Thoughts and Musings on Faith, Music, Family, Life

Listen to (and watch) the Music, Pt. 2

Well folks, you've already seen the pics in the last blog.  And now here it is: Acoustic Blend's entire concert at the Lexington Civic Center - totally free for you to listen to in streaming audio.  Just click on the play buttons below to hear each song (which, as you probably guessed, is in set list order).

It certainly wasn't a perfect show - the usual flub-ups and missed notes.  And the audio below isn't the greatest, although it's really not too shabby for a digital recording device we sat up on the first row of the balcony.  But imperfections lend character to it all, right?  Besides, Ken and I have had the pleasure of making music together for nine years now, and I think this show reflects the fact that we really enjoy what we've been doing all that time.  At least I hope that's what shows.

Highlights of the show, in my humble opinion, were Ants Marching where I get to demonstrate the true genius of a loop pedal (this, by the way, is fast becoming our "signature song").  Also, on Purple Rain, one of the opening acts, Allan Cooper," came out to play with us and laid some pretty awesome licks.  The cool thing was that he was set up in the orchestra pit which rose up when he started playing.  Nice little touch to close the show.  I'm throwing in YouTube clips of these two songs at the end of the post - do check 'em out (thanks to Jerry for the YouTubing).

(incidentally, if you subscribe to this blog via email and don't see the mp3 players to the left of the song titles, go to this post at http://thoughts-musings.com and you'll see 'em there).

CIVIC-MINDED: LIVE IN LEXINGTON 2009

Seasons of Love/Heaven

Ticket To Ride

When the Stars Go Blue

Better Off

Colorblind

Acoustic BLAND

Ants Marching

No One

Presbyterian forms & the Appalachia

Mountains In My Heart

Life talk

Life Is A Gift

Thanks ya'll

Purple Rain

NOTE: Bummer, YouTube removed the Purple Rain clip! Oh well.  You can watch some other videos from the concert here.

Listen to the Music, Pt. 1

Thought I'd share some pics from the Acoustic Blend concert at the Lexington Civic Center this past Thursday. Aapparently the planets aligned for the busiest day in downtown Lexington's history and there was a meeting or event at every church within a five-block radius (one of the few times I didn't want people to go to church).  So while the crowd may not have been large in numbers it was definitely large in spirit.  Besides, any time you have people who pay their good money to come hear you play, you can't complain about that one bit.

There were three opening acts and we hit the stage right around 8pm.  We played for just under an hour, breezing through eleven songs.  We did a few originals but also mixed things up with our standard covers - everything from Dave Matthews to Alicia Keys to Ryan Adams to the Beatles (that's where the "blend" in our name comes from).  I'm working on a YouTube clip as well as some audio clips too and will let you know when those are up (thus the "Pt. 1" in the blog title).

Special thanks to Lee Zehmer from nearby First Presbyterian Church for joining us on bass for a few tunes.  Also thanks to Terri Lamb for taking the great pictures, and everyone who had a part in putting on this show.

Check Acoustic Blend out on the web at our official website (where you can hear some previous audio clips), fan us at our Facebook page, and if you still do the Myspace thing, we're there too.

Enjoy!

A Different Kind of Confession Booth (or, what happens when Christians come out of the closet)

It's Thursday morning and I'm in my second office - a local coffee house with wireless internet.  Getting ready to hit the road, actually, for a big Acoustic Blend show in Lexington at the Civic Center there (pictures and YouTube clips hopefully forthcoming).

But I've been thinking a lot over the past few days about my last blog and both the challenges and opportunities of a post-Christian America.  The opportunity, in my opinion, is for the church to reclaim it's original mission of serving people rather than striving to be a cultural tour de force.  The challenge, though, is that doing this requires a huge shift in thinking and behavior that, sadly, is not all that natural for us anymore.

 That's why I feel the following story is pure genius.  It's an excerpt from Don Miller's book Blue Like Jazz, which was all the rage a few years ago and still offers a unique perspective on Christianity that is refreshing and a tad disconcerting.  Don was involved in a small campus ministry at Reed College, a liberal arts college in Portland Oregon with a reputation of not being terribly welcoming of organized religion. Please give it a read - you won't be disappointed.

