Donald Miller’s Blue Like Jazz Movie Signs With Major Hollywood Distributor.
Hachett Book Group’s Center Street to publish Jeremy Lin: The Reason for the Linsanity.
Kirk Franklin’s Hello Fear certified Gold by RIAA For Shipments Of 500,000 Copies
JEREMY LIN Talks About His Favorite Music: I’m A Huge Lecrae And Hillsong United Fan! (VIDEO)
John Piper Interviews Lecrae At PASSION 2012
Just weeks before the Passion World Tour hits Vancouver, and alongside the March 13 release of the Passion: White Flag live album, Passion founder and recent GRAMMY ® nominee Louie Giglio will debut the latest in the 900,ooo+ selling Passion Talk Series, SYMPHONY, I LIFT MY HANDS. As seen by over 200,000 people on the 50-city Chris Tomlin “And If Our God Is For Us… Tour,” SYMPHONY, I LIFT MY HANDS is one of Giglio’s most compelling talks and one that left audiences spellbound.
What a week it has been for Sparrow Records singer-songwriter Audrey Assad, whose critically adored sophomore album, Heart, bowed on Valentine’s Day to across-the-board praise and her highest sales-week numbers to date. Heart ranked in at No. 3 on the Christian Soundscan chart, selling over 7,300 units, giving her a 185 percent sales increase over the debut week of her last album, The House You’re Building. The CD also crowned the iTunes ® Christian & Gospel Albums chart and reached No. 18 on the overall iTunes ® Albums chart. In addition, before Heart‘s release, Rhapsody named it one of their “Most Anticipated Albums of 2012.”
Third Day is getting ready to make all of their Spring Tour shows available as digital audio recordings exclusively available from their website. To launch it, they’ll be making a 4-song live EP available for FREE for a limited time. Today, they announced… “As many of you know, we are always looking to improve our fan’s expierence and come up with new ways to continue to connect with you. Years ago, we had the idea to start recording all of our concerts. Then we thought, “We should share these recordings with people.” So, we started streaming the shows on our website. The one down side to that was that you had to be connected to the internet to be able to listen and could not take the recording with you to listen whenever you want.”
“Well, after lots of work we are excited to tell you that for the spring tour, you will be able to purchase each night’s concert as a digital download on our website! As a little teaser, we will be offering a Third Day Live sampler for free. This 4 song EP will include a favorite performance from the Make Your Move Tour from each of the band members. This sampler will only be available from March 1st – March 15th. Be on the look out for more info on this in the coming weeks.”
In the very beginning of the biblical story, right after Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating the forbidden fruit and ushering sin and death into the world, they realized they were naked and felt vulnerable. That started the first game of hide-and-seek. Adam and Eve tried to hide from God. They were exposed. And they didn’t want God or their partner to see.
This is a perfect illustration of the daunting challenge of becoming honest with God and each other. It’s like getting naked. It’s the deepest form of vulnerability, dating all the way back to seconds after the Fall.
Most of us carry at least two fears about sharing our pain and struggles with another person. One, we fear being exposed, being truly known by our struggles and faults, not just by the front we usually put forward. Two, we fear being rejected. Like Adam and Eve, we think that if God were to confront us in our total vulnerability, he would be appalled to the point of distancing himself from us and punishing us or shunning us.
So we do what Adam and Eve did. We don’t just hide; we try to cover our nakedness. They did it with fig leaves. We do it by pretending we’re not hurting and putting on a happy face despite feeling dead inside. We do it by trying to
make up for our faults with self-righteousness or lying to cover ourselves.
God did not accept the leaf coverings. They didn’t work. But he didn’t reject Adam and Eve. According to the Bible, he covered them himself using animal skins. The message is vivid and clear. We can be covered, but something must die. God’s providing animal skins to cover the first humans’ nakedness is a picture of God’s providing the sacrifice of Jesus to cover our sin.
The lesson is challenging but simple: if we want to experience the joy of unity, of relational connectedness, of the glory of God, we have to risk showing our true selves to God and others, and we have to be gracious coverers of one another with the good news of Jesus Christ’s sacrifice.
The beauty of this is that the more reliable we are with grace, the more reliable our communities will be with honesty.
THE PRACTICE OF HONESTY
Getting to the place of honesty with each other can be difficult, but there are few things more rewarding-and healing. There is a divine catharsis in unburdening ourselves of sin and painful experiences. It sets us free and allows the burden to be shared, if not lifted. Why do you think they call it “getting something off your chest”?
Of course, this is a risk. It can be a disaster to fall into the hands of insensitive, insincere, or just flat-out mean Christians. Many times we are reluctant to share what’s going on in our lives because we’ve been burned in the past by gossip, judgmentalism, bad assumptions, terrible theology, or even ambivalence or stony silence. Nevertheless, God calls us to know and be known. He wants us to be a living picture of the reconciliation he offers between himself and us. And we can’t do reconciliation if we don’t get real.
You may want to begin by identifying one Christian you can trust with the difficulties of your life. This person could be an accountability partner, an older believer whose wisdom and insight you respect, or perhaps a pastor, counselor, or therapist. Getting one on one is the first big step toward later sharing with multiple people, perhaps in a prayer group or small group or support group of some kind.
Identify cultures of grace. Are there pockets of Christians where you can see that lives have been transformed by the good news of Jesus, where sin is spoken against but sinners feel loved and cared for and not condemned? Can you see acceptance and belonging? Do you see honesty already taking place? Does the place feel warm and welcoming? Hopefully you have located this culture of grace in your own church or at least in certain groups or gatherings within your church.
When life falls apart, to some extent we all feel like we’re the first to experience it. So I know that tentativeness and unease will be there regardless. But take the risk!
If you lead a small group or community group of some kind at your church, or if you work with a group of volunteers, strive to create a safe place for honesty. This probably means you will have to go first. When someone goes first, it breaks the seal of fear and discomfort that prevents transparency. When someone goes first, it immediately tells others in the group that they are not alone. And we are more likely to get honest with others when we don’t feel as though we are alone. But somebody has to go first.
Will it be you?
God is faithful. He will meet you at every point with the grace you need and the healing you long for. And once you can be honest with him and find in him not rejection or condemnation but acceptance, your fear of people will gradually dissipate, giving you the confidence to get real with others too. You’ll be able to let them see how you are
torn, which will start helping you recover.
I attended the Easter Prayer Breakfast at the Whitehouse this past April and right before walking through the buffet line we paused to pray. I was expecting the typical pre-meal prayer, but it turned into a defining moment for me. A sixty-seven year-old African American pastor began to pray with such familiarity and authority that after he said “Amen,” I turned to Andy Stanley and Louie Giglio, who happened to be standing next to me, and said, “I feel like I’ve never prayed before.”
Have you ever felt that way? Someone prays with such familiarity with God that you feel like you hardly know Him? Or they pray with such authority that you feel like your prayers are impotent by comparison? I wonder if that’s how the disciples felt when they heard Jesus pray. Maybe that’s why they asked Him to teach them to pray in a new way.
I’ve never met anyone who felt like they prayed too much or prayed too effectively. All of us feel like we fall short when it comes to prayer. But that’s exciting because it means there is potential for improvement. There are new dialects, new tactics, new dimensions to be discovered. And if you transform your prayer life you transform your life. Why? Because the transcript of your prayers ultimately become the script for your life. We write the future with our prayers. Or in the words of Walter Wink: “History belongs to the intercessors.”
The Legend
A few years ago, I was reading through The Book of Legends, a collection of stories from the Jewish Talmud, when I discovered the true legend of Honi the Circle Maker. It forever changed the way I pray. I pray more. I pray with more faith. I’ve learned how to pray circles around my dreams, my problems, my family, and most importantly, the promises of God.
A devastating drought threatened to destroy a generation–the generation before Jesus. The last of the Jewish prophets had died off nearly four centuries before. Miracles were a distant memory. And God was nowhere to be heard. But there was one man, an old sage who lived outside the walls of Jerusalem, who dared to pray anyway. His name was Honi. And even if the people could no longer hear God, he believed that God could still hear them.
With a six-foot staff in his hand, Honi drew a circle in the sand. Then he dropped to his knees and raised his hands to heaven. With the authority of the prophet Elijah who called down fire from heaven, Honi called down rain.
Lord of the Universe, I swear before your great name that I will not move from this circle until you have shown mercy upon your children.
Then it happened.
As his prayer ascended to the heavens, raindrops descended to the earth. The people rejoiced over the rain, but Honi wasn’t satisfied with a sprinkle. Still kneeling within the circle, Honi lifted his voice over the sounds of celebration.
Not for such rain have I prayed, but for rain that will fill cisterns, pits, and caverns.
The sprinkle turned into such a torrential downpour that the people fled to the Temple Mount to escape the flash floods. Honi stayed and prayed inside his protracted circle.
Not for such rain have I prayed, but for rain of benevolence, benediction, and grace.
Then, like a well-proportioned sun shower on a summer afternoon, it began to rain in perfect moderation. Some within the Sanhedrin threatened excommunication because his prayer was too bold for their taste, but the miracle couldn’t be repudiated. Eventually, Honi the Circle Maker was honored for “the prayer that saved a generation.” The circle he drew in the sand symbolizes the power of a single prayer to change the course of history. It’s also a reminder of this timeless truth: God honors bold prayers because bold prayers honor God.
The Challenge
We have not because we ask not, or maybe I should say, we have not because we circle not. We give up too easily, too quickly. If God has given you a dream, you need to keep circling it in prayer. You can’t just pray. You need to pray through. You need to work like it depends on us and pray like it depends on God.
Prayer is the difference between fighting for God and God fighting for you. Some of you have been fighting so hard. Maybe it’s time to pray hard. Then God will fight your battles for you.
I’m convinced of this: your leadership potential is directly proportional to your prayer capacity. You can’t do anything until you pray, but when you start drawing prayer circles around your dreams and God’s miracles, all bets are off. With prayer, all things are possible.
You tell me: is there anything more important or more powerful than prayer?
If the answer is no then let’s pray like it.
Start circling!
The other night at a wedding I ran into an acquaintance, a longtime pastor of a large church. In the course of our conversation, I asked how I could pray for him. Without hesitation he said, “That I would actually spend time with Jesus and not be so caught up in being busy all the time…. You’d think after all these years I’d have that down, but I don’t.”
Isn’t it interesting how the ministry always seems to creep its way between the minister and Jesus? My friend was so busy doing things for Jesus that he didn’t have much time for Jesus.
Ministry flows from intimacy. The primary call on the minister is to be with Christ in an intimate love relationship. When Jesus called the twelve disciples, He appointed them “so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach, and to have authority to cast out the demons” (emphasis mine). Note the order: Jesus ordained that his first leaders be with Him before they attempt to do workfor Him. As Jesus would later teach, He is the source for life and ministry. Without deep connectivity to Him, their ability to live and lead well would crumble beneath the pressures they would soon face as leaders in His kingdom.
The same is true for the Christian leader today. We have been saved that we might have a meaningful love affair with Christ; everything else is subordinate and subsequent to that glorious truth. Tozer wrote, “We are called to an everlasting preoccupation with God.” Yet Christians in general, and often leaders in particular, seem to succumb to busyness and struggle with practicing unhurried intimacy with Christ.
This is a dangerous compromise. Eugene Peterson asserts, “The word busy is the symptom not of commitment but of betrayal. It is not devotion but defection. The adjective busy set as a modifier to pastorshould sound to our ears like adulterous to characterize a wife or embezzling to characterize a banker. It is an outrageous scandal, a blasphemous affront.” “Ouch,” says this busy pastor.
In the book of Jeremiah, the Lord was expressing His displeasure with the southern kingdom of Judah: “The priests did not say, ‘Where is the LORD?’ And those who handle the law did not know Me” (emphasis mine). The word know used here is the word yada in Hebrew, and it means to know relationally and experientially. The Lord’s complaint is that they did not know Him relationally, experientially, and intimately. His rebuke targeted the spiritual leaders who, of all in the kingdom, carried the privilege and responsibility of knowing Him. Though many other sins were prevalent in Judah at the time, the one that seemed to most upset God was their departure from intimate relationship with Him. They were still working for God, but they weren’t really with God.
We sometimes get so caught up in doing good things for God that we don’t have time for God. The danger is that in our zeal and passion for the ministry, we can easily lose the sine qua non (essential condition) of simply knowing Christ intimately. Recall the words of the risen Lord to the church at Ephesus: “I know your deeds and your toil…. But I have this against you, that you have left your first love.” Their many good works were acknowledged by the Lord, but they were a pitiful substitute for relationally loving the Lord.
Our first love is to be our last love. All that would seek to place itself between us and our first love must be dealt with ruthlessly in the life of the leader, lest he or she become weary in the numerous responsibilities facing him or her. These responsibilities, apart from connection to the Object of our service, eventually grind us down to the very core of personal inadequacy. When busyness supplants with-ness we are in trouble.
Christ’s suggested course of action for the church at Ephesus was to repent. This can mean only one thing-that the leader or minister or ministry or church that is engaged in good works while neglecting sincere relational nearness to Christ is on a perilous path and must change course immediately to avoid shipwreck. We all know that the reefs and shores of Christian work are strewn with the wrecks of busy and important, but not intimate, men and women.
The work will always seek to pry its way between Christ and the Christian. The passion of every pastor and leader must be to love and enjoy Jesus with every fiber of his or her being. Authentic and eternally impacting ministry can flow only from an intimate relationship with Christ.
I was angry because I believed, and still believe, that the God who created the universe did not create too many children in His image and not enough love to go around. And I wanted to do more. I wanted to help them all.
God whispered that one is enough. He assured me that He would hold the others while they wait for someone to come along and give them their milk and their medicine. He doesn’t ask me to take them all but to stop for just one, because, as I do it for one of “the least of these” I do it for Him (see Matthew 25:40). I felt deep in my spirit that He was teaching me to care for the one person in front of me. Stop for the little boy with white hair and scabs covering his body; stop for the baby girl with feces covering her dress, so weak that she can’t hold up her head. Stop and love the ones right in front of me and trust Him with the rest. He whispered that it would be okay and that I didn’t have to be angry, I could smile because one less baby was hungry, and that was good enough for that day.
This is a lesson He has continued to teach me. And it is sometimes hard and ugly. Because every time I stop for that one sick child, that one hungry old man, that one new baby girl, my mind races with the statistics of how many more I am not touching, not feeding, not saving. God whispers every time, though, that this one is enough. It is enough that this one is feeling His love and that love is eternal. Eternal.
Today, that anger is gone, though sometimes I still have to sit with the Father in my sadness and brokenness over all the hurt in this world. Sometimes I still have to cry to Him and ask Him why innocent children must suffer and beg Him to move people to action. Still, we as a family just love the ones with whom God has entrusted us as best we can. We let Him hold us as we hold the little ones He has given us to look after. We do what we can do, and we trust Him with the rest.
When I have a rough day, or several rough days in a row, as I did around the time Patricia joined our family, I can easily forget why I do what I do. I used to repeat to myself, “Do not forget in the darkness what you have been promised in the light.” When my days are dark and difficult, I am tempted to look around and think, Why? Why do I do this? Why would I take one more child? Why would we live with less so we can give to others more? Why did I leave family and friends to go to a land of strangers? What am I doing here?
I do not usually forget the answer to all these questions: “For Jesus. Because He called me to this and because He gave His life for me.” This means that it has been granted to me, it is my privilege, not only to believe in Him but also to suffer for Him (see Philippians 1:29). That suffering is not alone, but is with Him, and oh, what a privilege it is just to be able to be in His presence, to share that with my sweet Savior.
This is what it means when I say I do it for Jesus. He loved me first; I love Him back. And sometimes it hurts. But even then it is pure joy to even be considered worthy to share in His suffering. That is the promise: not that He is sorry that it hurts, but that He sees; that He knows; that He is here with us.
I think of various “ones” with which I have been blessed.
I think of Michael, who is back at home with his stepmom, healthy now, but maybe still mistreated. God knows that, in Uganda, as a single woman I cannot legally adopt a little boy, so how my heart could be so knit to his?
I think of a girl named Gloria, whose brain was so damaged from her high fever she may always be in a vegetable-like state. God in His infinite wisdom knew that had I been there a few days sooner, this potentially lifelong damage could have been prevented.
But then I think of fourteen little girls who have a home and food and a mommy, and who know Jesus. I think of sixteen hundred Karimojong children, modern-day lepers in Uganda, singing about God’s love for them and leaving the school with their bellies full. I think of four hundred sponsored children who sometimes show up on Saturday in new clothes because their parents can finally afford to buy them a new dress or shirt, now that Amazima provides for all their basic needs (food, education, medical care).
I see thousands of deep brown eyes and feel thousands of little brown hands and I know that even on the hardest day, stopping is worth it. A life changed is worth it, even if only one. God’s love made known is worth it, even if only to one. I will not save them all. But I will keep trying. I will say “Yes.” I will stop for one.
My dignity as Abba’s child is my most coherent sense of self– Brennan Manning
In January 1998, Monica Lewinsky found herself in way over her head. Her face was on the front page of every newspaper, and each new day seemed to bring one more humiliation. She was 25 years old – and caught in a presidential sex scandal. She had no idea what was coming.
Today, at the age of 38, she’s still caught. Single, alone, and running out of options, she’s the butt of jokes, the object of stares – the easy sexual punchline. Seventeen years later.
Most of us are not former presidential interns. Most of us haven’t had our decisions scrutinized by pundits and talk-show hosts. And most of us haven’t had an affair with the most powerful man on the planet. We’re nothing like Ms. Lewinsky. Or are we?
How many of us live with embarrassment about secrets that got out? Or betrayal from past lovers and friends? Or fear that someone will recognize us as a fraud? Or hopelessness, brought on by repeated failures? I’m willing to bet Ms. Lewinsky knows what that’s like, and I’m willing to bet more than a few of us do too.
Those of us caught in embarrassment, betrayal, fear, and hopelessness are living with a label that lies. We live branded by things that happened years – maybe even decades – before. And as a society, we are 100% percent OK with letting that label stick.
Maybe you’ve heard or said things like:
“He’s the pastor that was bangin’ his secretary and then ran off with her.”
“Isn’t she the one that was hooked on prescription drugs and went crazy?”
“Remember, that’s the pervert youth pastor that was caught looking at porn at work.”
In our desperate need to understand each other and place people in context, we attach permanent labels – usually from the dirtiest and most controversial part of the story. Sometimes the label is attached to others, and sometimes it is a label we believe about ourselves. Either way, the label lies, strips away our complex humanity, and falls short of describing who we really are.
Grace is the second chance that erases labels for others, and it’s the permission to move on that we give ourselves. And yet, grace is so scarce. It’s disappearing, and its disappearance is leaving an army of wounded “has-beens” and “screw-ups” in its wake.
In grace’s absence, we instead choose to label. Our culture thrives on devouring the Monica’s, the Haggard’s, and the Michael Vick’s, replaying their past mistakes for a quick fix of pleasure and entertainment. It makes us feel good to think that people have flaws worse than ours; it feeds the insecurity caused by our own labels.
So what can we do? For one thing, we can stop kicking people when they’re down. We can start skipping the water cooler, deleting the emails, and raising our voice on behalf of second chances. When someone seeks to label another soul, we can speak up on their behalf.
We can start risking our own “personal brand” to encourage the downtrodden and defend life’s outcasts. In fact, People of the Second Chance was started to do just that – tear down the labels of a Vulture Culture and replace them with a culture of grace and second chances.
Of course, this is all utterly impossible if we can’t rediscover our own identity in grace. Giving someone a second chance starts with giving ourselves a second chance. It means stripping away the labels that we wear and finding the truth of who we are in grace. I’m sorry, but you can’t give what you haven’t first received. The strength to forgive others and forgive ourselves comes from finding our identity as the one God forgave first. In the face of that grace, labels are shattered. In the face of that grace, dehumanization crumbles. And in the face of that grace, someone like Monica Lewinsky stops being the punchline.
Having no current pastoral obligations, Geoff and Sherry Surratt, who have both served extensively at churches like Seacoast and Saddleback, visited over the past few months nine different churches, attending as anonymous visitors.
“It has been an eye-opening experience,” Geoff Surratt shared on ChurchLeaders.com. Discovering firsthand the obstacles of connecting with a new church, the former Seacoast Church executive pastor shared a few pointers on how to “make your church stickier” and retain visitors.
“None of these ideas are new or revolutionary, but I bet you think your church is a lot better at each one than you really are,” the father of two noted. “Trust me on this; they’re not.”
For example, though most churches thought they were a friendly and welcoming group, in actuality, they had minimal contact with newcomers outside of the front door greeting.
From an outsider’s perspective, a church could come off cold and unwelcoming because more often than not their greetings were never extended beyond the initial exchange.
The only interaction newcomers would get after their first step through the door would be during the “forced greeting time,” when neighbors only acknowledged their presence whe
n they were directed by their leaders to do so.
“Feeling alone and disconnected is the one experience we’ve had at almost every church we’ve attended,” Surratt shared, also stating that his wife, an extrovert, felt the same way.
In order to extend the welcome and “friendliness” of the church, he suggested teaching on hospitality, dividing the congregation into sections with chosen leaders responsible for the people who sat in their section, and creating things like a “gorilla greeter” team, made up of people who purposefully sought to find those who were disconnected and connect with them.
Many people seek connection and relationships when they come to church, but are often left alone and desperate for a friend.
“People want to connect, you want people to connect; let’s put significant time and energy into making this happen,” the Denver resident advised.
Although he was not pushing “consumer Christianity,” he felt that churches should be more like car lots, not in an overbearing or forceful way, but with the mentality of “How can I put you in this car today?”
“If the main reason people are showing up at church is to find relationships, there has to be a way to help them connect today. Not next month, not at the pancake breakfast on Saturday, but today.”
While friendliness and maintaining relationships are important, clear signs and directions are just as vital for first-timers, Surratt stated.
Marking where the parking lots, worship rooms, restrooms, and other places are located while also detailing programs for guests are things that help visitors navigate the church better.
Though regular churchgoers have ingrained the layout and worship schedule into their memories, no longer even needing to think about where to go and what to do, visitors are usually lost from beginning to end without guidance.
“The bottom line is we should do everything we can to make our church at least as easy to navigate as the local Target.”
Additional ways Surratt felt churches could be made “stickier” included better applicable and practical Gospel-centered preaching and more readily accessible volunteer opportunities and resources for newcomers as well.
All in all, Geoff and Sherry Surratt’s reflection on their personal experience with the church today is aimed at creating a warmer environment for the first-time visitor, guest, and attendee who feels lonely, needs comfort, or is discovering God for the first time.
Surratt not only seeks to help newcomers but the church as a whole as well to function in love and unity.
Geoff Surratt is currently a freelance Church Catalyst and Encourager and has written three books including Ten Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing. His wife, Sherry, was recently named the new president and CEO of MOPS International beginning January.
John Piper interviewed Lecrae in the recent PASSION 2012 conference, and Lecrae says that he sees himself as a relevant minister in an urban culture wherein he can share the word of God through songs and music.
WATCH:
Jeremy Lin says he’s a big Lecrae and Hillsong Fan
So what is life like for one of the most celebrated Christian artists of the last four years. Especially life as a single Christian gal? Well we have answers.
In this video below Kari Jobe talks about the challenges and rewards of being single.
(This video goes out especially to all the single guys who are crushing on the beloved Ms Jobe.)
WATCH:
Rick Warren is not a hoarder. He’s a sentimentalist.
According to multiple sources the uber popular author is about release his newest book, “A Pack Rat Is Better Than A Lab Rat: The Other Purpose That Can Drive Your Life.”
In it Warren will share how he first started “packing heat” as he calls it. The “heat” referring to his items that symbolize cherished memories from his past. He’ll share about how every anniversary he sleeps with his old 1964 Ford Fairlaine muffler under his pillow. The purported back story of this sentimentalist act is that apparently Warren drove his ’64 Fairlane to take Kay Warren AKA Kay ‘The Best Wife’ Warren, as Rick has been known to refer to her in the media—on their first date.
It is clear that this new release will give readers even more insight into the heart and character of the man influencing millions.
A source close to proceedings, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, also shared that Warren’s new CB handle is “Pack Daddy” or “P Daddy” for short.
Warren keeps a CB radio in his Ford Explorer.
For more information please email: takeiteasythisonlyajoke@thisisnotarealemailaddress.com
Craig Groeschel On The Hidden Danger Of Pride On Social Media Outlets.
The popular Oklahoma pastor and author recently talked about the subtle temptation of pride on social media platforms that we have accepted as normal.
Donald Miller On How Jesus Inspired The Most Loyal Devotion In Men, Unlike Any Other Leader In History.
Carlos Whitaker On The Challenge Of Cleaning Out Our Internal Worlds
Pete Wilson On Maddonna, Tom Brady And His New Book
Mark Batterson On How God Used His Book Powerfully In Someone’s Life.
Hawk Nelson Frontman and Lead Singer Jason Dunn To Leave Band To Pursue Solo Career.
Kari Jobe’s Latest Album “Where I Find You” Sells 24,600 In Its First Week
90′s CCM Artist Natalie LaRue Back With A New 6-Song EP After A 10-Year Absence. (During Which Time She’s Gotten Married And Had 3 Kids)
Pastor, Blogger and Author Pete Wilson To Release New Book With Thomas Nelson, Called Empty Promises: The Truth About You, Your Desires, and the Lies You’re Believing
Ex-Delirious Front Man Back With New EP Called “God’s Great Dance Floor” Comprised Of All New Songs Written Over The Past 2 Years
We know God opposes the proud. But some forms of social media seem to have redefined what pride is and what it’s not.
For example: Imagine if I stood before our church and told everyone, “Joe Smith said, ‘Craig you are the best preacher ever! Your sermons changed my life.’ And Jill Denny said, ‘I loved your book. Everyone should read it. You are the best author I’ve ever read!’ Not only that, but Mike Mitchell said, ‘Craig, Life Church is the best church in the world! No church is as good as Life Church.’”
Chances are good most people would look at me funny and think I’m a little full of myself for saying such things.
But if I simply retweeted those exact same statements, my retweets would seem totally acceptable to most. Honestly, I’m wondering if that is acceptable to God, or if it’s just pride in disguise.
I believe we need to walk a very careful line in ministry (I am certain I have crossed this line at times). Sure we want to celebrate what God is doing in our churches. Of course we want to get the word out about a new series or a book we’ve written. Unquestionably we want to share more reasons to give praise to our God.
But at the same time, we need to be careful that we’re not drawing attention to ourselves.
Your thoughts?
After nearly a decade with Christian rock band Hawk Nelson, frontman and founding member Jason Dunn will depart the GRAMMY® and Dove Award nominated group on May 15th. Dunn plans to release his first solo project under the name Lights Go Down later this year.
Dunn spent the last few months recording at Profile Studios in Vancouver, B.C., with RIAA Gold-accredited record producer Steve Kravac (Blink 182, MxPx, Less Than Jake). Tentatively titled Abandon Progress, information about the album’s release date and label and distribution plans are forthcoming.
Hailing from Ontario, Canada, Hawk Nelson signed to Tooth and Nail Records in 2004, and to date have recorded 5 full-length albums selling in excess of 600,000 units. A compilation album, The Songs You’ve Already Heard: Best of Hawk Nelson, is scheduled for release on March 27, 2012.
“I will miss playing music on stage with my friends, but really looking forward to the future with Lights Go Down,” says Dunn. “I wish Hawk Nelson the very best with their future endeavors.”
The band posted an official statement on HawkNelson.com that addresses Jason’s departure and as-of-yet unannounced future plans for Hawk Nelson:
We want to officially announce that Jason Dunn will be leaving Hawk Nelson at the beginning of May to pursue his solo career.
“For 10 years we have climbed this mountain together. Hawk Nelson has gone through thick and thin, challenges and blessings. Jason is a brother, and we will miss everything he brings to the band. We know that God has a plan for him as well as for the future of Hawk Nelson. We’re excited to share about the future of Hawk Nelson very soon, and we constantly give God all the praise and glory.”
-Daniel Biro, Jonathan Steingard, and Justin Benner
A couple years ago Phil Wickham got together with a bunch of friends for a very special night of worship called “Singalong” and the entire show was recorded & given out for free on his site! The album was amazing, so we were super excited to hear Phil’s announcement recently about another “Singalong” album coming soon.
Watch this video message from Phil to learn more about it:
The band’s previous album, ‘The Generous Mr. Lovewell‘, released in May 2010, peaked at number 3 on the main Billboard 200 chart, their highest chart placing to date. The album, named after a fictional character who encourages people to ‘Love well’, included the singles ‘All Of Creation‘, ‘Beautiful‘, and ‘Move‘.
The uber-successful worship leader rock stars also known as Hillsong United is back with their first live album in four years, named ‘Live In Miami’. The album captures 21 tracks recorded during the band’s sold out worship night at the American Airlines Arena in Miami, Florida back in August 2011.
The band’s widely successful ‘Aftermath US Tour’, in support of their latest studio album ‘Aftermath’, saw sold out worship nights in venues across the country – from New York to Los Angeles (where the band became the first Christian band to sell out Staples Center) and back east to Miami where the new CD and DVD were recorded live.
The main draw of this album has to be the live recordings of the songs we haven’t heard before on any live album. For me ‘Aftermath‘ was, and still is, a stunning piece of work from the band, and I have to admit that the songs on that album are some of my favorites from the Hillsong stables ever. That whole album had a different vibe and style to what you might count as the Hillsong United style.
Moving onto the review of this album and the velocity of passionate loud worship kicks off in the way you would expect from any Hillsong album. Starting with the stunning ‘Go’ the album opens with big guitars and big drums and a packed worshipping crowd singing along to every word, “We’re giving it all away, We’re giving it all to go your way”. The big guitars continue into the song Break Free, if you weren’t already singing along you will be by the chorus of this one, “Won’t you break free, won’t you break free, get up and dance”.
Search My Heart moves into one of the most played Christian songs ever, Mighty To Save. These are two great songs to have next to each other, beautiful pieces of music used to flow the album together. I know the question might have passed your lips when looking at the track listing of this album. Does the world need another version of Mighty To Save, and the answer is probably no, yet this version of the songs fits perfectly into the 21 track album and is still an amazing worship song that is great to sing along to: “He rose and conquered the grave”. Amen. Would I buy this album for the so called classic ‘Hillsong’ songs? No. But there is enough new live material on here, more than enough in fact, to get your teeth into that the older songs are actually a great addition.
One of my favorite moments on the whole of the album comes right in the middle, it is wonderful to hear the dance bleeps and beats of Freedom Is Here, which is one of those songs that really hit the spot. This song then flows into Shout Unto God then into the stunning and beautiful Like An Avalanche. For my review of the the original album of Aftermath I said of this particular song, “It’s an outpouring cry to God with the chorus of ‘And I find myself here on my knees again, caught up in grace like an avalanche, nothing compares to this love, love, burning in my heart’, wonderful musicianship on this song, a strong powerful track.” Not much has changed apart from this live version is 100 times better!
Of course you personally will have you favorite songs on this album. Maybe it is the brilliant Hosanna with its well known opening guitar riff or the very distinctive guitar sounds of Rhythm Of Grace. This album has them all. If you want to hear the new live version of songs from the last few Hillsong United albums then this is one album to look out for. If you are looking for the older classic songs that have been played around the church for the last ten years like Your Name High and From The Inside Out then this album is also for you. This album is a must have.
For me, you have to look at it not as ‘another’ Hillsong album, but as a recorded version of that amazing time of worship in Miami. The album flows well with great heartfelt worship songs sung with passion by Hillsong United. But overall the best bits for me are hearing the loud drums, big guitars and the thousands of worshippers singing together the name of Jesus, and that is always a special thing.
The final album from the David Crowder Band, Give Us Rest (A Requiem Mass in C [The Happiest of All Keys]), sold over 50,000 copies in its first week making it the No. 2 record in the country behind Adele’s 21, and the No. 1 new album on the charts. With a nearly constant No. 1 hold on the iTunes ® Overall Albums chart, Give Us Rest offers David Crowder*Band the highest chart and sales debut of their over decade long career.
“We have been really happy to hear and read the responses to the album,” remarks Crowder. “You make a thing and you hope it will mean something and be useful to someone else and to see such a positive reaction so early, well, we thought we couldn’t be happier about it. But then, when I got a phone call letting me know that we were debuting at number two on Billboard, I think, as far as memory serves, I pointed to the sky, yelled something, then un-ironically, with the purest of heart, totally Tebowed right in the middle of the street I had unknowingly wandered into.”
In what has been hailed an “epic,” “captivating” and “most artistic” final effort from the GRAMMY ® nominees, reviews have applauded the 34 track, double-disc album and full career of David Crowder*Band.
“One of Christian music’s least predictable bands closes out a decade-long career. The group’s final album, patterned after a Requiem Mass, contains nearly two hours of music. Give Us Rest’s 34 tracks encompass raw recordings and elaborately constructed arrangements ranging from U2-like worship songs to pseudo-choral music to bluegrass-y gospel hymns.” – USA Today
“Their most artistic project… Complexity, and simplicity. Deliberately arranging sound, emotion, intellect and vision. Doing more than pulling out a set of songs and putting them on a CD. DC*B’s contribution was also their journey. Give Us Rest is their coup de grace. Well done, David Crowder*Band, it’s time to take your rest.” – Worship Leader
“It’s an honest plea from a man who almost single-handedly redefined modern worship for the 21st century, which certainly was no easy task. But before stepping away from the microphone for good, Crowder showed exactly why he and his bandmates are in need of a rest, by creating an exhaustingly epic, double-disc album…. Give Us Rest sounds exactly as a ‘final album’ should. It is a Mount Everest of worship rock albums, never to be topped. For over a decade, David Crowder created some of the most creatively inspired worship music in the world, and now he deserves his rest.” – ChristianityToday.com
“A captivating offering… the band’s crowning achievement in a career of exuberant, cerebral accomplishments… In the end, joy becomes the lasting note of this album, and perhaps the legacy of the career of this gone-too-soon band.” – Crosswalk.com
“From track one to thirty-four it is nothing short of an amazing experience. 5 Stars” – JesusFreakHideout.com
“an epic blaze of musical glory… a memento of its career” – watchgmctv.com
Give Us Rest contains nearly two hours of music constructed in the outline of a Requiem Mass. The track listing even reads like a liturgy. It begins with The Entrance (or, the introit), a segment of three songs, then segues into The Plea (or, the kyrie), a section of three more songs, and then The Plight (or, the gradual and the tract), a sequence of six songs, and so on, all the way through The Absolution (or, the libere me and the paridisum), a string of six tracks to close out the album—and their 12-year run.
David Crowder*Band gave their final performance at Passion 2012 in front of over 42,000 college students, live at the Georgia Dome in downtown Atlanta. Just months earlier, the band completed a nearly 100% sold out headlining tour. Announced initially to their fans, David Crowder*Band revealed their final plans in early 2011. To read the original statement, click http://www.davidcrowderband.com/letter.html.
About David Crowder*Band:
Named among the “most thoughtful, progressive and exciting acts in contemporary Christian music” by The New York Times, the popular yet unconventional David Crowder*Band unveiled their final collection of new music on January 10 with the release of Give Us Rest or (a requiem mass in c [the happiest of all keys]). Give Us Rest follows their last GRAMMY ® nominated studio project Church Music which debuted at No. 1 on the Christian retail chart scanning over 35,000 units. This gave David Crowder*Band their largest street week to date ranking in at No. 11 on the Billboard Top 200. David Crowder*Band’s latest music video for “SMS (Shine)” nabbed coverage on NBC’s The Today Show, Fox & Friends, USA Today, Billboard and Paste Magazine online as well as a GMA Dove Award win for “Short Form Video of the Year.” The video was also recognized at the LA Film Festival in 2011. Along with the group’s 9 GMA Dove Awards and 22 nominations, the band was the first Christian artist to be named MSN.com’s Artist of the Year in 2006. The band is part of the Passion Movement, participating in university student gatherings in the US and around the world. The group’s leader David Crowder is further an acclaimed author, having penned two books, including his acclaimed, highly personal, Everybody Wants to Go to Heaven, But Nobody Wants to Die: Or (The Eschatology of Bluegrass). David Crowder*Band debuted their first Christmas album, Oh For Joy, in October of 2011.
About sixstepsrecords:
Founded in 2000 by Louie Giglio, sixstepsrecords is a worship label and a division of Passion Conferences. sixstepsrecords’ artists include Chris Tomlin (How Great Is Our God: The Essential Collection) David Crowder*Band (Give Us Rest), Charlie Hall (The Rising), Matt Redman (10,000 Reasons), Christy Nockels (Life Light Up), Kristian Stanfill (Mountains Move) and Passion (Passion: White Flag). The label partners with Sparrow Records/EMI CMG Label Group for A&R, marketing, sales and distribution operations.
About EMI CMG Label Group:
Brentwood, Tennessee-based EMI CMG Label Group is comprised of Sparrow Records, Forefront Records, and Credential Recordings, in addition to providing A&R and marketing support for sixstepsrecords via a joint venture and licensing partnership. Balancing freedom, discipline, creativity, profitability and ministry, EMI CMG Label Group strives for excellence in artist development. The Label Group is a division of EMI Christian Music Group. For further information, please visit www.emicmg.com.
Jamie Grace records hit singles when she isn’t completing a full course load in college.
The 20-year-old singer songwriter, who goes by the stage name of Jamie Grace – short for her full real name Jamie Grace Harper – starts her final semester at East Point, Georgia’s Point University this week. It will be hard concentrating, she said, as there’s a possible Grammy award to worry about besides senioritis. The child and youth development major is competing next month in the category of 2011′s “best contemporary Christian music song,” for “Hold Me,” a single she recorded with tobyMac of DC Talk and solo artist fame.
“I have always wanted to share God’s joy and love with young kids in the hopes it will inspire them,” said Jamie Grace. “I feel blessed to do something like this at my age. It’s rare.”
Performing comes naturally for Jamie Grace, who said she started expressing herself artistically at an early age. Born in Atlanta, she grew up the daughter of a pastor and associate pastor at the same church. At age 12, she said she asked for a video camera for Christmas. Unwrapping it that holiday, she said singing and acting have taken center stage in her life ever since.
“I’ve always been very dramatic,” Jamie Grace said. “I’m a lot more comfortable singing my feelings, for example, or even just typing them, rather than saying them out loud. I think I’m more comfortable with music, but every now and then I still like to do a monologue. Music is very therapeutic to me.”
Music soon became not just a performance for Jamie Grace, she said, but a coping mechanism. Born with Tourette syndrome, the young singer said songwriting soothed her during battles with her condition. Tourette’s is a nervous system disorder that manifests itself in uncontrollable physical or vocals tics in victims.
“A lot of times they say that if you’re focused on something you love, Tourette’s won’t bother you as much,” Jamie Grace said. “When I’m playing music or acting, my syndrome isn’t visible. It was definitely something that was harder for me earlier in life. I know that I’m not going to be stressed out or upset about it as I know God’s going to bring me out of my pain in it.”
Jamie Grace said her parent’s faith forced her to nurture her musical talents. Diving deep into Korean pop, Southern gospel, jazz and Christian rock music, she soon developed an eclectic style that she perfected in a series of YouTube videos. They caught the attention of tobyMac, who signed the young musician to his record label and helped her release her first album One Song at a Time last September.
“For me, tobyMac isn’t just someone on the radio,” Jamie Grace said. “He’s someone I really looked up to growing up. He’s so humble. It’s all about God and his music.”
Realizing their daughter’s talent, Jamie Grace’s parents gave her their blessing to play professionally so long as she stayed in school. It was a tough decision, Jamie Grace said, but the college student eventually decided to complete her studies in children’s ministry. Once she finishes this year, she said she intends on making her parents proud regardless of her career path.
“My parents are the best parents I could have ever asked for,” Jamie Grace said. “They’re my rock and everything to me. I feel very blessed God would surround me with them.”
Her success, she concluded, couldn’t have come without God’s blessing. Whether she’s tackling Tourette’s or a college exam, she said she trusts in the Lord to lead her on the path to success.
“I always encourage kids when they’re going through rough spots to surround themselves with people who love God and love them,” Jamie Grace said. “It’s important to stay in the Word and relationships with those in the Word. I just want to continue staying focused on whatever God has for me. I’m ready to go for it.”
When all is done
Judgement comes
And we will stand
Right in front of Him
Spare us, oh God
Spare us, oh God
Spare us, oh God
Spare us, oh God
Have mercy, oh God
Have mercy, oh God
You left me in the dark
Not so much as a spark
You left me in the dark
You left me in the dark
You left me in the cold
Left me here on my own
Left me in the cold
Left me in the cold
You left me on my own
You left me all alone
You left me on my own
You left me on my own
You left me when I gave You all that I had
You left me when I gave You all that I had
Oh save a place for me
To Your right hand upraise me
Oh save a place for me
To Your right hand upraise me
The red of blood hit the dirt
And the whole earth mourned and the whole earth shook
As we watched the nail into a tree
Oh the wretched souls of sinners like me
God you came
God you came
My God you came down
God you came
God you came
My God you came down
Faint and weary you have sought me
Oh my Saviour God through the cross you have bought me
What a love, your son for my salvation
What a cost, your wondrous incarnation
God you came
God you came
My God you came down
God you came
God you came
My God you came down
Tuba mirum spargens sonum
Per sepulchra regionum
Coget omnes ante thronum
Mors stupebit, et natura
Cum resuget creatura
judicanti responsura
Liber scriptus proferetur
In quototum continetur
Unde mundus judichetur
Judichetur
Judichetur
Judichetur
Judichetur
Oh, what wondrous noise the trumpet sounds
Judichetur
Judichetur
Oh, through all the Earth it shakes the ground
Judichetur
Judichetur
Quid sum miser tunc dicturus
Quem patronum rogaturus
Cum vix iustus sit securus
Day of wrath
Oh, day of mourning
Day of wrath
Oh, day of mourning
See the ashes, cities burning
Hear the final prophets’ warning
Day of wrath
Oh, day of mourning
Day of wrath
Oh, day of mourning
Oh Lord forgive
Oh Lord forgive
The faithful we’ve outlived
Oh Lord forgive
God hold back your hand
Oh God hold back your hand
Stay your wrath again
Oh God hold back your hand
Blessedness of everlasting light
No more pain
No more night
Oh Lord forgive
Oh Lord forgive
Free from chains of sin
Oh Lord forgive
God reach out your hand
Oh God reach out your hand
Full of grace again
God reach out your hand
Blessedness of everlasting light
No more pain
No more night
Blessedness of everlasting light
Oh what light
Oh what light
This place is trying to break my belief
But my faith is bigger than all I can see
What I need is redemption
What I need is for You for to put me back on my feet
Wha ah ooooh ooooh oooh
Wha ah ooooh ooooh ooh oh
I swear I’m trying to give everything
But I feel I’m falling, oh make me believe
What I need is resurrection
What I need is for You to put me back on my feet
Wha ah ooooh ooooh oooh
Wha ah ooooh ooooh ooh ohhh
If I could feel You shine Your perpetual light
Then maybe I could crawl out of this tonight
If I could feel You feel You shine
Oh let me feel You shine
So beautiful and warm
So beautiful and bright
Like a sun comin’ out of a rainy sky
Oh let me feel You shine Oh,
Let me feel You shine
I lift the knife to the thing I love most
Praying You’ll come so I can have both
What I need is for You to touch me
What I need is for You to be the thing that I need
Wha ah ooooh ooooh oooh
Wha ah ooooh ooooh ooh ohhh
If I could feel You shine your perpetual light
Then maybe I could crawl out of this tonight
If I could feel You feel You shine
Oh let me feel You shine
So beautiful and warm
So beautiful and bright
Like a sun comin’ out of a rainy sky
Oh let me feel You shine
God I need a Savior
O come Generous King
O God I need a Savior
To come rescue me
Oh let me feel You shine Your magnificent light
Then maybe I could crawl out of this tonight
If You let me feel You feel You shine
Oh let me feel You shine
So beautiful and warm
So beautiful and bright
Like a sun comin’ out of a rainy sky
Oh let me feel You shine
Let me feel You shine
Let me feel You shine
As we the community have gathered here
I would like to pose a question:
How do you sum up a life in a few words?
How do you measure the weight of a soul in a matter of moments?
You do not. You cannot.
But you can pray for rest, and you can pray for light.
And you can remember, you can always remember.
“Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine:
Et lux perpetua luceat eis.
In memoria æterna erit iustus,
Ab auditione mala non timebit.”
[English translation:]
“Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord:
And let perpetual light shine upon them.
He shall be justified in everlasting memory,
And shall not fear evil reports.”
