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What Good is Our Love If We Always Communicate It Wrong?

Tuesday, September 10th, 2013

For some odd reason, my blog post on “Calling BS on Rick Warren’s Quote” is getting more comments and traffic than any other post so far. I haven’t even published half the comments because they are all just links to the original quote in context. Thank you to everyone – I now know the context of the original quote. But that was not the whole point of that quote in the first place. I was dealing with how people are misusing the quote, not with Rick Warren himself.

A lot of the comments just had to be deleted as people tried to prove to me that they really don’t hate anyone by… using hateful language directed at me. Interesting, huh?

Most of all, I think a lot of people are so tied up in proving how much they love gays that they missed the point I was making. First of all, maybe you should wonder why you feel the need to prove you are a great gay-loving person to some random stranger on the Internets that runs a very unnoticed blog? Guilty conscious maybe? Me thinketh some of you doth protest too much. But ultimately, you missed my point if you think that whole post was about whether or not people who say they love really do or not. I didn’t contrast the whole situation as either/or. I called BS on saying that your attitude is being “just disagreeing.” It’s not just that – it is usually more. It may be love at some level, but the hurtful, hateful feelings are there, too.

If not, then where is the hurtful, hateful language coming from? So you say you love gays but use disrespectful stereotyping language for them (like the term “lifestyle”)? Can you see where that just doesn’t add up to many people?

Until we get this as the church, we will continue to be written off as irrelevant by people who don’t see the logic there. Disrespect may not equal hate, but to most people it doesn’t equal love, either. What good is our love if we always communicate it wrong? Or is it really love in the first place if it causes more hurt than we intend?

“But sometimes we have to speak the truth in love” people say.

This is usually translated to “I can say whatever mean things I want as long as I think it is truth and I end the rant with ‘but I love you man’ or something pithy like that.” Usually people use that statement as a way to cancel out the “in love” part with the “speak the truth” part.  ”In love” is used as a modifier in the statement, meaning that you take the truth you want to speak and choose words that modify it to come across as loving. It’s not a “get out of jail free” card, designed so that you can say whatever on earth you want and then tack on “in love” at the end. Of course, that is what many in the church do in my experience… and they whine about it when they get busted for it on Facebook or some random stranger’s blog.

[you can read more posts like this on my blog: Ecclesia Extraneus: Confessions of a Metamodern Christian (ecclesiaextraneus.wordpress.com)]

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Excerpt from “They Shall Know We Are Christians By Our Political Pressure Moves.”

Monday, July 23rd, 2012

A gay man was walking from his house to the neighborhood grocery store, when he was attacked by a group of thugs. They took his clothes and possessions, beat him and went away… leaving him half dead. A preacher happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw that the man was gay, passed by on the other side. A good Christian Mom saw him also and decided to create a movement to boycott the street that let a gay man walk down it. But a homeless man came to where the man was and felt sorry for him. He bandaged his wounds, even putting on some rubbing alcohol he had been saving. Then he put the gay man in his own shopping cart and rolled him to a hotel and took care of him. The next day he took out all the money he had and gave it to the hotel owner. “Look after him,” he said, “and when I return from begging for more money, I will reimburse you for any extra you may have to spend.”

Which of these three do you think was a good Christian to the gay man who fell into the hands of thugs?

The world is full of thugs that want to beat up on all kinds of people – maybe not always physically, but definitely emotionally and socially. Do we want to join the thugs just to get to the chance to “be right”, or do we want to be known for our mercy and compassion?

At one point in history, an expert of religious law was told a story like this one and asked who was the good person in the story.

The expert in religious law replied “The one who had mercy.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

Are we bandaging wounds, or causing more?