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Each year at Reed they have a festival called Ren Fayre.  They shut down the campus so students can party.  Security keeps the authorities away, and everybody gets pretty drunk and high, and some people get naked.  The school brings in White Bird, a medical unit that specializes in treating bad drug trips.  The students create special lounges with black lights and television screens to enhance kids' mushroom trips.

Some of the Christian students in our little group decided this was a pretty good place to come out of the closet, letting everybody know there were a few Christians on campus.  Tony the Beat Poet and I were sitting around in my room one afternoon talking about what to do, how to explain who we were to a group of students who, in the past, had expressed hostility toward Christians.  Like our friends, we felt like Ren Fayre was the time to do this.  I said we should build a confession booth in the middle of campus and paint a sign on it that said, CONFESS YOUR SINS.  I said this because I knew a lot of people would be sinning, and Christian spiritually begins by confessing our sins and repenting.  I also said it as a joke.

But Tony thought it was brilliant.  He sat there on my couch with his mind in the clouds, and he was scaring me because, for a second, then for a minute, I actually believed he wanted to do it.

“We are not going to do this,” I told him. 

“Oh, we are, Don.  We certainly are.  We are going to build a confession booth!”

We met in Commons – Penny, Nadine, Mitch, Iven, Tony and myself.  Tony said I had an idea.  They looked at me.  I told them I had a stupid idea that we couldn't do without getting attacked.  They leaned in.  I told them that we should build a confession booth in the middle of campus and paint a sign on it that said, CONFESS YOUR SINS.  Penny put her hands over her mouth.  Iven laughed.  Nadine smiled.  “They may very well burn it down,” she said.

“Okay you guys.”  Tony gathered everybody's attention.  “Here's the catch.”  He leaned in a little and collected his thoughts.  “We are not actually going to accept confessions.”  We all looked at him in confusion.  He continued.  “We are going to confess to them.  We are going to confess that, as followers of Jesus, we have not been very loving; we have been bitter, and for that we are sorry.  We will apologize for the Crusades, we will apologize for those televangelists who steal people's money, we will apologize for neglecting the poor and the lonely, we will ask them to forgive us, and we will tell them that in our selfishness we have misrepresented Jesus on this campus.  We will tell people who come into the booth that Jesus loves them.”

All of us sat there in silence because it was obvious that something beautiful and true had hit the table with a thud.  We all thought it was a great idea, and we could see it in each other's eyes.  It would feel so good to apologize, to apologize for the Crusades, for Columbus and the genocide he committed in the Bahamas in the name of God, apologize for the missionaries who landed in Mexico and came up through the West slaughtering Indians in the name of Christ.  I wanted so desperately to say that none of this was Jesus, and I wanted to desperately to apologize for the many ways I had misrepresented the Lord.  I could feel that I had betrayed the Lord by judging, by not being willing to love the people He had loved and only giving lip service to issues of human rights.

So we set to work on the confession booth throughout the beginning of Ren Fayre, and people looked at us over the first couple of days with both curiosity and amusement.  The further along we got on the booth, though, the more I began to wonder if our idea was such a hot one.  As we began to put the finishing touches on it, I was in the process of telling Tony that I didn't want to do this.  And then someone opened up the curtain and walked in, saying they were our first customer.

“What's up, man?”  Duder sat himself on the chair with a smile on his face.  He said his name was Jake.  I shook his hand because I didn't know what to do, really.

“So, what is this?  I'm supposed to tell you all of the juicy gossip I've done at Ren Fayre, right?”

“No.”

“Okay, then what?  What's the game?”  he asked.

“Not really a game.  More of a confession thing.”

“You want me to confess my sins, right?”

“No, that's not what we're doing, really.”

“What's the deal, man?”

“Well, we are a group of Christians here on campus, you know.”

“I see.  Strange place for Christians, but I am listening.”

“Thanks,” I told him.  He was being very patient and gracious.  “Anyway, there is this group of us, just a few of us who were thinking about the way Christians have sort of wronged people over time.  You know, the Crusades, all that stuff....”

“Well, I doubt you personally were involved in any of that.”

