My Worship Revolution

Go visit Beth Hutton’s weblog over here.  Keep em comin Revolution!!

I thought y’all might wanna check out this video I got from Dave for this past Sunday.  The team is in India and they are doing amazing things!  After you watch the video, make sure you stop by the India Team Blog to hear all about what they are doing and how you can be praying for them!

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I read a great article this morning over at MMI about the things the church could learn from a staff field trip to Starbucks.  Check it out over here and then come back over.  It’s well worth reading.

Now every so often I think we need to be careful about these things.  It is possible to go overboard worrying about these sorts of issues, but unfortunately, that’s NOT the problem at most churches. 

My favorite part is the reference to Starbucks goal, which I’ve heard before, of being the "third place" for people to be, right behind home and work.  I would love to see this be more of a goal in every one of our churches.  (Quick reminder – the church is not a building, it is a community.)  If we really want to be a community of believers doing life together and making an impact in our community, shouldn’t we be together a whole lot more than just Sunday and life group?  And shouldn’t all of these gatherings be a place where "outsiders" should feel comfortable to be with us and see Christ in us as well?

Just a few thoughts that got me going this morning.  What do you think?

That’s right…Revolution bloggers just keep poppin up all over the place!  Go visit Charlie Garrison and leave him a comment so he knows you’re reading.  I have a feeling this one is bound to be entertaining!

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So, for Valentines day, I thought it would be nice to take my wife out for a movie, after coming home with some flowers, chocolate, and a card.  (Thank you Steph for watching Caleb!)  So I figured, "Hey, it’s Valentines Day.  How about a nice romantic comedy chick flick that Rachel would enjoy."  So we headed out to grab a real quick bite and see Because I Said So.

Now, before I go any further, let me say, I think I’m fairly lax on my movies and not like ultra-conservative or anything.  Maybe more than some others, but not ultra.  (No matter what Rick says about it, I still think Braveheart is the best movie ever.)    Anywho, we sat through about twenty minutes of non-stop sexual innuendos.  Worst part was, they weren’t even funny, the acting sucked, and it didn’t seem to be steering in any interesting direction.  It was just crass to be honest.  I mentioned the idea of walking out to Rachel which she said would be OK with her.  (PS, I don’t think I’ve ever walked out of a movie theater.)  After we sat there for a few more minutes, Rachel had a brilliant idea,  "Do you want to go see Music and Lyrics instead?"  Our movie had started at 6:50.  Music and Lyrics at 7.  So we bailed.  (Needless to say, I don’t recommend Because I Said So to ANYBODY.)

Music And Lyrics: got there a few minutes late, but not too much to miss the plot.  Cute movie, really funny.  Way better than the other.  The thing that bums me out is the other movie got our box office money.  Of course it still had our cultures jacked up views of sexuality and romance, but that is, of course, to be expected.  (Really good article about that issue and how it’s damaged romantic comedies here.)

There was one part that got me going, though.  There is a scene that depicts a popular female artist in the movie doing a large concert in NY.  Lots of 13 and 14 year old girls at the concert.  Artist comes out with inappropriate clothing and dancing and crowd goes wild.  It wasn’t the movie that bothered me.  It was the fact that it is all to accurate a reflection of our pop culture.

It reminded me of a quote from Dean from last week about Christians not doing enough because we don’t get angry enough.  Whether it fully applied to this situation or not, I was getting angry about what has become common place to relay to our youth.  Frankly, it pisses me off the things that our culture teaches our kids about sexuality and I’m kinda sick of it.  End rant…thanks for reading.  Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

We finished the night at Borders chattin over a cup of coffee and me buying a journal/sketch book to start pouring out some more creativity from my brain, maybe even some song lyrics (kinda the recurring theme for the past week and a half), and Rachel getting a calendar.

It was great spending some time connecting with my wife tonight.  I am so incredibly lucky to have her, and it’s all to easy to lose that time to actually talk and just enjoy each other in the midst of work and kid.  Happy Valentines day Rachel Kaye!

Yesterday at all three services we prayed over and comissioned our 2007 India Team.  They are currently on their way to Southern India to spend two weeks ministering to the people there.  I had the privledge of going on this trip with the first team we took over there as a church about a year and a half ago.  It was an amazing trip and I know that God is going to do amazing things in the hearts of the people who are going.

Keep track of what the team is up to while they’re there at the India team blog here.

I really miss that good southern food from Re:create.  Now it’s back to microwave pizza and milk.  I may go back next year just for the food alone!