(this is an excerpt of a blog post called “They Shall Know We Are Christians By Our Political Pressure Moves.” You can read the rest of this post and all of my other random musings at my Ecclesia Extraneus blog: http://ecclesiaextraneus.wordpress.com)

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The Half-Way Road of Science

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

One of the first things that come to mind when I think of Science is a scene in Star Trek 4 after the crew of the Enterprise has traveled back in time to 1984. The doctor from the future is walking around a hospital and runs into a lady that is there for a kidney dialysis – a cutting edge modern procedure at the time. Dr. McCoy exclaims “My God, what is this, the Dark Ages?” He then hands her a pill that grows a new kidney – something modern science in 1984 said was impossible.

Science is always evolving… meaning that in 100 years we will look back at our knowledge now and laugh at how misguided we were.

So you always have to take Science with a large dose of humility. One of my degrees is in Geology (from a college that teaches evolution if you are curious), so I say that with a large amount of fear on my part. It’s not exactly en vogue to admit to the limitations of Science.

Those that use Science to explain or deny religion will eventually run into many problems. Not that this means we shouldn’t try… it just means we need to acknowledge the limitations and not let those limitations become proof of anything. That would just be bad science. Lack of evidence usually only proves that you lack evidence, not that anything is a fact.

The Bible is clear that it is only through faith that we will find God. This basically means that there is something that will prevent us from finding Him any other way. If we could prove scientifically that God exists, faith would be eliminated. So would a huge chunk of free will – because who could argue with scientific proof? I’m not sure what that road block is – some have speculated that maybe God created barriers in the scientific world to block absolute proof. Seems kind of mean to me. After all, the Creator of the universe would never have anything to fear from us exploring His creation. Personally, I believe God is just so much more complex than human beings that we could just never create anything big enough to prove Him scientifically.

Of course, Christianity is not the only religion like this. Many world religions have similar beliefs that would make God or Truth impossible to find solely through scientific methods.

So how do we find God? Through the cliché “religious experience”? Or something very subjective and open to interpretation like emotions? Scientists sometimes can’t accept this because you can’t quantify these means scientifically. And thus lies the rub of the “Science-only” route. If you can’t lay it on a lab table and dissect it, it can’t be real. But the Bible tells us that you can’t put it on table and dissect it. You have to have a religious experience, a personal revelation of God, in order to know if He is real or not. You have to have faith first, which is kind of backwards if you think about it.

Many scientists will tell you that religious experiences aren’t real because people from all religions experience them and therefore they are just human experiences. That is a weird idea to take, especially since I have never heard of a dog claiming to have had a religious experience. Therefore, by default all religious experiences ARE human experiences because we only know of humans that have had them.

Many people like to discount religious experiences because people from all religions have them. If non-Christians can have a religious experience, then that means Christianity is false and probably also all religions. God would only speak to members of His real religion, so the fact that all religions have some kind of hard-to-explain “religious experience” component proves they are all false. But the Bible describes a few stories where non-Christians and non-Israelites had genuine religious experiences, like in the story of Balaam & the Angel. So the Bible clearly explains that God speaks to anyone regardless of whether they picked the one “right” religion to follow.

Of course, the fact that we can’t prove or disprove God with Science is scary to some, and reason to hate Science for others. I would suggest to take neither path, but to explore all avenues to finding truth. Science, truth, emotion, and religious experience are all part of the picture and none are to be feared. But none should be left out, either… or your picture will be incomplete.

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Beggars, Bread, and Sketches

Monday, May 23rd, 2011

I had something in mind that I was going to write for this issue’s column, but then the little one gave us an early wake-up call this morning and my mind went blank. And then I read Steve’s great column and decided to do something different.

Below is a sketch that illustrates what Steve is talking about. It was meant to be turned in to an actual full blown piece of art work, but time has hindered that so far. But sometimes the rough sketches are the best. The imperfections seem real to us, just like the perfection of CG graphics seem so unreal at times.


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Corporate Greed Is Killing Music

Saturday, January 1st, 2011

Some people ask me why I say “corporate greed is killing music.” What about people that are stealing music? Or even those that do buy music but are too lazy to check out anything other than what the corporations are pushing on them? Or couldn’t the blame be places on the musicians and bands that just dial in a performance and don’t push themselves creatively?

