As a child grows older and begins making cognitive decisions about their values and how they view themselves and the world around them, the Family unit has an immense and clearly irreplaceable part to play in influencing who that person will become. Dads, in particular, can often be viewed by their kids as the law or the judge, jury and executioner. When an overprotective father starts putting boundaries around his teenage girl who wants to go out to a lake house for the night with a big group of friends he knows very little about, all of the sudden this judiciary platform starts being challenged in all sorts of new ways. If he were to refuse her the permission to go he may be called Hitler, Stalin or Mussolini and be accused of being the WORST DAD EVER. A good father stands his ground amidst such fledgling accusations and potential insecurities one might experience being labelled as such.
Now the same father may put in place seemingly harsh and strict rules for his budding teenager in other areas. Lets take again the area of drug abuse. He can lay out clear boundaries and consequences for those boundaries and really drive the point home that if these rules are broken, that there will be a price to pay. However, if and when a child of this same father, the one who puts explicit parameters around their child, happens to observe that he isn't living out of the same values he is demanding of them... the result is usually catastrophic.
Do you remember that commercial in the 80's? The one with the the dad sitting his teenage son down on his bed. He confronts him and pulls out this little wooden box full of assorted drug paraphernalia in it. He begins to drill his son on where he learnt to use this stuff, all with such firm disbelief and seemingly righteous indignation. He is shocked and angry and demands an answer from his resistant and rebellious teenage boy. The son finally blurts out that iconic and unforgettable statement
"I learned it from watching you alright! I learned it from watching you!!!"
The narrator then closes with the almost as famous line "Parents who do drugs, have kids who do drugs."
Now this doesn't mean that a loving Father who walks the walk as well as talks the talk may not still have a child who rebels and does all sorts of terrible things to themselves as well as their friends and family. There is obviously no perfect way to raise a child and ensure with 100% certainty that they will never get into trouble or suffer or ever be in pain. The truth is though, this generation is in this epidemic because there isn't a strong balance of both Authority and Influence. We either have parents who shelter and squash the life out of their children or just as worse, we have parents who completely check out and leave their precious one's to their own devices to sort out what works and what doesn't.
I'm not a father yet, no wife or even a GF at this stage. Over the last 3 years or so an insatiable desire and hunger to be a loving father has been growing somewhere deep in my soul. I don't understand the difficulties yet of the balance between being the "white house" and being like “Mike” ( read my last post for reference). I do know that until God brought people into my life that brought both strong boundaries as well as amazing, loving and generous examples of a life I actually wanted to live, that I would never grow the way God intended for me to grow.
I’ve seen some pretty amazing examples of parenting over the years by some pretty incredible people. I don’t always see what happens behind closed doors and I’m sure there are moments that even the greatest of the great families wouldn’t be proud of. But I’ve had the privilege of witnessing first hand fathers and mothers who straddle the line of authority and influence with vigorous commitment. Parents who understand how crucial their roles are in the different stages of their children’s lives. It’s easy to sit back and look at our stories or our own families and point out all the times we’ve been let down or shortchanged.
I believe the enemy LOVES it when we do that.
He loves it when we look back and pinpoint all the discouragement and spend as much time as possible stewing over these things. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t dig deep into our wounded pasts and allow the Healer to get involved. God the Father is the kind of father who wants to redeem all of our hurts and pains caused by the Family. He cares deeply that a lot of us have had a bad run. His love and caring isn’t just expressed with embracing us in our pain but it goes further than that. He shows us the way forward, he shows us how to redeem the beauty of Family regardless of what has occurred in the past. He shows us how to navigate this tight rope of Authority and Influence in arguably the most crucial institution on the planet...
FAMILY
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Monday, August 6, 2012
Authority vs. Influence Pt. 2a "Family Matters"
Every Friday evening for many years as a young adolescent I would sit down in front of the TV with my mom and be whisked away into a magical fantasy land for 2 hours of family centric sitcom bliss. TGIF was a benchmark for many American families, which is really interesting to think of now that I'm not 10. How they were able to get anyone to stay home on a Friday night and watch TV instead of going bowling, eating out, going to the movies or a number of far more dynamic options is quite the feat. Each show featured in this 2 hour time block was highly focused on the family unit.
Boy Meets World
Step by Step
Full House
Family Matters
The latter two seem to be the ones that stick out to me the most from my childhood. Mary Kate and Ashely got their start here as the two twins who played Michelle and the world will never forget Steve Urkel.
If there was one thing that ABC got right in this burst of golden TV history, it was that Americans desperately wanted to see the Family unit portrayed and demonstrated on screen in a way that brought them hope and brought a sense of lightness to this incredibly critical and detrimental area. The reality during the 90s was much the same as the reality in any other decade or era, human beings are born into this broken world directly into families. Each person is here due to a male and female getting together, doing the deed and creating the opportunity for new life to come about. Whether that deed was done in marriage and a healthy life giving relationship or family structure is another question.
If you have read my previous post on Authority vs. Influence you would of observed the major difference that the area of Government plays in comparison to the area of Arts and Entertainment. One shapes us as individuals by clear boundaries and jurisdictions it creates while the other relies entirely on appeal and impact through no means of force whatsoever.
The Family sphere is an interesting one in that it actually straddles both areas of Authority and Influence. A strong family is made up of parents who create both strong and protective boundaries as well as an environment for growth and exploration by observation. The application of what the families values are based on the influence of each of the family members.
This picture is largely distorted and our current generation of young people today are faced with an epidemic of unprecedented proportions. I unfortunately am a part of this fatherless generation of young males who have been thrust into a world where Family is failing us and failing us badly. It's a broken mirror of refracted images on what is meant to be a cocoon of both protection and love.
Loving parents understand the balance between Authority and Influence in raising a child. It would only be appropriate to create strict and seemingly even harsh boundaries for a child. It would also only be appropriate as well to ensure clear consequences are communicated and delivered when necessary for children as they grow up. Rules that govern how they cross the street, whether they talk to strangers, when they go to sleep, what they are allowed to eat etc. A good parent exercises absolute control and directive power in these areas in the formative years of a child, not because they are power hungry or demand submission just so they can feel like the boss, but because they understand that each of these areas as as well as thousands of countless others demand such rigorous and even calloused dictating.
If breached or taken lightly the result could be catastrophic and even fatal. This is why when we see a mother who screams in agony at her 4 year old to prevent them from walking into a busy intersection we don't look at her with criticism or dissent. Even after she has scooped that child in her arms and lovingly embraced them, we know that the next thing that must happen is the delivery of consequences. We may not all agree on the delivery, but the most loving thing to do in this scenario is to punish and bring sharp clarity as to why she told them not to run into the street, even if the toddler doesn't immediately understand, they need to know that what they've done is very WRONG.
There is justice here, and when done with sincere and unconditional love...it's beautiful.
( Part 2b coming soon)
Boy Meets World
Step by Step
Full House
Family Matters
The latter two seem to be the ones that stick out to me the most from my childhood. Mary Kate and Ashely got their start here as the two twins who played Michelle and the world will never forget Steve Urkel.
If there was one thing that ABC got right in this burst of golden TV history, it was that Americans desperately wanted to see the Family unit portrayed and demonstrated on screen in a way that brought them hope and brought a sense of lightness to this incredibly critical and detrimental area. The reality during the 90s was much the same as the reality in any other decade or era, human beings are born into this broken world directly into families. Each person is here due to a male and female getting together, doing the deed and creating the opportunity for new life to come about. Whether that deed was done in marriage and a healthy life giving relationship or family structure is another question.
If you have read my previous post on Authority vs. Influence you would of observed the major difference that the area of Government plays in comparison to the area of Arts and Entertainment. One shapes us as individuals by clear boundaries and jurisdictions it creates while the other relies entirely on appeal and impact through no means of force whatsoever.
The Family sphere is an interesting one in that it actually straddles both areas of Authority and Influence. A strong family is made up of parents who create both strong and protective boundaries as well as an environment for growth and exploration by observation. The application of what the families values are based on the influence of each of the family members.
This picture is largely distorted and our current generation of young people today are faced with an epidemic of unprecedented proportions. I unfortunately am a part of this fatherless generation of young males who have been thrust into a world where Family is failing us and failing us badly. It's a broken mirror of refracted images on what is meant to be a cocoon of both protection and love.
