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)

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.