Well, maybe the truth of the matter is that “lazy fans (or musicians) are killing music” really just doesn’t sound as catchy on a t-shirt. But for me, I don’t think these factors are killing music. They are certainly ruining it in some cases, but not killing it. We have always had some fans that don’t want to think and some musicians that are lazy – even back when the music industry was booming. But then again – we also had corporate greed. So what is different now?

The difference is that now fans and musicians that do care can find ways around the corporate greed – both legally and illegally. The digital revolution has leveled the playing field a lot. The corporations could have jumped in early and taken advantage of the changes – but they still would have lost some money. In the long run, they would have still stayed afloat, but that short term loss was just too much for them. So they went the greedy route and fought the change.

The reason this is important is that we still need a national distribution network for people to hear and obtain music (legally). The corporations provide that. Without that, there would be no way for any bands to go on national tours – and almost all bands would just be local acts trying to make a living off the same fans every week. In other words, there would probably be no professional music stars.

There would probably be no music acts at the half time show during the Super Bowl either. You need someone famous to do that, and without the national distribution that labels afford, there would be no stars.

But those corporations are also ripping off their bands. So you see why I pin the problem on the corporations. They could have changed for the better, maybe suffered a bit, but ultimately came out on top with everyone happy and new, sustainable business model.

But they chose the path of greed.

(this article was also published in the January 2011 issue)

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Giving Both Sides a Fair Shake in a Documentary

Friday, October 1st, 2010

I will be the first to admit that I am not a fan of the modern day documentary. I am one of those people that believe in giving everyone a fair shot, even when you are getting across your agenda. Agendas happen all the time – it is not like I expect people to not have them. But if you want me to listen to yours, at least show me that you have honestly and fairly considered all sides.

That being said, I think there are still reasons for watching documentaries if they contain some historical value. David di Sabatino’s documentaries fall in to that category. I feel that he really didn’t give everyone in his films a fair shake, but he did at least give some good historical information to make you think.

Here is what I mean by giving everyone a fair shake. Lonnie Frisbee is painted as a misunderstood person that was just treated badly by the leaders around him. His leaders should have known better. But the hard thing is, he was a leader, too. I wonder why the same grace that was extended to Lonnie wasn’t also extended to John Wimber or Chuck Smith? Lonnie’s mistakes and lies were glossed over with a kind of “well, he shouldn’t have done that, but he was only human so it was okay” kind of attitude. Wimber and Smith were human, too – and should be given the same benefit of the doubt as Lonnie. But they are pretty heavily slammed. And unfairly too – I have worked with several Vineyard churches, and there has never been a cover-up of Lonnie’s involvement (like the documentary implies). In fact, a friend of mine wanted me to read a book that Vineyard wrote on their history. I asked if Frisbee was in there, and he stated that there was a whole chapter on Lonnie, as well as chapters on many other mistakes the Vineyard made through the years. I’m sorry if John Wimber failed to mention Frisbee at the right time back in the day. People are just like that – it is kind of like when people speak of an ex-wife. They usually don’t say a name, just “My Ex.” When you are still hurt by something that is just the way you act. It is not some cover-up conspiracy.

The troubles continued when I watched the Larry Norman documentary. I realize that there are five people out there that still worship Norman and won’t admit to his problems, but I think the rest of the world knows all about it. Shoot – most of the various accusations against Norman were well-known even back in the early 1990’s when I first got in to Christian music. Once again, I still don’t get why Norman was not extended the same grace that Frisbee was – both were leaders that hurt people by their actions. Both of them had victims. Di Sabatino claims that Norman still had “victims that deserved to have their side heard.” But yet he only brings up the issues that have been well known for over a decade. I just don’t get that. Not that I think this should have stopped the documentary – I just think he is not applying the same standard to both people. Frisbee also had victims – and was a victim himself (as Norman was probably also, since all musicians were back them).

