie, and the orchestra literally plays the soundtrack to the movie.  This movie was cut listening to the soundtrack.  I can't wait to see the results!

The music on the album is a mix of orchestral music with techno.  This mix comes off well.  Some tracks like Derezzed are almost all techno music.  This is what Daft Punk is known for, and they don't disappoint.  The music is well sequenced and mixed with an originality that is rare in techno.  Where Legacy really shines though is in the use of the orchestra.  There are moments that sound like something from Batman Begins, moments that sound like Lord of the Rings in their scope and grandeur and moments that sound like the great composers.  No, I'm not exaggerating.  Adagio for TRON is incredible.  I actually stopped what I was doing, put the headphones on, started the track over, closed my eyes and listened.  Exquisite.

Something that is so different about this album is the interplay between the orchestra and the techno.  What you would expect would be the orchestra and the loops to be treated as separate entities, but since the Daft Punk guys created it all at the same time, the orchestra is simply another sonic tool for the layering of the music.  The result is something truly unique (at least I've never heard something quite like it).

What is important about this album is that I can listen to the whole thing and that I can listen to it multiple times.  It seems like movie soundtracks have really gone downhill in the last decade.  The aforementioned Batman Begins sounds much the same throughout and the new Star Trek wasn't much better.  Listening to Legacy I can hear what is missing from so many soundtracks, melodies and counter-melodies to go along with these wonderful chord progressions.

If you enjoy classical music, techno music or movie soundtracks, you really owe it to yourself to listen to this album.

Worship Geek Moment

Dan Strom just emailed me this link, and it looks like the best thing for our projection system since sliced bread. I can't wait to try it out. I'm picturing running the video for Sunday from a Google Chrome window instead of the massive resource heavy Song Show and being able to edit the show from my office or home rather than heading upstairs to the Projection booth, and Pastor Flack would be able to create and edit his sermon notes from right within the program... I'm really excited to try this out!

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Why I Never Answer My Phone

Depending on how well you know me, or if you have ever tried to get a hold of me, you will have quickly realized that calling me is pretty much useless, but if you send me an email, you will usually get a response in a decent amount of time. I've never really thought about why I'm like this, but I'm reading a book called, "Hamlet's Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital World," and I realize that it's my attempt to get some space. Picture in your head a friend who has a Bluetooth device hooked up to their phone. Have you ever noticed that people with them tend to talk on them a lot and have difficulty not answering the phone, even if they are involved in a real live conversation.

The phone has become the ultimate instant communication tool, demanding immediate response. When you receive a call, you are expected to answer it. If I am busy and phone rings, Jodie will ask, "Are you going to get that?" to which my typical response is, "If it's important, they will leave a message.". Why? There are only a few things in my mind that rise to the level of needing instant response and those types of things come from a small group of people (caller ID is a wonderful thing). Every thing else tends to fall into the categories of needing a quick response, a response, or no response at all. By waiting for a message, it gives me the opportunity to sort the message to the appropriate response.

This is why I love Google Voice. It allows me to filter incoming calls to my contacts only, and the rest it sends to voicemail, which is transcribed and sent to me in an email. Once in my inbox, it can be responded to immediately, starred for later response, or read and digested with no response needed. The difference is that I get to set the time when I will interact with my email. Now, granted, my iPad (by the way this is the first post I've written on the iPad) dings when I get an email, but I choose whether or not I check the ding. When I'm at work, I check my email immediately and respond immediately. People have figured out that if you email me during the day during the week, they get an immediate response. I used to check voiemails once a day at best and often slower than that. During my days off, I check emails a couple of times a day, and respond slowly or star for a later response.

Long story short, I have attempted to exert some kind of control over the busyness and sense of urgency in my life. I would encourage you to take a look at the things in life that are adding to your hectic day and yet don't really need to. This could be emails (I have a friend who checks emails once a day because then he can control the amount of time it takes), facebook, your Bluetooth, perhaps even something like checking the news constantly. Consider how you might gain a measure of control back.

If not, please know that if you need to get a hold of me, don't call, send me an email, and I'll get back to you!

Finally Excited for Christmas

There is a major difference between Jodie and me in our appreciation of holidays.  It comes down to this, Jodie likes to celebrate holidays, I really could care less about most holidays.  To me, the only holidays that rise to the occasion of being a day to celebrate are Thanksgiving, Easter and Christmas.  The rest of the holiday schedule (including Birthdays) could disappear and I wouldn't be terrible torn up about it.

Now, not only does Jodie love Christmas, but she loves Christmas starting in the fall.  This year, she pulled out the Christmas music October 3.  Actually, it might have been earlier, but October 3 was the first time I heard it.  I have a firm rule that no Christmas music may be played before Thanksgiving, and really I could wait until the 2nd week of December to start listening.  It's not that I'm a Scrooge, I just get bored with music, and there are only so many Christmas songs to listen to before you start repeating them, over, and over, and over, and over again.  If I wait longer to start listening to Christmas music, then I don't get burnt out on Christmas music before Christmas even gets here.

What's worse than early Christmas music?  Shopping!  If I could, I would not leave the house on the weekends during the holiday shopping season (we live off of a shopping center, so we get to have fun with holiday traffic).  Drivers start getting punchy, lines get crazy long, and people generally loose common sense when shopping during the Christmas season.  This I find to be odd, since they mostly have common sense the rest of the year.  So, I have been shopping online for many years now, and will likely continue that trend.

Having read this far, you may be wondering how in the world the title matches the post.  To this point, I have complained greatly about the Christmas season.  Well, the title is true, I am finally getting in the Christmas season.  Last night was the Riley County High School Christmas concert, and it was really wonderful.   They had it this year at Grace, and the church was decorated nicely with candlelight around the sanctuary, and the music was great.  Then this morning, worship team practiced our Christmas music set (note: we've been singing Christmas music for a couple of weeks).  Then the kicker, this afternoon Lindsay Arthur came in to practice the Offertory for tomorrow, "Christmas Morning" by Shannon Wexelberg.  First of all, if you have not heard of Shannon Wexelberg, she was the worship leader at the National Worship Leader Conference this year who impressed me the most.  She led worship from the piano, and it was a moving time.  She has released a Christmas album called Love Came for Me, and it is one of the best Christmas albums released in the last couple of years, and the song Christmas Morning is one of the best (if not the best) original Christmas song written in the last couple of years.  Lindsay sings wonderfully well, and it was such a blessing to run through the song today.  If you are in the Manhattan area, plan on coming to either the 8:30 or 10:30 service tomorrow to hear her sing, hear Pastor Flack preach Advent from the Psalms and all of the other Christmas celebration in the service.

Before I leave you, let me leave you with the last verse of the song and a link to buy the cd (or you could listen to it on a service like Rhapsody or MOG).  Trust me, worth it!

This Christmas morning

As families gather all around the tree

Let’s tell the story

That Love was born to die for you and me

To mend the broken

To be what we could never be

This Christmas morning

Let us worship Christ the King

Love Came for Me

Another New Blog????....... Enough Already!!!!!!

Yes, I know, I have launched no less than three different blog sites over the last three years, agerling.wordpress.com, alan.gerlingfamily.com and amos5worship.com with a relaunch on that site.  So, here we are with another place to call blog home.  Luckily, most of my posts have moved with me as I have gone from site to site, with the exception being the posts I wrote while using habari on amos5worship.  I'll probably manually copy those over later.

Couple of reasons for the move back to Wordpress.  First of all, renewal was up for amos5worship, and I just couldn't justify paying for the domain when I don't use it all that often.  Jodie came to the same conclusion and moved her blog to psalm127mom.blogspot.com (I know, Blogspot :-( Ick!)  The second reason was the time needed to tinker within my custom design on my custom install of habari really resulted in me doing nothing.  With this blog, I've got it set up, and Wordpress worries about things like upgrades and design theming, etc.  That means that all I have to worry about is the content!  Oh, and did I mention free.  That's a pretty solid reason.

