how i get inspired

some cool art found on ShareSomeCandy, starting with my all-time favorite.

a million miles

Donald Miller's new book "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" is coming out soon, and he's posted the first 3 chapters of it online to give a taste and get some feedback. I highly enjoy reading his books so if you've never read anything of his you are in for a nice surprise. Don said in his blog that this book starts a little slow, so that's why you get to read 3 chapters instead of just one sample chapter.

The book is based around some ideas he learned at a writer's conference- that good stories need conflict and difficulty and pain to be enjoyable. Think of your favorite adventure story, one that makes you feel alive and excited, even though you are only observing from a distance. It's probably full of more hardship and loss than most of us have ever imagined in our life. But it's also full of more hope and excitement and triumph than most of us think could really ever happen.

Our lives are usually geared to be as smooth and comforting as possible, and our biggest dreams are often of more stuff that is easily attained. We have no conflict or adventure, and we are bored to death. Maybe even literally.

A note from the beginning of the book:

If you watched a movie about a guy who wanted a Volvo and worked for years to get it, you probably wouldn't cry at the end of the movie when he drove off the lot testing the windshield wipers. You wouldn't tell your friends you saw a beautiful movie or go home and put a record on and sit in a chair to think about what you'd seen. The truth is you wouldn't even remember that movie a week later, except to feel robbed and want your money back. Nobody cries at the end of a movie about a guy who got a Volvo.

But we spend years living those kinds of stories and expect life to feel meaningful. Maybe that's why we go to so many movies, because our real lives don't feel meaningful anymore.

I know a lot of us are in a place of reassessing our lives, so maybe this will be encouraging to you. I want to get to a place where I am free to follow the dreams God puts in my heart, but I feel stuck because of the bills and responsibilities I have. That's the reason why I am selling my house (and pretty much all my furniture!), and why I downgraded my car a couple years ago, and why I'm trying to stop spending so much money on entertainment. I want to simplify, to need less money, and hopefully then to be able to work less and have more time to invest in the areas I'm really interested in. It's crazy because I don't know how to make money in any of these pursuits, but I'm trying to trust God with that. I think Jesus was serious when he said not to worry about food or clothing or shelter, and I want to start trusting him for even those basic things.

The hard thing about music and books and movies is that sometimes they inspire us to live in new ways, and other times they suck all the creative juices right out of us. Sometimes they take us away to another world and help us imagine how our world could be different too. Sometimes they just help us escape our own pain and fears for long enough to forget the anguish we feel deep inside.

But what if we could live in such a way that we could let out those stories etched deep in our hearts? It's hard for me to believe that those feeble, disjointed dreams rattling in my head are worth the effort it would take to discover if there is anything to them. But what if the whole point of life is not even actually accomplishing something useful or beautiful, but instead just enjoying the story as it plays out?

re-learning old practices

For 3 years I lived according to a certain routine that brought me closer to God than I had ever been before. It was such a formative and beautiful time in my life even though it consisted of long days going in multiple directions, lots of emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual stretching, and intense practice of the disciplines. But somehow over time I began to weaken. The things that had given so much life now seemed to suck me dry.

I have gone through a process for several years where nearly everything in my life has been shaken and torn down. My beliefs, my dreams, my actions, my worldview, my identity. It has been the most difficult thing I have ever experienced. Often I thought I was dying. Now I'm certain that I was. I didn't understand it at the time, but now I see that I had accidentally built all of these good practices and beliefs over the top of insecurity and fear. Instead of bringing life and healing to the broken places of my life, I tried to cover up and ignore the painful things. I was trying to earn love instead of receiving it with grace. God had to tear everything to the ground so he could fix my cracked foundation. I had to become a failure in my own eyes in order to really accept that God loved me anyway- even when I had nothing to offer.

This last year has been a time of rebuilding, but I have really struggled with implementing the old practices I had learned. I have been extremely hesitant to enter back into anything that looks like what I did during my furnace years- prayer, reading Scripture, passionate worship, and spiritual disciplines. I don't want to fall back into the old patterns again. Even though I know these practices are essential, I haven't re-learned how to join these spiritual practices with the other aspects of my life in a that supplements my whole life in a healthy way. The only way I knew how to pray or worship or lead was an channeled around an attempt to ignore or hide the brokenness in my heart.

I've been trying to learn, and it has been very up and down. This year I've been trying to take time 3x a day to pray using a Celtic Daily Prayer book. It has been so helpful because most days I don't have my own words to pray. I have needed to read the prayers of fellow Christians from hundreds of years ago, and I've found them to so often resonate with my heart. But even then there have been many days I just haven't wanted to even try that much. I have discovered that on the days I feel good I don't take the time to pray. And often on the days I'm most hurting I will avoid any time with God even though I knew that I needed him to do something.

