Extravagent

“If leading worship is just about bringing a group of people into a room so we can get goosebumps and sing songs together, there’s not much value in that. But if leading worship is a means to an end, that we leave this place as a different kind of people, as part of a new humanity that God wants to create – the people that are caring for the widows and orphans, that aren’t bound by the systems of this world but becoming free, becoming fully engaged in our world – then that matters.”

Music in the Noise

I love coffee shops.
I love music.

Life has been full of a bunch of noise here lately.

Sometimes I feel like I'm going to spend my life in dim lit rooms with music playing in the background that is great to concentrate on and amazing to just hear and experience in the background.

I am settled that I am not going to settle. I have to take my life on the road a bit.
There a good things "out there" and there are good things "here"
I need a way to experience both.

I really just feel like I need to find church outside of walls.

I have to find the music in all of the noise.

Where the Spirit of the Lord is...

Freedom Writers:
Can seeing how we are all the same really break the cycle of war?
Does it take hopelessness to give hope to?
What about the "white" world?
Does this same inspiration make it into my classrooms and my church?
Is this all just glamorized by Hollywood?
Is this where the spirit of the Lord is? Is this where we see liberty?
Could I be blessed with a burdened?

I'm full of questions, but full of hope.
At the least I know a concept my heart goes out to.
Liberty.

I thought God had given me the gift of fixing problems.
When the situation backfired I realized I had taken it without asking.

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of dust

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

Visioneering

I'm done with just being good at being a people person.
I want to love people again.

Slowly I am learning how to walk again.
I long to run strong.

I don't want to just be good at music
I want to lead worship.

I don't want to just encourage people
I want to hold their heart like God has held mine.

I don't just want to learn about the Good News
I want to be a part of it.


All in all
My righteousness is but filthy rags.

I just want to join in the beauty that is.
There is movement out there.
It's time I get in motion.

It's about time.

I want to be the kind of person who does the right thing.

Not just the big things, the ones that are obvious what is right and what is wrong,

but in the little things, the subtle unnoticed things... you know what I do when no one is watching.

Because it is so easy to let those kinds of things slip away.

The kinds of things that shape who you are as a person.

It's been a long time since I felt like I was inline with what I have found to be The Way.

It's not that I have turned away from my faith, I am there intellectually,

I am just disconnected at heart. The more I learn about New Testament history and theology I love it. I am eating it up, but it's been hard. It's been hard to turn my attention so much to the scholarly study of what is my source of guidance, authority, and inspiration. I feel like I am psychoanalyzing my dad.

My discipline has fallen through the cracks and think this has killed me.

I have been tired, lonely, and brain dead.

I can't read, I can't listen to sermons, I can't seem to get inline with God.

I just sit on facebook, or youtube, or just hang with people and not doing anything.

I have fallen into a rut and I am so afraid I am missing out on things around me.

I can't wait to go home. To have a shift in place so I can move away from the books for awhile and work on who I am.

Because right now I feel empty. Right now I feel like I am out of gas. Right now, I feel like I'm in sin.

Bring me back to life. Unlock my spirit so I can pour it out again. I am ready to look people in the eyes. I am ready to listen, and care, and give.

Break me from this shell of a person that is developing.

It's time now.