He spoke and stars came out
He spoke and lighting flashed and thunder broke the quiet
He spoke and my heart, it burst to life
All this mystery divine
Fall on your knees
Forgiven and clean
Forgiven and free
Oh my God, oh my God
It’s too wonderful
It’s too wonderful
A voice then all of this
A voice that called me friend in darkest of night
A voice and my heart, it burst to life
Fall on your knees
Forgiven and clean
Forgiven and free
Here we are
It’s too wonderful
It’s too wonderful
To feel this grace rescuing
Lifting us up, washing our feet
Oh my God, oh my God
It’s too wonderful
It’s too wonderful
Oh reverent love burn us up
Until what I was is gone
Holy love burn us up
Until what I was is gone
Reverent love burn us up
Until what I was is gone
Like clouds dissolve in sunlight
Oh wonder
Fall on your knees
Forgiven and clean
Forgiven and free
Oh my God, oh my God
It’s too wonderful
It’s too wonderful
Oh feel this grace rescuing
Lifting us up, washing our feet
Oh my God, oh my God
It’s too wonderful
It’s too wonderful
Oh wonder
Fall on your knees
In wonder
Fall on your knees
Why me Lord
What have I ever done to deserve even one
Of the pleasures I’ve known
Tell me Lord
What did I ever do that was worth love from you
Or the kindness you’ve shown
Lord help me Jesus I’ve wasted it so
Help me Jesus, you know what I am
Now that I know that I’ve needed you so
Help me Jesus my soul’s in your hands
Try me Lord
If you think there’s a way I can ever repay what I’ve taken from you
Maybe Lord
I can show someone else what I’ve learned myself
On my way back to you
Lord help me Jesus I’ve wasted it so
Help me Jesus, you know who I am
But now that I know that I’ve needed you so
Help me Jesus my soul’s in your hands
Help me Jesus my soul’s in your hands
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Jesus have mercy
Oh have mercy
Oh God have mercy
Oh God have mercy
Jesus have mercy
Oh have mercy, mercy
Oh my God what have I done
Oh my God what have I done
What have I done
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Have mercy
Oh we will bend and break
In such a fragile state
We won’t be here long
No, we won’t be here long
Kyrie eleison
The one who I’ve searched for
For so long has come
With open arms
Today is the day of glory
Today is the day I’m home
Oh day, what a day
Oh day, I’m yours
Oh day of resurrection
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Again
Today is the day I rise like the dawn
Up out of death
To a Son, to a Son
Oh day, what a day
Oh day, I’m yours
Oh day of resurrection
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Beat the drum and say no more
The heart and mind and soul have flown
Oh what am I to do
Oh what am I to do
Beat the drum and say no more
Drift away with you my love
Oh what am I to do
Oh what am I to do
But surrender
To you
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Lux Aeternam, shine
[Lux Aeternam is Latin for Light Eternal]
Oh great God give us rest
We’re all worn thin from all of this
At the end of our hope with nothing left
Oh great God give us rest
Oh great God do your best
Have you seen this place it’s all a mess
And I’ve done my part to well i guess
Oh great God do your best
Could you take a song and make it thine
From a crooked heart twisted up like mine
Would you open up Heaven’s glory light
Shine on in and give these dead bones life
Oh shine on in and give these dead bones life
Let it shine, let it shine
On and on, on and on, come to life
The latest artist to join the Kickstarter revolution is Gungor. The popular indie worship band has the hopes to fashion a brand new live CD/DVD and are asking fans for their help to fund it. Check out their statement below and visit their Kickstarter campaign for more info!
At the heart of Gungor’s music is that corporate transcendent experience that can happen when people get together to worship. Our music has always been designed to draw the listener into a moment of connection with the Divine. For this reason, our live shows are a very important part of our work. The live shows aren’t simply the places that we market the songs that we previously recorded; they are the places of connection from the music to real human faces, joy and pain. It is abstraction moving to connection. I think this is part of why people keep asking us for a live album.
There is something that happens live that is difficult to capture in a studio. There is a power when there is a “we” that has purposefully joined their hearts together. We have had some pretty incredible moments of connection in our live shows, but we’ve never had a way of sharing those moments with people outside of the ones at the show. We’ve actually pitched the idea of a live album several times in the past to our label, but it never worked out.
We have recently fulfilled our contract with our label and are now free to make this album that we feel like we are supposed to make, but we can’t do it without your help.
The idea is to make a live album as well as a short film of sorts. Rather than focusing on a single concert experience, we would like to record the majority of our upcoming Spring tour and compile the most “magical” moments that happen into one project.
One of our hopes in doing it this way is not only to gather from the best of our live experiences, but also to portray some of the diversity and beauty of the Body of Christ. The extent of this project is going to be directly tied to the budget. I have big dreams for what this could be, but we don’t have the resources to do it all ourselves.
To let you into my head a little bit, we are planning on doing a fair amount of international traveling this year, and I am imaging capturing expressions of the Body of Christ from all around the world. For example, how cool would it be to have one song recorded with the Church gathered in a mainstream venue in New York City, but then the next song is being sung with the Church gathered working in an African orphanage or a basement in China? How powerful would it be to bring a couple acoustic guitars and a string section into a room with a bunch of recovering drug addicts and sing “Beautiful Things” with them? That’s the kind of thing we’d like to see on this film rather than just a traditional concert DVD.
To pull it off though, we are going to need to bring a bunch of gear and personnel out on tour with us, and that’s not cheap. If we raised 30,000 dollars from Kickstarter, we could afford to get it done, but we’d still have to cut some corners. Anything extra that we could raise over our bottom line goal would go towards making this project that much better. As many problems as human religion has, we believe the Bride of Christ is beautiful and we’d like to put her on display a little bit to the world.
This is something that’s been rolling around in my head and heart for a long time, but we’ve never had a way to pull it off. I’m hoping this could be the way. Thanks for your prayers and consideration! Grace and peace,
Michael
Louie Giglio tweeted Monday, 23 January 2012 about an article he thought his followers should definitely check out. Giglio tweeted:
@louiegiglioLouie Giglio
Great post from @bradlomenick on connecting with those you seek out/desire to meet with:http://bit.ly
Below is the blog post/article in its entirety.
Over the last 15 years, I’ve heard this alot. From key leaders, CEO’s, authors, celebrities, politicians, actors, producers, pastors, and lots of other folks.
I would figure out a way to make a connection with someone, and then arrange a meeting, phone call, breakfast, lunch, or coffee. Inevitably, this question would eventually come out in the conversation. I loved hearing it. It was the honest question.
Now I ask it. Not because I’m someone who deserves to ask it, but more because time is precious. When you are a leader and have a team and an organization to run, besides family and friends and all kinds of other things that require your attention, and there are people who want to spend time with you, you have to make choices. I understand now why all these folks were always asking me that question.
So next time you have a meeting or phone call or a lunch with someone who you respect and want to learn from and consider to be a key influencer, here are a few pointers on how to make sure they’ll want to talk to you the next time you call or want to meet:
1. Honor that person’s time. Find out how much time they have, and then stick to that. And actually wrap up sooner than what is expected.
2. Ask way more questions than you give answers. You’re not the expert, they are. So leverage the time and soak up their wisdom. Don’t use the time to share your story, unless the person truly wants to know.
3. Pay for it. If you are at breakfast or lunch or dinner, pay for the meal. I don’t care if you are meeting with Bill Gates, pay for it. It is a sign of respect. Even if you are a non-profit and trying to raise money, pay for the meal. Seriously.
4. Tell the person what the agenda is. If you are planning to ask them for money, tell them that. If you want a favor, tell them that. If you have a certain need you want to get their advice on, tell them that. If you have specific questions you want to ask and get their answers on, tell them those questions. Be upfront. Be honest. Be real and authentic.
5. Be prepared. Know everything you can about the person you are meeting with. Have 8-10 questions prepared for the conversation (more on this in a later post), plus several items of interest you will want to cover. Do your homework. The more you know about someone and have a good understanding of who they are and what their interests are, proves that you value and respect their time.
6. Write it down and follow up. Bring something to write with, and write down the good stuff. Also, based on questions you ask, figure out ways you can serve that person. If that person likes a certain coffee, send them a gift card. If that person likes a certain college team, make a connection about that team a month later. If you can make a connection for that person that will serve them, do it. If you want to create a long term value add friendship, you’ll need to be intentional around their likes and interests.
It’s not about the money or the fame or the glory, but about changing people, multi-platinum country music artist Josh Turner shares on iamsecond.com, a website built to inspire people to live for God and for others.
Turner’s story marks the latest addition to the site, which spotlights dozens of celebrities and everyday people telling their testimonies of personal struggle, transformation and hope through short films.
“I haven’t always been the guy that walks into a room and automatically the attention is on me,” the country singer admitted. “I’m normally the guy that stands off in the corner.”
Now, able to move whole audiences to their feet and command the Billboard country charts, the 34-year-old musician is capturing the attention of thousands nationwide, charming many with his deep and expressive voice.
“Singing allowed me to express myself in ways that I wouldn’t be able to do otherwise,” Turner stated.
It also allowed him to explore his faith more through song.
Growing up in the church in Hannah, S.C., a small farming community “a long way from any kind of big city,” Turner found himself singing the bass and baritone parts in numerous choirs, cultivating his talent.
Though he always dreamed of singing country music as a young boy, he never really thought he could make a living out of it until he heard Randy Travis’ album Storms of Life.
“That was the album that really made me start dreaming of the possibility of doing this for a living,” he remembered. Moving to Nashville in 1998 to get a record deal and try to get his foot in the industry, Turner enrolled at Belmont University where he majored in vocal performance.
One night while in college, walking home from the school’s music library, a vision came to him of a long, black, beautiful, shiny train.
“People are standing out to the sides of the track, watching this train go by, just craving to get on it,” Turner described. “At the same time, they know that this train leads to destruction, it leads to emptiness, it leads to nowhere, but yet they still want to get on it. This train was a physical metaphor for temptation.”
Hurrying home to his apartment, he wrote three verses and a chorus that night, waking up the next morning to write a fourth verse as well.
“At that moment in time when I laid the pen down, I said nobody’s ever gonna want to hear this,” he said. “It’s too old-fashioned, it’s too old-timey, it’s a gospel song. So this is probably not going to end up on one of my records in the future.”
But that was precisely the song that helped him sell a million copies of his first record, Long Black Train in 2003, with a hit title track by the same name reaching the Top 20 of the Billboard country singles chart.
It was also the song that he played the first time he was on the “Grand Ole Opry,” for which he received two standing ovations and an encore.
With many touched by his lyrics, Turner had a realization about his newfound fame: It wasn’t about the money or the glory, but about the people.
“It’s about changing people, it’s about touching people and influencing people in a positive way, and so from that point on, that’s what I’ve tried to do,” he affirmed.
He also realized that there was no song he could write or no record he could make that was going to “save” him. Only a Savior could do that.
“I’m thankful to have Jesus as my Savior,” Turner expressed. “My relationship with God has always been one to where I’m talking to him all day, every day, about anything and everything. It’s just a continuous ongoing conversation that I have with the Lord, and I feel like that’s brought me closer to Him.”
“It helps me think through things clearly, I feel like it’s given me wisdom about other people, about myself, about the life that I live. Ultimately, I get my joy from Him, and always put Him first,” he concluded.
“I don’t feel like God called me to be a Gospel singer. He didn’t call me to be a Christian singer, he called me to be a country singer, and I just happen to be a Christian.”
Turner’s latest single, “Time is Love,” was officially released on Tuesday from his upcoming yet-to-be titled fifth studio album. The debut single from his last album Haywire, “Why Don’t We Just Dance,” a four-week No. 1 hit, was the most-played song at country radio in 2010, according to Mediabase. It also won an American Country Award for Single of the Year-Male.
His fourth No. 1 single, “All Over Me,” was named BMI’s 2011 Song of the Year, and by garnering No. 1, made him one of only seven country artists to have two No. 1 hits in 2010.
Josh Turner’s testimony is just one story among dozens featured on I am Second, which includes other personal films from stars like Josh Hamilton, Texas Rangers outfielder and 2010 American League MVP; former Korn band member Brian Welch; surfer Bethany Hamilton; and football stars Colt McCoy and Sam Bradford.
The site, which launched in 2008 in Dallas-Fort Worth, has more than 5.5 million visitors from 217 countries worldwide. Additionally, Thomas Nelson Publishers released the I am Second book this month.
Requiem aeternam dona eis
Domine et lux perpetua luceat eis
Te decet hymnus Deus, in Sion
et tibi reddetur votum in lerusalem
Exaudi orationem meam
ad te omnis caro veniet
Requem aeternam dona eis
Domine et lux perpetua luceat eis
[English Translation]
Grant them eternal rest
O Lord and let perpetual light shine upon them
You should hymn of God, in Zion
and unto thee shall the vow be performed in Jerusalem
Hear my prayer
all flesh shall come to thee
Grant them eternal required
O Lord and let perpetual light shine upon them
Come and rest here
Come and lay your burdens down
Come and rest here
There is refuge for you now
You’ll find His peace and know you’re not alone anymore
He is near
You’ll find His healing, your heart isn’t shattered anymore
He is here
Breathe in, Breathe out, you will find Him here
Come and rest here
Come and lay your burdens down
Come and rest here
There is refuge for you now
You’ll find His peace and know you’re not alone anymore
He is near
You’ll find His healing, your heart isn’t shattered anymore
He is here
Breathe in, Breathe out, you will find Him here
I will rest in you
I will rest in you
I will rest in you
I will rest in you
Breathe in, Breathe out, you will find Him here
Breathe in, Breathe out, you will find Him here
You will, you will find Him here
You will, you will find Him here
Spirit come and change the atmosphere
Convict and open hearts here
The anthems that the angels sing
The worship of the King of Kings
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
We exalt Your Name
High above the heavens
We exalt Your Name
All of creation sings praise
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
Your presence fills and satisfies
Tears down the walls we hide behind
Oh God of every aching heart
We long for You in light and dark
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
We exalt Your Name
High above the heavens
We exalt Your Name
All of creation sings praise
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
You reign, yes
We exalt Your Name
High above the heavens
We exalt Your Name
All of creation sings praise
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
For Jesus reigns
Over all, He reigns
We exalt Your Name
If my heart is overwhelmed
And I cannot hear Your voice
I hold on to what is true
Though I cannot see
If the storms of life they come
And the road ahead gets steep
I will lift these hands in faith
I will believe
I’ll remind myself
Of all that You’ve done
And the life I have
Because of Your son
Love came down and rescued me
Love came down and set me free
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
Mountain high or valley low
I sing out and remind my soul
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
When my heart is filled with hope
Every promise comes my way
When I feel Your hands of grace
Rest upon me
Staying desperate for You, God
Staying humble at Your feet
I will lift these hands in praise
I will believe
I’ll remind myself
Of all that You’ve done
And the life I have
Because of Your son
Love came down and rescued me
Love came down and set me free
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
Mountain high or valley low
I sing out and remind my soul
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
I am Yours
I am Yours
All my days
Jesus, I am Yours
Love came down and rescued me
Love came down and set me free
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
Mountain high or valley low
I sing out and remind my soul
I am Yours
I am forever Yours
I am Yours
I am Yours
I am Yours
Jesus, I am Yours
Lead us to You
Show us Your mercy
Your majesty lifted up on high
It tells of Your goodness
Your name is true
Your name is holy
Your splendor is written in the skies
It tells of Your greatness
We will rise
To praise You
Offer our lives before You
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
You are worthy
Lift up our eyes to Your glory
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
We stand in awe
You won the victory
Your enemies tremble at Your name
It speaks of Your triumph
You clothe the poor
You mend the broken
You heal our hearts
You take our shame
It speaks of Your kindness
We will rise
To praise You
Offer our lives before You
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
You are worthy
Lift up our eyes to Your glory
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
We will cry out Your renown
You are the God who has saved us
We will rise to praise You
We lift a glorious sound
You are the One who redeemed us
We will rise to praise You
We will rise
To praise You
Offer our lives before You
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
You are worthy
Lift up our eyes to Your glory
Let every nation, all of creation
We will rise
We will rise
We will rise to You
Lord, You’re calling me
Lord, You’re beckoning
With love abounding
And I run
I run
I need You
I can’t get enough of You
I come alive when I’m in Your presence
Oh God of my salvation
Lord you’re drawing me
I am completely
Overtaken
Yes, I Run
Jesus, I Run
I need You
I can’t get enough of You
I come alive when I’m in Your presence
Oh God of my salvation
Lord I’m running
Lord I’m running
Lord I’m running to You
Draw me closer
I need You
I can’t get enough of You
I come alive when I’m in Your presence
Oh God of my salvation
I run to You (Lord)
I run, I run, I run to You
I run to You
I run to You
You never change
You are the God
You say You are
When I’m afraid
You come and still my beating heart
You stay the same
When hope is just a distant thought
You take my pain
And You lead me to the cross
What love is this
That you gave Your life for me
And made a way for me to know You
And I confess
You’re always enough for me
You’re all I need
I look to You
I see the scars upon Your hands
And hold the truth
That when I can’t You always can
I’m standing here
Beneath the shadow of the cross
I’m overwhelmed
That I’ll keep finding open arms
What love is this
that You gave your life for me
And made a way for me to know You
And I confess
You’re always enough for me
You’re all I need
Jesus in Your suffering
You were reaching
You thought of me
What love is this
that You gave Your life for me
And made a way for me to know You
And I confess
You’re always enough for me
You’re all I need
What love is this
that You gave Your life for me
And made a way for me to know You
And I confess
You’re always enough for me
Always enough for me
Always enough for me
Take the sun
Take the moon
Take the earth and watch it move
Under Your control
Cause You’re all they know
Here’s my life and all my heart
I give it all but every part
Is under Your control
Lord You’re all I know
The stars in the sky will hang there
’til You tell them to
The faith in my heart will still sing
Of what Your love can do
And even when life weighs heavy on me
I know You’re in control
And You’re all I need
The stars in the sky will hang there
’til You tell them to
Take the sea
Take the tide
Take the waters watch them rise
Giving praise to You
Always praising You
Here’s my voice
And all my soul
Singing freely when
Lord, I’m giving praise to You
Lord I’m praising You
The stars in the sky will hang there
’til You tell them to
The faith in my heart will still sing
Of what Your love can do
And even when life weighs heavy on me
I know You’re in control
And You’re all I need
The stars in the sky will hang there
’til You tell them to
The clouds will rain
The seasons change
(Cause You told them to)
The sun will shine
Your burning light
(Cause You told it to)
When You speak your words through my soul
So I know it’s true
You’re in control
You’re in control
You’re in control
The stars in the sky will hang there
The faith in my heart will still sing
The stars in the sky will hang there
’til You tell them to
The faith in my heart will still sing
Of what Your love can do
And even when life weighs heavy on me
I know You’re in control
And You’re all I need
The stars in the sky will hang there
The stars in the sky will hang there
You bring hope
You bring life
Awaken hearts
Open eyes
With our voices
Hear them rise
We call these dry bones to come alive
You are faithful
You are true
We can always run to
Love that never fails
Arms that never close
Blood that covers sin
Grace that never ends
You have saved us
You have won
Sin is broken
Death is gone
Freedom’s found us
Breakthrough’s near
In Your presence
No more fear
Our Savior’s here
Our Savior’s here
Faith is stirring
Hearts are free
Chains are broken
When we believe
You are mighty
You come through
We can always run to
Love that never fails
Arms that never close
Blood that covers sin
Grace that never ends
You have saved us
You have won
Sin is broken
Death is gone
Freedom’s found us
Breakthrough’s near
In Your presence
No more fear
Our Savior’s here
Our Savior’s here
Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Our God saves
You have saved us
You have won
Sin is broken
Death is gone
Freedom’s found us
Breakthrough’s near
In Your presence
No more fear
Our Savior’s here
Our Savior’s here
Oh, You save us
You save us
You save us
Lord, You save us
You save us
You save us
Yeah, You free us
You free us
You free us
Oh, You free us
You free us
You free us
Yeah, You heal us
You heal us
You heal us
Yeah, You heal us
You heal us
You heal us
You’re our Savior
Our Savior
Our Savior
Our Savior
You opened the blind eyes
Opened the blind eyes
Heal our sickness
You alone
You opened my blind eyes
Gave me a new life
Oh yeah, our Savior’s here
Troubles chasing me again
Breaking down my best defense
I’m looking
God, I’m looking for You
Weary just won’t let me rest
And fear is filling up my head
I’m longing
God, I’m longing for You
But I will find You in the place I’m in
Find You when I’m at my end
Find You when there’s nothing left of me
To offer you except for brokenness
You lift me up
You’ll never leave me thirsty
When I am weak
When I am lost and searching
I’ll find You on my knees.
So what if sorrow shakes my faith
What if heartache still remains,
I’ll trust you
My God I’ll trust You
Cuz You are faithful and
I will find You in the place I’m in
Find you when I’m at my end
Find you when there’s nothing left of me
To offer You except for brokenness
You lift me up
You’ll never leave me thirsty
When I am weak
When I am lost and searching
I’ll find You on my knees, my knees
When my hope is gone
When the fear is strong
When the pain is real
When it’s hard to heal
When my faith is shaken
And my heart is broken and my joy is stolen
God I know that
You lift me up
You’ll never leave me searching
Find You in the place I’m in
Find You when I’m at my end
Find You when there’s nothing left of me
To offer You except for brokenness
You lift me up
You’ll never leave me thirsty
When I am weak
When I am lost and searching
I’ll find You on my knees
Here I am
Just for You, only You
Here I stand
Wanting You, only You
In Your presence, Lord
I will find my strength
You’re the breath in me
You’re my everything
With my heart bowed low
And my hands held high
All consuming fire
You’re my one desire
Your name, oh, Your name
Let it stay on my lips
I will seek Your face
God, it’s You, only You
In Your presence, Lord
I will find my strength
You’re the breath in me
You’re my everything
With my heart bowed low
And my hands held high
All consuming fire
You’re my one desire
It’s You
God, it’s You
It’s You
God, only You
My heart will always sing
I love You, I love You
In Your presence, Lord
I will find my strength
You’re the breath in me
You’re my everything
With my heart bowed low
And my hands held high
All consuming fire
You’re my one desire
It’s You
God, it’s You
It’s You
Only You
It is You
My heart will always sing
I love You, I love You
Every secret, every shame
Every fear, every pain
Live inside the dark
But that’s not who we are
We are children of the day
So wake up sleeper, lift your head
We were meant for more than this
Fight the shadows, conquer death
Make the most of the time we have left
We are the light of the world
We are the city on a hill
We are the light of the world
And we gotta, we gotta, we gotta
Let the light shine
We are called to spread the news
To tell the world the simple truth
Jesus came to save
There’s freedome in His name
So let His love break through
We are the light of the world
We are the city on a hill
We are the light of the world
And we gotta, we gotta, we gotta
Let the light shine
We are the light (3x)
So let your light shine brighter
We are the light (3x)
Jesus
You are the light (3x)
We will lift You high
And shine, shine, shine
We are the light of the world
We are the city on a hill
We are the light of the world
And we gotta, we gotta, we gotta
Let the light shine
Wish it could be easy
Why is life so messy
Why is pain a part of us
There are days I feel like
Nothing ever goes right
Sometimes it just hurts so much
But You’re here
You’re real
I know I can trust You
Even when it hurts
Even when it’s hard
Even when it all just falls apart
I will run to You
Cause I know that You are
Lover of my soul
Healer of my scars
You steady my heart (x2)
I’m not gonna worry
I know that You got me
Right inside the palm of your hand
Each and every moment
What’s good and what gets broken
Happens just the way that You plan
And I will run to You
You’re my refuge in Your arms
And I will sing to You
Cause of everything You are
You steady my heart (x2)
The number of those who ate was about five thousand men, besides women and children.
-Matthew 14:21
Jesus didn’t feed 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish.
He fed a crowd of people that numbered 5,000-besides women and children.
But in those days, the women and children typically weren’t part of the headcount. Therefore, we typically refer to this incident as the feeding of the 5,000. Actually, it was more like 20,000, at the very least.
With this in mind, isn’t it remarkable that the ingredients for the miracle came from a little boy?
Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?”
-John 6:8-9
God fed the multitude through the meager resources of a child who wasn’t evenincluded in the original count.
God likes the unlikely.
When He looks for someone to use, He often looks for the under looked.
He calls for the youngest son, who wasn’t even worth bringing in from the sheep field, from the perspective of his father and older brothers.
Be careful before you count someone out.
They might be the channel of your miracle.
And if you’ve been counted out lately, don’t worry.
God often hides His provision in places where no one else would know to look for them.
Man looks at the outward appearance. But God looks at the heart…
Style: Worshipful indie-folk-rock; compare to Coldplay, Chris Tomlin, Mumford & Sons
Top tracks: ”Come Find Me,” “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms/Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus,” “Oh My God”
The David Crowder Band’s final studio album opens with the words, “Give us rest / We’re all worn thin from all of this / At the end of our hope with nothing left / Oh great God, give us rest.” It’s an honest plea from a man who almost single-handedly redefined modern worship for the 21st century, which certainly was no easy task. But before stepping away from the microphone for good, Crowder showed exactly why he and his bandmates are in need of a rest, by creating an exhaustingly epic, double-disc album. (Read our extensive interview with Crowderhere.)
It’s even got an epic title: Give Us Rest (a requiem mass in c [the happiest of all keys]). The album starts quietly, with gentle piano keys over atmospheric synths, but quickly turns to stadium-filling anthems that would inspire U2 or Sigur Ros. The energy levels rise and fall, each new crescendo more triumphant than the previous. And this goes on for a staggering thirty-four tracks. The overzealousness of Give Us Rest is comparable to watching all three Lord of the Rings films in one sitting. It’s epic, inspiring, breathtaking—and really, really long. As great as it is, there are times when you can’t help but wonder how much more is possible.
Not unlike Frodo Baggins’ tumultuous expedition, Crowder trudges through a lot of emotional and spiritual terrain on his last journey. He coos quietly with an acoustic guitar on “Why Me Lord?” but shouts his lungs out on “Oh My God.” Styles range from simple country ballads a la Johnny Cash to electronic-tinged rock-outs that Family Force 5 would love. But at the core of this album, it is pure worship.
It’s clear from the first track to last that Crowder is singing for and to God. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself singing these words from “Fall on Your Knees” at your next worship service: “He spoke and stars came out / He spoke and lightning flashed and thunder broke the quiet / He spoke and my heart, it burst to life / All this mystery divine / Fall on your knees / Forgiven and clean / Forgiven and free.”
The music doesn’t sound dissimilar to Passion, Chris Tomlin, or Hillsong, but the David Crowder Band has always stood separate from that pack of modern worship groups due to its eclecticism. Crowder himself is still a wild-eyed, crazy-haired Jesus freak, and his band can play anything from keytar or Theremin to scratching on turntables and even a Guitar Hero controller. And this imaginative use of instruments may be what fans miss most, even as they continue singing Crowder’s songs in church services for years to come.
Give Us Rest sounds exactly as a “final album” should. It is a Mount Everest of worship rock albums, never to be topped. For over a decade, David Crowder created some of the most creatively inspired worship music in the world, and now he deserves his rest.
Missionary Sarah Young’s Jesus Calling devotional (Thomas Nelson) has now sold more than 2.5 million units worldwide, and Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell’s The 5 Love Languages of Children (Northfield Publishing/Moody Publishers) has exceeded 1 million copies sold.
In addition, the Jesus Calling brand of titles, including Jesus Calling for Kids and theJesus Calling Devotional Bible, has sold more than 3.5 million units, reported Thomas Nelson.
“What an honor it is to watch God at work, drawing people closer to Him through the pages of this book,” said Laura Minchew, senior vice president of specialty publishing at Thomas Nelson. “I heard a recent story of a woman so touched byJesus Calling that she purchased 23 copies to give to every member in her family.”
Jesus Calling is also now available in a large deluxe edition that features large, black print and the scriptures written out after each devotional entry. The book was also released as an app in 2011, giving readers access to the full-text book with the ability to share quotations or gift the app to friends.
Young’s next devotional, Jesus Today: Experience Hope Through His Presence, is scheduled to release in the fall.
Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell’s The 5 Love Languages of Children—re-released for February by Northfield Publishing/Moody Publishers—has sold more than 1 million copies since its 1997 publication, reported Janis Backing, the company’s publicity manager. The new release has been updated with the Love Languages Mystery Game and an epilogue for parents of teenagers and/or adult children.
Chapman and Rick Osborne have teamed up to write A Perfect Pet for Peyton, launching the “5 Love Languages Discovery Book” series for children 4-8 years old. The fully illustrated oversize hardcover features four-color illustrations with hidden details by Wilson Williams Jr. A social media campaign will build on the 5 Love Languages base, aiming to drive parents to a contest page and unlock exclusive content from each book.
Elsewhere in the children’s market, David C Cook plans to release a softcover edition of The Action Bible New Testament in April. More than 200,000 units of The Action Bible have been sold since September 2010.
A Christian Book Award winner, the full-color, comic-style Bible illustrated by DC Comics artist Sergio Cariello now has its own app, audio edition and The Action Bible Christmas Story.
Tyndale House Publishers is revamping two of the most popular titles in its best-selling “Little Blessings” series. With enhanced art, Why Is There a Cross? and Who Is Jesus? will be released in March, retailing for $3.99 each.
Written by Kathleen Bostrom and illustrated by Care Bears artist Elena Kucharik, these “questions books” for kids ages 3-8 have sold more than 80,000 copies combined in the hardcover format.
The final album from US worship band David Crowder Band has now been released. ‘Give Us Rest or (A Requiem Mass in C [The Happiest of All Keys])‘ has risen straight to number 1 on the main US iTunes Album Chart after it’s first day of release, 10th January 2012. The band performed their final show together last week at the Passion 2012 Conference in Atlanta ahead of their sixth and final studio album.
The popular American worship band announced back in May 2011 that they would be ending in early 2012 following the release of their final album. “The decision was reached that this sixth album would be our last”, explained the band. “None of us is sure what’s next, but we’re not afraid. We’re, in fact, really, really excited! And we’re sure that music will play a role in the future for most, if not all, of us, since, well, we wouldn’t know how to not have it a part of our lives.”
The group’s final album, ‘Give Us Rest‘ is a bumper 34 track double-CD album, including first single ‘Let Me Feel You Shine‘. Their previous studio album, ‘Church Music‘ (2009) debuted at Number 1 on the Christian retail chart and Number 11 on the Billboard Top 200, also receiving a Grammy nomination.
‘Give Us Rest’ Track Listing:
Disc 1:
1. Requiem Aeternam Dona Eis, Domine
2. Oh Great God, Give Us Rest
3. Lux Aeternam Shine
4. Come Find Me
5. God Have Mercy (Kyrie Eleison)
6. Why Me?
7. Fall On Your Knees
8. A Burial
9. Let Me Feel You Shine
10. Reprise #1
11. Blessedness of Everlasting Light
12. The Sound of Light
13. Interlude
14. Sequence 1
15. Sequence 2
16. Sequence 3
17. Sequence 4
18. Sequence 5
19. Sequence 6
20. Sequence 7
Disc 2:
1. Reprise #2
2. Oh My God
3. I Am a Seed
4. After All (Holy)
5. The Great Amen
6. There Is a Sound
7. Oh, Great Love of God
8. Our Communion
9. Sometimes
10. A Return
11. Oh, My God I’m Coming Home
12. Leaning On the Everlasting Arms / ‘Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus (Medley)
13. Jesus, Lead Me to Your Healing Waters
14. Because He Lives
© Louder Than The Music
*This article first appeared in Louder Than The Music Magazine.
Playing “Reach,” “Matter of Faith” and other favorites from his widely acclaimed and first solo CD, on fire, Peter Furler will also draw upon his multiple radio hits spanning his career as founder of the newsboys during Christian music’s largest annual tour, Winter Jam. Joining Furler’s band during the tour is fellow artist and former newsboy bassist/vocalist, Phil Joel, who recently released his solo album, Playlist. Rounding out Furler’s band is Dave Ghazarian (Superchick) on guitar and Jeff Irizarry on drums.
The 48-city Winter Jam tour that begins today in Charleston also features Skillet, Sanctus Real, Kari Jobe, NewSong, Building 429, Group 1 Crew, illusionist Brock Gill and others in venues like American Airlines Center (Dallas), Fed Ex Forum (Memphis); Sprint Center (Kansas City), Time Warner Arena (Charlotte); AT&T Center (San Antonio), Phillips Arena (Atlanta) and more.
With multiple GRAMMY nominations and Dove awards, “Songwriter of the Year” nods and musical talent that has driven the sales of five RIAA Certified Gold records, over seven million albums sold and 25 No. 1 songs, Peter Furler adds to his accolades this week by gathering the No. 1 Christian song of 2011 in Australia with “Reach.” A featured track on his solo CD, “Reach” held the top spot on The Rock Across Australia (TRAA) Top 100 Song Chart for eight consecutive weeks. The song also became a multi-format top 10 single in the US as his current single, “Matter Of Faith,” hits Top 15 and continues to climb this week on the Billboard AC Indicator chart.
Furler makes his return to music after amicably ending his long tenure in 2009 as the lead singer of newsboys, the band he founded in Mooloolaba, Queensland, Australia. Refreshed and reawakened to the joy of music, Furler’s first solo album, on fire, released amidst wide critical acclaim on Sparrow Records and sparked cover features in CCM Magazine, Christian Musician, I Am Entertainment magazine and more. The album is available on iTunes, Amazon, Walmart, LifeWay Christian Stores or at favorite Christian retailers everywhere.
As one of the most successful, award-winning artists today continues his musical journey, Peter Furler is one of Australia’s biggest exports of any musical genre. Writing, producing, recording and singing such international classics as “He Reigns,” “Shine,” “Something Beautiful” and “It is You,” Furler has a raw honesty and ability to turn a rock show into a deep worship experience. He has collectively performed to over 15,000 Muslims in Morocco, for the Pope during World Youth Day, at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, at a 9/11 service for U.S. military leaders at the Pentagon, at a New Age festival on the shores of Galilee in Israel, rocked the punters at an outback pub in Australia, and was enthusiastically received last year in front of 20,000 people at Easterfest in Mooloolaba as his first concert since returning to music.
More information Peter Furler can be found at: http://peterfurler.com, www.facebook.com/peterfurlerofficial and http://twitter.com/PeterFurler.
According to reports, more than 42,000 tickets have been purchased for PASSION 2012 at the Georgia Dome, in downtown Atlanta. As of 30 December 2011 last week the entire event was sold out. This year’s conference runs from Monday, January 2 – Thursday, January 5, 2012 featuring renowned speakers Francis Chan, John Piper and Beth Moore and host, Louie Giglio.
Also featured will be all the sixstepsrecords artists as well special guests Hillsong United and Lecrae. This will also be the last concert performed by the David Crowder Band.
Passion conferences are designed to draw university-aged young people, and many participants have had their lives changed. “Passion 98 changed my life,” says a Texas man on the Passion 2012’s Facebook wall with the picture of a hat, which he says has accompanied him to over 26 nations. “Tomorrow it accompanies me, my wife and 10 students to Passion 2012 – I am hoping they bring back a Passion Hat this year!”
Passion seeks to engage the “university moment” with the compelling message of Jesus and the challenge to leverage life to make him famous. To achieve that purpose, tens of thousands of students who love Jesus will make a difference this year in the city and beyond. Upon registration, every attendee will bring towels and socks to donate to the city’s homeless community. By Jan. 5, more than 100,000 socks and 40,000 towels will be collected and donated.
As part of Passion’s “Do Something Now,” the participants will also raise $1 million to free, rescue and restore those entrapped in modern-day “slavery,” such as bonded laborers in India and girls and women trafficked to Western nations from Nepal and other developing nations. There are more slaves today than any other time in the history, according to Passion. The Do Something Now movement has raised over the past years more than $6 million to help end treacheries like sex trafficking, provide clean water and meet other pressing global needs.
The Passion movement began in 1995 with a stirring in the heart of Giglio to see college students across the globe “awaken to the reality of a glorious God and Creator.” Passion gathers college students from campuses and churches around the world and across ministry and denominational lines.
Popular speaker, author and Pastor of the uber-popular Lifechurch.tv which according to CNN boasts more than 4 million members, Craig Groeschel shared a picture of his Christmas present via twitter a few days ago. Groeschel posted this picture below with a caption that read:
If I gain weight, this is why. Thx@tomdfrench!http://pic.twitter.com/2jt1vbBm
Also Pastor Matt Carter, pastor of the Austin Stone Church in Austin, TX and former pastor of Chris Tomlin’s home church and pastor of NFL Cleveland Browns quarterback, Colt McCoy, posted a picture of his Christmas present with a caption that read:
I don’t know which one got the coolest gift.
Chris Tomlin Band lead guitarist and all-round musical genius Daniel Carson announced his Christmas engagement on twitter and facebook a few days ago.
According to reports the lucky lady is one Miss Bren Roberts who herself is on twitter here.
The announcement caption on Carson Twitter page simply read:
Congrats to the happy couple from all of us here at Awaken Generation!!!!
Mars Hill Bible Church founding pastor Rob Bell has written a farewell letter to the members of his congregation – thanking and warning them, and also making a confession.
“This church, this place, this community, was once simply a hunch. A dream. A vision. A picture in the mind of a new kind of church for the new world we find ourselves in,” he stated.
According to Bell, it was through the congregation that he was able to experience the joy of creation. “I will never be able to fully, adequately explain what it has been like to have imagined you, conceived of you – this church – and then have you exist.”
“Thank you. Thank you. Thank you,” he added. Bell also expressed gratitude for the responses of grief and support over the news of his departure. He told the congregation that this was significant and meaningful.
“Any change, even if it’s good, is always a form of loss, and loss must be grieved. That’s the only way it works,” he revealed. “You expressed your grief and then went on to make it very clear that whatever we would be up to next, you were cheering us on.”
Bell said the congregation’s support is significant because it shows the “belief that God is big” and any steps to share this love with more “people is movement in a life giving direction and that this same big, loving God is fully capable of taking care of all of us, whether we are together or apart,” he shared.
With that message of thanks, Bell went on to share the lesson he had learned from his many years as senior pastor of Mars Hill. He thanked his fellow brothers and sisters for teaching him to “find God in the full spectrum of human experience.”
“You have taught me not to fear the full spectrum of human experience but to embrace it, to celebrate it, to wallow in it and soar with it. Many Christians are eager to point out that Jesus said he was the Son of God and that’s the wedge issue, the divisive point you have to take a stand on,” he said.
He added, “I believe he is and in the same breath, I remind you that he also referred to himself a shocking number of times as the ‘son of man.’ ”
According to Bell, the “son of man” means human and that is shocking. “Take a stand onthat,” he urged.
Bell also warned Mars Hill members to never forget that the “movement is word to flesh” and to be cautious of those who would “take the flesh and want to turn it back into words.”
He also spoke of a lingering question – one that hung in the air, asking: “What will happen to Mars Hill?”
“When people ask ‘what about Mars Hill?’ or ‘what’s Mars Hill going to do?’ It’s as if Mars Hill is a disembodied reality with a life of its own,” Bell revealed. But, “here’s the twist: the church is not an inanimate, impersonal product. There is no ‘Mars Hill’ in theory. There is no abstract, disembodied entity Mars Hill apart from the people in this room who ARE Mars Hill.”
According to Bell, when people ask this question they are really asking, “What are you going to do?”
“You are the answer, because you are the church. Mars Hill is not a product, it is a gathering of people. You,” he stated.
Bell closed his letter with a confession – revealing that despite his 12 years as Mars Hill’s pastor, with all the experiences and sermons – he is just getting started.
“I feel like I’m just getting started,” Bell shared. “Like I’m a rookie, a freshman. I believe that that God has made this day. That it’s good. And you can have joy in it, even if you’re limping.”
He urged the congregation to make a confession with him – to say, “I feel like I’m just getting started.”
Bell announced in September that he was leaving the ministry after more than a decade of service. He revealed that his new calling involved moving his family to Los Angeles within the year to undertake several projects, which include penning more books and undertaking speaking engagements. He also recently wrapped up his “Fit to Smash Ice Tour” in Canada and the U.S.
The 42-year-old author has also stated that he will not be starting a new church. As Bell departs Mars Hill, teaching pastor Shane Hipps will be taking over in his stead at the Grandville, Mich., church.