The last reason that I transitioned away from amos5worship is that I felt a pressure on myself to keep post to subject matter of worship and justice and related matters.  Not to say I didn't stray, but I felt weird writing a long post on Ubuntu on a worship site.  Worship Geek (a light-bulb moment that happened to be available) lets me flex the content since the title is really a description of two passions of mine, worship and all things geeky.  So, my hope is to post more often.  (I know, I've said that before)  I'm also planning to broaden the content a bit.

So, sorry for the change again.  I really do intend that this is going to be my permanent blog for the foreseeable future.  Thanks for being patient, and looking forward to sharing with you going forward.

Goodbye Rhapsody

For those of you who know me well, you know that for a long time I have been an avid user of Rhapsody.  Matter of fact, during my sophomore year, as I was using Audiogalaxy to download hundreds if not thousands of illegal mp3s, I began to feel convicted that what I was doing was stealing.  The biggest barrier to me purchasing all of those tracks on cd was the eclectic nature of my listening habits.  I listen to a lot, and I like to listen to new music often.  That is where Rhapsody came in.  Rhapsody launched in December of 2001, and I quickly subscribed.  For a monthly fee (that has gone up and down over the years, but usually settled around $9.99), I could listen to unlimited tracks by most of the artists I wanted to listen to legally.  The downside was that the service only worked streaming (they later added the ability to purchase mp3s).  This wasn't too much of an issue for me since most of my listening was in my dorm room.  Much has changed over the years, and much has stayed the same.  For many of those years, Rhapsody was a player installed in Windows, and recently, they launched a web player and iOS apps.

I have been a faithful customer for all of those years.  Rhapsody really has been a part of my music life, especially now that I'm a worship director, listening weekly to new albums and artists.  So, why am I saying goodbye after all of these years?  Simple, something better and cheaper came along.  This week, the Chrome app store launched, and one of the reviewers commented that the Chrome version of the MOG web player was really nice.  To be blunt, it blows Rhapsody away, and it is an early beta with features missing.  Rhapsody has been slow to change (in 9 years, the player changed little), and has become in many ways bloated, including the web player and the amount of resources it uses.  In my geekiness, I have switched to Ubuntu, and the only way to play tracks is through the web player, and it's just plain awkward, and it hasn't changed in two years.

So, MOG it is.  Maybe someday I will return to Rhapsody, but for now I'm going with the new kid on the block.  Oh, and did I mention that MOG is half the price of Rhapsody.  Makes a big difference!  I figured out how much I have paid to Rhapsody over the last 9 years, but I will spare you the wincingly large amount.

Goodbye Rhapsody, you will always be my first music streaming love.

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It's been a long day. This Sunday, the Flack family had gone out to Tuttle Cove (if you didn't know our Church Picnic is out at Tuttle Cove), and they came back and said that the site was pretty torn up. So, I went out this morning, and pretty torn up was a gross understatement. It is more like a grassless mud-hill. Certainly not a place where you can have 500+ people walking around, sitting, etc., much less building a stage on with sound equipment and a generator. So, the picnic is cancelled. Yes, yet another event cancelled. After trying every other possible venue in town, I ended the day frustrated. Thankfully, things like the meat had not yet come in, so the order could be cancelled, but honestly, I really look forward to these combined services.

If you look back through my blog, you will see that I often talk about my desire to see the congregation together more. It is a healthy thing for the members of the Body to occasionally see the whole Body gathered together. So, stick it on your calendars. Easter 2011 is coming up fast! Actually after all my calls, it looks like City Park might be a better venue for us for the college, so I'm starting to plan now!

That being said, I look forward to see God work Sunday. After the let down of this week, I am again reminded of God's providence (sovereignty). Nothing is outside of God's control or plan... even a muddy slick instead of a grassy hill! Poor example, but today I needed to be reminded. I think sometimes we get into the habit of talking about God's providence in the big things. When things are going really good, or when we are going through tribulation, we think of how God is sovereign in the situation. We forget that God is in control in the little things too. After all, in addition to naming and counting the stars, He also numbers the hairs on our head (Matthew 10:30).

If I may, let me quote quickly from Kevin DeYoung's book, "The Good News We Almost Forgot: Rediscovering the Gospel in a 16th Century Catechism"

"... Like most of us, ... students are much more at ease using passive language about God's permissive will or comfortable generalities about God being "in control" than they are about stating precisely and confidently to those in the midst of suffering "this has come from God's fatherly hand.... If God is a Father, then surely He exercises His authority of His creation and creatures for the good of His beloved children. Providence is nothing more than a belief in God the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth, brought to bear on our present blessing and troubles and buoying our hope into the future...."

Lord of the Rings, Programming and Karate Kid

Poor kid, this morning started out with Isaac's 9 month appointment. All continues to go well. He's 93rd percentile in height and head circumference and 76% in weight. Healthy kid.

The worst part about these appointments are the shots. Jodie of course will have nothing to do with holding him down, so it inevitably falls to me. Every time, he has laid there calmly, making eye contact with me. Then out of the corner of my eye I see the nurse jab, and then a split second later, I see a jump, a realization that something just hurt big time in his eyes, and then the tears well up. Then the screaming..... You get the idea. Anyway, poor kid took a really long nap this afternoon.

So, while the Gerling family worked on their naps, I headed downstairs to continue my whirlwind quest to get all of the programming projects that have been piling up done. I hunted a bit and decided on Lord of the Rings for a background movie. I can't really say that I watched it all that closely as I was engrossed greatly in converting Jodie's Joomla website into a Habari one. Again, I love Joomla, I've worked with it a lot, and it works great for sites like the church website. However, the major complaint from Jodie has been that the comments don't work. I really have no idea why such a thing would happen, and therefore had no idea how to fix it. Habari has a nice elegant comment solution, so I spent my day learning how to create a template for Habari! You can see the result at psalm127mom.com. If you saw the site before, you actually really shouldn't notice that much of a difference (other than the fact you can leave comments), but rest assured, the site is now actually on a blogging platform!

This leaves one final project. I need to redo the Jodie Gerling Designs & Photography page. Jodie actually has had a design done for several months now, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I've spent most of the evening looking at various platforms for photo blogs with a nice gallery layout and after some consideration of PixelPost and ZenPhoto, it looks like the winner is ye old classic platform, Wordpress. Anyway, that's tomorrow's goal, so hopefully you can see the results soon.

Now, while I was trying out various CMS platforms, I put in Karate Kid II. I just can't believe that I always forget how much I love this movie. I know, some of you are saying that Karate Kid I is better, but I have always loved the sequel far more. Sure, the original has lines like, "Don't forget to breathe," and "Wax on, wax off," but how does that relate to you in real life? Really. The second movie teaches us about things like honor and sacrifice and has a wonderfully pure love story between Daniel and Kumiko. What could this be? A love story without any make out scenes or other junk that manages to work its way into modern movies? No, just a story where two people get to know each other by spending time together, realizing that despite being from different worlds, they have a lot in common and they fall in love. Note, it isn't till after they declare their love for each other that they even consider kissing! This is so much more like real life.... well, the way it ought to be, than what most movies portray.

Anyway, I digress. Let me just throw some quotes out there for digestion.

Mr Miyagi: "Daniel-san, never put passion before principle. Even if win, you lose."

Mr Miyagi: "Lies only become truth if other person chooses to believe them."

Would you not agree? So much more profound than, "Paint the fence."

