Tag Archive for 'church'

Charlie Peacock on the Future of CCM

Published
by
michael lee
on 1 May 2008
in audio, church, emerging church and faith and theology
. 1 Comment

Charlie Peacock wrote a piece for the final print issue of CCM Magazine, on the future of Christian Music. Well worth a read:

In the future, young musicians will think that all Christian music is dated and boring, and they will create something they think is current, relative and exciting. They will say things like: “We just wanna show people that you can be a Christian and have fun, too.” Or, “We’re not gonna hit people over the head with the Bible. We’re not Christian musicians; we’re musicians who are Christians.” Or, “We are totally sold out to Jesus. We don’t write vague, sugar-coated lyrics.”

It will be nothing but retread hubris though. I will roll my eyes and grumble that history is hell-bent on repeating itself.

Read the whole thing here.

(ht: The Black Nail)

Phreaky Phwednesday: 1 Samuel 25:22

Published
by
michael lee
on 30 April 2008
in church and phreaky phriday
. 33 Comments

Of all the arguments I’ve ever heard for using the King James Bible, this is by far the best. BY FAR.

Pastor Steven L Anderson, pastor of Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona. My favorite quote is, “The editors of the NIV pee sitting down.”

(ht: Monday Morning Insights)

Servant of Grace

Published
by
michael lee
on 4 April 2008
in audio and church
. 4 Comments

I wrote a song about 3 years ago that we’re pulling back out and dusting off for the next 3 weeks at church. Doug’s starting a series about actually doing things, serving the community in which we’ve been placed, you know, that whole Kingdom thing.

This song seemed to fit. You can download the chart and the demo, and use it freely if you’d like. Or, mock it intensely in the comments, either way.

Downloads: Demo / Chart

No More Tithing

Published
by
michael lee
on 23 March 2008
in The Intra-Web-O-Sphere!, art and culture and church
. 24 Comments

So, a few years ago, Matt shot a quick and cheesy little video about what church would look like if we simply did away with tithing. I subbed out some of the music, and we distributed it through Sermon Spice - you can see the original here: No More Tithing.


no-more-tithing.png

You need to watch it all the way through, just trust me on this one. Watch the little gags along the way. Got it? Good.

I did a Google search tonight for the phrase no more tithing, just to see what would pop up. And lo, the google gods blessed me with this:

I called Matt, and made him watch the whole thing while on the phone with me. We laughed so hard I threw up.

The Hand of Blessing

Published
by
michael lee
on 11 March 2008
in church, life and prayer
. 18 Comments

Josiah Michael LeeOn Sunday, we brought our son Josiah forward to be blessed by our church family. It was a joyful event, as those sort of things always are, I think. In our church, we come forward and lay hands on people, and the whole church prays together for that person. It’s a beautiful moment. It was made all the more beautiful by our precocious 2 1/2 year-old Sophia reaching her hand over and placing it on Josiah’s back to pray for him.

It’s been causing me to think, over the last few days, about what that blessing means. I have a bit of a mystical and contemplative nature, and am prone to think about everyday events as small reenactments of grand themes. In this case, though, the act of placing on hands and blessing a child doesn’t feel like some great supernatural transaction, some new angel hovering near, or fortune being enticed into a child’s life by some new supernatural gravitational field. The blessing of the church felt human, earthbound, and it was that humanness that brought me to tears in the service. Yes, I cry a lot these days. It’s how I leak out all this excess testosterone.

The church didn’t pray down a blessing that didn’t already exist. They stood up, laid their hands on my son, and confirmed their commitment to the blessing he already shares.

He will live and grow in a community of faith, and will learn to see the hand of God in the mundane transactions of life.

He will learn in the company of loving teachers, in silly songs and motions, in shared toys and snack time, he will learn how to be gracious and patient. As he grows, he will learn to love The Book, and learn how to let it implicate his life. He will learn to take up models and heroes, and to let them inform his choices. He will learn to serve, to give, to set his hand to the task of building the Kingdom of God in acts of justice, compassion, and grace.

He will learn to be a man in the company of godly men. In their strengths, and in their failings, he will learn about honor, and self-discipline, and humility, commitment, the special obligation of the strong to the weak, about virtue and integrity. He will learn about sexuality and identity, about the particular weaknesses of men, and he will learn about them in the company of those who love Yahweh.

He will be the recipient of grace, of instruction, of companionship, of diligent correction, of hospitality, of all the good things that come from life lived together.

When our church comes together to bless someone, it is a very human thing we do - we pledge to be blessing to that person. To see a hundred people stand, and lay their hands on his head, and on his back, and on us in support, and to hear them say, “He is ours, to care for, to love, to encourage, to teach, he is ours, and we are his. We are the cloud of witnesses, the strong right arm, the body, the co-laborers, the gathered followers of The Way, the forgiven-thus-forgiving Family of God in this place. We are his brothers. We are his sisters. We obligate ourselves to him. This is our particular blessing to him.”

Nothing could make me love this church more than the beauty of that moment.