A joint venture...

So Laramie and I are tackling this one together this week.  Since there is no specific topic to blog about, we're just going to rant about super spiritual things we dislike:

Alleli:
I don't like it when somebody I just met jumps into the spiritual deep end within the first five minutes.

"Hey, my name is ______...so what is God doing in your life right now?"

No thank you.  I need a little segue. How old are you?  Do you have any brothers or sisters? Where did you grow up?  Those kinds of questions are necessary for creating a baseline for future conversations.  When there is no established relationship, I can't just swan dive into the clear pool of spirituality like they can. No, I don't want to tell you my thoughts on the second coming of Christ. No, I'm not going to start talking about what a Proverbs 31 woman looks like in today's society.  I just want to eat my half-priced appetizers in peace.

Laramie:
Okay, so, just in case anyone reading this doesn't know me...I'm pretty private. I like to keep most things to myself other than my love for Christ and my never-to-be-treated addiction to coffee. One of the things that ceases to catch me off guard is when someone I've just met genuinely asks me how I'm doing...

"How are you really doing?..." "..................................................."

It's like that jelly fish scene in Nemo... I just stare. Then they stare. Then I start to wish I was in the doctor's office counting the holes in the ceiling. But before I send out my SOS, I'm usually able to grab some sort of interesting piece of info to share...that isn't uncomfortably revealing and is hug-worthy.

Alleli:
One thing that absolutely drive me nuts is when somebody is trying to tell me their amazing spiritual revelations...but says nothing.

"God has just been showing me all of these things in my life that are getting in the way.  I have been arguing with Him for so long, but He finally showed me how prideful I've been and took away those parts of my heart.  It's been a painful process, but I'm finally getting to see His glory work in my life and amazing things are starting to happen."

Blech! That tells me nothing!  If you didn't want to say anything, then just don't say anything.  Spiritualizing a conversation for the sake of spiritualizing the conversation is not productive.  What do you want me to do, just nod my head in agreement like I know what you're saying?  Make those weird sounds people make when somebody goes off on a wild verbal tangent? "Mmm... mmhmm...yeah...no, I totally understand....mmmm..."

Laramie:
Alright. If I could summarize my childhood, these would be the three words that really pull it all together: Homeschooled, Pastor's kid. And really, this doesn't bite me in the butt as much as it did, but I always loved the looks I would get when these two things were revealed in conversation. People either think I was raised by wolves or I came out of the womb quoting scripture and I have a pet giraffe. No, I don't know how to crochet, I don't sew my own clothes, I do know who Obama is, and I happen to like Maroon 5. I secretly love it, but I publicly get offended just to normalize the situation. I loved my life growing up, but it's so hilarious when it's as if I grew up without civilization. Not true, I just read more books than the public school system :)




And as our closing statement: Predestination.

Chew on that.

Lecture, lecture, lecture....

Growing up, my mom had the biggest heart for international ministry.  From first grade on, we had multiple foreign exchange students floating in and out of our house.  Some of them we actually hosted, some would live with us for the school year, some we took to go see the Amish, others we would just fill their hungry stomachs. No matter the student's background or religion, my mom always brought the Gospel to her surrogate children.  Her hospitality brought them in, and her wisdom keeps them asking questions.

That's not me.

I love my mom and support her ministry, but my heart does not lie within international ministry.

During lecture series at school, we had a few missions-oriented individuals come in and tell us about what God has been doing in their ministry. Through avenues of music and creative arts, these guys are reaching and preaching to a demographic that is largely unreached or indifferent. God has been using these guys in big ways through their evangelistic ministry and were encouraging all of us as students to consider serving overseas.

That's not me.

I have an appreciation for their ministry, but my heart does not lie within overseas ministry.

I see such an intense need for keeping people in the Church than getting them there first.  I want to be in community with the ones who've walked in saying "Now what?" If we can't answer that, then why are we in the Church in the first place?

Past Living

Let me just share a current frustration with you...

Let me also preface this by saying I have been a PMS mess this past week.

I have seen so many of my fellow peers stuck in how things used to be.  Classes looked a certain way. People performed a certain way. Certain things were expected out of certain people.  Certain emotions were to be felt on certain occasions. Yuck!