This morning I realized a few things. First, that I've been subtly thinking of God like a doctor or counselor. I only go to him when I have something wrong. I only share my thoughts so he will tell me what's wrong and fix them. I am still living in a reactionary way, looking for a quick answer to get me better so I can keep running along and being 'normal'. I think I understood this on some level, which is why I would avoid God when I was really struggling. I knew God is more than medication and didn't want to treat him like that.

The odd thing is that I go to my parents when I am hurt physically or emotionally. I talk to them about what is happening, but I don't think of them as a doctor or counselor. I have a deeper relationship with them than just 'fixing' me. I just don't know how to really walk with God like a parent, even though the Bible is full or fatherly and motherly descriptions of God.

The other little thing that came to mind is that the times I set aside for focused prayer are not supposed to be about being more prayerful or spiritual or obedient. I want to learn to pray and worship all day in everything I do, not just at 3 set times during the day, and I found myself dreading those prayer times because I didn't want to get back into the habit of believing that certain times or places or things are more 'spiritual' or 'godly' than others. But these times can be a way of setting my direction for the day, of choosing how I want to live this day. When I am driving on the freeway, I only rarely need to turn the steering wheel but I am driving the entire time. On some trips I might go for hours straight ahead, but other times I will need to constantly be turning corners or avoiding other cars. So maybe I can learn to be aware of where I currently am in my life, and adopt a lifestyle of prayer that is dynamic to that. It's always good to set a direction when you begin a journey, and you will need to change your course throughout, but whether you are turning or going straight ahead or even stopped on the side of the road for a break, it is still all part of the same journey.

I know these aren't really new ideas to most of you, but I wanted to process them and record what I'm learning so they didn't slip away. This has become a little more real to me today and I wanted to share it with my friends.

mewithoutYou (again)

I just love this band. Their new cd (it’s all crazy ! it’s all false ! it’s all a dream ! it’s alright) comes out at the end of May, but it got leaked early and is all over the internet, including on youtube. It's definitely a lot different from their style on previous albums, and could even be described as 'hippie', as my friend Ryan called it in disappointment! Several of the songs are from the perspectives of animals, insects, or vegetables, which truthfully isn't TOO big of a departure for mewithoutYou anyway... At the same time, despite the apparent disconnect from "reality", the songs ask such insightful questions that I can't help asking myself "Why have I never thought of that before?" You have to listen to this amazing song/allegory/parable, called 'The King Beetle on the Coconut Estate'! Yep, talking insects and fruits...


view lyrics in pop-up window


Leave your thoughts in the comment section. I'd like to hear what you think the song is trying to convey and what points you think the band is trying to make.

And also check out this pretty cool interview with Aaron, the vocalist and writer of the band.

aware

Earth is crammed with heaven,
and every common bush afire with God,
but only he who sees
takes off his shoes.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning


Listen...



...or read
We believe that the world God created is good. That he creates people in his image, and that no amount of darkness can erase that divine imprint. Because we believe that all of life is sacred, we look for God's fingerprints everywhere. We celebrate the divine in the daily, pursuing lives of hope, gratitude, and worship. God invites everyone, everywhere into this way of life, and we believe it is the best possible way to live.
-Mars Hill Directions: Upward (Celebration)

ash

a prayer for ash wednesday

O Lord, who hast mercy upon all,
take away from me my sins,
and mercifully kindle in me
the fire of thy Holy Spirit.
Take away from me the heart of stone,
and give me a heart of flesh,
a heart to love and adore Thee,
a heart to delight in Thee,
to follow and enjoy Thee, for Christ's sake.
Amen.
- St. Ambrose

mewithoutYou - Paper Hanger

view lyrics in pop-up window so you can read while watching the video

Not one motion of her gesture could I forget
The prettiest bag lady I ever met
Pushing her cart in the rain
Then gathering plastic and glass
She watched the day pass
Not hour by hour
But pain by pain
If I was a basket filled with holes
Then she was the sand I tried to hold
And ran out behind me
As I swung with some invisible hands

I stopped believing, you start to move
She was like wine turned to water then turned back to wine
I stopped my leaving and the better man bloomed
And you can pour us out and we won't mind

I was dead, then alive
She was like wine turned to water and turned back to wine
You can pour us out, we won't mind
A scratch around the mouth of the glass
My life is no longer mine