“No, I wasn't,” I told him.  “But the thing is, we are followers of Jesus.  And we believe he represented certain ideas that we have not done a good job at representing.  He has asked us to represent Him well, and we've failed him in that.”

“I see,” Jake said.

“So there is this group of us on campus who wanted to confess to you.”

“You are confessing to me!”  Jake said with a laugh.

“Yeah.  We are confessing to you.  I mean, I am confessing to you.”

“You're serious.”  His laugh turned to something of a straight face.

I told him I was.  He looked at me and told me I didn't have to.  I told him I did, and I felt very strongly in that moment that I was supposed to tell Jake that I was sorry for everything.

“What are you confessing?”  he asked.

“Well, there's a lot.  I will keep it short.  Jesus said to feed the poor and to heal the sick.  I have never done very much about that.  Jesus said to love those who persecute me.  I tend to lash out, especially if I feel threatened.  Jesus did not mix His spirituality with politics.  I grew up doing that.  I know all of this was wrong, and I know that a lot of people will not listen to the words of Christ because people like me, who know Him, carry our own agendas into the conversation rather than just relaying the message Christ wanted to get across.  So I've not been a good follower of Jesus.  There's a lot more, you know.”

“It's all right, man,” Jake said, very tenderly.  His eyes were starting to water.

“Well,” I said, clearing my throat, “I am sorry for all of that.”

“I forgive you,” Jake said.  And he meant it.

“Thanks,” I told him.

He sat there and looked at the floor, then into the fire of a candle.  “It's really cool what you guys are doing,” he said.  “A lot of people need to hear this.”

“I don't know whether to thank you for that or not,” I laughed.  “I have to sit here and confess all my crap.”

He looked at me very seriously.  “It's worth it,” he said.  He shook my hand, and when he left the booth there was somebody else ready to get in.  It went like that for a couple of hours.  I talked to about thirty people, and Tony took confessions on a picnic table outside the booth.  Many people wanted to hug me when we were done. 

All of the people who visited the booth were grateful and gracious.  I was being changed through the process.  And I think those who came into the booth were being changed too.

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See, I told you it was cool.

This story speaks to me in many ways, but three in particular.  First, I'm struck by how this campus ministry was the minority at Reed - I love that he describes their actions at Ren Fayre as "coming out of the closet!"  Truth is, this isn't all that different from what those first Christians experienced back in ancient Palestine as they were dwarfed by the Roman empire - same thing.  Throughout history the church has thrived when it's been countercultural.  My hunch is that, in a post-Christian America, we will know more and more what it feels like to be that campus ministry group at Reed.  And I think this is a good thing.

Miller's story also shows me that Christians do their best work when they assume the role of the servant, when they take on a stance of humility and grace that feels entitled to nothing, when they meet people where they are rather than demanding others come to them on their own terms.  In a post-Christian America the church simply can't afford to try and do things they way they used to.  That's like sticking a confession booth in the middle of a wild college party and asking everyone to come inside and confess their sins.  That's been done plenty of times, and it's not working anymore. I truly believe that when we approach people where they are out of humility, seeking genuine fellowship and striving only to serve them, the church can regain its mojo and start making a difference in this world again.

And finally, there's absolutely nothing wrong with Christians saying they're sorry.  Because a lot of horrible stuff has been done in the name of Jesus, and they carry that legacy.  Repentance cuts both ways.  The good news is that, thanks to "duder," so does forgiveness.

I'm telling you, it's that easy.  The hard part, of course, is actually doing it.  Time to get to work.

A "Post-Christian America?" Don't sweat the small stuff...

There's a famous line in Lindsley lore, spoken by my father back when my brother and I were kids, as the three of us played in the surf at Daytona Beach.  Right before a mammoth wave would crash down on us, when little eyes would grow wide with excitement and a tinge of fear, Dad would look at us and smile and say: Ah, don't sweat the small stuff.  And we understood what he meant - not only with what was spoken, but what was implied as well: Don't sweat the small stuff, because it isn't as big as you think it is.  