READ:
BELOW IS COPY OF BELL’S FAREWELL LETTER:
dear mars hill,
to all the brothers and sisters of this church
to those who have been here from the beginning—who remember the old building, who braved that one
ten foot wide hallway, clogged shoulder to shoulder with people leaving the hangar to pick up their
children who had spent the previous hour packed into oxygen deprived classrooms
to those who hiked through the snow and slush and mud that first day to sit on the floor
who idled in long traffic jams to listen to sermons from the book of Leviticus on blood and guts and fire
and then to those of you who showed up for the first time last week
to those who have complained for ten years that there’s no sign out front and heard me respond time and
time again ‘yes, but you found it’
to those who were baptized in that nearby lake in those early days—especially those of you who were
baptized that one sunday when we didn’t know that all of those hundreds of fish had died earlier that
week and washed up on shore and so before you got baptized, you watched in horror as your fellow
church members wearing waders collected the dead, rotting fish in black trash bags and cleared out
enough space for you to wade in and celebrate your new life—
and then to those of you who have been baptized in this room, in an old former mall, standing here
soaking wet, surrounded by friends and family, cheered on by your tribe, not sure how to put it in words
but absolutely convinced that you in some way were tasting heaven on earth
to the young and to the old
to the hunters in your trucks who can’t grill it if you don’t kill it,
to the vegetarians in your prius’ wearing hemp underwear
to those on the right and those on the left
and to those of you who never removed your ron paul bumper sticker from the last election,
to the Dutch, and to the not much,
to Lions fans and to infidels,
to all of you wherever and however you find yourself
whatever size, shape, color, perspective, history, and background you bring to this gathering
grace and peace to all of you on this day.
kristen and i were out to dinner with some friends in october for a last meal before we moved. they have
been beloved friends of ours for ten years and at the end of the meal one of them took out several folded
pieces of paper as she told us that she had written us a letter, which she then read. in the letter she took
us back through our ten years together, remembering events and people and places and moments we
shared, several of which i had forgotten about. many times she would pause when she read about a
particular experience we had all shared together, and we would look around the table at each other as we
found ourselves visiting that day long passed. when she was done, there was not a dry eye around the
table. it was a sacred moment. a glimpse of the eternal in the now.
so as i’ve been thinking about my sermon here today, i found myself returning again and again to the
power of a good letter. someone may text you or ping you or email you or direct message you or contact
you on facebook—but none of those particular mediums of communication can begin to compare to a
letter in which the person has labored over every word, going back over it again and again and again,
crafting the phrases and searching for just the right word and turn of phrase to capture precisely what
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you want to say. technology has given us a wide array of methods to communicate and because of this
variety, it’s important we remember that there is a distinction to be made between diversity of form and
depth, significance, and soul.
so, i’ve written you a letter.
i’ll start with some thanks,
then a lesson you’ve taught me,
and then some warnings,
and then a confession.
first then, some thanks.
there is a pattern to the creative process. you start with an idea, a hunch, an image, a vision, a picture of
the thing you want to create. it may be a business or a painting or a mission or a cause or a new way to
empower people to help themselves or a basic need that is unmet or a song or a new way to landscape
your backyard or a product or a project for school or a piece of furniture or a new color for the walls of
your downstairs bathroom because you just can’t stand that awful shade of pale mustard that for some
unfathomable reason the previous owners thought looked good.
and so you set out to make it, create it, change it, fashion it, form it, organize it, and arrange it. and it
takes something out of you. you have to sweat, exert, and expend yourself. you have to gather or purchase
or harvest the materials. you make a plan, you design it, engineer it, make sketches, have meetings, do
research. you study how others have done similar things.
and then you get at it. as you work away, what was once just an idea, an abstraction in your mind, begins
to become a reality. whether it’s wood and nails or words or paint or a new flow of resources in a new
direction, at some point it begins to take shape. what once existed only in your mind begins to exist in
actual time and space. you can see it, taste it, hold it, admire it. and because it cost something, because it
only exists as a result of your sweat and blood, you have a visceral attachment to it. it came out of you.
and when it’s completed, you may be exhausted, spent, and ready for a rest, but you are exhilarated.
it’s late sunday night and you’ve been painting all weekend, and you’re sitting there on the floor in the
hallway outside that downstairs bathroom and you’re exhausted and it took way longer than you expected
and you smell and you need a shower and you have a bit of a buzz from all of those fumes, but you are the
king and queen of your empire because those walls are no longer that putrid shade of pale mustard.
they’re magenta.
or cranberry.
or sea foam green.
you have taken part in the mystery at the heart of creation. we’re here, somehow. our existence itself
continues to be a profound mystery. being itself raises more questions than it answers. this mystery takes
us deep in to the heart of the divine. when we create, we are participating in that mystery in a real and
tangible way.
this truth about the creative process brings me to you because
you
were
once
an idea.
this church, this place, this community, was once simply a hunch. a dream. a vision. a picture in the mind
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of a new kind of church for the new world we find ourselves in. a church that was fearless in confronting
the injustices and systems of oppression that lurk around every corner and at the very same time deeply
committed to the personal, intimate experience of following Jesus, of experiencing the joy and peace that
transcends space and time. a church that found the stale, old categories of liberal and conservative
boring and irrelevant because we’d experienced resurrection, which includes and affirms anything and
everything that brings liberating, new life wherever it’s found, irrespective of whatever labels and
categories it’s been given because of an abiding conviction that the tomb is,
after all,
empty.
a church where the main thing was actually the main thing.
a church that understood that there is a simplicity on the other side of complexity, aware of all of the
various interpretations and theological perspectives and complicated systems of thinking and analyzing
and yet with a clear, resolute sense that Jesus is doing something in the world, bringing water to the
thirsty, food to the hungry, peace to the restless, presence to the lonely and we are invited to join his
movement. that Jesus is ultimately not a proposition you intellectually assent to but a person you say
‘yes’to.
what matters then, is your ‘yes.’ with whatever you have, and whatever you don’t have. with whoever and
however you are or aren’t, wherever you’ve come from. what matters is our ‘yes.’
you,
my friends,
through you i have experienced the mysterious joy of creation. i will never be able to fully, adequately
explain what it has been like to have imagined you, conceived of you—this church—and then have you
exist. from those earliest discussions kristen and i would have in our early twenties, eating lunch at the
taco bell on colorado boulevard in los angeles, imagining what a church could be, to this very moment,
you have brought me the joy of creation.
thank you.
thank you.
thank you.
and then a second thanks.
in september when you learned that i would be leaving you, for many of you it was like a bomb going off.
you didn’t expect it, you weren’t looking for it, you got an email on a thursday and on the following sunday
you heard it directly from me. i have, since then, had the chance to personally interact with a large
number of you and you have been across the board extraordinarily consistent in your responses, which
have been two:
one: grief
and
two: support.
this is significant, and meaningful, for a number of reasons.
first, any change, even if it’s good, is always a form of loss, and loss must be grieved. that’s the only way it
works. stuff it, deny it, repress or suppress it and it will come back to a haunt you, it will lurk in the
shadows and it will resurface later.
your grief then, is a sign of health. it demonstrates an awareness of your interiors, your heart, and your
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desire to face and embrace what’s actually going on inside of you.
and then secondly, you have been supportive. at times, shockingly so, at least from my perspective.
some of you only had that thursday email and still, when you saw me, with no details, you expressed your
grief and then went on to make it very clear that whatever we would be up to next, you were cheering us
on. this is significant for a number reasons, namely, your belief that God is big and that any movement to
share this love of God with more people is movement in a life giving direction and that this same big,
loving God is fully capable of taking care of all of us, whether we are together or apart.
a story, to tell you why this means what it does to me.
several years ago there was a well known pastor who openly, publicly had a number of issues that he was
against, both morally and spiritually and politically. he was loud and outspoken about these particular
issues. it turns out that one of the issues he was most vocally opposed to was something that he himself
had been engaged in. upon this being revealed publicly, his church released him from his leadership
position. shortly after this, a friend of mine happened to meet him while visiting the same city and when
they began conversing, this pastor-in-exile expressed a great deal of stored up venom for his former
church that he had started, venting about how they had shot their wounded and they hadn’t extended him
grace and love and all that. he was shocked that they had treated him like they had.
here’s what i find so startling: he was complaining about how they dealt with him, but he’s the one who
shaped and taught and molded them. he merely found himself on the receiving end of how he had trained
them to be. he created and crafted the system to behave a particular way and then it behaved in that exact
way.
it’s easy to form a circle and pick up stones, taking turns quoting bible verses the whole time, ready to
unleash those stones on the one who’s guilty. it’s another thing to be the person standing in the middle of
that circle, desperate for one person, just one, to say “is any of you without sin?” those who have ears to
hear, let them hear.
so that’s the question you have as a leader, pastor, teacher,
the question you live with day in and day out: “are they getting it?”
i have tried to teach you about a big God, who holds all things, including us, in an unconditional, loving
embrace. i have tried to teach and model for you an unswerving hope and trust, that change and risk and
leaps of faith are normal and at times absolutely necessary for our growth and the continued expansion
of our hearts. so when, in this change, this loss, this transition, this departure, you have responded time
and time again with largeness of spirit and bigness of heart, with confidence that the God who got you this
far is fully capable of taking you the rest of the way, deeply attuned to your own emotions and responses
and at the very same time convinced that everybody will be just fine because what could possibly separate
us from the love we’ve tasted and experienced, the love of Christ that holds and sustains us all?
oh my. it’s so moving to me.
thank you.
thank you.
thank you.
with those two words of thanks, then onto a lesson that you’ve taught me.
for many people, the simple dualisms of right and wrong and good and bad are the sole prism, the lens,
through which they look for God in the world. so if things go well, then ‘God is good’ is how the thinking
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goes, and if things don’t go well, all kinds of questions arise about God and hope and faith and was it all
just a grand illusion in the first place?
the life we’ve found together, however, is far more subtle, nuanced, and complex than those simple
dualisms, and i’ve seen you discover this deep well of insight as it shapes you in profound ways.
i’ve seen you get cancer and struggle with infertility and attend funerals of people you love and get let go
from your jobs and lose tens of thousands of dollars and get sued and find out your kid is using drugs—
and at the same time i’ve watched you find God in the mess. in the tension. in the chaos. i’ve seen you find
peace and joy and calm and rest in situations in which everybody else is convinced that peace and joy,
much like Elvis, have left the building.
there’s an ancient midrash about jacob who wrestles the angel. they say that he walks with a limp
afterwards, but at least he’s experienced God.
i’ve watched many of you walk with a limp.
it’s a deeper wisdom you have attained,
a higher level of consciousness,
a more refined and ultimately more enduring way of seeing that you have acquired.
it’s a spirituality that doesn’t need quick and easy answers, it shuns the trite and cliché,
it understands Christ is here somewhere in this mess, and no matter how dark or foreboding it gets,
we will at some point see him,
friday will give way to sunday
and while there are blood and tears and heartache
and at times we’re barely holding on by our chiny chin chin
when we do stumble into the daylight, when we do find a little respite, a sliver of shalom,
when we eventually do meet the resurrected Christ
it will be real and it will matter and it will be true and
it will satisfy.
i’ve seen you lament and laugh,
cry and celebrate,
weep and wail
and then whoop it up,
pull your hair out from pain and frustration
and then dye it bright colors because someone’s throwing a party.
you have taught me not to fear the full spectrum of human experience but to embrace it, to celebrate it, to
wallow in it and soar with it. many Christians are eager to point out that Jesus said he was the son of God
and that’s the wedge issue, the crux of the faith, the divisive point you have to take a stand on. i believe he
is. and in the same breath, i remind you that he also referred to himself a shocking number of times as
the ‘son of man.’ you know what ‘son of man’ means?
human.
now that’s shocking.
take a stand on that.
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what he stressed, what he thought was a big deal, what he called himself time and time again, was son of
man. it is a big deal for a human to be divine, but if you’re looking to provoke, and if you want to focus in
on astounding claims he made about himself, how about the mind-bendingly revolutionary claim of the
divine being human?
weeping,
spitting in mud,
eating,
drinking so much he’s accused of being a drunk,
letting people clean his feet with oils,
inviting people to touch his wounded sides.
humanity, now that’s interesting.
Jesus invites us into the full spectrum of human experience,
from lament to exhilaration and everything in between.
from basking in the presence of God,
to cursing at the top of your lungs from the rooftops
because God is nowhere to be found,
shrieking till you’re hoarse ‘my God, my God, why have you screwed me’
now that’s life.
that’s real.
that’s divine.
you’ve shown me how to find God in the full spectrum of human experience.
so, there are some thanks,
and a lesson you’ve taught me.
now, some warnings.
first, there is a meta-movement in the scriptures, an arc to the unfolding story of redemption. it is the
movement from word to flesh.
think of the ten commandments. one of them is ‘don’t kill.’ it’s absolute base level requirements here:
could you just not murder each other? but then the story progresses, it evolves, and so later Jesus says
that greater love has no one than to lay down their life for another. and then he gives his life, out of love.
so the earlier ‘could you try not to kill each other?’ grows into ‘could you love with such fidelity and
devotion that you’d actually give your life for another?’
the command, the words, to protect and preserve life take on flesh and blood, to the point where it’s an
entire pervasive pattern of life, second nature, in which you seek the well being of others ahead of your
own.
word takes on flesh. this is the story of Jesus, the word, the creative life force of the universe, taking on a
body and moving into the neighborhood. so when Jesus talks about the kind of life God has for us, he talks
about us experiencing in flesh and blood a whole new way of being. serving, caring, discovering, thanking,
forgiving, loving, tasting, embracing, doing whatever we do for the least of these. it’s an embodied faith,
one that’s dirty and bloody with sleeves rolled up and sweat on the brow. it’s one where there’s plenty of
wine at the party.
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i write this to you because of how many of you have been challenged about your participation in the life of
this church, often with the accusation: but what do they believe over there at mars hill?
as if belief, getting the words right, is the highest form of faith.
Jesus came to give us life. a living, breathing, throbbing, pulsating blow your hair back/tingle your
spine/roll the windows down and drive fast/experience of God right here, right now.
word taking on flesh and blood.
and so you’ve found yourself defending and explaining and trying to find the words for your experience
which is fundamentally about a reality that is beyond and more than words.
so when you find yourselves tied up in knots, having long discussions about who believes what, a bit like
dogs doing that sniff circle when they meet on the sidewalk, do this:
take out a cup
and some bread
and put it in the middle of the table,
and say a prayer and examine yourselves
and then make sure everybody’s rent is paid and there’s food in their fridge and clothes on their backs
and then invite everybody to say ‘yes’ to the resurrected Christ with whatever ‘yes’ they can muster in the
moment and then you take that bread and you dip it in that cup in the ancient/future hope and trust that
there is a new creation bursting forth right here right now and then together taste that new life and
liberation and forgiveness and as you look those people in the eyes gathered around that table from all
walks of life and you see the new humanity, sinners saved by grace, beggars who have found bread
showing the others beggars where they found it
and in that moment
space
place
remind yourselves that
this
is
what
you
believe.
remember, the movement is word to flesh.
beware of those who will take the flesh and want to turn it back into words
flowing from this, then, a second warning.
there is a question that lingers in the air,
the question that people actually talk about
the question, of course, is ‘what will happen to mars hill?’
now please don’t be deceived by this question,
thrown off by it’s ubiquity,
misled by the way that it is freely, commonly asked, as if the answer is somehow out there somewhere
waiting to be discovered.
the way advertising works is you try and associate the impersonal, inanimate product you are selling with
something personal and embodied. sometimes famous people are paid large sums of money to endorse a
product, in the hope that whatever this person is known for, whatever they’ve accomplished or achieved,
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will, in essence, rub off on the product. so that you’ll think ‘michael jordan, the greatest basketball player
ever, is talking about this plain white t shirt that manages to keep its shape around the neck after
multiple wearings, so this must be the greatest plain white t shirt ever.’ that sort of thing. the effort, then,
is to associate the tangible product with an intangible value or concept embodied by a person. several
years ago apple began running those annoying/clever ads in which the nerdy pc has a stilted
conversation with the cool guy mac. microsoft took a beating in those ads, so they began running a series
of counter ads in which groovy hipster folks look at the camera and say ‘i’m a pc.’ once again, trying to
associate an inanimate, impersonal product with actual flesh and blood, breathing, living people.
you, my friends, have the opposite problem. when people ask ‘what about mars hill?’ or ‘what’s mars hill
going to do?’ it’s as if mars hill is a disembodied reality with a life of its own.
here’s the twist: the church is not an inanimate, impersonal product. there is no ‘mars hill’ in theory.
there is no abstract, disembodied entity mars hill apart from the people in this room who ARE mars hill.
so when people say what’s going to happen to mars hill? they’re asking what’s going to happen to you.
what are you going to do? how are you going to respond?
you are the answer,
because you are the church.
mars hill is not a product,
it is a gathering of people.
you.
that’s why there’s no sign.
how does a person find mars hill?
well, you have to meet one.
remember when woody yelled at buzz: ‘you are a toy!!!?’
i’m woody, yelling at you, buzz: you are a church!
you are the answer to the question what will happen to mars hill.
and so please,
i ask of you,
i plead with you,
to answer well.
prove them wrong.
bring your friends,
give money,
get more involved.
believe.
trust.
practice hope.
there is an essence to this place, a spirit. that’s how organizations and institutions and movements and
causes are: they develop patterns and energies that manifest themselves in fairly consistent ways over
time. and you know it the moment you walk through the door. you size a place up, you catch what’s in the
air, you read the body language of a place. you’re here because of the essence and spirit of this place.
people are welcome here, and they know it. Christ is alive here, healing people and liberating people and
giving new life. there is mission here, cause, purpose beyond these walls. and you know it. i know it.
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it’s a reverent hum just below the surface of everything we do here. you can taste it, feel it, smell it.
don’t mess with that.
protect that, preserve that.
you know what i’m talking about.
if you grumble and complain and become agitated and divisive you will ruin the pure, sweet, humble,
captivating essence that is present in the midst of this community.
when in doubt, stop talking and start praying.
breathe.
stay calm, be cool, be nonreactive. breathe some more.
once again, mars hill is going to be in new territory, trying things, experimenting, learning together where
the new life is.
it’s what we’ve been doing from the beginning.
if you want this church to be some other church,
then please leave this church and go to that church.
this church has it’s own unique path,
it’s own particular dna
and you must be true to it,
or you will lose something vital to who you are,
and why God brought you together.
in the coming days the question for each of you is: are you bringing hope and creativity and life here
or are you using your voice and power to cut it down? are you destroying something beautiful?
do you believe that this church’s best days are ahead of you?
if your answer is anything other than yes,
you are already answering the question.
this leads me to a universal truth:
people whisper sweet nothings to their lover
but they yell ‘fire.’
reflect on this with me.
love, whispered.
danger, yelled.
fear, it turns out, is often louder than love.
sometimes fear is good, and yelling even better,
especially when there actually is a fire.
but other times fear is toxic, destructive,
the opposite of love.
remember that.
look for it.
and call it out, confront it when you come across it.
fear has no place in this place.
when you’ve leaned over and looked into the tomb,
when you’ve ran huffing and puffing to your friends,
10
insisting in between breaths, ‘he isn’t in there!’
fear is no longer the game you’re playing.
you’ve been seized by hope.
and hope has it’s own rules.
and now for a confession.
i have tried my best to live at peace among you.
i have done everything i could to the best of my awareness to keep my side of the street clean.
i have tried to be a voice of hope, help, healing, and truth to you, year after year, sunday after sunday.
i have tried to apologize whenever i wronged you,
i have knocked on some of your doors,
asking for your forgiveness,
and you have been gracious,
and kind,
every time.
and so,
with all of these years here,
all these experiences,
all those sermons,
i confess to you today
that i feel like i’m just getting started.
like i’m a rookie, a freshman, a newb.
i feel younger than ever.
i feel like the world is big and wide and open and things are possible that if they were revealed right now,
we’d turn to each other to say ‘no way! that’s awesome!’
i believe that God has made this day,
that it’s good,
and you can have joy in it.
even if you’re limping.
can you make this confession with me today?
can you say with me ‘i feel like i’m just getting started?’
you can be old,
you can even be over 40,
you can have a lot of life behind you,
and yet you’re being renewed,
you’re being reborn,
you’re wide eyed and filled with wonder,
you’ve tasted and you’ve seen in such a way
that you realize
you’re just getting started.
the past and the present and the future begin
to meld into one giant eternal now
and you understand in that moment
what Jesus was talking about when he said
he came to give us that kind of life.
11
i feel like i’m just getting started.
i feel like i’m just getting started.
i feel like i’m just getting started.
from quantum physics, we’ve learned that when two subatomic particles are bonded, attached, together,
and then they’re separated they exhibit fascinating behavior. they demonstrate that they are aware of and
affected by that particle they were once attached to. this is called quantum entanglement. we’ve been
together for a number of years, and now we’re parting, but forever we’ll be entangled.
and i celebrate that.
and so i stand today in your midst,
happy, satisfied, anticipating magnificent tomorrows,
feeling like i’m just getting started,
and i say, until next time, with as much love as i can possibly muster:
grace and peace be with you.
your brother rob
On the heels of releasing their highly acclaimed rock worship project, God’s Not Dead, Newsboys will embark this spring on their biggest tour yet, the “God’s Not Dead Tour.” Kicking off Jan 12th and running through May 5th, the tour will run in over 60 cities across the U.S. The tour is presented by Compassion International, continuing their partnership with Newsboys to raise awareness for child sponsorships. Additionally, a special VIP Pre-Show Meet & Greet Experience will be held nightly with a portion of its proceeds going to support Compassion International’s child trafficking initiatives. Other major sponsors supporting the tour are I Am Second and Interstate Batteries.
Joining Newsboys on the tour will be special guests The City Harmonic (winners of GMA Canada’s New Artist of the Year award), the high-energy pop foursome Anthem Lights, and the rock-driven group Abandon. A special emphasis has been placed on outreach and evangelism, with youth evangelist Bob Lenz joining the tour to share a message of hope. Lenz’s non-profit organization, Life Promotions, will be building a network of supporting churches throughout the tour to facilitate the post-concert evangelistic efforts of the tour, with additional support from I Am Second. I Am Second, a movement meant to inspire all people to live for God and for others, is designed to help people discover their purpose in life.
Newsboys’ God’s Not Dead Tour Dates:*
January 12 – Holland, MI
January 13 – Anderson, IN
January 19 – Sheboygan, WI
January 20 – Port Huron, MI
January 21 – Menominee, MI
February 02 – Amarillo, TX
February 03 – Longview, TX
February 04 – Abilene, TX
February 09 – Temple, TX
February 10 – Carlsbad, NM
February 11 – Phoenix, AZ
February 12 – Tuscon, AZ
February 17 – Oceanside, CA
February 18 – Brentwood, CA
Feburary 19 – Sacramento, CA
February 21 – Layton, UT
February 23 – Anaheim, CA
February 24 – Redlands, CA
February 25 – Fresco, CA
February 26 – Bakersfield, CA
March 02 – Farmington, NM
March 03 – Lubbock, TX
March 09 – New Bern, NC
March 16 – St. Charles, IL
March 17 – Quincy, IL
March 22 – Barre, VT
March 24 – Lynchburg, VA
March 28 – Yankton, SD
March 29 – Indianola, IA
March 31 – Spencer, IA
April 05 – Edna, TX
April 06 – McAllen, TX
April 14 – Valdosta, GA
April 21 – Springfield, OH
April 22 – Wabash, IN
April 26 – Knoxville, TN
April 27 – Evansville, IN
May 03 – Menasha, WI
May 04 – Oak Creek, WI
May 05 – Flint, MI
*Dates and supporting acts are subject to change
Are you praying the right way? If you aren’t sure, you might want to take a lesson from Francis Chan.
The author of Crazy Love and other best-selling Christian books argues that some Christians aren’t praying the right way—they are too focused on their own needs rather than God’s mission. As Chan sees it, it’s no surprise that there are so many ineffective prayers that don’t get answered. Scripture, after all, warns about this.
“James 4 says a lot of times you’ll ask and you don’t receive because what you’re asking for you’re asking to spend on your own passions and no one warned me about that,” Chan said in his latest video in the Basic series.
A seven-part film series produced by NOOMA filmmakers, Basic is Chan’s response to his frustrations with the modern-day church. In the video, Chan challenges believers to examine the roots of the church and get back to the basics of prayer.
An always transparent Chan shared how he once thought he could just ask God for anything, as if He is a big genie in the sky. Now, Chan realizes he has to be more careful about his prayers, and he encourages other Christians to be more careful also.
“I would just start opening my mouth and talk to God about whatever, and there’s some truth to that. But I noticed in the Bible there are also some warnings that we have to be very careful how we approach God,” says Chan, former pastor of Cornerstone Community Church. “For example, Ecclesiastes 5 says guard yourselves, guard your steps when you go near to the house of God, and it says draw near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools who do not know that they are doing evil.”
As he looks at the way the disciples prayed in the days of the early church—and as he looks at the way Jesus taught us to pray—Chan says he realizes it’s a lot different from what he was taught. In response to this revelation, Chan has been diving back into prayer studies for the past few years. In the video, he shares insights from the Lord’s prayer.
“Think about these phrases now that we’ve been saying for years that maybe we didn’t mean, We used to say ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ We’re asking for our daily provision. Truth is, I think, if God just gave us our daily bread, many of us would be angry,” he says. “That’s all you’re going to give me? You’re just going to give me enough to sustain me for today? What about tomorrow or next year or 10, 20, 30 years from now? I want to know that I’m set up. And yet Jesus says just pray for your daily provisions.”
Chan also explored Jesus’ next petition about temptation and deliverance from evil.
“Haven’t you prayed that at times in your life when you were actually still holding on to some temptation? Maybe you weren’t even ready to let go of all of your sin and yet you’re saying it,” Chan says. “It’s like your words weren’t matching up to your heart.”
Chan says the verse of Scripture in the Lord’s prayer that scares him has to do with forgiveness.
“We’re saying ‘God forgive me in the same way as I have forgiven others.’ That scares me because I know I’ve prayed that while being angry at other people. I know I’ve prayed that prayer while I was still unforgiving,” he says. “So now when I’m telling God forgive me in the same way as I forgive other people, see, we need to be warned about this kind of stuff.”
With The Story tour making its rounds in venues across the country, The Story Bible from Zondervan continues atop the Bible best-sellers list for weekly sales ending Nov. 26, according to Pubtrack Christian data from the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA).
The remaining Bibles in the top five are: 2. NIV Life Application Study Bible, Italian Duo-Tone, carmel/dark carmel (Zondervan); 3. NIV True Images, Italian Duo-Tone, chocolate/bubble gum (Zondervan); 4. NIV Life Application Study Bible, Italian Duo-Tone, honeysuckle pink (Zondervan); and 5. NIV Faithgirlz! Bible, Italian Duo-Tone (Zondervan).
The Top 20 General best-sellers are: 1. Heaven is for Real, Todd Burpo (Thomas Nelson); 2. Longing, “Bailey Flanigan Series” No. 3, Karen Kingsbury (Zondervan); 3. Jesus Calling, Sarah Young (Thomas Nelson); 4. Heaven is for Real for Kids, Burpo (Thomas Nelson); 5. Nearing Home, Billy Graham (Thomas Nelson); 6. The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven, Kevin Malarkey, Alex Malarkey (Tyndale House Publishers); 7. Not a Fan, Kyle Idleman (Zondervan); 8. Coming Back Stronger, Drew Brees (Tyndale); 9. A Log Cabin Christmas Collection, Wanda E. Brunstetter, et al. (Barbour Publishing); 10. Jesus Calling: Large Print Deluxe Edition, Young (Thomas Nelson); 11. Crazy Love, Francis Chan (David C Cook); 12. Courageous, Randy Alcorn (Tyndale); 13. The Resolution for Men, Stephen Kendrick, Alex Kendrick, Randy Alcorn (B&H Books); 14. Every Day a Friday, Joel Osteen (FaithWords); 15. Through My Eyes, Tim Tebow (Harper); 16. Jesus Calling: Deluxe Edition, Young (Thomas Nelson); 17. Learning, “Bailey Flanigan Series” No. 2, Kingsbury (Zondervan); 18. Live Loved, Max Lucado (Thomas Nelson); 19. Christmas Stories, Max Lucado (Thomas Nelson); and 20. One Thousand Gifts, Ann Voskamp (Zondervan)
Top 10 Fiction: 1. Longing; 2. A Log Cabin Christmas Collection; 3. Courageous; 4. Learning; 5. A Lancaster County Christmas, Suzanne Woods Fisher (Revell/Baker Publishing Group); 6. Leaving, “Bailey Flanigan Series” No. 1, Kingsbury (Zondervan); 7. The Tehran Initiativeby Joel C. Rosenberg (Tyndale); 8. The Wonder of Your Love, “Land of Canaan” No. 2, Beth Wiseman (Thomas Nelson); 9. The Christmas Shoppe, Melody Carlson (Revell/Baker Publishing Group); and 10. Her Daughter’s Dream, “Marta’s Legacy” No. 2, Francine Rivers (Tyndale).
Sherwood Pictures’ latest movie, Courageous, will be released on DVD Jan. 17, with a special edition for Christian retail.
The Exclusive Collector’s Edition will include more than an hour of extra content not available in the general market version and will retail for $24.99. Also available only in CBA stores will be a DVD/Blu-ray combo pack with the additional material, retailing for $34.99. Both editions will be distributed by Provident-Integrity Distribution.
Details of the DVD release had been eagerly awaited by Christian retailers who reported strong sales for the filmmakers’ previous Fireproof when it was released for home viewing. Some credited the DVD and the accompanying book, The Love Dare, with helping them stay in business.
Opening in 900 theaters across the country Sept. 30, Courageous was among the nation’s top 10 box-office earners for three weeks. Stores will be offered a display that can carry the DVD and Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, the soundtrack and related book releases.
“We are very excited about Courageous—its box office, and even more importantly, its ministry impact,” said Randy Davis, vice president of sales & marketing at Provident-Integrity Distribution. “We believe that families across our country, and around the world, will be positively affected by this film. And similar to Fireproof, retailers across the country expect the Courageous brand, and specifically the DVD, to be the top-selling product in CBA over the next 18-24 months.”
Among the extras in the Exclusive Collector’s Edition will be the music video for Castings Crowns’ soundtrack song, “Courageous” and featurettes on the history of Sherwood Pictures and members of the volunteer production team at the Albany, Ga., church where the company is based. There are also episodes A Church of Prayer and The Importance of Fathers.
Other features include a making-of documentary, deleted scenes and bloopers, and a commentary by Sherwood Pictures co-founders and filmmaking brothers Alex and Stephen Kendrick.
Family Christian Stores is offering the DVD for a pre-buy price of $19.98, with a free copy of Building a Courageous Home (a $9.99 value), featuring the Kendricks and including family activities.
Three Judson Press authors are taking to the airwaves to share their inspiring stories. Janet Perez Eckles, author of Simply Salsa: Dancing without Fear at God’s Fiesta, shares the heart-wrenching story of her loss of sight and the murder of her youngest son.
Upcoming interviews include:
Also a frequent radio and television guest, Anita Mellott, author of School is Where the Home: 180 Devotions for Parents, has been speaking on the topic of homeschooling.
Anita’s upcoming interviews include:
Fans of Thousand Foot Krutch most likely already know about the band’s anticipated 2012 new studio album, The End Is Where We Begin, but what they might not know is that TFK will be releasing the record completely on their own for the first time in over ten years. To help finance the completed record and the production of new CD pressings and shirts and such, the band has launched a Kickstarter campagin in support. They have until the end of the year to raise $40,000, but are already close to breaking that goal as this report goes to print. Check out the band’s announcement below…
We are just finishing up our new album “The End Is Where We Begin” and we want you to be a part of the journey! We will be releasing this new album on our own—with your help! We can not thank all of you enough for your support so far. We could not be here without you and now you can play an important part in helping us launch our new album.
This is a great way for us to connect more with you, by offering some exclusive and unique packages related to the new album. We couldn’t be more excited about this. We will keep you up to date here as much as we can – everything from the tour, to the artwork, to the ideas and everything in between as our plan begins to take shape. And of course…the music! We are most excited to share some of that with you as quick as we can! And there are some cool ways for us to do that. We hope that you find the support pledges exciting, as we had fun dreaming them up! Please make sure that any of your friends that are fans of TFK are aware of our new adventure.
P.S. We know that our fans are the best. Let’s show the world the strength of the TFK community. If we hit our goal in 1 day, then we will make one new song from the new album available to everyone (for free!) by Friday December 2nd!
Thanks so much for taking part in this journey with us,
TFK
Visit the band’s Kickstater page here and join us in supporting TFK!
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Jesus have mercy
Oh have mercy
Oh God have mercy
Oh God have mercy
Jesus have mercy
Oh have mercy, mercy
Oh my God what have I done
Oh my God what have I done
What have I done
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Lord have mercy
Oh Christ have mercy
Have mercy
Oh we will bend and break
In such a fragile state
We won’t be here long
No, we won’t be here long
Kyrie eleison
The one who I’ve searched for
For so long has come
With open arms
Today is the day of glory
Today is the day I’m home
Oh day, what a day
Oh day, I’m yours
Oh day of resurrection
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Again
Today is the day I rise like the dawn
Up out of death
To a Son, to a Son
Oh day, what a day
Oh day, I’m yours
Oh day of resurrection
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Beat the drum and say no more
The heart and mind and soul have flown
Oh what am I to do
Oh what am I to do
Beat the drum and say no more
Drift away with you my love
Oh what am I to do
Oh what am I to do
But surrender
To you
You come and find me, find me and I
Oh I come alive
Oh I come alive
What can I do but offer my life
And I come alive
Oh I come alive
Oh great God give us rest
We’re all worn thin from all of this
At the end of our hope with nothing left
Oh great God give us rest
Oh great God do your best
Have you seen this place it’s all a mess
And I’ve done my part to well i guess
Oh great God do your best
Could you take a song and make it thine
From a crooked heart twisted up like mine
Would you open up Heaven’s glory light
Shine on in and give these dead bones life
Oh shine on in and give these dead bones life
Let it shine, let it shine
On and on, on and on, come to life
Former Superbowl MVP and devout Christian Kurt Warner, remarked in a recent interview that Tim Tebow take it easy with all the God stuff every time. Speaking to the Arizona Republic, Warner said,
“You can’t help but cheer for a guy like that, but I’d tell him, ‘Put down the boldness in regards to the words, and keep living the way you’re living. Let your teammates do the talking for you. Let them cheer on your testimony.’
“I know what he’s going through, and I know what he wants to accomplish, but I don’t want anybody to become calloused toward Tim because they don’t understand him, or are not fully aware of who he is. And you’re starting to see that a little bit.”
Since officially becoming a starter in the NFL Tebow has gotten known for his praying on the sidelines, his frequent references to Jesus in interviews, and praying with players from opposing teams after games. While many Christians laud Tim for his bold stance, many are questioning the wisdom of this approach.
But Warner’s advice to Tebow is to limit that outward expression of religion on the field to avoid alienating coaches, players and fans and instead the right time to share his message.
“There’s almost a faith cliche, where (athletes) come out and say, ‘I want to thank my Lord and savior,’ Warner told the Republic. “As soon as you say that, the guard goes up, the walls go up, and I came to realize you have to be more strategic.
“The greatest impact you can have on people is never what you say, but how you live…. You set the standard with your actions. The words can come after.”
What do you think of Warner’s comments? Is he correct or mistaken on what Tebow’s doing?
Tim Tebow prays with members of both teams after their overtime win against the San Diego Chargers.
Matt Redman
“Don’t let your life give evidence against your tongue. Sing with your voices… sing also with your conduct.” St Augustine
Canadian Christian band trio, High Valley, won 5 big awards at the recent GMA Covenant Awards in Canada. High Valley won five categories that included: Group of the Year, Artist of the Year, Country/Bluegrass Song of the Year (“The Father’s Love”), Country/Bluegrass Album of the Year (High Valley), and Video of the Year (“A Father’s Love”).
“I’m so proud of High Valley and the Covenant awards they won recently,” says Jeff Berry, manager, Eaglemont Entertainment. “They are one of the hardest working artists out there and I’m proud to be on their team. Though they have had great success with four top 20 country singles in Canada this past year, they spent many of their early days singing in churches so it’s very special that the GMA community would honor them in this way.
High Valley signed with Centricity Music in 2007, and the group is comprised of three brothers: Brad Rempel (lead singer/guitarist), Curtis Rempel (background vocals/mandolin), and Bryan Rempel (background vocals/bass), who hail from Alberta, Canada. Within the last year, Brad has moved to Nashville with his wife and two children and is becoming a well-known songwriter in the country music community, having co-written with such high-profile writers as Rivers Rutherford (“When I Get To Where I’m Going,” “Real Good Man”) and Casey Beathard (“No Shirt, No Shoes, No Problems,” “Right Where I Need to Be”). High Valley’s video for “On The Combine” just went into rotation at CMT Pure Country and is part of the fan voting for Pure 12-Pack Countdown each week. The group has garnered quite a loyal fan following in Canada, and now also in the states, where they have played festivals/concerts with such superstars as Carrie Underwood, Reba McEntire, and Michael W. Smith. They played their first concert at CMA Music Fest last year on the Hard Rock outdoor stage to a tremendous response from the crowd.
#Greatness is a process.If your willing to go through the lows and highs to get there is what separates us from being good & being #Great
According to a piece in Publishers Weekly, News Corp. is paying $200 million for Thomas Nelson, the parent company of HarperCollins, which was disclosed in its quarterly filing on Friday. In 2006, InterMedia paid $473 million for the publisher, which had sales of $253 million at the time.
The filing reiterated News Corp. still hopes to complete the purchase before the end of the year, following regulatory approval and the completion of other closing procedures.
Centricity Music’s high-profile band, Downhere, won two major categories during the recent GMA Covenant Awards in Canada. The group won Song of the Year (“Let Me Rediscover You”) and Pop/ Contemporary Album of the Year (Two At A Time). Two At A Time was released in the summer of 2010 and had two new songs plus B-sides and demos in order to satisfy the high demand for new Downhere music between albums. Downhere’s current project, On The Altar Of Love, released in late August and as a result didn’t qualify for this year’s awards.
“It is such a thrill when artists we have been developing and working with get the recognition they deserve,” states Steve Ford, VP of marketing, Centricity Music. “To have Downhere continue to garner the accolades from their Canadian fans is overwhelming.”
Downhere continues to generate tremendous reviews for their projects, with JesusFreakHideout.com calling On The Altar Of Love “one of the best releases of the year.” The band is currently on The Called To Love Tour with labelmates Jason Gray and Aaron Shust, which ends Nov. 13 in North Carolina. Downhere will launch their highly anticipated How Many KingsChristmas tour on Dec. 1 in Overland Park, KS. At the same time, co-lead singer Marc Martel has become a music sensation with his Queen Extravaganza video audition that generated more than 4 million hits. It led to an appearance on the Ellen Show, winning the MTV O Awards 2011 for Best Fan Cover and Queen drummer Roger Taylor announcing in a FOX News interview that Martel “is an extraordinarily good singer.” The fan voting process begins Nov. 14 at www.queenextravaganza.com and concludes Nov. 25. Winners for the Queen Extravaganza Live Tour will be announced in December.
When you are in a touring band, there is a lot of time that is spent waiting. Waiting to board a plane, waiting for the bus to arrive at the venue, waiting for sound check…etc One of the many games that people in our band have implemented now and then to fill the waiting time is a little game we might call the “Christian or secular” game. Basically the game is simply playing a very short clip of music and having someone guess whether it is “Christian” or “secular” music. The person who is most accurate with his or her guesses is the winner.
This is surprisingly easy to do.
Especially when you talk about radio stations. It is easy for me to spot a Christian music radio station within about 3 seconds. Far before any Christian lingo is uttered to make it clear.
It’s weird. I’m always trying to figure out what it is that makes something sound like Christian music, because there’s definitely something… I’d love to get some of your thoughts about it. But for me (and I’m actually one of the better players of the game if I must say so myself), I find something very disingenuous about most Christian music. This is something I can simply feel at a gut level. If I hear a song, and I hear any sort of pretending or false emotion, that’s a good first indicator. I’m really not trying to throw mud here, I’m being honest at how I am good at this game. Christian music often has a sheen to it that other music doesn’t have. Some pop and country music has a similar sheen, but the Christian sheen is like a blander sheen somehow.
The vocals are always really hot in the mix because for Christian music, the words are the most important part. That’s kind of similar to country though as well, so you have to be careful there. Country has some of the same Nashville tones, players, and compression styles that Christian music has most of the time, but the twang is just a little deeper with the country side of things. There’s also a little more “humanness” or “soul” in Country to my ears.
The false emotion that I’m talking about might be familiar to some of you. There’s just something more believable about the whispery sexy voice that is singing about sex on the mainstream radio station than the voice that copies that style of singing while putting lyrics in about being in the arms of Jesus. And it’s really not even the style or the lyric that is the problem to me, it’s the fact that I don’t believe that the singer is feeling the kind of emotions in singing that lyric that would lead to that style of singing. It’s that same kind of creep out that you feel when somebody gives a really loud fake laugh. It’s just weird and uncomfortable feeling.
An example of this would be a song that somebody sent us recently of an older song of mine called “Wrap Me In Your Arms.” The lyric is a very intimate and soft sort of lyric. “Take me to that place where I can be with you, you can make me like you…etc” This person did a hardcore/screamo version of this song. Not just like getting a little loud, I mean full out death metal sounding, demon-voiced screaming. It was so freaking weird mostly because it seemed so disingenuous. You would never speak such gentle words to someone you loved by screaming in their face like you were possessed by Beelzebub. That’s an extreme example, but it’s very typical of the basic premise of most Christian music to me, which is–use whatever musical style you wish as a medium to communicate your message. It’s not about the art, it’s about the message. So use whatever tools and mediums you have at your fingertips to do so. If you want to reach emo kids, then sing emo music but with Jesus language. The problem with this is that emo music is not simply reducible to certain sounding tones and chords. There are emotions and attitudes of different genres of music that are the soul of the music. You can’t remove the anger from screamo and have it still be screamo. It’s the soul of that music, whether that soul is good or evil is not the point, simply that it is the soul. So when you remove the soul from music and transplant the body parts (chord changes, instrumentation, dress, lights, and everything but the soul…) and parade it around with some more “positive” lyrics posing as Christian music, then what you have is a musical zombie.
It looks like a human.. It eats like a human… It still walks and makes noise and resembles a human, but it’s not. It’s a zombie. It has no soul. It just uses it’s human body for its own purposes.
This is what I initially feel when I play the “Christian or secular” game. I look into its eyes, and I perceive whether the thing has a soul or not. And 9 times out of ten, I can do it very quickly and efficiently.
Why is this like this? I don’t know, and it makes me very sad. I don’t hate all Christian music. There are a few artists that I know in the Christian industry that are really trying to transcend the inherent limitations and zombying effect of the industry. But the industry as a whole is broken, friends. We call it Christian, but it’s certainly not based in Christianity. It is based on marketing. That’s it. I wish I could tell you otherwise, but it wouldn’t be true.
Example:
We just were part of one of the biggest tours of the fall in the Christian music industry. To my knowledge, every night but one night was sold out, and that’s because they added a second show in the same city kind of last minute. The interesting thing about this tour was that it was pretty much in all mainstream venues. Clubs, theatres…etc It was awesome.
But you know what made me sad? That empty bar every night.
Even though these shows were all sold out, I would imagine that the bartenders at all those clubs were like “oh man, Christian night… that means no tips for me.”
Sometimes the promoters would just buy out the bar so there wouldn’t be any liquor sales at all.
I’m not saying that I wished that everybody was getting hammered at the show… But for crying out loud, buy one beer. Or heck, if you don’t drink beer, buy a Coke.
But here’s what is super weird about this situation. I bet you if you took all of those Christians that came to the shows and split them up and had them go to “secular” shows, A LOT of them would have bought a drink. It’s the fact that there is this assumption among all of the Christians there that having a drink at a Christian event is sort of a questionable thing to do.
Why is this?
It’s certainly not because of the Bible. Jesus’ first miracle was turning water into wine at a wedding. And not just any wine. The kind of wine that made people think they saved the very best wine until the end. And you preachers who pervert the scriptures with your own extremely biased interpretations, here’s a news flash, people at parties don’t think the best wine is non-alcoholic grape juice. Religious people didn’t call Jesus “a glutton and a drunkard” because he ate communion loafers and grape juice all of the time.
Sheesh. It’s just so ridiculous to me.
And here’s the thing. I don’t even drink very much. I’ve never really been drunk, and I’m not advocating that people should just be foolish with their drinking or eating habits. But for crying out loud, this whole spiritualizing of alcohol being an inherently bad thing is so annoying. It’s mostly just an American thing, by the way (as well as places where America has exported these ideas with our missionaries). If you go most other places in the world, or anywhere else in history for that matter, Christians drink alcohol. Ever heard of a little thing called Communion? You know, the bread and the wine? That’s a pretty big deal in Christianity. Jesus didn’t pour out a cup of grape juice.
Man alive.
You know what the alcohol thing is based on? You ready for this? You sure?
Money.
Old people are the people that give the most money to Christian organizations like religious media outlets. And old people grew up in a time where alcohol was seen as a taboo social reality. Just like dancing or playing cards or “mixed bathing” (swimming). It’s based in an era of prohibition. These are old American values that we’re dealing with, not Christian values. It’s the old American people that have money that the Christian organizations do not want to offend. So they create an environment where drinking is seen as evil. If you want to start a television ministry, you can’t have it known to your donors that your staff likes to go out for drinks after work. So you implement rules for them. Do you know how common this is? I have friends that have lost their jobs over crap like this.
Do you see the irony of this? If you had been a disciple of Jesus and drank some of the wine of his first recorded miracle with him, you would be fired from a lot of the churches in this country. Shame on us.
So the point? (I haven’t forgotten) The point is that the industry that labels things as Christian and sells them to you has far more to do with marketing then Christianity. They are marketing to the mixed bag of values that has created the Evangelical Christian subculture. It’s a mix of some historically Christian values, some American values, and a whole lot of cultural boundary markers that set “us” apart from “them.” This sort of system makes us feel safe and right, and it makes some of its gatekeepers very wealthy and powerful.
The effect is then the filtering down of this subculture to people that don’t necessarily want to think through the viability of every one of these boundary markers, but in their simple desire to belong to what they consider the good guys, they acquiesce to the rules handed to them. At least in public. As the joke goes, why do you take two Baptists with you when you go fishing? Because if you only bring one, he’ll drink all your beer.
Here are some of the actual effects of this subculture though.
1. It makes us dishonest
When the foundation of the market and music you are trying to make is pretense, it’s very hard to be honest and successful. There is an unspoken assumption from most of us that we really want the people on the stage or on the book or album cover or on the radio need to have it together more than we do. Because we are messed up, we need them to be a sort of savior and hope for us. The result of this is that it’s often the people who are really good at pretending that they have it all together that make it to the stage and the book or album cover and the radio stations.
So Christians that would normally buy a beer don’t because they are in the Christian concert. Christian bands that smoke (which a lot of them if not most of them do, including some of my players) have to duck into back alleys as to not offend anybody. I think smoking is stupid. But I think it’s stupid because it smells bad and it kills you. I don’t use my religion to judge other people about it.
Rather than just being honest about where we are at and what we all struggle with though, we look to our gatekeepers to believe and live morally vicariously for us. That way we feel better about being part of the system of good, and the moral brokenness in our own lives is repressed like the fear of a child with her security blanket.
This sort of dishonesty is at the heart of much of what I and so many others find so repulsive about much of modern American Christendom
2. It kills creativity
I had a conversation with John Mark McMillan last night about something that I think is very interesting. By the way, I consider John Mark to be one of the ones I consider to be making a valiant effort in transcending some of these imposed limitations in this industry. But he mentioned to me how strange it is that people keep calling his new album “creative.” That word is actually one of the most used words when people describe our music as well. In fact, I bet some of you reading this have described as such. Here’s the weird thing about this…
Why do you find it necessary to say that?
Do you notice that nobody really uses that word about other types of music? I just was perusing some Itunes user reviews to see if this holds up. I checked John Mark and mine, and “creativity” is very often found. But it’s not often found in reviews of bands like Sigur Ros, Bon Iver, Radiohead, Sufjan Stevens or other artists who are certainly very “creative.”
Nobody goes to an art gallery and says, “boy, that painting is so creative.” Why? Because it’s art! Of course it’s creative! Why else would it be there? It’s very nature is creativity. Or like Lisa pointed out to me today, “that would be like saying, I love your house, it’s so architectural.”
But when someone in the Christian industry actually takes their art seriously, everybody is like “holy crap, listen to how creative it is!”
It’s like a person that’s been living among zombies for years seeing an actual human being and exclaiming, “wow, look at how clean her face is! She doesn’t even have any blood on it or anything!”
