Tag: general

I am not proud to admit it, but while I have had a myspace account for a while (only to log on to my friends’ sites) but as of tonight at 11:30 or so, I actually put a bit of energy into my profile, and even invited some friends. If you have a myspace account, please be my friend. Reach me at http://www.myspace.com/znewsome.

Peace,
-Z

Yesterday, after almost missing my flight back to Phoenix, I boarded the plane and found a seat in the next to last row. After getting settled I noticed the guy across the row from me looked familiar. Within minutes he was involved in a conversation with the guy directly in front of me. Doing my own thing, I couldn’t help but hear words that interested me about “tracks”, “that Rick liked them” and “that Warner wasn’t going to be a problem”. I looked up to see Anthony Kiedis (the lead singer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers) in the seat in front of me and Chad Smith (the drummer for the band) sitting across the aisle. Not wanting to invade their space and right to have a peaceful and normal flight, I said few words, mainly to encourage their artistic offerings and discover what they were headed to Phoenix to do.

As the flight went on, others on the flight realized who shared this experience with them and began to stare out of the corner of their eyes at the two musicians. What a trippy thing it must be to live life feeling a multitude of eye corners on your every move.

It was fun and a bit crazy to have Anthony Kiedis serenade your landing with Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t she lovely” I pinched myself a few times on that plane to make sure I wasn’t dreaming

At what volume do you listen to your music? Today as I sat in Zoey’s Coffee Loft I was had my ipod cranked with some ambient, new agey music as I sat and thought, wrote, and became engrossed with myself. I do this often. I rarely pump the volume to it’s limits, but I on most occasions, turn up my music just enough to drown out the world around me. The thought reminds me of a advertisement I saw yesterday for a local newspaper here in Ventura where I am visiting. The ad went like this, “Ventura Newspaper (I forget the real name):It’s always been about you”. I was hit by the absurdity and consumeristic nature of such an ad. I even laughed out loud.

Yet today, in my favorite coffee shop, I very much lived that mantra. It always has been about me. I find myself doing things to drown out the world around me. After all, I have so much going on in my existance as it is. I have little time for others, for their problems, their pain, their hurt, their search for completion and acceptance, even the simple sounds that living life makes. I drown them out with the newest Coldplay, or some chilled-out Snow Patrol.

I tried something different today. I turned down my ipod to the point where I could enjoy my music AND hear the soundtrack of nearby lives as well. Suddenly some things made sense. As followers of God in the way of Jesus (my new description of myself), we struggle with the battle betwen being focusing on our own stuff while loving and caring for others that we share life with. For me, I often find myself doing one or the other – I wallow in my own pain and struggle in one moment and listen to and love on someone else in the next. Maybe we need to stop this “either/or” way of living and move to a more “and” posture. Maybe rather than turning off the sounds of our own journey’s we might just turn them down a bit that we might also be able to listen and learn from the journey’s of others.

In my experience this morning, I am able to listen to my music with all it’s emotional cues AND also hear the clanging of coffee cups, the whirl of the espresso machine, the sounds of the ivy as the wind ruffles through it, the horns of cars alerting pedestrians of their presence on the nearby street, the sputter of the coffee dispenser as it runs out of it’s goods, the creaking of the old wooden floor under the feets of my fellow patrons, the laughs of the joke-teller as well as the joke-receiver, the conversations of troubled parents just outside the door, and even the music that the coffee shop has deemed most appropriate for it’s guests. How we miss out on dimensions of life, dimensions of both God’s creation as well as the progress of his redemptive work in the world around us, when we turn up our music too loud and drown out the world around us.

It’s time that we as God’s people, stop listening only to the “music” of our own lives and existences and add in the sweet sounds of the world around us. The crys of people longing to be valued for who they are, to be seen as what they are – the creative work of God. We must not continue to drown out the injustices of this world, the unloviness of this world, the dark places we wish didn’t exist and turrn down our stuff to the point where we can both be who God is making us to be AND his people commissioned to represent his loving embrace, his healing hand, his unconditional acceptance, his eternal justice, and his all-accepting forgiveness.

To do this, we must be willing to hear both the bad and the good, the beautiful and the unlovely, the excviting and the painful sounds of the earth. Happy listening.

Forgive my soppy reflectiveness, but this morning I have been sitting in “my place”. You have one too. That spot that you’ve claimed. Where you do your best thinking. Where the creater seems a bit nearer and the result is a creative you previously failed to discover. Where beauty overflow and curiousity beckons your exploration. I believe that we all have a place like this in the world. Mine is a second-floor cafe in ventura with great coffee, an ivy-lined courtyard, and an eternal ocean-breeze that effortlessly and gently fills the space. The free wireless internet is what originally drew me here, but I have discovered that it is my place. Over the two years, some of my best spoken messages, organization vision, and missional thinking has been birthed here. Today, on my last day in Ventura, I am here alone. Alone to think and to ponder, and to unpack, to dream, and to cry a bit. To hurt and to heal. And maybe unfortunately for you, to write.

This morning I was met with some bad news. I turned off the water of the shower just in time to hear the chime of my cell phone’s new message notification. I checked my messages and was informed by the digital reproduction of a denominational head’s voice that my church planting assessment had been finished and he wished to discuss the results with me. The church planting assessment was a 6-hour interview that Kelli and I went through in early August and it’s purpose was to determine whether Kelli and I would be “successful” at starting a new community. You probably guessed it, the assessment came back differently than I would have hoped.

I wish I could say something different, but my integrity screams otherwise – I am hurting. The dissapointment of missed expectations fills my soul and I can’t hide from the pain. No rationale can remove the feeling. No resolution can absolve the experience. At this moment, pain is me and I am pain.

As I walk the streets of downtown Ventura, I see a people that share my experience. A couple fighting loudly on the sidewalk, no doubt too over unfulfilled expectations. A homeless man whose tired and dirty eyes hid the pain of experience poorly. Grimaces from passerby’s – obviously reeling from some sort of pain.

Pain is a reality of our world, and altough so much of me wishes it wasn’t, at this moment I am glad it is. At least for me.

The pain I am feeling causes me to dream of something better. To try harder to see God’s “creation vision” for his people and his world (and for me). Pain is an unsettling in our reality. It attempts to prevent us from living life and seeing others the same way we did before.

Today it is making me ask questions that can help my existence and my usefulness to the Kingdom of God. Hopefully it will push the arguing couple into reconciliatory conversation, the homeless man to seek help or rehabilitation, and the grimacing venturans to smile and relax a bit.

I will not run from pain. It has never worked in the history of mankind to avoid pain. It hunts us down and it’s attack is even more unmerciful if we hide from it. We MUST see God’s desires, his dreams, his design in the midst of the pain and then move there.

Here is a picture from one of the “conversations” at the Soliton Sessions. Gareth Higgins and Greg Russinger speak of living life with others in the city and the struggle we have to make eye contact with others.

Kelli and I have launched a new site that will serve as a conversation about the journey we feel God has us on. If your interested in journeying with us, you can check out http://www.therevolutionarylife.com. Sign up for the newsletter to receive a monthly update from us.

Thanks,

Zack