A Step in the Right Direction for the Church

This is what we should have been doing since the eighties.

My time this weekend

I've been writing lots of papers as you may or may not know, and that is how I spent this last weekend. I did however get to attend Christ the King Bellingham so that I could work on a paper for my worship studies class. This paper will tell whether CTK is a pedagogical church or revivalist church, or does it deal with the mind or the heart.
I loved going to this church, because my friend/mentor/hero leads there, and seeing the way that he leads the congregation is a beautiful thing. He is able to capture and direct the attention of the congregation deeper than the singing of the songs, but more so draw unconciously attention to the meaning of the songs. He also started the service with a very simple greeting saying that we are worshipping our God with song which is just one of many ways to worship this God that is so worthy of praise. I'll be honest, I'm going to steal that because I truly believe that people need to hear and know this when they are worshipping through song. It was very refreshing to be led in worship rather than lead. Thank you sam

ron

listening to: Buckethead "Colma". A guitar prodigy who toured with Axl (they were NOT Guns and Roses) on his last tour. He plays with a white mask on (like the guy from the Halloween movies)and a KFC bucket on his head - need I say more?

And Challenging for Nerd of the Year is...

Nerd of the Year Contender

Negative Christians

At Trinity Western University, I am a Christianity and Culture major, which looks at Christianity and its history and theology. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the more I learn, the more I question about my place in the church and though I question, I've met people who are more extreme than I am. My fellow C & C majors wonder the same as me, but they threaten to leave the protestant church and instead move to the orthodox church. This used to be attractive to me, until I came to this thought: the church is the bride of Christ, and the we are basically calling the bride all of the names and thoughts that we have of it (i.e. a whore). When we call the church these names, the groom is going to find out and punch us in the face. Martin Luther quote from Monkey's blog: the church is a whore, but I love her. Did Luther get punched in the face?

If we are so negative and so quick to leave the church, how will it ever find out what Jesus intended for it to be in the first place.

ron

listening to: Christmas mix - Christina Aguilera, Neil Diamond, Greg Otterholt, Adam Sandler, Tracy CHapman, and many others.

Worship Conference

This past weekend, I was given the opportunity to attend a Worship leaders conference down in Kirkland with other worhship leaders from our church. Here are my likes and dislikes:

Likes:
I was able to get to know people that I serve with a little better. I was able to learn different and new approaches to the guitar. I saw music done in different styles and with different approaches. I got out of town for the weekend. I saw favorite artists such as Lincoln Brewster, Chris Tomlin, and Matt Redman. The classes I took were very informative, and well taught by professional musicians and teachers.

Dislikes:
Wherein lies the difference between the Worship set and Christian Concert? I found myself waiting to hear my favorite leaders to play their hits. I watched more than "worshipped". Though I got to see them play, I left in the middle of their...set? I don't think that I was the only one who thought this - I hope not - because it was aggravating to hear people say, "I love this song". I'm not self righteous and I'm not THE worship leader either. In fact, throughout this conference, I fell into the trap of wishing I could show some of my chops to people. When you stick a bunch of musicians in a room together, there is no breathing room because our heads swell up and fill teh room itself. It is a sad thing really, because as leaders our humility should be prevalant, but even during the musical worship sets you hear it. When the leader is singing, all that you can hear throughout the congregation are the harmonies of the song and no melody.

oh well, my stank still stinks like everybody else.

ron
Listening to: the new David Crowder Band CD. I love his music because he sounds like David Crowder and not compared to any other people (Secular or Not). Favorite track is the remake of Hank Williams/Johnny Cash's "I Saw the Light" and "Oh God, Where are You Now? (In Pickerel Lake? Pidgeon? Marquette? Mackinaw?)"

Is This a Joke?

Really quick add to the last-
cruising around and found this job description for an "Extreme Worship Pastor" in a Pomo/GenX church. Read on and be baffled or amazed or just plain filled with laughter.


Job Description:
Main Event Church is seeking an exceptional leader to be our Pastor of Extreme Worship Arts. We believe the right person will be a unique fit for for such a time as this.

This person serve under the Senior Pastor, and will oversee all areas of worship. Candidates must embrace the Senior Pastor’s vision of aligning all people of all denominations under the same vision. The person must also meet these requirements:

Ability to infuse the TULIP doctrine in all worship sets

Postmodern, Visionary, Missional leader capable of creating an ethos and apostolitic movement

Willing to find some songs written from a premillenial dispensationalist theological tradition

Desires to develop an emerging handbell choir

Some snake handling may be appropriate (for our believers service only)

Agree that the Lord is to be worshiped through magnificent attire and appropriate versions of the Bible

Demonstrate proof of a second blessing... Tongue speaking in various accents is a major plus as we are a multicultural church.

