Do you pray daily?

I run some online business stuff on the side promoting affiliate products. I’m always interested in seeing what type of “stuff,” for the lack of a better term, people can manage to sell — everything from your typical “How to Make a Million Dollars from Home” to “How to Successfully Cheat on Your Wife.”

But the pitch I got this morning was nothing like I’ve ever seen. You’ll just have to read it.

“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.”
– John 3:16

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5:53 AM is way too early

I always have this dilemma when I have to get up early in the morning for something. I don’t want to wake up too late and then end up being rushed because I don’t have enough time to get ready, but I also don’t want to wake up so early as to waste the much needed sleep. Sometimes this dilemma gets to me and I end up not even sleeping well.

I got invited to lead worship at a church about 30 minutes north of here. I had to get there early to rehearse, so I set my alarm for 5:53 AM. It seemed like an optimal time. And it was.

I haven’t done a lot of guest worship leading, so this was a good experience for me. The community there is pretty neat because it has a lot of history to it with it being somewhere around 100 years old! I always enjoy the sense of community that a smaller church naturally brings. Also, Bob Henry (campus ministries staff at Huntington University) and his family ended up being a few miles away, so they visited! It was such a random thing.

Danny Cox (click to enlarge)

Last friday, my mentor, Danny Cox, and a new friend of mine, Danny Rossi, who is also on staff at the church, opened for headliner Phil Wickham. All these guys’ sets were fantastic. It was a small venue too, so that was neat. Check out their music if you haven’t. Also, if you haven’t seen Phil Wickham live, you probably should.

Phil Wickham (click to enlarge)

It’s definitely a weird time around here. A lot of the staff at the church are taking vacation and getting rested up. Things sort of ease back because a lot of people are gone. My mentor is actually going to be taking a couple weeks of vacation. So while I’ve been engaged day-to-day, it’s been kind of laid back from what I hear. Supposedly things ramp back up at the end of the summer. Hearing this makes me eager to write those papers for the school and get them out of the way.

On another note, I’m trying to work on my social skills.

If you know me a little bit, I really eat up those moments of solitude. However, I’m finding I’m so reflective I’m wondering if it’s potentially dangerous. I’m pretty sure I could isolate myself in a room for a month straight and enjoy myself thoroughly with reading, writing, and thinking. Thankfully I’ve had folks invite me to hang out and be apart of their life.

That’s all from me on this front. If you have an extra car you want to get rid of, please let me know. I might need it real soon.

Plugging in

It’s week #2 of my internship. This week I definitely feel like I’ve been able to engage and contribute a little bit more in all the meetings, and this week I was able to play some music. I guess I’ve heard this before but I’m realizing how much you don’t actually play a lot of music being a music director/worship leader. You do, but the majority of the work is planning, coordinating, and working with your team.

One of the things I’m enjoying most is being around so many different creative people. I’m learning so much just by observing, listening, watching, and joining in with it all.

I keep saying I’m working with a really creative group of people. Here’s a video from their Easter service last year to give you a sense of what I’m talking about (http://www.vimeo.com/4132259):

Aside from the many meetings, here are some highlights.

1.) On Monday…

I went with Mike (service music director) up to a studio 30 miles north of Detroit to listen to him track some guitars for a recording project. Ben West is producing it and it’s sounding fantastic (check out Ben’s band The Great Fiction). These guys are so creative. Then, I drove back in almost tornadic weather. Unbeknownst to me, there was a tornado watch out. Worst storm I’ve ever drove through in my life.

2.) On Wednesday…

I got to play with a great group of guys for the New Community service and lead some worship. I’m coming alongside of Rob, who is a worship leader at Kensington, and leading worship with him. It can be weird sometimes jumping in with a band you’ve never played with before, but these guys were so welcoming and inviting. It was such a joy leading with them.

Again, the New Community service is a more “typical” service with worship, message, and communion, whereas the weekend services are more bent towards the skeptic, questioner, and seeker.

3.) Yesterday…

I went to a production meeting where all the service directors, producers, and others meet to get all their details straight for the weekend. Again, there’s a lot to coordinate with music, teaching, sound, video, and other teams between five different campuses, so these meetings get everyone on the same page.