Loving parents understand the balance between Authority and Influence in raising a child. It would only be appropriate to create strict and seemingly even harsh boundaries for a child. It would also only be appropriate as well to ensure clear consequences are communicated and delivered when necessary for children as they grow up. Rules that govern how they cross the street, whether they talk to strangers, when they go to sleep, what they are allowed to eat etc. A good parent exercises absolute control and directive power in these areas in the formative years of a child, not because they are power hungry or demand submission just so they can feel like the boss, but because they understand that each of these areas as as well as thousands of countless others demand such rigorous and even calloused dictating.
If breached or taken lightly the result could be catastrophic and even fatal. This is why when we see a mother who screams in agony at her 4 year old to prevent them from walking into a busy intersection we don't look at her with criticism or dissent. Even after she has scooped that child in her arms and lovingly embraced them, we know that the next thing that must happen is the delivery of consequences. We may not all agree on the delivery, but the most loving thing to do in this scenario is to punish and bring sharp clarity as to why she told them not to run into the street, even if the toddler doesn't immediately understand, they need to know that what they've done is very WRONG.
There is justice here, and when done with sincere and unconditional love...it's beautiful.
( Part 2b coming soon)
Monday, May 21, 2012
Authority vs. Influence pt.1 "Like Mike"
If there was one single thing that needed to be named as the most critical in what shapes a person, there would no doubt be a fierce battle for what would be deemed as the most highly significant.There are many things that a person encounters in the human experience that play a large role in shaping that individual. All of these things are continually shaping us; our values, our beliefs, our worldview and outlook on what part we play on this blue and green sphere as it continues to spin around the sun.
Economics
Education
Government
Religion
Family
Media
Arts & Entertainment (aka Celebration)
I just finished attending an amazing gathering where I was provoked and challenged to dig deep into how all of these influence and shape our societies. Some very bright people have contributed into clarifying how these 7 areas mold us as people. No matter how small or large the societies we live in, each of these areas are represented as critical areas of how a person views himself as well as the people and the world around them.
Some of these spheres shape us purely out of an authoritative lens. We see ourselves and the world around us a certain way through certain spheres because certain spheres demand that we do. The area of government fits into this more so than the rest. Our governments create laws and regulations that create boundaries that are meant to protect and care for its people. When someone steps out of these boundaries, government by its very nature needs to exercise their authority to maintain and preserve order. People view themselves and others through this sphere in very black and white terms. This is its designated purpose.
Some of these spheres effect us entirely based on influence. On the far other extreme from government, arts and entertainment shape our societies 100% by influencing us through our appreciation of more abstract and less authoritative mediums. Musicians, artists, authors, actors and athletes largely shape the way we see the world as individuals, often even much broader than us as individuals though. They shape our families, towns, cities... even as far as nationally and internationally.
Authority vs. Influence
A good way to polarize the difference between these two spheres is to use the example of the abuse of drugs and alcohol by young people and how each one addresses the issue. Government can set up strict laws, codes, regulations, curfews, bans, penalties, campaigns and hundreds of other initiatives to try and keep its societies young people far from such destructive substances. These initiatives can rise and fall due to a vast number of different and broad factors, but at the end of the day when the boundary is breached, government exerts its authority as a means to contain and manage more so than to actually prevent.
People can be presented with a number of warnings and communication to not do drugs but when they do, a strong government ensures that its societies members see that there are consequences.The punishment and execution of authority here shapes the way a person thinks about whether or not they will abuse drugs and alcohol. This can be done in both just and unjust ways but nonetheless, government relies nearly entirely on its domain of authority versus its influence.
Now, take a famous athlete like Michael Jordan. At the peak of his domination in the sport of basketball hundreds of millions of people across the US and all over the world could recognize his face regardless if they liked basketball or not. His influence was and is still to this day enormous. He is the greatest to ever play and many might argue that ever will. His influence stems entirely by his ability to run fast, jump high and put a rubber ball into a net ten feet off the ground. He has close to zero authority to enforce or ensure that young people don't do drugs. He can't put handcuffs on anyone or throw anyone into the slammer. However, when Michael Jordan gets on T.V. and speaks to young people to follow their dreams and stay away from drugs...The outcome here is mind boggling.
Millions of people will listen not because they have to, but because they see his accomplishments and respect his position based on what he's done with his life. They are heavily influenced to stay away from crack not because they are forced to stay away from crack, but because they too want to be like Mike. (please do yourself a favor and search on youtube for the song "Like Mike". It's an absolute classic)
The point here isn’t to try and compare the two and pick which one is superior. The point is to recognize that all seven are fundamental and that all seven play a critical role. It’s hard to imagine wanting to be like a Government office and it’s easy to imagine wanting to be like Mike. One doesn’t trump the other and in fact I believe that God has every intention for each sphere to thrive according to Kingdom values and principles. Stay tuned for more thoughts on some of the other spheres soon.
Pt. 2 Coming soon: The equal domain of Authority and Influence in Family
Economics
Education
Government
Religion
Family
Media
Arts & Entertainment (aka Celebration)
I just finished attending an amazing gathering where I was provoked and challenged to dig deep into how all of these influence and shape our societies. Some very bright people have contributed into clarifying how these 7 areas mold us as people. No matter how small or large the societies we live in, each of these areas are represented as critical areas of how a person views himself as well as the people and the world around them.
Some of these spheres shape us purely out of an authoritative lens. We see ourselves and the world around us a certain way through certain spheres because certain spheres demand that we do. The area of government fits into this more so than the rest. Our governments create laws and regulations that create boundaries that are meant to protect and care for its people. When someone steps out of these boundaries, government by its very nature needs to exercise their authority to maintain and preserve order. People view themselves and others through this sphere in very black and white terms. This is its designated purpose.
 | |
| US Capitol Building (Directive Authority) |
Some of these spheres effect us entirely based on influence. On the far other extreme from government, arts and entertainment shape our societies 100% by influencing us through our appreciation of more abstract and less authoritative mediums. Musicians, artists, authors, actors and athletes largely shape the way we see the world as individuals, often even much broader than us as individuals though. They shape our families, towns, cities... even as far as nationally and internationally.
Authority vs. Influence
A good way to polarize the difference between these two spheres is to use the example of the abuse of drugs and alcohol by young people and how each one addresses the issue. Government can set up strict laws, codes, regulations, curfews, bans, penalties, campaigns and hundreds of other initiatives to try and keep its societies young people far from such destructive substances. These initiatives can rise and fall due to a vast number of different and broad factors, but at the end of the day when the boundary is breached, government exerts its authority as a means to contain and manage more so than to actually prevent.
People can be presented with a number of warnings and communication to not do drugs but when they do, a strong government ensures that its societies members see that there are consequences.The punishment and execution of authority here shapes the way a person thinks about whether or not they will abuse drugs and alcohol. This can be done in both just and unjust ways but nonetheless, government relies nearly entirely on its domain of authority versus its influence.
Now, take a famous athlete like Michael Jordan. At the peak of his domination in the sport of basketball hundreds of millions of people across the US and all over the world could recognize his face regardless if they liked basketball or not. His influence was and is still to this day enormous. He is the greatest to ever play and many might argue that ever will. His influence stems entirely by his ability to run fast, jump high and put a rubber ball into a net ten feet off the ground. He has close to zero authority to enforce or ensure that young people don't do drugs. He can't put handcuffs on anyone or throw anyone into the slammer. However, when Michael Jordan gets on T.V. and speaks to young people to follow their dreams and stay away from drugs...The outcome here is mind boggling.
Millions of people will listen not because they have to, but because they see his accomplishments and respect his position based on what he's done with his life. They are heavily influenced to stay away from crack not because they are forced to stay away from crack, but because they too want to be like Mike. (please do yourself a favor and search on youtube for the song "Like Mike". It's an absolute classic)
 |
| Who wouldn't want to be like this guy?!?!?! |
Pt. 2 Coming soon: The equal domain of Authority and Influence in Family
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
The music inside of us Pt. 2
I was having a classic songwriting discussion with a fellow songstress friend of mine on skype a while back. We were casually discussing current songs we were working on and the tone of the conversation was a fairly standard one for these type of exchanges. We both seemed to struggle to like the songs we were talking about that we were working on. It wasn't self loathing hatred or anything, but the sentiment was that we just weren't quite satisfied with the individual pieces. Something always just seems to be missing from our finished products, and therefore they often remain just that... unfinished, incomplete, never heard relics.
