ben cooper music

2007-06-21T12:45:00.000-04:00

2007-06-11T13:07:00.000-04:00

Paul Potts singing Opera...

It's about time that we see past image and just listen.

2007-06-08T09:29:00.001-04:00

Unbelievable...

Only in Paw Paw, Michigan would a guy in a wheelchair get pushed 4 miles down the highway by a semi-truck. My favorite part is that the worst thing that happened was that he spilled his Coke.

Here.

2007-05-23T20:17:00.000-04:00

DATE CHANGE
The date for the Higher Grounds CD Release show has been changed. It will now be held Monday, June 4th instead of Friday, June 1st.

2007-05-16T11:29:00.000-04:00

New CD

The new project is finally finished, and is in the process of being replicated. The songs are currently available for purchase digitally (see above), and will be in physical form within a couple of weeks.

The songs are also up on these pages:
myspace.com/cooper
virb.com/bencooper

I hope you like!

Ben

2007-05-07T17:22:00.000-04:00

NEW CD SHOW
For those of you in the Fort Wayne, Indiana area, I will be playing a show at the St. Joe Higher Grounds on Friday, June 1st at 7:30. At the show, I will finally have my new CD that has taken almost a year to finish, which is an exciting relief. Or a relieved excitement.

Find it.

2007-04-16T01:58:00.000-04:00

That's so emo.

2007-04-11T12:23:00.000-04:00

I dropped it...

Hey all, I'm currently in the market for a replacement cell phone to hold me over for a few weeks. I'll be getting a new one soon, but I would greatly appreciate it if anyone had an old used one that you'd be willing to let me use in the meantime. Thanks!

2007-04-03T15:41:00.000-04:00

2007-03-04T03:44:00.000-05:00

Africa...

Well, I can't believe how fast this trip came up. I'm leaving Sunday afternoon to go to Uganda for a week with my dad, thelongbrake and his dad. We'll be spending the majority of the week just hanging out with kids in an orphanage, so it should be a great experience.

Not sure how familiar you are with Uganda, but recently the country has been featured in a couple movies/documentaries: Invisible Children and The Last King of Scotland. It should be an incredible time of learning and I look forward to sharing more when we return!

2007-02-24T00:27:00.000-05:00

Tracking & water alarms...

So last week was pretty eventful. Not only did we finish all of the piano recording for the next project, but I also had a wonderful wake-up experience to go along with it. I was sleeping peacefully...

In the dream I was, for whatever reason, picking up and looking inside a cup to see if it was clean. In reality, my alarm was going off. Instead of picking up my phone to turn it off, I had actually picked up the glass of water next to my phone.

Since I sleep laying down, I naturally had to turn the glass upside-down in order to see the inside. Yep, I ended up waking up right when four or five ounces of cold water saturated my head and pillow.

2007-02-14T01:46:00.001-05:00

Happy Valentine's Day!

2007-02-10T01:14:00.000-05:00

Tony Dungy

If you have a few minutes, it's worth watching this speech that the Colts' coach made a year ago after winning NFL Coach of the Year for 2006. Until watching this, I didn't realize how much of a man of faith he is. It is always an encouragement to watch Christ-followers doing work with excellence...

2007-02-10T01:12:00.000-05:00

2007-01-28T03:01:00.000-05:00

This is cool...

2007-01-25T14:51:00.000-05:00

Over the Fall semester, a group of songwriters here in Nashville were chosen to participate in a pop songwriting workshop, led by writer Darrell Brown. Last night we had a sort of reunion to reconnect with everyone and hang out. This is me, Darrell and Andy Davis, who was also in the workshop.

2007-01-22T00:05:00.000-05:00

Q: What's the difference between the Indianapolis Colts and a dollar bill?
A: You can still get four good quarters out of a dollar bill.

Let's hope for a whole dollar...

2007-01-18T10:30:00.000-05:00

Nature...

I love movies that showcase the beauty of Creation. Here's another one about crazy birds of paradise. (Caleb, did you see any of these in Papua New Guinea?)

2007-01-12T21:14:00.000-05:00

Criminal Minds

If you're still reading this by now, you must be a Marine. Anyhow, my apologies for forgetting to blog while at home for the holidays. I hope everyone's Christmas and New Year's went better than Mr. Chalk up there. Don't get the wrong idea, I'm definitely not an avid fan of the CBS show "Criminal Minds."

