How about you? Any good book suggestions?

Our Senior dinner is always one of the saddest, but most rewarding, nights of the year. We all meet together at the house of a family in our church for dinner. Then after dinner, all of the students go around and tell a major thing that God has taught them in their last 4 years (err… 5, for some of them). It’s sad, because we realize that some really great leaders in our ministry are moving on. But, it’s so rewarding because we’re able to see visible fruit of God’s grace in their lives.

Seeing immediate fruit in your ministry is sometimes a tricky thing…..it can be encouraging, it’s not always accurate, because fruit takes time to grow. So having a 4 or 5 year perspective on growth is so cool. We get to hear how different studies and d-group stuff has affected them. Honestly it was hard not to cry the entire time they were sharing last night….I am so grateful to God for allowing me to work with these college students. And even though we only have them for a few years, it’s so cool to think that God is using us to help shape the trajectory of their lives and cultivate future godly women and men who will serve in churches around the world.

How cool is this. Have any of you downloaded the song? What do you think?

1. Zach Lind, the drummer for Jimmy Eat World (which is one of the most fantastic Rock and Roll bands of our day), has a blog that is consistently very interesting. He posted some great thoughts yesterday about how we often find our identity in the wrong things… about how we can easily feed our egotism even while doing good things if not for the right reasons. I hope I’m paraphrasing him well. Go check it out yourself here.

2. Enjoyed reading Brody’s Positive Post Tuesday. It’s a really kind post about his wife…who sounds like a cool person. I have been meaning to join in on writing a Positive Post Tuesday myself….I’ll start next week.

3. I golfed in a tournament at this golf course today. The word “tournament” is a very generous term for what my foursome did today….we were 12 over par…..and it was best ball. But that was enough to get us second place in our handicap strata. Sorry no pictures.

1. Coldplay has announced that Violet Hill, the single from their upcoming CD (Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends) will be free for download for one week on their website starting April 29th. Also, you can read about the song list to Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends at Pitchforkmedia.com.

2. All the talks from the Together for the Gospel conference are posted here. I’ve already had a chance to listen to C.J. Mahaney’s message….looking forward to listening to the rest.

3. It must be because we share a Swedish heritage…. I love The Cardigans, Long gone before Daylight. My friend James told me about them a few weeks ago, and then got me this yesterday. Great CD, can’t wait to listen to it more. Thanks James.

There’s a verse in Luke that says when you throw a party don’t invite the people who can invite you back and return the favor. But invite the cripple, the lame, the poor and those who can’t return your favor. Then your reward will be in heaven.

About 4 years ago, a girl from Providence, who has a sister with special needs, decided to start a prom for people in our city with special needs….people who didn’t ever have a chance to go to a prom of their own. One of the reasons I love my church is because the people here are some of the most selfless people I have ever meet.

The 11th grade students from Providence take on this project, but the event requires hundreds and hundreds of volunteers from our church to run smoothly. I think it takes 2 volunteers for every 1 guest….there were over 600 guests who attended last night.

They think of everything – from providing dresses and suites, donated by the people in our church, to offering make-overs, portraits, shoe shines, flowers, and food for the guests. The guests are welcomed by escorts and fans cheering for them as they make their way down a red carpet, then are paired with a “date” (host) who takes care of them for the evening. The highlight of the night is the dance – the chairs are cleared out of the worship center to make a dance floor, a disco ball is hung up, and they dance the night away.

Danielle, Bennett and I went for a while last night – it’s definitely one of our favorite events of the year.

Danielle, Bennett and I sponsor a child, named Koren, through Compassion. He lives in Kenya. We try our best to pray for him at dinner…….we don’t remember to as much as we wish we did. A couple of days ago, Danielle showed me a letter that we recently received from Koren. It says that he has started singing with a children’s choir (which I’m happy about), and that he wanted us to pray that he improves at school. He also was really happy that he can now read swahili words.