Guess what? Change is okay.

Like I talked about a few weeks ago, I had a lot of change happen my senior year of high school.  Getting a new youth pastor in particular was especially difficult.  I had the same youth pastor for 6 years. Why did things have to change the last year I was going to be living in town? I dug in my heels that whole year hoping if I held out long enough, things would go back to the way they used to be.

I missed out on so much.

My peers are missing out on so much.

I had a wise friend once tell me, "If you're not changing, you're not growing." I see God doing great things at our school despite our human nature.  We are a flawed community, but we love the Lord.  I don't understand how we can expect God to move in us and around us if we're resisting change. How can we expect to grow spiritually and in our vocation if we're resisting change?

I'm excited to witness and experience the massive amounts of change that are just around the corner. Are you?

I'm here now...and I'm singing

For real, that's how I feel about my mad writing skillz.

I can worship God with singing.  I can worship Him with my guitar.  I can worship Him anywhere at any time.

I have to remind myself that I can also worship Him with my writing.  Sometimes when I write, I don't feel like I'm giving Him my best...so I quit writing.  I've got a lot of not-quite-half-of-a-song songs.

God deserves more than my half-hearted attempts at writing.  I am convicted.

Out of the norm

My senior year of high school was rough.  I'm pretty sure the first 3 months of school I didn't smile.

"Smiling's my favorite"--Buddy the elf....and me.

Let me tell you why- I dropped out of jazz band, I stopped playing sports, my church got a new lead pastor and youth pastor, my mom was in and out of the hospital...and I was being an idiot.

Woof.

Prior to school starting, I snuck out of my house to hang out with some friends.  We went to a house party to smoke and drink.  In my intoxicated stupor, a guy I didn't even know and I went off to a bed room and...whatever.

I went home that night really, really broken.  I couldn't sleep, eat, cry, feel anything but guilt and shame.

Later in the school year, I couldn't stand feeling so low anymore.  The one thing I knew I needed to do to feel relief was the scariest thing I had to do- tell my dad.  I spent a whole weekend psyching myself up for that dreaded conversation.  Go figure- the night I want to talk with my dad, he goes to bed early. Go figure- he has to leave town early the next morning for work out of town.  If I didn't say anything to him that night, I was going to lose my nerve.

So I wrote him a note  explaining what happened and shoved in his computer bag.  The next three days went by way too fast and way too slow all at the same time.  I was not looking forward to his reaction- I thought he would reject me, he wouldn't love me, he would disown me.  Lies.

Later in the week when he came home, I was in my bedroom getting ready for work and he came in.  We looked at each other and he walked across the room without saying a word and hugged me.  I broke down sobbing.  I know we would've talked more...stupid job.  Those few intimate minutes we spent in my room were a freaking God-send.

Only after I was broken of this superman complex, humbled beyond what I thought possible, and being scared sh*tless did I experience kairos.  Through my dad, God showed me true, unconditional, undeserving, intimate love. Time froze just for a moment and the walls came down.

Back home

Back home, I had my sound guy.  Actually, he was more my slides and lights guy who also happened to do a little bit of sound.  When the mics were hot and the lights were on (and just as hot), we were tight. He was very much another part of the band.

When I wanted to switch to a song that wasn't in our list for the night, he had it ready by the time I started singing the first verse.  When I was going to do a stomp in a song, he'd dip the lights and bring them back up when the band came back in.  When I was going to say something, he'd make sure all of the other instruments came down in the mix in time to hear my first word.

That guy....a very, very hard man to replace.

Yet, sometimes I have to be that person.  I need to know those basics- up, down, mix, balance, listen, respond. What a daunting task! But I ask myself- am I the most effective worship leader I can be if I don't at least have an elementary grasp on the technical side of service?

NOLA

My youth group went down to New Orleans every summer for the past 5 years.  I had the privilege of being one of a few youth leaders to accompany on the trip.  Each day, we worked on different site and performed tasks to help rebuild homes due to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.  Most of our jobs consisted of construction-esque duties.

The first year I was on the trip, there were 6 of us at one house ripping out the rotted wooden fascia and soffit installing the longer lasting vinyl version.  It took us 5 days to rip apart, cut up the appropriate sizes, and reinstall everything...we didn't have all of the appropriate tools to get the job done any faster.