I’m not slamming the people that describe our music as creative. I appreciate the kindness that’s behind the words, but it does make me sad that the idea of creativity is so foreign to our industry that we have to actually point it out when someone actually sees the art as art and not zombie propaganda. Ok, that might have been a little much. But I like the sentence so I’ll leave it.
So that’s why I’m good at the Christian or secular game. I’ve seen behind the curtain, and I know the little man that’s pulling the levers, and he’s not impressive. I recognize his voice at this point, and it’s all over religious media.
Why am I writing this blog?
Some of you have commented in the past when I’ve been critical of the Christian music industry that I’m being hypocritical by still being a part of it. I don’t see it that way. I actually love a lot of the individual people in the industry. There really are some amazing people in it, many of who share my weariness about the way things have been. And I also love you guys. I love our fans. I love the people that we get to meet and I love being able to get our music to them. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try our best to purify the systems that we are part of. I just want to be honest about what I see and call us to find better ways of doing things.
Two quick recommendations and I’ll stop this blog that has already gone on WAY too long:
Consumers: I would suggest that you actively support those artists that you love that the industry hasn’t necessarily bought into. The cards are stacked against people that actually want to do honest creative art in this industry, and the people that try really need your direct help and support to have any chance. For us, we’ve had one guy for instance that has been sending us a check every month for years because he appreciates what we are trying to do. Do you know how much that one family has helped us stay encouraged? Even if it’s not a huge amount of money or anything, just having people behind you in this sort of battle is really helpful.
Industry people: Stop being so afraid. I know you want things to be different than they are as well. I know you want creativity to be valued as much as “Becky” analysis, but we need some of you to have some balls and make some decisions based on that value system. Yes money matters. But so does beauty. Art actually makes a difference in the world. Have the courage to actually make decisions on values and not simply on past numbers and trends. And for crying out loud, if it really is good, the numbers will follow eventually anyway.
Artists: Take heart. I think the tides may be turning. The recent attention and success of our band speaks to it I think. People are growing weary of the status quo. The machine and its sheen have seen its strongest days. So I encourage you as well to not be afraid. Your art is worth making even if the industry around you isn’t quite ready for it yet. Make it and let them catch up with you. Your art is sacred. Be honest. Be brave. And don’t let the markets or the industry be the final filter on your art, let your heart do that. Ok that’s all from me tonight.
Francis Chan, pastor and best-selling author of Crazy Love and Forgotten God, talked about his own experience as a Christian college student during Monday’s convocation in his first visit to Liberty University.
Chan’s message was about living biblically, while staying culturally relevant, to effectively make disciples for Christ. He reflected on his time as a student at a Christian college in California, saying his five years there were some of the worst in his life in terms of living out his faith.
“I was doing a lot of Christian things, but I didn’t have the intimacy with God that I have today,” Chan said.
He spoke about his struggle with hypocrisy because he was surrounded in a Christian culture that fueled complacency rather than a faith-driven lifestyle. During this time he said he “lacked peace” because he was comfortable in going through the motions.
“I’m at the most peace when I’m living by faith,” he said. “I want to look like a guy that walked out of the Bible, not one who walked out of the Bible belt.”
He explained that many times people think Christians are “weird” and “socially awkward” because they lack relevancy to the latest trends and relationship building that is vital to making disciples.
Chan reminded students “to work hard to stay in the world”—engaging the world without compromising.
He encouraged students to follow the example of the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23, making disciples but not being consumed by the Christian “culture.”
“[We must] be able to look at someone in the eye and tell them about what’s most important to us,” he said.
Chan is a founding pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi, Calif. After recently stepping down as pastor, he is pursuing church planting work in San Francisco where he resides with his wife, Lisa, and their five children. He speaks at several conferences a year.
Ron Luce, the founder and president of Teen Mania Ministries, has publicly criticized cable news network MSNBC in recent weeks for the recent airing of its documentary “Mind Over Mania” wherein the network explores some of the inner workings and allegations of former Teen Mania Honor Academy alumni. Response to the documentary from past members about the portrayal of the ministry on TV has drawn both fierce criticism and praise. Clearly there is a huge difference in opinion between past members about the impact of Teen Mania’s Honor Academy.
Luce accused the station of using misleading sound bites and clips of events to cast an inaccurate and clearly negatively biased view of the Texas-based ministry. Saying, also that the network “lied to” and intentionally mislead Teen Mania staff and students about the goal of the documentary in order to gain access to interviews.
MSNBC has since fired back at Luce and Teen Mania, saying all allegations against their practices and documentary are false and unfounded. “MSNBC strongly disagrees with Mr. Luce’s characterization that what was broadcast in Mind Over Mania was inaccurate. MSNBC did not approach Mr. Luce and his group under false pretenses and we have shared those thoughts with Mr. Luce,” the network was quoted as saying. The documentary features Honor Academy alumni who say the program was more damaging than positive.
Viewer responses to the documentary on social networking sites have been divided and conflicted. With some praising the documentary and others lamenting what they view as obvious media bias. Teen Mania, has also released a statement saying, they “welcome any question of our motives and our methods in communicating the gospel of Jesus Christ and are dedicated to using feedback to create a better experience for the young people we serve, but MSNBC’s Mind Over Mania segment ultimately takes issue with the fact that many of the Biblical tenets celebrated in Christianity are at odds with our current culture.”
The debate continues.
David M. Edwards’ song, “Rising Up To Heaven,” was chosen to be the theme song of Regent University’s Global Day Of Worship, which is taking place this Friday, Nov. 11, 2011. The single hits INSPO radio for a sneak peak on Friday.
“I’m honored to be able to share new music from Rising Up To Heavenwith a global audience,” said Edwards, recording artist, creative director of the International Center for Worship and artist-in-residence at Regent University. “It is an exciting day for Regent University to host many talented worship artists gathered together for a common goal – to praise and lift up the name of Jesus Christ.”
The four-track EP is released by Maranatha! Music and produced by Phil Sillas. Rising Up To Heaven will be officially released digitally on Nov. 22, 2011.
“Maranatha! Music is thrilled to partner with Regent University for the Global Day of Worship, and we are delighted to work with David on his new project, Rising Up To Heaven,” said Randy Alward, president of Maranatha! Music. “He is a gifted songwriter and worship leader and has a unique ability to engage an audience of worshippers.”
The Global Day of Worship is a 24-hour worship event that takes place on Friday Nov. 11, 2011, at Regent University in Virginia Beach, VA. Worship artists from across the country and around the globe will gather for worship and the launch of Regent University’s new International Center for Worship. Edwards will perform along with Andrae’ Crouch, Aaron Keyes, Le’Andria Johnson, MANIFEST, Adlan Cruz, Sillas, and others.
Edwards released “Here With You” earlier this year through Maranatha! Music and EMI CMG Distribution. Edwards is the author of Worship 365: The Power of a Worshiping Life and the Worship 365 events. He is a columnist for Rev! Magazine and a popular conference speaker.
For more information on David M. Edwards, visitwww.davidmedwards.com.
For more information on Maranatha! Music, go towww.maranathamusic.com.
For more information on the Global Day of Worship, visitwww.globaldayofworship.com.
The Tim Tebow Foundation and CURE International are building a children’s hospital in the Philippines’s Davao City.
Dubbed the Tebow CURE Hospital, the surgical facility will offer 30 beds and focus primarily on orthopedics. Ground will break in January and the hospital is expected to open its doors in mid-2013. The project marks the first effort in a partnership announced in October.
Choosing the Philippines for the first Tebow-CURE hospital is no coincidence. Tebow, the starting quarterback for the Denver Broncos and a Heisman Trophy winner at the University of Florida, was born there.
“I was born in the Philippines and my parents have been missionaries to that area since 1985. The Philippines have always had a special place in my heart,” Tebow says. “I’m excited to be a part of this hospital that will bring healing to thousands of children who would not otherwise have access to care.”
The hospital, which is CURE’s first in the Philippines and 12th worldwide, will be on the island of Mindanao, a particularly poor area of the Philippines.
“Throughout the world, 80 million children suffer every day with crippling conditions like clubfoot and spine deformities, conditions that are correctable with surgery,” says Dr. Scott Harrison, the founder and president of CURE International. “We feel blessed that the Tim Tebow Foundation has chosen to partner with us to bring first-world quality care and spiritual healing to the children of the Philippines.”
The hospital will house a Timmy’s Playroom, which will provide faith, hope and love to children before and after their surgeries. It will be the Tim Tebow Foundation’s first international playroom.
The construction project is expected to cost $3 million, with donors from CURE and the Tebow Foundation sharing the costs. About one-third of the children treated at the hospital are expected to be charity cases.
San Francisco’s Tenderloin district houses 37,000 people in 586 apartment buildings—all in just one square mile. San Francisco City Impact dreams of planting churches in those apartment buildings—in every single one of them.
Francis Chan, author of Crazy Love and former pastor of Cornerstone Community Church, is working with the team, called Adopt a Building. SFCI is on mission to “holistically heal and transform” the San Francisco community through urgent relief works and preventive works.
The urgent relief works provide food, clothing, healing housing and rescuing for those in crisis; the preventive works of educating, counseling, training and spiritual discipleship exist to make sure the cycles of poverty and despair are not repeated.
The Adopt a Building method will pick an apartment building and assemble a prayer team to pray for those residents. Then a “grace team” will go door to door, visiting each unit in the building.
The grace team will ask residents if there is anything they need—food, medical or school supplies, prayer. The grace team members are there to say, “We don’t want anything from you, we just want to give,” Francis Chan explains.
The grace team will compile a list of needs and prayers for residents and return the next week to deliver what was requested. This allows the teams to continue conversation they started the week before and ask if prayer requests were answered.
Chan says if a residents’ prayer requests are answered, the grace team can ask if they’d like to know about God. The ministry would then bring in a discipleship team, which teach the residents how to study the Bible and know God for themselves.
“Our ultimate goal is that we would train some of these people and teach these people so well that eventually there would be a leader in that building who would gather the other believers together and even be the pastor of that apartment building,” Chan explains. “And our goal is to go to every single building and plant a church.
“I know that sounds a little far-fetched or maybe crazy to you, but we believe it can be done and we believe this is something God wants to do.”
Christian Huang, operations director for Adopt a Building, says the team will use a discipleship curriculum Chan is working on to train the pastors.
The ministry had a launch meeting Sunday night with 65 volunteers. They are currently working in four buildings, but hoping to add more in the near future.
“We believe God is gonna answer the prayers of his people and He’s gonna show His power,” Chan says. “We believe for His church to be established down here.”
WATCH:
An MSNBC documentary about Teen Mania Ministries suggests the Christian youth organization Ron and Katie Luce launched in 1984 may be a cult.
Teen Mania Ministries has sent more than 67,000 teens on mission trips with its Global Expeditions arm. More than 6,000 have participated in the Honor Academy, a yearlong internship for high school graduates and young adults to provide leadership training and present opportunities to grow in God. And more than 1 million have attended Acquire the Fire Youth rallies. Hundreds of thousands of teens have accepted Christ through Teen Mania programs.
Nevertheless, five former interns for Teen Mania say the ministry caused them harm. There is also a group of former Honor Academy interns that are making claims of spiritual abuse.
Awaken Generation sat down with Ron Luce to discuss the MSNBC documentary, called “Mind Over Mania,” which portrays Teen Mania as a mind-controlling cultish group. Luce says MSNBC’s broadcast is not only an attack against Teen Mania, but an attack against Bible-based Christianity.
Why did you agree to the interview with MSNBC?
Luce: The producers came to us under false pretenses about four months ago. They said they were doing a series on ministries in America. They wanted to interview us about youth ministry. We found out the day after the interview that a blogger group led by a girl who had a bad experience in our Honors Academy 12 years ago put them up to this. The documentary featured five girls who had been a part of our Honor Academy.
My heart goes out to these girls. You can tell that they are really hurting. We have met with most of them over and over again over the years trying to assuage them and love on them and help them walk through the challenges they face. We’ve asked them to forgive us for anything we’ve done to hurt them while they were interns. We are not a perfect organization, but we seek to improve ourselves and get better. They were taken advantage of by this MSNBC group for the sake of sensationalizing a story and generating revenue.
What did the documentary misrepresent about Teen Mania?
Luce: The program offered massive distortion and took things out of context. We used to do a weekend military-esque Navy Seals for God program, where we taught interns how they can endure more than they think they can.
MSNBC showed kids crawling through the mud and crying. They show a close-up where it looks like some of the kids are about to eat worms. This was in the day and age when Fear Factor was a huge sensation and kids really wanted that kind of raw challenge. No one was forced to eat worms, and these worms were organically grown for human consumption. So it seems MSNBC intentionally misled viewers by painting a picture of abuse.
For MSNBC to clearly imply that Teen Mania is negatively impacting the youth who come through our programs is completely untrue and unfair. But we have to consider the source. Christians can’t just believe what the furthest left-leaning network in the entire country is saying about a Christian ministry. We need to be careful and ask thoughtful questions about what MSNBC is airing.
MSNBC suggested Teen Mania uses mind control. Can you address that?
Luce: The producers have these self-appointed cult experts and walk the girls through eight points of how you can tell if mind control is being used. The eight points actually come from a booklet that was published about Chinese mind control, which has been totally debunked by all of psychologists and psychiatrists. They are using that as the standard of whether or not these girls have been under mind control.
What did Teen Mania do that was painted as mind control?
Luce: The producers suggest that if we insist on purity, then that’s mind control. But purity is all through the Bible. The points of contention that MSNBC called us out on have nothing to do with practices unique to Teen Mania. It’s more about what Scripture says we as Christians should be doing. This broadcast is contending and confronting core Christian beliefs. They are confronting every Bible-believing church in the country. These are things we all believe.
If MSNBC can show a program like this and get some believers to agree that this is mind control, they start softening our resolve to live scripturally and take the Bible for what it intends to communicate and live it. The program purports to be about Teen Mania but the case it makes is against the whole of the Body of Christ that believes the Bible.
Are you getting any feedback from supporters?
Luce: We have been overwhelmed with intern alumni who are telling us how God changed their life through our program. These five girls are not representative of the literally thousands that are out there changing the world. They are making a difference. They are missionaries around the world. They are executives of corporations. They are entrepreneurs and they are thriving in their faith. But some are questioning Teen Mania now because they’ve seen this program. But consider the source and how they’ve taken everything out of context.
Why do you think you are getting this attack?
Luce: We just started our new Acquire the Fire tour. We have events that are sold out across the country. This is a distraction the enemy is trying to put in our path and other people’s path.
What have you learned from this experience?
Luce: I’ve been interviewed by some of the toughest people in the media, like Christiane Amanpour from CNN. I’ve been on Nightline. I’ve been on O’Reilly. Secular media is not a new thing and secular media has dug and interviewed me with scrutiny. They’ve come to our campus. When it’s fair journalism, the stories turn out to be positive because they are really looking at the facts. What kind of hit us unknowingly is how blatantly biased MSNBC would be. In retrospect we should have known better. That’s their DNA.
What can Christians who believe in your ministry do to help?
Luce: Get on the blogosphere any place you are convicted and tell the story of how your kids were involved in Acquire the Fire or one of our missions trips or our Honor Academy and how God used it to change their lives. Post it all over the place so people from various streams can see that the truth. We are going to be releasing our own documentary in the next few days that gives context and tells the story from kids who have had a positive experience.
Word Entertainment, Warner Music Groups’ Christian music division, has been celebrating the storied label’s 60th anniversary of making Christian music this year. This past Wednesday, Nov. 2, Word Entertainment staff and executives threw a special anniversary celebration in Waco, TX, home of the label’s origin, which was founded by Baylor University graduate Jarrell McCraken in 1951. On hand for the celebration included members of the McCracken family as well as Waco Mayor Jim Bush; Chairman of Word Entertainment Mike Curb; Warner Music Nashville President & CEO John Esposito; Word’s first A&R Director and artist, Kurt Kaiser; Word Entertainment President & CEO Rod Riley; and Baylor University President Ken Starr. The event was attending by many Word employees both past and present with a special commemorative plaque presentation to the McCracken Family and Baylor University on behalf of Word Entertainment. Mayor Bush also presented a proclamation, naming Nov. 2 as “Word Day” in Waco, TX. The night concluded with an outdoor concert featuring Word Entertainment’s Dove Award-winning artists Chris August and Sidewalk Prophets on the Baylor campus. To view the historical video of Word Entertainment, visit here.
In honor of the label’s anniversary, Word Entertainment recently released a 3-CD compilation featuring a 51-song collection with a bonus excerpt from the company’s original recording, entitled, Word: Six Decades Of Hits. The anthology spans 60 years of great music that has come out of this landmark label featuring legendary artists such as Amy Grant, Sandi Patty, Point of Grace, Jaci Velasquez, and new breakthrough artists such as Francesca Battistelli, Chris August, and Sidewalk Prophets.
For further information on Word Entertainment and the 60th anniversary celebrations, visit www.WordLabelGroup.com.
Roman, Inc., a leader in the giftware industry, signed a licensing agreement with lovethislife debuting January 2012, to design and distribute everyday gift product.
In 2012, Roman’s lovethislife® line will offer an assortment of gift products that remind us to celebrate the moment. New offerings include: wall plaques, ornaments, jewelry, frames, and mugs, to name a few.
“Roman has been part of a long emerging trend of verse and/or message-related products. lovethislife, though completely different for Roman, falls right into this trend where the inspiring messages are about ‘you and your path in life.’ Messages are embedded into ‘swag’ organic art placed on updated functional items. This brand hit the market eight years ago with some heavy hitter celebrities making the emotional connection, which spurred its popularity. The logo icon is subtle, but for lovethislifers, easily recognized. The brand sees no age limit and is marketed to young and old at heart,” says Marje Reed, director of product development.
lovethislife originated as the name of musician/producer David Culiner’s one-man Malibu-based band until he realized the parameters of what constitutes a ‘band’ could be expanded to invite creators from all fields to adapt their passions and offerings to the spirit of ‘lovethislife.’ lovethislife as a lifestyle brand launched January 2003 via women and men’s apparel to measure viability of lovethislife’s appeal & resonance for future goods & services. The premium-priced apparel line continues to flourish and serve as the primary revenue stream and brand extension for lovethislife. The passion for writing and producing music remains the core essence of lovethislife.
Two B&H Publishing Group authors have won USA “Best Books 2011” Awards from USA Book News, the premiere online magazine and review Web site for mainstream and independent publishing houses.
Candace Cameron Bure, who starred for eight seasons in ABC television’sFull House and is now a featured cast member of ABC Family’s Make It or Break It, received her award in the Women’s Health category forReshaping It All: Motivation for Physical and Spiritual Fitness. Also a New York Times best seller, the book is a candid account of how faith ultimately reshaped her life, giving her true freedom from food addiction.
James L. Rubart took the Fiction: Visionary category for his widely acclaimed debut novel Rooms about a young software tycoon who inherits a coastal Oregon home that is really God’s physical manifestation of his soul. Rooms also won an RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Award.Publishers Weekly says, “(Rubart’s) premise is compelling.”
Other B&H finalists in the USA “Best Books 2011” Awards included What Women Fear by Angie Smith (Self Help: Motivational) and current New York Times best sellers The Resolution for Women by Priscilla Shirer (Women’s Issues) and The Resolution for Men by Stephen and Alex Kendrick with Randy Alcorn (Parenting/Family: General).
“We’re proud of these authors and grateful to be working with them,” says B&H VP of marketing Mary Katharine Hunt. “Their books are making a real difference in readers’ lives, and it’s an honor to be part of that.”
For a complete list of USA “Best Books 2011” Award winners, visit USAbooknews.com.
Warner Press announced that its youth fantasy fiction novel Hunter Brown and the Eye of Ends by the Miller Brothers has been awarded a bronze medal in the 2011 Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards in the category of Pre-Teen Fiction – Fantasy. With this award, all three books in The Codebearers™ Series now have received bronze medals in this category in the Moonbeam Awards.
Hunter Brown and the Eye of Ends continues the story of teenager Hunter Brown that began in Hunter Brown and the Secret of the Shadow and Hunter Brown and the Consuming Fire. In this final book of “The Codebearers” series, Hunter Brown finds that his memory is gone. Now he must fight to piece together the growing puzzle of his past under the constant surveillance of an intimidating detective, who isn’t all that he seems. But what begins as a harmless search for memories quickly leads Hunter into a deadly hunt for his missing father and a lost relic, the Eye of Ends, said to predict the end of the Author’s story.
The Miller Brothers, Christopher and Allan, combine their unique skills as authors and animators to produce stories of faith and fun for families everywhere. In addition to Hunter Brown and the Eye of Ends, their works include additional novels in “The Codebearers” series and the “Heroes of Promise” series, published by Warner Press. Growing up behind the shelves of their parents’ Christian bookstore, the Miller Brothers learned firsthand the value of faith-based stories. Founders of Lumination Studios, they live in Seattle, WA, with their families.
Baker Publishing Group and On Demand Books, the company behind the Espresso Book Machine® (EBM), have entered into an agreement to sell Baker’s list of paperback titles on the EBM “digital-to-print at retail” sales channel.
Baker is the first major Christian publisher to make available substantially their entire paperback list to the EBM network. This agreement will enable Baker to reach more readers both in the existing Christian market and in broader trade and academic bookstores that are equipped with an Espresso Book Machine.
Essentially an ATM for books, the patented EBM and its EspressNet®software system links to a vast network of content, enabling the instant distribution of books, on demand, at point of sale. With the push of a button, the technology converts a digital file into a quality paperback, in any language, with a full-color cover, in minutes. This environmentally friendly technology eliminates shipping, returns, and the pulping of unwanted books.
“We believe the Espresso Book Machine in a local bookstore offers the book-reading customer the best overall access to printed books at the time they are in a store and ready to purchase a title,” says David Lewis, executive VP, sales and marketing for Baker Publishing Group. “If the publishing community will support this technology by allowing all of their titles that fit the machine’s specifications to be printed locally, it will give the local bookstore a better opportunity to survive. This is the only way a bookstore can have hundreds of thousands of books to sell without the cost of holding all of that inventory. It allows a local bookseller to compete on selection with the on-line retailers.”
“We are delighted to announce the latest publisher to join our ever-growing Espresso Book Machine network,” says Dane Neller, CEO of On Demand Books. “Baker Publishing Group is one of the great Christian publishers, with a high-quality list of fiction and non-fiction titles that will appeal to our existing trade and academic bookstores. The inclusion of their titles also supports our expansion of EBMs in the CBA retail market. We hope Baker is the first of many religious publishers to see the great potential of the Espresso channel.
(Nashville, TN) – Multi-talented singer/songwriter, Karyn Williams has inked a recording deal with Nashville’s Inpop Records, paving the way for her first full-length album next year. She joins an impressive Inpop roster that includes Newsboys, Mat Kearney, Jaci Velasquez and more.
“I’m so excited to join the Inpop family,” said Williams. ”Christian music has had a huge impact on my life and has also played a big part in my walk with the Lord over the years. I’m honored to be able to work on this record with a company that believes in me so much.”
“She’s real and authentic,” said Andrew Patton, General Manager of Inpop Records. “She knows who she is, and has a powerful story that we can’t wait to share through her music. We were all won over by her immediate warmth, amazing songs, and her worldwide platform through Adoption that creates a ministry that few new artists start out with.”
Williams debut single and album will be released with a flurry of domestic and international appearances in the spring of 2012.
About Karyn Williams
The eldest daughter of Orlando Magic Senior Vice President and founder, Pat Williams, Karyn has been around giant hoops, giant hopes, and giant dreams for as long as she can remember. Her international family includes 19 children, fourteen of which were adopted from all over the world. She has teamed up with Holt International & the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute as an artist partner, an outspoken advocate and tireless worker on behalf of adoption and foster care. The 9-time marathoner and graduate of the University of Florida is also the author of the highly acclaimed book, The Takeaway , co-authored with her dad. (HCI 2009) She currently makes her home in Nashville, Tennessee with her husband, award winning songwriter & producer, Brian White. For more information, visit www.karynwilliams.com
About Inpop Records
Inpop Records is an independent music label based in Brentwood, Tennessee and is home to some of the best-known bands in Christian music. Distributed by EMI Christian Music Group, Inpop Records has become one of the top-selling independent labels within the industry, having established a reputation for seeking out the best artists in emerging talent and for expanding the music marketplace with sound and ideas. Inpop’s roster includes Newsboys, Mat Kearney, Jaci Velasquez, Tricia Brock, Jimmy Needham, and The Advice among others. For more information, visit inpop.com .
The 21st Anniversary Covenant House Candlelight Vigil in Times Square, sponsored by Aviva USA life and annuity company, also will feature the first-ever Covenant House CEO Solidarity Sleepout. Following the Nov. 17 vigil in Times Square, more than 40 influential leaders will be sleeping out in the shadow of the Covenant House New York Crisis Shelter in solidarity with homeless youth.
“On Nov. 17 and 18, we are going to transform Times Square and our crisis shelter into centers of hope and solidarity for homeless youth,” said Covenant House President Kevin Ryan. “Natalie Grant will light up Times Square with an inspirational performance. After the vigil, we will march back to our crisis shelter with 300 of our homeless kids and a generous group of CEOs and business leaders will sleep in cardboard boxes outside our crisis shelter.
“These leaders have selflessly decided they want to walk in our kids’ shoes and experience, if only for one night, some of what our kids go through,” said Ryan. “We will sleep out to show our support and to raise awareness that thousands of young people are struggling to survive every night on our streets.”
The vigil in Times Square begins at 6 p.m. and will feature Grant, Gospel Music Association Female Vocalist of the Year for four consecutive years (2006-2009) and the top-selling adult contemporary female solo artist in 2005, 2006 and 2008. Grant is also an outspoken advocate for victims of human trafficking. Abolition International, which Grant created in 2005, has raised a significant amount of funds and awareness to fight the trafficking of women and children for the purpose of sexual exploitation.
“We are honored to have Natalie share her incredible talent with us in Times Square,” said Ryan. “Her songs are inspirational, and she has dedicated her life to raising money and awareness for child victims of trafficking around the world.” The vigil also will feature homeless youth from Covenant House, who will share stories of their journey through homelessness to independence.
Following the vigil, Covenant House will host the CEO Solidarity Sleepout on the concrete near the shelter at 460 West 41st St. with high-ranking executives hoping to improve this corner of the world. Among those planning to sleep out are: Philip Andryc of Berens Capital Management; Brian Cashman of the New York Yankees; Bill Donahoe of Allegiance Retail Services/Foodtown; Gary Dubois of Crum & Forster/Seneca; Dave Eklund of Aeolus Reinsurance; Tom Glocer of Thomson Reuters; Jeff Kaplan of Deerfield Management; Geraldine Laybourne, co-founder of the Oxygen Network and chairman of Alloy Entertainment; Julio Alfonso Portalatin of Chartis Growth Economies; George P. Reeth of Companion Property and Casualty; Adam Silver of the NBA; and Strauss Zelnick of Zelnick Media.
“No one can do this work alone, so we appreciate Aviva USA sponsoring this vigil, which will help thousands of kids in the years to come,” said Ryan. “Our friends at ABC, NASDAQ, Reuters, and Toshiba are donating their screens for the evening in Times Square to shine a light on the problems our kids face. And, of course, the business leaders who are leaving their homes to sleep in solidarity with our kids are showing a commitment and love for our kids that will make a tremendous impact. It is all of us working together that will save more lives and give a voice to the thousands of homeless kids who are alone on the streets.”
Covenant House provides 24/7 crisis care and on-going support for homeless young people in need of a safe haven. Assistance can be found by simply calling the Covenant House NINELINE (1-800-999-9999) or visiting www.nineline.org. More information about Covenant House and resources for homeless youth can be found at www.covenanthouse.org. ?
The First Baptist Church in Euless, Texas, gave $30,000 for the second time to its members on Sunday, asking them to invest the money and support missionary work around the world with the earnings.
Pastor John Meador asked the congregation “to take that money and invest in some way as to bring a return so that you can come and give it to the Miracle,” according to the33tv.com.
The Miracle Mission is the name of the church’s fundraising program for missions. Last year, church members turned the $30,000 reverse offering into $150,000 by creatively investing the money.
“We had one man last year that got a $10 bill,” Executive Pastor Gary Phillips said. “He’s an artist, and he bought a canvas. He did a piece of art work, sold it for a thousand dollars, and brought it back and gave it to the miracle.”
“Last year, when we first did it, I had actually invited someone to church with me that particular day, and we were sitting there and she looked at me and said, ‘Y’all pass out money every Sunday?’” Tonya Bowman, a church member, was quoted as saying.
But, the money wasn’t just a free gift – it was a challenge, she added. The $30,000 was handed out in $5, $10 and $20 amounts.
The church’s “Miracle” strategy is based on Isaiah 41:20, “Everyone will see this Miracle, and understand it is the Lord…. who did it.”
With a debt of $6.5 million in 2005 and no existing plan to service the debt, First Euless was going through one of the toughest moments in the church’s then 100-year history. Interim Pastor Dr. Bill Anderson stood in the pulpit one day and asked God to do a miracle. By 2007, the debt was cleared.
As a reminder of what God has done, a stone was placed in the waterfall garden area east of the worship center for every $1,000,000 given to the Miracle, the church website says. Six large stones are currently placed in this area “as visible reminders of God’s miraculous power and blessings.”
“Today, The Miracle is about others who need a miracle in their lives, as well as ours,” the church says. “It’s about how one church, calling out to God in prayer, those same three prayers, can send money, resources, and people to share the love and message of Jesus Christ to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria… and the uttermost parts over the coming year.”
The church believes in raising money on a regular basis to support Christian work. Pastor Phillips said, “We’ve seen 130 homes rebuilt over the last three years, we’ve given away food and clothing to over 15,000 families a year over the last three years.”
Yesterday, I got to speak at the church where I grew up in Lititz, Pennsylvania. I spent my formative years there from second grade to 11th grade… It’s been 19 years.
It was like stepping into a time capsule with the familiar smells, hallways, and faces. I saw young families of old schoolmates, young adults who were just small children when I knew them, and the parents of friends who are now… gulp… elderly people. And some of those I asked about were dead, divorced, gone.
I became kind of sad that I’d missed out on all of that.
Made me realize there are two kinds of people in the world: those who stay in one place and reap the benefits of life-long relationships… and those who move around a lot.
I wouldn’t trade all of my other experiences for anything. It shaped who I am. But there’s a richness of life that’s missing when you skip around. Like flipping TV channels.
Whether it’s by choice or against your will, would love to know which one you are: settler or pioneer.
Hillsong United will release a new Aftermath Tour Edition CD/DVD early next year. The DVD will be called ‘Aftermath- Live In Miami’. The CD/DVD will feature live versions of songs from their Aftermath album released in early 2011. The special concert film was taped in Miami, FL on August 6, 2011. According to reports post-production of the new tour special is already underway.
Kari Jobe, a worship leader at Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas, and a 2010 Dove Award Nominee for New Artist of the Year, released brand new music yesterday. “We Are” is the new single from her upcoming sophomore release and is available now wherever you buy music, including and Amazon. Fans, who have waited for over two years for a new album, have already made the single #1 on iTunes (Christian & Gospel)!
Kari, who is also well-known for her version of the praise favorite, “Revelation Song,” is working on a full-length album with producer Ed Cash (Chris Tomlin, Third Day) that will be released early 2012.
“The last few years my ministry has grown and reached farther than I ever dreamed!” she says. “I’m so excited to see what the Lord has for me next.”
It was just about a year ago we started filming Blue Like Jazz the movie, and since then we’ve been feverishly editing the film, adding a soundtrack and test screening the film.
At first, the movie ran for nearly two hours, but not we’ve got it down to 97 minutes and the movie, in my “objective” opinion, is singing. Seriously, it’s getting great reviews, and this is without color correction or sound editing, two factors that take a movie over the top.
So far, we are getting about 45% of the audiences saying the movie was excellent, about 49% saying it’s “very good” and the rest liked it a little less. Out of the thousands who have screened it so far, only 6 people rated the movie as “poor.” Of course, that’s going to happen no matter what we do, but we are still making the movie even stronger and by the time it hits theaters I think people are going to be pleasantly surprised.
The number one comment we get when we screen the film is “finally.” And by that they mean “finally a film that talks about faith that feels normal, not preachy, not heavy on agenda but heavy on meaning, cinematically beautiful and disarmingly honest.” Those are all from the notes we’ve received on our surveys.
As many of you know, this movie was funded by nearly 4500 backers on a website called Kickstarter. Since then, other investors have joined us and are still joining us on a much larger scale to get this movie released in theaters. That said, amazingly, our director, Steve Taylor has called more than 3000 of the backers and thanked them personally, and intends to call each of you before the film hits theaters. I’ve called hundreds myself and every conversation gives me the same sense of gratitude that we had when we first started filming. This movie was truly made with passion and creativity and mostly love.
If all goes according to plan, the movie will release on April 13 of 2012.
Third Day has been nominated for a 2011 American Music Award®, as announced today at the J.W. Marriott Los Angeles L.A. LIVE. This is the band’s fourth career nomination, winning in 2008 for its album Revelation.
For the fifth year, winners will be determined by online voting from now through Friday, Nov. 11, 2011. Fans can vote at the Coca-Cola AMA voting website, amavote.com, as well as http://is.gd/U2P4uY. Artists will be honored in the categories of Pop/Rock, Country, Rap/Hip-Hop, Soul/R&B, Alternative, Adult Contemporary, Latin, and Contemporary Inspirational.
The live broadcast of the 39th annual AMAs will take place at the NOKIA Theatre L.A. LIVE on Sunday, Nov. 20 (8:00-11:00 p.m. ET/PT) on ABC. For a complete list of nominees, presenters, and performers, visit: http://abc.go.com/shows/american-music-awards.
About Third Day:
Over the past decade, Atlanta-based, multi-Platinum rock band Third Day (made up of members Mac Powell, Tai Anderson, David Carr and Mark Lee) has racked up 27 No. 1 radio singles and sold more than seven million albums, including two RIAA Platinum as well as eight Gold certifications. A recent Georgia Music Hall of Fame inductee (2009), Third Day has garnered 24 career GMA Dove Awards from 42 nominations, 4 GRAMMY Awards (with 11 career nominations), an American Music Award (with 3 American Music Award nominations) and multiple ASCAP honors for songwriting. As a credit to its songwriting, Third Day’s memorable “Call My Name,” off its Revelation project, was selected by country star Keith Urban as a bonus track on his Defying Gravity album.
As a top-ranked touring band, according to Pollstar magazine, Third Day has played for audiences reaching into the millions. Because of its mass appeal, Third Day has been featured by top media outlets including “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” (NBC), “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson” (CBS), “60 Minutes” (CBS), ABC’s “Nightline,” USA Today, the New York Times, and even graced the cover of Billboard magazine, which called Third Day “one of the best rock bands.”
For more information on Third Day, please visit: www.ThirdDay.com, www.facebook.com/ThirdDay or www.providentpress.com
John Waller, the popular recording artist who touched the world with his song “While I’m Waiting” from the hit film Fireproof, recently appeared on TBN’s Praise The Lord with host Russ Taff where Waller shared the behind-the-scene details of his latest song, “Heaven Just Got Better.”
During the interview with Taff, Waller discussed the recent birth of his son, Josiah Emmanuel, and the death of his mother less than 24 hours later. Waller also performed songs from his current CD, As For Me And My House, as well as debuting “Heaven Just Got Better.”
“I wrote ‘Heaven Just Got Better’ a couple of years ago, but never did anything with the song,” says Waller. “After my mother’s death, I went back to the song and finished it as a tribute to my mom. It was as if God was holding the song for just this time,” he adds.
“I never thought a perfect place like Heaven could get any better,” he says. “Now I know it is.”
As the segment ended, Waller said prayers over the studio audience, as well as the TV viewers, using Jewish blessings from the Old Testament, including the Aaronic Benediction from Numbers 6:22-27.
“It was truly an honor to be interviewed by the legendary Russ Taff. He was one of my favorite singers growing up,” Waller says of his experience at the show. “It was particularly special to sing ‘Heaven Just Got Better’ for the first time,” he adds.
About John Waller:
Waller first captured the attention of the Christian music community as frontman for the pop band According to John. His major label debut, The Blessing, included the powerful title track, “While I’m Waiting,” the theme song from Fireproof, the No. 1 independent film of 2008. Waller has long been known for injecting heavy doses of scripture into his songs, and his current CD As For Me And My House is no exception. He draws on Joshua 24:15 to boldly proclaim the Word of God to this generation through a rich variety of musical styles.
The title track, offered as a free download to those who sign the Joshua 24:15 Declaration for restoring our focus back to family values at Waller’s website, highlights the album’s theme of declaring our allegiance to God. The music video version of “As For Me and My House” has more than 190,000 views on YouTube so far. To sign the Declaration and to view the video, visit johnwallermusic.com.
Waller’s As For Me and My House is available through City of Peace Media and Provident Distribution. For more information on Waller and As For Me and My House, visit johnwallermusic.com or cityofpeace.com.
It’s a harsh reality, but I’ve discovered it is true: I can’t teach you to be creative. I work with creative hopefuls all the time who want me to teach them to be creative. And I’ve tried, but it just doesn’t work. What does work? Leading people through a process that allows them to stretch and build their creative muscles. Those muscles are there. In fact, we were born with them. But overtime, in the routine of life, the responsibilities of adulthood and the lack of use, they atrophy. And just like any personal trainer will tell you, as you begin to work those muscles again … they will come back.
John Maeda from CreativeLeadership.compublished the following tool…
The model above, which he calls Brennan’s Hierarchy of Imagination, outlines one of the best creative processes I’ve seen. Let’s start at the top and work our way down.
Imagination
Whether you’re a natural dreamer or a linear realist you can explore possibility. With no regard to limits or liklihood, using phrases like: What if? Imagine if? How about? Envisioning, seeing it in your mind. Pure Imagination.
Creativity
This is the brainstorming meeting. This is where the ethereal ideas are captured from our imaginations and take the shape of concrete ideas. Allowing concepts to rub against ideas, mixing up scenarios. The elements come together to form the clay that is shaped into ideas.
Problem Solving
This is where most Creatives exit the room. They put the ideas on paper and leave the rest up to Administratives to refine and execute. We leave the “NO People” to shoot our ideas full of holes and then fill them. But what if we let the “YES People” be a part of this process too? Most Creatives have weak refining skills. Beginning to flex the problem solving muscles will not only enhance the final result, but will also create stronger process. Problem solving refines our ideas.
Reflex
Our natural response to the stimulus we’ve experienced. The gut reaction to what you’ve taken in. No thought, no pretense, just human reflex. The more we immerse ourselves in the creative process, creativity becomes our natural response.
Just like the sponge soaked in water, releases water when squeezed – when we are soaked in creativity, submerged in this process – creativity will be our reflex.
Leading people through the creative process fuels my own creativity in a way I never expected. Watching the lights come one and ideas begin to flow and the look in their eye – is one of the passions of my life.
Challenging the ordinary, saying YES when others say NO, removing limits and destroying obstacles through creativity is the only way we can bring change to this planet. The problems are too big. Flexing our creative muscles and challenging ourselves to walk through the process will birth leaders who can face the mountains before us.
As I reported here a few days ago, the Hillsong Live team, along with all their superstars, are hard at work preparing for Sunday night’s live album recording for their 2012 album TOGETHER AS ONE. The live recording will taking place this Sunday, October 30, 2011. And in an attempt to check in on rehearsals that are going on full steam this week, I’ve had to keep tabs on a number of the Hillsong team’s twitter accounts. The great news is I was not disappointed. Many of the different well-known worship leaders and songwriters like Reuben Morgan and Ben Fielding and so on, have all posted various pictures. Here they are.
Below Is The Live Album Recording Video Promo.
WATCH:
NASHVILLE, Tenn.— The Winter Jam Tour Spectacular, Christian music’s largest annual tour and Pollstar’s #1 tour in attendance for the first quarter of this year, announced its highly anticipated 2012 artist and city line-up during a special launch event held earlier this evening in Nashville.
Founded and hosted by Grammy®-nominated Christian music mainstay NewSong (pictured at right) and produced by Premier Productions, the Winter Jam 2012 Tour Spectacular will be headlined by Grammy®-nominated alternative rockers Skillet. The 47-city tour will also featureSanctus Real, former Newsboys frontman Peter Furler, Kari Jobe, Building 429, Group 1 Crew, illusionist Brock Gill, and national speakerNick Hall. In addition, the OneVerse Pre-Jam Party will include performances from Dara Maclean, For King & Country, and We As Human.VeggieTales’ Bob and Larry will also make a special appearance.
Kicking off its 17th year January 6 at the Charleston Civic Center in Charleston, West Virginia, the tour is slated to stop at Philips Arena in Atlanta; Dallas’ American Airlines Center; the FedEx Forum in Memphis, Tennessee; the Sprint Center in Kansas City, Missouri; Charlotte, North Carolina’s Time Warner Cable Arena; the Verizon Arena in Little Rock, Arkansas; and the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas, among other leading venues, before concluding April 1 at Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Winter Jam admission is $10 at the door, with no ticket required.
“With one of the most powerful line-ups of Christian music’s top artists in Winter Jam history, we are thrilled to announce what promises to be our biggest tour yet,” said NewSong founding member and Winter Jam creator Eddie Carswell. “After seeing more than 90,000 people make decisions for Christ during last year’s tour, we enter Winter Jam’s 17th year of ministry excited to begin the adventure of what God has in store for us—and audiences around the country.”
Presented by Holt International, additional Winter Jam 2012 Tour Spectacular sponsors include the University of Mobile, The Creation Museum, OneVerse, Wayne E. Bailey Produce, Texas TransEastern, Premier Christian Cruises, Xtreme Conferences, and Camp Electric.
Additionally, 2012 marks the continuation of the popular Jam Nation fan program, which will offer individual and group memberships guaranteeing free and early concert admission. Members also receive a limited-edition Jam Nation t-shirt, a collectible Jam Nation Platinum Access Pass, and can participate in a Jam Nation Q&A with select tour artists, among numerous other exclusive benefits.
Since its formation by NewSong in 1995, Winter Jam has featured many of the top names in Christian music, including TobyMac, Third Day, Newsboys, Steven Curtis Chapman, and Jeremy Camp, among others. The Winter Jam 2011 Tour Spectacular outpaced attendance for all other tours in the first quarter, including Bon Jovi, U2, Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber, according to Pollstar’s 2011 Worldwide First Quarter Ticket Sales “Top 100 Tours” chart. In addition, for the first time in its history, the tour will hit 11 cities in the western United States this fall.
Celebrating 30 years in Christian music, NewSong has recorded 17 albums, garnering 20 #1 Christian radio singles and a Grammy® Award nomination, in addition to being inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame, among numerous other achievements. The band’s now-classic 2001 ballad, “The Christmas Shoes,” was a #1 hit at mainstream AC radio and inspired the best-selling novel and top-rated CBS television movie of the same name. NewSong’s latest recording, One True God, debuted at #1 on Billboard’s Top Christian/Gospel Albums chart earlier this year. The project features the new single, “The Same God.” For further information on NewSong, visit www.newsongonline.com.
With RIAA Gold certification, current scans easily surpassing 800,000 units, non-stop mainstream and Christian market touring, and RIAA Gold certification for each of their three hit Active Rock and Christian Rock singles, two-time Grammy® nominated alternative rockers’ Skillets’ latest, Awake has cemented the band as a top rock act in both the Christian and mainstream markets. Awake hit the ground running debuting at No. 2 on Billboard’s Top 200, selling over 67,000 units and peaking at No. 1 on iTunes® overall “Top Albums” chart and “Top Rock” chart. After two years, the album remains on the Billboard Top 200 with only a handful of other mainstream acts claiming the same honor.
With massive sales has come radio, awards and tour success, as Awake boasts four Active Rock radio hits with “Monster,” which was also AOL Music’s No. 4 “Mainstream Rock Song of 2009,” the No. 1 Christian CHR & Rock single “Hero,” which has been used by the NFL in their Sunday Night Football and NFL Weekend Kickoff promos, and their latest No. 1 mainstream hit “Awake & Alive,” a remix of which is featured on the TRANSFORMERS: Dark of the Moon soundtrack. And while Skillet’s intensely explosive live show consistently ranks within Pollstar’s Concert Pulse “Top 50 Tours,” the band also received the 2011 Billboard Music Award for “Top Christian Album,” and was Billboard’s No. 2 “Top Christian Album” and No. 9 “Top Alternative Album” in 2010. For further information on Skillet, visit www.skillet.com.