I couldn't help but think of my father's words (words I've said to my two boys as we've stood in the waves) when I heard how some folks - some who are good friends of mine - reacted to this recent Newsweek article.  The title itself is ominous enough and designed to appeal to one's fears: The End of Christian America.  Nobody likes for anything to end, especially when it's something we've been led to believe we should want. 

I don't think it'd be presumptuous to say that there's a wide swath of America who's assumed for years that ours is a "Christian nation."  To be honest, I've always wondered what that term means.  Is it reality that's being talked about, or an ideal?  Does it mean that every single American citizen is Christian, or should be?  Are we talking about a simple majority?  Or are we referring to supposed "Christian values," a nebulous phrase that is such because 1) there is disagreement over what values are inherently Christian, and 2) there is ignorance of the fact that other faiths profess many of the same values Christians hold dear.

Nevertheless, this hasn't stopped many well-meaning people from pursuing the notion of a "Christian nation" - not only because they think it's a good thing, but because they believe it's what God wants.  In recent years, however, these folks have found themselves increasingly frustrated in their quest.  The election of a "Christian president" (another nebulous expression) at the turn of the century did not usher in an expected reformation of right-thinking religious ideology. Some of the hot-topic issues, such as homosexuality and abortion, continue to be in flux.  And a recent study on religion in America has shown that those professing the Christian faith, while still in the majority, experienced a sharp decline in the past decade.  The area of greatest increase?  Those professing no faith at all.

So this has caused some in Christian circles to go into a general state of freaking out; from which they emerge with some pretty ominous conclusions: there is no hope for our country, we are all doomed, and God has given up on us.  Personally I think that's just plain silly, as is the notion that we were, are, or ever will be a "Christian nation."  This may sound strange coming from a pastor, I know.  But therein lies the stereotype that people like me - a middle-aged male Caucasian pastor of a small congregation in a rural part of the Bible belt - get a lot. And perhaps for that very reason I've often found it hard to put into words how I feel about all of this and why.  Stereotypes aside, these issues are incredibly complex and multi-faceted.  It's not simple stuff we're dealing with.

And then this past week I ran across a blog by noted evangelist Jim Wallis of Sojourners, who I admire a great deal, and his comments on a "post-Christian America."  And in my humble opinion, I think he hits the nail on the head, especially with this paragraph:

Personally, I am not offended or alarmed by the notion of a post-Christian America. Christianity was originally and, in my view, always meant to be a minority faith with a counter-cultural stance, as opposed to the dominant cultural and political force. Notions of a “Christian America” quite frankly haven’t turned out very well.

It's as if Jim got in my skull and spoke my thoughts.  I simply could not have said it any better.

What Wallis is referring to, by the way, is the less-than-stellar history of the church whenever it's been coupled with political/governmental power.  When the church first started, it was not only in opposition to the Roman empire of its time, it was hiding from it.  Churches were held in the privacy and seclusion of people's homes - which, incidentally, served to foster fellowship.  Over its first two hundred years the church continued to grow and become more public, but it never assumed a position of authority or influence in the culture.  It was always, as the expression goes, counter-cultural.  All of that changed in 313 AD, however, when the Roman emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Milan.  And before you could say "Apostle's Creed," Christianity became the official religion of the Roman empire.  Every Roman citizen - and there were a few of them, mind you - literally became Christian overnight.  This did absolutely amazing things for the church rolls - membership morphed to an unprecedented magnitude.  But it didn't do much for the spirit of the church.  In fact, if anything it served to deaden it.  So whenever the church takes on a position of privilege, power and entitlement in society, it's almost always never a good thing for the church, and usually not for anyone else, either.

Why?  Because in the process the church loses its soul.  It recasts the church's mission in the world from one of service and fellowship to one of entitlement and duty.  Leadership in the church confuses Christ's power with worldly power - after all, that is humanity's greatest temptation: absolute power corrupts absolutely.  It increases intolerance of other peoples/faiths/religions, because if one truly is the majority, it's almost impossible to see things from the other's perspective. 