 

Beautiful Things

A new group I've started listening to here in the last couple of weeks is Gungor. At the worship conference this year, one of the bands played their song Beautiful Things. The search for that song brought me to them. I will probably post some more songs of theirs, but this is the first one I heard. I love the juxtaposition of instruments that you wouldn't typically put together to form a worship band. I can't remember the last time I saw the glockenspiel used outside of a classical setting.

The Divine Commodity

The modern church is beset by a consumer mentality and filled to the brim with consumer Christians. That is the premise of Skye Jethani's book, "The Divine Commodity: Discovering a Faith Beyond Consumer Christianity."

Using a mix of examples from modern church leaders, Bible stories and interestingly, stories about Vincent Van Gogh, Jethani attempts to deconstruct different ways that the Church has adopted consumerism and restore Christians to use their imaginations. In the book, he deconstructs: our commodified view of God, our branded identities, our attempts at transformation through external events, our devotion to institutions as God's vessels, our unceasing pursuit of pleasure, our contentment with segregation and the individualism pushed by consumerism.

The book had a tendency to hit pretty close to home. I would imagine anyone involved in a church in America would see examples in their own experiences. I should make it clear that Jethani's purpose is not to tear down the Church, but rather to illuminate the power of the Gospel.

The chapters that spoke to me particularly were the chapters on attempting to transform people through external events and the chapter on our contentment with segregation. I am as guilty as the next person of using programs and ministries to affect change in peoples' lives, but we too often forget that it is the Holy Spirit that affects change. That, and it is through relationships with Christians living the Gospel that unbelievers see Christ. Also, the chapter on segregating ourselves according to our own tastes speaks so strongly to the situation we have now in the church. Like hymns? Go to the traditional service. Want to have fun in church, go to youth group, etc. The Church is a diverse Body, not a loose corporation of separate groups.

Overall, Jethani is a decent writer. I found myself getting bogged down several times, not following his connections from one thought to the next. I wonder if part of this was my reading of this book on Kindle. Perhaps in the print version, things are laid out such that there are distinct separations between subjects. That being said, there were many parts that I took notes and several times that I thought of people that would benefit from reading this book.

So, I would recommend this book to anyone who is a part of the American church, especially to those who find themselves disillusioned by the church. This book is eye opening and refreshing.

Random comment for the day.

A guy mentions randomly in a sermon that he happens to not like David Crowder's song, Everything Glorious, and almost a year later, he still gets accused of hating on DCB!  I love David Crowder.  I have spent money on cds and books by said musician.  I just happen to disagree with the theological implications of one of the songs that they sing!

Daily Blogging?

You might wonder what happened to the daily blogging thing that I committed to do.  Well, if you read back a bit, you'll see a post on daily walking.  It came down to spending an hour every day walking or an hour every day blogging, and frankly, I need to walk a whole lot more.  So, I will continue to blog as much as possible, but it will be spotty once again until I find the time to carve out for thoughtful consideration of blog posts!

The Toolbox

Either last week or the week before, I watched a series of videos by Nathan Nockels talking about the click track that they use for A Mighty Fortress.  You can find the first of the series here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XKC1gtXXYk.  As adamant as I have been in the past about using click tracks, these videos softened me to the concept.  I still stick by my question that musicians have been keeping time for centuries without a metronome piped into their ears, why can't we?  That being said, a click track allows the team to expand their sound and do things they couldn't do otherwise.

I don't know if you all know this, but I spent a summer once working in an 1875 cabinetmaker's shop making furniture with period tools.  Woodworking takes on a different light when you are using dovetail saws, and handsaws and foot powered lathes.  However, there were many occasions that we wished we could do something with the wood that it was either extremely time intensive or simply impossible to do with hand tools.

In the same manner, there are things that we could do to fill out our sound if we used the tools available to us.  So, this week, since Ryan (my intern) is leading worship Sunday, I've been learning the ins and outs of tools like Ableton Live and Reason so that we can try some click track things coming up on March 7th (the team that Sunday is right for throwing something completely new at them).  Of course, I am still of the conviction that there are teams out there that use click track far too often.  To use the woodworking analogy, they use a buzz-saw for everything.  I would hope a balance could be found so that we can use all the tools at our disposal.

What are your thoughts on click tracks?  Do you think they take away or add to the music?

God of Justice

I just posted the devotional for God of Justice.  Head over to the devotional page to check it out.  It's on God of Justice by Tim Hughes.

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2332591&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=0&show_portrait=0&color=ffffff&fullscreen=1

God of Justice

I ran across this song a couple of months ago, and thought that it would be a perfect missions month song, but more than that it hits the themes that I think we need to be reminded of over and over again.  Justice.  Mercy.  Loving the unloved.  These themes go hand in hand with worship.

We’ve talked before about Amos 5:21-24.  God hates and despises our worship when it is not accompanied by justice and mercy.  Micah 6:8 follows along the same lines where it says, “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly before the Lord.”  Yet again we see that theme of the Lord requiring of us justice and mercy and kindness.

How does this happen?  I think Tim Hughes does a great job of reminding us of both the purpose and the method that we might show the world around us love.  That God of justice was a savior to us all.  He came to rescue the weak and the poor.  Most importantly, He came to serve and not to be served.  That is our example, to serve and not to be served!  This was just as countercultural then as it is now.  The disciples were shocked when Jesus washed their feet.  This was the same Jesus who John the Baptist was unfit to tie His sandals, yet He was serving the disciples at a base level.  This of course was a picture for how He came to serve all on the cross of Calvary.

I don’t know about you, but I have trouble with knowing how to answer this call.  This call to go live to feed the hungry and stand beside the broken.  I have been contemplating justice for months now since David Nasser’s talk about being the Bride of Christ in the world.  In a completely unrelated time, I was watching today a message John Piper gave this week about C.S. Lewis and how he is the second most important dead person in his life.  About 50 minutes into his message, he starts talking about what Lewis taught him about the perils of introspection.  He quotes C.S. Lewis, and I’ll repeat the quote here.

This is our dilemma . . . as thinkers we are cut off from what we think about; as tasting, touching, willing, loving, hating, we do not clearly understand. The more lucidly we think, the more we are cut off: the more deeply we enter into reality, the less we can think. You cannot study Pleasure in the moment of the nuptial embrace, nor repentance while repenting, nor analyze the nature of humor while roaring with laughter. But when else can you really know these things?

You cannot hope and also think about hoping at the same moment; for in hope we look to hope’s object and we interrupt this by (so to speak) turning around to look at the hope itself. . . . Introspection is in one respect misleading. In introspection we try to look inside ourselves and see what is going on. But nearly everything that was going on a moment before is stopped by the very act of our turning to look at it. Unfortunately this does not mean that introspection finds nothing. On the contrary, it finds precisely what is left behind by the suspension of all our normal activities; and what is left behind is mainly mental images and physical sensations. The great error is to mistake this mere sediment or track or by product for the activities themselves.

Then Piper ties it all together by saying this, “What this has meant for me is, first, that I see now that the pursuit of Joy must always be indirect—focusing not on the experience but the object to be enjoyed. And, second, I see that faith in Jesus, in its most authentic experience is suspended when it is being analyzed to see if its real. Which means this analysis always ends in discouragement. When we are trusting Christ most authentically, we are not thinking about trusting, but about Christ. When we step out of the moment to examine it, we cease what we were doing, and therefore cannot see it. My counsel for strugglers therefore is relentlessly: Look to Jesus. Look to Jesus in his word. And pray for eyes to see.”