A complete list of Winter Jam 2012 Tour Spectacular dates and cities can be found at www.jamtour.com.
Uber acclaimed worship leader and songwriter, Matt Redman, took to twitter a few days ago to share what he referred to as “Tips For Creativity.” I thought the tips were brilliant. There are 5 tips in total. While most of them refer to song-writing, they can be applied to other creative arts too.
Tips for creativity, no.1 – “Imagination is like a muscle. It grows stronger when you flex it.” – John Piper
Tips for creativity, no.2 – “You can have 1,000 ideas, but unless you capture an emotion, it’s an essay.” – Bono, U2.
Tips for creativity, no.3 – “I have principles, not a formula.” -Director James Cameron describing his movie-making approach.
Tips for creativity, no.4 – “An unending curiosity for doing something different.” – Producer Sir George Martin on The Beatle’s approach to artistry.
Tips for creativity, no.5 “When a person speaks or writes or sings or paints about breathtaking truth in a boring way, it is probably a sin.” – John Piper
BEC Recordings’ Kutless is wrapping up another great year with the release of their first Christmas project on October 4 titled This Is Christmas. This album is filled with four classic holiday songs along with two original Kutless Christmas tunes (“This Is Christmas,” “Beautiful”). There will also be a 10-song exclusive version available at Wal-Mart this season. Kutless will also be touring heavily this fall as part of the “One True God,” Winter Jam and the “Very Merry Christmas” tours.
“The Christmas season is one of my favorite times of the year,” shares Kutless frontman Jon Micah Sumrall. “It is a special time for us to enjoy family, festivities, and gift giving but most importantly to remember the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. My hope is that This is Christmas will be an encouraging and festive reminder of why we celebrate Christmas. Truly Jesus is the reason for the season.”
Since the 2009 release of their hit worship album, It Is Well, BEC Recordings’ Kutless has catapulted to the top of the radio charts with their mega-hit song “What Faith Can Do,” which spent multiple weeks at No. 1 on AC, CHR and National Christian Audience charts. The second single, “Everything I Need,” also became a top 10 single at AC Indicator, Monitored and National Christian Audience charts. The current single “Amazed” is already a top 20 single at AC Indicator, CHR, and Inspo charts.
The band will be following-up to this highly acclaimed album that has sold more than 300,000 units with a brand new 2012 studio release. Kutless is putting the finishing touches on this new project with producers Chris Stevens (TobyMac, Mandisa, Carrie Underwood) and Dave Lubben (worship leader, Kutless).
For more information, go to www.kutless.com or the band’s official YouTube Page http://www.youtube.com/kutless. Follow the band on Twitter @kutless and become their fan on Facebook: facebook.com/kutless.
This Is Christmas Track listing
1. O Holy Night
2. This Is Christmas
3. Breath Of Heaven
4. Mary Did You Know
5. Beautiful
6. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear
I love sitcoms. Seinfeld, Friends, Everybody Loves Raymond, Frasier, King of Queens—newer ones like Til Death etc. you name it, I love them all. And I’ve been having this cool desire to create a sitcom that will be done by Christians, it won’t be a “Christian sitcom” it will be a normal sitcom that is family-friendly and free from so much of Hollywood’s propaganda stuff that permeates so much of sitcoms nowadays. The format as this stage is an open book (meaning undecided), I can create a sitcom episode with 4 friends, married couples whatever. All that matters is that it will be hilarious.
But before we can raise more money from friends to do maybe 4 episodes later, for now I will need to do a 20-minute first episode that will be a called a pilot. We’ll then show the pilot to people and ask them to help us to create more episodes.
But to create a pilot we’ll need a few things:
1. We’ll need to hire a production company for maybe 3 days to a week, to film it for us (this will cost about $10,000)
2. We’ll need to rent a studio
3. Build sets
4. Hire actors
5. Feed the actors and crew
6. Hire hair and make-up people
7. We’ll need to hire an editor to do post-production
All these things would cost money, but if we can get like say 500 -1,000 people who say, “I would love to see this come to life, count me in. I can kick in $20,” then we could do it.
If this is something you’d be interested in getting on bored with drop me a line seinfeldfan2006@yahoo.com and once we have 500 – 1,000 people who say they’d love to kick in $20 one time then we’ll do it. And it can easily be done by April 2012.
How Joining In Will Work:
If you email me and say, “count me in,” we’ll wait till the number of supporters has grown to more than 500 people. And once we have more than 500 people (this could easily take like 3-4 months to achieve). I will send out an email to all the supporters saying, “we’ve reached our required number, you can now go to our website to donate. thanks.” Then you donate it, and we’ll do it.
You could come visit us on set, maybe even be in it as a minor actor or background etc. we could possibly also host a viewing party of all our supporters once its finished. And you can be in the live audience the night we film it.
Mormonism is back in the news. And with two Mormon presidential candidates, including Mitt Romney (the front runner for the Republican nomination), there’s a good chance we will be hearing much more about Mormonism for the next twelve months. Denny Burk has a very helpful piece on whether Mormonism is a cult [1], and Albert Mohler has written a thoughtful article on “Mormonism, Democracy, and the Urgent Need for Evangelical Thinking.” [2] I won’t repeat their arguments, except to reiterate Mohler’s reminder that voting for a president should include examining the candidate’s religious beliefs, but should include other considerations as well.
Presidential elections are important. But believing the truth is even more important. With that in mind, I thought it might be helpful to provide a brief overview of Mormon history and theology. I won’t try to debunk Mormonism or prove Christianity. But I hope this quick survey will show that the two are not the same.
A quick note on secondary sources: Christian materials do not always treat Mormonism fairly or go the extra mile to present Mormon ideas as a Mormon would recognize it. One book that does is Andrew Jackson’s Mormonism Explained: What Latter-day Saints Teach and Practice [3]. I also recommend A Different Jesus? The Christ of the Latter-Day Saints [4] by BYU professor Robert Millet. Richard Mouw concedes too much in his Foreword and Afterword, but it’s still helpful to get Mormon Christology from a Mormon himself.
Mormon History
Joseph Smith was born in rural Vermont in 1805, the fourth of nine children. With little success farming in Vermont, the Smith family moved west to Palmyra, New York. There Joseph Smith was exposed to different revival movements, and most of his family became Presbyterians, though Smith later said he leaned toward Methodism.
The presence of so many variations of Christianity bothered Smith. Which one was right? How could he choose? At one revival meetings, a preacher quoted from James 1:5 “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him” (KJV). Smith, 14 years old at the time, went home, reflected on these words, and went into the woods to pray.
According to Mormon tradition, this is when Joseph Smith had his first vision. In this visions, which is foundational to the Mormon faith, Smith claimed to see two “personages.” The one-God the Father-pointed to the other and said “This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!” Smith asked them what sect he should join. They answered that he should join none of them. They were all wrong. All their creeds were an abomination and their believers corrupt.
Three years later, Mormons believe Smith received another vision. In this vision the angel Moroni told Smith of golden plates buried under a hill near Palmyra. The plates were revealed in 1827 when Smith was provided with two reading crystals–urim and thummim–by which he could translate the writing (Smith claimed the plates were written in hieroglyphics). In 1830 Smith published The Book of Mormon, which contains the story of the lost Israelites who migrated to America in the sixth century BC but were killed in battle in AD 428. Smith later received another vision from John the Baptist giving him the Aaronic Priesthood.
That same year (1830) Smith founded the “Church of Christ.” In 1838 he changed the name to “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.”
Smith continued to receive revelations telling him to move from New York to Ohio to Missouri and eventually to Illinois where he and his followers built a town called Nauvoo. There Smith and his followers tried to live out an utopian vision of society. They also instituted polygyny as early Mormon leaders argued that Jesus had had many wives. Smith and his brother were arrested in 1844. Later a mob stormed the jail and killed them both. Mormons consider Smith a martyr. Others say he died in a violent shoot-out.
Following Smith’s death there was a schism. A small group called the Josephites became the Reorganized Church with headquarters in Missouri. Most followed Brigham Young, who became their First President and prophet. In 1847, Young took the followers to Utah and built Salt Lake City.
Today there are more than ten million Mormons worldwide-about half in the United States. Mormonism is the largest new religious movement from the West since Christianity (which really came from the Near East). It is also the first homegrown American religion. Mormonism continues to grow because of it missionary impulse and its commitment to doctrinal and ethical distinctives.
Mormon Theology
Let me highlight seven areas of Mormon doctrine. Again, I won’t try to refute the Mormon position, but I hope you will see the explicit deviation from the historic Christian faith.
1. View of history. In Mormon thinking, the rise of Mormonism was not merely a reformation or renewal of the church. It was a complete restoration. Following the death of Christ’s apostles, the church fell into complete apostasy. The church lost divine authority and true doctrine. There is no unbroken continuity from the early church to the present. Christianity, for almost all of its history, was false and without the truth—until Joseph Smith and his revelation. As Mohler points out, Mormonism not only rejects historic orthodox Christianity, their whole religion is based on the need for such repudiation.
2. View of revelation. Mormons believe the Bible (the KJV version), but do not consider it inerrant. Neither do they consider the Bible complete. What makes Mormonism unique is their belief in continuing revelation sustained through prophets, seers, and revelators. So while Mormons affirm the Bible, they also affirm the inspiration of the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. Through an elaborate hierarchy of President, First Presidency, Twelve Apostles, First Quorum of the Seventy, and Second Quorum of the Seventy, Mormons can receive authoritative interpretations and new authoritative revelations.
3. View of man. According to Mormon theology, men and women are the spirit sons and daughters of God. We lived in a premortal spirit existence before birth. In this first estate we grew and developed in preparation for the second estate. In this second estate we walk by faith in this second state. A veil of forgetfulness has been placed over our minds so we don’t remember what we did and who we used to be in our premortal existence. Our purpose in this life is to grow and mature in a physical body to prepare us for our final eternal state.
Mormons do not believe in human depravity. We are not implicated in Adam’s fall. We are basically good in our eternal nature, but prone to error in our mortal nature. The human is a being in conflict, but also a being with infinite potential.
4. View of God. In Mormon thought, God has a physical body. According to Doctrine and Covenants, “The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also;” but “The Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit.”
Whether God the Father is self-existent is unclear. There was a long procession of gods and fathers leading up to our Heavenly Father. Brigham Young once remarked, “How many Gods there are, I do not know. But there never was a time when there were not Gods and worlds.” What is clearer is that the Mormon God is not a higher order or a different species than man. God is a man with a body of flesh and bones like us.
Mormons do not believe in the Trinity. They will talk about the unity of three personages, but the unity is a relational unity in purpose and mind, not a unity of essence. The three separate beings of the Godhead are three distinct Gods.
5. View of Christ. Mormons believe Jesus is Redeemer, God, and Savior. He is endless and eternal, the only begotten son of the Father. Through Jesus, the Heavenly Father has provided a way for people to be like him and to live with him forever.
But this familiar language does not mean the same thing to Mormons as it does to Christians. Jesus was born of the Father just like all spirit children. God is his Father in the same way he is Father to all. Whatever immortality or Godhood Jesus possesses, they are inherited attributes and powers. He does not share the same eternal nature as the Father. Jesus may be divine, but his is a derivative divinity. As one Mormon theologian puts it, Jesus “is God the Second, the Redeemer.”
6. View of the Atonement. Mormons believe Jesus died for sins and rose again from the dead. The atonement is the central event in history and essential to their theology. And yet, Mormons do not have a precise doctrine of the atonement. They do not emphasize Christ as wrath-bearing substitute, but emphasize simply that Christ somehow mysteriously remits our sins through his suffering.
While the atonement itself is not overly defined, the way in which the atonement is made efficacious is much more carefully delineated. Salvation is available because of the atoning blood of Christ, but this salvation is only received upon four conditions: faith, repentance, baptism, and enduring to the end by keeping the commandments of God (which include various Mormon rituals).
Finally, it should be noted Mormon theology stresses the suffering the garden rather than the suffering on the cross. Atonement may have been completed on Golgotha, but is was made efficacious in Gethsemane.
7. View of salvation. The goal of Mormon salvation is not about escaping wrath as much as it is about maximizing our growth and insuring our happiness. Salvation is finding our way back to God the Father and recalling our forgotten first estate as his premortal spirit children.
Mormon theology teaches that we cannot receive eternal reward by our own unaided efforts. In some respects, salvation is based on what we have earn, but what we earn is by grace. How this plays out in Mormon life may differ from person to person, but they stress that the gift of the Holy Ghost is conditional upon continued obedience. Mormons must keep the First Principles and Ordinances, which consists of the Ten Commandments, tithing, chastity, and the “Word of Wisdom” which prohibits tobacco, coffee tea, alcohol and illegal narcotics.
Temples are also important in Mormon doctrine and practice. Couples must be married in a Mormon temple to have eternal marriage, and every Mormon must be baptized in one of their 135 (and counting) authorized Temples. Because of the importance of baptism in the Temple, baptisms for the dead are extremely common. Mormons keep detailed genealogical records so that their ancestors can be properly baptized. By one estimate more than 100 million deceased persons have been baptized by proxy baptism in Mormon temples. Those who received this baptism are free in the afterlife to reject or accept what has been done on their behalf.
Death in Mormon thinking is seen as another beginning, complete with opportunities to respond to postmortem preaching in the world to come. We will live in the spirit world, and at some point our spirit and body will be reunited forever.
There are four divisions in the afterlife. The Lake of Fire is reserved for the Devil, his demons, and those who commit the unpardonable sin. The Telestial Kingdom is where the wicked go. It is a place of suffering but not like the Lake of Fire. Most people go to the Telestial Kingdom where they are offered salvation again. The lukewarm-not quite good, not quite evil-go to the Terrestrial Kingdom when they die. This Kingdom is located on a distant planet in the universe. The Celestial Kindgom is for the righteous. Here God’s people live forever in God’s presence. We will live as gods and live with our spouses and continue to procreate. This is the aim and the end of Mormon salvation.
Conclusion
I encourage you to study Mormonism for yourself if you have more questions. I think you’ll find that though the language sounds similar at times, the beliefs are quite distinctive. Mormons do not understand history, God, man, salvation, heaven, hell, the cross, Jesus, or the Trinity as the canonical Scriptures teach, nor do they agree with the doctrine taught by the holy, catholic, apostolic church over two millennia.
“Fabulous,” “infectious,” “exciting,” “spectacular,” “worshipful,” “captivating,” “creative,” “brilliant” – all of these adjectives and more are being used by the critics as they applaud The City Harmonic for its first full-length album, I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home), which releases today on Kingsway with EMI CMG Distribution in the USA.
Already hitting No. 1 on the iTunes® Canada Inspirational Chart, the growing success has energized the band’s engaging live performances throughout North America. Recently finishing its headline tour with Aaron Gillespie, the band continues across North America this fall and will join newsboys for the “God’s Not Dead World Tour” that launches in January and travels coast-to-coast through April 2012. Tour dates to be announced soon.
For a limited time in conjunction with the release of I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home), The City Harmonic is offering the title track and current radio single for free through its Facebook page. The song was actually written even before the songs on the “Introducing” EP (Nov. 2010), and has always been the lynchpin on which the full-length record would hinge.
“The dream, like Martin Luther King’s, is that there is another way,” explains The City Harmonic front man Elias Dummer, “that it can be what we say it is, the eventual truth that we will awaken, just as Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz awakened from her dream, to find ourselves home at last.”
The City Harmonic, consisting of Elias Dummer, bassist Eric Fusilier, guitarist Aaron Powell and drummer Josh Vanderlaan, wrote and recorded all of the songs for I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home), which was co-produced by the band and Jared Fox. From the “now but not yet” tension of earthly Christian living heard in much of the album, including the title track and “Mountaintop,” to having hope in the midst of struggle in “Fell Apart” and “Be Still O My Soul,” to dealing with apathy in “Yours” and “Wake Me Up” and living missionally in “Spark” and “Benediction,” the songs take the listener on a poetic journey.
Here is how the critics are responding to I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home):
“Following up their acclaimed Introducing EP, they prove here that they are no one-hit wonder. Artistic songs … will surely gain them even more accolades … Strong vocals and lilting instrumentation round out a fabulous first full-length album.” –CCM Magazine
“Musically captivating, the project builds from song to song, carrying the listener on a journey… Track by track, there are layers and mysteries and scriptural connections to explore… one of the best albums of 2011.” –Watchgmctv.com
“No worship band in recent history has created the kind of reaction The City Harmonic has with their EP, Introducing The City Harmonic… their album has remained in the top 15 of all of Christian music … I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home) will continue the musical journey, with lyrics that point to the wonders of our God combined with sweeping melodies and infectious choruses … It has been this kind of embrace that has resulted in many naming The City Harmonic as the ‘New Artist of the Year.’” –Amazon.com
“Anyone who has heard and loved the song ‘Manifesto’ has an idea of the gifts the band The City Harmonic is bringing to current Christian music. Now… this new and exciting band … is getting ready to release its full-length debut.” –LancasterOnline.com
“A band to be reckoned with, it’s hard to believe this is their full length debut. If this band don’t go on to become one of the best in Christian music, then there is simply no justice. Oozing talent, brilliant musicianship, huge sounding rock songs, what more could you want? An absolute gem of an album.” –Louder Than The Music (5-star review)
“The City Harmonic are ready to take the world of Christian music by storm.” –I Am Entertainment
“A few adjectives to describe the band The City Harmonic: Uplifting. Brilliant. Grandiose. Jubilant. Fortunately for us music lovers, when they breathe in all that is good, they also breathe out this music that words can’t describe, speakers can’t contain, and other bands could never duplicate.” –Relate Magazine
“This album is uplifting, song after song. It’s filled with emotional vocals and meaningful lyrics … Cleverly crafted piano and guitar blend perfectly with lead singer Elias Dummer’s vocals for a truly spectacular listening experience.” –Teen Ink
“I believe this is the best debut album by any band in the history of Christian music. If it were possible I would give this album ten stars out of five.” –Christian Music Review Blog (5-star review)
“Definitely deserving of a five-star rating, the anticipated follow-up to their Introducing The City Harmonic EP was well worth the wait!!” –Jay’s Musik Blog (5-star review)
“While there is so much to be said for this kind of talent and creativity, it should suffice to simply know that quality in every regard positively abounds in this album. Is it worth your dollars? More than ten times.” –TheWorshipCommunity.com
“The record is outstanding both lyrically and sonically.” –AlphaOmegaNews.org
In less than a year, The City Harmonic went from being virtually unknown to international acclaim. The band has gathered an impressive five nominations, including New Artist of the Year, for the Gospel Music Association Canada’s 33rd Annual Covenant Awards that will be held in Calgary, AB October 28. Its unifying hit radio single, “Manifesto,” which is featured as a bonus track for a limited time on I Have A Dream (It Feels Like Home), has sold over 90,000 copies as its companion video has been viewed on YouTube by over 1,000,000 people. Becoming the best-selling new artist of 2011 on the SoundScan Top Current digital singles sales chart, the band has simultaneously gathered endorsements from Mac Powell (Third Day), Peter Furler, Matt Redman, Kyle Korver (Chicago Bulls), Seth Smith (Colorado Rockies), as well as “likes” from Tommy Shaw of Styx and thousands of others on its Facebook page.
More information on The City Harmonic can be found at www.thecityharmonic.com.
One of my favorite things in the world is to discover awesome new Christian songs that were hidden in fairly over-looked music albums. The song may not be new in the strict sense of the word, but they are new to me. And usually when that happens I love to share it with other people who never have heard or heard about the song. One such song is the song “Christ Is Risen” by Christian recording artist Matt Maher.
I was kidding when I said in the blog post title that’s its a song of 2011, it’s really off his 2009 album “Alive Again.” And in my view, its a true gem. If you’ve never heard it or heard about it before I think you’ll appreciate the heads up. I listen to this all the time, often replaying more than five times at a time.
Here is the youtube video that you can use to listen to the song. Definitely worth checking out.
HERE ARE THE LYRICS:
Let no one caught in sin remain
Inside the lie of inward shame
We fix our eyes upon the cross
And run to Him who showed great love
And bled for us
Freely You’ve bled for us
Christ is risen from the dead
Trampling over death by death
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Christ is risen from the dead
We are one with Him again
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Beneath the weight of all our sin
You bowed to none but heaven’s will
No scheme of hell no scoffer’s crown
No burden great can hold You down
Lyrics provided by http://www.kovideo.net/
Source - http://www.kovideo.net/christ-has-risen-lyrics-matt-maher-520839.html
In strength You reign
Forever let Your church proclaim
Christ is risen from the dead
Trampling over death by death
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Christ is risen from the dead
We are one with Him again
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
O death where is your sting?
O hell where is your victory?
O church come stand in the light
The glory of God has defeated the night
Sing it o death where is your sting?
O hell where is your victory?
O church come stand in the light
Our God is not dead He’s alive He’s alive
Christ is risen from the dead
Trampling over death by death
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Christ is risen from the dead
We are one with Him again
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Christ is risen from the dead
Trampling over death by death
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Christ is risen from the dead
We are one with Him again
Come awake come awake
Come and rise up from the grave
Rise up from the grave
Photo (L-R, standing): Blaine Barcus, VP A&R, Provident Label Group; Chris Brown, Elevation Worship; Terry Hemmings, President & CEO, Provident Music Group; Mack Brock, Elevation Worship; Scott Knight, VP Business Affairs, Provident Music Group; (L-R, seated) Wade Joye, Elevation Worship; London Gatch, Elevation Worship; Holly Zabka, Senior Director, Essential Music Publishing.
(NASHVILLE, Tenn.) Oct. 18, 2011– Elevation Worship, a Charlotte, N.C.-based worship team from one of America’s fastest growing churches will release its national debut album, For The Honor, on Essential Worship November 22.
Worship leaders Wade Joye, Mack Brock, Chris Brown and London Gatch lead Elevation Worship and serve full-time at Elevation Church in Charlotte, N.C. The church, established by Pastor Steven Furtick, launched with eight families and one massive vision to reach people far from God.
In fewer than six years, Elevation Church has grown to more than 10,000 people at six locations across the Charlotte area, making it the second fastest growing church in America. Pastor Steven is also becoming one of the most influential leaders, speakers and authors in the country.
From the beginning, Pastor Steven had a vision for Elevation Worship to write and record songs that reflected the church’s journey, experiences and needs. The fourth album from Elevation Worship, and its first national release, For The Honor features all original songs including the title track, “Give Me Faith”, “All Things New,” “Exalted One” and “The Church.” A complete track listing for the release follows:
1. Exalted One
2. Lord is My Rock/You Lifted Me Out
3. For The Honor
4. God Be Praised
5. The Church
6. The Highest
7. Victorious
8. We Rejoice
9. Give Me Faith
10. All Things New
11. The Gospel
12. You Reign Alone
13. Give My Life to You
14. Our King Has Come
Additionally, a digital deluxe version of the album will contain 3 bonus songs, 5 music videos, For The Honor documentary, chord charts for all songs and more.
As with recent movements including Hillsong, Passion and Jesus Culture, Elevation Worship seeks to bring new ideas to the worship arena, connecting with other worship leaders as well as churches to better serve God and His Church through worship.
Worship Pastor Wade Joye says, “We have seen God do the impossible in our church time and time again, and we consider it such an honor to give voice through these songs to the great things He has done. Our prayer is that all who hear this project will be inspired to believe that the Lord can do the same in their own lives and churches.”
For further information on Elevation Worship, including album artwork and press images, please visit: www.providentpress.com orwww.elevationworship.com
Kisses from Katie: A Story of Relentless Love and Redemption is now available at your local bookstore! I cannot say enough about Katie, her inspiring story and the impact that she is having (with Amazima) on the people in Uganda. I visited her in May and met her girls and met the Amazima team and I feel so privileged to know these people and serve with them.
In Kisses from Katie you read how Katie Davis graduated high school and moved to Uganda at the age of 18 to teach Kindergarten in an orphanage. She did not know the language. She had very few connections in the country. She took the untraditional, unconventional path and followed Jesus to Uganda, away from her sheltered upbringing, leaving behind her little brother and her boyfriend and all her high school friends, to live in a tiny bedroom (more like a closet) in a land of red-clay dirt, orphaned children, poverty, and disease. Yet she would find in Uganda a joy that surpasses her greatest expectations. She discovers the closer she gets to following Jesus, the more beauty and joy and purpose she experiences.
Some of my favorite parts of the book are describing all her first impressions and cultural observations of Uganda. Believing she would teach 12-15 students, she arrived to 138 pairs of eyes eagerly waiting her instruction. Can you imagine it? She describes encounters with rats, diseased children, her first trip to Masese, how she came to add her daughters to her family, and the birth of Amazima Ministries, the organization I work for and love.
Mostly this book is about an ordinary woman who is able to do extraordinary things, not because of who she is, but because of who He is. I really love Richard Stearn’s endorsement of her book:
“When you think of what one young woman can accomplish by simply being open to God’s call no matter the cost, you begin to ask questions like, Am I really open to God’s will for my life? Through Katie’s story, we’re reminded how God can use ordinary people to do extraordinary things for Him. We simply need to be willing to be used.” Rich Stearns, president of World Vision U.S. and author of The Hole in Our Gospel
I will never forget the evening I was standing in the airport at Thessaloniki in Greece waiting for my bags and thrilled to finally be there.
I had delays coming in from Australia and was already tired before I had started.
I wondered if my bags were ever going to come out, the Greeks never seemed to be in a rush. While waiting I glanced up to see posters of young children and women with the word MISSING boldly stamped across the top.
I asked the pastor who was hosting me what these pictures were and she said they were the alleged victims of human trafficking. I could not believe what I was hearing and did not believe this actually happened.
Our bags came and we went to eat and chatted through the conference schedule. We did not speak about the posters again, only the conference.
Later that evening back at the hotel I could not shake the images I had seen. I had been disturbed, and my life interrupted although I had no idea how much.
I was a wife and mother of two little girls 1 & 5. We were based in Australia as part of the leadership team of Hillsong Church and travelled as a family for over 8 months of the year building network churches worldwide through leadership training, teaching & evangelism.
My life was full, focused, planned, and fruitful and did I mention FULL. I had no time, space or desire for anything else. In fact I was the queen of absolute focus, no distractions, and delegation.
But I could not sleep.
I sat up and read Luke 10, the story of the GOOD SAMARITAN. I had always thought I was the Samaritan. I was traveling and serving churches and leaders, doing mission and evangelism, in fact I spent my life running from event to event trying to help people.
As I read the story I felt as though I was more like the Levite and the priest who were also so busy going to their next religious meeting that they walked past the very person they were called to reach.
They saw the wounded man as an interruption to their ministry not as the object of their ministry.
The Samaritan had compassion “and so he went to him”. It was these 6 words that changed my life and leadership paradigm. Compassion is the thing that fueled all that Jesus did, and if I was going to go the distance in Christian ministry I had to be motivated by what motivated Jesus. My heart had to beat for His very heart beat.
We often confuse compassion with emotion, but true compassion is never compassion until we cross the street and get PERSONALLY involved in a lost and hurting world. We must touch people to effectively reach people.
I had a choice that day. Was I going to cross the street and hide behind the busyness of my schedule, life and ministry… Or would I go to them I had started ministry with a heart to do whatever I could to love, serve and reach people… Had I become so professional, organized, busy, and successful that I could no longer be interrupted by God?
Were my goals, objectives, strategies, timelines, performance indicators and outcomes so clearly defined that there was no longer any room in my life for divine interruptions?
And that my friends is how The A21 Campaign started. I simply allowed my life to be interrupted by God and decided to take a risk and jump in to help the fight against human trafficking. Why? Because I could. Because it is the right thing to do. Because 27 million are waiting for our help. Because I never signed up to be a professional Christian, a professional speaker, a professional writer, or professional anything.
I became a follower of Jesus Christ which still means anywhere, anytime; I will allow divine interruptions to turn my life and ministry upside down…
Or perhaps right side up.
We must always allow God to interrupt our best plans-it’s the only way we can change the world.
Nicole C. Mullen celebrates the success of her album Captivated with a nod from Worship Leader Magazine for one of 2011’s Best of the Best “Top Worship Albums” and her upcoming induction into the Christian Music Hall of Fame on Nov. 5, 2011. Mullen’s new single, “Holy Captivated,” is impacting AC and INSPO radio now.
“Nicole is such a joy to work with and a true woman of God,” said the album’s producer, Ed Cash. “‘Holy Captivated’ was the first song she sent me, and I knew immediately that I wanted to be a part of her record. The words to this song just take me to the throne room.” Early response to the new radio single is another reflection of the incredible impact Captivated is having on audiences.
Riding on the momentum of Captivated, “Holy Captivated” is Mullen’s second single from the album produced by Cash. Written by Mullen and Antonio Neal, the song features Mullen’s heartfelt vocals backed by equally powerful lyrics.
“‘Holy Captivated’ is a song that I began to write one morning as I was waking up,” explained Mullen. “Without sounding ‘hyper-spiritual,’ it was as if my spirit was singing it before my mind could craft it. The song is a declaration of the awesomeness of God, regardless of our emotional climate. He is good in every season of life, even when horrible things happen. He is worthy of worship when our lives are experiencing the freshness of spring. He is worthy of worship in the hard winter seasons. He is worthy of worship in death and in life. He is HOLY, HOLY, HOLY!”
Mullen’s brilliant resume, highlighted by her CD, Captivated, and her lifelong commitment to ministry are key reasons why Worship Leader Magazine named the recording one of the best of the best this year and why she is being honored as an inductee into the Christian Music Hall of Fame in November.
“We are very pleased to induct Nicole C. Mullen into the Christian Music Hall of Fame,” said Christian Music Hall of Fame Chairman Andy Woolard. “Her career spans 20 years since her first release of uplifting and encouraging people and praising our One True God. Her Multiple Dove Awards and GRAMMY nominations, along with continued touring, show us Nicole is worthy of our recognition and induction. We pray Nicole continues to be an encouragement and has many more years of spreading the word of God through her music.”
Nicole C. Mullen possesses a diverse resume as a wife, mother, singer, songwriter, speaker, and successful businesswoman as well as a minister and mentor. She has written and recorded such classic songs as “Redeemer” and supplied signature songs to other worshiping artists. Songwriting has always been one of Mullen’s most treasured gifts and she’s used it as a vehicle to encourage, inspire and to teach. Her creativity and compassion have fueled a life of ministry with global impact, mentoring young people through her Baby Girls Club and Team NCM.
For more information, visit www.maranathamusic.com andwww.nicolecmullen.com.
Christian music pioneers the Newsboys is releasing a new album called God’s Not Dead, their first worship album since 2004, on Nov. 15 and are gearing up for a tour in promotion of the record.
Joining the Newsboys for the tour are: The City Harmonic, Anthem Lights and Abandon, with preaching from Bob Lentz.
This will be singer Michael Tait’s second album with the Newsboys since he took over vocal duties for them in 2009 due to the departure of band founder Peter Furler.
Tait was in the band in 2009, but the album In the Hands of God was written and recorded with Furler while Tait sang live.
Prior to the Newsboys and some solo work, Tait was in the biggest Christian group of all time, dc Talk from 1989 to 2000, with Toby Mac and Kevin Max Smith, before the group went on hiatus with solo careers.
Furler, originally the band’s drummer from 1985-97, took over vocals when former vocalist John James left due to an admitted drug and alcohol problem.
Together the band has released 15 albums spawning countless singles and major tours, and received worldwide critical success with their 1994 album Going Public featuring their biggest single “Shine” and 1996′s album Take Me to Your Leader.
They’ve been nominated for four Grammy’s and 24 Dove Awards winning five including Rock Album of the Year, Rock Recorded Song of the Year, Recorded Music Packaging of the Year, Short Form Music Video of the Year, and Event Album of the Year.
Other awards won include Best CCM Video 1999 by the Billboard Music Video Awards, 1995 Video Award and 1999 Video Award from the International Angel Awards, and Favorite CCM Album 1999 from the Nashville Music Awards.
The Newsboys is currently touring Canada before they join THE STORY TOUR with Max Lucado, Steve Curtis Chapman, and more.
Date, City, State Location
12/1 Wichita, Kan. Central Christian
12/2 Dallas, Texas American Airlines Center
12/3 Tulsa, Okla. BOK Center
12/4 Austin, Texas Shoreline Christian Center
12/7 Longwood, Fla. Northland Church
12/8 Atlanta, Ga. Philips Arena
12/9 Winston–Salem, N.C. LJVM Coliseum
12/10 Virginia Beach, Va. Rock Church
12/11 Woodbridge, Va. Hylton Chapel
12/14 Plymouth, Mich. Northridge Community Church
12/15 Grand Rapids, Mich. First Assembly of God
12/16 Hoffman Estates, Ill. Life Changers Church
12/17 Eden Prairie, Minn.Grace Church
12/18 Independence, Mo. Independence Events Center
I came across this incredible video a few days and was just blown away. You have to watch it.
Wait until you see what this little girl does when her parents reveal her biggest birthday present.
Her name is Lily.
WATCH:
Atlanta, Ga –October 10, 2011 –Dedicated to providing uplifting music and family entertainment, gmc announces the acting debut of four-time GMA Dove Award Female Vocalist of the Year Natalie Grant this Sunday in the gmc world premiere movie, Decision. Sharing the story of a family in despair rediscovering their faith, Decision debuts October 16 at 7 PM and 9 PM EST as well as re-airing Sunday, October 23 at 11 AM EST.
Grant stars in this touching and dramatic movie dealing with family, loss, love and faith. Decision also features award-winning country music star Billy Dean as well as the theme song by American Idol contestant Ricky Braddy (Season 8).
“I’m so excited that my debut acting role was in a film that offers so much hope and stresses the importance of faith and family,” shares Grant. “I was also honored to work along side some wonderful people who were patient with me and helped this ‘rookie’ every step of the way!”
In this uplifting drama, Grant stars as Ilene, a mother struggling to make ends meet after the tragic death of her firefighter husband (Billy Dean). When she begins to lose control of her heartbroken teenage son Jackson (Michael Rosenbaum), she reaches out to her estranged father Wyatt (Rusty Whitener) to take in the troubled boy. Gradually, they form a bond that will require Jackson to find an inner strength he never knew he had to avert yet another family tragedy.
For a sneak peak of the movie, check out the trailer on watchgmctv.com.
It’s official, there is a God in heaven!!! Tim Tebow was named the starting quarterback of the Denver Broncos.
I can’t tell you how much joy it brings me to share the good news of Tim Tebow’s promotion to number 1 QB in Denver. It’s no secret that all of us here at Awaken Generation are huge Tebow fans and are rooting for him to do great things in the NFL. We love his unashamed stand for Christ in culture, his humility, class and winning spirit. And we love those Bible verses he tweets every game day for all the world to see.
Coach John Fox informed Broncos players at a team meeting on Tuesday that Tebow would get the call in Week 7, following Denver’s bye week, at Miami.
Tebow replaced Orton in the second half Sunday with the Broncos down 13 points at halftime, and completed four of 10 passes for 79 yards and a touchdown off a screen pass in his two quarters of action. He had his troubles with a few snaps. But Tebow’s practice reps were limited and he’d hardly played since preseason, so some rust can be expected.
The former first-round pick has legions of followers and supporters but also many detractors who doubt his ability to win consistently in the NFL because of an unorthodox throwing motion and poor downfield accuracy. He entered the season expecting to start, but when the Broncos failed to complete a trade of Orton, Tebow was outplayed in training camp and fell behind Orton.
Ironically, the Dolphins will be honoring the University of Florida’s 2008 National Championship team on Oct. 23 when Tebow and the Broncos visit. Dolphins rookie center Mike Pouncey played on that team, as did Tebow.
I do want to say that we appreciate and respect Kyle Orton tremendously as a quarterback and by no means do we intend to demean or slight Orton as Tebow fans. And I really feel for him considering he had to go out there each week knowing that the entire city was calling for Tebow to play. It really is not personal Kyle, you’re one heck of a football player.
One of the things I have found particularly ridiculous are the constant cheap shots Tebow detractors have been taken throughout this whole Orton-Tebow debacle, both at Tebow himself and his many fans, saying “Tebow’s a joke and will never make it in the NFL and everyone calling for his instatement are ignorant so and so’s who know nothing about football.” I want to say to them, as Tebow fans we are not delusional, we know he’s got a long way to go and a lot of improvement to undergo. We know right now he’s not the best QB in the league, we know that. The reason we’re rooting for him and want him to play is because he is a proven winner and we know that given the time to develop he will find great success in the NFL. I just find it so surprising that his detractors are writing him off, and he’s not even had one full season of playing in the NFL. He just got out of college, and has spent all of his two years in the league on the sidelines, so why so quick to pan him? Seems very unjustified to me.
Many people forget that Kobe Bryant used to be on the bench for the Lakers for many years before he became the Kobe we know today. So was Derek Fisher. Aaron Rogers was very poor QB when he first started in the NFL as a back-up to Brett Favre but he got better over time—more than five years. There are many great sports stars who weren’t always that good when they first started in the big leagues, but they grew and got better over time. As Tebow fans, we know that is needed for him too—we’re not delusional. But he’s proven himself before so we have no reason to doubt him. We know he’ll do great things. And we can’t wait to watch him sling it every Sunday for a long time to come.
Response is in my mind one of the best Phil Wickham albums to date. And his voice shines with particularly brilliance on this album. Response is quickly becoming one of my favorite albums of this year. Phil Wickham actually surprised me, because I did not expect Response to be this good. The lyrics are some of the most meaningful lyrics I’ve heard in a very long time. This album is filled with emotion and it just seeps out through every single song. Each song sounds unique and each song sends chills up your spine because of how powerful it is. You will quickly fall in love with this album.
“Heaven Fall Down” is a great song to start the album off with. Some albums (like this one) start off the album with an amazing song that really sets the mood for the rest of the album, then there are some albums that start off with a song that has nothing to do with the concept of the album and it really starts the album off on a bad note. Phil Wickham did a great job of selecting this song to be the first track you hear on Response. The chorus has as much emotion as every single song by Hillsong combined. I love it when you can literally feel the emotion in a song. You feel as if you are there with Phil Wickham when you listen to “Heaven Fall Down.” His heart’s song becomes your heart’s song. He says, “We’re crying out in desperation for You!” Listen to it a couple of times, and this line will make you get down on your knees in reverence for God.
I really love the track “One God.” This song really makes me feel empowered. When he says, “Wonderful Savior from death you rise,” it makes me feel like I can do anything. The whole song reminds me that God is there in everything and He reigns over all. Think about it, he says, “Father of mercy You break the chains, now there is victory in Jesus’ name!” God is there for us. This song has amazing lyrics and also a nice beat to go with it.
The first single from the album “At Your Name (Yahweh, Yahweh)” is a nice melodic song. It is one of those songs that helps to close your eyes and really revel in the music and his voice. This song talks about how majestic our Lord and Savior is. Just close your eyes and listen to it and think of all He has done for you. You will quickly be filled with awe for our Savior.
“Sun and Moon” is a great ballad between Phil and God. He says that if God is the sun then he wants to be the moon because he wants to reflect Him. It is such a beautiful song that really captures the heart of most Christians. Lecrae said the same thing a while back in DJ Official’s song “Show Off.” I absolutely love that analogy, and I think Phil Wickham has probably done it the best in song that I have ever heard.
Response is a beautiful album that I am quickly growing to love. Phil Wickham knows how to craft words and make them sound more beautiful than anything you have ever heard. This album is definitely his best so far. Every single song on the album is worth listening to. If you like worship music, then this is the album for you. It has the most meaningful lyrics of any CD to come out this year. You will be blown away.
Favorite Song: Sun and Moon
Favorite Lyrics: “Take these hands, I know they’re empty but with You they can be used for beauty in Your perfect plan. All I am is yours.” (From the song “All I Am”)
New York, NY – (October 10, 2011) – Platinum selling artist Mark Schultz is known for his deeply emotional music that same powerful sound will be heard on his upcoming instrumental album titled Renaissance releasing November 1st.
Always on the move, Mark recently spoke to several major New York City press outlets in support of the new album and his novel Letters From War. These included SIRIUS/XM Satellite Radio, ABC News, CBS Radio, PIX 11 Morning News and an appearance on FOX News Live, which can be seen here - http://tinyurl.com/markschultzFOX. The attention has rallied fans both old and new and sent preorders forRenaissance soaring to over 70,000. However, there is nothing that Schultz enjoys more than being in concert halls with his fans and he looks forward to all of his performances this year.
For more information, please visit www.markschultzmusic.com
Saw this video a few days ago of Troy Palumalu pranking fans at Madame Tussauds Wax Museum. Who is Madame Tussauds any way? But never the less, it was hilarious. Thought I’d share it here.
(Nashville, Tenn) October 5, 2011—Over the years praised singer/songwriter Phil Wickham’s works have been met by critical acclaim and commercial success. Response is proving to continue this trend as it released this week and has already flown to No. 2 on the iTunes ® Christian Chart. Also trending with his past critical success are the rave reviews Response is receiving:
“Wickham’s a true original thanks to clever wordplay, adventurous arrangements, and the ability to strike just the right balance between reverence and resourcefulness.” –ChristianityToday.com
“This is the worship album Phil Wickham fans have been asking for. With his trademark poetic lyrics and infectious melodies, Responsepresents pop worship songs- the perfect collection of vertical songs for your church, car, or playlist.”-Christian Musician Magazine
“Wickham’s songwriting is in a higher caliber than most songs on Christian radio right now…It’s easy to dive into God’s glory with Wickham on this album. It’s one of the best worship records you’ll get this year and you won’t want it any other way.” –JesusFreakHideout.com
“Phil Wickham’s enthusiastic and reverent style of writing and singing praise and worship songs has consistently been a draw. Wickham’s prayerful sentiments are consistently filled with his personal adoration of God. Response is no exception. Several of these songs should be added to your Sunday morning worship set.” –New Release Tuesday
“It’s a very humble and reverent album, declaring who God is, what He has done for us, and sums up what our proper Response should be.”-HollywoodJesus.com
“You will be inspired to worship along with this gorgeous, serene music as you contemplate the goodness of God and His glory and power. You will also enjoy Phil’s dynamic vocals that only magnify this powerful fourth album from Phil Wickham.” -ChristianMusicReview.org
Featured on the chart-topping album is Wickham’s latest radio hit “At Your Name (Yahweh, Yahweh)” that is climbing the radio charts with support from top Christian radio like K-LOVE radio network, KSBJ/Houston, KXOJ/Tulsa & WDJC/Birmingham among others. Watch Wickham open up about the single and the full album here.
In conjunction with the new release, Wickham will also tour around the country this fall performing songs from Response and more. For more information on Wickham, his music and a full list of tour dates please visit www.philwickham.com.
About Phil Wickham:
Phil Wickham is at his core a humble and sincere artist who writes songs and worships God using the medium of music. It is with that brush that he paints images of a loving and creative God across the canvases of listeners’ hearts and minds. The evidence of this gift has been apparent on all three of his critically acclaimed efforts: Phil Wickham (2006); Cannons (2007) and Heaven & Earth (2009). He continues to prove this on his latest fourth studio album, Response, which released October 4 with Fair Trade Services.
Selling 200,000 albums to date, Wickham has been featured in major publications such as CCM, Relevant, Worship Leader, Christian Music Today, About.com, SongTouch, Advance Magazine, and more. Both Heaven & Earth and Cannons made their way into the top 5 on iTunes Christian album charts, and the single “Safe” placed in the top 20 on Billboard’s Christian AC and Soft AC/Inspirational charts.
Wickham has toured with some of the industry’s most renowned artists including MercyMe and the David Crowder* Band. For more information please visit www.philwickham.com
I just came across a tweet by Max Lucado, stating that Zondervan is making his latest book available for free download. That’s a retail value of $24.99 for FREE !!!.
You can click here to download your free copy.
You can download it from different retailers like apple’s iBooks, amazon, Barnes & Noble & Christianbook.com. I chose to go with Christian book since I don’t have a kindle or iPad, which is what you’ll need to download the ebook from those retailers. However, before I could download the ebook from Christian book I had to:
1. Open a Christian book account (since I didn’t have one)
2. Download and install Adobe’s Digital Reader on my computer
3. I had to open an account on Adobe to use the reader.
But after I did all this I got Max’s new book free. So I am happy about that.
Below is a trailer for his new book.
WATCH:
Brian Houston
“When your heart is no longer in it, the first two things that disappear are your joy & your generosity. 2 Cor 8:2.”
Wow.