Then I spent the whole afternoon in the church’s studio recording a track with Mike for a Father’s Day video that’s being shot. It’s so fun to be able to spend a whole afternoon being creative.

To top it all off, I’m having some problems with my car and the mechanic just called me back informing me it’d cost me $1300 to fix. I have a feeling my car is on it’s last leg.

So far, so good

As you know, I started my internship earlier this week on Monday. I’ve been telling people that it’s been like drinking from a fire hose. Kensington is a large a church spread over five different campuses. So there is always a lot going on and a lot to coordinate. I can’t go into the itty-bitty details, but here is kind of an overview of what’s been going on.

Today is a day of rehearsals and run-thrus. I’m actually sitting in a tech rehearsal right now for the Saturday service. My responsibilities at the moment include asking a lot of questions and getting sense for how these type of things go. There are so many people included in making these services happen. It’s quite cool to see how the service director gets everyone on the same page.

Yesterday was a day off and a day to catch up. I spent some time in the morning in the church’s studio writing which was really refreshing. I haven’t done that in awhile. The church has a nice space set aside with a ton of instruments and recording rig, so it served as a nice place to get away.

This week has mostly consisted of a lot of meetings and rehearsals. I’m trying to get acquainted with the eb and flow of things. It’s still kind of a work in progress to see what my role will be specifically on a weekly basis since there is always so many different things that the music arts team is involved with.

I also met with the vocal director so she could hear me sing and be able to figure out how she could use my voice for different services. The weekend services are very targeted towards the non-believer, skeptic, seeker, doubter, etc. so they don’t end up doing really any corporate singing, but rather other songs (e.g. Ben Folds, The Who, Brooke Fraser) that serve as a teaching component in the service. The services really incorporate a lot of media and different art forms. For example, I worked with Mike on recording a Sigur Rós-ish instrumental piece to serve as a track with a video the video team put together. This all to say that each service can look really different with different elements and styles of music. On the flip side, the mid-week service is a more typical service with worship, message, and communion. I’ll be doing stuff with this as well.

All in all, it’s been great. I’m working with some really talented and gifted people, and I know that I’m learning a lot, which is a good feeling.

Saddle Up Your Horses

As the great Stephen Curtis Chapman so eloquently put back in the 90s, “Saddle up your horses we’ve got a trail to blaze.”

That probably wasn’t the coolest analogy for my current life experience, although it is true. I loaded my sweet ride of a horse of a car to the roof today and headed off from Marysville, OH to Troy, MI.

I got stuck a bit south of Troy in Detroit with some detours. Not to mention, it seemed like every driver I was behind in Ohio was driving 5 mph below the speed limit. But this was okay because it was a good ride. I like to have the window rolled down to feel the warm, gentle 70-degree air in my face.

I’m staying with my friend Dan Koch’s aunt and uncle, Carol and Lance. Dan goes to Huntington too. They are such stellar people. I can’t wait to get to know them more. They’ve given me free reign on their basement. It’s very spacious and I have a king size bed! Can you believe it? I’m so thankful for their hospitality.

I’ve been able to see the city some and familiarize myself with the essentials like: Kroger, Target, Barnes & Nobles, and most importantly Chipotle. These are all within a couple miles away.

I’m absolutely exhausted from the move. There is something about moving that takes it out of you. Within myself, I definitely feel a bit out there. I think it’s a hitting me a bit more that I’m in a completely different place and don’t really know anyone very well. There’s some excitement to the new experience ahead but new settings always require a time of transition.

I hope to touch base with my mentor tomorrow and get a sense for what the next week might bring. I don’t “officially” start until Monday. For now, I’m just getting settled with my host family and enjoying their company.

Coelho, Rilke, & Manning

I’ve been able to be home for the past couple weeks. I haven’t had a lot of commitments except to help my grandparents with some work around their house, so it’s given me freedom to do some leisure reading.

Right now, as recommended by my friend Justin, I’m currently reading Paulo Coelho’s The Fifth Mountain which is a story based on the biblical prophet Elijah. I’m only about a fourth in, but Coelho has done a really good job of bring to life the struggles of Elijah. It’s fresh.