How do we love justice and mercy?  How do we keep from just singing?  We focus on Christ, always on Christ.  How else will we know justice than to look to the perfect Judge Himself?  How else will we see mercy unless we see Him who showed such mercy and grace at the cross that we must be made speechless?  Our prayer should be, “fill us up and send us out.”  Just as Piper prayed for “eyes to see,” let us be praying for hands to love and eyes to see and feet to go.  I know that if that is truly the desire of our heart, He will open up opportunities, and before we know it, we will look back and say, “wow, look how God was glorified by serving those people!”

So, as we worship, let us remember that our worship is not just songs on Sunday, but rather our songs on Sunday are about our worship throughout our lives!

Jumping through Fires Review

I’m not sure what I expected when I “picked up” a copy of David Nasser’s new book, “Jumping through Fires: The Gripping Story of One Man’s Escape from Revolution to Redemption.”  I heard David Nasser speak last year at the National Worship Leader’s Conference.  If you know me well, you know that I often say that most people learn their theology from what they sing in church, not what they hear in church.  What you remember is not usually specific examples from the sermon, but rather the songs that you sing in your car, home and often in your head.  There are however a handful of times that I’ve heard a message by a speaker so riveting that I remember it starkly.  One example is when Pastor Mark talked about what divorce really is.  He talked about two becoming one flesh.  Then to demonstrate what happens when you tear that flesh apart, he ripped a teddy bear in half.  The one message that has been on my mind for the last half of a year or so is David Nasser’s message.  If you go back through my blog a bit, you will find the link to the video of that message.  It is powerful, but I highly recommend that you watch it a couple of times.

So, it was with that frame of mind that I sat down to read this book.  Jumping through Fires is a well written, engaging book.  I would say that it is an easy read, and I got through it in a couple of hours.  Nasser’s style is storytelling at its best.  He tells the story in a linear style, and then goes back and fills in the tangents that would have sidetracked most authors throughout.  The result is that you become so engaged in the story he’s telling that when he goes back afterwords and fills in holes, you appreciate more the stories he just told.

Reading about Nasser’s life is really reading about Jesus’ working through a tapestry of events that unfolded over the course of 20 or so years.  You really see how God moved through events, often events that are bleak, to eventually bring a young man to saving faith, and then send him out to touch the lives of people all over the globe.

The story starts when David Nasser is 9 years old, and his family is caught up in a religious revolution that changed their world.  Nasser talks about moving to America, going from shy Iranian kid, to school druggie, and then Christ taking hold of his life and story, and using it to spread the gospel.  One story that moves me is the story of his first visit to youth group, and how God used a team of worshipers with servant hearts to soften the hard heart of Nasser’s Muslim father.

I did find myself wanting more from this book.  Perhaps because the book is a strict autobiography, and at no point does Nasser go off on a tangent and start preaching at his readers.  He simply lets the events speak for themselves and lets the reader draw their own conclusions about God’s power in lives.  It does give me a bit of perspective on the talks I have seen him give, and likely on any future books I will read by him.

I would encourage you to go out and grab a copy of this book and enjoy!

A Mighty Fortress

This week's devotional is up on the devotional side of the website.  This week I talk about Christy Nockels' song, "A Mighty Fortress."

 
http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/-4H-iWayY5M&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x234900&color2=0x4e9e00&hd=1

A Mighty Fortress

As I look through Christy Nockels’ song, “A Mighty Fortress,” I am fairly certain that we could go through the song line by line and find the corresponding Bible verses.  So, in the interests of time, let’s grab some of the major themes.

Let’s start with a concept that isn’t mentioned in the song directly.  This is the image of the separation of the wheat from the chaff that we see throughout the Bible.  I would encourage you to look up chaff and see the illustrations.  The chaff is the seed husks and stalk that get separated out from the wheat.  It is worthless for anything but being burned.  We see throughout the Bible that God separates the chaff from the wheat in our hearts and burns it up.  He separates that which is useless to our purpose of glorifying Him and burns it up.  What a promise!

This is the image that the Nockels paint for us first.  The image of God as a consuming fire.  They get this term from Deuteronomy 4:24, “For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.”  and Hebrews 12:28-29, “Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.”

Some people get the wrong idea from the term jealous God.  When God is jealous, he wants the best for us.  He knows that if we would only turn and keep our eyes on Him, we would be satisfied.  Our deepest need is to worship.  As a people, we all respond to that need by worshiping something.  That may be money, or power, or ourselves, or other unsatisfying things.  The Father knows that if we would turn and worship Him, we would be satisfied from the well that never ends.

Next to the idea of God as a Judge.  Do we not want justice?  When we are wronged, do we not want the offender judged fairly?  God is the only righteous Judge.  He alone sees to the core of our being and judges us.  That is why Christ was necessary, because when God looks at us to judge us, He must be fair, and getting judged fairly on our own is bad news for everyone.  When we identify with Christ though, when He looks at us, He doesn’t see our sin and brokenness, He sees Christ’s perfect atoning work on the cross!  What a wondrous love!  What about the murderer who accepts Christ though?  How can God not judge that man or woman for his/her crime?  I would say, have you not committed sins as great either in your heart or in deed.  Have you coveted?  Have you committed adultery by looking where you shouldn’t look?  Have you murdered someone with your words and actions or inactions?  I think if we start looking at ourselves, we start realizing just how great Christ’s sacrifice really was.  It all boils down to the greatest command, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind.”  We all fall short, and the only One that ever has completed this command was the One who has existed in perfect harmony with the Father as a part of the Godhead for all eternity.

The other part of the song that Christy talks about is the other half of Hebrews 12:28-29.  Here it talks about the Kingdom being unshakable.   We’ve seen that imagery before of course.  When I read the title of this song, my mind goes to Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress” which is based on Psalm 46.  It is the same thought.  We would rather build our Faith on a solid foundation.  The solid Rock that is our Savior Jesus Christ.  In His name we cannot be shaken.  Though storms may buffet, we can never be shaken in Him.  This is a truth to cling to.  This is a promise that He is faithful to keep.  So much more faithful than we ever have been or will be.

So, let’s make this our prayer, to set our eyes on Him and our hearts on Him.  Let us take refuge in the fortress that can never be defeated.  Let us not fear even when the earth gives way and the mountains are moved into the heart of the sea.  Even though its waters roar and foam, though its mountains tremble at its swelling.  Let us be still and know that He is God.  He will be exalted among the nations; He will be exalted in all of the earth!  The Lord of hosts is with us.  The God of Jacob is our fortress.

Amen

A Daily Walk

Despite this site’s focus on my daily walk with the Lord, today I just wanted to briefly mention that today I started my daily walk with the treadmill.  Despite a more consistent meal structure since we’ve brought Isaac home, my weight has ballooned quite a bit in the last 4 weeks or so, to the tune of 15 pounds or so.

Once upon a time, I had a jogging/walking regimen that was daily, and during that time, I lost 30 or 40 pounds.  Of course, I was also a marching band director with all of the accompanying physical activity.  I just find myself either sitting in my chair at work, or sitting in the rocking chair in the nursery, and not necessarily doing a lot more than that.

So, I’m starting with a daily hour of walking.  My intent is to at some point add back in the jogging too, but for right now, it’s on the treadmill for an episode of some form of Sci-fi!  I actually did some research on what the benefits of simply adding an hour of vigorous walking a day are, and was surprised to find that there are many added benefits to walking an hour a day.

So, let me throw down the gauntlet!  Let’s walk an hour a day!  If it’s not winter, go outside and prayer walk.  Let 2010 be the year you started getting healthier!

Where was the Church last week?

Something I’ve been encouraged by this week is the seeming outpouring of people crying out for the people of Haiti.  People are seeing devastation and they are giving to relieve the suffering of hurting people.  Ministries are on the ground, trying to show people the love of Christ.  The Church has (at least for now) shown up for Haiti.