When I brought these issues up with Di Sabatino, he accused me of being a Norman fanatic. Strange, because I honestly don’t even like Norman’s music. I recognize the place it has in music history, but I just never got into it. I only owned one Norman cassette a long time ago. That has really been Di Sabatino’s response to any critics – you are just a “Norman fanatic.” I guess the small number of Norman fanatics out there must be really loud – because I can never find any of them and Di Sabatino thinks they are everywhere.

Which leads to another confusing issue for me – he says he still stands behind what he said, just not how he said it. Still stands behind accusing a bunch of Larry Norman critics and haters of being Larry Norman fanatics just because they criticized his films? Odd, again.

But I write all of this just because I am one of many that have clashed with Di Sabatino publicly. Many that have clashed with him have written him off completely, even created websites aimed at exposing him. After reading the interview in this issue, I have to say that I am seeing signs of hope. The brash, egotistical filmmaker that I once saw is showing signs of softening his “I am always right” edge. So there is hope. I like what I read, so I will continue to follow his filmmaking endeavors.

But I still want to see a bit more grace going all ways and not just towards one side.

(this article was also published in the October 2010 issue)

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Don’t Let Idiots Influence Your Beliefs on Important Matters

Thursday, July 1st, 2010

I was hanging out with some friends recently when the topic drifted to deeper religious subjects. Two people got in a little back and forth about a certain topic. It started with one of them saying “well, I used to believe that, but now I have come to the revelation that…” After they went around a few times, I pointed out to them that they were actually saying basically the same thing and disagreeing over semantics.

At some point in life, most people get to a point where they re-shape their beliefs on something. This typically happens in the “twenty-somethings” age, but could happen later or earlier depending on how much people evaluate themselves. When I was in my 20s, I quite often said “I used to think that way, but…”

Then I got into my late thirty’s and realized that I had been through a good five or six different “I used to think this, but…” on most topics. It dawned on me that our beliefs on many things are constantly evolving, so we should never look down on someone that thinks something we have moved on from. You never know if you might come back to that same belief once you figure out how silly your current one is.

Add to this that you can pretty much logically support any belief in the world, depending on what information you decide is not truth.

The article on Ojo Taylor is an example of this. He states that there is not archeological evidence for the Exodus. But even a simple Google search will turn up thousands of examples of what people claim is archaeological evidence. Some of them sound crazy. But I also remember reading a very scholarly article by an Atheist detailing archeological evidence for many Biblical events, including the Exodus and Noah’s flood. Some people say it is there, others say it isn’t – you just have to weigh the two opinions and decide which one you think is accurate. Ojo came to one conclusion on that, one that I disagree with. But that is his choice.

There are other issues too – like certain epistles being forgeries for example – that are controversial. There is evidence for both sides. I tend to disregard anyone that automatically labels the other side as “stupid” or “ignorant.” That’s never the case – they just came to a different conclusion than you. The whole Creationism vs. Evolution debate is one of those that are really hard to follow, because most people on both sides disrespect the other. There is scientific evidence for both sides on that one – I have seen evidence for and against Creationism and evidence for and against Evolution with my own eyes. The only people I have found worth listening to in this particular debate are those that respect the scientific credibility of the other side, even if they disagree with the interpretation of the evidence.

Because really, that is all it comes down to is interpretation of evidence. But I would also say to not let the bad examples on either side of an issue influence your decision. Either the Exodus did happen or it didn’t. But don’t decide that it didn’t happen because some Christian was a jerk to you about something in the past.

The same goes for your beliefs about God. If there is a God, and if He is real – then how some jerk hypocritical Christian treats you is not going to change that fact. Don’t let idiots influence your beliefs on such important matters. Author Anne Rice is a famous example of this recently. She had this to say:

“Gandhi famously said: ‘I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.’ When does a word (Christian) become unusable? When does it become so burdened with history and horror that it cannot be evoked without destructive controversy?”

Words only become unusable when we let circumstances control us, instead of us controlling circumstances. “Love” is a word that has been cheapened a million more times so than “Christian” by modern media, so much more so burdened by history and horror… but do we stop using it because others have misused it so badly?

