welcome to the neighborhood

trader joe's, let me be the first of many to welcome you to the neighborhood.

you've picked a good place to settle down. i mean, if you're gonna pick a state in the midwest, you've chosen well. and if you're gonna pick a suburb of minneapolis, again, i believe you've chosen well. we're not as hip, trendy, or crowded as uptown, yet we're not as suburbanly sprawled as maple grove. welcome to the neighborhood.

you'll get your fair share of business here, from the soccer moms looking for a healthy snack for their athletically inclined offspring to the chino latino crowd looking for a fresh avocado to make their homemade guacamole. from the young urban professionals looking for a quick lunch bite, to the local coffee addicts grazing for the caffeinated equivalent of crack to cocaine (same great high, new low price). and even still, the retirement community across the street will peek their heads inside your 100% organic doors, just to see what all the hype is about. welcome to the neighborhood

people will come from north and south, from hennepin and 35W, just to see what you're about. discounted organic foods. less clutter. more fun. cheap wine that only tastes good when you're too young to know better (the nearly infamous two-buck-chuck). and above all, this:

trader joe's in-house-brand honey mango shaving cream.

upon the label, it reads "100% organic, 100% paraben free, 100% vegetarian".

you know, i've gotta hand it to you trader joe's... last time i checked, i wasn't going to eat my shaving cream. but i suppose if i got into the shower and was hungry enough, well, it might happen someday. and your label has been just informative enough to let me know that if i do decide to eat it, it fits within the confines of my paraben-free vegetarian diet. thank you trader joe's. your labels are quite informative. welcome to my shower. my belly. my neighborhood. my heart.

hunkered down in the corner (put down the mufffin in review)

the church does not have dibs on being the only place to find jesus and community. we know this. you can find jesus and community anywhere that people are fully alive.

at one point during the put down the muffin show last thursday, i turned to aaron ankrum and justin law saying "i think i meet jesus here more than i do at church. does that mean i shouldn't work for a church?" to which aaron replied "well, you do need beer money...". i guess he has a point.

as bruce, zach, charlie and matt concocted new and slightly-more-feverish melodies, and as the scent wafted thru the air of the familiar PDtM tunes that keep us all coming back for more, i couldn't help but look around and smile. we are the funny, the lovely, and the holy. and we hold the presence of Jesus inside of us because He is all around us.

there He was, hunkered down in the corner, smiling at us, thrashing his head to the beat (which, at the time, was 11/8, and i'm pretty sure that Jesus is the only person who could find a way to thrash his head to 11/8). maybe He was smiling back at all of us because when we are the most alive, we are the ontological proof of his existence.

i've heard it said that the glory of God is man fully alive. i've had a major beef with this overly-used catch phrase for some time now. i see no direct corrolation to scripture on this, and often times i feel that being fully alive is drawing attention to the thing that is alive, not the Thing that gave it life. but i'm starting to believe that maybe, just maybe, it might be true... more than a thousand pipe organs, and a trillion blazen sunsets, the best witness to the glory of God IS man fully alive. and the best place i know to experience this is when i get to witness my amazing friends create music ex nihilo.

there are so many moments that can take your breath away with their beauty, hope, and love if you just let them. stop. look around. catch a breath. remember how rare these moments are. i believe this to be the most reliable evidence we have of an active Creator Redeemer. He's right over there, hunkered down in the corner, pouring the Good on every moment.

time for an honest fight

derek webb (one of the original members of the band caedmon's call who wisely left the band before they went completely bubble-gum-toothpaste-commercial-pop-christian) is giving away his record 'mockingbird' for free. yeah. go to www.freederekwebb.com, download the record and join the conversation.

the conversation is loaded, open, honest, and blunt... you have to be willing to ask some questions that probably don't have answers. i think this is beautiful, what webb is doing - poking at the theology of a theocracy, and who we are as westernized christians. but through the poking and the asking, there is love. in his lyics, i hear a love for the Church, a love for the bride of Christ, and an honest love for the people Jesus died to save. but get ready, because this kind of love is going to hurt.

six years ago, these poetic meanderings of webb's would've angered me, because i wasn't ready to ask the questions, and i wasn't ready to have the 'answers' i had been spoon fed my whole life dismantled. at least for now, i know that i would rather live inside of the confusion and not know all the answers, than stand outside of the dialog with my neat little box of solutions.

"don't teach me about politics and government
just tell me who to vote for
don't teach me about truth and beauty
just label my music

don't teach me how to live like a free man
just give me a new law

don't teach me about moderation and liberty
i prefer a shot of grape juice
don't teach me about loving my enemies

don't teach me how to listen to the spirit
just give me a new law

i don't want to know
if the answers aren't easy
just bring it down from the mountain to me

do not be afraid..." -derek webb