But perhaps the greatest ill effect of the church/society marriage is just plain laziness.  Not too long ago it was standard stuff for every business in town to be closed on Sunday mornings.  This meant that if people wanted to interact with others and get out of the house, church was it.  Now there are many "options" for people to choose from on Sunday morning: kids' soccer games, other community functions, the golf course at the country club or the Starbucks down the street.  The church doesn't have the same influence over the culture that it once did.  I've often heard fellow clergy complain and lament this because, as someone once actually said to me, "Now we have to work harder to get them here."  And see, I don't think that's a bad thing at all.  In fact, I think it could be the best thing that's happened to the church in a long time.

So the thought of the end of a "Christian America" does not threaten me in the least, nor does it give me any reason to mope, whine, or declare the imminent end of Western Civilization as we know it.  As a matter of fact, I think it's because of this very development that the best days of the church are ahead of us.  But it's going to take a lot of work on our part; a huge joint effort across lots of lines (racial, gender, denomination, ideological, etc.) that we've gotten pretty good at drawing before.  It will involve a drastic undoing of many of the perceptions and habits we've acquired over the years as Christians living in America, along with an intentional adoption of a new way of doing things.  Many folks have written lots of good stuff about how the church should negotiate this change; allow me to offer up a few of my own.

First, we must stop expecting and demanding perks from society, such as the absence of "competition" on Sunday mornings, partisan prayer at municipality meetings, or the Christianization of anything outside the church.  We should not feel a sense of entitlement just because of our faith.  The early church had no such thing and they flourished.  Seems to be a lesson there...

Second, we need to quit feeling insulted, angered or worried about expressions like "the end of Christian America" or even the tongue-and-cheek title of Wallis' blog: "A Christian Mistake."  The truth can be good for us.  Besides, contrary to popular opinion, the job of a Christian is not to always be right.  Our job is to be faithful.

Third, we must come to terms - and quick - with the fact that our society is becoming increasingly multicultural and reflects many different religious perspectives.  And we should stop being scared of this.  We should view this as a wonderful opportunity to partner with people of other faiths - or people of no faith at all - to focus on what we have in common and how we can make ours a less violent, less wasteful, and less divisive planet.

Fourth, we must put forever to rest the notion that being Christian and being patriotic are one and the same.  A Christian can be patriotic, but a Patriot does not equate being a Christian - or any person of faith.

Fifth, Christians should work diligently to assume a more humble and gracious stance in the world, instead of the arrogant and entitled image we've done such a good job of creating over the years.  Somehow we've got to come to grips with the fact that the man we believe to be the son of God was a peasant Jew who made a meager living as a carpenter, who didn't own any property or wardrobe, whose only sense of self came from the people he hung out with and the God he once called "Daddy."  I know people like to claim otherwise, but I honestly believe that if Jesus came back today in our society in the same way he appeared in first century Palestine, the vast majority of us would not only fail to recognize him but do our best to get rid of him.  That right there should tell us something.

And lastly, I really think we should listen to my Dad, when the wave is about to crash down on us and we think it's all over: Don't sweat the small stuff, because it really isn't as big as we think it is.  Because when it comes to the mission Christians believe they've been sent on, what's more important: identifying a nation with a particular religion, or helping to heal a broken world?  While we're in the throes of debating a cultural religious identity and what values are part of that, there's a child dying of hunger every six seconds.  While we're worrying about shrinking percentages of adherents, wars are claiming the lives of too many and ruining forever the lives of even more.  While we're debating things like sexual orientation and other hot-topic issues, there is real pain and suffering out there that we are turning a deaf ear towards.  In the big scheme of things, whether our nation is Christian or not is small stuff indeed. 

So let's not sweat it.  Instead, let's sweat the stuff that really does matter: hunger, poverty, injustice, disease, corrupt systems, inequality, racism, gender bias, a warming earth, bigotry, hate crimes, overflowing landfills, joblessness, a crumbling economy, mental anguish, human brokenness, and people who need us to show them, in so many ways, God's far-reaching love.

Where might all of this lead people of faith?  Wallis offers this: Making a real impact on the values and directions that a democracy will choose is, perhaps, a more exciting kind of influence than relying on the illusory and often disappointing hopes of cultural and political dominance.

If that's what awaits us, then bring on a post-Christian America.  Let's not sweat it!  In fact, let's welcome it with open arms. 

Talk about a hefty overdue fee....