I am however, more interested than in the past, as I was fortunate enough to have my song "Hallelujah" chosen to be on the most recent season DVD release. The funny thing, though, is that due to the way copyrights work, my song got chosen to be on the version released outside of North America (Region 2). The studio probably only paid to license the original songs that aired on TV for use in these United States. So Mom, I'm sorry if you have to go to Fiji in order to see my song in the show.

2006-12-23T18:41:00.000-05:00

And so this is Christmas...

2006-12-18T16:16:00.000-05:00

Before the Music Dies

The record business is dying, but the music business is alive and well.

2006-12-11T21:16:00.000-05:00

What everyone owns, no one owns

I've been researching for a presentation I have to give tomorrow on Marxism, and happened to run across this article.

What's wrong with saying "Merry Christmas" or calling green things with lights "Christmas trees"? When those phrases are said, I along with most people probably tend to think about American traditions of gifts and decorations rather than the Reason for the Season (or this). The connotations aren't necessarily entirely Biblical. If Santa Claus had anything to do with any specific religion, he'd be out the door too.

I guess I'm just saying that it won't be long until the day itself won't be called Christmas, but The Holiday or something. I'm all for fairly representing all religions and all forms of celebrations, I just think that what people are shying away from is more of an American tradition.

What would an eight foot menorah look like anyway?

2006-12-08T17:56:00.000-05:00

Tracking has begun...

I woke up at 8:34am this morning. "Sounds good," you say. "Not bad for a college stoodent," says another. Well, let me tell you that it is in fact bad, considering that I had a Physics of Sound final exam that actually started at 8:00am. Oops.

It's been a long time coming, but this past weekend we finally began recording for the next CD. It looks as though there will be somewhere around 12 songs, hopefully with something for everyone.

Here is where we tracked drums.

In other news, I opened our big brown trash can that sits beside our house only to find a raging half lion / half horse creature eating our leftovers. That scared me.

Answer key: "stoodent" = "student"

2006-11-27T19:17:00.000-05:00

I'm really busy this week...

...the time for blogging will come.

2006-11-20T19:48:00.000-05:00

There are 35,000,000 Americans who struggle to feed themselves. In by far the richest country in the world, this should not happen.

2006-11-14T00:58:00.000-05:00

2006-11-10T01:18:00.000-05:00

Who We Are

All people are the same deep down. Celebrity doesn't exclude anyone from feelings or temptations. The only importance or status anyone has is what other people assign them, not because they are somehow more than human. Why do we assume that a ruler is any greater than those being ruled? Are they not just in the position to rule that we give them?

If we believe that everyone is equal, including people of high status, we must also believe the same about those we view as socially inadequate to us. True, some people are more easy or glamorous to love, but I don't believe God discriminates.

In my short experience I have noticed that it is common for Christians to shy away from or excuse people that don't live similar lives or share the same values. Maybe they drink or smoke or, heaven forbid, do something "worse." We allow these to become barriers in our minds, believing that they are so worldly that they wouldn't care about what we offer.

We religiously allow ourselves to believe that we would never do such things and that we are therefore superior (because we are "above" the things that "they" do). How excluding and elitist that view is! Truth is, we are all susceptible to the same temptations and Christians don't seem to be sinning any less than unbelievers. As much as I hate to say, it doesn't seem as though we accept that we're all broken people.

When we preach a message of elite religion rather than humble love we absolutely set ourselves up for an "I knew you didn't believe what you preached" mentality. I've always been fascinated that unbelievers smell fake religion better than we do, coming to the same conclusion that we should: we aren't made for religion, and we can't keep it up.

The relieving part of this is that we don't have to be religious and put off a certain holy vibe; it just naturally happens (in an inviting rather than intrusive way) when we truly seek the love and life that Jesus offers us. And I argue that this is the only thing that separates us from people who are not Christians, not an egocentric man-made pedestal.

2006-11-04T19:47:00.000-05:00

40 Watt
I have noticed something lately: no matter what the situation, I always have some formulated picture or idea of how it ought to be. I don't think I am alone on this.

On the most simple levels, we eat because we are hungry; we turn on a light when we can't see in the dark. But even beyond basic necessities, I find myself wanting to feed my hungry self a certain way and light the room so it's inviting.

I like having 40 Watt bulbs in each corner of the room. Call it ambiance or whatever. I light candles and listen to Bach whenever I do homework or read. I enjoy aligning situations with how I feel like they should be. It's almost like bringing them back up to the level they belong rather than just trying to make them better.

