I had a little extra time at the end of my recording session last night, so I had a little fun with this.
For more beautiful music, check out Then Sings My Soul Saturday every Saturday hosted by Amy at Signs, Miracles and Wonders.
four minutes with God: Philippians 4:8
a Quote:
“An intellectual is one who loves ideas, is dedicated to clarifying them, developing them, criticizing them, turning them over and over, seeing their implications, stacking them atop one another, arranging them, sitting silent while new ideas pop up and old ones seem to rearrange themselves, playing with them, punning with their terminology, laughing at them, watching them clash, picking up the pieces starting over, judging them, withholding judgment about them, changing them, bringing them into contact with their counterparts in other systems of thought . . . suiting them for service in workaday life. A Christian intellectual is all of the above to the glory of God.”
and
“…the true intellectual occasionally sees some things, makes true observations and has insights that few, if any before him have seen or had. If there is any danger in this, it is not in having a one-track mind, but in having a mind with so many tracks that it either arrives at many places at the same time or it never gets out of the station.” (emphasis added)
(from Habits of the Mind: Intellectual Life as a Christian Calling
my Prayer:
Intellectual? That sounds so much better than “I just over think everything,” which we both know I have a tendency to do, Lord. Sometimes my head is filled with so many thoughts and ideas, I can’t focus. Sometimes I weigh alternatives to the point of inaction. So frustrating.
Even so, thank you for my love of reading and learning and thinking. And thank you for my limitations, both real and self-perceived. They keep me grounded and authentic. It’s so easy for education and knowledge to displace my trust in – and dependence on – YOU, especially in times of confusion or when circumstances seem . . . irrational.
Thank you for every day that I wake up with more knowledge and understanding than I had the day before. At the same time, thank you for making it crystal clear to me that – compared to all that is possible to know and understand in this world – I know and understand about as much as can be contained within grain of sand.
Thank you for the intricate details in this world, from the greatest wonders to the tiniest. That you are evident in the awesome beauty of the Grand Canyon as well as in the first breath of a newborn infant is just a peek at your perfect plan and limitless power. Every creation is filled with opportunities for discovery, every problem is an opportunity for ingenuity,
Through your power and grace and mercy, please help me to learn from my mistakes. Please help me to make different and better decisions based on what I’ve learned. Please bless me with insights and ideas and imagination, even if they sometimes overwhelm me. I want all that I am and think and feel to lead me to choices that place me in the center of your will. For your glory.
the Word:
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”
Philippians 4:8
the lyric:
“With all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind, with all the strength that I can find. Take my time here on this earth and let it glorify all that You are worth. For I am nothing, I am nothing without You ”
from Nothing Without You (youtube link) by Bebo Norman
and if you have an extra 3:33 minutes…
This was dual published on my Pragmatic Communion blog.
(Christian brain image from wallpaper4god.com)
Friday Funnies: hand sanitizer at church and Christianeze.
Need a few more chuckles today? Check out Friday Funnies hosted by Homesteaders Heart!
If you’ve got time to hang out for a few minutes, check out what else makes me laugh: Pragmatic Compendium’s “laugh!” category.
note to self: STOP IT.
For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.
2 Timothy 1:7
I have a love/hate relationship with a certain praise team song I lead. I actually love the song. I just hate the very first note of the first verse. Or maybe it just hates me. The latter seems unlikely, I know.
The last time I sang this song, the instruments played the intro, got right up to the first verse and …
I didn’t have it.
I looked at the worship leader at the moment I was supposed to sing and shook my head. He started the song and turned it over after the first line.
When I talked to him later he said, “you’re just over thinking it.”
I tend to do that.
Just an hour earlier, I had walked into the music room for the pre-service rehearsal and the worship leader and the drummer were both there. I listened to them play and after a few minutes I recognized the guitar intro to Mighty to Save. The drummer recognized it and fell in. I absentmindedly came in on the right note. Fell in is more like it. I didn’t even try. Wasn’t even thinking about it.
simple.
It hadn’t always been simple. When I first learned the lead to Mighty to Save, I bought the Laura Story version, with the piano intro. Then I came to rehearsal and we didn’t have a pianist. We did have two guitars that day. And unfortunately, they each had chord charts in two different keys. I was standing closest to the guy with the wrong chart. I came on on the wrong note, but it fit, until midway into the verse, then it was glaringly obvious I was off.
Let the season of doubt begin.
After that, I had no confidence that I could come in on the right note. How could I have started on the wrong note and not even realized it? What if I did it again? How do I recover the song if I come in on the wrong note during worship? The music director offered to play my note on the flute for me. It got to the point where I believed I couldn’t do it without her.
I hated that.
I was determined to break my need for this crutch. I bought the Hillsong version of the song, with the guitar intro. I completely stopped listening to the piano version, even going to the extreme of turning off the radio if it began playing.
FINALLY.
I was able to begin on the correct note without the flute playing it in the background. I led the song multiple times over the next few months without a problem.