This conversation was a little different than most though, it took a turn at some point and I found myself seeing things in a whole new light. I started having thoughts like...
"Why do we do this to ourselves?”
“Why are we our own worst critics?”
“Why do we have these insatiable desires to try and force out incredibly complex masterpieces?"
The answer is simple. We get this desire by listening to and watching our musical hero's. We listen to one of our favorite albums and sit down with every intent to replicate the magic we’ve just ingested. What actually ends up happening is you put on a Death Cab record and start strumming a few chords. You cross your fingers and hope to magically force a brilliant Ben Gibbardesque literary hook with a magical melody to boot to just appear out of thin air. Rarely is this the result, very rarely in fact. In my personal experience it goes a bit more like this: You end up spending hours painfully writing silly, meaningless dribble. You more or less end up whining out melodies until your roommate comes in the room and you sheepishly pretend like you weren't actually just attempting to write the next world changing song.
Or you get to the next step in which you actually slightly like something your working on and decide to share it with someone. You grab a sibling or close friend and nonchalantly pretend like you weren't really doing anything else and could maybe just show them a little silly thing you're working on. All the while your palms begin to sweat, your fingers shake and your voice slightly trembles as you invite this person into something that is so incredibly personal and real to you. As soon as you finish you desperately want to be validated but at the same time you don’t want them to necessarily drown you in over the top affirmation. You’re hoping for a middle ground response where they don’t flatter you but still firmly appreciate what you just played for them. If this doesn't happen JUST the way we were hoping, that song might as well be buried 100 feet underground, never EVER to played for anyone again.
This might be slightly exaggerated for some but the reality is that the songwriting process is much more like this then most would think or give credit for. Our musical hero's are the one's who found the bravery to play their music with little to no fear of the rejection. As I was discussing this with another tormented budding song bird I began to feel for the first time, probably ever in my short musical journey, that I needed to discover a feeling of balance and pace with this all. The desire to want to write a beautiful album like 'Bon Iver' is only natural when you listen to it. I feel that I actually get swept into something quite magical and as a songwriter you begin to dream of what it would be like to produce something of that magnitude.
I found myself in this conversation remembering why I fell in love with music and songwriting to begin with. When this love affair first started it was pretty simple. I had close to no ambition or musical influence and my musical library was highly limited. Their weren't all of these layers of validation and approval necessary to sit down and thoroughly enjoy playing 3 simple chords and belting out a simple and naive' song. This is the thing we all love about music the most though. We love it when we see someone playing a song for no other reason than the simple fact that they are head over heels in love with the beauty of music.
This is the thing that inspires the artists in all of us as well. This is the foundation of true art and the beauty therein. The foundation unfortunately gets shaky along the way and we are tempted to compromise for many trivial to tragic reasons.
Me and Nate playing just for the love of the game
Tens years has passed since I first took the plunge into the deep and vexing world of musical composition. I’ve consistently teetered back and forth from the soaring heights and simple joys of creating melody, rhythm and rhyme, only to crash back down to the tedious, grueling and heart-wrenching side of what it means to become truly vulnerable and really share what’s happening deep inside of me.
This is what I love to call a beautiful tension.
I’m convinced that pretty much every beautiful thing in this world has this type of tension. I’ve found in my experience that the creator God seems to live in this tension and that he doesn’t shy away or become intimidated by it. The tension I'm referring to is the evidence that we all have true freedom and the ultimate choice in being like the creator God.
When God sat down and decided to create the most beautiful things we could ever imagine I get this sense that he had an almost naive’ hope that it would all come out beautiful and perfect and full of his love, and really to start off, that’s exactly what it was. I’m toying with the age old question of God’s foreknowledge but really the last thing I want to do is get too theological here, so please just journey with me a for a second.
I believe creation also required a great deal of vulnerability on Gods part. The capacity he’s given us to reject the true beauty he’s made for us or to choose to enjoy it like a good song, is to me even more proof of the wonder and beauty of God. I kinda see it like inviting someone to listen to one your new songs for the first time, only on an infinitely higher level. God was sharing with us the most beautiful song that would ever exist. True beauty can never be objective and will always be highly subjective. We must be able to choose both the things we love and the things we dislike, otherwise the appreciation of beauty would become obsolete and vanish.
All that to say, I see songwriters and really any type of artist as being someone who is tapping into this freedom. Someone who is giving people the ability and place to choose whether to love or hate what they have created. They are allowing themselves to both be naive’ and incredibly vulnerable, all in the same breath. It’s a good thing that God possesses not only all creativity in the universe but also wisdom. The ability to be both hopeful and vulnerable at the same time is enough to drive anyone absolutely mad. Wisdom is paramount in this journey and God is absolutely full of it.
This conversation was a little different than most though, it took a turn at some point and I found myself seeing things in a whole new light. I started having thoughts like...
"Why do we do this to ourselves?”
“Why are we our own worst critics?”
“Why do we have these insatiable desires to try and force out incredibly complex masterpieces?"
The answer is simple. We get this desire by listening to and watching our musical hero's. We listen to one of our favorite albums and sit down with every intent to replicate the magic we’ve just ingested. What actually ends up happening is you put on a Death Cab record and start strumming a few chords. You cross your fingers and hope to magically force a brilliant Ben Gibbardesque literary hook with a magical melody to boot to just appear out of thin air. Rarely is this the result, very rarely in fact. In my personal experience it goes a bit more like this: You end up spending hours painfully writing silly, meaningless dribble. You more or less end up whining out melodies until your roommate comes in the room and you sheepishly pretend like you weren't actually just attempting to write the next world changing song.
Or you get to the next step in which you actually slightly like something your working on and decide to share it with someone. You grab a sibling or close friend and nonchalantly pretend like you weren't really doing anything else and could maybe just show them a little silly thing you're working on. All the while your palms begin to sweat, your fingers shake and your voice slightly trembles as you invite this person into something that is so incredibly personal and real to you. As soon as you finish you desperately want to be validated but at the same time you don’t want them to necessarily drown you in over the top affirmation. You’re hoping for a middle ground response where they don’t flatter you but still firmly appreciate what you just played for them. If this doesn't happen JUST the way we were hoping, that song might as well be buried 100 feet underground, never EVER to played for anyone again.
This might be slightly exaggerated for some but the reality is that the songwriting process is much more like this then most would think or give credit for. Our musical hero's are the one's who found the bravery to play their music with little to no fear of the rejection. As I was discussing this with another tormented budding song bird I began to feel for the first time, probably ever in my short musical journey, that I needed to discover a feeling of balance and pace with this all. The desire to want to write a beautiful album like 'Bon Iver' is only natural when you listen to it. I feel that I actually get swept into something quite magical and as a songwriter you begin to dream of what it would be like to produce something of that magnitude.
I found myself in this conversation remembering why I fell in love with music and songwriting to begin with. When this love affair first started it was pretty simple. I had close to no ambition or musical influence and my musical library was highly limited. Their weren't all of these layers of validation and approval necessary to sit down and thoroughly enjoy playing 3 simple chords and belting out a simple and naive' song. This is the thing we all love about music the most though. We love it when we see someone playing a song for no other reason than the simple fact that they are head over heels in love with the beauty of music.
This is the thing that inspires the artists in all of us as well. This is the foundation of true art and the beauty therein. The foundation unfortunately gets shaky along the way and we are tempted to compromise for many trivial to tragic reasons.
Me and Nate playing just for the love of the game
Tens years has passed since I first took the plunge into the deep and vexing world of musical composition. I’ve consistently teetered back and forth from the soaring heights and simple joys of creating melody, rhythm and rhyme, only to crash back down to the tedious, grueling and heart-wrenching side of what it means to become truly vulnerable and really share what’s happening deep inside of me.
This is what I love to call a beautiful tension.
I’m convinced that pretty much every beautiful thing in this world has this type of tension. I’ve found in my experience that the creator God seems to live in this tension and that he doesn’t shy away or become intimidated by it. The tension I'm referring to is the evidence that we all have true freedom and the ultimate choice in being like the creator God.