Should our lifestyles as believers reflect the same mentality? As people who know God's love as being right and perfect (the ultimate standard of "good"), shouldn't we live in pursuit of making the world around us as good as it can possibly be by the power of love?

We can create a life ambiance that is saturated by a comforting and peace-giving God. We make things as they ought to be by putting a 40 Watt bulb in every corner of our world.

2006-10-30T17:14:00.000-05:00

Halloween, 1983

Q: Why do demons and ghouls hang out together?

A: Because demons are a ghouls best friend.

2006-10-28T16:03:00.000-04:00

Pay It Forward
Over the past couple of weeks I kept hearing people mention the movie Pay It Forward. I had seen it after it came out a long time ago, but for whatever reason I just kept thinking about wanting to watch it (which ended up turning into a date with thelongbrake).

Two things I really enjoyed about the movie:

1. The impact of doing good deeds. Often times I feel as though I've been taught to do good, but not to make the deed known to many people. Sort of a humility thing I guess. But why, then, would Jesus tell us that for others to know God and praise him we must let our good deeds "shine before men"? I feel like there's a very real gap between our faith and our deeds (aka, our faith has nothing to validate it without the deeds). We somehow try to show people our faith by our faith rather than an outpouring response through doing good and expressing God's love to others.

2. Change is preceded by facing the imperfection head-on. Numerous times in the movie different characters' lives were transformed, but only after they fully admitted to their addiction or mistakes.

It's like when we helped our neighbor move into her house. She insisted over and over that we let her pay us for helping, but we didn't take any money. This doesn't make sense to a world that sits firmly on an equal reimbursement mentality (I give you X amount and you give me X amount in return). She ended up returning the favor in the form of an incredible lasagna (so for all of you who do not win Josh's photo contest, there is more than one way to get that lasagna).

What happens when we give somebody something with no expectation in return? All of the sudden they are launched into the laws of the Kingdom, where the world's natural laws simply do not amount to anything. Love is the currency, where one transaction mysteriously brings value to both the giver and the receiver.

2006-10-24T15:09:00.001-04:00

Somebody's brain was Left Behind...

2006-10-19T11:55:00.000-04:00

Perception

I was talking with some friends a few days ago about what kind of car we would drive if we could have any in the world. Ironically, the conversation was spurred by our observation of the great number of really nice, really new cars there were in the church parking lot as we were leaving.

I've heard of stories where someone wealthy "blesses" someone else with a good deal on a really nice car that they probably otherwise wouldn't have been able to afford. Most times I've seen this happen within a church congregation. I understand the good intentions (and am definitely not discouraging generosity), but sometimes I think we overlook the ramifications of such things.

I believe that perception is often no different than our acceptance of reality. Take the new car thing for instance. If I were given a really nice car, only a few people in my life would know that it was a gift. Everyone else would just perceive that you were attempting to acheive a certain lifestyle.

I was given a really nice black North Face jacket a few weeks ago, and wear it quite often. I would say that maybe five people know it was a gift, and everyone else assumes I spent $90 or $100 on it. Again, I am not saying there's anything wrong with trying to look nice or whatever. I'm just realizing that my life looks a certain way to other people, regardless of whether or not I know that my motives or intentions were different than they perceived them to be.

Our beliefs are validated by our lifestyle. Take Shane Claiborne for instance. People test him all the time when he's on the road speaking. "So, which hotel are you staying at?" Since he stays with families to save money and build relationships when he travels, his beliefs are validated by his actions. James 2:14-26 has a great deal to say about this.

2006-10-16T23:42:00.000-04:00

Chipper (1991-2006)

I don't often quote any t.v. show, let alone The Office. Not sure if anyone reading this saw the episode Thursday night about the bird funeral, but the timing was uncanny. It was about grieving with death, culminating in a parking lot funeral for a bird that had committed window suicide earlier the same day.

"Death is just a part of life."

Nothing that I haven't heard before, but for some reason it stuck with me...especially when I received the e-mail from my mom that Chip hadn't made it through the previous night.

As strange as it seems, this was the first death of any life within close proximity. My grandparents are all still living and healthy. As far as I know, all of my close relatives haven't died since the last time I was home.

It was just a weird feeling. Not going to lie, a tear was shed over the passing of Chip. It's been blessing to have never lost anyone near to me, but I realized that so far death has a 100% success rate of taking humans that aren't also fully God. Well, it even took him for a brief period.

