Leeland and the holy spirit hoedown

So the over all thought for the tech nightmare post was if you can't do it right when you're trying to do it big, then either a) don't do it at all, or b) scale back till you can do it right. One other thing I forgot to mention is the use of punch lights/audience lights as house lights...bad idea.

After yesterday's post on tech I figured I would bring the other side of the 'concert/conference' that made the entire thing just a little more on the awkward side. Gideon's Army was a charismatic organization that had put on the whole thing and frankly from the time we walked in it was kind of an awkward oppressive feeling because we were not part of the group. I kind of wondered what was going to happen when "Gideon" got up to introduce Leeland because intermittently he began saying unintelligible things, which I kind of shrugged off as the fact that I couldn't understand him to begin with.

The music started and people moved forward and all of the sudden people broke loose, dancing in the aisle ways shouting, etc. Now this could have just been an exuberant group of kids...so no condemnation there. Leeland started getting into it and went into a 20 minute rendition of just saying love, love, love or joy, joy, joy. Ok thats cool, but people were hoopin and hollerin like it was 1995. I didn't get it. So that kind of drug on and on and on and then out of no where the guy gets up again and starts praying because this was a "conference" to start igniting the passions of students in their schools. So wait...this was a student rally?

All of the sudden people started walking up on stage, to 'pray'. This girl grabbed the mic and started rambling nonsense then started praying and then back to some gibberish. Then another guy jumped up on stage and started praying and waving his hands. This was getting a little awkward. The pastor grabbed the mic and started praying again and had Leeland start to sing more, but he joined in with them in singing loudly into the mic and dancing on stage. By this point, besides looking like Benny Hin, he had lost all respect from me. This is the look at me mentality. What did Jesus say about the people who do this? They already have their reward.

Let's look at this from the reverse perspective, and this applies not only to this situation but what you do in your own church/life. We're trying to reach the MTV generation. These kids are already highly skeptical view of God, religion and church. You're going to hold a youth rally event, that you're going to encourage kids to bring lost people to. I'd say a lot of the kids have never been to church or, don't want a part of church because of past experiences. How to you expect to connect with them when your media and tech on the face value looks cool, but either doesn't work or doesn't look good? These kids consume exuberant amounts of awesome (production value) media, or go to expensive concerts. They're attention spans for this kind of stuff is short, you have to grab them and hold them, even if it's simple.

A lot of times Christians get pegged for doing cheesy stuff. Watch TBN, a large helping of Christian music videos and maybe a smattering of concerts online and you'll get my drift. Lady with big blue/pink/green hair in high backed gold chairs and fancy set pieces? A sub par music video that looks like a kid did it in his basement on his laptop and hand cam? a hand full of intelligent lights pointed at the ceiling?

I could take a ton of time and talk about speaking in tongues, go read the Bible, it's in there, the apostles did it because there was a need for each person to hear in thier own language, it's a miracle event. Gibberish not included. Can God still preform miracles today? yup, but speaking in a language all your own (and sounding like an idiot) to be more spiritual is not exactly what I'd call a miracle, more like acting like the Pharisee who is standing on the street corner praying loudly so that all can hear.

You expect students to invite their lost friends, who are skeptical to religion, to a place where they are ultimately going to feel extremely uncomfortable and probably become even more skeptical of religion. Imagine, you didn't know Christ, or you may not have to imagine. You walk into a building set up for 700 people and there are only about 200-300 people there. No one talks to you, and because you're an outsider you kind of get looked at funny. The event starts and people start going crazy, not just hey im having fun goofing off crazy but I'm possessed spinning and jumping around, flailing like a dead fish crazy. People start running laps for Jesus, a couple people get up on stage and start speaking in tongues, and the band is singing one word over and over again for 20 minutes. You can't figure out what is going on and by the time the speaker gets up to tell you what is going on you've completely disengaged yourself.