Vice Verses (Credential Recordings/lowercase people and Atlantic Records), the new album from GRAMMY-winning rock bandSWITCHFOOT, debuts at No.8 on The Billboard 200. It also debuted at No.5 at iTunes Album chart, No.5 on the Internet Album chart and No.3 on iTunes Alternative chart. The band will perform “Dark Horses,” their new Top 15 Modern Rock hit, on “Conan” on October 25th. The track was just added by Clear Channel Alternative Premium Choice, WTCL (Denver),WRFF (Philadelphia), KNDD (Seattle), WRXL (Richmond) and WVIC (Lansing).
SWITCHFOOT’s co-headlining tour with ANBERLIN is currently underway. (See below for itinerary.) After performing for a packed house at New York City’s Best Buy Theatre last week, lead singer/guitarist Jon Foreman took the show outside, performing atop a newspaper stand for thousands of people in Times Square. Along the tour route, local chapters of StandUp for Kids (www.standupforkids.org), a national nonprofit volunteer outreach organization dedicated to making a difference in the lives of at-risk, homeless and street kids, will be collecting new and used backpacksat the concerts. The backpacks will be used to distribute food and essentials to kids served by the organization.
“The War Inside,” another track from Vice Verses, can be heard in the trailer for In Time, an upcoming 20th Century Fox film starring Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried. SWITCHFOOT has contributed an exclusive new song, “Out of Control,” to the just-released Hawaii Five-0 soundtrack. The track was heard in this week’s episode of the hit CBS show. You can also check out SWITCHFOOT’S recent performance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” at: http://www.hulu.com/watch/280337/jimmy-kimmel-live-switchfoot-dark-horses
SWITCHFOOT waged a Game Day takeover of ABC, with Vice Verses tapped as the exclusive music for the Oklahoma vs. Florida State football game. ESPN hosted an exclusive stream of Vice Verses and partnered with the band to give away a trip for two to the 2012 Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA. Hurley selected SWITCHFOOT as the exclusive music for the Hurley Pro, held last month in Trestles, CA and the band performed at a recent San Diego Padres game.
Vice Verses, the eighth studio record from the multi-platinum rock band, explores the polarity of what it means to be human. “Between the dialectic of life and death we are pulled tight, stretched out like the strings of my guitar,” Jon Foreman explains in his latest Huffington Post piece, which you can read at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jon-foreman/vice-verses-making-art-ou_b_974302.html. “We are the notes dancing from the strings of time, held firm between life and death. This is the polarity of our existence, pulled tight between despair and hope, belief and doubt. We are strung tight between our birth and the grave. Humanity is dancing on the fretboard in-between. Death will one day cut the string. Until then, we live in the tension.”
It’s an adventurous collection that builds on the harder-edged sound of 2009′s Hello Hurricane and puts the rhythm section upfront, with hip-hop influenced tracks like “Selling the News,” “The Original” and “Blinding Light.”
“[The] gorgeous, swelling ‘Restless’ sounds plucked from U2′s Achtung Baby,” said Alternative Press. “But the real standout is ‘Souvenirs,’ a stunning ballad that, if there’s any justice, will go down as one of the band’s biggest hits to date.” Billboard praised Vice Verses‘ “powerful, anthemic rockers” and Relevant Magazine called it SWITCHFOOT’S “most unique” album yet.
SWITCHFOOT – comprising Jon Foreman (vocals/guitar), Tim Foreman (bass), Chad Butler (drums), Jerome Fontamillas (keys/guitar) and Drew Shirley (guitar) – recorded most of Vice Verses in the band’s San Diego, CA home studio, working with producer Neal Avron (Sara Bareilles, Weezer). Mike Elizondo (Eminem, Dr. Dre, Pink) who produced 2009′s Hello Hurricane, served as executive producer. Hello Hurricane entered The Billboard 200 at No. 13 and contained the Modern Rock hits “The Sound (John M. Perkins’ Blues)” and “Mess of Me.”
The band took home “Artist of the Year” honors at the San Diego Music Awards earlier this year and remains very connected to their hometown. Each year they host theSwitchfoot Bro-Am Presented By Hurley (http://www.switchfoot.com/c/bro-am), an annual concert/surf contest/silent auction. The event has raised more than $500,000 to date for San Diego-based children’s charities, including StandUp for Kids.
SWITCHFOOT/ANBERLIN FALL 2011 U.S. TOUR
10/5 Bowling Green, OH Bowling Green State University – Stroh Center
10/7 Boulder, CO Boulder Theatre
10/8 Salt Lake City, UT Gallivan Center – X96 concert
10/10 San Francisco, CA The Warfield Theatre
10/11 Los Angeles, CA The Wiltern
10/13 Amarillo, TX Azteca Music Hall
10/14 Siloam Springs, AR John Brown University – Bill George Arena
10/15 Longview, TX Le Tourneau University – Belcher Center
10/17 Dallas, TX House of Blues
10/18 Austin, TX Stubbs Waller Creek
10/20 Albuquerque, NM Kiva Auditorium
10/21 Phoenix, AZ Grand Canyon University Arena (SWITCHFOOT ONLY)
I came across this verse the other day.
“In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.” Hebrews 5:7
It struck me as odd that Jesus was “heard because of his reverence.” It has caused me to raise the level of reverence in my prayers. I hope it does the same for you.
Heaven is for Real sits at No. 1 on the Top 20 General best-sellers list, while Beverly Lewis’ final installment of “The Rose” trilogy, The Mercy, heads the Top 10 Fiction list in the new weekly best-sellers introduced by Christian Retailing in association with the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA). In addition, Zondervan took all five spots in Top Five Bibles, with the hardcover NIV Adventure Bible leading the list.
The Mercy also stands at No. 8 on the General list, while Francis Chan sees three titles (all David C. Cook) posted this week, Crazy Love at No. 4, Forgotten God at No. 18 and Erasing Hell, co-written with Preston Sprinkle, at No. 19.
Courageous, Randy Alcorn’s Tyndale House-published novelization of the new Sherwood Pictures’ movie, sits second to Lewis’ Amish fiction and at No. 17 on the General list. B&H Books’ The Resolution for Men by Stephen and Alex Kendrick is at No. 18.
In full, the Top 20 General list is as follows: Heaven is for Real by Todd Burpo (Thomas Nelson); Every Day a Friday, Joel Osteen (FaithWords); Jesus Calling, hardcover, Sarah Young (Thomas Nelson); Crazy Love; Radical, David Platt (Multnomah Publishers); Not a Fan, Kyle Idleman (Zondervan); The Mercy (Bethany House/Baker Publishing Group); One Thousand Gifts, Ann Voskamp (Zondervan); The Well, Mark Hall with Tim Luke (Zondervan); Expecting to See Jesus, Anne Graham Lotz (Zondervan); One-Year Women’s Devotional (NavPress); Jesus Calling, deluxe, Sarah Young (Thomas Nelson); Empowered Evangelicals, Rich Nathan and Ken Wilson (Ampelon Publishing); KJV Standard Lesson Commentary 2011-2012 (Standard Publishing); The 5 Love Languages, Gary Chapman (Northfield Publishing); The Resolution for Men; Courageous; Forgotten God; Erasing Hell; and Living Beyond Your Feelings, Joyce Meyer (FaithWords).
Top 10 Fiction: The Mercy (Bethany House/Baker Publishing Group); Courageous; The Healing, Wanda E. Brunstetter (Barbour Publishing); The Crossing, Serita Ann Jakes (); Forbidden, Ted Dekker and Tosca Lee (Center Street); The Judgment, Lewis (Bethany House/Baker Publishing Group); Fatal Convictions, Randy Singer (Tyndale House Publishers); Learning, Karen Kingsbury (Zondervan); Code Triage, Candace Calvert (Tyndale); and A Lineage of Grace, Francine Rivers (Tyndale).
Top Five Bibles: NIV Adventure Bible, hardcover; NIV Church Bible, navy, large print; NIV Teen Study Bible, hardcover; The Story, NIV, hardcover; and The Journey, NIV, softcover.
Drawn from the ECPA’s national Pubtrack Christian store data, the lists track sales for the week ending Sept. 24.
Sherwood Pictures’ Courageous was the No. 4 movie in the country last weekend during its opening and the No. 1 new movie. The fatherhood-themed film ranked just behind No. 1 Dolphin Tale, No. 2 Moneyball and No. 3 The Lion King 3-D.
The weekend box-office take for the Sherwood Pictures’ PG-13 drama was $9 million, $2.2 million more than its predecessor, Fireproof. With a production budget of around $2 million, Courageous opened in 1,161 theaters nationwide. Dolphin Tale opened previously in 3,507 theaters,Moneyball in 2,993 and The Lion King 3D in 2,330.
“What a great weekend for us, between Moneyball and Courageous,” said Sony Worldwide President of Distribution Rory Bruer, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “Moneyball had a tremendous hold, while Courageous, only costing $2 million to make, was a huge success. It hit home for that core audience,”
Market research firm CinemaScore gave the film a rare A+, while the film saw mixed reviews.
Frank Scheck from The Hollywood Reporter thought that Courageous revealed Alex and Stephen Kendrick’s “growing expertise as filmmakers with its skillful blending of moving drama, subtle comedy and several impressive action sequences. …
“The characters are complex and well-drawn, struggling with various personal issues that test their faith and character in believable ways. But the episodic and frequently melodramatic storyline contains enough incidents and subplots to fill an entire television season.”
The Los Angeles Times said the film “proves a particularly clunky, tunnel-visioned vehicle whose overbearing, overlong script nearly smothers the movie’s quibble-free message: Fathers must be responsible. And what of the importance of mothers here? It often feels like a case of ‘Oh, them.’ ”
The fourth film from Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga., Courageous follows the faith and fatherhood journey of four police officers.
I have already expressed my immense sadness at the breaking up of iconic and iconoclastic Christian band David Crowder Band here. And as such I am super eager to find out whatever information I can about their final album that is slated to be released in 2012.
I just found out that their last album will be entitled, “Give Us Rest.” According to reports the album is will drop on January 10, 2012.
DC*B also released a brand new Christmas record this week entitled, “Oh For Joy.” I listened to some samples on iTunes yesterday and again they’ve raised the bar again with their creativity and inventiveness.
The band is currently on their final tour, the 7 Tour, and will perform their final show at Passion 2012, the annual Passion Conference led by Louie Giglio.
I don’t know if I’ll find rest with their break-up.
Carlton Cuse has teamed with author/pastor Rob Bell for Stronger, a drama project with spiritual overtones, which has been sold to ABC via ABC Studios in a hefty script deal. Stronger, which the former Lost co-showrunner and the founder of Michigan’s Mars Hill Bible Church are co-writing and executive producing, revolves around Tom Stronger, a musician and teacher, and his spiritual journey as he becomes a benefactor and guide to others. Music is expected to be a big part of the show, which features autobiographical elements as Bell is a former musician and played with rock/gospel bands in the 1990s.
Cuse and Bell met at the 2011 Time 100 gala — Bell was a 2011 honoree and Cuse had been on the magazine’s list of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2010. The two immediately hit it off and soon concocted the idea for Stronger. While spiritual, Stronger won’t be supernatural. It will touch on the spiritual side of people’s lives much like the final season of Lost did and like Bell has done in his career as a pastor speaking to congregations of more than 10,000. Bell last week announced that he will be leaving the Mars Hill Bible Church in December to move with his family to Los Angeles. The series with Cuse is one of many things Bell plans to pursue, including touring and writing more books. (His most recent tome, Love Wins, is currently on the New York Times bestseller list.) Bell’s expertise is expected to add authenticity to the project, which won’t be straight and square like previous spiritual network offerings, including Touched By An Angel and 7th Heaven, and is also expected to feature a healthy dose of humor. Because the genre is missing from TV at moment, the networks have pursued projects with spiritual elements. Marc Cherry’s Hallelujah was picked up to pilot at ABC last season and is currently being redeveloped. In addition to Stronger, Cuse has another project, Civil War drama Point of Honor, in development at ABC.
Christy Nockels, worship leader and recording artist on Louie Giglio’s sixstepsrecords, is hard at work finishing her new album.
“Making a record this week some amazing fellas” Nockels tweeted a few days ago and shared this picture below.
The “amazing fellas” she’s referring to I think is Chris Tomlin and his band, who can be seen in the photograph.
A few days later the singer tweeted: “Feel like I’m leaving camp as we wrap up this first part of recording, thank you to all who are making this the best experience ever!”
Chris Tomlin, tweeted the same week: “At the studio with Christy Nockels listening to the beginnings of her new record. a new sound, a new day. So good. Can’t wait for u to hear.”
According to reports, the new record will be titled, “Knock, Knock, Knocking On Nockels Door.”
Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Michigan, stood before his 7,000-member congregation Sunday to discuss his departure from the ministry he founded more than 12 years ago.
Telling Mars Hill Bible Church members that they would “be fine,” Bell spent much of his half-hour sermon discussing the new calling he felt had been placed on his life to “share God’s love” in new ways, according to ABC 13.
That new calling for his life involves moving his family to Los Angeles within the year to undertake several projects, which include penning more books and undertaking speaking engagements, such as his “Fit to Smash Ice Tour” in Canada and the U.S.
Bell, 41, also informed the Mars Hill congregation that he would not be starting a new church.
According to congregants who posted their reactions on Twitter, Bell’s remarks were very emotional. ”To be honest with you, I thought I would die here, but that’s not really the right way to say it… Change is a form of loss,” Bell said, according to Heidi Fenton. Chris Zoladz, also tweeted Bell as saying, “We serve a big God and none of this is shocking to him. All we can do is embrace a future that is going to be brilliant.”
The Love Wins author attempted to comfort worried congregants at the Grandville church about his departure by telling them, “You are going to be fine.”
Bell, who received a standing ovation as he concluded his remarks Sunday, will continue preaching at Mars Hill Bible Church until he departs in December.
Mars Hill staff members made the announcement Thursday that Bell had resigned, revealing in a statement:
The news had attracted so much attention that Mars Hill Bible Church’s website suffered a crash that same night.
Bell’s recent book was so concerning to many evangelicals that some released their own writings to counter Bell’s claims about hell. Among them, Francis Chan recently released Erasing Hell, Mark Galli authored God Wins: Heaven, Hell, and Why the Good News Is Better than Love Wins, and a group of theologians including R. Albert Mohler, Jr. and J.I. Packer collaborated for Is Hell for Real or Does Everyone Go to Heaven?
Still, some applauded Bell’s work, calling it timely and prophetic.
Bell will be traveling across the U.S. and Canada in November for his “The Fit to Smash Ice Tour.” On his official website, Bell says “Fit to Smash” will involve “several hours of entirely new content I haven’t given before, exploring all the exhilarating ways we stumble and fumble and fail and bleed and limp along and just how good and sacred and thrilling it all is.”
Shane Hipps, the Michgan church’s co-pastor, will continue preaching after Bell’s departure. Hipps joined Mars Hill as a teaching pastor in early 2010.
LOS ANGELES, Calif. (September 27, 2011) – Today, Reach Records’ Grammy-nominated hip-hop artist Lecrae is releasing the newly-formatted REHAB Deluxe. In this latest installment, Lecrae offers Rehab Deluxe, which includes the Grammy-nominated Rehab, Rehab: The Overdose, previously unreleased tracks and a documentary chronicling Lecrae’s life and story of rehabilitation. In conjunction with the re-release, an exclusive offer is also available nationwide at Target this week featuring Rehab Deluxe at $9.99 which includes two additional songs (Finally Free ft. J. Paul and Hope ft. Coffee).
The new package features the smash “Hallelujah” and encourages listeners to keep pursuing Christ who brings freedom from our past experiences and present struggles. An album full of conviction, Rehab Deluxe features new powerful songs like “Wish it Wasn’t True” and “Jesus Muzik Dubstep Remix by Karac.”
The 4th project for Lecrae, REHAB is a straight up call to conviction in real life through its unique style and lyrical content. Lecrae gets support from Sho Baraka, Trip Lee, Tedashii, Pro, J.R., Benjah and many others along the journey towards restoration–with several memorable collaborations. PK, CheeseBeats, J.R., and Benjah contribute on production and sonically, help take the listener along a soul-full ride.
“My hope is that people will not just gain practical insight for their lives, but they would find real sympathy from myself and mostly in the High Priest who sympathizes with us—Jesus,” says Lecrae.
Having established himself as the frontrunner of Christian Rap, Lecrae returned in 2010 with an album whose influence extended into mainstream media and culture. REHAB, arguably his most heartfelt album to date, broke into the Billboard Top 200 Albums debuting at No. 17, while reaching No. 3 on the Top 10 Albums chart on iTunes. With an offering of rehabilitation found in Christ alone, Lecrae also maintained his established base, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Contemporary Christian chart and No. 1 on the Billboard Gospel Albums chart. The impact of this album continues to spread across the globe, receiving nominations for several awards including a Grammy for Best Rock/Rap Gospel album.
With the influence of his groundbreaking album REHAB continuing to expand, Lecrae is gearing up for a nationwide tour in support of the new release. The REHAB Tour, featuring performances and also new music from label mate Trip Lee, emergent CHH artist Thi’sl and newcomer C-Lite, is an eight-city tour and will be kicking off in Indianapolis, IN on September 29, 2011.
REHAB 2011 Tour dates:
Date Location
September 29, 2011 Indianapolis, IN
September 30, 2011 Grand Rapids, MI
October 1, 2011 Cincinnati, OH
October 2, 2011 Pittsburgh, PA
October 6, 2011 Columbus, OH
October 7, 2011 Memphis, TN
October 8, 2011 Birmingham, AL
October 9, 2011 Charlotte, NC
For further information and a list of upcoming Reach Records and ReachLife Ministries events, please visit http://reachrecords.com/. For more information about ReachLife please visit http://reachlife.org/.
About Reach Records and ReachLife Ministries
Reach Records and ReachLife Ministries strive to, “bridge the gap between biblical truth and urban context.” Founded in 2003, Reach Records is a Christian music record label dedicated to using music as a means of reaching the urban community in a biblically sound way. While Reach Records employs music to reveal biblical truth, ReachLife Ministries aims to empower ministry leaders with this music in order to grow the urban church.
One of the world’s top worship bands Jesus Culturewill release a new full-length live album on 29th November 2011. Recorded live over three days in Chicago at Jesus Culture’s Awakening 2011 conference, ‘Awakening: Live From Chicago‘ will be the band’s sixth full-length album and follows last year’s well received ‘Come Away‘ live album.
‘Awakening: Live From Chicago‘ will feature worship songs by the Jesus Culture Band as well as songs from Jake Hamilton, Kristene DiMarco, and Byran & Katie Torwalt. “Live From Chicago is a highly anticipated release and is sure to ignite a generation of passionate worshippers across the globe”, says EMI CMG. The album is currently being mixed by Sam Gibson (Hillsong United, Delirious?, Pearl Jam, Crowded House).
Jesus Culture Band began as the local youth group worship team led by Banning Liebscher when he was youth pastor at Bethel Church. The band consists of Kim Walker-Smith and Chris Quilala along with Jeffrey Kunde (lead guitar), Brandon Aaronson (bass), Ian McIntosh (keys) and Josh Fisher (drums). In 2006 Jesus Culture Band recorded their first album ‘Everything‘.
A European Tour by Jesus Culture kicks off in London later this month. The band will perform at the HMV Hammersmith Apollo, on 24th September and then visit Amsterdam, Netherlands (27th Sept), Kolding, Denmark (28th), Berlin, Germany (30th), Budapest, Hungary (2nd Oct), Zurich, Switzerland (4th) and Paris, France (5th).
‘Awakening: Live From Chicago’ Track Listing (Not Final):
01. You Are Glorious
02. He Is Faithful
03. Break Every Chain
04. Father of Lights
05. Fill Me Up
06. Dance
07. My Everything
08. Burning Ones
09. The Anthem
We are so excited here at Awaken Generation to congratulate proud parents Chris and Lauren Tomlin on the birth of their baby girl Ashlyn Alexandra Tomlin!
A big congratulations to the lucky parents from all of us here.
Ashlyn was born on Thursday, 22 September 2011. Both Mother and Baby are doing great.
According to Chris, the name ‘Ashlyn’ means dream, because they have pray that she has great dreams for her generation.
Australian mega-church Hillsong will record their latest live album on 30th October 2011 at a special event taking place in the Allphones Arena in Sydney. The album, to be titled ‘Together As One‘, will be the twenty-first in the annual live praise and worship albums from the Hillsong Church.
Each year Hillsong record and release a live album featuring new worship music from the Hillsong team, which includes Reuben Morgan, Joel Houston, Ben Fielding, Darlene Zschech and Hillsong United.
The latest Hillsong live album, ‘God Is Able‘, was released in July 2011. Since 1992, Hillsong Live has resourced the local church and received gold and platinum album status multiple times, writing such well known worship songs as ‘Shout To The Lord‘, ‘Inside Out‘, ‘Hosanna‘, ‘The Stand‘ and ‘Mighty to Save‘, awarded the 2009 Dove for Worship Song of the Year and currently the Number 1 CCLI song in the USA and Canada.
It was the morning of October 27, 2007 and my prayer time had degenerated into a venting session. I was the youth pastor at The City Church in Seattle at the time, and in my opinion the youth ministry wasn’t growing big enough or fast enough. My team and I were all trying our hardest, but we had hit a plateau and couldn’t seem to break through.
The book of Acts with its supernatural stories and explosive church growth wasn’t blessing me so much as it was frustrating me. “Why, God? Why don’t we see these things here in Seattle? How can we make our youth group and church grow?”
My prayer time ended and I got in the shower, still frustrated, still complaining to God. He’s used to that, I’m sure. David was a great complainer. The entire book of Psalms can pretty much be summed up by: “God, why do the wicked have all the gold, glory, and girls, and here I am running for my life and you don’t even care; please, please, PLEASE help me . . . actually, come to think of it, you are God and you are good, and I trust you and sooner or later things will work out for your glory and my salvation, and I guess I’ve got a great life after all and I love you. Selah.”
When I stepped out of the shower, God spoke to me. Not audibly—if He ever does that I’ll probably hide under the kitchen table—but a phrase branded itself on my brain: Grace grows the church. Immediately I remembered Acts 4:33: “And great grace was upon them all.”
I didn’t think too much about it at the time, but looking back, that was a defining moment in my life and ministry. I began to see grace everywhere I looked: in the Bible, in my church, in God’s dealings with me.
I didn’t know that a year later I would become the preaching pastor of our church, or that two years later I would take over from my dad as lead pastor. Leading a church with a weekly attendance of over six thousand, a staff of over a hundred, and a multimillion-dollar budget is more than intimidating, and without that revelation of grace, I wouldn’t have survived.
While the transition has not always been easy—change never is—God’s grace has been more than enough. Our attendance is up, dozens are getting saved each week, giving has increased even in the midst of recession, and lives are being changed.
Grace is the central theme of the Bible. Taking grace out of the Bible would be like taking speed away from a running back: you wouldn’t have much left. Fourteen New Testament books begin with a reference to grace and fifteen end with one. The message is clear: start with grace and end with grace, and you’ll get the job done.
Think back to the origins of the church in Acts 2. A group of uneducated and fear-struck nobodies were filled with the power of the Spirit, and in one afternoon three thousand people were saved. Soon the number grew to five, ten, twenty, one hundred thousand. In the words of their enemies, they turned the world upside down. Two thousand years later, two billion people are called Christians.
Was that the ingenuity of a man? Were the disciples holed up in the upper room, plotting how to create a worldwide phenomenon that would span two millennia? Did they just get lucky? Or was great grace upon them all?
Forget the spreadsheet, calculator, and pencil—you won’t figure out how the Early Church grew with logic alone. It’s no coincidence that the first time we see church growth mentioned, we hear that “The Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47).
Please don’t misunderstand me: I’m not dismissing the importance of strategy or hard work. But they must begin and end with grace or they won’t last. If I have to be smart enough and tough enough to do this all on my own for the next thirty years, please, just shoot me now! As I’ve told my church more than once, if you were thirty years old and had six thousand people showing up every week expecting to hear something new, profound, and biblical, you’d be preaching grace too!
Our greatest efforts and best-laid plans won’t accomplish in a lifetime what God’s grace will do in a moment. His grace is the reason we are serving Him in the first place. It’s why we care about the lost and why we minister to people—even the mean ones. It’s grace that draws in hurting people who need to belong before they can believe or behave.
It’s grace that grows the church.
Rob Bell announced today that he has decided to leave Mars Hill Church, the Grandville megachurch he and his wife founded 12 years ago, to focus on a broader audience, the church announced today.
Shane Hipps, author of Flickering Pixels will take over for Bell during spring 2012 after Bell finishes his series on Acts in December.
The church released the following statement on its site:
Feeling the call from God to pursue a growing number of strategic opportunities, our founding pastor Rob Bell, has decided to leave Mars Hill in order to devote his full energy to sharing the message of God’s love with a broader audience.
It is with deeply mixed emotions that we announce this transition to you. We have always understood, encouraged, and appreciated the variety of avenues in which Rob’s voice and the message of God’s tremendous love has traveled over the past 12 years. And we are happy and hopeful that as Rob and Kristen venture ahead, they will find increasing opportunity to extend the heartbeat of that message to our world in new and creative ways.
Bell’s ignited a firestorm in the evangelical world earlier this year when he released his book “Love Wins.” In it he questioned the traditional Christian view of hell, arguing that hell was not eternal. He wrote that people could choose to leave hell if if they wanted too. This view drew the ire of some of the most influential evangelical leaders including John Piper. After seeing a video promoting “Love Wins,” Piper tweeted “Farewell Rob Bell” on his Twitter account. That set off a furious online debate about the book. The controversy helped propel it to the number two spot on the New York Times bestseller list.
Bell founded Mars Hill Bible Church in 1999, spending 18 months gathering in a school gymnasium before expanding to a former mall in Grandville, Mich. The church seats about 3,500 and holds two Sunday morning services. Bell was formerly an assistant pastor at Calvary Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Other prominent pastors and leaders, including Francis Chan, N. T. Wright, and Jim Belcher, have left their church positions in the past few years to pursue broader activities.
Below Is The Full Text of Mars Hill Church’s Statement:
To our community of attendees, listeners, and supporters:
The infamous quote “change is the only constant” certainly holds true at Mars Hill. We have experienced ongoing changes that have improved and transformed—as well as at times unintentionally created tension or heartache within our community. And now, we have another significant change to hold together.
Feeling the call from God to pursue a growing number of strategic opportunities, our founding pastor Rob Bell, has decided to leave Mars Hill in order to devote his full energy to sharing the message of God’s love with a broader audience.
It is with deeply mixed emotions that we announce this transition to you. We have always understood, encouraged, and appreciated the variety of avenues in which Rob’s voice and the message of God’s tremendous love has traveled over the past 12 years. And we are happy and hopeful that as Rob and Kristen venture ahead, they will find increasing opportunity to extend the heartbeat of that message to our world in new and creative ways.
Rob and Kristen started Mars Hill and helped create a church that removes the barriers to meeting Jesus. And while we recognize that no one person defines a community, we acknowledge the impact of Rob’s leadership, creativity, and biblical insights on our lives, and face a deep sadness at the loss of their presence in our community.
Rob will be addressing our community in both Gatherings on Sunday, September 25, to describe his journey and call to pursue a new venture. For the remainder of this year, he will be teaching our Acts Series several times with his last teaching being in December.
As we plan for the future, Shane Hipps will continue to teach our community and we will be inviting other familiar voices to teach on Sundays during the spring of 2012.
We continue to be amazed by the grace and trust of the community we serve. Your voice and heart will be important elements of how we move forward together as a community of believers. We invite you to continue on this journey with us and ask that you would join us in prayer while we carefully discern what lies ahead for the Mars Hill community.
Grace and Peace,
The Elder Team, Ministry Leadership Team, and staff of Mars Hill
Our thoughts and prayers of all of us here at Awaken Generation Blog go out to Rob and his family during this time of transition.
Fervent Records’ multi-award winning artist Chris August has always loved spending his few days of summer vacation at home surrounded by friends. But, this summer he joined K-LOVE in honoring special families by filling his days off with intimate performances at their homes as part of his first “Living Room” tour. K-LOVE listeners had the unique opportunity to win one of only five intimate concerts for a local family in need or a family with a unique story, spreading the neighborhood ministry. Traveling nationwide the week of 8/22, August lent his talents to celebrate with and encourage communities in Indianapolis, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Phoenix, and Denver. The performance in Oklahoma City was not the typical family living room as the show was held at Fort Sill army base with about 30 soldiers and their families. The highlight of the day was when K-LOVE winner Bruce Chim presented August with personalized army fatigues and a plaque to commemorate his performance. The concert crowds ranged in size from an intimate group of 20 to a full on block party with over 350 neighbors gathered around to see August’s live performance featuring his smash hits “Starry Night” and “7×70” as well as his current single “Battle.” These fan-favorite tunes are from his award-winning debut albumNo Far Away co-produced by August and Ed Cash and available everywhere now.
“It was an amazing experience,” Chris August stated, “I can’t say enough about how much it blessed me to be a part of these peoples lives.”
August will be playing a whole different string of venues this Fall as he opens for David Crowder*Band on their upcoming nationwide 33-city farewell tour, “The 7 Tour.” The tour kicks off on 9/28 in Austin, TX, and will wrap on 11/13 in Jackson, MS.
Fervent Records’ Chris August is quickly becoming a favorite in the CCM genre. With an impressive sweep at the 42nd Annual Dove Awards, he earned awards for “New Artist of the Year” and “Male Vocalist of the Year,” adding him to an elite group of only three artists in the history of the show who have received both awards. He also claimed the nod for “Pop/Contemporary Album of the Year” for his debut album No Far Awaythat he co-produced with acclaimed producer Ed Cash. The album delivered August’s debut single “Starry Night,” which hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Christian/AC chart in September and stayed put for six weeks as well as the hit follow-up single “7×70,” launching this self-taught pianist, guitarist, and producer as an artist in his own right. Featuring a resonant collection of soulful pop-rock sing-alongs, touching balladry, and heart-on-sleeve lyricism, No Far Away has become the best-selling New Artist project released in 2010. A native of Dallas, TX, August previously toured as the keyboard player and opening act for pop sensation Ashlee Simpson and worked with Ryan Cabrera, Brian McKnight, and Jessica Simpson before shifting his focus to a solo career.
For more information and additional tour dates on Chris August, visitwww.ChrisAugustMusic.com.
Had a long talk tonight with a friend about our flaws, how as we were growing up we were fat or freckled or wore glasses, and about no matter how much we change, we still feel like that rejected kid. She wasn’t quite as chubby as I was (or still am!) but she still got made fun of in school. For both of us, the healing really came when we learned to accept ourselves as we were.
It’s a slow process, for sure, and for me it included forgiving myself without feeling sorry for myself, and deciding to enjoy life now, not “when I lose weight.”
For me, that was the beginning of a long journey of losing more than 150 pounds. I don’t always love my body, but I rarely if ever hate it anymore. I’ve come a long way from those times that, in high school, I’d stress about not fitting into my band uniform. It’s been an incredible journey. I never diet anymore, and I keep a closer check on the crap I tell myself than I do on the scale (though I confess I weigh every day as, for me, it’s healthy to see that number and accept it rather than hate it.)
I used to hate seeing pictures of me back when I was so much heavier, but now, I love them. I was a good guy back then. I was carrying around a lot more than weight and it only produced muscle. And being that big gave me a big heart. I’m grateful.
It’s true we impress people with our supposed perfections, but we connect with each other in our flaws.
I’d rather be connected than perfect. After talking to my friend tonight about our flaws, I’m going to bed connected. Feels pretty good. Hope you’ve got some folks to celebrate your flaws with too.
Thought this video from Caitlyn Crosby was great.
Feel free to share your very favorite flaws in the comments below!
(NASHVILLE, Tenn.) Sept. 15, 2011 – Eight-time GMA Dove Award nominee Matt Maher heads out on a coast-to-coast fall headlining tour, visiting more than 25 cities through late October. “The Love In Between” tour is named after Maher’s forthcoming Sept. 20 studio release, whose debut single, “Turn Around,” is currently impacting Christian radio.
Kicking off Sept. 15 in Longview, Texas, the first half of Maher’s tour will be sponsored by his own non-profit, Comm+Unity, and feature guest artists Essential Worship’s One Sonic Society as well as recent Integrity Music signing All Sons & Daughters. Compassion International will present the remaining tour dates, joined by award-winning singer/songwriter Laura Story and new Essential Records artist, labelmate Andy Cherry. Information about the tour can be found at http://mattmahermusic.com/tour/.
Among the tour’s key dates are a The Love In Between CD release show in Phoenix on Sept. 20 and a concert at The City National Grove of Anaheim (Anaheim, Calif.), host to several sell-out concerts including Ray Charles, Morrissey, Jill Scott, Cyndi Lauper, George Lopez, Merle Haggard, Jamie Foxx, Dropkick Murphys and Seal, among others, on Sept. 22.
Maher comments, “My hope for this tour is to bring together believers of all ages and denominations and provide a night where we can reconnect with God and each other; that we’d leave with a greater desire to see, in concrete ways, how connected we are meant to be.”
Interconnectedness is also a theme on Maher’s new album, along with the ideas of suffering, grace, redemption and hope. These concepts are neatly swaddled in a new folk-Americana “blue collar gospel’ sound, fusing rootsy, hook-laden tracks with compelling stories and undeniable truths. The project’s debut radio single “Turn Around,” is already connecting with listeners nationwide, climbing its way to No. 11 this week on the National Billboard Christian Audience chart and No. 10 on the Billboard AC Indicator chart. WONU-FM radio listener Jen comments, “The song is awesome. I think it has potential to reach non-Christians because it is realistic in its lyrics. Definitely play this one on the air.”
Greg Cassidy, JOY-FM music director and morning show host, also comments, “St. Louis is lovin’ the new Matt Maher tune! It’s hitting real people where they really are. From the 51-year-old woman in her seventh day of sobriety to the couple that have been pondering divorce…that simple reminder to ‘turn around” has made its point! Home run for Matt!”
To sample an audio stream of “Turn Around” and for an up-to-date tour itinerary visit www.mattmahermusic.com. Also follow Matt on Twitter atwww.twitter.com/mattmahermusic.
About Matt Maher
Matt Maher – worship leader, songwriter, singer and recording artist – has embraced his calling as a “musical missionary” to impact a global stage.
Maher is well known for writing moving worship anthems including “Your Grace Is Enough,” “As It Is In Heaven,” “I Will Rise,” “All To Us,” “Here For You,” “Hold Us Together” and “Christ Is Risen.” His songs have appeared among the top 10 ranked songs on the CCLI chart, marking their popularity in church services worldwide, while also being recorded by artists including Chris Tomlin, Audrey Assad, Matt Redman, and the Passion movement. Additionally “Alive Again” was selected by iTunes as the best Christian & Gospel song of 2009. Such popularity has prompted more than 350,000 career sales. National media exposure includes the covers of Breakaway and Christian Single, a live performance on “FOX & Friends,” and guest writer for Billboard magazine.
Maher sits on the board of directors for the Catholic youth organization, Life Teen, and is a staple writer with EMI CMG Publishing. Amid busy touring and writing schedules, he hosts WorshipTogether’s “New Song Café” and is an active, bylined contributor to The Washington Post’s “On Faith” section ( http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-faith), an interactive conversation on religion.
Maher is from St. John’s Newfoundland, Canada and currently resides in Mesa, Ariz. with his wife Kristin and son Conor. For more information on Matt Maher, visit www.mattmahermusic.com.
About Comm+Unity
Comm+Unity is a new non-profit organization started by Matt Maher with the objective to fund local relief organizations who might not otherwise have the opportunity to be publicly recognized.
About Compassion International
Compassion International is the world’s largest Christian child development organization that permanently releases children from poverty. Founded in 1952, Compassion successfully tackles global poverty one child at a time, serving more than 1.2 million children in 26 of the world’s poorest countries. Recognizing that poverty is more than a lack of money, Compassion works through local churches to holistically address the individual physical, economic, educational and spiritual needs of children – enabling them to thrive, not just survive. Compassion has been awarded ten consecutive, four-star ratings by Charity Navigator, America’s largest charity evaluator.
My counselor shared a statistic with me two years ago that floored me…90% of the people entering ministry DO NOT RETIRE from ministry, they either quit or have some sort of moral/ethical failure that disqualifies them.
I’m not a rocket scientist…but I honestly do not believe that is what Jesus called us to OR what He wants for our lives.
AND yet so many of us (church leaders) struggle/wrestle with this (usually inwardly because if we said out loud that we are dying inside we fear that people may perceive us as weak!)
Here are ten signs that you are near a burnout and/or meltdown…
#1 – You are beginning to despise people and your compassion for them is continually decreasing rather than increasing.
#2 – You OFTEN think about doing something other than ministry…and your biggest desire isn’t to honor God and reach people but to simply find relief from the pressure that seems to be building daily inside of you.
#3 – You cannot remember the last time you simply had fun with family and friends…and joy is something you talk about but are not experiencing for yourself.
#4 – You are disconnected at home…when you get there you do not want to engage with your spouse or your children, you cannot enjoy being around them…you spend more time online than you do with your family…and you find yourself wanting to sleep all of the time.
#5 – You continually tell yourself and those you love that “this is just a really busy season and that you will slow down soon.” (However, the truth is that you have been most likely “singing that same song” for years!)
#6 – You are continually becoming obsessed with what others say about you…and one negative comment from someone who does not like you can put you in an incredibly deep valley and cause you to feel hopeless.
#7 – You begin to make easy decisions rather than the right ones…because the right ones take too much work.
#8 – There is no hope in you…and, you actually despair life. You have actually thought of death…and some have even entertained suicidal thoughts.
#9 – You are experiencing unexplained depression and/or anxiety. You are even having panic attacks and you can’t explain it!
#10 – You are increasingly becoming withdrawn from family and friends.
“How did you come up with this list,” you ask…it’s quite simple, I went back to December 2007 until January of this past year and listed out the qualities that were the most prominent in my own life. That’s right…my life! I went through a trial of intense depression and anxiety during that time period and, the best way I can describe my life would be “dark!”
However, through me swallowing my pride and asking for help, the support of an incredible wife, the support of great friends and seeking out an incredible counselor…and the unbelievable mercy of God I broke free from my darkness this past January. Oh sure, I still struggle with it more often than I wish I would…but I cannot tell you the incredible feelings of freedom and joy I’ve had since January that I haven’t had in YEARS!
And…this is the motivation for Reawaken – a one day worship/seminar for senior pastors, their wives and other church leaders as well. It’s going to be an event where I am going to be talking about the things that pastors don’t talk about that often…how to overcome the desire to quit and actually get your passion/joy back at a level that you didn’t believe you could have.
ALSO…I am bringing in who I would consider to be THE BEST counselor on the planet for pastors and church leaders. His name is Dr John Walker…and not only is he a licensed psychologist but he has also planted churches, pastored churches and served in nearly every capacity as a church staff member. In others words…he understands our world.
It’s going to be an incredible day…in fact, it COULD be the day that the Lord uses to SAVE your ministry! You can go here to find out more information about it...but I can tell you right now that it is going to be the most raw and real event that you will EVER attend. AND…pastors, I am REALLY encouraging you to bring your spouse to this one!!!
God called us to do a lot of things for Him…but He did not call us to flame out or drop out. I want what Paul said in II Timothy 4:7 to be true of all of us! I want us to finish well!
September 19, 2011 – Los Angeles, CA – Fort Worth’s explosive heavy rock band OH, SLEEPER has announced a partnership with non-profit organization To Write Love on Her Arms to present the Children of Fire Tour, which kicks off October 27 in Little Rock, AR. The band will be joined by Greeley Estates, Ten After Two, At the Skylines and Secrets touring in support. Tickets are on-sale today (links are below).
“We are extremely excited to partner up with TWLOHA for this upcoming tour,” says guitarist James Erwin. “It’s an organization we’ve loved and supported for years now, so it’s cool to come together with them to help get the word out to our fans about TWLOHA. It’s an important issue, so hopefully this will help bring light to a situation that plagues so many youth today.”
“Over the past five years, we have found a home within the greater community of music,” adds TWLOHA spokesman Chad Moses. “Here, we have had some of our greatest opportunities to engage individuals and grow incredible friendships. We met the guys in OH, SLEEPER a few years ago at Cornerstone Festival, and they have since become some of our most visible supporters in the hard music scene. At TWLOHA, we value working closely with music we believe in, but beyond that we also get to work with musicians we firmly stand behind. I remember vividly an interaction between Micah and a young fan directly following their set at Cornerstone. The young man approached an exhausted Micah and simply expressed gratitude for the honest nature of their debut album When I Am God. He said that some of those songs kept him going and were the reason he did not die by suicide. Immediately, Micah stood up, gave the fan a bear hug and said, “We are honored to have you as a fan. Thank you for staying alive! Never give up!””
“Who wouldn’t want to collaborate with guys like that?,” continues Moses. “They are creating music because they have a message to spread and fans they love. It is clear that we are all working toward the same thing: spreading hope. OH, SLEEPER’s creativity and personality have had TWLOHA’s support for years now, and this Fall, we have the chance to work together on their tour for the release of Children of Fire. The new album exists in a world full of questions, a world which many of us relate to on some level. The hope with this tour is to start a conversation and let the people in the audience know they are not alone, that their story is important and their life matters, that hope is real and help exists.”
OH, SLEEPER unleashed their third studio album, Children of Fire, digitally on September 6 and will release the album on CD on September 27. The much anticipated release has set message boards, blogs and websites on fire with grassroots buzz and has garnered rave reviews across the board.
To Write Love on Her Arms:
To Write Love on Her Arms is a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for those struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury, and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inspire, inform, and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery. Since its start in 2006, TWLOHA has donated over $850,000 directly into treatment and recovery and answered over 160,000 emails from over 100 countries. http://www.twloha.com/
OH, SLEEPER Tour Dates:
Oct 27 – Little Rock, AR – Downtown Music
Oct 28 – Oklahoma City, OK – The Conservatory
Oct 29 – Rogers, AR – Pinnacle Hills Cross Church Oct 30 – St. Louis, MO – Fubar
Oct 31 – Omaha, NE – Sokol Underground
Nov 3 – St. Paul, MN – Station 4
Nov 4 – La Crosse, WI – Warehouse
Nov 5 – Joliet, IL – Mojoes
Nov 6 – Toledo, OH – Frankies
Nov 7 – Jamestown, NY – Jamestown Savings Bank Ice Arena
Nov 8 – Annapolis, MD – Knights of Columbus
Nov 10 – Richmond, VA – Kingdom
Nov 11 – Lynchburg, VA – Cross Point Venue
Nov 12 – North Charleston, SC – The Wharehouse
Nov 13 – Jacksonville, FL – Murray Hill Theatre
Nov 14 – Lake Wales, FL – Club DeCosey Nov 15 – Douglasville, GA – The 7 Venue
Nov 16 – Chattanooga, TN – The Warehouse Venue
Nov 17 – Nashville, TN – Rocketown (White Building)
Nov 18 – Tupelo, MS – Good Time Charlies
Nov 19 – Baton Rouge, LA – North Gate Tavern
Nov 20 – Waco, TX – Art Ambush/Runt Entertainment
For More Information:
https://www.facebook.com/ohsleeper
http://www.myspace.com/ohsleeper
http://twitter.com/weareohsleeper
http://www.twloha.com/
When it comes to TV Shows, I prefer sitcoms any day of the week over anything else. I can watch the same episode 60 times and still love it and want to watch it again. So I was thinking now the other day about who I think are my favorite TV characters of all time and I think I came up with a top five list that I think is on the money.
So My Favorite TV Characters Of All Time Are:
1. Cosmo Kramer (Seinfeld)
2. George Costanza (Seinfeld)
3. Ross Gellar (Friends)
4. Frank Barone (Everybody Loves Raymond)
5. Martin Crane (Frasier)
Who’s on your top five list?
In this week’s edition of Cool Song Fridays, I want to introduce to one of my favorite songs of the last few months called “Awakening.” If you’re familiar with the Passion Movement (Louie Giglio, Chris Tomlin etc.) then you’ve heard this song before, but if not you’re in for a cool surprise. This version that I love, however, is a cover version of this song performed by Hillsong on their latest release “God Is Able.” It’s the last track on the album and truly a gem.
First of all, let me open this post by saying that I’m a huge Tim Tebow fan. I want him to succeed in the NFL like no one else (besides Colt McCoy). So like many other Tebow fans I’m disappointed that we don’t get see him play every week. In other words, I want Tebow to be the starter. I think he’ll surprise everyone with just how impressive he is if given the chance. Sure he’ll have to go through a learning slump but that’s just part of the process. It’s not that I have anything against Kyle Orton or that I want him to fail, it’s just that I really really want Tim Tebow to succeed.
