calm

so, it's been a while since my last blog. this is greatly because i'm not great at remembering to blog. ha. anyways, the last couple of weeks have been pretty interesting. a lot and nothing has happened, or at least that's how it feels. 

i got a job at the gap. that's exciting (kinda). it's not ideal, but hopefully it will get me closer to being able to survive on a month by month basis! fantastic. other than that, we've just been trying to get everything prepared for the season of ministry that is about to be upon us (program starts next weekend)! it is kind of the calm before the storm, i guess. 

and i'm having to work very hard to savor the calmness of it all. i like to be busy. i have a really hard time staying sane when i don't have a lot to do. however, in that, i think God is teaching me a lot about how sometimes we just need to enjoy sabbath and be recharged. it's not easy, but it is really important that in our walk with God that we enjoy and embrace rest when it comes. 

psalm 46:10 is hard to embrace, but i think that when we do actually embrace it, it will revolutionize our lives. so, if you're in a calm period right now, enjoy it, and take time to enjoy something that you don't normally have time to enjoy. 

i'm back

so, yesterday i had probably one of the worst travel days in the history of mankind. however, the great thing is that it had nothing to do with a storm of any type, natural disaster, or catastrophe of any sort. it was all because my train ran late for no legitimate reason. 6 hours late. and i missed going to my very first cubs game with some of my favorite people in good ole chicagoland! however, the cubs did end up winning the game! *perhaps, i would have been bad luck for the cubs, and thus, God did not want me in attendance...

anyways, i think yesterday was overall one of the most inconvenient days that i have ever had. [i wanted to say "worst" instead of "inconvenient", but that would have probably been inaccurate. however, it sure didn't feel merely "inconvenient" yesterday.] the crazy/hard thing about it was that i did everything humanly possible to get to chicago (from atlanta) by game-time, and it just didn't happen. there was absolutely nothing i could do. and i think that is what really angered me about the whole situation. we are conditioned to feel like if we give 110%, then everything will work out. however, that's just not the way it is.

now, looking back on the situation, i see how much this looks like the life that i live so often.

i work work work as hard as i can, and then, i get angry when i don't get what i feel like i deserve. the cool thing is that God's timing is a lot better than ours. and He sees every situation from every different angle. so, i can rest easier knowing that even though i feel like my efforts should yield a certain result, God is working all things together for a much greater purpose and i should just be happy that He is letting me be a part of it!

basically, i don't understand why God didn't let me get where i wanted when i wanted, and that is ok. 

sometimes, i think we take bigger steps by giving up than by trying harder. sometimes, we need to just accept our finiteness [and even embrace it]. God is bigger than our plans, and for that, we should be grateful.  

christian talk radio

i know that two blogs in one day is unprecedented and completely ludicrous, but my experience tonight merits a post.

sometimes i get caught up listening to christian talk radio. don't judge me. there's just something about it that catches my attention. sometimes, i will listen to it for hours on a long trip. it's kind of like the npr for the southern baptist mind. ha. anyways, often i am appalled at the things i hear. it is truly amazing to me what these folks choose to talk about for ridiculous amounts of time.

so, tonight i was driving home from zaxby's (which is delicious and i wish we had them in illinois), and ran across a little christian talk radio program. the topic at this particular point in the program was brought up by a caller from ohio. the caller said that he was talking to someone the other day about jesus (which he explained by saying, "i talk about jesus in public any chance i get"), and they brought up wine. at this point, i start laughing in the car. by myself. it just really struck me as funny. anyways, he went on to ask the host of the program a question about where he could find verses in the bible that supported his theory (which is shared by many conservative evangelicals) that the wine that jesus and the disciples drank *and the water Jesus turned to wine was, in fact, unfermented wine (grape juice). 

now, let me preface my next statements by saying this:

i am not blasting either point of view here. 

however, upon hearing this question and the subsequent response, i could not help but wonder why we care so much about whether the juice was fermented or not. what does it really matter? how have we made the alcohol issue so big, that when this man begins talking to someone who is far from God, that the conversation immediately turns to the issue of Jesus drinking wine. *i am talking about the consumption of alcohol, not drunkenness-the bible is very clearly against drunkenness. 

perhaps i am just simple minded, but are we so easily distracted that we will be utterly consumed by peripheral concepts that do not pertain directly to the nature and character of God that we totally miss the major crux of the gospel? 

here is my proposition (for me and anyone else reading this): let's love God as much as we possibly can. let's love Him like He's never been loved before. let's seek His truth in every situation. and let's work out our salvation in fear and trembling... maybe when we begin to do this, we will become so focused on Jesus that everything else (all the peripherals) will simply fall into place. 

it's just  a thought, but i feel like it could be really cool if we all tried it! 

weekend goodness

so, as promised, i have a little more to say about crazy love. here's the strange thing, some of the stuff really started resonating with me much more this weekend. 

my adventures this weekend have been quite interesting! i taught at my first worship conference, i have been at the atlanta airport 3 times in the past 2 days (and will be there again tomorrow morning), and i met and spent a lot of time with one of the most interesting people/best songwriters that i have ever met (you know his songs). great/crazy weekend. however, the entire time, i have had a strange feeling about being here.