Where was the Church last week.  Why weren’t we crying out to God last week for the people suffering in the poorest country in the western hemisphere.  Why weren’t we desparate to see the 1.5 million orphans in Haiti taken care of and homes provided?  Do you know how many orphaned children 1.5 million is?  Kansas City, Missouri has a population of only 500,000.  1.5 million is the population of the 4^th largest city in the US, Philadelphia.  And now, post earthquake, estimates say possibly 2 million orphans.  So, when Christ tells us in Matthew 25 to take care of orphans, we’d better sit up and pay attention to what’s going on in Haiti.

So, Church, let’s look around and not wait for the next disaster to have our hearts broken for the people that are in desperate need.  Let’s step out, and show the world Christ’s love.

What Grace is Mine

I’ve been thinking a lot on God’s Grace this week.  I talked about it some in this week’s devotional, but I’m struck so by the depth of His mercies.  This coming Sunday, as a closing song, we’re singing the Getty hymn (if you know me, you know I love the Getty hymns), What Grace is Mine.  I know it’s the cheating way out of writing a blog post, but it is rather late!  What wondrous words follow here:

Verse 1 

What grace is mine

That He who dwells in endless light

Called through the night to find my distant soul

And from His scars poured mercy

That would plead for me

That I might live and in His name be known

Chorus

So I will go wherever He is calling me

I lose my life to find my life in Him

I give my all to gain the hope that never dies

I bow my heart take up my cross and follow Him

Verse 2 

What grace is mine to know

His breath alive in me

Beneath His wings my weary soul may soar

All fear can flee

For death's dark night is overcome

My Saviour lives and reigns forevermore

Chorus

So I will go wherever He is calling me

I lose my life to find my life in Him

I give my all to gain the hope that never dies

I bow my heart take up my cross and follow Him

 

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/AwaZFpGrdSo&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x234900&color2=0x4e9e00&hd=1
 

The Bride of Christ

By far the most impacting speaker I’ve heard this year was David Nasser at the National Worship Leader Conference.  I’ve looked for another talk like it, and this is the only one I’ve seen him give like this.  Here’s a link to the site you can watch it.  Of the four, Nasser is the one on the bottom right.  When he spoke, he warmed up the crowd, and then he started talking about weddings.  In particular he described the way that the gathered crowd watches everything in kind of a detached amusement until, the music swells, everyone stands and turns around and gasps in awe as the bride walks in the room.  I still remember that moment, and I’m sure you guys that are married remember when your bride came in the room.  Everyone stops and takes notice.

The Church is the Bride of the Christ, but right now, the world is not captivated by the beauty of the Bride.  It was this message, where David Nasser talked about Amos 5.  When I see what is happening in Haiti, I think it’s time for the Bride of Christ to walk in the room.  I have two questions.  #1, how can I be the Bride of Christ, and #2, how can Grace Baptist Church be the Bride of Christ.

If you’re wondering the same questions, for now #1 starts with prayer, and for me is going to continue with giving of resources.  There are several websites (like KLove) that you can go to for ideas of places to give to.  I saw a report on Drudgereport that the US Red Cross is actually out of medical supplies.  I think Jodie and I are going to give through Compassion International.  With $105, you can provide a families needs for two weeks.  I would encourage you to find a ministry and to support it.  As a church, we have got to figure out how we can show the love of Christ to these people.  It breaks my heart when I see comments from people like Pat Robertson saying that the earthquake is a result of the national religion of Voodoo.  How does that help?  Sorry, I just got really angry when I saw that.

How He Loves (part 2)

After much time, the second devotional on the song How He Loves is up in the devotional section of the site.  Sloppy wet kisses and oceans of grace are expounded upon.  If you don't know the song, I've posted below my favorite version of the song.  David Crowder changes the offending words sloppy wet, and honestly, I really like Jared Anderson's version anyway.  Plus, I really think I should grow a beard again!

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=6804902&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=0&show_portrait=0&color=ffffff&fullscreen=1
 

How He Loves (part 2)

If it seems like it’s been forever since we did the devotional on How He Loves (Part 1), it’s because it’s been forever!

We left off after verse 1.  The chorus is fairly self explanatory, so we kind of skipped over it.  What I wanted to do here was to go through the second verse.  Of course, by the second verse, I mean the original one with that oh so controversial line in it, “when heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss…”

Before we get there, let’s start at the beginning of verse 2.  “So we are His portion and He is our prize.”  This sounds wrong to me.  Isn’t He our portion?  Well, this line is not only Biblical; it’s straight from the Bible!  We find the thought in Deuteronomy 32:9.  Rather than me with woeful attempts to use the English language try to explain it, I’ll quote Matthew Henry’s explanation here.

“All the world is His.  He is owner and possessor of heaven and earth, but His Church is His in a peculiar manner.  It is His demesne, His vineyard, His garden enclosed.  He has a particular delight in it:  it is the beloved of His soul, in it He walks, He dwells, it is His rest forever.  He has a particular concern for it, keeps it as the apple of His eye.  He has particular expectations from it, as a man has from his portion, has a much greater rent of honour, glory, and worship, from that distinguished remnant, than from all the world besides.  That God should be His people’s portion is easy to be accounted for, for He is their joy and felicity; but how they should be His portion, Who neither needs them, nor can be benefitted by them, must be resolved into the wondrous condescensions of free grace.”

What a wondrous thought.  There are so many blessing that can only be resolved by the wondrous condescension of free grace!  So much so, that we’re drawn to redemption only by His grace.  On our own we wouldn’t desire redemption.  It is only by His grace that we come to Him.  There is so much grace that if it were an ocean we would all be sinking in it!  Even people that neither acknowledge nor worship Him are benefiters of His grace every day.

The most breathtaking display of His grace was when heaven met earth by God the Son taking earthly form, becoming despised and rejected, beaten and crucified, all so that rebels could become worshipers.  That’s where this line, “When heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss” comes in.  Unfortunately this line alone is why we will never sing the song on Sunday morning.  I would have to take 20 minutes and explain what is meant by these lines, and only those that would be there would understand.  John Mark McMillan has blogged about this, so I’ll let his explanation stand.

“The idea behind the lyric is that the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of earth converge in a way that is both beautiful and awkwardly messy.  Think about the birth of a child, or even the death of Jesus Himself.  These miracles are both incredibly beautiful and incredibly sloppy (‘gory’ may be more realistic, but ‘Heaven meets earth like a gory mess’ didn’t seem to have the same ring).  Why does the church have such a problem when things being sloppy?  Do we really think we’re fooling anyone on Sunday morning, especially God?  Are we going to offend Him?...”

A sloppy wet kiss… Both beautiful and messy at the same time.  What a perfect description of what happened at both the incarnation and the cross.  This is why when David Crowder (with John Mark’s permission and blessing) changed the line to “unforeseen kiss.”  It has meant that so many more people have heard and sung this song than would have if he hadn’t changed the line.  The unfortunate part is that unforeseen completely changes the meaning of this verse.   When we consider the shocking way that Christ redeemed His people to the father, we can’t help but be struck by the depth of His love.  When we consider this, we should have no time to consider our regrets because we should be so busy worshiping Him!

Many of you know my dislike for “7-11” songs (7 words repeated 11 times),but when you consider how He does love us, and in such an undeserved way, you just have to repeat to the world that He loves us so much, and the world needs to see that!  Oh, how He loves us!

Unencouraging Response to Leadership

I’m up to Joshua starting today with my readings, and first, I was struck by the leadership that Joshua showed.  After 40 years of wandering about, Moses dies, and Joshua immediately takes up swift and decisive leadership with knowledge of where his mission and strength come from (the Lord).