Now this all came with a gut check too. I had to stop and say, because I'm a Christian is it wrong for me not to get into something this much. Can I still say I'm joyful and not express myself outwardly like this. My conclusion is, yes I can. Your faith is expressed through many number of means and it does not have to be show-offy. Then I had to ask myself, is this junk wrong? You can take that in two directions. Personally for them is it wrong(without touching on biblical issues)? no, it is how they express themselves, if they want to dace like a fool go for it. Publicly is it wrong? I might have to say yes on that. Paul says in Corinthians to not cause any one to stumble, Jew, Greek, or the church of God.... Telling someone that they do not have the gift of tongues and there fore are less spiritual, or making someone feel completely out of place and uncomfortable is NOT biblical.

As Christians we are called to be a change agent in the world around us. Not a deter rant for those to believe. We should be providing warm, welcoming, challenging and growing environments for students that does not cause them to leave with more questions or down right rejection because of how we acted. (Not watered down, just being able to bring teenagers in without having them freaked out, the word 'church' is hard enough to swallow for the general public)

So does the holy spirit need to have a hoedown in order to meet us in a place? absolutely not, he's with us wherever we're at. Just be authentic, that is all God asks of you as a Christian. You'll get a better response from people too.

Leeland and the sword of faith

I ventured out to see Leeland last night. I was kinda pumped, I like Leeland, musically, vocally and lyrically. They are one of the 'fresher' bands on the worship/CHR music lists. Frankly I think a lot of their lyrics hit home just because of their age group and who they're writing to.

I got into the place after Brandon told me it was part of a conference to find out who was putting it on, Gideon's Army. I don't mean this in a condemning or mocking way, but it was a charismatic event. (insert pause here). Unfortunately every charismatic event that I have had the pleasure of taking part in have seriously been the most awkward things I've ever seen. There are a lot of things you can point fingers at in 'Christianity' and say that is why people think we're nut jobs, this would be one of them.

I'll dive into the technical aspects first. We walk in to see a jib (that wasn't being used for the concert) sitting in the back, cool except it was covered in gaff tape and was a little chincy...oh boy. Secondly we notice the IMAG screen (yes singular, one not two) that had a live single camera feed with the gideon's army logo and some text overlayed. The music lyrics were overlayed in the same fashion and it really seemed the lady was typing them up as the song went on because they were not instantaneous. The text was a serif and was tiny tiny. There wasn't really ANY front lighting for video except for the bright white and blue lights coming out of the movers they had. The sound, well...that was intersting, the right speaker cluster wasn't on through the first song, brandon had to go let the sound guy know it wasn't engaged. Vocal's weren't real audible and it was very hollow(and a lot of bass, the room was a conference room too which didn't help). Back to lighting, the inteligent lights had about 2-3 moves and most of the light got thrown onto the cieling which made no sense to me. One more thing that was a nail in the coffin. They stopped everything to show a video on relief efforts going on in Galveston, cool, except the video made me feel like I was on an acid trip. The computer running the WONDERFUL graphics was A) a PC, B) extremely UNDER powered and C) MIRRORED. If you're in the tech world these three things on their own are bad enough but all together = a disaster. So you saw the person end the program and go back to the desktop and open up windows media player to start the video and they struggled to get it full screen. It was at this poin that I noticed the screen was not keystoned in any sense of the word. Once the video played it started chugging, in essence the computer could not keep up with the audio/video, so the audio seemed to seriously lag, and it was extremely choppy. The guy talked slow to begin with, and the audio/music was aweful. So out of 5 stars i give a .5 on tech crew.

Ok I would go on to part two of this blog and talk about the atmosphere but I don't actually have any time to go on to that...

So I end part one with this, Christian events end up extremely sub par in the tech/creative field and this is one thing that we get laughed at for. You cannot be taken seriously any more if you don't step up your game. Just throwing money at something does not necesarily make it quailty either, time, effort and experience come largely into play as well.

Living On My Own: Episode One (roll star wars theme)

I've been in my apartment for 2 weeks now and I figured I would go ahead and leave a few stories. The apartment pictured to the right is my neighbor down and across from me. Every time I go by their door their garbage is sitting outside of their door in little bags. It will sit there for days at a time till one day it disappears...only to show up IN FRONT of the dumpster. Now I don't exactly know why it doesn't go IN the dumpster, or why exactly it has to sit in front of their door and make my walk to my door obnoxious either. It could have something to do with the elephant god picture thing that is posted right under their apartment number.