the weirdness started on my way to my parents' house from the airport. i was talking to andrew (he picked me up from the airport. what a great friend. *this is before he dropped my phone in sweet tea.), and i told him about how weird it felt to be back in GA. it's not a bad thing...i just don't feel like this is where i'm supposed to be anymore. there is nothing for me here. *which is really an answered prayer because it would've been really awful if i would have gotten here and been ready to move back! ha. but it really solidified in my heart and gave me total assurance that i'm exactly where i'm supposed to be (at willow)!

so, anyways, as i was teaching sessions at the school of worship (which was amazing) on how to run a rehearsal, God really just spoke to me about what rehearsal is really about. it is, of course, on the surface, how we get the band ready to play for our services on sundays. however, it is so much more than that! it is the time that we have set aside to empower and encourage our student band members, and i think that is really the main idea (for me) behind it. rehearsal has the potential to be a really boring and possibly frustrating time. but i really have seen now that rehearsal is just one of the avenues that God has given me to share His crazy love with our students. 

if i'm doing my job and really leading them, i think that they will go out and share His love with others. *and that is when the real worship happens!!!!!

so, leaving GA tomorrow, i am very thankful for where God has me and what He has me doing! very cool.

back in GA

so, i'm back in the great state of GA this weekend to teach a couple of sessions at a student worship conference called the school of worship. i'm really excited to be a part of it! however, it does just feel weird to be back in the state. not bad. just weird. but it has definitely already been a really hilarious trip!

last night, i was eating at my favorite restaurant in the world (the border mexican restaurant in carrollton, ga), when possibly one of the funniest things i've ever seen happened... i was talking about my ridiculously bad luck with phones and how i always have to go get my phone replaced because they always mess up. at this point, i said, "yeah. this is my 4th phone since the end of december, but it's never anything i do. something always just happens (keep in mind: up until this point, every problem that i've had with a phone has been software issues or things of like nature). anyways, when i finished that sentence, it was as if the stars aligned and the phone gods frowned upon me. as soon as the word "happens" comes out of my mouth, andrew owensby (bff and drummer extraordinaire) drops my phone straight into his full glass of sweet tea!!!!! fully submerged. fully. never has such irony occurred in my life. *i must say at this point that if my phone is to be dropped in a beverage, i could not ask for a better one to receive it. the border's sweet tea is seriously probably my favorite sweet tea ever, even better than chickfila... 

anyways, it was funny that andrew dropped the phone, but the timing is really what did it. unbelievable. but thanks to a very quick rescue effort and much time with a hair dryer, the phone seems to have escaped unscathed.  

crisis averted. 

crazy love

so, i'm just going ahead and putting this out there, but this will probably not be my last post on the amazing book by francis chan, crazy love. after repeated conversations with scott woods about this book (by the way, these were all conversations based on the cover and the intro), i decided it was a must read for me.

i've been a chan fan (yes, i just coined that phrase) since i heard him at passion a few years ago. the message that he gave at the conference was one of the most significant in my spiritual development over the past few years. 

i have a tendency to compare myself with others. for the good and the bad. i try to rationalize things that i do by falling into the "well at least i'm not doing this or that" trap. i also look at others and think to myself, "man, i wish i could play guitar as well as so and so, or i wish i could sing as well as... [you get the point]." and i've heard countless messages on the whole don't feel bad because you're not as good at something as someone else. however, chan's was the first message that i had heard on the sin of comparison as in not being prideful because of your supposed spiritual maturity...

it rocked my world. not in a cool/feel good, God-campy way. but in a-everything that i have ever done was out of the wrong intentions-i feel like such an idiot-i need to repent kind of way. definitely not the feel good message of the year but oh so necessary in the society in which we live (even within the church)!

that's the backstory...

so, i decided to buy crazy love and give it a shot. after all, i'm always up for reading something that will kind of change my perspective about stuff and what not. man, that does not even begin to describe the experience of this book. it has literally been devastating. it started as a near typical book about what is wrong with me (how convenient), but at about page 90, the intensity grew, and has lasted for the next 30 pages. at this point, i'm on page 120 or so and literally had to put it down for a while. it's really an exhaustingly truth-filled read.

chan's examination of the gospels and the book of revelation yield truly frightening results about the reality of lukewarm christianity--it doesn't exist. wow. for some reason, (i guess as a member of the american church) i've always tried to give people the benefit of the doubt in regards to not seeing the fruit of their supposed faith. however, now that i really think about it, Jesus never really gave the option of a middle road. it was always all or nothing. follow me or don't. sell everything you own or don't. there was no other option, and no matter how hard we search, i don't think that we'll find a true middle road now.

sobering thought, i know. but i think it is something that we all need to hear or at least be reminded of. 

let this encourage you towards love and good deeds...

rise

we just finished a 3 day service event called rise. we took the students out to different community care and public service organizations to let them get a real glimpse of the poverty and needs that exist even right here in mchenry county. it started out kind of slow for our group (we were with a van full of 6th graders). but by the end of the adventure, i think the kids really did gain a good grasp of how many needs there are in our community and how much God really does care for each of them. It all culminated with the packaging of food at an organization called "feed my starving children." it was a truly amazing time. in a few hours of work, we packaged enough food for 49 kids to be able to eat for 1 year. it was really incredible to see how little effort produced such a great outcome! 

yo

hey everyone. this blog is going to be my attempt to keep everyone up to date as to what is going on in my life and all that jazz. i promise i'll try to post very regularly!!!