When God sat down and decided to create the most beautiful things we could ever imagine I get this sense that he had an almost naive’ hope that it would all come out beautiful and perfect and full of his love, and really to start off, that’s exactly what it was. I’m toying with the age old question of God’s foreknowledge but really the last thing I want to do is get too theological here, so please just journey with me a for a second.
I believe creation also required a great deal of vulnerability on Gods part. The capacity he’s given us to reject the true beauty he’s made for us or to choose to enjoy it like a good song, is to me even more proof of the wonder and beauty of God. I kinda see it like inviting someone to listen to one your new songs for the first time, only on an infinitely higher level. God was sharing with us the most beautiful song that would ever exist. True beauty can never be objective and will always be highly subjective. We must be able to choose both the things we love and the things we dislike, otherwise the appreciation of beauty would become obsolete and vanish.
All that to say, I see songwriters and really any type of artist as being someone who is tapping into this freedom. Someone who is giving people the ability and place to choose whether to love or hate what they have created. They are allowing themselves to both be naive’ and incredibly vulnerable, all in the same breath. It’s a good thing that God possesses not only all creativity in the universe but also wisdom. The ability to be both hopeful and vulnerable at the same time is enough to drive anyone absolutely mad. Wisdom is paramount in this journey and God is absolutely full of it.
Friday, March 30, 2012
The music inside of us Pt.1
Music is the lifeblood of humanity. Yes, that's a big call, but really music seems to be the one thing that seems to be able to just connect us as human beings. No matter what language, cultural, religious or any other kind of potentially divisive boundaries we create for ourselves, the love of good music is universal. Though there isn't always unified agreement on genre or style, when you break it down to its very basics, the things we actually appreciate about music or a good song are the same across the board. Songs yearn to connect with us at an emotional and dare I even say spiritual level.
That's why we listen.
Sure, we want our eardrums to be tickled with nice sounding melody and we want our feet to stomp along to a good beat. But we all know that a great song goes far beyond any of those musically theoretical appreciations. When a human being sits down with an instrument and sings their own words, when they express the raw emotion of their soul...
Everyone listens.
Not just with their ears though. It doesn't matter whether it be with a harp, a guitar, a piano or even a carved empty gourd that he/she pounds against the ground. I believe when someone pours themselves into a song, when they really dig deep into their present condition and express themselves with absolute raw honesty, something very spiritual occurs. As we sit and listen our hearts open up and things we weren't even really sure were there inside of us begin to bubble up from places we didn't even know existed.
The greatest artists of our time are the one's who have, in some mysterious and ethereal way, tapped into the deepest parts of us by giving us glimpses of what lies deep within them. We begin to see way beyond their exterior and are invited through melody, rhythm and rhyme onto the front porch of their hearts. Sometimes it's beautiful, other times it's dark and tormented.
Johnny Cash
John Lennon
Bob Dylan
Jimi Hendrix
Michael Jackson
Kurt Cobain
Talk to any avid fan of the aforementioned and you'll get much more than the appreciation of their musical ability. As genius as their ability may be, each one left their mark far beyond things you can measure with things like record sales and fame. These artists connected with the world at a whole other level. They tapped into something big and grand and by allowing themselves to be fully expressed through their little guitar,microphone,dance floor etc., they cracked out of being just mere performers and embraced the mantle of being prophets to their generation. These artists, along with many other geniuses can all tend to have a similar thread that beyond any possible genre or style, binds them together. We use the term eccentric genius to capture the way people like this throughout history seem to blaze forward miles beyond the pack. Mozart, Einstein, Howard Hughes all fit this bill as well. The sad part of all this is that these insanely gifted individuals are all bound together in tragedy as well. In some way or another, they all somewhat lost the plot altogether while completely losing their minds in the process. Nearly all of them ended up dying way too young.
If these classic icons can be considered prophets, they would be the MAJOR prophets of the Old Testament. These guys would be considered the heavy hitters like Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. They carry a ton of street cred an everyone know's them by name. Then there are some other dudes that I really admire just as much as any of those other guys, but they often aren't on the cover of Time magazine or gracing headlines around the globe.
Guys like...
Justin Vernon
Dallas Green
Dustin Kensrue
I guess you could classify them as the MINOR prophets, you know, the Habbakuk's,Haggai's and Amos's. The guys that tend to get a little passed over for their more epic, dramatic and often tragic counterparts.
I listen to these budding genius' pour their soul into their music and something inside of me is unlocked. It feels as if I'm being literally transported to a whole other place when I listen to them strum their guitars and belt out their heavenly melodies. I listen and the immediate reaction I experience is that I want to play just like them. I'll be honest though, I tend to go beyond just musical appreciation with these guys as well. If they were to wear cool little western flannels at a big show or on tv... I tend to find myself skimming through my local Op shops with a bit of 'plaid vision', subconsciously scraping together my identity to the people who so eloquently portray a huge part of what I really want to be.
At some point almost a decade ago I decided to pick up a guitar. Contrary to any kind of logic or reason I began to strum my chicken fingers against those steel strings and also attempted to force melody to emerge from my deep, gravely and seemingly unpleasant/tone deaf vocal cords. It all changed from that point on and there really was no looking back. Hundreds of absolutely terrible and meaningless songs have ventured out into the atmosphere from within me since those early days. All the while their have been a few that seem to resonate with people in ways that I couldn't explain even if I tried.
Sometimes a song will resonate with my family or with some of my best friends. Sometimes with complete strangers at big church service gatherings and sometimes they resonate with drunken strangers at bars and pubs.The moments when someone tells me that something I have created touched them in a meaningful way seem to transcend any other kind of affirmation I could ever receive. Their seems to be an indescribable joy that comes from knowing that something that is completely and entirely of my creation, can go beyond me and make a real and significant difference to another person.
There will always be people we look up to in whatever thing we find ourselves being passionate about. A Michael Jordan, a Hemmingway, a Kelly Slater or a Bob Marley. When I began to sit down and attempt to relay my heart and soul through a guitar and microphone it didn't take long for me to find others that were really good at it and that I could only hope and dream to emulate.
(Part 2 coming soon)
That's why we listen.
Sure, we want our eardrums to be tickled with nice sounding melody and we want our feet to stomp along to a good beat. But we all know that a great song goes far beyond any of those musically theoretical appreciations. When a human being sits down with an instrument and sings their own words, when they express the raw emotion of their soul...
Everyone listens.
Not just with their ears though. It doesn't matter whether it be with a harp, a guitar, a piano or even a carved empty gourd that he/she pounds against the ground. I believe when someone pours themselves into a song, when they really dig deep into their present condition and express themselves with absolute raw honesty, something very spiritual occurs. As we sit and listen our hearts open up and things we weren't even really sure were there inside of us begin to bubble up from places we didn't even know existed.
The greatest artists of our time are the one's who have, in some mysterious and ethereal way, tapped into the deepest parts of us by giving us glimpses of what lies deep within them. We begin to see way beyond their exterior and are invited through melody, rhythm and rhyme onto the front porch of their hearts. Sometimes it's beautiful, other times it's dark and tormented.
Johnny Cash
John Lennon
Bob Dylan
Jimi Hendrix
Michael Jackson
Kurt Cobain
Talk to any avid fan of the aforementioned and you'll get much more than the appreciation of their musical ability. As genius as their ability may be, each one left their mark far beyond things you can measure with things like record sales and fame. These artists connected with the world at a whole other level. They tapped into something big and grand and by allowing themselves to be fully expressed through their little guitar,microphone,dance floor etc., they cracked out of being just mere performers and embraced the mantle of being prophets to their generation. These artists, along with many other geniuses can all tend to have a similar thread that beyond any possible genre or style, binds them together. We use the term eccentric genius to capture the way people like this throughout history seem to blaze forward miles beyond the pack. Mozart, Einstein, Howard Hughes all fit this bill as well. The sad part of all this is that these insanely gifted individuals are all bound together in tragedy as well. In some way or another, they all somewhat lost the plot altogether while completely losing their minds in the process. Nearly all of them ended up dying way too young.
If these classic icons can be considered prophets, they would be the MAJOR prophets of the Old Testament. These guys would be considered the heavy hitters like Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. They carry a ton of street cred an everyone know's them by name. Then there are some other dudes that I really admire just as much as any of those other guys, but they often aren't on the cover of Time magazine or gracing headlines around the globe.
