This is one of my top 5 desert island albums. Taylor does some masterful lyric work layered on top of gritty guitars. Get it on iTunes and while you are at it, get Taylors earlier work The Overflow too.
Key Listens: Mumford & Sons
Mumfod & Sons An amazing piece of work from an amazing band. Fresh takes on faith and life, grace and love. Contemplations of our relationship with God. Pure, heartfelt, and real. NOTE: One song (Little Lion Man) I advise caution with kids.
Album drops February 16th, unless you happen to be in the UK ;)
Recommended Reads
No Perfect People Allowed: Creating A Come As You Are Culture in the Church
John Burke
Fabulous book for anyone trying to build the Kingdom of God in a postmodern society. Get it here!
This is perhaps not the best forum for this rant, but as I have reformed and no longer post on http://arizonarants.blogspot.com/ (though, I just checked it out and it's a pretty fun read), this is the place for it. To keep with the context, I spiritualized it, though, in reality, there should be no separation in our lives. As spiritual people, everything is spiritual or has a spiritual component.
So the rant. I'm coming to the conclusion that I hate marketing. Strong words from someone whose job title includes the words marketing and brand. I suppose what I hate is what we have done with marketing. In most cases, marketing has become, and feel free to quote this:
mar·ket·ing [mahr-ki-ting] -noun 1. Convincing people that they cannot live without something they do not need.
Now, yes there is good marketing. I market a product that benefits people and is something some people quite literally can't live without. But notice these signs and labels I have seen recently:
These are what I call marketing jibberish. We use words that mean something to you to suggest that this product will somehow make your life better. Drinkability. How is Bud Light more drinkable than any other beer or beverage? Think about it. Drinkability. Able to be drunk. Every drink has drinkability. Of course the suggestion here is that this beer has all then qualities you want in a drink, it's one you want to drink, others are somehow, NOT drinkable.
Authentic. What an overused and maligned word.
Authentic. au·then·tic [aw-then-tik] -adjective 1. not false or copied; genuine; real: an authentic antique. 2. having the origin supported by unquestionable evidence; authenticated; verified: an authentic document of the Middle Ages; an authentic work of the old master.
How often do you think you drink fake coffee? Do you wonder, when at Starbucks, I sure hope this coffee is authentic? And what is a coffee experience? Do I even want one? I just want a cuppa joe while I experience something else. Something called life.
Save money, live better. Is there really a connection? And who can raise their hands that their quality of life is better due to Walmart? Sure, maybe you own more cheap junk, but better?
I write this, not to attempt to change marketing, that is a daunting task. If you are interested in that, check out Adbusters and sign up to become a Culture Jammer (don't breaks any laws tho).
I write rather, to just make us think. What are we subconsciously buying into by not questioning the consumption. I don't mean consumption of the coffee, I mean intellectual consumption. We take in so much crap that the good stuff has a hard time finding purchase in the folds of our gray matter. If we dilute words and meaning, we are diluting Truth. Truth comes to us through word and the Word. If those words lose meaning, truth loses its potency.
Let's be like the Bereans who were praised for searching out a matter. Let's be those for whom words matter. Let's not let meaning become subjective and vague. Truth is a sword, let's wield it with accuracy.
I'm standing in front of the Lufthansa Senator Lounge, their version of a First Class Lounge, in Dusseldorf Germany.
I'm waiting.
It's 5:21am and the lounge opens at 5:30am.
Waiting.
What do I do with 9 minutes? Should I get out a book? A Laptop maybe? Check my iPhone? Check my Blackberry? Pull out my Archos media player? My nook?
As I go through a mental list of possible distractions, evaluating their potential to maximize this 9 minutes by location in my carry-on and boot up time, I am asked a question from beyond -- or given a statement that is as loaded as a question rather.
Why not just wait.
"I AM waiting," I respond to the cosmos, "I am looking for something to do WHILST waiting!"
Why not just wait.
And it strikes me like a bolt of lightning that something is terribly wrong with the soul of a man who cannot just "wait" for 9 minutes.
Wait. Just wait.
So I wait and open up my spirit to what waiting means. And what I see is a flood of humanity, cascading upon me like water from a dam who can no longer support the weight of the lake behind it. In a single gaze, I see windows, lights, air ducts, smartly hidden cables, food, floors, and people rushing to their gates.
And all of those things, have more humanity behind them. Windows have been washed by someone, lightbulbs replaced by someone, cables hidden by someone, food prepared by someone.
And all that humanity has humanity behind it. The window washer has a family back home in Poland, the lightbulb replacer lost a daughter to trafficking, the cable hider laments the loss of his wife, the food preparers labor all night to earn enough to barely put food on their own table.
A sea of humanity is revealed in my waiting.
How much humanity do I miss, buried in a book. How much of life passes by while I am nervously checking email? How many people's live do I miss while waiting for one of the plethora of electronic gadgetry to boot?
Genesis tells us that man was created in the image of God. Then, by missing humanity, I am missing God. And by missing God, I am missing the Point. Entirely.
To see humanity, to really see it is to see God. When Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love God, and the second like unto it to love our neighbor, he was drawing our attention to the fact that to love our neighbor (and ourselves) IS to love God. We cannot love God and not love our neighbor. They commands are connected. The cannot exist apart from each other.
Love God. Love Others.
And how can I love either when I don't make time to see them?
Why not just wait.