Then follows perhaps the most unencouraging response that the people could have said (now I’m quite certain neither they, nor the interpretation means it this way).  They said, okay Joshua, we’ll follow you like we followed Moses!  Now, I realize that the generation that is following Joshua is not the generation that had a rather bad track record of disobeying God and Moses.  Something about a golden calf, and some serious trepidation about the Promised Land (giants and all), and see the previous post for examples of bellyaching.

So, if I were Joshua, I’m not sure that I would be heartened by that statement.  And to be blunt, it doesn’t take terribly long for the Israelites to start following instructions much the same way (kind of like us huh?) that they did in the wilderness.  They do a great job with the whole march around Jericho with the ark, and give a great shout, and the walls come tumbling down thing, but they then promptly disobey God and Joshua.  Achan and Zabdi take some of the devoted things that they were told not to take, and the Lord’s anger burned against all of Israel.  They had just witnessed some really cool miracles, and they were so distracted by greed that they derailed the nations’ following of God.

God quickly tells Joshua why He’s angry at the nation of Israel and they repent… You know, go to Joshua and read the story!  My point was made early on.  I just saw irony in the following like they followed Moses.

Archives Completed

I’m not sure if this counts as a blog post, but since I’ve spent most of the evening transferring my old site alan.gerlingfamily.com over to this site, it will have to!  Looking back, I started out well, and then sort of dropped off very quickly.  Actually, I think I’ve already blogged more than in 2009.  I’ve actually found this to be very helpful to me.  This morning, I shared a sort of combination of some of the posts that I’ve written this week (Love of God + Romans 8:38), and someone came up and said that they really appreciated what I shared this morning.  I guess being forced to come up with a deep thought every day gets me in the habit of thinking devotional thoughts.

Back on to the archive subject, there was the link to look at it.  The old site is officially down, so I guess I’ll start getting all of my hits from people looking for Lincoln Brewster’s “A New Hallelujah” on this site now! (By far the #1 referral term on the old site)

Old Worship Matters Video

I've been moving all of my old posts from alan.gerlingfamily.com over to amos5worship, and I ran across this one from 2008.  I forgot how much I loved this 3 minute video.  One great quote he says is, "I was supposed to be worshiping God, but instead I had been worshiping my opinions about worshiping God."  He talks about what it means to be a worship leader, but he's really talking about how to be a worshiper!

Romans 8:38-39

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor thing present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Romans 8:38-39 (NASB)

I need to hear this verse a lot.  It’s actually the verse that comes to mind the most.  If I’m struggling with something, I think through it.  When I am having trouble preparing for worship on a Sunday morning, I sing through it (I know a melody to it that some random person at East Iowa Bible Camp came up with that I’ve remembered ever since).  This verse is a great comfort to me.

What I love most about it is that Paul doesn’t just stop at nothing can separate us from the love of Christ; he goes through all the spectrums.  He contrasts all of the extremes.  Nothing from death to life.  Nothing from angels to demons (and everything in between), nothing in our past, and nothing in our future (in other words, nothing we have done and nothing we will do) can separate us from Christ.  Oh what marvelous Grace He has shown us!  Need you another reason to worship!

It’s no wonder that the hymn writer wrote:

The love of God is greater far than tongue or pen can ever tell.  It goes beyond the highest star and reaches to the lowest hell.  The guilty pair, bowed down with care, God gave His Son to win.  His erring Child, He reconciled and pardoned from his sin.

And my favorite verse (I love the picture that he paints here)

Could we with ink, the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made.  Were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade.  To write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry.  Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky.

Oh love of God, how rich and pure!  How measureless and strong!  It shall forevermore endure the saints’ and angels’ song.

We will spend all eternity worshiping Christ our redeemer, yet even that time won’t even begin to describe the love that He showed us at the cross.  Let’s get a good head start yes?  Hope to see you Sunday singing praises to our King! (Or if you’re not in Manhattan, hope you are somewhere singing praises to the King!)

Web Week

As I come to the end of the week, I look at my time sheet for work and realize that I've spent almost all of my time this week working on websites. Most of the week was spent rebuilding the church website in Joomla. It's funny, the reason I use Joomla these days is because the committee decided to use a CMS, Drupal was decided upon, I saw the beauty of a CMS, I tried to build Jodie's Design website in Drupal, after screaming at my computer decided to try some other ones, discovered that Joomla is more in line with my style, and now the church website is in Joomla. Did you follow that? ;-)

Anyway, I finished up yesterday, and got the domains all transferred over. I came home today from the Barkey funeral (by the way, truly a blessed time of remembering Aaron, if you weren't there, you can read Pastor Flack's message here) excited about sitting down and having a relaxing day, and as I walk in the door, Jodie greets me with, "our websites have been hacked." <groan> So, I spent the next 2 or 3 hours first restoring our backups and then making sure it doesn't happen again. These people need to find something else to do with their time, seriously.

Then, after a moment of inspiration, I promptly sat down and programmed the Grace Youth Ministries website that's been in the waiting for a while. It is now an empty designed sponge waiting to be filled with content (that's actually what took me all week with the Grace site, there was a lot of content).

On a completely random and unrelated note, if you aren't a Grace attendee, chances are that you've never heard or sung Chris Tomlin's version of All the Way My Savior Leads Me. I much prefer it to the hymn music (don't worry, Fanny Crosby's lyrics are still intact), and I like the chorus he added. On the plus side, every time we sing it in church, the congregation belts it out, and I do love hearing the congregation belt it out!

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/yKkDzII4s4s&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x234900&color2=0x4e9e00
 

Matt Maher - Alive Again

Chances are, you know who Matt Maher is.  At the very least, you would recognize perhaps his most popular song, Your Grace is Enough.  Last August, Matt released his second major label album titled Alive Again.  I’ve found this album to be a good mix of upbeat and reflective songs, each with well thought through lyrics, and a sound that I can stand up to repeat listenings.

One of the things that make this cd a great album to put on your MP3 player, in your car, or on your computer is the depth of the lyrics.  They make you really lean in and listen to what’s being said.  It really shocked me to discover that Matt is Roman Catholic.  I had not realized the extent to which the Catholic Church is on the verge of revival.  There are many young Catholics out there who love the traditions that they’ve grown up with, but are dissatisfied with aspects of the Catholic Church.  Rather than leave the Church, they’ve decided to reform it from the inside out.  Needless to say, I have found all the songs to be solid, and would recommend listening through the album.

The track that you’ve likely heard on the radio is the title track, Alive Again.  I’ve found the stand-out tracks to be Love Comes Down, Remembrance (Communion Song), and Christ is Risen.  The first two we’ve sung often since August in Grace services, and I’m quite sure we’ll work Christ is Risen in time for Easter services.

Actually, as I have been writing this on and off this evening, I’ve been listening to the cd for the first time in a while, and I’m reminded how much I like this cd, so go out, download it from iTunes, or Rhapsody or buy a cd, but you really should listen to it!

http://www.youtube.com/v/f79KWKrGqiA&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x234900&color2=0x4e9e00
 

Time Flies!

I was reposting sermons today, and I really realized that though a year and a half is a short time, I’ve been here a long time.  That is, I’ve been here at Grace for a lot of Sundays.  It’s kind of weird how the cadence of the work week culminating on Sunday is just a completely different feeling that what it was like when I was a teacher.  Then, things had a rhythm and flow of certain seasons (i.e. marching season, Christmas season, contest season, etc.)  There was always a build-up to each season, with a break at the end.  Here the only long buildup is Easter Cantata.  Everything else is kind of short bursts.