Guys like...
Justin Vernon
Dallas Green
Dustin Kensrue
I guess you could classify them as the MINOR prophets, you know, the Habbakuk's,Haggai's and Amos's. The guys that tend to get a little passed over for their more epic, dramatic and often tragic counterparts.
I listen to these budding genius' pour their soul into their music and something inside of me is unlocked. It feels as if I'm being literally transported to a whole other place when I listen to them strum their guitars and belt out their heavenly melodies. I listen and the immediate reaction I experience is that I want to play just like them. I'll be honest though, I tend to go beyond just musical appreciation with these guys as well. If they were to wear cool little western flannels at a big show or on tv... I tend to find myself skimming through my local Op shops with a bit of 'plaid vision', subconsciously scraping together my identity to the people who so eloquently portray a huge part of what I really want to be.
At some point almost a decade ago I decided to pick up a guitar. Contrary to any kind of logic or reason I began to strum my chicken fingers against those steel strings and also attempted to force melody to emerge from my deep, gravely and seemingly unpleasant/tone deaf vocal cords. It all changed from that point on and there really was no looking back. Hundreds of absolutely terrible and meaningless songs have ventured out into the atmosphere from within me since those early days. All the while their have been a few that seem to resonate with people in ways that I couldn't explain even if I tried.
Sometimes a song will resonate with my family or with some of my best friends. Sometimes with complete strangers at big church service gatherings and sometimes they resonate with drunken strangers at bars and pubs.The moments when someone tells me that something I have created touched them in a meaningful way seem to transcend any other kind of affirmation I could ever receive. Their seems to be an indescribable joy that comes from knowing that something that is completely and entirely of my creation, can go beyond me and make a real and significant difference to another person.
There will always be people we look up to in whatever thing we find ourselves being passionate about. A Michael Jordan, a Hemmingway, a Kelly Slater or a Bob Marley. When I began to sit down and attempt to relay my heart and soul through a guitar and microphone it didn't take long for me to find others that were really good at it and that I could only hope and dream to emulate.
(Part 2 coming soon)
Friday, March 16, 2012
Kony and the narrow way
The viral campaign #KONY2012 launched by Invisible Children has created an unprecedented amount of online buzz and with that buzz has also come a stack of controversy. I needed to take a moment to step back, take a deep breath and really ask God what was going to be of any benefit of me writing yet another blog about this exciting and somewhat complicated moment in modern communication history. I am going to write a few thoughts out and try my best to convey a clear sense of hope, direction and balance from what God is highlighting to me as important things surrounding this highly significant and very important current event.
Whether you are follower of Jesus or not, these thoughts may or may not be of any assistance to you. Please hear my heart from the get go though;
I in NO WAY, shape or form, desire to offend, slander, marginalize or demean ANYONE.
With that being said I wish to present to you that I do believe with absolute confidence that the way of Jesus of Nazareth is supreme. That his way is above all else, whole, certain and infinitely greater than any campaign that will ever exist.
One of the most simple and frustrating things Christians believe in is that the work of Jesus is the ONE and ONLY thing that will bring any kind of real and sustainable change in the world.
Let's be honest with that for a second. This is an incredibly naive and incredibly narrow way of looking at the world .Their are no two ways about it. If you believe that Jesus was born in a manger, that he lived a perfect and blameless life, that he died on a sinners cross and then to top it all of came back to life... if you believe any of this and any of the other things the gospels tell us about him, you are automatically putting yourself in a very tricky position. When you take on these beliefs they must affect what you believe about, and how you respond to literally everything else in life.
Jesus' way is a narrow way. It's a simple way and it's an all encompassing way. This is what I'm trying to remind myself right now.
This is easy to forget as I click on the numerous blogs criticizing the KONY 2012 movement. Its also easy to forget as I watch any of the beautifully made Invisible Children films over the past few years. Both of these mediums honestly cause me to feel very angry. Angry at injustice on one hand and angry at, what I feel in a moment of frustration, seemingly bitter and overly critical people.
Jesus responded to shockingly similar things to what we are currently responding to in this current debacle. He responded in compassion to those who were being overlooked and oppressed and he also responded in anger to religious pride, arrogance or any other form of seemingly unrighteous judgement. Not only did he respond to these things but more importantly was HOW he responded.
Jesus models a two handed approach of: GRACE and TRUTH
I see this model being outworked in one never trumping the other, but more one making room for the other. The truth is we all deserve death, every single one of us is guilty of something. Paul tells us that the consequences are the same for all of us and that there is no sliding scale on how good or bad anyone of us are. No small bad or large evil determines anymore the TRUTH of what really is due to every single one of us.
I, Stevie Lujan am guilty of crimes against humanity. I deserve to be punished and I personally don't deserve anything less than that of anyone else on the planet.
Joseph Kony is guilty of crimes against humanity. He deserves to be punished and he doesn't deserve this any less than that of anyone else on the planet.
Now, the beauty of Jesus is that he allows GRACE to impact us in such a way where the TRUTH doesn't become secondary or watered down, but it in some mysterious way it illuminates the truth in such a way as to completely set us free. By God showing us his grace by having Jesus hang on a cross we truly understand the weight and the truth of all reality... the truth that we are completely stuffed without Jesus. Grace here is making us aware of the Truth and in essence it is preparing a way for it to really sink in and impact us.
A petty but hopefully helpful example of this in human interaction would be if I told a friend of mine something factual. Let's say the fact is that he smells really bad due to a lack of proper hygiene. Now, me blasting him with the truth in front of a room full of people may not produce any sort of satisfactory outcome in either his scent or more importantly, my relationship with him. I may fix one problem by shaming him into taking showers and wearing deodorant more frequently, but the more likely outcome will be that I've created a much more sinister problem than his odor. By presenting the truth without grace I will in essence fracture our relationship and create a new reality in which his scent is more important to me than who he really is beneath all those smelly clothes.
If I in grace were to find a way to pull him aside and lovingly and sincerely ask him about his hygienic habits and whether or not he is aware of the severity of his scent and possibly go even a step further and buy him my favorite deodorant and ENCOURAGE him, it's a much better bet that both the issue of his odor predicament and our relationship will greatly flourish.
The first option takes little guts and minimal effort. We have the option to just belt out the truth and force the person to take it or leave it.
The other requires great diligence and deliberation. It requires you to believe the best about a person, even at the expense of you feeling a little uncomfortable.I think it's pretty obvious which road Jesus takes with us.
Ok, so with that as a backdrop here are some of my current thoughts on what is going on with the KONY 2012 stuff. I had a whole long list of the actual grievances, criticisms and the responses by Invisible Children listed here, but I found myself being challenged to let people do their own research and to find the blogs and websites themselves. No one should really care what I think about who's more right and wrong because the fact of the matter is we are all WRONG at the end of the day.
We are all dead without the love of Jesus burning within our hearts.
I commend anyone, anywhere who is sincerely aiming to make a difference in this world. I personally believe that without Jesus as the absolute linchpin, that as great as any effort or campaign may be, it will always require the simplest and most profound solution humanity will ever have to really set things straight. I see a lot of Jesus in Invisible Children. I see a group of people responding to injustice with great passion and vigor and busting a gut to rope in as many people as possible. The accusations that they are naive' and misinformed, to me, is much easier to swallow than accusations of being apathetic and far removed from the millions upon millions of people in our world who are trapped in cycles of hurt, pain and oppression. God will judge our hearts and time will judge our fruit.
We... we will judge our own hearts first and foremost and respond like Jesus did. We will respond in Grace and Truth.
I am praying for Grace and Truth for this campaign.
I am praying for Grace and Truth over Africa.
I am praying for Grace and Truth over affluent western society.
I am praying Grace and Truth over Joseph Kony.
I am praying Grace and Truth over Stevie Lujan.
Whether you are follower of Jesus or not, these thoughts may or may not be of any assistance to you. Please hear my heart from the get go though;
I in NO WAY, shape or form, desire to offend, slander, marginalize or demean ANYONE.
With that being said I wish to present to you that I do believe with absolute confidence that the way of Jesus of Nazareth is supreme. That his way is above all else, whole, certain and infinitely greater than any campaign that will ever exist.