See, waiting is not just waiting. Waiting is allowing my spirit to use my eyes to cause my brain to really see. Waiting is walking with my spirit out. Letting my spirit guide by soul and body.
Lord, give me the grace to wait. To slow down and see humanity and in it, You.
The news is reporting that yesterday was a sad day for Generation X'ers with the loss of both Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett. Personally, I don't know that Generation X has any stake in the latter, but the former was certainly part of the GX vernacular. But more than the deaths of these two, this week marked the death of something else far more sinister.
Restraint.
In mere hours, Twitter was all atwitter with the news of Jackson's demise. In moments, statuses (stati?) were updated and commented on, recommented, retweeted, and passed along. IM's and SMS's were ablaze, networks hummed with electrons passing on information both wirelessly and wired. The news was disseminated faster than anything I have ever seen. Perhaps restraint is the wrong word, maybe verification is what I'm looking for, but restraint does play into it.
SO there are two sides of this.
1) What if this was false?
2) Why cant we get the gospel out with the same effectiveness?
Addressing the first, the Bible commends the Bereans for looking into a matter, searching out the truth. I question how many people truly looked into the facts of MJ's death before passing on the news. Even if they did, the news reports were vague, and speculative at the time the news was being spread. Even the confirmation was based on a "friend of the family" who "confirmed" the story. This one happened to be true, but so often they are not. Mark my words, there will be people trying to use this lightning fast news network for more insidious and deceptive means.
Is it the Postmodern's need to be heard that drives this? Is it the need to be talking, regardless of what is being said? Is it the need to pass along some truth? Is it a need to be first to say something? What is it that drives this? Personally, I think all the above, but more importantly, it is the need for truth. It is the need to believe in something bigger than ourselves, even if its a sad piece of news. Whether it was true or not was immaterial, it became the truth of the moment. It was true now, even if proved false later. See, when you can change your truth based on what you feel, the trueness of truth isnt important.
And the second--I'll just leave that as a rhetorical question. But I will leave with this verse..
For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way. 2 Thessalonians 2:7
Many people I know don’t go out with kids. And the more kids you have, the greater the chances you avoid going out. We have four kids, according the the prevailing theory, we should never go out. In fact, people told us when we had 3 that we would never eat out again. That certainly hasn't proven to be true. We go out quite frequently and we have taught our kids how to act in a crowd. Depending on where we are, the rules are different. In a new place where they don’t know where we are going, they follow us very closely. If there are lots of people around, they walk close, holding a hand. If its a place we know, and there aren't many people, they can run up ahead a bit. The same is true with God. The Bible indicates that there are times when we will walk behind as He leads. Other times we will walk side by side by with Him, and sometimes, He lets us run up ahead. Consider these verses:
JOHN 10:27 My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.
MARK 16:20 And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs.
ISAIAH 30:21 Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” Whenever you turn to the right hand Or whenever you turn to the left.
The trick is to know where we are expected to be walking. In Psalm 23, David walks in all three depending on the need.
David follows when he needs rest and refreshment: The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness For His name’s sake.
David walks side by side with God in times of battle and struggle: Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
David walks before God when he is anointed to carry out a vision: You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me All the days of my life; And I will dwell in the house of the Lord Forever.
Not only do we need to know where we are expected to walk, but we need to make sure that we dont fall into the traps that can happen in each scenario. When we are following God, it is very easy to find that we are lagging too far behind. We can no longer see God up ahead and then we get further and further. Perhaps we stop to smell the roses, our eye catches something shiny, or we stop to talk to an old friend. But over time, we realize that we can no longer see God or where He is going. Sometimes my kids like to hang on me as we walk. Or they are so close that I trip as I walk. I love when my kids walk close, but at times, they can be SO close that it impedes what I am trying to do. Sometimes we are like that with God. God is working somewhere, doing something and has invited us to work with Him, but we are so focused on knowing Him more, being close to Him that we hinder the work He is doing.
This of course, is not to be confused with times of resting in Him, like Mary who was commended for sitting at Jesus’ feet. This falls into the “follow” category. Here I am talking about working with God, side by side as friends, doing the same work. Lastly, there are times when God says GO! He has given us vision and a task and sets us loose to go accomplish it. It is in these times that we have to be careful that we dont run too far ahead so that we can no longer hear Him giving direction from behind. It is easy to get so involved in the task God gave us that before long we are running so far ahead that we no longer know if we are doing the task right. It is critical that we are able to hear His voice when He has given us the gift of being able to run! Lets learn to be fluid in these stages, able to go from one to the other as needed. They are all about knowing what God is doing in our lives, and being sensitive to the Shepherd who knows what it best for us and when.
I just had the opportunity to spend some time in New Orleans for work. The hotel we were at was right on Rue Bourbon, right in the middle of the French Quarter “action”. New Orleans strikes me as a conflicted city. The question struck me while I was there:
Who is more guilty, the city that caters to a debauchers, or the people who flock to a city to live out their debaucheries?
The answer, to me is that we all individually have to answer to the Creator of history for our own actions. The people who visit the city, and those that run the city. As a tangental note to the discussion, after Katrina, New Orleans did have a clean slate from which to rebuild their image, but they chose to pursue the same course.
What struck me most about the trip is that New Orleans represents the conflict that each of us as artists must face. It is a picture of the war for our souls that rages in our flesh. Of all the places I’ve been in the last couple years, and the list is extensive, no city compares to New Orleans in the abundance of “gifts”.
