No time to say Hello. Goodbye. I’M LATE. I’M LATE. I’M LATE!

I hate to be late. You’ll find To-do lists scribbled on all kinds of paper. In my purse, notebook, house, etc. But I recently read an article from The Washington Post that preached to me as loud as a sermon.

The newspaper decided to try a social experiment and recruited the world famous violinist Joshua Bell to participate. He stood in the entrance of a busy Washington D.C. subway station and played for 43 minutes on a Stradivarius violin worth 3 ½ million dollars.

The editors worried what might happen when he was recognized, or too many people stopped to listen to the beautiful music. Cameras. Autographs. Crowd control. But the results were quite different, and not very surprising, when you think about it.

Most people power walked by without even sparing a glance. It was rush hour, after all. They had jobs to get to. Projects to complete. Starbucks to buy. Out of 1,097 people who passed, only a handful even paused to listen for a few minutes. Only one woman recognized him. And there was never any problem with a crowd. In a direct quote from the article, Gene Weingarten wrote, “The people scurry by in comical little hops and starts, cups of coffee in their hands, cellphones at their ears, ID tags slapping at their bellies, a grim danse macabre to indifference, inertia and the dingy, gray rush of modernity.”

They filmed the crowds as they rushed by and noticed only one consistent glitch in the apathy. Children. Every time a child passed, they were caught by the sound, twisting and turning to listen. And every time, the parent hurried them off, deaf and blind to the musical splendor.

I felt conviction as I read the story, because I knew in my heart I would have been one of them. I might have hesitated for a second, thought how talented he was for a street musician, then glanced at my watch and rushed right along. Can’t be late for work. Gotta stick to the schedule.

I believe God places little gifts along the roads of our lives. Beautiful moments to relieve the monotony and give us a glimpse of Heaven. Music is just one of the tools he uses. But how many times do I rush right past these hidden presents? The verse says unless we become like children we will never enter the kingdom of Heaven. I pray God helps me develop the kind of attitude they have that recognizes the beauty along the way, and stops to listen to the music.

If anyone is interested in reading the full article “Pearls Before Breakfast” from The Washington Post, the link is: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html

The Voice of God

This morning I read the scripture from Zephaniah that speaks of God rejoicing over Israel with singing. I admit my first thought was, “How can I turn this into the blog posting that is due today?” My second thought was, “Does this count as a daily devotion?” Finally, I put away childish things and began to read about the singing voice of God.

 

The celestial voice

Many people imagined that God’s voice must be something to behold. All concluded that eventually in Heaven we will finally be able to hear God singing and it will blow our minds. My imagination ran rampant on these musings. God must have range for days right? Would He be like Donnie McClurkin, Israel, or is he going to be more like George Beverly Shea? Wait a minute, you can’t put God in a box! He might sound like Aretha Franklin! You can see how quickly it gets out of control.

 

I suspect that Heaven is going to be filled with musical splendors that will blow our finite minds, but I am not inclined to think that God singing over us here in the present needs to be defined in such an ethereal context.

 

The subastral voice

There are songs that minister despite the various interpretations and styles it is delivered in. There are moments captured by technology in which an anointed singer has far reaching impact beyond the moment they had prepared for. We all experience moments week after week in which we find ourselves in a position to minister to one or many through the avenue of our vocal abilities. I believe in each circumstance we can find ourselves in the unique position of being the singing voice of God. I suppose that would mean He does sound like Donnie, Israel, George, and Aretha!

 

We are the body of Christ. We are the visible face of Jesus to the world around us. What a sobering and exciting thought that we are to be the voice of God singing and rejoicing over His people.

Blackberrys and the Power of Perspective

President-elect Obama is “clinging to his BlackBerry,” saying “they are gong to have to rip it from my hands.” President Bush awaits his January-20th-reunion with his BlackBerry. Upon leaving her post, Condoleezza Rice plans to buy an iphone! It is bizarre to image that great world leaders live out their “calling” in such an insulated way.

Living an insulated life

Then I consider my own life calling. I am a music pastor. Let’s face it… I live an insulated life too. Like many music leaders at Apostolic churches I “do ministry” with the so-called-spiritual-elite. Those who fall into my ministry team are those who have already traveled the path beyond spiritual infancy, through the gates of modesty, and into the realm of “approved for the platform.”

Let me be honest. This bugs me. Some days I feel like I’ve been forced to surrender my Blackberry. Sometimes I crave the raw perspective of a new convert. Or the passionate worship of a newbie. I sometimes wonder if the insulation hurts my effectiveness more than it helps.

Do Apostolic Musicians Impact the World?

As I see it, this is one reason that Apostolic musicians are not carrying the battle-cry for Justice. Israel Houghton and Donnie McClurkin are singing to 400,000 in Africa. (Thanks, Ann, for the inspiration for my thoughts!) But the majority of us are not challenged to reach the world because our job descriptions are to lead the sanctified.

How can we begin to comprehend mercy and justice when we are solely rubbing shoulders with saints who allegedly have it all together? How many Apostolic music leaders and musicians visit the prison? How many feed the homeless? How many ever mentor a new convert? How many visit impoverished nations of the world? Or minister to orphans? Are we pre-occupied with consulting our own inner-circle and managing the occasional “administrative scandals” that rise up? Does our only glimpse of the “real world” come through carefully staged tours?