So what was different about the last time I sang it?
the piano.
After I came in so effortlessly at the beginning of the pre-service rehearsal, we added keyboard to the intro and rehearsed it again after everyone else had gotten there.
I couldn’t find the note. Actually, I have no idea if I could or couldn’t find the note, because I didn’t try. I just said, “I don’t have it.”
Season Two. The doubt was back. I wimped out during the rehearsal, so you know what happened when it came time to start the song during worship, I froze up. Chickened out. wimped.
Will I ever be able to start this song on the right note if I hear a piano? I don’t know. But I won’t ever know if I don’t try.
So the wimping out for fear of getting it wrong? I’m going to STOP IT.
Wimping out for fear of getting it wrong . . .
I’m betting there’s a lot more I wimp on than that one little note.
“Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.”
Winston Churchill
need some “sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, spending too much time on the internet” medicine.
PinkGirl did the writing on the sign in sheet at her school for me so I wouldn’t spread germs:
Date: 4/18
Time: 9:01 (school started at 8am)
Reason: “Mom is sick”
Disapproving look from temp worker at the front desk.
Me: “Be nice or I’ll hug you.” (to myself)
Doc: “When did this start?”
Me: Thursday night. Been living on Sudafed, Mucinex & leftover hydrocodone.”
Doc, laughing/shaking head: “You’re not supposed to tell me that.”
A few minutes later: “You need a shot. You’re wheezing.”
Today, I love that steroid shot more than coffee. not kidding.
Lord, thank you for my doctor. Thank you for that relationship. You sent me to him so long ago that I forget to appreciate that blessing. Thank you for all the free and affordable medicine – and for the steroid shot.
For the next few days, the acronym “LOL” will be replaced with “COL” because lately, the first doesn’t come without the second.
PinkGirl: Mom, what does “COL” mean?
Me: Coughing Out Loud, because when I laugh, I start coughing.
PinkGirl: “You should just say LOL.”
Me: “Yesterday you told me I was too OLD to use LOL.”
PinkGirl: “Well, old people can use it in private.”
Me: “How old does someone have to be before they should only use LOL in private?”
PinkGirl: “29.”
what the heck? I took some of the samples my doctor gave me for symptoms and within the hour I felt like a complete space cadet. The decongestant was phenylephrine. I usually take pseudoephedrine. I may be wrong & my symptoms were the cause of the lightheadedness, so I’m going to take the next dose – with supervision.
(I really, really needed a decongestant. The effects of the sauna wore off too fast and my neti pot wasn’t even working. Benadryl is an antihistamine containing diphenhydramine – which is also the main ingredient in TylenolPM, Nytol, Sominex…KNOCKS me out. TylenolPM dosage says take two, I can never handle more than half of ONE. I was taking Mucinex for the chest congestion.)
Lord, thank you for this day of rest. Please help me to get better so I can get back to “real” life.
I changed my mind. FirstHusband says I shouldn’t take any more phenylephrine. He said we had a phone conversation earlier today and I was really “out of it.” (I think I remember talking to him…)
Nobody called me today and asked me to volunteer for anything did they?
Lord, even in my tiredness and with all these nasty germs, please show me how I can serve you today.
PinkGirl: “MOM! The duck came SO close to me this time!”
Me: “Did you feed it?”
PinkGirl: “Yeh, cat food.”
Me: “wait. have you been throwing cat food in the back yard?”
PinkGirl: “yeh”
Me: “For how long?”
PinkGirl: “a week. maybe two.”
NOW I know what the raccoons are digging for and eating every night.
okay, I have a new game for the Easter Bunny Cake blog post of 2009.
Will it beat its own record?
The highest number of views it got in a single day was 3,709 on April 3, 2010, which was ONE day before Easter last year. Today it got 2,135 views.
eBay sent me a “Happy Anniversary” email today. Eleven years and they can’t spare a coupon code? At the very least they could have made it fun and included the item titles of the very first things I bought and sold.
Later…Obviously, I don’t watch TV when I’m sick. I hang out on the internet and search my email archive file for my very first eBay auction win: A Mr. Potato Head Voice Changing Recorder. eh. big whoop.
My daughter felt compelled to show me this video today:
Hey JC, JC won’t you smile at me die for me?
I have musical traditions.
Our family has to listen to Nat King Cole sing “the chestnut song
Satchmo has to sing What A Wonderful World
and on Palm Sunday, I have to listen to Hosanna
I was introduced the Jesus Christ Superstar at 15, when my chorus teacher trusted me with my very first solo. It was “I Don’t Know How To Love Him
I had absolutely no idea what I was singing about.
Flash forward . . . a few years. It’s never been easier to listen to this song – now I get to WATCH it too. And this year, I noticed something I never caught when I listened to the audio recordings. If I ever noticed it while watching before, I flippantly attributed it to a video glitch, although seeing it now, I wonder how I ever made that mistake.
