Christmas and Rachmaninoff

So what is the story trying to tell us? Well in order to fully answer that question we each have to create space in our lives to actively listen to the story. And it also helps to hear the story told us in different ways.

I want to introduce you, if you aren't familiar already, with The Vespers. They are a sort of wonderful musical storytelling experience, encompassing such a broad spectrum of Biblical currents and themes, all culminating in and around Christ. Written by Russia's great composer, Rachmaninoff, the Vespers are how we translate Rachmaninoff's Russian title for the work, which most literally means "all-night vigil".

The Vespers are 15 choral movements, with each section focusing on a specific section of the Scriptures, from creation to the resurrection. I've been listening to them over the past few days, and it's been like jumping into a deep, refreshing pool on a hot summer day. With all the Christmas hubbub occurring right now, it is absolutely vital that we each take time to absorb and conform ourselves to the Biblical story of Christmas. This is a great way to do so. It takes a little bit of time, and a bit of patience to let the story unfold, but it is well worth the effort!

Here is the link to the first movement (all 15 are on Youtube, just follow on the sidebar for the next movement)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn5dpIECTds&feature=related

Here is the link to the text where you can follow along with both the original language and the English translation. it also has some good background on the Vespers.

http://www.signumrecords.com/catalogue/sigcd054/programme.htm

I hope you enjoy! Find ways this Christmas season to get wrapped up in the real Christmas story.

mark.

Snow Angels

What exactly are we getting ready to celebrate as we enter into this Christmas season? Better yet, what are we celebrating now as we live out each day of this month of December?

These kinds of questions always seem to pop into my head as Thanksgiving ends and Christmas season bursts upon the scene. But this year the answers are coming in a very real and tangible form: through the first Christmas story, as described by Luke and Matthew in the Gospels. Here are a few things I think they are telling us.

1. Slow down. We can't be changed by the Story if we don't take the time to enter into the Story and allow our hearts and minds to be gripped by its awesome force.

2. Notice. Luke and Matthew point out different things in their accounts, and each writer calls us to see the broad range of characters in the Story. What was it like for those shepherds in that cold field? What is Joseph doing that is so important? Why should we pay attention to Simeon and to Anna?

3. Sacrifice. The Story calls us to give up ourselves in worship and adoration of the Word made flesh, to pursue a different reality than the one our culture subscribes to.

The Story should be telling us all sorts of different things as we engage it this Christmas season. What is it trying to tell you?

Decade in Music

Well we're almost to the end of the decade of 2000, and as I'm on thanksgiving break I thought I'd go through some of my favorite cd's of the decade. I bought my first cd in 2000, so this was definitely the decade I first really got into music. So without further ado, here are my favorite albums of the last decade:

2000 - Coldplay's Parachutes ; Nickel Creek's Nickel Creek

2001 - Caedmon's Call's In the Company of Angels

2002 - Coldplay's Rush of Blood to the Head; Kutless's Kutless

2003 - Switchfoot's Beautiful Letdown; Enter the Worship Circle's 1st Circle; Over the Rhine's Ohio

2004 - Andrew Peterson's Behold the Lamb of God

2005 - Mae's The Everglow; Jack Johnson's In Between Dreams; Over the Rhine's Drunkard's Prayer

2006 - John Mayer's Continuum; mewithoutYou's Brother, Sister; Sufjan Stevens' Seven Swans; Switchfoot's Oh! Gravity; The Weepies' Say I am You; Fernando Ortega's The Shadow of Your Wings

2007 -The Avett Brothers' Emotionalism; Sara Groves' Tell Me What You Know; Anberlin's Cities

2008 - Andrew Peterson's Resurrection Letters; Coldplay's Viva la Vida

2009 - The Avett Brother's I and Love and You

Top 5 Albums of the Decade

1. Coldplay A Rush of Blood to the Head

2. Andrew Peterson Behold the Lamb of God

3. The Avett Brothers I and Love and You

4. John Mayer Continuum

5. Mae The Everglow

There it is. That was fun. Chide me where you think I need chiding, agree heartily where hearty agreement is necessary.

mark.

All the difference in the world

Over the summer I read a book by GK Chesterton about Thomas Aquinas and Francis of Assisi. I certainly enjoyed it, but I didn't realize it would continue to have reverberating effects through much of this semester. Somehow a key theme of the two biographies has stayed with me like a shadow trailing behind me as I walk.

All of my 5 classes at seminary have by now intersected on more than a few topics, and while I know this is by design in order that we would learn better by repeated exposure, I don't think they planned the intersection that has meant the most to me so far. That intersection is prayer. In some form or fashion, all of my classes have dealt with far-ranging things related to prayer, and it is as if the Chesterton book I read this summer is the matte-board to which they are all sticking.

We've gone over the Lord's prayer in interpretation class. We've discussed the theology of the prayers of the Psalms in Old Testament. We've examined the prayers of the early church in church history. We've thought about the deeper layers of prayer in spiritual formation. And we've even tackled praying in Greek class, going through a few short sections of the Scripture together.