I just googled it and I'm guessing that it is the hindu god of success, Ganesha. Or the god to remove obstacles...well i wish he'd remove the freaking obstacle of garbage sitting in front of these people's doorway! Then again that could be what they're testing out, and he's moving it down to in front of the dumpster every few days.....no

Then there is car wash lady, In one weeks time I saw her out there washing and waxing her car twice. It could be OCD or it could be she just forgot she did it a couple days earlier. I haven't seen her out there doing it this week but it has been a little cooler and I haven't exactly had time to sit around and watch for her this week either.

I ventured out one day to get my hair cut at the mall. It was an extremely awkward 20/30 minutes. The guy was gay and did not talk all that much, so sitting there for 20+ minutes being touched by this guy who wasn't saying much is kind of awkward. Then when he did bring things up it would be things like, so you're new in town, 'by yourself?' there are some cool places to hang out at, and then at the end he said, I'm really glad you came in today. Really captain awkward? If it wasn't for the fact that he gave a good haircut I'm not sure what I'd think.

I'm still battling to get the internet in my apartment so I am currently thiefing wifi from the public access at the complex. The only problem is I'm just on the edge of the signal so in order to latch on to it I have to have my laptop against a window and even then it's a 50/50 chance whether or not it stays connected. It was supposed to be up yesteday but once again they failed to meet their date, so now i get to call and complain! I'm wondering if I can use this as leverage to get out of my verizon contract for my wireless...hey you're not living up to your promises and pissing me off so I'd like out all the way, thanks.

thanks for reading

Stage set 101

Alright the task this time around was to school or be schooled. Thankfully the former happened rather than the latter. My first huge task was to tackle the stage reset in the youth building and they had some pretty big goals what with extra projection and such.

Thankfully after a week or so of work and stumbling through my first set I can call this one a success. I'm sure not all will turn out that way, and I'm sure there will be ways I can streamline the process and clean up around my runs.

The biggest feat on this stage set to tackle was the broken 'screen' floating on stage. First off, it was pretty cheap, foam core boards you can find at your nearest hobby lobby and some lumber and brackets at your local hardware store. Make a rectangle, create some varied height surfaces using angle brackets, spray paint black and then attach your foam core. (warning, if you fly your support structure before you hang your foam core make sure you have plenty of people around who are not level challenged otherwise you might end up with more of a disaster than a unified but 'randomly chaotic' design.

What did we use to hang the boards, some really sticky vent tape, but I'd even go as far to suggest using something a little more hardcore, liquid nails comes to mind (although there is some set time required before hanging) or white screws.

Play with patterns then throw up a couple of projectors and see what happens.

Next post: Living on my own: episode one.

woops - Texas day 1.2

I guess I was supposed to blog about how I was going to be moving to texas...the funny thing is that as of last night I moved (at least in person, but not all of my stuff).

I'm tired and this is going to be kind of succinct but here's what happened in the short.

Sugar Creek Baptist flew me down, everything went great, I proceeded further in the process to get a job, then they offered me the job. I accepted. Within two weeks I have found a place to live, and last night I flew in to start today. My stuff is being driven down by my awesome parents, and I'm staying with a guy from work for a few days till they get down here. I got in last night at 11 after some delays (1 technical and lets just say it was interesting with no AC on the plane while we were grounded for 20 minutes with some black people who wouldn't shut up about how scared they were and they wanted off the plane).
I got in about 11p cst and finally got my luggage only to get to the rental car booth and they said oh you need a credit card, how about a debit card, ok...run it through...you're not 25 yet this isn't going to work...what do you mean it's not going to work. Apparently if you're not 25 renting a car on a debit card doesn't work because they think you're not going to have the 'credit' to rent it. IT'S COMING OUT OF MY CHECKING WHO CARES ABOUT CREDIT?! so finally I call the manager in there (after midnight) and he approves me for the car AFTER I agree to pay for full insurance coverage...I'm tired and pissed at this guy. So now I'm paying double for my rental car. I jump on the road only to get super lost in the industrial part of Houston. Finally I whip the car around off the highway and see a sign for where I'm supposed to be praise God! I make it in about 1am to Brandon's place (which is 2am for me since I'm still running on est).