Secondly, as recommended by my roommate Big Dave, I’m also reading Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke. This is really good. Rilke was a young German poet back at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. Franz Xaver Kappus, who was an aspiring poet, exchanged letter’s with Rilke in hope for some professional critique on his own poems. This is the type of book that is filled with a lot of quotable material. Rilke was a very extraordinary thinker for such a young man (twenties). I think it also resonates with me because Rilke speaks a lot about what it means to be an artist.

You are so young, so before all beginning, and I want to beg you, as much as I can, dear sir, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

Thirdly, I was given Brennan Manning’s The Furious Longing of God as a gift and just finished that. I’ve never read any of Manning’s other books, but I’ve always heard good things. I thought The Furious Longing of God was decent. I would recommend it to those who struggle with the idea that God could love them just as they are (which accounts for virtually all of us) or who’ve been really burned by religiosity and legalism.

His chapter on healing was really good. Manning puts an interesting twist on the topic and defines healing as “a response to a crisis in the life of another person.” In Manning’s view, healing is tied to affirmation. Healing takes place when you and I step into other’s lives and affirm the the beauty and good we see in them. We take a moment to look past their brokenness and sin and affirm the truth of who they are and who they are not.

A shriveled humanity has a shrunken capacity for receiving the rays of God love.

It becomes hard for others to accept the reality of the unconditional love of God when you or I treat others as anything but beloved and cherished by God.

What are you reading these days?

What am I doing?

I’ve created this blog out of an attempt to keep friends and family updated as I’m away on my internship experience at Kensington Community Church in Troy, MI. However, out of fear my grandma or second cousin would read this and be left clueless, I thought it’d be a good idea to actually tell you the gist of what my internship is all about and how it fits into my studies at Huntington University.

I just finished my junior year as a worship leadership major. All ministry majors are encouraged to do a 6.5 month internship with a church or ministry organization the summer after their junior year through the first semester of their senior year. In conjunction to the internship, students have some papers and readings.

The past three years my studies have consisted of core curriculum, bible and religion, theology, ministry, and music classes. I’ve also been involved on campus the last couple years with campus ministries as the coordinator of the worship band for university and student chapel services. For my internship, I’ll be interning with the music director and his team. I got to spend a bit of time with them back in March, and it was a great time.

So the time has come, where I distance myself from the friends and experiences that have become so close and familiar to me these past couple years, and immerse myself in a new, unknown place, with new experiences and relationships, that will drastically shape my life as I know it today. Whew. While exciting, it is a bit scary, but it gives me great peace to know that while the circumstances of life will always be changing, God is steadfast in his love, in his provision, and in his care.

I will be moving up to Michigan at the end of the month. I’ve been blessed to be hosted by one of my friend’s (Dan Koch) aunt and uncle in Troy. My internship will go from June 1 to mid-December. Right now, I am at home in Ohio enjoying the free time to relax and recharge, be with family, and get all those last minute things done.

So here’s the deal…

If you don’t know, I’ve had this website since I was twelve, and I’ve used it for a variety things like storage space, email, and website design. And throughout the years, I’ve heavily avoided hopping on the blog bandwagon full-fledge, because to be honest, it feels like a very potentially narcissistic activity to engage in. I won’t say anything more about that.

Blogging’s evolutionary journey has been a very interesting one over the past several years. In 1999, there were only about 23 blogs. When I did a research paper on blogging back in 2006 of my freshman year, Technorati was reporting that they were tracking over 55.4 million blogs. I can’t imagine what that figure is now.

I don’t know why I shared that information, but here I am, with my newly founded blog, contributing to that large and glorious statistic.

The goal of this blog is pretty simple. It’s not one for narcissism’s sake but rather pragmatism’s sake. I’m about to leave what I know here on campus at Huntington University to go on a 6.5 month internship “far away” from what is familiar in the next few weeks (more on that later). For now, I just want to keep you folks updated on my journey and experience. This blog seems most practical for accomplishing this. And, I partly stole this idea from my friend Brooke who did this when she did her internship in Calcutta, India.

Okay, now that I feel justified in doing this… Until next time…