Exegetically establish a movement of fluidity in the Extreme Worship Ministry

We realize that many of these requirements are personal preferences and not biblical mandates. Therefore, each candidate must be aligned with roughly 3/4 of all our requirements.

God Bless America and Nobody Else!

I'm reading, "the american Jesus" by Steven Prothero. A recommended read to any american who believes that we are the chosen nation...we are aren't we? This book gives a history of how we came to worship Jesus instead of God the father like the New World Puritans who "founded" america. It is such an interesting thought how our belief in Jesus is so different than that of the founding fathers of the good ol' US of A. According to Prothero, we began distorting the face of Jesus and his agenda when Jefferson took a razor and glue to the gospels to build the "Jefferson Bible" and give us what he feels are teh essentials of the Gospels. Only in America....Only in America.

ron

Listening to: Matisyahu-Shake off the Dust...Arise. This is a Hassidic Jew who mixes his chants and beliefs with Dancehall Reggae music. Definitely worth a shake of the tuchas.

Busy, Busy, Busy

This past weekend I was up in Beautiful Vancouver, British Columbia on saturday night and sunday morning. It was really quick, but painful. I was up to participate in a liturgical service where I helped lead some of teh embodied prayer or praying with the whole self. Really what I'm doing is churching up the phrase "interpretive dance". Yes, that's right, I was doing a little bit of interpretive dancing this weekend. Here's a question for you: What has two thumbs and hates interpretive dance? Answer: this guy right here.
It was an interesting night and really cool in some parts. The worship music was done by a Jazz Combo and all that we did that night, Cynthia and I experienced when we went to an Anglican Church service at St. Johns (shaugnessy). It was a really neat experience in a beautiful church. If you are ever in the area, really you should check it out because it was just an over all different experience. See, I come from an adrenaline driven church experience, so tradition is something taht I don't have a lot of experience in. I really enjoyed it, and took communion from a Community Cup- that was different. It was real wine too. I'm not of a fan of wine, so it made me think a little differently of actually ingesting the blood of Christ as a bitter experience and the way that Jesus died.
This next weekend I get to go to the Christian Music Summit and learn about worship leading, guitar playing, etc.. Sometimes I am very saddened by these things, because they offer classes like, "How to have a Cool Choir" - no joke, this is an actual class - and it makes me embarrassed. Some of the peole who are at this thing are some of the bigger names in Christian music such as Matt Redman and Chris Tomlin...it makes me wonder what they think of classes like this.

ron

Listening to: Right now I love this guy named Monte Montgomery, an acoustic player from Austin Texas. Also I listen to Pantera while running.

...Somebody Kill Me Please!!!

In the next month I will be writing paper after paper after paper...after paper. I didn't realize I would have to waste this many trees. Here is my schedule of Papers:

A paper on Jonah-Looking at the Fish as a symbol of Hell, but it is a Hell that God gave to Jonah out of his grace. 6 Pages Due November 2

A paper on Jesus in the image of man. 10 pages Due November 17

A paper on the Jefferson Bible and his deist agenda. 10 pages due November 29

A paper on the Desert Fathers in the early church. 10 pages due December 6

A paper on the Architecture of the medieval church in worship 10 pages Due December 5

A paper due on an Old testament Theme that I haven't even begin to think about. 6 Pages due on December 7.

Also, a couple of 1-3 pagers detailing services at different churches that I will visit.

God help me please.

ron

Lived To Tell The Story...

Well, my weekend is over and now I have officially spoken for the first time. It was actually really fun. It was a stretch for me, but in teh end it all came together. I realized that God works in wierd ways (realized yet again) when I was driving home thinking about how I don't think any kids got anything out of what I gave them this weekend, but I think that this weekend was just a way for God to tell me that I can do it. I often wondered if I could, but was never given the chance. That's my friend Monkey for ya! Always looking out for the little man and giving me a chance. I think my biggest fear this weekend was that I didn't let him down and that people would see me as a serious talk giver guy. Sometimes during the talk time, I would see kids staring off into space and I'd think that it was normal, but there was also a leader who sat in the front and would frown the whole time-not very encouraging to say the least. Oh well, God pushed me through it and I lived to tell you about it. THat's all that really matters.

ron

listening to: I got an MP3 player this weekend. So cool. Decided against the iPod for financial reasons, but also because it is very discouraging that you can only use their stuff. Boo. Soory <---canadian for sorry--- to my friend Paul, because I know that he works with Macstuff.

I'm an Uncle!!! This is my nephew Kale Evan Pai. He was even born on my birthday! (October 14th...its not too late to send a present) 

Ron the Speaker?