(this article was also published in the July 2010 issue)

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Innovative Changes In The Music Industry

Friday, April 2nd, 2010

So the music industry is dying, MySpace is dying… every where we look the opportunities for musicians are drying up. Or is it that just the big music labels aren’t adapting fast enough to the changing times? Maybe their greed is finally getting the best of them?

No matter what happens in the changing tides of the music scene, I think that bands and musicians themselves need to be the innovators – especially in how they reach their fans. We’re starting to see many bands do just that, of course – but the more that jump on the innovation band wagon, then the faster we can get to the new future of the music industry.

Several bands are trying some inventive methods. One such band is SLIDE. I don’t really know if there is a way to describe their method, or a good term that fits it. But the idea is pretty simple: record songs one at a time, release them through iTunes as they are recorded, add a few remixes to make it interesting, rinse, and repeat. When they get enough songs out there, they will release a CD. Instead of “pay-as-you-go” plan, this sounds like a “finance-an-album-as-you-go” plan. I can’t speak for how they afford it, or how much money they make towards the overall cost of recording, but they are still moving forward, gaining momentum all the way.

Another innovative method is the open source record as described by Temple Foundry Mediaworks. From the sounds of it, it still seems like this will be experimental for now. My head is swirling with many questions about how the details will work out, but it is still an interesting model to follow.

The Internet (for now, at least) is still a good source to connect with fans. If your band doesn’t have a FaceBook page yet – get with the times. MySpace is turning into a ghetto fast.
Other sites have some good ideas, too. I really like what BandCamp.com is doing – you can sell albums or songs in full quality format. This is a great way to get albums out there, especially ones that might not be popular enough to justify a full CD pressing (obscure re-issue, fan club type albums, or unreleased albums that never got finished).

But I have to wonder if the dream of being a full-time working musician, making enough to live, is gone forever. Will music become a part-time hobby for most? If you can get enough people to come out and watch your shows, maybe you can become a full-time musician. But how can that happen? We used to know who the hot bands were by listening to the radio and watching MTV. Those avenues are dying. What will be the radio charts and MTV top video countdowns of the future? I am all for bands being able to do open source records and online downloads, as long as there is a way for bands to tell how popular they are. They need to know if they need to book the stadium tour or the dive-bar tour after all.

This last issue is really the missing piece. Music distribution is pretty irrelevant in the Internet age. People can find the music if they want to buy it. The issue now is how do bands know how popular they are? Where do you turn to find out what people with your same tastes are listening to? Discussion forums are dying, and Facebook doesn’t quite (yet at least) rate music popularity. That is one piece that we are beginning to miss… but are we aware of what we are missing?

(this article was also published in the April 2010 issue)

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How Bad Is The Illegal Music Downloading Business?

Thursday, October 1st, 2009

Did you hear the recent news about illegal down-loaders? Those shady, evil, conniving pre-teens that are destroying the music world as we know it are buying the most legal music. The audacity of those… a… what?

I had to have read that wrong. Let me see… what does it say exactly? “The people who do the most illegal downloading also buy the most music.”

Maybe I should put down stones before casting them and all that…

Shocking as it may seem to those that buy the music industry lines, these findings don’t really shock anyone that knows someone who downloads illegally. You see, illegal downloading has never been about getting something for free (to most). It has been about finally getting quality control back in a system that has always made big bucks on consumer ignorance.

Let’s face it – how many albums do you have that you would have never bought if you could have listened to it first? The music industry has made big bucks from pushing artists to finish before they have good songs, or just putting a mediocre band in the studio to record two hit songs and bunch of filler, or putting good albums on cheap quality mediums that will scratch, break, or go obsolete within a few years (forcing consumers to re-purchase their entire music collection). They have always counted on you not knowing what you are buying. You are supposed to hear the one good song on the radio and rush out and buy the whole album – filler junk and all. Then you are supposed to play that one song to death until your record scratches, your tape breaks, or your CD melts on your dash and you are forced to buy a new one.