Once again, NPR comes through when I'm driving home from work, and I get to hear this story.

Here's the skinny: there was a book that was taken in 1864 from the Washington & Lee University Library in Lexington, VA (back when it was called Washington College) by a Union soldier during the Civil War.  Apparently he mistakenly thought it was another school, one where he had checkout privileges.  The book, understandably, was never returned.  Instead it was passed down from generation to generation, until it wound up in the hands of Mike Dau, who eventually learned of the book's history and decided it was time for it to go home.  So this past week it was finally returned to the library - 145 years overdue.

The book, for the record, is History of the War in the Peninsula and in the South of France From the Year 1807 to the Year 1814 by W.F.P. Napier.  Long title.  It was actually the first of a four-volume work.  Now, after almost a century and half, the set is complete again.

The dude who returned it said he was grateful the library waived the late fee.  I imagine so!  I wonder how big it would've been if they actually added it up?  One shudders at the thought.

Hearing this reminded me of something a friend once shared with me - he swears it's true.  He was in the process of moving into a new home - I think it was after he graduated from college.  As he was unpacking boxes he came upon some children's book that he had checked out from his local library when he was eight years old.  He was now 23.  Somehow it had gotten so mixed in with the rest of his stuff that he'd totally forgotten about it all those years.  So he calls the library back in his home city to tell them what had happened, and to get a mailing address so he can send it back to them.  He figures that'd be the end of it.

Not so fast.

The librarian asks him to hold on for a minute, and he starts hearing the sound of an adding machine in the background.  He's hearing this for quite a while.  When she gets back on the phone, she tells him he can send a cashier's check with the book for the overdue fee.  He almost chokes on his own chuckle.  He asks her if she's serious.  She tells him she is.  He asks her how much.  She reads off a number that has five digits, all to the left of the decimal point.  I believe that's when he hung up and found the library address online.  The book is now back in the hands of its rightful owner, sans check.

I'm not even sure if libraries enforce overdue fines anymore, do they?  Guess we all can be grateful for the grace.  Even so, I think I'll go check the boxes up in the attic.  You know, just in case.

Music, Unexpected

You've probably gathered from prior posts that I am not a big fan of mainstream radio - stuff that's packaged all nice and neat; glitzed-up ear candy for quick and easy consumption by the masses.  I tire very quickly of music that's pitched as a product rather than something designed to dig deep into one's soul.  That's one reason why I appreciate things like Paste Magazine, Pandora and emusic.com - because they force you to see the good stuff out there that you'd probably miss otherwise.  I always enjoy discovering something new and refreshing that's more than just the same-old, same-old.

So I wanted to share two musical discoveries I encountered on Tuesday of this week that would never be mistaken for the same-old, same-old - not a chance.

First is something I heard on NPR while driving home from work - a lady named Christine Balfa (the woman to the left here) and her instrument of choice.  Christine, it appears, is a professional triangle player.  I didn't know there was such a thing, but apparently there is.  And she's actually made a CD of her triangle music - 55 minutes of it.  Nothing but triangle.  It's called Christine Balfa Plays The Triangle.  Yep.  You can read her story and listen to the interview, as well as some album tracks, here.  And I'd encourage you to do that, if for no other reason just so you can say you did.  It's hard to tell whether we're supposed to take this seriously or not - Balfa's own record label muddies the waters when they advertise her CD as "the perfect gag gift."  I swear I'm not making this up.

Listen, I try not to denigrate another's musical ventures.  And I'll give her props for being able to play rhythms I never could.  But 55 minutes of triangle?  I mean, if you were family, for instance, would you seriously go to the CD release party?  I can hear it now: .....CLANG, CLANG CLANG, CLANG, CLANG CLANG, CLANG!  Thanks everyone!  And now for my next song: CLANG CLANG, CLANG CLANG CLANG, CLANG CLANG, CLANG CLANG CLANG.....  I will give her this: you'd never hear her stuff on top 40 radio.  Right on, sister!  So go to Valcour Records and purchase the CD at your own risk for only six bucks - gag gift or otherwise.