One of the most simple and frustrating things Christians believe in is that the work of Jesus is the ONE and ONLY thing that will bring any kind of real and sustainable change in the world.
Let's be honest with that for a second. This is an incredibly naive and incredibly narrow way of looking at the world .Their are no two ways about it. If you believe that Jesus was born in a manger, that he lived a perfect and blameless life, that he died on a sinners cross and then to top it all of came back to life... if you believe any of this and any of the other things the gospels tell us about him, you are automatically putting yourself in a very tricky position. When you take on these beliefs they must affect what you believe about, and how you respond to literally everything else in life.
Jesus' way is a narrow way. It's a simple way and it's an all encompassing way. This is what I'm trying to remind myself right now.
This is easy to forget as I click on the numerous blogs criticizing the KONY 2012 movement. Its also easy to forget as I watch any of the beautifully made Invisible Children films over the past few years. Both of these mediums honestly cause me to feel very angry. Angry at injustice on one hand and angry at, what I feel in a moment of frustration, seemingly bitter and overly critical people.
Jesus responded to shockingly similar things to what we are currently responding to in this current debacle. He responded in compassion to those who were being overlooked and oppressed and he also responded in anger to religious pride, arrogance or any other form of seemingly unrighteous judgement. Not only did he respond to these things but more importantly was HOW he responded.
Jesus models a two handed approach of: GRACE and TRUTH
I see this model being outworked in one never trumping the other, but more one making room for the other. The truth is we all deserve death, every single one of us is guilty of something. Paul tells us that the consequences are the same for all of us and that there is no sliding scale on how good or bad anyone of us are. No small bad or large evil determines anymore the TRUTH of what really is due to every single one of us.
I, Stevie Lujan am guilty of crimes against humanity. I deserve to be punished and I personally don't deserve anything less than that of anyone else on the planet.
Joseph Kony is guilty of crimes against humanity. He deserves to be punished and he doesn't deserve this any less than that of anyone else on the planet.
Now, the beauty of Jesus is that he allows GRACE to impact us in such a way where the TRUTH doesn't become secondary or watered down, but it in some mysterious way it illuminates the truth in such a way as to completely set us free. By God showing us his grace by having Jesus hang on a cross we truly understand the weight and the truth of all reality... the truth that we are completely stuffed without Jesus. Grace here is making us aware of the Truth and in essence it is preparing a way for it to really sink in and impact us.
A petty but hopefully helpful example of this in human interaction would be if I told a friend of mine something factual. Let's say the fact is that he smells really bad due to a lack of proper hygiene. Now, me blasting him with the truth in front of a room full of people may not produce any sort of satisfactory outcome in either his scent or more importantly, my relationship with him. I may fix one problem by shaming him into taking showers and wearing deodorant more frequently, but the more likely outcome will be that I've created a much more sinister problem than his odor. By presenting the truth without grace I will in essence fracture our relationship and create a new reality in which his scent is more important to me than who he really is beneath all those smelly clothes.
If I in grace were to find a way to pull him aside and lovingly and sincerely ask him about his hygienic habits and whether or not he is aware of the severity of his scent and possibly go even a step further and buy him my favorite deodorant and ENCOURAGE him, it's a much better bet that both the issue of his odor predicament and our relationship will greatly flourish.
The first option takes little guts and minimal effort. We have the option to just belt out the truth and force the person to take it or leave it.
The other requires great diligence and deliberation. It requires you to believe the best about a person, even at the expense of you feeling a little uncomfortable.I think it's pretty obvious which road Jesus takes with us.
Ok, so with that as a backdrop here are some of my current thoughts on what is going on with the KONY 2012 stuff. I had a whole long list of the actual grievances, criticisms and the responses by Invisible Children listed here, but I found myself being challenged to let people do their own research and to find the blogs and websites themselves. No one should really care what I think about who's more right and wrong because the fact of the matter is we are all WRONG at the end of the day.
We are all dead without the love of Jesus burning within our hearts.
I commend anyone, anywhere who is sincerely aiming to make a difference in this world. I personally believe that without Jesus as the absolute linchpin, that as great as any effort or campaign may be, it will always require the simplest and most profound solution humanity will ever have to really set things straight. I see a lot of Jesus in Invisible Children. I see a group of people responding to injustice with great passion and vigor and busting a gut to rope in as many people as possible. The accusations that they are naive' and misinformed, to me, is much easier to swallow than accusations of being apathetic and far removed from the millions upon millions of people in our world who are trapped in cycles of hurt, pain and oppression. God will judge our hearts and time will judge our fruit.
We... we will judge our own hearts first and foremost and respond like Jesus did. We will respond in Grace and Truth.
I am praying for Grace and Truth for this campaign.
I am praying for Grace and Truth over Africa.
I am praying for Grace and Truth over affluent western society.
I am praying Grace and Truth over Joseph Kony.
I am praying Grace and Truth over Stevie Lujan.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Holistic Hippies Pt.2
Jesus lived a FULL life. He lived a PERFECT life. He lived a WHOLE life. From the moment he arrived in a manger to the moment he ascended into those clouds, he was combatting and rectifying this broken and separated reality that human beings and all of creation seem to be completely subjected to. Jesus' ministry can often be hard to pin down on what was his primary objective. We often want to pick one expression of his time on planet earth as the most significant.
Often we find that this primary act of Jesus was expressed through his death on the cross, and rightly so, this was significant. This issue of sin and the suffering it produces is settled in this wonderful and beautiful act.
Some people look more at his teachings and his acts of compassion as a man as the primary expression. His wisdom and mercy become the guiding principles in how we should follow him.
Some people find that his death was only the beginning of something great and that really his resurrection was the primary purpose of his life on earth. Everything else was just a lead up to the moment where he defeated death itself and overcame the devil once and for all.
If your anything like me, reading through the Gospels in particular and trying to clarify with absolute certainty what the main thing is... well, it can be really exhausting. The moment I find myself settled and secured that I finally "got it", that I have complete revelation on this stuff, I find myself being painfully and excruciatingly humbled by another aspect of who Jesus really was and what he really came to do. I start to wonder in these moments if I'm missing the point. What if Jesus came not just to be glorified on how he put some things back into place by a few scattered events throughout his life, but what if everything he did was a massive, all encompassing expression of God's love that we will never, EVER be able to get our minds fully around?
Jesus' ministry to the world was HOLISTIC. Body,soul,mind,heart... he literally made it possible for us to be whole in every single area. How did he do this, you might ask?
Through his...
LIFE
DEATH
RESURRECTION
My proposition then is how do we learn to appreciate the breadth of his ministry in all that he did? How do we encourage a broad and HOLISTIC approach to following Jesus where we don't allow ourselves to get too pigeonholed into only focusing on one of the areas mentioned above?
You can see this quite a bit in Christian ministries. We get really focused on one of the amazing expression of Gods love and grace to the world through Jesus.
We get a revelation of Jesus' compassion on the sick, poor, orphaned and widows. We allow ourselves to be consumed with his heart and mercy for anyone who is in any kind of need. We see how he provided for the masses with fishes and loaves. We see how he ate and fellowshipped with the rejected and despised. We read about these things and we are inspired to go and do things like set up hospitals, aids clinics, shelters, counseling centers, orphanages etc. We see how Jesus responded to the physical needs of this world and we are compelled to follow.
Then we get a revelation of Jesus' radical and miraculous authority over spiritual and dark afflictions of the soul. We read about how he commanded a legion of demons out of a man and sent them into a pack of pigs. We read about how he spit in dirt and touched people's eyes with his holy mud. How he got words of knowledges about people he had only just met. As we read these things, of course we begin to be inspired on how God might want to use us in similar ways. So we set up whole schools and programs to train us in the supernatural. We desire to have access to this supernatural authority Jesus walked in, in both his life and through his miraculous resurrection.
Then we get a revelation of Jesus on the cross. How much pain and affliction he went through... all for us. How be hung and bled and eventually died to free us from our own self inflicted misery. We see the destructive power of sin and the bondage it holds us in, in both this life and the next. As we truly understand the mercy of God through this act of Jesus we are overwhelmed with a sense of total gratitude and appreciation. So we go about trying to convince the world through whatever means necessary the urgent and compelling truth of the cross. We set up schools, ministries, programs, outreaches etc. with the sole intent of learning how to preach this beautiful Gospel.