If you're still looking for a blanket
Sweetie, I'm sorry, I'm no sort of fabric
But if you need a tailor
Then take your torn shirt, and stumble up my stairs
And mumble your pitiful prayers
And in your tangled night's sleep, our midnight needles go to work
Until all comfort and fear flows in one river
Down on the shelf by the mirror where you see yourself whole
And it makes you shiver

I stopped believing, you start to move
She was like wine turned to water then turned back to wine
I stopped my leaving and the better man bloomed
And you can pour us out and we won't mind

I was dead, then alive
She was like wine turned to water and turned back to wine
You can pour us out, we won't mind
A scratch around the mouth of the glass
My life is no longer mine

Our lives our not our own even- the wind plays still.
All I felt was fire and bone
And movement, movement, oh!
If they ask you for a sign of the Father
Tell them it's movement, movement,
movement of...
hope

come all you weary - thrice

Wake up, wake up!

underOATH was really great last night. There were 4 bands, and the total show was almost 3.5 hours long! As headliners, they got a full hour, which is the longest I've ever seen them play (as this time there were no random pipes bursting above our heads, flooding the floor with 3 inches of foul-smelling water and interrupting the show).

Their set list was, for anyone who cares (I think there might be one or two of you...) something like this...:

• Salmarnir (Pretty cool to start a hardcore show in LA screaming Psalm 50 on top of an otherwise instrumental track)
  
• Returning Empty Handed
  
• In Regards to Myself
  
• It's Dangerous Business Walking Out Your Front Door
  
• To Whom It May Concern
  
• You're Ever So Inviting
  
• Young and Aspiring
  
• Writing On Walls
  
• A Moment Suspended in Time
  
• Everyone Looks So Good From Here
  
• Casting Such a Thin Shadow
  
• Encore: A Boy Brushed Red Living in Black and White (they always close with this!)
  

It was just a really cool time. The opening bands were pretty good (Poison the Well especially) and two of them are not Christians. I appreciate that underOATH always makes a point to let people know they are believers. Last night Spencer (the screamer) simply said something like "We are Christians and the reason we do all this is to honor Jesus and tell people that God loves them. We aren't better than any of you because we believe in God or because we are up on this stage, but I wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for Jesus. My life used to be ruled by addictions and Christ set me free from all that. We don't want to push anything on you, but come talk with us after the show if you wanna know more about this."

They are so passionate that it's absolutely contagious. The crowd was united in these songs, moving and screaming and dancing with every ounce of strength they had. It's beautiful. The reason I love underOATH so much is that there is nothing fake or pretentious in their music. They don't try to pretend that life is easy even with Christ, but no matter how dark or hard, they always come back to hope. "I know the light is blinding to the naked eye, so why don't you take steps away from being alone. I swear it's not to late for you. It's all worth reaching for the hand to pull you out. Wake up!"

My bud Tyrel once talked about seeing POD play live, and how every time they play "Alive" he steps back from the pit and just worships God, and it's one of the most spiritual, real, intense moments. That's how underOATH is to me. Somehow every gut shaking kick of the drums, every dissonate, distorted guitar chord, every scream is worship. So leaving with a headache, aching body, ringing ears, and a hoarse throat doesn't even bother me cause it's like I left everything out there on the floor as a sacrifice. Maybe that's why I think there should be more screaming in worship songs... :)

\m/

sacred

So have you ever noticed how we treat some things a s sacred and others as normal. Who doesn't act different in the WPC chapel than the Furnace Coffee House? It's so deep in us that we don't even think of it. (By the way, I thought of this while I was walking from school over to an open church building so that I could get some quiet and pray for a bit...)

And have you ever noticed how you can "feel" God more in the chapel than in the coffee house? Or am I the only one?

Now we all know and say that God is everywhere, but we go to places designed to connect with God. We ask God to come to us. Why do we do this? Is it just habit? Does God really physically come to a certain time and place? Is it just the only way of putting into words our desire to be in fellowship with God?

But then why do some places feel different? You know, those holy, sacred places that demand hushed voices and focused hearts and cell phones on vibrate. Is God really more present there? Are we more aware? Is it because of expectations, or past experiences? Or is it that God is worshiped often there and there is a resonance of his presence? And some times during a worship service everyone is like "Man God just showed up and it was powerful" and other times it isn't like that. Are we all somehow more aware of God and other times we collectively are disengaged?

Please take a second and think about this and pray about it, and then leave a comment with your thoughts. Cause this is something I am genuinely wrestling with right now. I don't just want a theologically correct answer, ya know? What do you think?