Today I got up, went in to my first day just a bunch of getting oriented to life on campus, recieved my janitor ring of keys to almost every door in the place. Checked out where all the stuff was I needed to know. Ate food, more checking out of stuff I need to know, setting up my email and then setting up my desk (kind of).

I'll throw up pictures on facebook tomorrow.

thats my blog for today.

flying out

Welp the next time I update will probably be an indication whether or not I'm moving.

Some stuff has been moving mighty quick lately. I had a second interview with Sugar Creek Baptist Church out in Sugarland Texas not two weeks ago. That went well, I emailed a few days later because they said they would set up number three with another guy, gave some times and said let me know when you would like it to happen. Tuesday of this week I get a random phone call, i recognize the area code and pick up. Third interview in the can, I thought it went well, but apparently they thought it went really well. I got a call a few hours later asking if this weekend I was free to fly down because they wanted to get me in before the youth were out for some reason (the position I'm in the running for is working in the youth ministry). I said HECK YES I CAN. The next day I had flight confirmations in my inbox and right now I'm sitting in Cleveland Airport waiting on my flight out to houston.

I really fell like this has been a God thing.
I've never felt like leaving Answers In Genesis was the wrong option. I still feel that way to this day, it's a great, God ordained place, but it was not for me. I had said when I left if I couldn't find anything that I would serve at a resturaunt in the interim. Frankly I feel like God was waiting for me to do that, to see if I actually would, to humble me. Days later I started on this process with the church. I feel totaly comfortable, and at peace with the entire thing.

Now the thing is, this church process could pan out to be nothing at all, and I understand that, but I'm also excited just to see God moving. If not here, then somewhere else. It is a confirmation for sure that I want to be part of a ministry full time in some respect doing what I love to do, media/tech work.

So a bit about this position, It's an Assistant Techincal Director. I'd report to the TD and the youth worship pastor. I'd be in charge of the tech for the youth ministry (lights, sound, video, stage design etc.) and then whatever else needs done. Doing training and team building with the youth involved in the services.

Bascially not a strech of the imagination seeing myself fill this at all.

Thanks to all who have prayed for my job situation.

My waiting room has been a couple months, and thats short in comparison to some peoples. Yet God is faithful to his own.

A lot is going on

The last time we talked I was busy but nothing that paid.

This week I started training again at Bravo's Italian Cucina (kitchen).
I walked in friday and was hired saturday. (no I didn't stay over night and camp out till they hired me).
Sunday morning Eric got the bright idea of tearing out the entire FOH console area and rebuilding it. (since we were going to do the install of a new board anyway)
So for the past 3 days I have spent A TON of time at church ripping out, running cable, planning, figuring out logistics of placement, getting supplies and arguing over the best way to do it.
Oh there has been a lot of prayer, that we're ready for a crash run through tomorrow afternoon for our wednesday night service.
I'm updating the graphic for the sermon series tonight.
I start doing follows on thursday for work.
Oh and tomorrow morning I have a second phone interview with Sugar Creek Baptist in Sugarland, Texas.
Busy Busy Busy.
In between training/following at Bravo's I'm going to be finishing up the install of the FOH system and hoping that it all works completely for Sunday morning.


For some reason every time I see a car with Obama '08 on it I am seeing a repetitive trend...they're black, same with tacky yard signs. Today I saw a car that had used window paint to paint OBAMA '08 on the rear windshield. Sure enough he was black. I didn't think his platform was ethnicity but it sure has turned into that. Every black person is proud to have someone of their own skin color running for the big man upstairs.

My thing is...the differences stop with the fact that he has more melanin...they fail to notice that he doesn't talk like he walked out of the ghetto...in fact he talks like your average whitey. So the next time you go to buy a car pennant that proudly beats your candidate choice into the side of your motor vehicle remember...check out the platform, background and dedication. The person you vote for is more than skin deep.