What about Isaiah 61?

What if our next choir rehearsal was filled with inner city kids? Or we were asked to minister to orphans in Guatemala? Or our band was entirely filled with new converts? I don’t know where to begin, but I pray that Apostolic musicians begin to impact the world as it really is. It is tragic to think that non-apostolic musicians are leading the way in fulfilling Isaiah 61:1:

“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.”

Can I have my BlackBerry back? I need to gain some perspective.

CompassionArt - Get It

Our fearless leader here at ninetyandnine recently gave me a cd for review (which will shortly be up on the home page) entitled CompasssionArt: Creating Freedom from Poverty. You can read all the details in the forthcoming review. Admittedly I'm not one to rush out and buy the latest Christian worship album to come down the pike. But I'd buy this one over and over. Yes, I was pretty impressed with the songs and the singers (the likes if Israel Houghton, Steven Curtis Chapman (who in my opinion OWNS the rights to "best written songs EVER"), Chris Tomlin, Matt Redman, CeCe Winans, Kirk Franklin, and other well-knowns. But it was the subject of the CD that really caught my attention. I'll admit that I had one of those jaw-dropping moments of pure joy when I read the following quote by Israel Houghton, stating, “It’s impossible to call ourselves worshipers and not be so moved in the area of justice.”

What is worship?

You see, I think we have a real problem in the fact that we don't know what WORSHIP means. we try to separate the terms "praise" and "worship" thinking that the mood each term evokes has something to do with it, when in reality "mood" has nothing at ALL to do with it! A working definition I came up with was this: worship is the God-centered, self-denying act of the faithful Christian life in which we encounter and respond to God, with mind, body and soul, in all of life, with the singular goal of glorifying God. Yes, I know it's kinda long, but worship is complex, thus the many commas!
Last semester I took Theology and Pracitce of Worship at UGST where I have to admit that every notion I ever had about worship was turned completely inside-out by Dr. James Littles' capable teaching. One text for required reading for the class was "The Message In The Music" by Woods and Walrath - a book I STONGLY recommend for all music ministers/worship leaders. Each chapter examined 77 current p/w songs from the CCLI list. They were examined from many angles, such as did they express the nature of God, were they overly "sexualized," meaning did they use language too personal or that evoked questionable images, were they musically excellent - melody, harmony, rhythm easy to sing congregationally, etc, did they encompass all facets of worship - corporate, us to God, us to each other, us to the world. One chapter that really stood out was the chapter examining whether or not our worship songs addressed the needs of social justice and those less fortunate. I had NEVER considered that! But the more I formulated my worship definition, the more I realized we had made our worship music too self-centered when it was never meant to be.

Right purpose = right use

Worship is not about us. It's purpose was never meant to make us feel good. As Dr. Littles said so many times in class, when someone states that they "didn't get anything out of that service," the reply should be, "well, I didn't know we were worshiping you." So, I said all that to say, if we really get the purpose of our worship music right, then we will address more than our own felt needs. That's why I loved CompasionArt so much. Someone (or several someones) finally got together and displayed a facet of worship music that is rarely seen.

Now, go buy this CD (on January 27) for two reasons: the songs are AMAZING and ALL the proceeds go to beneft several poverty projects worldwide for as long as the CD is sold.

Ramblings on Genre

I was vacuuming the sanctuary New Year's Day listening to some music on shuffle on the Shuffle and once again marveled at the way music can make work seem like play. It made me think of the genre of the “work song.” I was reading about it in an ethnomusicology article a while back. I think I was reading about music of a country in West Africa.

It also makes me think of the origins of the genre of the blues. I have mixed feelings about the blues. I enjoy the chord progression. I enjoy the melancholy and the expression of the inexpressible. I am saddened by the exaltation of things that are not godly. But mostly I am intrigued by the relationship of blues and gospel music.

What was it someone said in a post recently? Most of what we sing from our “hymnal” are not hymns but worship choruses? I think that’s true. But I have also noticed the predilection, or our heavy leaning on the more simple chorus, such as “God is great, and greatly to be praised.” You know the one. Don’t pretend that you don’t. It’s the old standby that starts off a song service when you don’t have something new and you don’t have something else. I can’t count the number of times I have heard this song. I love this song. But where did it come from? I, IV, V, I six-four, V, I … or something like that. Three chords, basically, give or take, depending on your mood, technique, and possible inventiveness. But where did this infectious yet simple chorus (and words) come from? Who thought it up? Who composed it? Obviously the words greatly and praised are paired together in four passages of scripture, my favorite being Psalm 48, with the other three expressing the same sentiment. "In my soul," is a lyric less obviously scriptural, more obviously composed. There's not much else to it.

I could sing this song working on the railroad, hammering ties into the ground. I could sing it dancing a jig around the sanctuary. I could sing it all day long. But I want to credit its author. I want her to receive royalty payments. And what is the genre of this song? Yeah, obviously it’s a worship chorus. But beyond that? Where did this song originate? We seem to have a long tradition of unattributable songs. What other songs do you know for which we cannot find who wrote it?