Not that I’m saying that’s bad, it’s just different.  Time flies much quicker this way.  I lose track of the weeks, and the months all seem to kind of melt together.  I feel like I lose contact with friends and family so much quicker because the week just flies by without stopping for a breath.  Although, now that I think about it, the major difference is the commute time.  I used to drive 30 minutes to work every day, and then 30 minutes back home, and then on Wednesdays, 30 minutes the other direction for church, or if I needed groceries, 15 minutes for Fort Madison, 30 for Mount Pleasant or 45 for Burlington.  I’m starting to realize that that was kind of like my slowdown time.  I usually would call people on the road, so most of the time that I spent communicating was in the car (don’t worry, I had a hands free).

Now, the drive maybe takes me 3 minutes if I hit the lights wrong.  It takes me far more time to dig my car out after a storm than it does for me to drive to church!  It’s odd, especially considering I used to fill up our cars 3 times a week, and now we fill up each car once a month or so, but I really miss my drive time.  I suppose looking back, except for the college years when I lived on campus, I’ve always had travel time.  Even when I rode the bus, we were almost the first ones on, and almost the last ones off.  I can’t begin to tell you how much reading you can get done with 45 minute bus rides all the time!

Anyway, if that sounded like whining, it really wasn’t, just thinking about something completely random, yet profoundly affecting of my life!  How about you?  Do you find yourself doing all of your thinking on the road, and would you miss it if it were gone?

Favorite Getty Hymn

I think I've decided that my favorite Getty hymn is Love of God.  Good luck finding a recording of it, there's a verse on YouTube (I'll post it below), but I literally cannot find the whole song anywhere.  Not only that, but it's not even listed on the gettymusic website.  I really can't figure that out, but it's okay, Love of God is still my favorite Getty hymn.  Hopefully you attend Grace, so you know it as well.  If not, you might actually consider buying the packet of Getty hymns from the website, just so you can have this one.  Of course, you get all the others too!

Let me quick write out for you the third verse, and you can see for yourself why this hymn is so amazing.

Love of God, what priceless treasure over all this world affords: To be His and His forever this my glory and my reward!  May this love beyond all knowing so capture my soul that I'm filled to overflowing with a passion for Him alone!

The second half of that verse is my prayer.  May I know the love of Christ so well that I'm filled to overflowing with a passion to know Him more!  His Love results in our worship, which results in His pleasure, which is our joy!  

 

Website Tweak

Yes, I realize that it has been a mere two weeks since I launched Amos 5 Worship, and I'm already messing with stuff.  I've changed the module that does all of the work on the Blog, so you'll notice things look a little different, specifically the comment system is much better, and the search engine optimization actually exists now!  If you subscribe to the blog, it is entirely possible that you will receive all of the posts over again because I cut and pasted them from the old module and I'm too lazy to go in and edit all of the created date timestamps.  So, sorry, but I promise it won't happen again, or if it does, it will be a very long time from now!

Giants

I was reading Deuteronomy 9 today, and I was struck by Deuteronomy 9:1-3.  Here we have God telling His people that they are going to head into the promised land and they are going to be faced with a people great and tall… giants.  Now, I don’t know about you, but when I think of a giant, I think of Fezzig from The Princess Bride.  He’s this huge, hulking man, who incidentally is known far and wide for his fighting prowess.  So, when I read Deu 9, I think of a land filled with a whole bunch of Fezzigs.

The Israelites aren’t stupid, matter of fact, they have a saying, “Who can stand before the sons of Anak?”  Well, the answer is simple, the Lord, because no one can stand before the Lord our God!  Long intro for pointing out that what I was struck by today is that there are a lot of giants in the Bible.  Of course, the one we think of most often is David and Goliath.  There we saw a short little guy against the greatest warrior that happened to be a giant, and what happened?  God showed that He can take the most unlikely of people and do incredible things, including defeating giants with one stone.  Why giants?  I think it’s because when Goliath is on the ground dead, no one is sitting around saying, wow, that David is sure some warrior.  Instead, when David says, my strength is the Lord of Hosts, people look and see that there is the reason why the giant was defeated.

What are the giants in your life?  I think God still likes to take unlikely heroes and defeat giants.  And I’m talking both inward giants and outward giants.  I believe that He is using some friends of mine to defeat the giant of unsafe drinking water.  The problem is this huge hulking problem, but with folks like them, and people like you buying filters and supporting them, that giant will be defeated.

We all have inward giants, and we need to know that those giants will be defeated.  Sometimes it happens with a single stone, and the giant is gone.  We need to make sure that He receives the glory for that, and sometimes the giant is defeated through a long campaign, but defeated he will be.  Make sure that God receives the glory for that too.

Really when you boil it down, Christ defeated all of our giants (sin) on the cross, once for all time.  So, if you have doubts, know that the giants in your life have already been defeated!  They are just fighting a rearguard action, but they have lost the battle!  Let us together rejoice in the victory we have in Christ!

     

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=7575212&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=ffffff&fullscreen=1

Benediction

Okay, so I’ve essentially had the same song running through my head all day.  It’s the song we closed the services with this morning, Benediction (May the Peace).  It is of course a Getty hymn.  I think I’ve mentioned somewhere that since May, I’ve started listening to and adding to the services Keith and Kristyn Getty hymns.  If you don’t know who the Gettys are, you really ought to go out and buy one of their two cds, In Christ Alone or Awake the Dawn.  That, or do a search on Rhapsody.

Anyway, this particular hymn has this chorus:

And to Him be praise for His glorious reign;

From the depths of earth to the heights of heaven

We declare the name of the Lamb once slain—

Christ eternal, the King of Kings.

You really start to get a picture of what worship is here.  We look forward to when we are seated before the throne singing, worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive riches and honor and power and glory!  Beyond that, the Gettys have written for us a hymn celebrating the Kingdom and the King.  What is really interesting about this hymn though is that, the verses are a classic benediction, giving a blessing.  The verses are focused on the person receiving the blessing, yet the chorus reminds us that as we head out from church into our lives, our chief concern is that Christ receive all of the glory, honor and praise.

So, as you head out into the world this week, remember, your focus is on Christ, and may He be praised with our lives!

Family

Well, the last of the family visits for a while ended today, and I must say, the one thing that I miss most living in Kansas is being near to family.  While it was good to see all three sets of grandparents, and one set of Aunt/Uncle/Cousins, it was bittersweet knowing that the next time that we will likely see them, Isaac will be 3 months old.  Though they will see pictures of him as he gets older, maybe even see him on Skype via webcam occasionally, it just won’t quite be the same.

This is when it is hard to follow the call God has given us.  We love our church home here at Grace and I love serving as worship director, but I do miss being surrounded by family.  I guess that’s probably because our whole lives growing up we were surrounded by family.  Even when Eric and then Mom moved up to the Des Moines area, I was still around Aunts and Uncles and Cousins and church family.  Then when I married Jodie, all of her family was there too.  Despite feeling welcomed here in Manhattan, it just feels lonely sometimes!

Well, this is getting depressing.  My whole purpose here was to just write and say how wonderful it was to see everybody over the last couple of weeks.  Of course, if you are family, and you didn’t come down, remember, you’re always welcome, and there are even some that I would be happy to sing a Selah duet in church with if they decided to visit us sometime…… :-D

So, until then, keep checking out pictures of Isaac on www.psalm127mom.com (we’re not posting a whole lot of pictures on Facebook.  I have issues with their privacy policies, and frankly, it creeps me out a bit that though you can “remove” pictures from your profile, you cannot remove them Facebook’s server).  Also, if you are family, and have Skype, let me know and you can see Isaac sometime!