Now, obviously all of the above mentioned revelations are God breathed, scriptural and profound. I asked myself recently if I were to sit down with Jesus now, interview style, and try to get him to nail down once and for all his crowning achievement, that his response might leave me somewhat hanging. I wonder if he would be almost confused by the question. I wonder if his answer would come across more like this...
"I did nothing apart from what the Father was saying to me. In those acts of obedience and dependence on him I was near to him and whole. From the brightest to darkest moments of my life on earth I experienced a WHOLE and FULL life in him. That is my crowning achievement."
As I grow in my life and calling I want to be blown away by the FULL measure of Jesus manifest in and through my life. Sure, there will be seasons where I focus more on certain aspects of what that fullness really looks like being expressed in and through me. Times where I dig deep into word and work on my hermeneutics (if you don't know what that word means,honestly, don't worry about it). Times where I focus on radical evangelism and proclamation as a means to make it more of my lifestyle than and event. Seasons where I busy myself with setting up schools, programs and ministries to equip others to know God more. Moments where I draw aside and sit in absolute silence and stillness and allow my life to be completely uncluttered and absolutely solely focused on intimacy with the Father. But the challenge remains to always allow myself to experience the HOLISTIC love of the trinity in every aspect of my life and the lives of those around me.
To never arrive, to never settle, to never feel like i've achieved.
But to rest in the fact that Jesus' Life, Death and Resurrection reach deep into my WHOLE being, continually conforming me to himself.
When you see someone who is incredibly confident and secure in who they are or what they're good at there's a good chance that they had a loving father early on speaking the truth consistently into their lives. A father who was generous in his approval of that child and a child who constantly, above every other person around them, was starving for their father to affirm them in whatever it was they were doing. I know that this is isn't an absolute rule and that not every single confident and whole person fits into this category. I do think you'd be shocked though at how high the percentage of people who are, how many did have this amazing and simple foundation in their lives.
I unfortunately didn't have this. So that leaves me with a interesting conundrum; how do I go about being secure,confident and whole in my life?
It's quite simple actually.
I follow Jesus' example of asking the Father non stop what he thinks about me, what he feels about me. I ask him for his heart for the people around me, I ask him if I'm doing a good job in loving those people. I ask him and only him to validate me and bring truth and definition into who I really am.
A CONFIDENT, WHOLE, LOVED son of the most high God.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Holistic Hippies Pt.1
My life is full of extremes. Sometimes I wish it wasn't always this way, but mostly I think I would go crazy if my life was nominal, marginal or highly measured. I always have a sense of something HUGE around the corner, constantly anticipating the next big impossible challenge. Often the thing around the corner ends up being even way bigger than I dreamed it could of been and I'm left wondering how in Hades I got myself into that kind of situation again?
It's terrifying and I'm addicted to the terror.
This is good, mostly. As a follower of Jesus we should constantly be pushing ourselves to live out of the sense of urgency that Jesus left us with when he ascended up into the clouds. He came and did a lot of cool stuff and put into motion the cure to make this world what it was created to be. He himself started it, and he himself will in some way finish it ( bring on the eschatology mysteries). But there is this long awkward pause in between these two moments and the shocking reality is that this stage, the stage we are in now, seems to be completely, 100%, no two ways about it, left in our hands. With that understanding our lives should be to a large degree wild, reckless, abandoned and terrifying. We haven't a second to waste really. The work Jesus started is still an ongoing process that Jesus decides to entrust to US to accomplish.
YIKES! No pressure aye, Jesus?
In my short time in full time ministry thus far I've had the chance to observe quite a bit of other people who, like myself, are really attempting to live completely sold out to the call of God in our lives. Varied results would be a fair assessment, and an even fairer one would be how incredibly inconsistent I am in the midst of all my astute observations on others. As we rise and fall in our ministries and pursuits of being used by God, I don't sense that we don't want to be wildly effective or that we as followers of this amazing Jesus don't have the highest expectations of what he can do in and through us. Even with the most sincere intentions possible, it seems like it's a slippery slope of simultaneous massive success and massive failure... ALL THE TIME! I began to ask myself is this really what God has for us? Is serving him supposed to be such an imbalanced guessing game of blind faith and sheer determination?
One of my new favorite words is the word HOLISTIC. As a teenager I was very confused on what this actually meant. Whenever I saw this word it was usually on a business sign for a New Age massage/grocery store somewhere on Maui (yes, sometimes both services were offered at the same establishment). In my mind I intertwined this word holistic with things like tofu,aloe vera, dreadlocks and girls with hairy armpits. Maui has a shockingly strong Hippy presence with my hometown of Haiku and the next town down the road Paia, being the epicenter of utopian hippy paradise. Endless stories of hippy madness could be told, but that's entirely beside the point. I do feel though that growing up in such surroundings made it difficult for me to appreciate this amazing word... HOLISTIC. It surely has a much larger meaning than a massage technique or way to buy organic household groceries. Here are some pictures of the funky and iconic town of Paia, Maui.
This place is the Mecca of Hippy Living
Fairly self explanatory: Hippies got to get their hemp bracelets from somewhere
This isn't so exclusively hippy, but it's a great mixture of both local and hippy: Paia Laundromat
Main product sold here would probably be happiness
Street view of the Mecca
When God created us, he created us to be like him. He created us with an innate sense of wholeness that comes directly from HIS wholeness. Father, son, holy spirit... ONE, WHOLE, COMPLETE, PERFECT. We obviously don't currently operate in this dimension. We are broken, disjointed, shattered and incomplete. As human beings we have come to recognize more and more the complexity of what it means to be in these skin covered miracle factories called our bodies. We know that we need to look after these bodies in more ways than one. Our physical bodies need food, nourishment, rest. Our brain needs stimulation, challenge and growth. Our emotional well being is constantly being determined by the amount of love and encouragement we are receiving from those around us. Our inner spirit is constantly striving to be restored to its original design of being one with the creator.
When any one of these areas is out of line with how it was designed to function it often sets off a chain reaction that immediately affects the other areas. If we are physically sick it can make us feel emotionally drained. If we are heavily depressed emotionally we can become literally physically ill. In reverse, many studies show that when some people are terminally ill with things like cancer, the sheer power of being positive and full of life in their emotions seems to literally deter the physical ailments in their broken bodies. One of my sisters best friend growing up was a part of a huge family of like 8 other siblings. I remember as a kid hearing that this friends mom just made a mental and emotional decision after her 2nd or 3rd child that she just wasn't going to allow herself to get sick during the pregnancies anymore. No morning sickness or vomiting, NOTHING. The story goes that the next 6 children came completely vomit, discomfort and sickness free! She made a conscious and emotional decision that affected her physical symptoms. Kinda hard to imagine actually.
Jesus lived a FULL life. He lived a PERFECT life. He lived a WHOLE life. From the moment he arrived in a manger to the moment he ascended into those clouds, he was combatting and rectifying this broken and separated reality that human beings and all of creation seem to be completely subjected to. (Pt. 2 coming soon)
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Parachute Pandemonium
I just finished one of the most thoroughly enthralling weekends of my young adult life. Parachute festival is an annual event held on the North Island of New Zealand right outside Hamilton. http://festival.parachutemusic.com/
It attracts upwards of 25,000 people each year with NZ and international musical acts and it was my very first multi day music festival experience. All in all the festival itself was decent, not a lot of bands that I would freak out over, but still a few that got me quite excited to see. I would like to go over the highlights of this amazing weekend by trying to list out a bunch of the INSANE things God did, way beyond watching cool bands play music to 1,000s for 30-45 minutes.
To start off, getting to NZ and participating in the festival was nothing short of a disaster. One of the most difficult preparation times i've had for anything in quite a while, halfway through the madness of trying to sort out the logistics of coming over I started to realize that God must be up to something HUGE. The broad strokes plan was to have a promo stall for YWAM and DTS, meet up with one of our current DTS outreach teams and serve the festival in security on top of running shifts in our promo tent. This kind of stuff normally shouldn't be tricky, but for some reason it was co-measurate with parting the red sea.
As soon as I got to NZ and actually arrived at the festival everything clicked and the ensuing 72+ hours were some of the most insane in my entire life. Below is a list describing some of the main events.
