Joy Is Contagious

Yes, I know it's a commercial for a cell phone but don't be all curmudgeony. Think on this...

1) Joy is contagious. Many of the people in the video were commuters who joined in the dance as a result of the enthusiasm expressed by those hired for the commercial. My favorite commuter is the man, who, after hearing the first few bars of "My Boy, Lollipop" eventually succumbs to the dance by lifting his arms as his expression turns from bewilderment into a beatific smile.

2) Joy is meant to be shared because God created us to live in community with one another. The older I get the more and more I see this truth manifested in my life. The times that I am most aware of God's goodness is when I am with friends and family, sharing a meal, a glass of wine, trading stories or making music. I mean, let's face it...this wouldn't have been quite as effective if it was simply one person dancing in their flat by his/herself.

3) Joy is expressed through clapping, shouting and dancing. If we have the true and life changing Good News of Christ Jesus, why can't our times corporate worship look more like this? Heck, even closer to home, why don't I live my life more like this? Consider Psalm 130:11-12...

You turned my wailing into dancing;
you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,
that my heart may sing to you and not be silent.
O LORD my God, I will give you thanks forever.

4) Ultimately, as much fun as dancing can be, the kind of joy we see in the video only be sustained for so long and after awhile starts feeling empty. The truth is that sustained, substantive, life changing joy is found in God alone. Augustine has said that our souls are restless until they rest in God and there are many Psalms that attest to this. I'd like end this post with a few of my favorites.

Psalm 16:11
You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

Psalm 19:8
The precepts of the LORD are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the LORD are radiant, giving light to the eyes.

Psalm 21:6
Surely you have granted him eternal blessings and made him glad with the joy of your presence.

Psalm 28:7
The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to him in song.

Psalm 94:19
When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought joy to my soul.

Psalm 30:4-5

Sing praises to the LORD, O you his saints,
and give thanks to his holy name.
For his anger is but for a moment,
and his favor is for a lifetime.
Weeping may tarry for the night,
but joy comes with the morning.

This last one has become more and more my prayer as of late...

Psalm 51:10-12

Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

Harold Best on the Nature of Beauty

Cosper, Best and Stam - Session Four from Sojourn/The 930 Art Center on Vimeo.

Mike Cosper from Sojourn Worship recently sat down with r. Harold Best (author of Unceasing Worship and Music Through The Eyes Of Faith) and professor Carl “Chip” Stam (Professor of Church Music and Worship at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) for a series of conversation about faith, art, music and worship.

I wanted to post this 10 minute clip because I think Best's discussion on the beauty and art as it relates to the western idea of perfection is particularly insightful and helpful as we approach what we interact with the process of making music and art at the church.

Kitsch or Art?

The performance is merely a superficial imitation of the song by Kansas yet at the same time there is an undeniable quality and skill to the performance itself. Even though the method or mode of interpretation is decidedly...unique .

I'll be straightforward: I lean most decidedly towards kitsch. However, the performance does leads me to the question what is role of the interpreter's skill in art. Is the label "art" inclusive to when the work is done with skill and beauty but decidedly derivative if not outright imitation? If not, how do artists inform and influence each other? Why is it still an "acceptable" expression of art to interpret classical music but not the popular form of rock of music?

Whatever the answers are, there is something ridiculously sublime about this performance.

Piper on Authentic Worship

"Let me mention here that this does not mean that worship is authentic only when you are red-hot for God. It can mean that when you are not red-hot, your heart feels a longing for the passion that you once knew or want to know more of. That longing, offered to God, is also worship. Or it can mean remorse that even the longing is gone, and you are scarcely able to feel anything but sadness that you don't feel what you should. That remorse, offered to God, is also worship. It says to God that he is the only hope for what you need. So don't have an all-or-nothing attitude about worship. The heart can be real even if it is not as enflamed with zeal as it ought to be - which it never is in this life."

John Piper – Singing and Making Melody to the Lord

John Updike (1932-2009)

Author John Updike died a couple of days ago at age 76. Here is his "Seven Stanzas at Easter" which I recently read on the Between Two Worlds blog.

Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body;
if the cells’ dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.

It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His Flesh: ours.

The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that—pierced—died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
new strength to enclose.

Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.

The stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,
not a stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.

And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.

Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
for our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.

For more on Updike read Russel D. Moore's article entitled John Updike is Dead, which reflects on Updike's life and the deep spiritual craving that flowed from his pen into his poems and stories.

I'd like to read more of this man's work.

Help My Unbelief, Part 2

In my last post I was talking about how Jesus places a huge emphasis on our belief in Him and acknowledging the struggle to surrender myself over to Christ’s perfect will, His wisdom and His faithfulness for my life.

As I’ve been wrestling with the issue of trust I find myself identifying more and more with the father in Mark chapter 9 who said, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!"

My heart struggles to believe the promises of Christ and my guess it’s a struggle for all of us.

“Help My Unbelief” is a song that has helped me to put into words what’s true of my heart and has served as a helpful prayer that I can come back to throughout my day. I’ve posted the lyrics below because I think the song can be an encouragement to all of us. You can meditate on the lyrics in your quiet time and download the song from iTunes. Allow the lyrics and melody to take root in our heart as you ask for God’s grace to help us believe more and more in His faithfulness.

Help My Unbelief
Words: John Newton (1725-1807), Music: Clint Wells (2005)
Taken from the Gadsby Hymnal #278
Recording by Red Mountain Church
From the album “Help My Unbelief”

I know the Lord is nigh,
and would but cannot pray,
for Satan meets me when I try
and frights my soul away.
And frights my soul away.

I would but can't repent,
though I endeavor oft;
This stony heart can ne'er relent
till Jesus makes it soft.
Till Jesus makes it soft.

Help my unbelief.
Help my unbelief.
Help my unbelief.
My help must come from Thee.

I would but cannot love,
though wooed by love divine;
No arguments have pow'r to move
a soul as base as mine.
A soul as base as mine.

I would but cannot rest
in God's most holy will;
I know what he appoints is best
and murmur at it still.
I murmur at it still.

Help my unbelief.
Help my unbelief.
Help my unbelief.
My help must come from Thee.

(A quick side note: The Crossing has created a couple of iMixes on iTunes that includes the original recordings of the songs that we sing on Sunday morning. These songs help us to meditate on scriptural truth about God and in singing them, help us to go deeper in our affections for him. You'll find the links to the iMixes below.)

The Crossing: Songs for Worship (A-I)

The Crossing: Songs for Worship (J-Z)

Help My Unbelief, Part 1

Last year I was spent a lot of time studying the first four books of the New Testament and in my study I was really struck by how much the promises of gospel are linked to our belief Christ.

John 6:35 - "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 6:40 “For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day."

Mark 11:24 - Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours."

John 1:12 - "Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God..."

John 3:16 & 18 - "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life... Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son."

Jesus places a huge emphasis on our trust, our faith and our belief in Him.

So, I’ve been taking more and more time to think and pray about how much I really do believe in Christ for all things. Am I trusting in Christ’s perfect will, His wisdom and His faithfulness for my life or am I believing in my own ability (or should I say inability) to make life work out the way that I think it should?

That's the struggle of sin, isn't it?