Oh, and of course they have a way to get more money off of the bands that can produce an entire albums worth of good songs. They just “invent” an entirely new format for delivering music every few years, forcing you to buy an upgrade… at full price. Remember when they tried to get those mini-discs to catch on, and then Gold discs, and then the super discs, or whatever all of those “CD-upgrades” were called? All of those formats tanked – because people were fed up with the constant upgrade.

Did you know the same is also pretty true for the movie piracy business? Most pirated movies come from someone sitting in the back of the theater with a handheld camera. The quality is pretty horrible. But people download them so that they can see the movie first before deciding to go to the movie theatre to watch it.

Of course, the unfortunate side effect of this for the smaller labels and independent bands is that people expect to be able to preview music, but have a harder time finding the less popular artists. If they don’t preview it, they don’t buy it. So the truth be told, the mp3 revolution is hurting the “little people” in the business. The only way to change this side effect would be to change the system. But the big labels don’t want to do that, because it would even the playing field. I fully believe that this is the main reason why big companies have been reluctant to embrace the mp3 revolution.

They are afraid of their filler junk being on a level playing field with all the quality little guys and girls out there.

(this article was also published in the December 2009 issue)

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Close Encounters of the Prosperity Kind

Saturday, August 1st, 2009

I remember about two years ago when my wife and I were looking for a new church in our area. Most of the churches we went to were great churches – just not for us. But there was one that really stuck out to us. We were tricked in to visiting one of those Prosperity Gospel “if you have faith, you’ll be rich” kind of places.

You see, I say tricked because I would never willingly set foot in any place that equates faith with the thickness of my wallet. But a friend of ours told us she used to go to a church that was “just like” the church we were looking for. I need to go back and check this friend’s sanity. Just like? I think not.
The visit started out innocently enough. Well, as innocent as you can feel walking into a building that makes Jerry Jones’ new mother ship (aka “Cowboys Stadium”) down the road look humble in comparison. I was wondering how many 747s you could fit in the foyer when were greeted by a nice lady and swept away to the visitor’s desk.

After getting a nice, slick stack of pamphlets, we were whisked away for the free “tour of the grounds.” I was quickly taken aback by the large neon signs pointing out everything along the massive foyer. Coffee this way, restrooms here, heated baptismal pool (complete with fancy fountain) over there, childcare around the corner, etc. I’m still not sure why they needed a neon sign pointing to a another large sign 20 feet away that both read “Coffee Shop,” but I found out later how seriously they took their coffee. I took one look at the prices in the coffee shop and decided to save money by going to Starbucks.

I’m no expert at neon signs, but the last time I did look in to buying one (don’t ask), it was hundreds of dollars for a small one. Kind of depressing that someone’s entire tithe for the year went into that overkill of a sign that basically only pointed the way to the local altar of Java.Next stop was the sanctuary and the start of the service. I don’t think I have ever been inside of a meeting hall so large before. The whole service wigged out my wife – she had never been to a Pentecostal-style service before. She wondered why the music kept playing while the pastor was up speaking. I was just marveling at the fact that this dude’s suit cost more money than every piece of clothing I had ever bought combined. Not the kind of leader I can look up too.

As soon as the service was over, we tried to make our way to the front door. Try being the key word. I guess we left the wrong exit door. There were so many of them after all. Apparently, our escape trajectory was at a perpendicular angel to the path to the coffee store. Talk about swimming against a human ocean! It was like we in that scene from The Matrix where Neo and Morpheus are walking against the flow of all the people is suits, and Neo is getting knocked all over the place. Except at least Neo was in a program that was out to kill him. We had it even worse – coming between people and the object of their devotion! Talk about opposition in the spirit!

The moral of this story? A Prosperity Gospel Fool and their money are soon parted. That and we are glad we found a good church the next week.

(this article was also published in the August 2009 issue)

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