While these points of emphases on prayer have not been underlined and highlighted by my professors, the little light in my head has been going off all semester as the Spirit has revealed connection after connection. And the central theme connecting everything together is gratitude.

Thomas Aquinas and Francis of Assisi learned through a long lifetime of obedience to see God in all aspects of life, from the tiniest parts of creation to the loftiest of existential questions. But this didn't just occur overnight in their conversion experiences. It was a sort of gradual process that was facilitated through daily gratitude. As they learned to give thanks to God for everything in their lives, these men of faith started to have the scales removed from their eyes, and I don't think we've had two such persons since who have seen God at work so actively in the world.

If we can't be thankful in the little things, what kind of heart do we have? If we can't thank God for the small moment of rest or the sandwich we had for lunch then what does that say about the alignment of the motives of our heart? Gratitude sees God, selfishness sees ourselves. Gratitude realizes that the gifts of life are from God, and are not to be possessed and worried over, but are to be thanked, praised, and enjoyed. Selfishness might not be as scary a thing on the outside as some of the more grievous, hard-hitting sins, but I venture to say (from experience) that it is the most debilitating disposition for the disciple of Christ to have.

Selfishness turns us sour from the inside out and affects every part of our lives. It grows scales over our eyes that keep us from seeing our brothers and sisters in need, and keeps us as well from seeing the beautiful gifts that God has given us through creation and through his more personal daily activity. In short, selfishness is a disease, and must be purposely fought. The great antidote to selfishness comes in the unassuming form of gratitude. Thanking God for the good times and the bad, for our very breath in the morning and the gifts he bestows upon us every day, for the big and the small. Slowly gratitude works inside of us to bring us new eyes and new hearts, through the wondrous work of the Spirit, and we begin to walk down the same road that the great disciples of our faith (including Aquinas and Francis) journeyed upon, and it makes all the difference in the world.

Looking in the Closet

My pastor has been preaching a series on the Blues, discussing the similarities between this type of music and living faith. I've been trying to put myself in the shoes of the people in the stories he's been telling, trying to think about what life must have been like during those those decades in the early part of the 20th century.

If you ever looked in your grandparents (or even great-grandparents) closet as a youngster, you will probably recognize many of the clothes represented in this slideshow of pictures. I found this story about a photographer from the 50's who recently died. He focused on normal every day people, and I enjoyed browsing these elegant photographs and stepping into another world. Take a look for yourself:

Here

the Real World

A few afternoons ago I went for a walk. After being in class all morning and in the library for most of the afternoon, I really needed to get outside for a little bit. Since I normally run, and run with an ipod, I thought it would be a good change-of-pace to slow down and walk, without the ipod. I tried to count how many different animals I saw and how many different varieties of plants that I passed, but I gave up after about 20 minutes. It hit me pretty hard: I pass by so much detail and so much variety and rarely, if ever, stop to recognize and take pleasure in it.

I've been reading a book by Eugene Peterson for one of my classes. It's called The Wisdom of Each Other, and it's a series of based-on-reality fictional letters between Peterson and a distant friend who has just converted to the Christian faith. Sprinkled throughout the letters are numerous one-liners that catch you off guard and make you want to put the book down and stop and think. And since most of the letters are fairly short in nature, Peterson really has to pack-in what he wants to say. I think he does a fine job.

One of the key themes he talks about in the book is church--what it is, what it does, and some of its pitfalls. In describing these elements of the church, I found myself really resonating with one particular description of the act of church, ie worshipping God with other believers. Peterson says, "every call to worship is a call into the Real World". Maybe that doesn't strike you as that astounding of a quote, but let me unpack it a little bit.

What he is referring to with regards to waking up to the Real World is what I experienced in my walk the other day. Our daily realities more often than not resemble the worldly conception of reality rather than the Godly conception of reality. The world's conceptions of truth, beauty, community, family, self-worth, freedom, etc., are like fractions compared to whole numbers. They work up to a certain point, but inevitably falter because they are too shallow.

The truth is, our conception of reality (which is most often just like the world's) is too shallow. We fail to see the invisible mysteries of God at work all around us or witness the tiny miracles of daily living, mostly because we are either too self-absorbed to notice anything other than ourselves (this describes me accurately) or we are running too fast on the treadmill of life. Church, then, or rather the act of worshipping together, reminds us of the Real World. It brings us back to the truth that God is big and God is in control and God is at work all around us. That is the story we enter in when we worship together on Sundays.

I need that wake-up call every day, especially in those days that feel like re-runs, like nothing new is happening, that all that is really going on is something that has happened before. It's in those times, more often than not, that the tiny miracles of God are embedded, waiting for me to notice. Waking up to the reality of God every day is difficult, but it is to discipleship what brushing our teeth in the morning before we walk out the door is to the rest of the day.

Ten Thousand Words

Great song by the Avett Brothers that gives a lot to think about.