Well friends, today was the final day of Re:create.  tomorrow there is an extra trip to EMI records, but considering the amount of sleep I’ve missed out on and the amount of work I need to do, I may very well be bailin out on that.  So here’s the highlights of day four…and what an AMAZING day it was:

Rick Dempsey
Rick is the V.P. of Disney films who has spent the past several years focusing upon character quality and the preservation and restoration of the Disney brand name.  He was there to talk with us about branding.  He shared some of the keys to branding in general and specifically at Disney.  he then transitioned to talk about the branding of the church as  whole and what we should be branded by.  Fun conversation.  here’s a few fun facts and info about Disney’s new strategies with their movies:

New Disney Movies Strategy

• Emphasizing the Disney brand
• Movie guidelines
  • No bad language
  • No gratuitous violence
  • No sexual content

2007 Movie Release Dates  the ones that interested me anyway

• Pirates 3 – May 25
• Nightmare Before Christmas…in 3D!!! – October 19
• Enchanted – November 21
• National Treasure 2 – December 21

We were able to see a trailer and a scene from the movie Enchanted.  I have to go see that movie, and  you should too.  It looks hilarious!

Leeland & Cyndi Mooring

Well you already heard a little about worshipping with Leeland.  That was an anointed time of worship and it rocked.  So was the rest of the afternoon.  Leelands mom, Cyndi, came to talk with us about what it looks like to be a good parent and raising a child, specifically one that is an artist.

This is one special family, and clearly two great parents in Cyndi and Todd.  they shared their stories of traveling full time and singing in churches around the country as a family.  They also shared the first song that Leeland ever wrote.  Check it out, and most importantly, be sure to listen at the end when they ask how old he was when he wrote this:

Man the spirit was thick in that room the whole time.  I couldn’t stop the tears from flowing several times as we took moments to worship and to be prayed over.  Here were a couple of REALLY great quotes from that session:

• They didn’t shield us from the hard times.  You can never know how mighty God is until you know how mighty a problem is that he needs to overcome.
  -Jack discussing the things he learned about faith as they prayed and trusted in God to take care of them as a family.)
• You can’t take your house to heaven, you can’t take your luggage to heaven, you can’t take your stuff to heaven, but you can take your children.
• We have an awesome responsibility to pass on what God’s done in our lives to them.  Then they will pass it on to their kids, and them to their kids, and you’ve left a legacy.

Chattin

Took some time as Re:create attenders only to chat with Randy for a while to hear about his dreams and what he is doing now as well as to discuss how the conference could be even better next year.  you will probably hear a bit more about Randy Elrod and his dreams here in the future.  this guys is an amazing visionary, artist, encourager, and all around inspiring person and I am so glad I had the opportunity to meet him here.  For a sneak peek of some really awesome things to come, check this out.

It was also really cool to be at a place where instead of having some lame evaluation form that may or may not be looked at, we were able to sit and openly and honestly share what we’d like to see more of in the future.  This is definitely a unique and special annual gathering.

Dinner and New Song Cafe

We all had dinner at someone’s house…yeah, all 100 of us!  Did I mention it was a GORGEOUS mansion?  As a sidenote, the guy who owns the house is the inventor of the evangecube!  I think that’s hilarious for some reason.  Check it out:

After an amazing dinner, we sat down all together in the main room of the house for a time of songwriters from EMI and Worship Together sharing some of their new songs.  the artists were Leeland Mooring, Matt Maher, and Brenton Brown.

After they shared some songs they wrote, which of course we got chord charts for, we decided to just finish off with like 20 minutes of worship.  Again, the worship was absolutely amazing!  I think some of the best worship times in my life have been with a bunch of friends in a packed out living room.  It was an awesome evening.  I’m sure you’ll recognize a song or two from these guys, and enjoy the tail end of our worship time:

Day four definitely turned out to be the best full day of all of them.  And there you have it.  The trip was great, and I’m sure I’ll give some closing general thoughts on the conference.  Sorry for a couple of long posts this week, but if you’re still with me, good for you.  Thanks for sharing the journey with me.  And to all you Re:create bloggers who are now reading, thanks for joining the longer journey.  I hope you stick around and hang out with us here for a while.

If nothing else, I was here this week to be here this afternoon.

That’s Leeland (18) on the guitar with his brother Jack (21) and their father on keys.  This kid has an amazing gift.  He led me into some of the deepest, most intimate worship time with Jesus that I have experienced in about as long as I can remember.  There is prophetic voice and a passion beyond his years that just flows out of him and inhabits his worship.

After worshipping there was some speaking by his parents and the family that I will tell you more about tonight in a recap of the day.  They sang together and encouraged us and prayed for us at the end.  I came unglued.  Man I needed this afternoon.  Thanks Jesus.

I was already missing my wife and son when I got the picture of them missin me:

Then I got to iChat with Rachel and she had Caleb with her.  It was great to see him, but it really just made me miss him even more cause I wanted to reach through the screen and touch him.  I think I didn’t really realize how much I missed him till I saw him and couldn’t touch him.  Hey, as a baby that’s the best part about him, it’s not like he can do anything else! 

I can’t wait to hold my baby and kiss my other baby when I get home!