This weekend I get the priviledge and opportunity to speak to high schoolers about worship. As much as I would love to discuss different aspects and styles of worship, I decided to tell these kids about some of the personalities of the triune God that we as christians worship. In my head I thought that it would be better instead of learning about "embodied prayer" or different postures of worship that it may benefit them better to learn about the different parts of the trinity and hopefully make them think about why we worship them.

please pray for this talk as it comes to fruition...I'm still not finished with it.

ron

listening to: Travis Tritt: Greatest Hits. I don't know why, but I like his voice. The thing that I love the most is his guitar playing.

Thoughts?

...modern Christianity has become willy-nilly the religion of the state and the economic status quo. Because it has been so exclusively dedicated to incanting anemic souls into heaven, it has, by a kind of ignorance, been made the tool of much earthly villainy. It has for the most part, stood silently by, while the predatory ecomony has ravaged the world, destroyed its natural beauty and health, divided and plundered its human communities and households. It has flown the flag and chanted the slogans of empire. It has assumed with the economists that "economic forces" automatically work for good, and has assumed with the industrialists and miltarists that technology determines history. It has assumed with everybody that "progress" is good, that it is good to be modern and up with the times.

-Wendell Berry

Berry went on to say that Christians admired Caeser even during his depradations and defaults. But in this alliance, they fail to take action against the Murder of Gods Creation and his willingness to destroy the world. For in these days, Ceasar is no longer a mere destroyer of armies, cities, and nations. He is the contradictor of the fundamental miracle of life.

A part of the normal practice of his power is his willingness to destoy the world. He prays, he says, and churches everywhere compliantly pray with him. But he is praying to a God whose works he is prepared at any moment to destroy. What could be more wicked than that, or more mad?

Thoughts on Don Miller

CYnthia and I went to see Don Miller speak at the firs conference center last night. It was a very insightful talk telling us that everybody is mroe important than we think we are. I thought htat the most important thing that he said was that the top two people that people are most scared of are:

2) Serial Killers
1) Evangelical Christians

It's funny that people are scared of Christains more than somebody who would eat somebodies brains without even thinking twice about it. One of the reasons of this is that we begin to think that we are seeing how many people we can convert before we find out who the person is. We put Jesus into the thought of a product before he is an actual relationship. We try to sell the product to a person before we can actually have some kind of credibility to speak in their lives.

Another thing he talked about was when he was asked to defend Christianity, and he said that he couldn't defend something that wasn't what it was supposed to be in the first place. He couldn't defend something with a name that was given to it so that Rome could have a voting platform. He wouldn't defend something that has been westernized and is used to assimilate other people to western thinking. All that we can defend is that God love us, but he loves everybody as much as us. We cannot go on writing people off because they don't believe God died for them and the world's sins. These are the people that God told us to love more than ourselves. These are the people that we need ot talk to.

As much as we would not like to think it, the church has become a club that has become inpenetrable by people on the outside. Some churches call themselves "seeker sensitive", but what are tehy being sensitive too? This is the question that makes me think that I want to play in bars again. I think I talked about how I hate hanging out with christians before, but sometimes I really mean it. Sometimes we as xtians are the fakest people. One time I played at a College ministry "talent" show and I said, "it's funny when you play in front of christians, because they won't let you know if you suck or not, because they clap at anything you do". "Oh that was great", they say. it jsut makes me laugh. It will be hard to play in bars again, because they will tell you if you suck, but at least they are real.

ron

CD- Sgt Peppers and Commons "Be"

Quick Thought for You-

In the beginning of the bible we are told about God dwelling among us within the garden with the tree of life and the impending curse that is set down upon us because of the mistake of Adam and Eve. But in Revelations 22 we are told about a time when God will dwell among us again and we will be face to face with him and a tree of life that will heal the nations and there will no longer be a curse. If we go right into the middle, we find Jesus as God dwelling among us and dying for us on the cross (the tree of life) that will forgive us our sins (lift the curse). Just something that ran through my mind as I was thinking during one of my classes.

Is it me, or does this look like one of those emails that you have to forward to ten of your friends if you believe in Jesus otherwise you don't?

ron

CD-Listening to the White Stripes in concert on NPR
Reading-a narrative of surprising conversions by John Edwards. zzzzzz...what? oh I'm sorry I fell asleep.

