the church geek

I’ve been tagged to play along on this new Presbymeme. So here it goes:

1) What is your favorite faith-based hymn, song or chorus.

That’s a toughie, especially since a lot of people have already said “Come Thou Font of Every Blessing” which I do love dearly. BTW, have you heard Sufjan Stevens version? it’s simple and absolutely beautiful. The one hymn though that I think I could sing every Sunday without tiring is “For the Beauty of the Earth.”

2) What was the context, content and/or topic of the last sermon that truly touched, convicted, inspired, challenged, comforted and/or otherwise moved you?

I was inspired by Joan Gray’s sermon during the opening worship at this year’s General Assembly about our call to love others as Christ as loved us. I was particularly moved by her story about the member of her congregation, who was dying of cancer, looking her in the eye as she was preparing to leave for vacation and saying “Promise me one thing: That you won’t come back early to do my funeral.”

3) If you could have all Presbyterians read just one of your previous posts, what would it be and why?

I honestly don’t come up with a lot of original stuff on my blog. However, I think the one post I’d want the PC(USA) to read is this one: The Mission and the Institution.

4) What are three PC(USA) flavored blogs you read on a regular basis?

I have lots of Presbyterian blogs in my Google Reader and I seem to keep adding more, but the three blogs that I most look forward to reading are:

Tribal Church - I resonate a lot with Carol and her husband Brian’s faith journey, as in some ways it’s similar to my own. Plus Carol is one prolific and thoughtful blogger on issues of ministry.

A Church for Starving Artists - Jan’ s reflections and thoughts on church and ministry in a post-denominational world are groundbreaking. More pastors, elders, and congregations, need to hear and be challenged by her voice.

The GA Junkie - How can you not love a blog with that name? Steve provides insightful and balanced analysis of issues not only in the PC(USA) but of other reformed denominations as well.

5) If the PC(USA) were a movie, what would it be and why?

Oh, I don’t know, for some reason the one that comes to mind is “The Savages.” It’s about a brother and sister who are forced to deal with their estranged and dying father. On my most cynical, least hopeful days sometimes I think that is the situation of our denomination.

Tagged: Since the whole Presby world seems to have already been tagged on this one, if you’ve read this and haven’t played along already, I say “Tag, you’re it.”

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This is the fifth sermon in a six part sermon series on discipleship. I preached this on July 20th. The text was Acts 13: 1-5

People always seem a little bit surprised when they get in our car and discover that we have not just one but several Johnny Cash CDs. They are even more surprised when they find out that Johnny is one of my all time favorite musical artists.

Now some of you here might be able to think back to Johnny’s early stuff. Classics like Ring of Fire, I Walk the Line, and Men in Black. While that old stuff is great, where Johnny really excels is in the recordings he made in the last couple of years of his life.

I’m not kidding when I say that these are some of the best albums of any recording artist out there. In his old age, Johnny found a way of connecting to the reality of life, belting out some of the most emotional and spiritual recordings out there.

One of my favorite songs is on Johnny’s album called American III. It’s called Nobody and instead of trying to sing it to and doing a really bad impression of Johnny Cash, I’m gonna play a bit of it here for you: (Click here for the song.)

Lori will tell you that I always break a smile and sing along, every time I hear that one line:

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One of the greatest bands from the eighties, Journey, is back with new frontman, Arnel Pineda, from the Philippines. Pineda’s voice is eerily reminiscent of Steve Perry, one of the greatest rock voices ever. Pineda’s story can be found here. (H/T: Smart Pastor.)

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1.) I just got around to listening to this November 2007 Nick and Josh Podcast interview with Michael Dowd author of Thank God for Evolution! Dowd, a self-described evangelical Christian, not only believes that faith and science are compatible, he believes that evolutionary science can inform and transform our faith. He believes it so much that he is even offering free copies of his book which you can download from his website.

2.) Fellow Presbyterian Minister, Shawn Coons, writes of a literal real world experience of “as we forgive our debtors.” I’ve not yet tried the whole Kiva Loan thing yet, but it sounds like a wonderful way to do some real good with a small amount of money.

3.) Over the past week, Theolog has had two interesting posts. The first is on the role of Children’s Sermons in our worship services. There are lots of great comments with this post. The second is on misinformation related to Barak Obama and the effect it has had on his home church Trinity UCC in Chicago.

4.) For your viewing pleasure, here are two lovely photos I’ve enjoyed this past week: #1 and #2

5.) U2 is coming in concert to a theater near you! This is likely as close as I’ll ever come to experiencing one of my all time favorite bands in concert. The best part? It’s in 3D.

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One of my favorite Christian artists, Sarah Masen, has returned. I discovered Sarah in the very late 90s but then she disappeared off the face of the earth (I assume to focus on raising her children.) Well, here she is singing a song called A Dream in My Dream:

Sarah Masen – A Dream In My Dream

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Since Sunday is the start of Advent and we’re finally getting into the Christmas spirit in the Wunder-Bonewald household, I thought I’d offer up my essential listening for Christmas.

This album (actually 5 set CD collection) by Sufjan Stevens has sky-rocketed to the top of my list of favorite Christmas albums. Sufjan works his musical magic with a collection of fresh, creative renditions of classic sacred carols combined with a number of his own original offerings. Christmas albums can be sappy and schmaltzy, but this album never is. Instead it evokes the feeling of warmth and love that one feels when family and friends gather around the piano and fireplace to sing together the songs of the season.