The Year Ahead

I find it fairly appropriate that as midnight came and went last night, I was literally at the changing table with a verydirty diaper.  As I look ahead at 2010, I see a year with a focus on learning to raise our son, Isaac.  I’m sure there will be missteps and successes, but as I was looking at my 15 month old nephew, I was thinking that Isaac will be not too terribly much smaller a year from now.  In the next year, we’ll have seen his first steps and heard his first words (probably).  We’ll see his personality grow and develop, and he’ll start learning hymns .

On the work front, I’m looking forward to the intern that is coming to work with me in a week (whoa, I so need to get the office ready this week!).  Because of that, the Easter cantata will be a whole lot of work, but hopefully a clear picture of the Easter story for those who don’t know Christ.  Also, the Easter service might be a special service, and in our spare time we’ll be working on the hymnal that I’m planning on publishing for Grace this year.  Also, I’ll be continuing the blogging and trying to get out and connect with folks in the community.

I still have a stack of books to read from last year, but since Jodie and I haven’t turned the TV on since we brought Isaac home, and we’re cancelling the cable, I think I might actually get through some of the stack.  I will of course post reviews as I finish.  There will I’m sure be whole hours of new and old worship music to listen through and I will let you know as they come out.

Above all though, I pray that I might draw nearer to God in this year, that I might worship Him as He would have me worship Him, and know Him, as He would have me know Him.  I hope that’s your prayer for the coming year too!  Praise Him for His mercies, for they are new every day!

The Year Behind

I can’t believe that tomorrow is already 2010.  2009 seems to have just flown by so quickly that I’m not sure where it all went.  I thought I’d hit some of the high and low points of the year and maybe talk about what I learned.  I don’t know really, I’m kind of hoping this post will write itself.  I’m going to do as it comes to me.

As I look back on last year’s resolutions that happened to fall on the New Year, I missed every single point I had… Yep, just read through them, didn’t accomplish a single goal I had.  They were all good goals; I just don’t know where the time went.

At church, some of the biggies were the Worship Philosophy, the Easter Cantata, my first sermon, and the combined church picnic.  All went well, and overall, I really began to hit my stride at Grace this year.  That’s not to say I’m where I’d like to be with all aspects of my job, but looking back at 2009, we were able to accomplish a lot, and I pray Christ was exalted in all we did.

In my personal life, we lost Grandma this year.  Since I didn’t really know Grandpa, or any grandparents on my dad’s side, it was really tough to lose that generation.  We were able to spend the last couple of days with her, and then celebrate her life.  I never thought I’d witness a discussion mid-funeral about whether the Sywassinks were German or Dutch, but it turns out that all our lives we thought it was German, but it’s actually Dutch.

On the up side, we added to our family a couple of weeks ago.  Isaac Stanley was born on the 11th of December.  We’re trying to figure out this whole parenting thing, but it’s amazing how this little boy has touched and changed our lives.  Tomorrow’s the year ahead post will essentially write itself with looking ahead at year one of his life.

In a more random list, I didn’t read as much as I wanted this year, but did chew through some books.  The pastoral staff went to the BASICS pastor’s conference in May, and since then I’ve been a trifle obsessed with Getty music, but the church tolerates it well!  Jodie and I did get to go to the National Worship Leader’s Conference in July, and I can honestly say that I’m still grappling with some of the things that I learned there, and I look forward to returning again either this year or next.

As I alluded to earlier, I do have some regret about 2009.  There was just so much that I wanted to do that just didn’t get done.  I’m sure you have regrets as you look back too.  Below, I’ve posted a wonderful video from Igniter Media talking about regrets.  Despite that, I know that I’m on a journey pressing toward the goal, and sometimes I move along speedily, and sometimes God has to drag me a bit, but I know that my Lord is always with me and always bringing me along.  So, goodbye 2009.  I hope you had a blessed year, I know that I’ve been blessed far more than I ever deserve!

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2613815&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=ffffff&fullscreen=1

Numbers 11

I’ve been following my automatically generated read through the Bible in a year plan, and occasionally, when nothing strikes me to write on my blog, I will likely share with you some thoughts from my daily readings.  For the last couple of days, I’ve been working my way through Numbers, and something struck me today about the contrast betweenNumbers 9 and Numbers 11.

As I was reading about the cloud that covered the tabernacle in Numbers 9, I actually thought, wow that’d make a great blog post.  In case you don’t know what I’m talking about, when the Israelites were in the wilderness, their pace was determined by a cloud that would descend on the tabernacle when they were to stop, and lift when they should start again.  Sometimes, they would stay in one place for a couple of days and sometimes only a night.  The amazing thing is that the Israelites were completely and totally reliant on the Lord.  They were fed by manna and dew.  Their pace was determined by a cloud, and even the decisions about who was and wasn’t to share in the Passover meal were consulted with the Lord first.  One of the biggest lies that we can convince ourselves of is that we are self-reliant and independent.  It is truly by the Grace of our Lord that we live from moment to moment and that we share in the blessings He bestows.  The Israelites were just more obviously dependant on Him.

Then we get to Numbers 11, and the people start whining.  You know, it was really actually better in Egypt, at least there we got to eat meat.  Now all we get is manna, and there’s only so much you can do with manna.  In Egypt we had fish and cucumbers and leeks and garlic (they must have been Veggietales fans).  Why did we leave Egypt again?  It was really better in Egypt…

Sound familiar?  If it doesn’t, then congratulations on being way ahead of me in your spiritual walk.  The Lord has done some serious leading in my life, but all too often, I look back and complain.  As bad as things were, they really weren’t that bad.  Is this maybe one of the ways that sin creeps back into our lives?  We start craving just that little piece of meat, because all we’ve had is manna.  Sure, manna is from the Lord, and is sustaining us, and showing how much He cares about our wellbeing, but the meat tasted so good.  You know, I won’t eat the whole thing, I’ll just have a bite.  Well, maybe a couple of bites….  Eventually, the Lord gave the people what they wanted in the form of a flock of quail, but it was plague ridden.  How cruel you might say!  Was it?  The Lord was providing manna, and when that wasn’t good enough, He warned them about the alternative, and they essentially said death was better than manna (didn’t they remember Egypt).

This makes me appreciate all the more the Grace that Christ shows us daily!  Even when we keep going back for meat, he keeps standing there with the manna and dew saying, “I have here the perfect sustenance.  Eat of the Bread and drink of the Water that I bring you and you will be satisfied!” May we all find our satisfaction in Him!

The deep sigh at the end of a long day...

You know that moment, like at the end of Lord of the Rings, when all the tension relaxes, and you get to just breathe a long deep cleansing sigh.  You know, like at the end of a long day.  This cd is like that for me.  It just seems to be that deep cleansing breath of music.

You probably have never heard of Justin Unger.  He’s a worship leader from Phoenix, AZ, and “To Know You Love Me” is his major label worship release.  And chances are, you still won’t hear about Justin Unger… at least from places like K-Love and AFR, his style just doesn’t fit what is popular radio right now.

Each track on the album is characterized by a smooth sound of piano, electronics, and the vocals of Justin and his wife Falon.  The lyrics stand out as having been given thought, and each song takes you on a journey.  All too often with today’s worship music, the verse/chorus/bridge feel is all too evident.  These songs almost feel like Getty songs in that they start in one place and end somewhere else.

Of the original material on the album, I particularly like, “To Know You Love Me,” “Sing to the King,” and “Make Me This Way.”  Of the bunch, if I could find a way to work it out for congregational worship, I would say “Sing to the King” is the most likely candidate to see a Sunday morning.

The two songs on the album that aren’t originals are “Praise to the Lord the Almighty” and “All Creatures of Our God and King.”  Both arrangements are very good, and add something to the listening enjoyment of each song.

This album is definitely one that would go well on an MP3 player or playlist for something to relax to without shutting off your brain.  Listen to the album here on Rhapsody.  Enjoy!