And it’s because of this that I had a big laugh while watching The Broncos vs The Raiders on Monday Night Football when I heard the Broncos fans Boo Orton and chant “We Want Tebow, We Want Tebow!!!”
The booing of Orton started early in the fourth quarter, shortly after a 1-yard run by Oakland quarterback Jason Campbell gave the Raiders a touchdown that put them in firm control against the Broncos. The chants for Tebow were first heard with 6 minutes remaining in the game, even as Orton was marching the Broncos toward the end zone in an effort to rally his teammates from a 10-point deficit. And when Broncos coach John Knox, was asked about the QB situation after the game he ignored the question.
If I could offer my two cents about the whole Tebow debacle: Here’s the thing—I think given the chance and the right amount of time Tim Tebow would blow everyone away with just how good he is. But so far he hasn’t been given the chance, so as a result I don’t think any criticism of him is justified. Even his game time in the preseason games wasn’t fair in terms of seeing what he can do. Because first of all, the Broncos kept running the ball – 2 out of every 3 downs they ran the ball leaving Tebow one chance per drive to throw the ball, meaning that if he didn’t make that pass they’d have to punt. So he’d essentially get 2 or 3 chances to throw the ball the whole half of the quarter. There’s no way that’s enough time to see what Tebow can do.
Of course Tebow’s success will mean nothing to those who don’t like him, even if they don’t know why. Either way, in the end coach John Knox can’t ignore or drown out the call of the masses of Broncos faithfuls. That’s a call he’ll have to answer one time or another.
(NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE) –September 13, 2011 –Salem Radio will present Grammy® Award winning Christian artist Rebecca St. James as the headlining force on the “Purity & Worship Tour” being presented nationally this fall in major Salem Radio broadcast markets across the U.S.
The concert dates will begin September 16 and 17 in Colorado Springs and Denver markets and continue through December. Salem Radio affiliates in Washington, DC, Orlando, Tampa, Atlanta, Detroit, Minneapolis, Omaha, San Antonio, and Houston are already committed with additional host cities being added.
The “Purity & Worship Tour” is being presented as an unplugged, acoustic evening of music and ministry geared to offer family themed entertainment, content, and messaging from one of Christian music’s most articulate contemporary voices.
The “purity” theme of the evening is designed to attract young people and their parents—mothers and daughters in particular, on a key issue of St. James’ messaging. Since the release of her signature song Wait For Me in 2000, the Australian born singer has been a major voice for the purity and abstinence agenda who has consistently carried the message throughout her ministry in music, books, and film worldwide.
Salem Communications is a leading U.S. radio broadcaster, Internet content provider, and magazine and book publisher targeting audiences interested in Christian and family-themed content and conservative values. Salem owns and/or operates approximately 95 radio stations –58 of which are in 23 of the top 25 radio markets nationally. Salem Radio Network® syndicates talk, news, and music programming to approximately 2,000 affiliates nationally.
About the tour presentation of Rebecca St. James, David Santrella, President of Salem’s Radio Division, notes:
“The message of purity and abstinence in today’s culture that is saturated by sexual imagery is perhaps one of the most important messages young women can hear. Rebecca St. James has been uniquely gifted with the ability to deliver through her music and her ministry, a message of sexual purity in a way that easily connects with parents and their daughters, helping to open the door to discussions which may not otherwise occur. Salem Communications is proud to be partnering with Rebecca to present The Purity & Worship Tour which will deliver that message in an entertaining and relatable way to our Salem markets nationwide.”
A key element of the “Purity & Worship Tour” will also be the presentation of her established music as well as new worship material from St. James’ latest album release I Will Praise You which debuted this spring as her first studio project under a new creative association with the Provident Label Group.
Now recognized also as a best-selling Christian author whose latest book on dating What Is He Thinking? (Hachette-Faithwords)will release nationally on September 26, St. James will also share a special screening segment of her pro life message film, “Sarah’s Choice” at the Salem events.
Joining Rebecca on the tour dates will be exciting new Contemporary Christian duo, For King & Country, whose debut single for Fervent Records “Busted Heart (Hold On To Me)” is now reaching national audiences via Christian radio.
Resource Rebecca St. James online: www.rsjames.com
Focus on the Family founder and best-selling author James Dobson is recovering from a fall while horseback riding in Montana on Sept. 10.
Dobson broke several bones, according to his successor at Focus and the nonprofit organization’s president, Jim Daly. In his blog, Daly wrote that Dobson, 74, was “in good spirits and expected to make a full recovery.”
Dobson founded Focus in 1977, resigning in 2009 so that the ministry could be passed on to the next generation of leaders. In 2010, Dobson—along with his son, Ryan—launched his new radio program, “Family Talk.”
Dobson’s fall caused a fractured and fractured scapula, as well as several broken ribs, according to a “Family Talk” press release. “His condition is stable, and his spirits are good at this early stage in his recovery,” said his daughter, Danae Dobson. “Hospital tests revealed there is no internal bleeding or other complications.”
Dobson was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2002. Dobson also experienced a major stroke in 1998, making it hard for him to speak and articulate words during recovery. In 1990, he suffered a heart attack after one of his tri-weekly basketball games, which forced him to give up the sport.
Dobson’s books include The New Strong-Willed Child, Family Man, Bringing Up Girls and Bringing Up Boys (all Tyndale House Publishers).
After selling a quarter million albums and over a half million song downloads to date, a chart topping radio single, receiving accolades for his previous three efforts and being featured in major publications such as CCM, Relevant, Worship Leader and Christian Music Today, Fair Trade Services’ recording artist Phil Wickham returns October 4, with his latest album Response.
On his fourth release, Wickham provides listeners with eleven tracks that seek to give a voice to humanity’s acceptance of God’s love in any circumstance. In the same way that the Psalms offer expressions of joy, sorrow, repentance, hope and victory, Response gives a voice to the appreciation and adoration of God in every chapter of life.
“When I see the different aspects of who God is in different situations of life, my response to that love can be seen as jumping for joy where other times I respond by saying, ‘You are Holy and I am not,’ humbled and falling on my face,” Wickham describes.
For his previous three projects- Phil Wickham (2006); Cannons (2007) and Heaven & Earth (2009), Wickham worked solely with longtime friend and producer Pete Kipley (MercyMe, Matthew West, The Afters). On Response, Wickham invited reputable producer Brown Bannister (Steven Curtis Chapman, Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith) to co-produce the album as an intentional effort to stay true to the album’s theme of voicing a collective worshipful response to God.
“There are more musicians playing on the record than I normally work with,” Wickham says. “Multiple drummers, bass players, etc and I wrote with more people on this record hoping to have these songs be an expression of everybody’s heart not just mine.”
The first single from Response, “At Your Name (Yahweh, Yahweh),” is currently receiving airplay on 26 stations nationwide, including national networks KLOVE and American Family Radio. The song has already cracked the top 15 on the INSPO radio chart and is No. 35 on the National Christian Audience radio chart. In support of the track, Wickham has been out on the road visiting radio stations across the nation including stations in Nashville, TN; Charlotte, NC; Minneapolis, MN and Kansas City, MO.
In conjunction with the new release, Wickham will also tour around the country this fall playing his new single, other songs from Response and more.
For more information and a full list of tour dates please visit www.philwickham.com
With over four million albums sold worldwide, 16 No. 1 radio hits, seven GMA Dove Awards, and three RIAA certified Platinum and three Gold records to her credit, Jaci Velasquez has signed a record deal with Inpop Records. Her first project with the label, titled Diamond, is slated for a Feb. 7, 2012 release.
“I’m personally and professionally thrilled to welcome Jaci to our Inpop family,” states Andrew Patton, GM/VP, Inpop Records. “I’ve had the pleasure of working with Jaci and her team for more than a decade, and to reunite and bring her new music to the world is an immense honor. Jaci has been and continues to be the driving positive force in the Latin music community, and her reach in and through the CCM world is also long and sustaining. Having the ability to link arms with any artist with such a broad foundational platform is a win-win out of the box for us.”
Taking a few years off to marry fellow musician Nic Gonzales (Salvador) and have two children, Zealand and Soren, Velasquez is returning to her career with a frenzy of activity. In addition to the upcoming release of Diamond, she is writing a new book and is starring in two new films, “The Encounter” and “Jerusalem Countdown,” both slated to release this year. And in the midst of all of this she manages to co-host Salem Broadcasting’s syndicated network show, “Your Family Friendly Morning Show With Doug & Jaci Velasquez,” which reaches more than 1.5 million listeners nationwide every week.
“I am so excited to be with Inpop,” exclaims Velasquez. “There are many new, creative, and talented faces in the Inpop family that I very much look forward to working alongside. This is in addition to a number of familiar faces that I have worked well with in the past, so it’s like a family reunion, but better! The way I look at it, it’s the best of both worlds.”
John Piper is releasing a new book on racism later this month wherein he candidly talks about his own past racial prejudice and the power of the Cross to overcome racial prejudice in all its forms. He begins Bloodlines with a confession of his own sins and experience with racial tensions, and shares about the journey of transformation God has taken him and his Church on, on this deeply personal yet controversial subject.
“I grew up In Greenville, South Carolina, where enforced segregation was almost absolute,” he writes. Comparing his world to that of Jesse Jackson, who lived just across town, he observed that it was no wonder Jackson attended a liberal theological institution rather than a fundamental or evangelical school in the South, which were “committed to segregation.”
Despite his racist tendencies, Piper had an affection for Lucy, a black woman who came to clean the family’s home every week. His mother, a “gutsy Yankee fundamentalist,” invited Lucy to their church for his sister’s wedding—a daring move in 1962 when the congregation had voted not to allow blacks into services. Piper’s mother was the lone voice against the motion.
Along with his mother’s good example, Piper was strongly affected by a comment by an Urbana missions convention speaker in favor of interracial marriage. God’s work in his life regarding his racist attitudes continued at Fuller Seminary and beyond.
Today, working in an urban parish, he doesn’t see himself as a model multi-ethnic pastor, but his congregation is intentionally aiming for greater diversity, and not long after he turned 50, he and his wife, Noel, adopted an African-American little girl.
Piper wrote Bloodlines with the aim of seeing Christ-followers learn to live “the kind of lives that advance the cause of Christ-exalting racial diversity and Spirit-enabled racial harmony.” He sees the gospel as “the only sufficient power for this effort, and the only power that in the end will bring the bloodlines of race into the single bloodlines of the cross.”
He devotes much of the book to the gospel remedy for racism, and addresses the Reformed church, acknowledging that some of its representatives have not always been good examples of racial reconciliation.
Piper also warns against another extreme—making race an idol. “Some churches have never taken the first baby steps in thinking biblically about race and ethnicity. Others devote so much focus to it that people get sick of the issue, and backlash sets in,” he writes, urging a God-centered balance.
In Bloodlines, Piper enables readers to grasp the reality and extent of racism, and then he demonstrates from Scripture how the light of the gospel penetrates the darkness of this destructive sin.
To order Bloodlines, call 800-323-3890, or visit www.crossway.com or find it on amazon here.
We could be reveling
Forever in the love you bring
And we could be wasted on
You and not count it lost
Like fools in love
We’re bound to make a scene
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed, our hearts bleed
For you
We could burn down the days
Inside the light of your face
And we could throw the years away
And not regret the price we paid
Like fools in love
We’re bound to make a scene
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed, our hearts bleed
For you
You have loved alive the dead and gone
And filled our thirsty veins with blood and song
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed for you, oh
Our hearts bleed, our hearts bleed
For you
The devil’s dealing dirty
In broken hearts and counterfeit currency
The living isn’t easy
When a heart’s regret can tax the air you breathe
But like diamonds we shine
Up against the sheet of night
The jet-black sheet of night
We overtake the cityscapes
We scale the heights
We break but we don’t die
Whoa we’ve got a blood
We’ve got a love that’ll brave the flood
Whoa we’ve got a blood
We’ve got a love that’ll brave…
The cold will leave you guilty
And the wind will shake you like a tambourine
The dogs will leave you hungry
And your superiors will tax the blood you bleed
But like diamonds we shine
Up against the sheet of night
The jet-black sheet of night
We overtake the cityscapes
We scale the heights
We break but we don’t die
Whoa we’ve got a blood
We’ve got a love that’ll brave the flood
Whoa we’ve got a blood
We’ve got a love that’ll brave the flood
But like diamonds we shine
Up against the sheet of night
The jet-black sheet of night
We overtake the cityscapes
We scale the heights
We break but we don’t die
The devil’s dealing dirty
In broken hearts and counterfeit…
It’s no secret that the Twilight book and film series have become a phenomenon among teenage girls, and in her new book, The Gospel According to Twilight: Women, Sex, and God, author Elaine A. Heath takes a closer look at the vampire story’s theology and the impact it could have on young women and girls.
Heath, the associate professor of evangelism at Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, told Awaken Generation Blog that the first reason why girls love Twilight is because it’s exciting.
“I think it really captures a lot of the spiritual and social questions and anxieties of a generation that describe themselves as spiritual but not religious,” she observed.
Twilight, which began as a series of novels by Stephenie Meyer and has since been made into several blockbuster films, is centered around a teenage girl, Bella, who falls in love with a vampire, Edward. Mix in a few werewolves, some danger, and a lot of romance and you have a cultural phenomenon.
The Twilight franchise raked in nearly $70 million in U.S. ticket sales on opening weekend for both the first and third films in the saga, according to The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) website. In 2009, the second installment, “New Moon,” brought in a staggering amount of nearly $143 million.
Despite its popularity, Heath has concerns about what young people might be learning from the stories.
“The most alarming aspect of the books,” she said, “is the systematic gender violence and gender stereotyping that’s negative … especially about women and girls.”
She believes the main female characters in the series are all victims of violence, but because it is mixed with romance and justification attempts, the violence toward women becomes “normalized” to the audience.
“Edward has many characteristics of men who batter,” she noted, “and his behavior and his control (stalking, demanding to know where she is), all these different things that he does to intimidate and control her, those are things that abusive men and boys do to girls.”
On the bright side, there are a number of positive theological themes to be explored in the series as well.
The strongest Christian theme, Heath suggested, is that of reconciliation. In the end, Bella’s character is able to bring peace between the warring species of humans, vampires, and werewolves. The theme of salvation is also present throughout the series.
The Cullen family (Edward’s parents and siblings), she added, are also a model of what a strong faith community is like – they encourage each other to do what’s right, sacrifice for the common good, and use their gifts to protect one another.
There are also Mormon themes present in the novels, Heath pointed out, because Meyer belongs to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
So there are good and bad lessons to be learned from the series, but the story can be used to open up a dialogue with younger generations.
“I think it could be very helpful in unearthing unhealthy relationship and gender issues that are in our culture,” she said. “Likewise, it could help us to have some great spiritual conversations and critiques of social problems in our culture.”
The key to discussing cultural issues, Heath noted, is to do so with respect.
From her experience, Twilight fanatics will “shut down” if you speak badly about their favorite character; so in order for parents or youth leaders to create a dialogue over cultural issues they need to approach them thoughtfully and lovingly.
Many more theological and social issues are covered in Heath’s book, in which she included a series of questions to help encourage dialogue over the important issues she discusses.
The newest film in the Twilight series, “Breaking Dawn, Part One,” opens in theaters on Nov. 18.
A few years ago, I was part of a mission team that helped build a Teen Challenge Center in Ocho Rios, Jamaica. After a week of hard work, our family stuck around for a few days to enjoy the island. When we checked into our hotel I happened to pick up a tourist brochure about cliff jumping and the second I saw it I knew I needed to do it. But a few lazy days later, we were on an airplane headed back to Washington, DC and I remember having this thought at about thirty-thousand feet: I might never get back here. I felt like I had forfeited a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And I still regret it. In fact, one of my life goals is to go back and not just jump off a cliff. I want to do a cliff baptism. Talk about baptism by immersion!
So I missed an opportunity to jump off a cliff. So what? In the grand scheme of things, that regret is rather benign. But that experience taught me a valuable lesson: at the end of our lives, we’ll regret opportunities missed a lot more than mistakes made.
That conviction is backed up by the research of two Cornell sociologists, Tom Gilovich and Vicki Medvec. According to their study, time is a key factor in what we regret. Over the short-term, we tend to regret our actions. But over the long-haul, we tend to regret inactions. Their study found that over the course of an average week, action regrets outnumber inaction regrets 53% to 47%. But when people look at their lives as a whole, inaction regrets outnumber action regrets 84% to 16%.
In theological terms, action regrets are sins of commission. And they certainly cause a twinge of guilt. But it is the inaction regrets or sins of omission that haunt us the rest of our lives. We are left to wonder: what if?
One of our core values at National Community Church is everything is an experiment. And that experimental approach to ministry gives us the freedom to fail. We’re not afraid of making mistakes. In fact, we’re afraid of not making mistakes because that means we aren’t taking enough risks.
Every sermon series is a teaching experiment. Every outreach is an evangelism experiment. Every small group is a discipleship experiment. Even our vision of meeting in movie theaters at metro stops throughout the metro DC area is an experiment in doing church in the middle of the marketplace.
I just don’t want to get to the end of my life and my ministry and wonder: What if?
I’d rather have some action regrets from falling flat on my face than leave a trail of inaction regrets in my wake.
I’m afraid that too many churches are playing not to lose instead of playing to win. We’re playing a prevent defense instead of storming the gates of Hell. We’re boycotting the Aeropagus instead of competing for the truth like the Apostle Paul.
Does it bother anyone else that the church is known more for what we’re against than what we’re for? We can do better than that can’t we? Instead of pointing our finger at what’s wrong with culture, the church needs to offer better alternatives. We need to make better movies and better music. We need to write better books. We need to start better schools and better businesses.
In the words of Michelangelo, we need to criticize by creating.
I have a core conviction that drives my ministry: there are ways of doing church that no one has thought of yet. That is what gets me up early and keeps me up late. I can’t imagine a more exciting time to be doing church. Podcasting is e-vangelism at the speed of light. Blogging is digital discipleship without borders. Our generation has an unprecedented opportunity to fulfill the Great Commission if we simply redeem technology and use it to serve God’s purposes.
But we need to stop doing ministry out of memory and start doing ministry out of imagination. We need to stop repeating the past and start creating the future. We need to stop being so afraid of doing something wrong that we don’t do anything right.
I know sins of commission grieve the Spirit of God. But I honestly don’t think they grieve God half as much as the God-ordained opportunities we fail to seize.
So what will you always regret if you don’t at least try it?
My advice is this: go jump off a cliff.
(Nashville, Tenn) September 1, 2011— According to TIME magazine over 40 million people sing the songs of Chris Tomlin each week, suggesting he is “likely the most often sung artist anywhere.” As a result, church congregations worldwide feel a connection with the lyrics and music Tomlin writes. On November 15th, sixstepsrecords will release a collection featuring many of Tomlin’s most defining songs to date on How Great Is Our God: The Essential Collection.
How Great Is Our God: The Essential Collection will feature 14 tracks; seven of which went to #1 at Christian AC Radio, 4 are currently in the Top 10 of most sung songs at Churches, and all 14 songs are in the top 120. Accolades aside, these are songs that not only have defined Tomlin, but have given a voice to the Church and millions of people around the world as they worship Jesus. Most notably, the record will also include new renditions of “Forever,” “We Fall Down” and a new version of the title track and current #1 CCLI song newly entitled “How Great Is Our God (The World Sings)” featuring the voices of influential worship leaders from around the world. For a full track listing see below.
Before the release of his new project, Tomlin will once again unite with friends Louie Giglio and Christy Nockels for the fall leg of his “And If Our God Is For Us…Tour.” Tomlin’s spring leg of the tour drew sold out crowds across the country. The event was in such high demand, second shows were added in Portland, Phoenix and Houston, and seats sold out shortly after they were announced. This season the tour will visit fans in Colorado Springs, Washington D.C., Indianapolis, St. Louis and more. See a full list of tour dates below. Tickets for all dates are currently on-sale now at www.christomlin.com.
Track Listing:
Chris Tomlin AND IF OUR GOD IS FOR US… TOUR with Louie Giglio & Christy Nockels 10/19 Colorado Springs, CO
10/20 Wichita, KS
10/21 Little Rock, AR
10/22 Pensacola, FL
10/25 Austin, TX
10/26 Corpus Christi, TX
10/27 College Station, TX
10/28 Shreveport, LA
10/29 Hattiesburg, MS
11/2 Indianapolis, IN – SOLD OUT
11/3 Johnstown, PA
11/4 Washington DC
11/5 Charleston, WV
11/11 Nashville, TN
11/12 Corbin, KY
11/16 Bourbonnais, IL
11/17 Memphis, TN
11/18 St. Louis, MO
11/19 Birmingham, AL
Marvin Sapp, whose wife passed away in 2010 after a battle with cancer, has announced plans to record songs for a new album expected to be released in 2012.
Sapp, who wowed fans with his 2010 Here I Am album, will be recording his next body of work live on Oct. 7, at Evangel Cathedral in Upper Marlboro, Md., near Washington, D.C.
The album was expected to address how Sapp overcame the loss of several people in his life, including wife MaLinda Sapp, who passed away in September 2010 due to complications from colon cancer.
“The focus of this record is how you can come through situations and still remain on top. It’s about how the enemy has a way of hitting you with stuff to cause you to fold and buckle, but I’m still standing,” Sapp told Billboard.com.
Sapp noted that although the album would be recorded live “some will sound like it’s studio. We’re gonna mix it up.”
As for why Sapp, pastor of Lighthouse Full Life Center Church in Grand Rapids, Mich., planned to record the music at a church in Maryland, the minister said Washington, D.C., is home to some of his biggest supporters.
“D.C. is one my largest audiences. They buy tons of records of mine in Washington, D.C. … So we’re going to do something different and see how it works,” he told Billboard.com.
The gospel album to be released in 2012 will be Sapp’s seventh, according to his official music website.
Sapp’s 2007 album “Thirsty” went gold and won seven Gospel Stellar Awards in 2009. His 2010 album, “Here I Am,” won several Stellar awards and a Dove Award. “Here I Am” was also recorded live.
Sapp debuted in the 90s as a gospel singer with the group Commissioned before launching his solo career in 1996.
“I am a preacher, called by God, who happens to sing,” was how Sapp defined his ministry.
In case you’re not too familiar with Marvin Sapp’s music, you can take a listen to one of my favorite songs by him below entitled, “Never Would’ve Made It Without You.”
Author William P. Young’s contract dispute regarding his runaway best-seller, The Shack, has been settled out of court.
Court documents show that a jury trial was scheduled for late September in Ventura, Calif., but on Aug. 12 the case was dismissed without prejudice.
Young filed suit in November 2009 against Brad Cummings and Wayne Jacobsen. Windblown Media countersued for $5 million in federal court and made a claim over the authorship of the book. Cummings and Jacobsen collaborated with Young in writing what became a No. 1 New York Times best-selling novel and founded Windblown Media to publish it after it was rejected by multiple publishers. Cummings did not respond to queries for comment by press time.
Hachette Book Group, which in 2008 began to distribute The Shack, also filed suit against Young and Windblown Media to determine where royalties should be paid and to protect itself from future lawsuits. In the wake of the dismissal, Hachette’s statement to Christian Retailing on the case was: “We’re very pleased that the parties have resolved their differences and we can move forward.”
Nichole Daiger, communications/public relations specialist for Los Angeles law firm Loeb & Loeb—which employs Young’s attorney, Michael Anderson—confirmed that the case was settled, but said that “the terms are confidential, so unfortunately we are not able to provide any comment or details.”
Attorneys for Windblown Media had a similar comment. “All disputes by the parties have been resolved by mutual agreement,” said Allison Hart of Los Angeles firm Lavely & Singer.
The suits filed concerned more than $8 million in royalties. Young’s contract had promised him 50 cents per paperback sale and $1 per hardcover sale, and a third of net profits.
“After we did an accounting, we recognized that he wasn’t getting paid anywhere near what he should,” Anderson told Christian Retailing in 2010.
Jacobsen said earlier that God was not “for us or against our brother Paul [Young]. He is for a resolution steeped in the very things we wrote about together—love, grace, truth, forgiveness and laying down our lives for each other. I’m sure Jesus yearns for a full reconciliation, but lacking that, would at least appreciate it if we could find a gracious resolution and a peaceful parting.”
When I was a junior in high school, my church youth group voted me to be their president. Apparently the qualifications for office had nothing to do with living like a Christian, and before I knew it, my one-year term “earned” me a partial scholarship to a Christian university. With athletics covering the rest of my room and board, I embarked on what I hoped would become a new, God-pleasing beginning.
I set off with a carload of clothes, Bic pens, my Cindy Crawford poster, and lofty dreams. Instead of being surrounded by young Billy Grahams and Mother Teresas, however, I was bombarded by miniature Lindsay Lohans and Kanye Wests and quickly pulled into the party scene.
Sin is fun — at least for a while. But it never fails to come back to haunt you, usually when you least expect it. Like a sneeze, sin feels good at first, but it leaves a huge mess. By my sophomore year, several of my fraternity brothers got busted for grand larceny, putting our whole fraternity at risk of being kicked off campus. Around the same time, because of a major hangover, I slept through tennis practice, which placed me exactly one mistake away from losing my athletic scholarship. And many people on campus despised me because of how I had treated a few girls.
Feeling lower and lower by the second, I decided to look up toward God — again.
I decided to start a Bible study in our fraternity house. I sold this unusual idea to my frat brothers by explaining that it would be great PR to help our sullied reputation. Truthfully, I wanted to learn about God. Since church hadn’t really helped me in that department, I thought I might as well go straight to the Bible to see what I could discover for myself.
On the Tuesday morning before our first Bible study, I was strolling across campus between classes when it dawned on me that I didn’t have a Bible. (I left the family’s gold Bible at home.) On my way to my world literature class, an older gentleman introduced himself to me, saying he was a Gideon. He asked me if I wanted a free Bible. I wasn’t sure what a Gideon was, but as
far as I was concerned, he might as well have been one of God’s angels.
That night, a handful of us started reading the Bible in a small, sweat-soaked, party-stained room in the Lamba Chi Alpha house. We started reading in Matthew, chapter one, and once we moved past who begat whom, the pace picked up. At the end of our rookie Bible studies, we prayed the only prayers we knew: “God, protect us as we party. God, keep Joe’s girlfriend from getting pregnant. God, don’t let us get caught cheating on the American history test.” They weren’t the typical prayers prayed at Baptist student unions, but they were honest.
We were a bunch of guys who believed in God but didn’t have a clue who God really is.
Although we didn’t know what we were doing, our little Bible study started to grow. Apparently many of our party friends bore a similar spiritual curiosity. The more Bible we read and the more prayers we prayed, the more people showed up and the more God seemed to do.
After finishing Matthew, we discovered that Mark, Luke, and John had several of the same stories. Three chapters into Acts, we got bored and skipped to Romans. Midway through Romans, I got so excited that I started reading ahead. When I reached Ephesians, I encountered two verses that would forever change my life: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.” Could this be true? We’re saved by God’s grace and his grace alone? It’s not by our works? Why didn’t anyone tell me?
I felt like a caged animal and had to escape that tiny room. Someone was sitting in front of the only door, so I slipped out the closest window and dropped to the ground. Sensing something important, I dashed to a nearby softball field, needing to be alone with God. What happened next is hard to explain and even harder for me to believe. The presence of God became real to me.
I always thought that only wackos actually hear from God. Sure, you heard God. And there’s a teeny angel on your shoulder right now telling you what to do next, right?
Well, that evening I became a wacko. Kneeling on the grass, I heard a voice. It wasn’t audible — it was actually way too loud to be audible, too present inside me. “Without me, you have nothing. With me, you have everything.” I knelt and prayed the shortest, most power-packed, faith-filled prayer of my life.
Not so much whispering as mouthing the words, I said to God, “Take my life.”
That was it. I had knelt down in the field as one person, and I stood up as a completely different person. I had the same body, the same voice, and the same mind, but I wasn’t the same. I’d later learn that I’d become what the Bible calls a “new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17). The old was gone; the new had come. I had finally transformed from a Christian Atheist into a Christian.
For the first time in my life, I believed in God and began to live like he is real.
Mission Not Accomplished
Since I was a new person, I became aware of a new mission: to spread the gospel into all the earth — starting with my roommate. No one was immune from my infectious faith. Not my fellow athletes, not my fraternity brothers, not my party friends, not my professors. To say I became a fanatic would be an understatement. I started collecting converts to Christianity like Michael Phelps collects gold medals. The more that God did, the more I began to understand that God was calling me to give him my whole life in full-time, vocational ministry.
As if on cue, when I was twenty-three, God opened a door for me to work at a historic downtown church. My dreamcome-true slowly turned into a spiritual nightmare. What started out as a good thing quickly became an obsession. My service was never enough. And as my love for ministry burned hotter, my passion for Christ cooled.
My mission had become a job. Instead of studying God’s Word out of personal devotion, I studied only to preach. Instead of preaching messages to bring glory to God, I preached to bring people to church. I promised hurting people I would pray for them, but I usually didn’t follow through.
At the age of twenty-five, I was a full-time pastor and a part-time follower of Christ.
An Invitation
Does any of this resonate with your experience? Was there a time in your life that you were closer to God than you are today? If you’re like me, your spiritual drift didn’t happen on purpose. Like a tiny leak in a tire, slowly but surely, your spiritual passion quietly slipped away. Maybe it has just become clear to you. Instead of a fully devoted follower of Christ, you’ve unintentionally become a full-time mom or full-time student or a full-time bank clerk — and a part-time follower of Christ.
Maybe like so many, you’re a member of a church, but you’re secretly still ashamed of your past. Perhaps you’ve heard about the love of God, but you’re still not convinced that God totally loves you. Or though you’re convinced God exists, your prayer life isn’t what you know it should be. Perhaps like many other well-meaning Christians, you know what God wants you to do, but you still do whatever you want. Or you genuinely want to trust God as your provider, but you find it so hard to actually do. Possibly you believe in heaven and hell, but sharing your faith with others is still foreign or simply way too intimidating for you. Or you may believe in God but don’t see much need for the church.
I’ll be honest with you about my struggles, and I hope you’ll be honest as well. And together, with God’s help, perhaps we can learn to know and walk with God more intimately.
Craig Groeschel is the founder and senior pastor of LifeChurch.tv, an evangelical Christian multi-site church with multiple locations in Arizona, Oklahoma, and Texas that feature live satellite video services. His new book, The Christian Atheist, was released March 23rd, 2011.
SWITCHFOOT will perform on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on Monday, September 19th. The GRAMMY®-winning band will give “Dark Horses,” the lead single from its upcoming album, Vice Verses, its television debut. The track is climbing at Modern Rock radio, where it has already been added by KTBZ (Houston), San Diego’s 91X and KBZT, CIMX (Detroit), KPNT (St. Louis), WXDX (Pittsburgh), KXRK (Salt Lake City) and numerous other stations.
Credential Recordings/lowercase people and Atlantic Records will release Vice Verses, the eighth studio record from the multi-platinum rock band, on September 27th. Working with producer Neal Avron (Sara Bareilles, Weezer), SWITCHFOOT recorded most of the album in their San Diego, CA home studio. Mike Elizondo (Eminem, Dr. Dre, Pink) who produced 2009’s Hello Hurricane, served as executive producer. Hello Hurricane entered The Billboard 200 at No. 13 and contained the Modern Rock hits “The Sound (John M. Perkins’ Blues)” and “Mess of Me.” The band won “Artist of the Year” honors at the San Diego Music Awards earlier this week.
On September 22nd, SWITCHFOOT will launch a co-headlining tour with ANBERLIN in Wilmington, NC. A pre-sale for fan club members is underway now at http://switchfoot.artistarena.com/. Tickets will go on sale to the general public this Friday, August 12th, at http://www.switchfoot.com/switchfoot/c/tourdates. (See below for itinerary.)
SWITCHFOOT and ANBERLIN have also teamed up with Eventful http://eventful.com to give their fans in the cities where the tour is routed the opportunity to bring an exclusive VIP acoustic performance to their city. Fans have until September 15 to cast a vote for their city at http://eventful.com/switchfootandamberlintour. The tour city with the most Demands will host the VIP performance prior to the regularly scheduled show. Eventful’s “Demand it!”™ service is used by over 100,000 performers who engage with millions of their fans to find out where they are in demand, and then utilize this essential data to optimize future tour routing.
Local chapters of StandUp for Kids (www.standupforkids.org), a national nonprofit volunteer outreach organization dedicated to making a difference in the lives of at-risk, homeless and street kids, will be collecting new and used backpacks at the concerts. The backpacks will be used to distribute food and essentials to kids served by the organization.
SWITCHFOOT has raised more than $500,000 for San Diego-based children’s charities, including StandUp for Kids, with its annual concert/surf contest/silent auction, the Switchfoot Bro-Am Presented By Hurley (http://www.switchfoot.com/c/bro-am). The seventh annual Bro-Am took place in June at Moonlight Beach in Encinitas, CA.
ESPN college football will host an exclusive stream of Vice Verses on September 17th and the album will provide the soundtrack to the NCAA games airing that day on ESPN. SWITCHFOOT will perform at the San Diego Padres-Arizona Diamondbacks baseball game on September 18th at PETCO Park in San Diego.
SWITCHFOOT – comprising Jon Foreman (vocals/guitar), Tim Foreman (bass), Chad Butler (drums), Jerome Fontamillas (keys/guitar) and Drew Shirley (guitar) – expands its sonic palette on Vice Verses. Songs like “Afterlife” and “The War Inside” take the harder-edged approach of Hello Hurricane a step further, creating what Billboard has called “powerful, anthemic rockers.” Tracks such as the groove-oriented “The Original” and “Blinding Light” benefit from a hip-hop backbeat as does “Selling the News,” a Beck-like song that finds Foreman performing spoken word. “The War Inside” really puts the rhythm section up front while the snappy “Rise Above It” recalls the Chili Peppers punk-funk. “‘Restless’ is the story of my life: thirsty, reaching, yearning for more,” confesses Foreman as his unflinchingly honest lyrics drive the current single rapidly climbing the AC/CHR Christian radio charts.
With its play on words, the new album’s title suggests its theme: everything has two sides. “Every blessing comes with a set of curses,” singer-guitarist Jon Foreman sings on the title track, all the while wondering if “there’s a meaning to it all.”
“The whole thing is about polarity,” says Foreman. “We wanted to write about the polarity of what it means to be human, the lights and darks. I’m always intrigued by the tension that exists between life and death. When making Hello Hurricane, there was a graveyard right by the hotel we were staying at while we were mixing it, and I spent a little bit of time there each morning walking through and sorting it out…really Vice Verses started there. This record is as much about loss as it is about what we still have while we’re living.”
The pre-order for Vice Verses is currently underway at www.switchfoot.com.
SWITCHFOOT/ANBERLIN FALL 2011 U.S. TOUR
9/22 Wilmington, NC UNC-Wilmington
9/25 New York, NY Best Buy
9/26 Philadelphia, PA Trocadero
9/27 Oneonta, NY SUNY College
9/29 Grand Rapids, MI Hoogenboom Center – Calvin College
9/30 Columbus, OH Newport Music Hall
10/1 Bourbonnais, IL Olivet Nazarene University-Centennial
10/2 Dekalb, IL Northern Illinois University
10/5 Bowling Green, OH Bowling Green State University – Stroh Center
10/7 Boulder, CO Boulder Theatre
10/8 Salt Lake City, UT Gallivan Center – X96 concert
10/10 San Francisco, CA The Warfield Theatre
10/11 Los Angeles, CA The Wiltern
10/13 Amarillo, TX Azteca Music Hall
10/14 Siloam Springs, AR John Brown University – Bill George Arena
10/15 Longview, TX Le Tourneau University – Belcher Center
10/17 Dallas, TX House of Blues
10/18 Austin, TX Stubbs Waller Creek
10/20 Albuquerque, NM Kiva Auditorium
10/21 Phoenix, AZ Grand Canyon University Arena (SWITCHFOOT ONLY)
Why did you want to spend two years in Atlanta to help start a church?
We’ve loved being around the Passion movement for the last decade, and have shared much life with those guys—leading and traveling together, dreaming up songs together, so many good stories along the way. When we heard Louie and Shelley [Giglio] and Chris were planting a church, there was no way we weren’t going to hop across the ocean and join in the fun! It was a great adventure for those first couple of years, but we felt the pull back to our homeland and life and ministry here. We ended up moving to Brighton, the most unchurched city in England—a very different kind of challenge!
What attracts you to church plants, and what was your role in Atlanta?
We’ve been around for the planting of a few new church communities, and it’s always such a faith-filled adventure. They’ve involved different sizes, styles, expressions, and cultures, but with all of them it’s been amazing to see Jesus building his church, and to realize that the gospel of Christ really works. If you put his hope, love, and glory on display in a relevant way, you’ll see it change, save, and transform lives. Who wouldn’t want to be part of something like that?
You had two kids born in the U.S., and both needed critical care. Tell me about that.
Jackson and Levi both had some breathing difficulties when they were born, and ended up in the ICU for a little while. Those moments are never easy to navigate; you’re expecting sheer joy in that season and then you get some struggle thrown in with it. But isn’t that so much of what life is like on this journey of faith? So often it’s battle and blessing all mixed up into one. But the longer you walk with Jesus, the more you realize just how utterly faithful he is, and I hope that conviction comes through in some of the songs we’ve been writing. It’s no coincidence that some of the most fruitful songs we’ve written have flowed from some of the hardest moments of our lives—like “Blessed Be Your Name,” “You Never Let Go,” and now “Never Once,” they all came from seasons of intense struggle and confusion.
How would you describe Passion City Church?
Louie is the last person to claim that PCC was some brand new innovative expression of church. But having said that, I think that Louie, Shelley, Chris, and the team are all creative people with a big worldview, so that’s going to add some spice. I think perhaps the unique thing about PCC is that it was a local community being planted from an already existing global movement. Usually it’s the other way around.
What have you learned from two years immersed in American culture?
I love the optimism in so much of the USA church. Sometimes we Europeans can be a bit more cynical or embarrassed to dream and live big. I think American optimism mixed in with a kingdom of God mindset is a wonderful, explosive mix. It reminds me of Psalm 18, where the writer is convinced that he can rise to the occasion: “With my God I can do this thing … I can do that thing.” I see that a lot in the USA church, and I’ve found it really inspiring.
What has been your focus since returning to the UK?
We’re now at St. Peter’s in Brighton—a recent church plant by Holy Trinity Brampton, a London church. One of the major landmarks in Brighton is St. Peter’s, this huge cathedral-like building in the center. Until a year or so ago it was increasingly rundown and empty. But now with this new church community, it’s starting to fill up again and be that “city on a hill” it was always meant to be. We are so excited to be jumping into the adventure as we’ve for a long time had a heart for that city—the most unchurched city in England. We’d love to play a tiny little part in its transformation.
Why is your new album called 10,000 Reasons?
It comes from a lyric in the title song: “For all Your goodness I will keep on singing: 10,000 reasons for my heart to find.” We’re never short of a reason to worship Jesus; his goodness and glory are flying at us steadily and speedily from every imaginable angle. So if we wake up one day and can’t think of a reason to exalt him, there’s something wrong with our spiritual outlook. I hope the album itself is flowing with reason after reason for the worship of God. There’s not really one over-arching theme; there are songs of the cross, songs of the holiness of God, songs of his faithfulness, songs about eternity, songs of how he gives us a bright future.
Why did you decide to do a live album, instead of a studio album?
There’s something about the singing worshipping church which is just so distinctive—it’s the people of God, in the presence of God, pouring out the praises of God. Honestly, there’s nothing quite like that dynamic on the face of the earth, outside of the worshipping church.
Pick a song or two and tell the story behind it.
“Never Once” is about the constancy and faithfulness of God. I began to write it in Atlanta on my first visit back since our family returned to the UK. Our house in Atlanta hadn’t sold, and the song started out in the empty, echoey kitchen—just me, my guitar, a few chords, and some very solid truth about our God. Transition is always tough, and I was thinking through the journey of the last few years—all the joys and struggles. I had a very real sense of God’s immense kindness and faithfulness over every page of my life. Jason Ingram and Tim Wanstall, two great friends and songwriters, jumped in to work with me to finish the song.
“Holy” is an attempt to paint a big picture of God, focusing on how worthy he is. My friend Jonas Myrin initiated this song. He’s a Swedish guy with a great melodic sensibility and a pretty amazing grasp on the poetry of the English language, considering it’s his second language! But most of all he has a big heart for worshipping God. On the day we wrote, this we were in a little English chapel near my house, composing all day. Jason and I had both ducked out for an hour or so to call our families and check in on home. We assumed Jonas was also taking a break, but arriving back at the chapel, he was still at the piano, and singing out the foundation of something that seemed so special. We were glad to join him in helping shape and develop the song. But it’s one of those songs where the moment I heard those opening bars, I had a strong sense that were being entrusted with something special. As it turns out I think this song became the centerpiece of the whole album in many ways. There was a wonderful response when we led it at the recording.
How do you feel like you’ve grown as an artist over the years? Any regrets?
There are a few lyrics I regret, but I’m not telling you which ones! Seriously though, I don’t take lightly the craft of congregational songwriting. We’re putting words into people’s mouths, and therefore their hearts and minds. So in a good (or bad) way, we are actually at times shaping the way someone thinks about God or approaches him. That’s an awesome task. You have to become more than just a musician writing some nice tunes to make Sundays more jolly.
When you start presenting songs in your local church, you are in effect a pastor, a teacher—maybe even a prophet or evangelist. Scary! The thing I’m learning more than ever is that teamwork is essential. Every song on the new album is a co-write, and I know that all of the songs went to a different place because of that. Working together we can spur each other on to create harder, dig deeper, and therefore I hope, go further.
You have a new book coming out in August, Mirror Ball. Please describe it in a nutshell.
The book is about living a big, bold, and bright life of worship. I hope it helps people get a heightened view of the amazing God we serve, and then propels them into a new confidence of who they can become in him.
What’s the difference between songwriting and writing a book?
I love working with words. Songwriting is interesting because ultimately you’re trying to say something in the most concise way possible. The aim for me is “simple but not shallow”—so it can be easily learned, but hopefully contains some important God-truths. Writing a book, on the other hand, you get a little more space to reflect and unpack a theme. But I find that what both disciplines need is the ability and diligence to shape, mold, re-form, and edit. Often we give up too early. Creativity is always a mix of inspiration and perspiration.
Jeremy Camp’s story has inspired thousands since his debut in 2002. He has now penned this story along with co-writer Phil Newman and will release the book to retail in September 2011. Camp’s book, I Still Believe: Discovering Hope and Healing in the Midst of Life’s Deepest Valleys, is a personal reflection on his story of the passing of his first wife, Melissa, to cancer just months after marrying, and how he has grown in his relationship with God through the past ten years. This touching book portrays a full-circle account of Camp’s story that has impacted his music.
“I’ve wanted to put this story in book form for many years, but it just hasn’t been the right time until now,” states Jeremy Camp about the timing of the book. “God was and is still working in my life, but this book is a result of the last ten years of pain, healing, restoration and new beginnings.”
Within each page of I Still Believe, Camp opens his heart and soul as he shares with the reader about responding to life’s most difficult hardships. He tackles how to turn earthly sorrow straight to God when faced with the passing of a loved one.
“As clear as things are now compared to the way I felt during Melissa’s illness and after her passing, I still see only partially, imperfectly, and incompletely,” shares Camp in the book. “I have tasted and seen the goodness of the Lord in the form of one life after another life changed because of the testimony of God’s faithfulness, even in the midst of pain and sadness. There will be a day, however, when everything truly becomes crystal clear.”
Fans have heard Jeremy share his story on stage and in interviews. Many do not know and will no doubt be touched by the complete story and details of his testimony and his heartbreaking story about his first wife, Melissa. Readers will also learn more about Jeremy’s modest life growing up in Indiana, his struggles growing into adolescence and how the start of his music ministry began to open more doors than he ever thought possible. The book also shares of his unexpected friendship with Adrienne Liesching, which eventually brought about healing and restoration as well as a new life together.
Camp’s deep heart for ministry and his desire to see the next generation become truly alive is so vivid within the pages of I Still Believe. Here are what others are saying about I Still Believe:
“We have choices when life hits us with tragedy or despair, crisis or loss. That’s the message of Jeremy Camp’s books, and it’s the reason you will find hope and healing by journeying through the pages of his story.”
- Karen Kingsbury, Bestselling author
“Jeremy Camp is an extremely talented artist. But what many do not know is that he has suffered greatly in life. Out of this suffering many of the songs we have come to love have been born and have brought encouragement and comfort to untold thousands around the world. Now, for the first time, Jeremy Camp tells his whole story. I heartily endorse it.”