Pain In The Neck

I threw my neck out. It hurts so bad that I am using an old prescription of Vicadin to help ease the pain. I led music at our monthly worship service last night at church. I was high on Vics. Is this a sin?
One thing that I'd like to pass on to you is this thought: THe importance of space. When I was leading worship last night, there were these moments where you could feel the presence of GOd in the room. You could feel that he was doing something incredible, but suddenly out of the blue there would come this extremely violating moment where an electric guitar would make a big "ka-chunk" sound, and this was not an accident. The guitar player was either checking his guitar or "adding" sound. Something that we guitar players are cursed with is that we love to play, and if we are not playing we think that we should be. Here is where the concept of space comes through.
When worshipping in any shape or form, we need to be considerate toward the Holy Spirit and be ready to move with it where ever it may lead. The thing is, if we are continually running our mouths/instruments/whatever it is that you worship with, how will you ever be able to be sensitive to what the Spirit is trying to say?
A friend of mine once showed me an illustration of this by balancing a broomstick on the end of my hand. THe point of this illustration was the fact that we cannot balance the broom without looking up to the heavy part of teh broom. This is what is true in worship: we cannot worship without keeping our eyes on the Holy Spirit, otherwise you are going to try to manipulate it to no avail.

ron
CD-THe Gorillaz*demon days. Beautiful cd.

Excited for-The movie Walk the Line. the Johnny Cash story. It will be amazing.

Words Cannot Explain...

I recieved the strangest phone call last night. I have a friend in california who I've known for some time now and he called me to tell me, "as a friend and as a pastor", that he has cancer. He finds out tomorrow if it is aggressive or not and an estimate on his life. He called me to tell me that he wants me to play at his funeral. It's a beautifully morbid honor that he is giving me, but it's these times that God just doesn't make sense. He's not old, and he's not young, he doesn't smoke, he's fairly healthy...he just has a sunspot that is growing on his head. This is where teh reality of "pastor" kicks in (and by pastor I don't mean that I have the title in front of my name). It's not jsut playing songs anymore, it's peoples lives in my hands and assuring that God is remembered in all of this shit. It is really numbing right now. Surreal...is that the word I'm looking for?

ron

cd-A mix of Hawaiian/island music to help soothe me: Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, Bob Marley, 311, ub40, Jack Johnson, Ho'aikane, and others that you may or may not have heard of. I sent a copy down to my friend to help soothe him also.

I hate smart people

I have this wierd torture device called New Testament Theology. I go every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 10:00-10:50. I am so lost most of the time, because it is so above my head. I don't want to look like an idiot, but I think I might bring a dictionary with me to class. People are throwing around words like dichotemy, dispensationalism. or Kerygma. I know what these words mean now, sort of, but it just seems like these people are learning new words and trying to impress the teacher with their little nuggets of jizz. I just want to look at them and say, "Your mental masturbation impresses nobody but the people in your head, and what you are doing is just pointless and annoying-please stop". I guess it's not the smart people I hate, but instead the chronic masturbators as mentioned above. I think that once people gain a little academic understanding there is this need to show it off. This is why I choose to not make sarcastic remarks towards the church anymore. I think some of it may come from my newly attained knowledge.

I hate academics.

ron

CD listening to: Still listening to Talib Kweli, son! Also listening to Dave Matthews "Everyday" CD. Never listened to it before. It sounds a lot like other Dave Matthews CD's. Don't you hate when people call him "Dave"? Hippies.

movie time

saw the "rockumentary" Rock School last night. It was very impressive, but also very upsetting. This guy is teaching kids to be rock stars, and also giving them really complicated pieces to play in hopes that they will "make it" and then the trail will lead back to them starting at Rock School in Philidelphia. Though it was really impressive to see these kids ranging from 9-17 playing Frank Zappa tunes, it was equally annoying how this guy was yelling at these kids and embarassing them. But the kids loved him. they said that it made them practice harder. What?!? I would have kicked him in the junk and told him, "suck it trabek, I'm out". Oh well, that's why they are really talented at the ages of 9-17 and I'm not quite there yet...and I'm going to be 29.

crap

turning over a new leaf...

isn't that the wierdest saying? If you turned over the old one, wouldn't it be just as effective? Anyways, that's what I am doing-I am turning over an old leaf. I was driving home from school and I realized how negative I have been toward the church as of late. Really I feel that it may stem from my eyes being opened to what used to exist, but now I see what the church has been turned into. I don't want to think like that anymore, so what I am going to do is start being positive. I won't let my sarcasm come out as thick as it used to. Though I am naturally sarcastic, I think that it would be best for everybody if I thought before I spoke. THis is out loud though, not to you who read this blog. I will still let it out here once in a while, but I will watch my mouth in the out loud world.

today it starts.

ron

Currently reading: The European impact on Indian Culture. An article that I can't give my immediate thoughts on, because the leaf has been officially turned.

CD: Common's album "Be". It was produced by the latest media whore Kanye West. It is very good. Also listening to an album by Talib Kweli. I'm going straight street suckas.