Balfa's triangle escapades were not the only musical discovery I experienced this week.  There's a YouTube clip making the rounds that you may have seen, and it's pretty amazing.  Susan Boyle is a 47-year old British woman who auditioned for the TV show Britain's Got Talent.  I have long since tired of these shows that - once again - commoditize music; packaging it to make us laugh, cry, cringe or feel some prescribed emotion within the span of a prime-time network show.  That being said, what Boyle did was flat-out unbelievable.  You must watch this clip.  It's set up to be like what American Idol has down to a science: highlighting some obscure person with bit interviews and soundbytes, setting the stage for a massively embarrassing/disastrous/entertaining "performance".  That's where you think this is heading - and then Susan opens her mouth to sing.

Did you see it?  You didn't?  Why the heck not??  Seriously you don't want to miss it.  So just click here and watch, okay?

There - aren't you glad you did?  That woman didn't miss a note - not one.  She was dead-on.  Not at all what anyone was expecting - the judges, the audience, the co-hosts, you and me and millions of others who've watched this on YouTube.  Hmm - there's a lesson in here somewhere, I can just feel it.....

See, this is why I love music.  In its purest form, it always has the potential to surprise us.  There's an endless combination out there of notes, chord structures, and instruments that, when assembled together, can create a song that moves us in ways nothing else can.  It can come from a 47-year old British woman whose voice comes out of nowhere.  It can even come in 55 minutes of metal banging on metal.   Beauty truly is in the eyes - or ears - of the beholder.

Wow.  I'm inspired.  Where's my Les Miserables soundtrack?  Think I'll go dig out that grade-school triangle and see what happens.  Don't imagine I'll make a CD of it though.  But hey, who knows.....

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POSTSCRIPT: I guess it was bound to happen eventually, but apparently Susan Boyle has her own Facebook page.  Her YouTube clip has been up for a mere five days, and already she's got 100,000 fans.  Here's the crazy thing: just this morning, a mere eight hours ago, she "only" had 49,000.  Whoa.

Easter

I've always thought of the movement from Good Friday to Easter Sunday as a summary of human history; past, present, and future: God weeping with us so that we may someday laugh with him.
- German theologian Jurgen Moltmann

Happy laughing today, everyone.

The Ties That Bind (and keep coming back)

My family and I got to experience something neat this past weekend.  I was asked to officiate the wedding of a young lady from my previous church.  She's 24 now, but I've known her and her family since she was twelve years old.  During my six years there I got to know her, her twin brother, older sister, and Mom and Dad pretty well.  Theirs was the kind of family we clergy-types really appreciate - great church members who are able to see you not just as a pastor, but as a human being too.  I shared many a fine dinner with these folks, exchanged Christmas presents (underneath the Christmas tree with the crazy-blinking lights - another story).  The door to their home was always open for me.  And when my girlfriend and I started getting serious, I was almost as nervous introducing her to this family as I was to my own.  They approved, by the way, and I wound up marrying her.  She thinks the world of them too.

It was a beautiful outdoor wedding - sunny blue skies, temperatures in the high 60's.  It was at a bed & breakfast sort of place off the beaten path, south of Greensboro - a cool farm house in the distance where the couple took their first pictures as husband and wife.  The bride wore her mother's wedding gown; there was a harp playing music.  By all accounts it would've been a wonderful wedding anyway.  But what made it all the more special was the connection I had with the bride and her family, forged through years of a friendship that began when she and her twin brother were in sixth grade.

I find that I'm encountering more and more of these trips down nostalgia lane.  And typically they revolve around one of two areas in my life: church and competitive swimming.  Last fall I officiated the wedding of another girl from this church, also Class of '03.  Next month I'll do the honors for a young lady who is not only a member of my current church, but who swam on the year-round swim team I coached waaaaay back in the early 90's.  The wildest connection of them all, though, occurred this past weekend as I was talking casually with the girlfriend of the bride's twin brother.  She made the comment that her father was also a Presbyterian minister and mentioned his name - I recognized it.  I told her that it sounded an awful lot like a guy who used to bring his two daughters to my swim team practices, back when I was doing that thing full-time, right before seminary.  Her eyes grew big - she was one of his daughters.  She's now 24 and in grad school.  She was six at the time. 