- Greg Laurie, Senior Pastor, Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California
“Jeremy’s music has always had a powerful impact on me, and now I know why. Behind his voice is a heart that’s uniquely connected with God. Through his pain, grief, sorrow, and loss, his life has become a crucible where the Lord’s love and mercy are real revelations. Reading Jeremy’s story has reinforced my faith in He who is able and alive!”
– Bob Coy, Senior Pastor, Calvary Chapel in Ft. Lauderdale
David Crowder*Band has announced that they will release their first ever Christmas record on Oct. 4, just months before the GRAMMY ® nominated band will debut their final album. Oh For Joy will include eight Christmas classics such as “Joy To The World,” “O Holy Night,” “Silent Night” and more, presented with the band’s distinct mark, final track listing below. The unique, nutcracker-themed cover was also revealed this week.
“Back in January we decided to start working on a record. It was to be a final masterpiece, our last statement, if you will. But we got sidetracked, and we made a Christmas album instead,” explains the band in a statement to their fans. “This is something that we are very excited about, something that we have wanted to do for years and years. Well, that Christmas album is now officially finished, and we are pleased to announce that on October 4th, Oh For Joy will release!”
Announced first to their the fans, David Crowder*Band will additionally be unveiling their final studio record on January 10, 2012. The album title is forthcoming, and the band is at work on the final project in their Texas recording studio. To read the original statement from the band, visit http://www.davidcrowderband.com/.
Up next for the band will be headlining the highly anticipated “The 7 Tour” with acclaimed artists Gungor, who is doing an acoustic set, Chris August and John Mark McMillan. This will mark the final tour for the GRAMMY ® nominees. The shows will span from September through November and hit over 30 clubs and theaters across the U.S. including key markets such as: Dallas, Texas, Los Angeles, Calif., Portland, Ore., Seattle, Wash., Chicago, Ill., New York, N.Y., Atlanta, Ga. and Orlando, Fla. Already, several dates including Dallas have sold out with many other markets being close to capacity.
Sales of religious books saw a major turnaround last year, rising 12.5% after declining 10.6% in 2009, according to the new landmark statistical survey by the Association of American Publishers and Book Industry Study Group.
Sales for the religious segment—in all print and digital formats—totaled $1.35 billion in 2010, said the joint report, released this week.
Incorporating net sales revenue and unit data from more than 1,100 U.S. publishers, BookStats is billed as the most comprehensive evaluation and analysis of the book industry, with information covering 2008-2010.
The report revealed that publishers’ net sales revenue was $27.9 billion in 2010, a 5.6% increase from 2008. Additionally, publishers’ 2.57 billion net units sold last year represented a 4.1% increase since 2008.
“The study indicates that the publishing industry is healthy and growing during a time of unprecedented change,” said Dominique Raccah, founder and CEO of Sourcebooks and chair of the BookStats committee. “Publishers have made significant investments in content and technology to better serve their audiences’ needs, and those efforts seem to correlate with the results we’re seeing.”
Click here for more information, and to purchase the complete BookStats.
Nothing is more difficult for us to get our minds around than the unconditional grace of God.
It offends our deepest sensibilities. We are actually conditioned against unconditionality–we are told in a thousand different ways that accomplishment precedes acceptance and achievement precedes approval.
Society demands two-way love. Everything’s conditional; if you achieve only then will you receive: meaning, security, respect, love, and so on. But grace, as Paul Zahl points out, is one-way love, “Grace is love that seeks you out when you have nothing to give in return. Grace is love coming at you that has nothing to do with you. Grace is being loved when you are unlovable.”
Like Job’s friends, we naturally conclude that good people get good stuff and bad people get bad stuff. The idea that bad people get good stuff is thickly counterintuitive; it seems terribly unfair and offends our sense of justice. Even those of us who have tasted the radical saving grace of God find it intuitively difficult not to put conditions on grace. The truth is that a “yes grace, but” posture is the kind of posture that perpetuates slavery in our lives and in the church.
Grace is radically unbalanced. It has no “but”; it’s unconditional, uncontrollable, unpredictable, and undomesticated. As Doug Wilson put it recently, “Grace is wild. Grace unsettles everything. Grace overflows the banks. Grace messes up your hair. Grace is not tame. In fact, unless we are making the devout nervous, we are not preaching grace as we ought.”
With this in mind, let’s look at Luke 7:36-50. This is the famous account of the sinful woman (most likely a prostitute) barging into a party of religious leaders and washing the feet of Jesus with her tears of repentance. Two rescues are happening in this passage: the obvious rescue of the immoral person but also the rescue of the moral person.
Normally, when we think of people in need of God’s rescuing grace, we think of the unrighteous and the immoral. But, what’s fascinating to me is, throughout the Bible, the immoral person gets the gospel before the moral person. It’s the prostitute who gets grace and the Pharisee who doesn’t. What we see in this story is God’s grace wrecks and then rescues, not only the promiscuous, but also the pious.
The Pharisee in this story can’t understand what Jesus is doing by allowing this woman to touch him because he assumes that God is for the clean and competent. But Jesus shows God is for the unclean and incompetent, and when measured against God’s perfect holiness, we’re all unclean and incompetent. Jesus shows the Pharisee the gospel isn’t for winners, but losers. It’s for the weak and messed-up person, not the strong and mighty person. It’s not for the well-behaved, but the dead.
Remember: Jesus came not to put into effect a moral reformation but a mortal resurrection (moral reformations can, and have, taken place throughout history without Jesus. But only Jesus can raise the dead, over and over and over again). As Gerhard Forde put it, “Christianity is not the move from vice to virtue, but rather the move from virtue to grace.”
Wrecking every religious category he had, Jesus tells the Pharisee he has a lot to learn from the prostitute, not the other way around.
The prostitute, on the other hand, walks into a party of religious people and falls at the feet of Jesus without any care as to what others are thinking and saying. She’s at the end of herself. More than wanting to avoid an uncomfortable situation, she wanted to be clean–she needed to be forgiven. She was acutely aware of her guilt and shame. She knew she needed help. She understood at a profound level that God’s grace doesn’t demand you get clean before you come to Jesus. Rather, our only hope for getting clean is to come to Jesus.
Only in the Gospel does love precede loveliness. Everywhere else loveliness precedes love.
What the Pharisee, the prostitute, and everyone in-between need to remember every day is that Christ offers forgiveness full and free from both our self-righteous goodness and our unrighteous badness. This is the hardest thing for us to believe as Christians. We think it’s a mark of spiritual maturity to hang on to our guilt and shame. We’ve sickly concluded that the worse we feel, the better we actually are. The declaration of Psalm 103:12 is the most difficult for us to grasp and embrace: “As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.” Or, as Corrie ten Boom once said, “God takes our sins—the past, present, and future—and dumps them in the sea and puts up a sign that says ‘No Fishing Allowed.’” This seems too good to be true…it can’t be that simple, that easy, that real!
It is true! No strings attached. No but’s. No conditions. No need for balance. If you are a Christian, you are right now under the completely sufficient imputed righteousness of Christ. Your pardon is full and final. In Christ, you’re forgiven. You’re clean. It is finished.
This week’s tweet of the week comes Dr. Tony Evans who tweeted:
“God is not opposed to greatness. God is opposed to pride. Big difference. God wants you to be great!”
Preach on, preacher.
Amid fears of an economic crisis, listeners of national Christian radio stations, K-Love and Air1 donated nearly $2 million in a daylong campaign to provide Compassion’s Water of Life safe water systems to those living in extreme poverty in Rwanda.
K-Love and Air1 focused on the immense need for safe water in Rwanda where 60% of the population lives below the poverty line. In addition, more than one-third of the population is without improved drinking water sources and nearly half are without improved sanitation facilities.
“The money raised will provide over 35,000 Compassion children and their families with safe drinking water for the rest of their lives,” said Mark Hanlon, Compassion’s SVP, USA.
“Thanks to the tremendous generosity of the K-Love and Air1 listeners, these kids and their families will never have to worry about diseases from unsafe drinking water,” Hanlon said.
“God continues to bless K-LOVE and Air 1 with a large stage from which to spread His word. We feel that part of being a good steward is to share this stage with like-minded ministries,” said Mike Novak, president and CEO of K-Love and Air 1.
“Compassion and the ‘Water of Life’ campaign was a natural fit. The K-LOVE and Air 1 listeners blessed about 35,000 families in Rwanda with these remarkable life-giving water filters, by donating $1.9 million to Compassion in a one-day event. To that, I say, ‘Praise God,’” Novak said.
Though economic reports threatened to reduce donor generosity, over 19,000 people gave an average of $90 to provide the systems. Air1 also initiated a pledge drive where a major donor agreed to provide a Compassion Water of Life system for Haiti for each person who signed up as a recurring donor to the station. As a result, 2,600 additional water systems were made available.
The benefits of safe water have more than health implications. It is also a financial issue.
“The direct result of safe water for families means that fewer resources will be needed to treat illnesses. And when children are healthy, they can go to school,” said Hanlon. “Safe water seems like such a simple thing, but for children in living in poverty in countries like Rwanda, it has the power to bring practical change through improved health and education.”
Compassion International is the world’s largest Christian child development organization that permanently releases children from poverty. Founded in 1952, Compassion successfully tackles global poverty one child at a time, serving more than 1.2 million children in 26 of the world’s poorest countries. Recognizing that poverty is more than a lack of money, Compassion works through local churches to holistically address the individual physical, economic, educational and spiritual needs of children—enabling them to thrive, not just survive. Compassion has been awarded 10 consecutive, four-star ratings by Charity Navigator, America’s largest charity evaluator.
Martin Smith sits down to talk about the best approach to writing Christian songs that will resonate with people for many years to come.
Acoustic duo Shane & Shane is partnering with Fair Trade Services for its first studio release in two years, The One You Need. Available Oct. 4, the project’s debut single and title track is currently impacting Christian AC, CHR and Inspirational Radio.
After a brief hiatus from recording, Shane Barnard and Shane Everett have returned to the studio with two years worth of new material, all self-written and self-produced. The duo, who has been playing together for 13 years, has joined efforts with Fair Trade Services, home to top artists including The Afters, MercyMe, and Derek Webb, for its latest album.
“Shane and I are so excited about our new record label Fair Trade Services,” says Everett. “It feels amazing to have a team around us who is not only concerned about selling records but also about the Gospel moving forward through song!!! We love these guys.”
The Shanes, now both married with children, created this latest record through the lens of fatherhood and community. In fact, Barnard penned the title track—a poignant letter from daddy to daughter—a week before his daughter Lucy was born. Having also recently assumed the role of worship pastors at their local church, The One You Need additionally contains songs intended to minister to those hurting around them.
“For the first time, we’ve been in community; and when you’re in community, you see the hurt,” Everett explains. “Being on staff has been an eye opening experience for us, rubbing shoulders with broken hurting people helps us not only in our own struggles, but lets us know how to pray and how much we desperately need it.”
Preceding the record’s release is lead single, “The One You Need,” which went for adds at radio July 22. Shane & Shane wrapped a national promotional tour in support of the single earlier this month. Watch Part I and Part II of their road trip at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihajxCkyZ4c and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ9DcP3QNjA. The duo also filmed a music video for the song, which will premiere on GodTube Aug. 4. Additional details are forthcoming. For more information on Shane & Shane and The One You Need, visitwww.shaneandshane.com.
Shane Everett and Shane Barnard formed the duo, Shane & Shane, after meeting at Central Baptist Church in College Station, Texas in the late 90’s. Since then, the acoustic-guitar wielding pair has become a college-circuit favorite with six label releases to its credit, and countless hours logged on the road, including tours alongside Bethany Dillon, David Crowder Band and Robbie Seay Band, among others. In total, the band’s career sales exceed half a million units. Follow Shane & Shane at www.facebook.com/shaneandshanemusic orwww.twitter.com/ShaneandShane.
Hachette Book Group announced that it has signed an agreement for a new novel with Wm. Paul Young, author of The Shack.
“Just as he did with The Shack, Paul’s new work is a compelling story that touches deeply felt emotions and needs, and questions of the heart,” said Rolf Zettersten, SVP of Hachette’s Nashville division.
“I am very pleased to have signed with Hachette for my next book,” added Paul Young. “We have had quite the adventure this last couple of years and I look forward with anticipation to what the future holds. The folks at Hachette are creative and passionate about the process and I am grateful for the integrity and support I have found at every level of this company.”
The Shack was published in 2008 and became an international phenomenon with more than 15 million copies in print (10 million in the United States and more than 5 million in foreign translations). It spent 50 weeks at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and has been translated into 41 languages.
I’ll be honest.
I’ve never been a Dennis Rodman fan.
I’ve always thought of him as a reckless, self absorbed, ego maniac. And while my assessment was probably fairly accurate, I think I forgot one thing. He’s a broken human being just like me.
His acceptance speech into the NBA Hall of Fame was unbelievably telling. If you have a moment you should watch (Warning: The language is a bit rough).
In his speech he did something that athletes (or anyone else) rarely do. Instead of focusing on his career he talked very candidly about his personal shortcomings and the pain he’s been through in life.
I almost started crying with him when he admits: “I have one regret; I wish I was a better father.” His own father abandoned him when he was five years old, and Dennis said that later in life: “He wrote a book about me and made a lot of money, but he never came and said hello to me.”
Just remember today before you judge that:
Arrogant boss
Self-absorbed friend
Angry parent
Everyone needs healing… Everyone.
Any thoughts?
hi there
Aaron Shust opens up his heart in this personal video about his son’s illness and how its affect him and his family, and how it all inspired his new album THIS IS WHAT WE BELIEVE that releases today. We all see some footage of Aaron at work on the new album in studio. You can get your copy on iTunes
More congregations than ever are hosting Ramsey’s Financial Peace University. Now he’s looking at their budgets, too.
It’s December 28, two days after the last Sunday of 2010. Dick Giesler has just reviewed the year’s financial numbers—three years after the start of the country’s worst economic disaster in nearly a century. Giesler, administrative pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church in Gurnee, Illinois, is fully aware of the challenging financial position of both the church and many of its members.
But Giesler is aware of something else. In addition to his administrative responsibilities, Giesler leads the church’s two weekly meetings of Financial Peace University, a personal finance course produced by radio and television host Dave Ramsey. More than 800 people have taken the course since the church started offering it three years ago, and at least 250 of them do not attend Immanuel. In those meetings, Giesler has heard the stories of mounting debt and seen struggles with budgeting. But despite the personal challenges, for the third year in a row, giving to the church is up more than 5 percent, placing Immanuel among the minority of congregations that have seen giving rise since the economic downturn.
“I can’t attribute it to anything specifically other than Financial Peace University,” Giesler said, “and obedience to the Lord’s principles about handling money.”
Shredding the Debt
Giesler himself is a former Financial Peace student and enthusiastic convert to Ramsey’s financial system. Ramsey preaches frugal living, generous savings, and, most of all, avoiding debt. (If you must borrow to buy a house, Ramsey instructs, make it a 15-year mortgage.) Giesler’s office displays a clear, cylindrical tower about two-and-a-half feet high. Inside are the remains of 950 credit cards representing millions of borrowed dollars that Financial Peace students have repaid through Ramsey’s program. During the 13 weeks of the class, he says, attendees typically pay off $6,000 in debt and save an extra $2,000. Often, members sign up for a second course.
Among the members are Chris and Amy Rupert, who now lead classes with Giesler. Chris, a software engineer, was introduced to Ramsey because of his initial concern about government debt—not his own. A Christian book on economics mentioned Dave Ramsey’s 2003 book The Total Money Makeover. Chris bought it and read it in a day.
“I got sick of getting to the end of the month and finding we were spending into a deficit,” Chris said. “We make good money and had nothing but a pile of debt to show for it.”
The information in Ramsey’s curriculum is not new or unique, Chris said, but it is trustworthy and gave them a plan.
“What I like about Ramsey is that it’s about behavior modification and small steps,” Chris said. “We make the same [amount of] money, but now we spend intentionally, and giving is on the list.”
The program had a marital bonus, one that nearly every couple in the class mentions. “Amy bore the bulk of stress with budgeting, because I just did not pay attention,” he said. “I was not engaged in my marriage as I should have been.”
Thanks for the Ministry
Throughout the course, a series of 12 videos plus one more on tithing, Ramsey returns to a few phrases. Children do whatever feels good, he says, but adults create a plan and follow it through. Another is, “Live like no one else today, so that later you can live like no one else.” He rails against a consumer culture that people fail to resist, trapping them with loads of stuff and debt. “It’s stooopid!” he shouts.
Ramsey has been giving out this kind of advice for 20 years, born out of stooopid behavior of his own. In his 20s, making $20,000 a month with a real estate portfolio worth several million, Ramsey says his wealth left him dissatisfied. But he didn’t have to face the burden of wealth for long: banks called his loans early, and Ramsey was forced to declare bankruptcy.
The churches he had attended looking for meaning he now turned to for financial help. A new Christian, he resolved to live differently, especially with his money. And he began telling others about his newfound, debt-free, frugal lifestyle. He self-published his Financial Peace curriculum in 1992, the same year he landed a spot on a then-bankrupt Nashville radio station.
For the first decade, Ramsey and his company, Lampo Group, lived in an uncomfortable tension between being Christian and being featured on secular radio stations. That tension followed him to the Fox Business Channel, where callers regularly thanked him for his “ministry” and asked God to bless him. (Fox ended the show in 2010, but Ramsey is still a regular guest on many of its programs.) “I had radio stations say, ‘We love the show, but does he have to talk about God all the time?’” said Bill Hampton, Lampo Group’s executive vice president.
The organization changed after the attacks on September 11, said Hampton. As the country turned to prayer following that day, Ramsey and his organization committed to integrating their faith into their financial teaching. “This is who we are,” Hampton said. “This is truth, and we’re going to be a business that operates in truth.”
Ramsey doesn’t claim that his financial principles are based on the Bible. But he talks about his personal faith, incorporates Scripture into his teaching, and speaks about the spiritual dimension of material things. “We found that people respect the consistency of the message. We don’t beat people over the head with the Bible,” Hampton said.
Still, integrating the Bible makes good business sense: While military bases, corporations, and other non-religious groups host Financial Peace classes, the majority of the 20,000 held last year were at churches. (About 251,000 families took part last year; 1.3 million have done so in the organization’s history.)
Irreverent Investor
Ramsey has his critics, most of whom are concerned with his investment advice. He is a severe critic of Biblically Responsible Investing (BRI), which strongly discourages people from investing in products that make money off of abortion, gambling, tobacco, or pornography. One financial adviser says he received e-mails from Ramsey “forcefully telling me not to tell people about BRI.”
The Financial Peace curriculum calls such investing “a slippery slope.” The financial adviser said, for instance, “If you no longer invest in funds that might invest in a company that supports abortion, you would also need to stop banking, because nearly all banks contribute to United Way, which supports Planned Parenthood …. [D]on’t choose these funds out of guilt. Don’t make poor investment decisions to choose these funds.”
“It’s a very sad reflection on the church when good ethics is deemed a slippery slope,” said Christian financial adviser Gary Moore. “Pastors should be very careful about his teachings.”
“Values-based investing is a good concept,” Ramsey stated in an e-mail interview. “However, I recommend that you invest in funds that have a five-year or longer track record of strong rates of returns, and few of these funds have that.”
Another financial adviser listed as an “Endorsed Local Provider”—someone who does business “Dave Ramsey’s way”—said Ramsey’s advice often goes overboard. “My recommendations are specific to the client,” he said. Some should probably invest outside the stock market, but such advice would get him delisted from Ramsey’s organization, which recommends only stock investments.
Most people who have gone through Ramsey’s program probably don’t recall the details of his investing advice. For them, it’s about quitting credit cards and budgeting. These simple but often dramatic behavior changes are unquestionably changing families around the country, as they did when Larry Burkett and Ron Blue were the top personal finance gurus of the conservative Christian world.
“You’re not free until you’re financially free,” said Chuck Bentley, CEO of Crown Financial Ministries. But that’s more than just free from debt and credit cards, he said. A human definition of financial freedom is financial independence. For God, “financial freedom is the freedom to serve only one master. You’re free to be Christ’s slave and no longer controlled by money, regardless if you have a lot or a little.”
Like Ramsey, Crown offers practical help, from a budgeting system to online bill paying. But Bentley said it’s most important to get someone’s heart in the right place and not simply deal with overspending. “The rich young ruler was probably debt free. But Jesus challenged his heart regarding his wealth.”
Rob Leacock, administrative pastor at Christ Church Assembly of God in Fort Worth, Texas, has used material from both Financial Peace and Crown Financial Ministries.While Financial Peace focuses on getting out of debt, Leacock said, Crown’s “focus is what the Bible says …. In a perfect world, we would do Crown first and get the biblical basis.” Then Financial Peace would provide a more step-by-step approach of putting the biblical principles into action. The people who had already gone through Crown classes, Leacock said, responded best to the Financial Peace classes.
Ending the Capital Campaign
In September, Howard Books will release Ramsey’s next book, one that has more in common with Peter Drucker than Larry Burkett. EntreLeadership signals Ramsey’s efforts to translate his expertise in personal finance into the areas of leadership and small business. (He has been conducting EntreLeadership conferences since 2005.)
‘Churches see the pain that finances cause in people’s marriages and families.’— Dave Ramsey
Meanwhile, Ramsey’s Lampo Group (lampo is Greek for “give light” or “shine”) has been quietly reshaping Ramsey’s church outreach. The Momentum curriculum, aimed at pastors and church leaders, shares many of Financial Peace’s themes: eliminating debt, saving, and giving. But it looks at church budgets, too. Perhaps most controversially, the program argues that churches should not conduct capital campaigns for any purpose. Instead, Ramsey argues, churches should just teach members to mind their finances.
“In the capital campaign model, you’re tapping the few members who are giving and you’re asking for more,” said Hampton. Instead, he said, “If you free resources, families will give. They want to; they just don’t know how to fit it into their budget.”
The argument convinced the leadership of the 1,200-member Christ Church Assembly of God. Leaders had been planning a capital campaign in order to pay off the debts from two new buildings. Then, in September 2009, leaders talked to Ramsey’s Momentum staff.
Executive pastor Stephen Blandino said Momentum consultants told them, “If you have a capital campaign, and your people are in debt, how will you reach your goals?”
The church instead signed 763 people up for Financial Peace. During the 13-week course, attendees paid off $951,899 in personal debt and saved another $219,274. The church asks for annual pledges to its building fund, but hasn’t yet launched a capital campaign.
“We want to eliminate our [church] debt, but we want to help our people get rid of their debt,” Blandino said. The church’s use of Ramsey’s programs, he said, “is about how we change the culture of our church when it comes to how we think about money.”
As the father of four energetic boys and a beautiful daughter, I am regularly jumped upon in the comfort of my own home. Often I will be minding my own business, perhaps walking past the stairs, when one of my sons will leap from a great height and land on me, trusting that I will catch him. Having gotten over the initial shock of being mugged in my own house by a person half my size, I’ve learned to take this activity as a huge compliment. It says so much about what they think of me and of what they consider me to be capable of.
Apparently, they even think I have eyes in the back of my head. When they launch themselves from the sixth or seventh step, they are counting on my strength and quick reaction to make sure they don’t end up in a heap on the floor. I love their bounding confidence and enjoy the way it fuels a sense of carefree adventure in them.
I wonder if we could start to live the same way in God our Father. Could we be so convinced of His strength that we live with a new holy confidence? Could we become so utterly sure of Him that our lives are marked by some big, bold and courageous leaps of faith?
Perhaps the strength of God is something we underestimate and underemphasize today. In Psalm 21:13 the worshipper cries out, “Be exalted, O Lord, in Your strength” (NASB). God’s strength in the Old Testament is very clearly on display for all to see. We see Him bring victory on a battlefield and turn a weak army into a mighty winning force.
But what does His strength mean in our own context today? What does it look like in your life or mine? I think that the strength of God manifests itself among us in at least three separate ways: It creates the possible; it turns around the inevitable; it overcomes the hostile.
As Moses led the people of God out of captivity in Egypt and to the edge of the Red Sea, there seemed to be no way through—but the strength of God held back waters so the Israelites could cross over. In that moment the inevitable recapture they dreaded was flipped on its head, and they continued to live in their newfound freedom. And to cap it all off, when they were safely on the other side, God let the sea reform, overcoming and overwhelming the Egyptians in their hostile pursuit of His people. This is the true strength of God in action, and we must apply these principles to our own lives. You may be at a complete loss for how to go forward in a situation, but the strength of God can create a way.
You may feel that in your current circumstance you will lose or that a certain person, stress or pressure will gain a hold on you. But God in His mighty strength is able to maintain your freedom and turn around the seemingly inevitable. He can stand strong against the hostilities you may face in life, and He will overcome anything outside His plan for you.
We talk of the love, peace and grace of God at work in our lives—and rightly so, for this is absolutely the case. But we would do well to take hold of His strength at work among us, too, and begin to live in a place of confident expectation.
*Matt Redman has been a worship leader since he was 20. He has released five albums and written six books including his newest July album and book releases: 10,000 Reasons and Mirror Ball, respectively. Copyright 2011 Matt Redman. Mirror Ball is published by David C Cook.
In conjunction with Zondervan re-releasing her book Expecting to See Jesus: A Wake-Up Call for God’s People this month, author and speaker Anne Graham Lotz will hold a national webcast on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Titled “A Wake Up Call for God’s People with Anne Graham Lotz and Joel C. Rosenberg,” the 2011 simulcast will feature messages from Lotz and the New York Times best-selling author.
“My prayer is that this simulcast … would serve to gather the church and reissue the wake-up call to the hearts of Christians everywhere,” said Lotz, whose other books include The Magnificent Obsession (Zondervan) and Just Give Me Jesus (Thomas Nelson). “It is my prayer that it would refocus us on Jesus as our hope for the future, and re-ignite such an intense longing for His return, that we live the rest of our lives with no regrets.”
The simulcast will be broadcast at 7 p.m. EST, Sunday, Sept. 11. Click here for more information.
“What are you doing?”
This seems to be the first question everyone asks when they see me, so I’m posting the ministries I am currently involved with…
1) I’m working with my friends David Platt and Mark Beuving in developing a discipleship tool that will help equip believers to make disciples. I am very excited about this, as I believe the greatest need in the American church is for allwho call themselves “Christian” to be out baptizing and making disciples.
2) I’m helping my friend Chris Huang develop a conference on August 26-27. Much of the conference involves walking around San Francisco and actually doing ministry rather than just talking about it. You can find out more about it atwww.cityimpactconference.com
3) I’m helping my brother Paul launch a new service that ministers to people who attend English services in Chinese churches. By combining worship services, it frees up the pastors to focus on discipleship throughout the week. We had our first service last Sunday and it was a great time.
4) I’m involved with my friend Brad Buser in establishing a new school that will train people to reach unreached people groups. We’re hoping to launch in about a year. The Lord has increased my burden for reaching those who have never heard the gospel.
5) I’m working with my friend Dave Lomas in figuring out how to implement discipleship at his church in SF. I’ll be team teaching and helping develop leadership this fall in hopes of launching a discipleship movement.
6) I’m teaching a preaching class for inner city ministers. We recently had our first class, and I was pretty blown away by their testimonies. I believe God is going to do significant things through these individuals.
7) Lisa and I decided to write a book over a year ago, but we haven’t gotten very far. Now that our baby is sleeping through the night, we should have some more time to write.
8) I have been spending a lot of time meeting pastors in the area and trying to support them in any way. I have met a lot of great leaders. I’ve learned a lot from them and hopefully I have been of help to some of them.
I still travel and speak almost every week. I tried to cut back significantly, but the calendar gets full somehow. No complaints though. I am enjoying ministry a lot. I love the new friends we have made in San Francisco. It’s beginning to feel like family, but we miss our friends at Cornerstone a ton. I still go back to preach there every 6-8 weeks or so.
Most importantly, I have really been enjoying my time alone with God. I readDesiring God by John Piper again last week. It still tops my list of books everyone needs to read. Besides the Bible, no other book has had as much impact on my life.
Minister and author Max Lucado has written a lot of books. Well, that’s an understatement. According to his publisher, he now has 100 million products in print, making him the most widely-read Christian writer on the planet. But behind the publishing juggernaut is a gentle man with a quiet voice, a pastoral heart, and a tender affection for the local church. His latest book, Max on Life: Answers and Insights to Your Most Important Questions (Nelson, 2010), is a series of questions and answers gleaned from his years at Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas. Drew Dyck talked with Max about responding to tough questions and the best uses of a pastor’s authority.
Your new book, Max on Life, is intensely pastoral. You’re responding to people’s problems and fielding their questions. How have the questions you’ve received over the years shaped you?
They’ve been extremely formative. I can’t overstate their importance. I love the church. I honestly do. I love this little pond that God’s given me to fish and oversee here in San Antonio.
There is that time after services, where you’re just greeting one person after another after another. And about every fourth or fifth person will have a question, sometimes a difficult question.
Typically there’s not a lot of time to chat, but I’ve realized that truly hearing people’s questions is every bit as important as the sermon. So I lock in on that person, and I try to, for those few minutes that we have, hear that question as deeply as I can.
I pretend nobody else is in the foyer. It may be my only chance to hear this person’s heart. These questions have meant a lot to me. They seem to stick in my memory vault. Then they will work their way into messages in the future. Remember that guy who asked me about divorce? Or that person who wondered if it’s all right to play with an Ouija board? They just seem to surface. Yes, questions have been tremendously helpful for me.
Questions about God’s goodness, even his existence, have been raised by popular atheist authors. Do pastors today have to be philosophers? How do you deal with those really tough questions?
We have to be ready to respond to what people are hearing throughout the week. Most people, however, don’t want a complicated response. My goal is always to keep the cookies on the lower shelf, to keep the answer accessible. Most of the books on a pastor’s shelves are too complex for what people want. My main job is to distill an understandable answer that people can take home.
There are some exceptions to that. Every church has some people who are extraordinarily intellectual. But 90 percent of the people are saying, “I prayed that God would heal my father, but he still died. How am I supposed to process that?” That was a real question that someone asked me yesterday.
So for three minutes I tried to gently suggest that sometimes God doesn’t do what we want, but he always does what is right. I didn’t try to get too philosophical. She just needed somebody to reassure her.
Some pastors, like Tim Keller or John Piper, are different than I am, and they excel at reaching those deeper thinkers. I listen to their sermons, and they’re just at a different level. And I think that’s phenomenal. I’m so grateful for people like that. I speak to folks who don’t dwell at that altitude.
When a person first asks you a question, are they just testing to see if you can be trusted?
Yes, a person’s first question isn’t really the question. Their first question is kind of like tossing the tennis ball into the air. It’s a practice swing. They’re just testing to see if I am listening to them or not.
So I make a habit of following up the first question with a question of my own: “Can you give me an example of that? When did that last happen to you? What effect has that had on you?” When I do that, I find that I hear them better.
If I answer too quickly, my odds of providing a good answer diminish. Sometimes people don’t want an answer; they just want to be heard. They just need to get something off their chests.
I heard a counselor once say, “Try to find the question behind the question.” That’s good advice for pastors. Even when people come at you and they’re a bit antagonistic, I’ll sometimes be so bold as to say, “Now, what’s the question behind this question? What do you really want to talk about?”
Are you generally tempted to answer a question with too little information or too much?
Probably with too little information. Even this morning I was reflecting on yesterday’s services and conversations. I was thinking, Oh, I wish I’d said this. I wish I’d said that. I could have done a better job of giving practical solutions.
Sometimes people come to you with such huge issues, even in casual settings. I’ll be in the grocery store and somebody will come up and say, “I’ve got to talk to you about my father, who just got put back in rehab. What can I do?” I think, Wow, this is not the time.
Often I will say, “I really want to put you in touch with the right person for this question.” That’s been a helpful phrase for me. It implies that I may not be the right person. Or I’ll say, “Call my office tomorrow. Let’s talk about this on the phone, and we’ll see if we can put you in touch with the right person.”
That keeps me from pledging an eight-week counseling commitment right on the spot, which I’m probably not best qualified to do. I know I wouldn’t do as well as other people would. Pastors can’t take on every problem and solve everybody’s need.
What does it mean to be a pastor with people’s questions? Do people view you as a representative of God, or more as an empathetic friend?
They’re asking me questions because they believe God has told me something. And of course I know that’s not always the case. But they’re asking because they think I will bring a frame of reference to this conversation that is biblically-based and God-centered. So I really want to do that. When people ask me questions, I find myself praying: Lord, is there a verse I can give here? Is there something I need to be especially sensitive to? And if a verse comes to my mind, often I’ll just quote that verse.
My wife is exceptional at this. When people come and ask her for prayer, she doesn’t do much more than quote a verse or two, and then she’ll start praying. She’ll say, “Now don’t be anxious about anything, but by prayer and supplication make all your requests known to God.” The person may not realize she just quoted a verse. She doesn’t say, “I’m about to quote to you Philippians 4.” But that’s a very effective way to minister. So I’m learning from her, and trying to do that more.
You don’t need a huge arsenal of verses. Maybe six or eight verses that you’re very familiar with, and that you are comfortable reciting. For instance, every preacher should be ready with Matthew 11:28: “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Or Psalm 23. Those should be part of our vernacular. What a gift those verses can be in difficult situations.
When people come with questions, they reveal a glimpse into the state of their spiritual life. Do you feel obligated to inquire about their spiritual condition?
Yes, I do. That’s why I usually follow up their question with a question of my own: “How’s this affecting you?” “Do you feel close to God these days?” or “Is this discouraging to you?” That helps me see where they are. So many people come to us because they’re angry at somebody. So you’ve got to feel that anger with them for a little bit, but then say, “Now, if you really try to get even with them, is that going to solve this problem?”
You may need to say, “Sounds like your biggest challenge is to forgive.” At some point every angry person has to deal with forgiveness and turning things over to Christ. Sometimes you have to speak firmly and clearly about that aspect of being a Christian.
How does pastoral authority apply here?
The first thing that comes into my mind is when we find ourselves giving counsel to an individual who is about to make a decision and we are trying to urge them down a particular path.
We no longer live in a day in which the pastor is given authority just by virtue of the title. That change is probably good for us. Now we must earn the authority to speak into someone’s life.
By nature I’m a pretty gentle person. But when I have seen our church members head down the route of divorce, or head into a career that’s going to take all their time away from their kids, I feel within me a burning, a passion rising, and I’ll warn them directly. And I reserve terminology for times like that: “Now, brother, I want to offer some counsel and to talk to you as a pastor.”
How do people respond?
They respond well. They may not always agree with me. But I think they respect it. Part of that is that I’ve been here since 1988. Some of that comes with time. But even as a young pastor, we have to take Paul’s words about not letting anybody despise our youth. We are called to speak into people’s lives. The Holy Spirit is leaning into us, counting on us to speak truth to people. In those one-on-one settings, that’s absolutely essential.
Sermons provide a wonderful opportunity to be the voice of authority in someone’s life. It’s not a one-on-one setting, so they don’t feel quite as threatened or defensive. But in a sermon we can speak direction into someone’s life. I’m doing a series on grace right now. I’m concerned about the person who thinks, Okay, grace gives me license to sin. The Romans 6 question: “Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?” So in one sermon, I said, “If you’re thinking these lessons on grace are giving you permission to do evil, consider yourself corrected.” And I just stopped. I let that sit for about 30 seconds. I think that’s effective—just giving a firm word like that. “Consider yourself corrected.” I’m really not an in-your-face kind of preacher. I’m more pastoral and gentle. But one of our privileges is to speak against bad thinking.
[Kasica is the guy on the far left]
Earlier this year, Skillet guitarist Ben Kasica announced his departure from the two-time GRAMMY-nominated band. Kasica left to pursue a new venture, which he shares below in a personal letter to his fans, industry and artist peers:
Dear Friends,
Many of you know after 10 years of playing with Skillet, I’ve chosen to move on. Many people have questioned why I would leave a band ‘at the top’ to pursue ‘smaller’ things. Here is my answer.
When I was 16, I was given the opportunity of a lifetime – to play guitar in my favorite band Skillet. I had been a fan since I was 12, attending loads of concerts, “moshing”, proudly wearing Skillet t-shirts, etc. I never thought I would ever actually be in the band. I was just a normal kid that loved God and believed He had the best for me. But, through a good friend, I got a call for an audition and somehow really believed in my heart it was going to work out. Two weeks later, I was on the road touring and playing in the band. Ten years, almost two million records, countless amazing fans and a myriad of priceless memories later, I’m here writing this memo.
I grew up on Christian music and it maintains a special and unique place in my heart for the way it inspired and shaped me as a child and for how it has contributed to my maturity as a young adult growing up in the business. I often think back to when I was a 12-year old kid, lying in bed with my headphones blaring, dreaming about being a rock star. I think every kid has moments when they dream big dreams like these. The trouble is, most don’t really know how to ever achieve those dreams, even if they know a sense of calling from God. This next phase of life for me is committed to seeing others’ dreams become reality and encouraging people along in their destiny in God.
I recently formed a company called Skies Fall Media Group. The name ‘Skies Fall’ was inspired by the imagery of the Kingdom of Heaven coming down to the earth. The mission of the company is to facilitate a wide range of creative business development in the world of the arts and media. Initially forged as a small recording and production company in 2005, the company was expanded in 2008 to take on artist development, publishing and management and become an artist-centric independent record label, Skies Fall Records. Coinciding with the record company, we operate a full-service recording studio where we are writing and producing music with our clients.
To artists, I hope to be an encouragement to you to continue in your heavenly calling and that you would know refreshment in your work; that you would be reminded of when you were a young musician dreaming of doing music, when you were on a mission to make a difference in this world, speaking the most powerful language in the world through music; that the long drives and early mornings and the absence of normal church-life would be met by a renewed desire to live out the mandate of God on your lives; that you might actually live in the fullest measure of who God created you to be.
Pope Benedict XVI met with artists in the Sistine Chapel recently and said, “You are the custodians of beauty…you have the opportunity to speak to the heart of humanity, to touch individual and collective sensibilities, to call forth dreams and hopes, to broaden the horizons of knowledge and of human engagement. Be grateful, then, for the gifts you have received and be fully conscious of your great responsibility to communicate beauty, to communicate in and through beauty! Through your art, you yourselves are to be heralds and witnesses of hope for humanity!”
I hope that together we can make a difference in the world, that we can communicate the heart of God through creativity and inspiration. I hope that together we can set precedents in business, the arts and media worthy of being modeled by the world. I hope that our success not be gauged solely by sales and numbers, but by our honor for each other, by our excellence in our spheres of influence and by the measure we allow the Spirit of God to lead us. I’m privileged and excited to join you in these endeavors.
Sincerely yours,
Ben Kasica
Skies Fall Media Group is focused on an artist-centric approach to give the artist maximum creative control and profits for their work. In 2010, they released A String Tribute to Skillet from Cellofourte (featuring Tate Olsen, cellist for Skillet). Earlier this year, they released Americana/folk artist Everett Thomas’ Visions of the Sea.
Skies Fall Media Group is now gearing up for this week’s release of the debut radio single, “Live for Love,” from the new band, We Are Leo. This Chicago-area based pop/rock quartet has developed their distinct brand of energetic, message-based music over the course of three years of touring, earning them a legion of loyal, grass-roots fans while playing with the likes of Skillet, Family Force 5 and House of Heroes. More information is forthcoming on their debut release this fall.
For more information on Skies Fall Media Group, visit www.skiesfall.com.
Steven Curtis Chapman is practically a legend in Christian music. Yet, even with a 20 year+ experience in the Christian music, and 50+ GMA Dove Awards, this beloved singer releases his 17th album, Re:Creation to Sparrow records August 2nd, 2011. But with this album, Steven returns to his classic pop sound as he delivers six all-new tracks, as well as remaking several of his well-known tracks. He also includes the popular “Morning Has Broken,” featuring vocals from his son Caleb. These combinations make for an enjoyable album from Steven Curtis Chapman, most comparable to his award-winning project Declaration.
The upbeat radio single “Do Everything” immerses the listener into Steven’s enjoyable pop sound, creating a track very similar musically to “Dive.” With “Do Everything,” Steven reminds the listener to “do every thing that you do to the glory of the one who made You… to bring a smile to His face, to tell the story of grace with every move that you make and everything that you do.” This track was simply perfect, and it was awesome to hear some new, but classic sounding music from Steven again. The more acoustic “Long Way Home” has a bit of a country feel to it, a track about how with the Lord’s help, we will get through any trials in our life, even if it does feel like we are taking the long way home.
Steven next brings life to the 90s classic “The Great Adventure,” adding more of an acoustic feel to it, but definitely making good use of pounding drums. “Dive (Deeper)” has almost a Celtic feel to it, but also sounds very serious and almost a bit haunting, making for a very enjoyable new take on this beloved SCC hit. “All That’s Left” is a bit mellow, but speaks of how all we really have to give is love and is all that matters. It is largely based on 1 Corinthians 13, so it was very enjoyable to hear this beloved chapter of Scripture put to music.
“Heaven In the Real World,” this time made up of acoustic guitars and strings was nice to hear again, as was “Speechless,” which was much slower and also made up again of acoustic guitars. But because “Live Out Loud” was acoustic with a funky pop beat, I actually enjoyed it more than the original! Then, one of my favorite Steven Curtis Chapman songs, “For the Sake of the Call” (featured on his fourth project by the same name), and “Magnificent Obsession,” were very slow and acoustic as well. They did have a slight drumbeat, making them still enjoyable to take a listen to.
Remember that Steven Curtis Chapman single featured in Veggietales’ It’s A Meaningful Life, “Meant to Be”? That song is on here, too! Another original, the track reminds the listener that they have a purpose and aren’t here by accident. The strong strings at the ending were a very nice asset to this track. “More to this Life” is recreated as well, this time with a bit of strings but a lot of acoustic guitars, making it sound almost sad.
The mellow “Morning Has Broken”/”Sing Hallelujah” mixture featuring Steven’s son Caleb and a ton of choir effects was very angelic and moving, obviously chosen to be a part of this project because of Steven’s daughter Maria, putting a very serene and moving ending to Steven’s Re:Creationproject.
It was great to hear some new music from Steven Curtis Chapman! Some of the tracks on this project are remakes, and some are brand new, but all of the tracks combine to create a refreshing acoustic album. Re:Creation is a must-have for fans of Steven Curtis Chapman!
Rating: 4/5
Track listing:
1. Do Everything
2. Long Way Home
3. The Great Adventure (Recreated)
4. Dive (Recreated)
5. All That’s Left
6. Heaven In the Real World (Recreated)
7. Speechless (Recreated)
8. Live Out Loud (Recreated)
9. For the Sake of the Call (Recreated)
10. Magnificent Obsession (Recreated)
11. Meant to Be
12. More to This Life (Recreated)
13. Morning Has Broken
14. Sing Hallelujah
This week’s tweet of the week comes from Louie Giglio who tweeted this past weekend:
“Vision wed with patience rooted in sacrifice combined with endurance clothed in humility…these mark the road to greatness.”
Say no more.
GRAMMY Award-winning artist Steven Curtis Chapman sings songs & shares stories on fall tour presented by Show HOPE.
This fall, Show HOPE will present iconic music veteran Steven Curtis Chapman’s “Songs & Stories” tour. In a unique songwriter’s night experience rarely seen outside Nashville, TN, Chapman will be sharing the stage with acclaimed and emerging artists, Andrew Peterson and Sparrow Records’ Josh Wilson. The tour will run from September to November of this year in conjunction with the release of Chapman’s newest album, re:creation, coming to stores Aug. 9. To see Chapman explain more about re:creation, visit http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=FJ219MNU.
Each night, “Songs & Stories” tour concert goers will hear the brand new songs featured on re:creation, including Chapman’s new single, “Do Everything,” which has already hit top 10 on both the AC-Monitor and AC-Indicator charts. The newest single is also No. 14 on the National Christian Audience Chart, and has over 77 stations supporting it. The GRAMMY Award winner will perform re-imagined versions of some of his biggest hits while taking advantage of the unique format to share the stories that inspired him to write both his current hits, and songs that have entertained for decades.
Additionally, audiences will also be treated to Chapman, Wilson and Peterson collaborating together on stage with a vast assortment of instruments from the ukulele to the cajon for a rare and memorable event.
The 24-city tour kicks off Sept. 29 and will hit major cities such as Atlanta, St. Louis, Denver and Portland before wrapping up on Nov. 3.
Chapman is also offering a unique pre-show experience for fans called “Soundcheck and Stories” which will include a Q&A with Chapman, an acoustic performance and an exclusive signed poster. For more date and ticket information about Steven Curtis Chapman and the upcoming “Songs & Stories” tour visit http://stevencurtischapman.com/.