Danielle and I haven’t done a great job of writing Koren, so please don’t read this and think that we’re a model Compassion-sponsor family. But, I wanted to post about this because Koren’s letter has just melted me. I can’t imagine my daughter writing to people in another country to thank them for their generosity… I mostly can’t imagine this because Bennett can’t go past “d” while saying her “a-b-c’s”, so writing anything seems like a very distant thing. But beyond that, and more seriously, I can’t imagine what it’s like to be a parent who works from sunrise to sunset every day and still can’t provide food for his family.

(Picture from Koren )

Most of you have seen in the news this week that the price of food is going up because of the grain shortage and gas prices. This shortage will mean very little to us in America. Sure, I might have to rediscover the delicacies of PB&Js…. I’ll wrestle with contentment, but adjust and be fine. I don’t mean to minimize the impact this food shortage might have on the US, but I do want to keep in mind that, even if we have to make significant sacrifices to our lifestyle, we’ll still have food on the table every day…. But millions around the world can’t say that. This shortage will be deadly for many children/adults around the world. They simply don’t have the resources to cope with drastic food shortages like we will.

So why talk about all of this? Because we have an opportunity to get involved with an organization that cares for families who live in areas of the world impacted by poverty, and that will, through our giving, provide what is needed for these families to live and hopefully thrive. Compassion is independently reviewed and audited, and has received the highest marks possible for a charitable organization, which means the money you give will be spent wisely. It will have the impact that you want it to have. And, most importantly, as people’s physical needs are met, they will also hear how their greatest need, reconciliation with God, can be found through Christ.

I guess my challenge for us is that we seek out how we can be more involved in the lives of people affected by poverty. I know for Danielle and me, a good place to start is trying to stay in contact with Koren more often and encouraging him and his family. I’m sure that the upcoming future might be tough for some of us financially, but I hope that we’re able to look outside of ourselves to a world in far more need.

You can get to Compassion’s website here.

This last one is a bit out of focus…but I love all the dust in the air.

Sorry that I haven’t posted my pics from The Myriad show….I left the card reader to my camera at the church….so I’ll have to post them tomorrow. Andrew got a really great shot though….go check out his picture from last night.

I’m not sure if any of you have read the Ben Gibbard article in the current Paste, but it’s incredible. They let him write it himself, and it’s such an interestingly introspective piece. It’s almost weird how honest he is in the article. He says some things about life and love that I think you’ll all find fascinating.

He also writes some cool things about songwriting that I wanted to post here, especially in light of what David Bazan said in Paste last month about songwriting. Here are a few of Gibbard’s quotes:

I’d like to think I’m a far better writer now than I was 10 years ago. When I first started the band, and I began writing in the way that has marked the trajectory of how I go about making music now, I was convinced that my writing was wildly descriptive and very dense and interesting, and people were really going to have to chew on this stuff. But now I’ll play a song like “Bend To Squares” and it’s like, “What the [junk....he used other words...sorry to be so ccm] am I talking about here? This song makes absolutely no sense.” I would just write what I thought were profound, dense lyrics. They may be about something in my head, but they don’t translate to being about anything that anybody could understand just listening.

I decided a handful of years ago that I just want to write songs that you can understand as soon as you put the record on. There’s no need to veil what’s happening in the song the way I used to.

My goal as a songwriter now is to simply write some memorable turns of phrase. The reaction I’d like from every song is “Wow, I listen to this song, and it’s about such-and-such, and there’s this lyric in there that’s just awesome.” At the end of the day that’s what I want.

Isn’t that great stuff? I’m not sure if he and David Bazan are polar opposites, but I do think that Ben is allot more comfortable with his music having a message.

What do ya’ll think?….where would you fall between the two views…..Bazan: don’t push a message…..Gibbard: don’t get in the way of the message?

Some friends and I are heading out tomorrow night to see The Myriad and Eisley show at Cat’s Cradle. I saw The Myriad last fall when they were opening for the Remedy tour and was totally blown away. They sound a bit like Radiohead or Copeland….only with these really great hooks tossed in.

I’ll be sure to get some pics up on monday.

Any of you planning on being there?