Stating the obvious, this sort of thing does make you feel old, as if I needed any help with that.  Marrying former swimmers and middle school youth is a blast, but it does remind you, in a rather unforgiving way, of all the years that have transpired since.  At the same time, it also makes me very thankful for all the people I've had the pleasure of getting to know, and how they can pop back into my life in the strangest of ways.  And it doesn't have to be about the same geographic region, either.  Those of you affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA) know how we "Presbies" keep bumping into each other; whether it's at a conference, presbytery meeting, summer camp, wherever.  Back in 1990 I spent four month in Hiroshima, Japan, teaching English and leading Bible studies with a missionary group.  On Sunday evenings I attended an English-speaking church in town - it was more like a fellowship group than an actual church.  It was comprised of a lot of "transplants" - non-Japanese folks who found themselves in a strange and foreign land and sought camraderie with those who spoke the same tongue (amazing the bond you can feel with people just because they speak English).

There was an English teacher from Boston, a family from Detroit whose husband worked for Ford, a nun from Iowa.  There was an exchange student from somewhere in England and a middle-aged man who was recently divorced and simply wanted to start anew in another country.  There was another lady in that group, an African-American woman about my age.  From the moment we met both of us had this sensation that we knew each other, but couldn't figure out from where.  It took almost the full four months, but eventually we figured it out - roughly fifteen years prior, we had been in the same small group at a Montreat Youth Conference.  Out of 1600 high school kids, we'd been in the same group of 25, gathered in the back room of Anderson Auditorium.  And now here we were, together once again, in this tiny fellowship hall along with a dozen other random folks, on the other side of the world.

It's kind of fun, actually - seeing the crazy ways that life brings folks back together every now and then.  It never ceases to amaze me, and I'll keep hoping it never does.  Even if it makes me feel very, very old.

A house divided?.....Pt. 2

You may recall this blog post back in the heat of the election season, about a house here in Mayberry on somewhat opposite ends of the political spectrum.  Literally.  Just to refresh your memory:

That's a McCain/Palin sign on the other side of the sidewalk, if you can't tell.

The blog, which you can read at the link above, was about how this husband and wife (he the Obama supporter, she the McCain fan) were able to acknowledge their political differences in a heated election without losing their cool with each other.  Which, incidentally, I thought was a lesson for us all, as we're well aware that politics is one of two topics that tend to divide people most emphatically (the other, of course, is religion - something I did not broach with this couple ;)

Well now we're past the election season, thank goodness, and on to another "season" known as March Madness.  So when I was driving by this same house yesterday on my way home from church, part of me wasn't all that surprised to find this:

 

Hmm.  I don't know if the Easter Bunny and "Ramses" the UNC mascot are necessarily polar opposites.  Instead I'm going to assume that this isn't an "either-or" thing but a "both-and" - husband and wife together supporting their basketball team, who happens to be playing for a national championship tonight; as well as the furry little fella who brings goodies on Easter morning (peanut butter eggs in my house).  Two worthy causes indeed.

And yeah, you heard me right, Carolina fans.  I, a true Demon Deacon, am in fact rooting for the Tarheels in tonight's game against Michigan State.  Call it the influence of being married to a Carolina grad (true love, I tell ya) and having another one for a brother.  Or the fact that my school has never been much of a tournament team, so around this time every year I have to morph into this nebulous creature called an "ACC fan."  I imagine it's something like kissing your sister, although I don't have a sister so it's hard to know what that's like.  But it sounds just as icky.

So I join with my wife, my brother, my house-divided neighbors (who are probably ready for me to stop taking pictures of their yard) and the rest of Tarheel Nation to say (and don't think this is easy for a Wake Forest fan to do) GO HEELS!

(until next year.  And then the Demon Deacons will kick your collective blue tails, along with everyone else in the Big Dance.  Maybe.)

A Rush I can believe in

Apparently this was an April Fool's thing.  Dang.  If only.....

Not to mention a pretty fancy splicing together of video clips.  That took some work there ;)

Sojourners, by the way, is a great organization that strives to bring together people of faith across party lines (not along them) in order to make a difference in fighting hunger/poverty/injustices here and around the world. Check them out here.