Watch the 10 seconds that begin around 2:29 minute mark.
four minutes with God: 1 Kings 19:10-15
a Quote:
“Sometimes we experience a terrible dryness in our spiritual lives. We feel no desire to pray, don’t experience God’s presence, get bored with worship services, and even think that everything we ever believed about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is little more than a childhood fairy tale.
Then it is important to realize that most of these feelings and thoughts are just feelings and thoughts, and that the Spirit of God dwells beyond our feelings and thoughts. It is a great grace to be able to experience God’s presence in our feelings and thoughts, but when we don’t, it does not mean that God is absent. It often means that God is calling us to a greater faithfulness. It is precisely in times of spiritual dryness that we must hold on to our spiritual discipline so that we can grow into new intimacy with God.” (emphasis added)
(from Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith
The Only Necessary Thing: Living a Prayerful Life
my Prayer:
Lord, I’m going to keep listening for your voice even when I think I can’t hear you.
I’m going to keep looking for you even when I think I can’t find you.
I’m going to keep talking to you even when I think I’m not making sense.
I’m going to keep reading your word even when I think I don’t understand it.
I’m going to keep serving you even when I’m not sure I’m doing any good at all.
I’m going to keep singing to you, knowing you can hear both my words and my heart.
Lord, I know these thoughts and feelings are lies. I’m so thankful that my faith isn’t grounded in them because they are temporary. You are eternal. And you are here with me, whether I can sense your presence or not. Thank you for that knowledge, it’s my rock.
the Word:
“He [Elijah] replied, “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
The LORD said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram.”
1 Kings 19:14-15(NAS)
My Paraphrase:
Elijah: “wah, wah, wah, I just witnessed your unlimited power, but now I’m sad and I feel alone.”
God: “I am HERE. Why are you still here?”
Elijah: “wah, wah, wah, I just witnessed your unlimited power, but now I’m sad and I feel alone.”
God: “Go. You have work to do, and whining isn’t on your to-do list.”
1 Kings 19:10-15(NAS)
the lyric:
“This is my prayer in the desert, when all that’s within me feels dry. This is my prayer in my hunger and need, my God is the God who provides…I will rejoice, I will declare, God is my victory and He is here.”
from Desert Song by Hillsong
“Come Holy One, awaken me, to your design, from my sleep.”
from Your Name by Curtis Froisland
This was dual published on my Pragmatic Communion blog.
please let this be a shared blessing.
I had another mountaintop recording experience last night. So profoundly thankful to the Lord for equipping me to do what I did, from leading me in my song selection to providing me with physical stamina to blessing my voice.
I actually struggled with my song selection, originally deciding to sing “Sweetly Broken.” But I just couldn’t seem to send the confirmation email with the track and lyrics.
Finally, five days past the submission deadline, I changed my mind and decided on Kristian Stanfield’s version of “Jesus Paid It All
Part of me wondered if I was gravitating to Jesus Paid It All
Lord, I pray for the guys at the recording session last night. I only know their names, not their stories. I pray that through the session last night, and the music and lyrics they will be listening to over the next month as they mix the song, you will move in their lives in a deeply personal way.
– If they don’t know you, please use my offering to help draw them to a saving faith in you.
– If they do know you, I pray that they will be encouraged in their faith.
– If they know you, but have forgotten you, please use this song and my voice and witness to remind them of you and give them a relentless passion for your intimate companionship.Lord, I’m so thankful for every opportunity to record. Even if nothing ever comes of these recordings, the studio sessions themselves are such an overwhelming blessing to me. I pray that these sessions would be shared blessings; that the other people involved would be blessed by these experiences too. If your plan is for me to share any of the recordings with others, please lead me to the person who can mix and master them. I trust that you can provide me with compensated work so I can earn the money needed to compensate that person and pay the licensing fees.
Regardless of when or whether that ever happens, I’m going to continue recording until you lead me in another direction. I’m going to continue moving forward until you say stop, rather than sitting still and waiting for you to say GO.
I also prayed yesterday that God would, in some way, bless me with encouragement. As I drafted this post, the mail came and in it, the rough mixes from last month’s recording session of “Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)
For more beautiful music, check out Then Sings My Soul Saturday every Saturday hosted by Amy at Signs, Miracles and Wonders.
“HOLY here we go again, batman.”
I’ve been known to emulate Robin’s plethora of “HOLY” outbursts. The most recent one one? A status update on Wednesday:
“At Appliance Direct. Holy rows of broken and ugly, Batman. Is this a scratch n dent store?”
Here’s a few more…
Need a few more chuckles today? Check out Friday Funnies hosted by Homesteaders Heart!
If you’ve got time to hang out for a few minutes, check out what else makes me laugh: Pragmatic Compendium’s “laugh!” category.
friday funnies: plasectomy
“Would you like to save 10% on your purchase today?”
NO THANK YOU!!!!
Need a few more chuckles today? Check out Friday Funnies hosted by Homesteaders Heart!
If you’ve got time to hang out for a few minutes, check out what else makes me laugh: Pragmatic Compendium’s “laugh!” category.