Thursday Night:
- Arrive at mystery creek around 8 pm after hitching multiple rides with multiple groups of people i've never met before from Auckland to Hamilton.
- Hastily set up our stall with close to no supplies like tape or any practical things. (Aesthetically challenged Stevie should NEVER be allowed to be in charge of anything of the sort)
-Attend the volunteers pre festival meeting, over 1000 people in a big room worshipping God sheepishly while Aaron Gillespie provokes us to be passionate about making Jesus public over the weekend.
-12 am find my tent and temporary home for the weekend.
Friday:
- Spend time with Jesus in the morning in our promo stall. Make a conscious decision to start each morning before the stall opens in worship and reading the word out loud, inviting God to have his way with our dinky little stall.
- God speaks to me to not spend any money of food etc. over the weekend and to trust him to provide for me the entire festival
- Half an hour later, I'm already extremely hungry and start pretending that maybe I made up the last bit. Immediately following this the ladies in the stall next door yell out over the wall... "You hungry over there? We have a whole roast chicken if you want it!"
- Meet with the DTS outreach team about how we should go about the weekend. Feel like God said for us to pray with every person that walks into our tent for his purpose and direction for their lives. Must of prayed with over 50 people over the weekend for direct, clear and prophetic words from God for their future. One of the highlights from these times included praying with a young single mom who dreamed of doing DTS and missions in school but got pregnant and then rejected by her church etc. After talking for 30 minutes or so, prayed with her and got a clear scripture from God and visions for her future. She cracked open and shared that God is pushing her now to take her 2 year old daughter this year and do a DTS, hopefully in Australia! Stories like this happened non-stop the entire festival in our stall. SO EPIC!
- Near the end of the first full day I cruise through the village where all the other stalls are set up. Saw some old friends who did dts at newy, notice TWLOHA twloha.com has a stall ( have small talk with some young interns), see that Come and Live also has a stall. http://comeandlive.com/ Rock up and immediately see the guys from Ascend the Hill http://comeandlive.com/artists/ascend-the-hill/ and Showbread http://comeandlive.com/artists/showbread/ praying with the founder Chad Johnson. I Join them in praying for the weekend and meet Chad (one of my heros of late). Make plans to get coffee with him the next day and chat up how YWAM and come and live can grow in relationship. (Check out all of the groups and bands I just mentioned... all LEGIT, just google em)
* Didn't even come close to going hungry once the whole day, completely looked after by random people all day, including multiple COFFEE'S!!!
Saturday:
- Start bright and early with worship and reading the word in our stall.
- Tons of incredible prayer times with both young and old about Gods plan and purposes for them.
- Checked out Jay Lucas' (old YWAM friends) seminar. Have lunch and catch up about life as of late.
- Have a solid connection time with Chad of Come and Live, major time of encouragement and prayer for both YWAM and Come and Live.
- Me and Chad pray with multiple kids for physical healing. Basically any person Chad saw with a crutch, cast, limp or ailment of any kind he would immediately stop and ask if we could pray for them. (For those that know me well, I am smack dab in the middle of a major wrestle in this area). Chads faith inspires me to make trusting God for healings a lot more personal.
- See 'The Chariot' for the first time. BUCKET LIST checked.
- After spending nearly 15 hours either in our stall or hanging with Chad, I attended a late night worship with the Edge/Kingsland http://www.edgekingsland.co.nz/signsoflife/ and Ascend the Hill. EPIC time. Prayed with a young guy named Tom for freedom from sexual sin and addiction. Prayed with a little girl named Faith for her tummy ache and her brother who is stuck in depression. At 12:30 AM I realize that I am a half hour late for my graveyard security shift. See a middle aged woman sheepishly standing outside a big group of people getting prayed for. God tells me to be a little more late and ask her if she's alright. She immediately blurts out that she needs a prophetic word to keep her marriage going. She shares how she's about to divorce her abusive husband. I ask God to speak something into the sitch, he does, Galatians 5:6. I pray it out and she hits the floor (literally). As she both sobs and laughs near hysterically, she begins to release years of pain and heartbreak. I find myself speechless ( for those of you that again know me well, you would know that this ins't super normal for me). I see this woman multiple times throughout the festival and each time she can't even begin to describe the weight thats been lifted off her.
- 12:45 am: Start my 6 hour graveyard security shift. AMAZING time of catching my breath and allowing God to clarify all of the things he's doing.
* Also didn't come close to going hungry once all day.
Sunday:
- Sleep for a little over 2 hours from 6:30- 8:30
- Wake up feeling absolutely WRECKED. Still push through and start morning worshipping and asking God to give me strength to end festival well.
- YWAM Tauranga guys show up and say they can man stall for pretty much the whole day.
- While hanging out with at the Come and Live tent a mom and her extremely handicapped son (caleb) come and ask for prayer. Chad prays with confidence and authority. I hesitate to pray initially but then decided to allow the compassion I was feeling for Caleb to be poured out through prayer for the pain to subside from Caleb's tormented body. Caleb says that the pain went from an 8 to a 4 while we prayed.
- Pass out in a near coma, two hour nap at some point in the afternoon.
- Wake up zombieish and spend some time in our stall, directional prayers for many are prayed. Young Tom comes and hangs out and we pray for his band to be able to go on tour and tell kids about Jesus.
- Run into caleb and his mom ( karen) around 10:30 PM. Caleb tells me that he wasn't telling the truth about the pain going from and 8 to 4 earlier, he said he felt guilty about being honest when we prayed earlier cause he didn't want us to be disappointed. ( theological head spin continues). Karen (mom) tells me that for some reason when I prayed something clicked in her heart. She goes on to tell me that she had another son with the same condition already die and is unwilling to let go of faith that God will touch and heal caleb. ( I barely hold back from sobbing hysterically). She then asks me about my life, tell her I'm with YWAM etc. and am here on holidays. She says "you look tired" I tell her my mental weekend so far. She offers for me to stay at their holiday home in Lake Taupo after the festival. I tell her that I don't have any transport, she says, "Oh, thats alright, my brother is a pilot and has a private plane. I'm gonna make some calls and see if he can fly you down for a few days!!!" ( yeah, not even kidding here, SILLY STUFF!)
- See the Chariot play again, way better then the first time.
* Fed all day, at one point I got pretty hungry and was starting to get a little nervous. At the peak of my hunger one of the come and live guys slipped $20 into my hoodie pocket.
Monday:
- Start last day with worship and the word
- Caleb and Karen mozy on over to our YWAM tent. Spend some time praying and chatting. As she leaves tent she slips me $50 (SO RIDICULOUS!!!)
- Pray with young married couple I had met with the come and live guys. After hanging out off and on all weekend realize that she is an old friends (bunji) little sister.
- Pack up the stall, say goodbye to Jesse and the DTS outreach team.
- An old DTS student from 2004 who was selling stuff at festival comes up and says "you dropped something out of your pocket" Then proceeds to slip $100 in my back pocket.
- Pack up my gear into a little burgundy volvo station wagon belonging to a young married couple I met the first day of the festival. Drive up to their house in Auckland where they offer to put me up until I make the next connection.
* Fed all day. Meat pies to gourmet risotto. Tip top ice cream blows my mind.
Tuesday:
- Surf for the first time in NZ at north Piha beach. HUGE closeouts, lots of paddling and duck diving.
- See much of the Auckland west coast, absolutely blown away by the beauty of Gods creation.
Wednesday:
- Currently sitting in a Queen st. cafe in downtown auckland. Absolutely flabbergasted by the grace of the Almighty God. Crying as I write out caleb's journey. Really confused on how I came out "on top" after praying with him, and that he still is in non stop agonizing pain. Trusting God to get me to Tauranga tomorrow for a Come and Live event and then spend the next 10 days with one of the most important families in my entire life (dawsons). Giving God every burden and hurt and pain from an interesting 2011. Finding myself literally wanting to jump out of my skin for the amazing things he is already doing and wants to do in 2012.
I hope that this little list of some of the more clear highlights from this weekend inspire and encourage you. Through reflecting on all that happened I'm shocked at the simplicity of hearing and obeying God. He truly knows what's best and wants us to experience this kind of freedom ALL THE TIME! I pray that you will begin, or continue, to trust him with every single part of you life. God bless.
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