I’m not normally a big flute fan, but James Galway’s album, Christmas Carol, has found its way into my heart. I’ve had this album for about ten years, and it never fails to move me into the wonder and celebration that Christmas truly is. This album was the first to introduce me to what has become perhaps my favorite Christmas carol, “Jesus Christ the Apple Tree.”

As far as sacred Christmas music goes, my all time favorite is Sing We Christmas from the a capella choir Chanticleer. The vocals of this twelve man group are crisp and clear. They grab you right from the beginning with a glorious rendition of another of my favorite carols, Es ist ein Ros entsprungen (Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming) and they keep you spell bound through the course of this wonderful album. For many years, this and Galway’s album were about all I had in my Christmas collection and to be honest I didn’t feel as if I needed much more than that!

The Vince Guaraldi Jazz Trio is simply brilliant in this original score from A Charlie Brown Christmas. If you love good jazz and you love Christmas then this is the one album you must absolutely own, but then if you love those two things I’m sure I didn’t have to tell you that!

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I was reminded that yesterday marked the 10th Anniversary of the death of Rich Mullins. A special thanks to Mark over at Jesus Manifesto for the reminder and for an opportunity to share my memories.

He also points to a good article on Rich Mullins commemorating his life and death at Relevant Magazine. Perhaps more than any other popular Christian figure, Rich Mullins was truly a hero in the faith for me.

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So, this morning in confirmation, I asked my students what they thought they were going to get for Christmas, to which one of them responded, “an I-Pod.” On a lark I asked “So, who’s your favorite musical artist?” thinking of course that I’d once again proven as ‘un-cool’ having never heard of them before.

This ninth grader responded “Sufjan Stevens.” I just about flipped, as I’ve been listening to Sufjan’s Christmas music for the last couple of weeks!

It was a beautiful moment.

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Sufjan Stevens is my new musical hero. You can hear audio streams of his 5-box Christmas CD set here. This is great stuff!!!

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In response to my earlier post about Contemporary Christian Music and its inability to capture the complexity and reality of life, a friend of mine reminded me of an article that was published about a year or so ago in Harper’s magazine regarding Ted Haggard and New Life Church.

The author analyzing the music that is sung at New Life Church writes the following:

There are no sad songs in a megachurch, and there are no angry songs. There are songs about desperation, but none about despair; songs convey longing only if it has already been fulfilled.

I wonder what song the folks at New Life, and especially their fallen pastor, Ted Haggard, are singing now?

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Over the years, I’ve fluctuated in the amount of time I’ve spent listening to Contemporary Christian Music.

At times there have been some artists I’ve loved a lot: In college I went through a Michael Card faze. In more recent years my favorite CCM artist was Rich Mullins, and I was deeply saddened by his tragic death a few years back.

Mostly I detest the format of Christian Radio, and I’ve been turned off by the “Positive Music for a Negative World” rhetoric which communicates to me “Christians shouldn’t really care too much about what happens in the world.”

I’ve not listened to much CCM over the past three or four years, partly because I had tired of music that didn’t take the pain in the world reality of life seriously enough. But today, I happened to turn on one of our local CCM radio stations and heard a wonderful song by Natalie Grant titled “Held.” The lyrics are gut wrenchingly honest about the struggle of life, and the chorus of the song says:

I wish I had heard this song before I did my sermon series on the Psalms. Her song is a perfect modern day example of a psalm of lament. Other songs I’ve heard in recent days from Third Day (Cry Out to Jesus) and Casting Crowns (Praise You in This Storm) indicate what I think is a positive turn to songs with deeper honesty before God about the hard stuff of life.

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Interesting discussion over at Adam Walker Cleaveland’s blog, pomomusings, about ‘Jesus is my lover’ type worship songs. In moderation, I generally like a fair number of the newer contemporary worship songs, but I agree; there are just some places that these songs should not go.

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Does anyone know who wrote this famous saying, “When you sing, you’re praying twice?” I was originally lead to believe that it was attributed to Martin Luther, but recently I’ve also seen it attributed to both St. Agustine and St. Basil. Does anyone have authoritative knowledge about the author of this famous quote?

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Sure wish I was at the NO Jazz & Heritage Festival this weekend. I could use a little fix of some good New Orleans music and some Crawfish Monica. At least I can catch some of the tunes at WWOZ.

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By the way, regarding my previous post below on music: For valentine’s day, Lori and I picked up some new music. We purchased Alison Krauss’ Award winning album “Lonely Runs Both Ways.” It is excellent.

As Mardi Gras season is now in full swing and because hundreds of thousands of New Orleanians remain displaced from their own homes (I just got an e-mail today from a friend who finally returned to her home) I STRONGLY recommend the album New Orleans: A Benefit Album for the Gulf Coast. There of course are other great reasons to buy this album like:

1. Strong contributions from many Louisiana music legends like Allen Toussaint, Dr. John, BeauSoliel, Irma Thomas, and more.
2. An album that evokes the mood of this great city; it’s heartache and sorrow as well as its triumphant spirit that rises above.
3. Liner notes written by Nick Spitzer (producer and host or NPR’s music show American Routes.) Both Nick’s radio show and his own family were displaced by Katrina.
4. Proceeds going to support Habitat for Humanity and their ministry to re-build homes.

If you want a feel for New Orleans music while supporting a good cause, I don’t see any way that you could go wrong with this album. I’m sure I’ll be listening to it for a long time coming.

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