I love construction jobs.

I am terrible at construction jobs.

Thankfully, there was another leader at the site we were at who had significantly more experience in this field than I did.  There was no way on God's green earth I could lead this project and wasn't about to attempt to take the lead.  He gave us all instructions on how to go about everything and we all obliged.  I must say, our handiwork (for being a rag-tag group of high school people) was pretty darn good!  

The last year I was on the trip, our youth group partnered up with an organization called the St. Bernard Project.  We were sent out to multiple sites to install insulation, put up dry wall, paint, remove mold...or sort screws in their warehouse.  

P.S. sorting screws are a waste of time and a joke.  

I was the only adult leader to be sent off to a different site every day we were down.  I had a different crew of students every day, a different project every day, and new challenges within our group every day.  If I had it my way, I wouldn't have been bouncing around so much, but the guy in charge of our whole team always asked me to be the one to take on the new sites.

In the middle of both of those trips, I was pulled off to the side by some of my co-leaders.  They thanked me for my flexibility and willingness to take a more back seat role to follow.  I was creating an example for my high schoolers.  It's okay not not always be the one up front.  It's okay to not be the one in charge.  It's okay to admit that I don't have all the answers or the experience to get the job done.

There is so much more to the story as there always is with mission work. 

Ever since I was young, everybody pegged me as a leader.  I know that is in me and I embrace that.  For the longest time, I had no idea what it looked like to be a follower.  That created a lot of conflict between me and whoever was in charge of whatever project.  New Orleans was out of my element in leadership and I was forced to step back and humble myself to the other leader's authority those weeks. What did I gain out of those few weeks every summer?  I gained those 3 C's we talked about in class- confidence, credibility and compassion.  

I learned a butt-ton of new skills in basic construction.  In the moments I needed to step up, our crew knew they could trust me.  I had the eyes to see students hurting on the trip and could sit down to be a comfort to them.

Following someone else's lead isn't so bad.

What theology?

Theology is one of those words that I've heard a lot in school... 2 of my last 3 were private faith-based colleges so that would make sense. Yet theology is one of those words I think we take for granted and we pretend we really know what it means.  I decided to take 30 seconds to look up what "theology" actually means.

Theology: The systematic and rational study of religion and it's influences and of the nature of religious truths.

Alleli translation: The patterns and habits we form in our faith due to the influences surrounding us.

I know, it's a significantly less scientific translation.  My bad.

Some things I've noticed in myself as I develop my own theology on worship is there are a lot of changes going on in my heart.   I'm finding out very quickly a lot of what I thought was my theology was just my own selfish opinion.  Example: for a long time I thought it was stupid how many people would close their eyes for a whole worship set...and not just close their eyes- it looked like their eye lids were putting their eyeballs in a vice grip.  To me, everybody looked like they were trying to not poop their pants.  "Why are they getting so emotional?" I thought. "We're singing about God's love.  Be happy!" So my theology at that time was worship was more than just an emotion. 

It's true.  Worship really is more than just an emotion.  But I twisted it in my head to believe the lie of worship has no need for emotion.  After all, we choose to worship.  What a twisted, selfish opinion on worship theology!

So after all of those scattered thoughts and many paragraphs started, deleted, and rewritten...I guess the place that I am at in regards to my theology is:

I'm still learning. I'm still discovering the lies that I believe(d).  And I'm excited to see where this next season takes me.  

If I was going to be honest...

Well I started typing out this blog by putting all of my cards down on the table...but there is no fun in revealing my pocket Aces in a high stakes game of Hold 'em.  So here is what I have to say:

My words are raw.

I am probably the biggest potty mouth among the worship leaders.  When I need to, I can have a silver tongue. In the right company, I'm an effing sailor.

Beyond those "naughty" words, my words are raw.  I like the truth.  It is not heard enough...because everybody wants the polished words. The easy to digest words. The meaningless words because it makes us feel better about ourselves.  Don't get me wrong, I try my best to think through what I'm going to say before I say it.  I like being understood the first time I say something.  I know my words carry weight.

But my words are raw.

--Alleli