So what I realized is this: our mindset determines how we live (another obvious).

What is the majority of our existence? Before or after death?

2006-10-11T00:03:00.000-04:00

bigger

This is a short film by my friend Dustin Winebrenner. He asked me a while back to add some music and, after some minor hurdles (coffee on my laptop), we got it finished recently. Hope you enjoy!

2006-10-08T01:10:00.000-04:00

How good it is...

That's right. James Taylor singing, meat on the grill, and a great opportunity for our street to become a community. There were about forty people that made their way over throughout the night and everyone had a wonderful experience. I would just encourage anyone reading this to throw a party for your own street. I guarantee that it is worth every penny and every effort.

2006-10-02T23:06:00.000-04:00

It's set! This coming Saturday we are having our street over for a cookout. After walking around to the 48 houses and delivering flyers, Clint and I sat down on our porch swing and realized that we have absolutely no clue what we've gotten ourselves into.

This is supposedly going to be a cookout, but the only grill we have is one that we ironically found in one of our neighbor's front yard with a "FREE" sign on it. I'm pretty sure that if they already decided that the didn't want to eat off of it anymore, then they won't want to this time either.

Also, we realized that this is going to cost a fair amount of money to provide everything except for the meat (everyone is bringing their own). We are now officially accepting donations and prayers.

2006-09-29T19:41:00.000-04:00

There's no horse like Patches...

2006-09-27T22:49:00.000-04:00

He who answers before listening-
that is his folly and his shame.
Proverbs 18:13

I've realized that I would have benefited a lot more from taking a Listening 101 class rather than a speech class here in college.

It's ironic, but I truly believe that listening well says the most.

It's like in middle school where whenever a kid has their hand up their ears close and the no longer are listening to the teacher. So often I mentally have my hand up, so to say, when someone else is talking to me. What good is it if I ignore what they say in anticipation of sharing my own opinion? And even if I hear, does that mean I'm listening?

My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak...
James 1:19a

2006-09-24T18:51:00.000-04:00

I recently had some professional pictures taken by my friend Cameron. Check them out by clicking the flickr badge on the sidebar.

2006-09-22T14:47:00.000-04:00

What follows is an excerpt from a book about the Salvation Army.

Two things distinguish us, and both are available to anyone: An openness to God's grace and a commitment to demonstrating it through service to others.

Hoard our assets (yearly budget of over $2 billion)? We exhaust them in the effort to reach more and more people.

Lower our expectations? We are out to save the world.

Trust no one? Our best customers - and future partners - are drug addicts, prisoners, the enfeebled, and the desperately poor.

If we are naive in our commitment, then God has blessed us for it, even if we count only the lesser blessings a hard-line business manager would acknowledge. We have survived and thrived for longer than just about any company in America. We are called "the most effective organization in the U.S." by the best-known management theorist in the world. By any material measure, our workers are vastly under-compensated; yet not only do we attract and retain dedicated life-long employees, we also have 3.3 million voluneteers, many of them prominent in their communitites and in the nation, who are eager to donate resources and time we could never afford to acquire or hire. And every year we are priveleged to serve 30 million people, many of whose lives are transformed before our eyes.

Our world, we believe, is the real world. It's as full of hope as it is of hurt. All we have to do is open our eyes and let its reality liberate our hearts.

questions

2006-09-20T15:11:00.000-04:00

why is it hard to make time for prayer?

why is it so much easier to keep busy than to stop and rest?

why am i so quick to ignore someone who asks me for money?

why does one negative thing often taint five positives?

why do squirrels have such long tails?

what am i taking for granted today?

what pressures do i feel and where are they coming from?

why am i so selfish?

why, if Jesus is so satisfying, do believers ever look elsewhere for fulfillment?

why are we so short-sighted?

why does it feel like things should be different in the world?

why do i blindly accept so much without trying to understand?

2006-09-16T19:07:00.000-04:00

The Rut Perscription

In my short experience I've realized that repetition often precedes rut. I ultimately get to the point where I'm doing a lot, but not really feeling like it's accomplishing much.

People with glasses will probably understand this metaphor...I compare it to when I'm sitting in the chair at the eyedoctor's office and am finally looking through the correct perscription. It's a moment of clarity where only then do you realize that you haven't been seeing as clearly as you could have previously.

Change is gradual. It's like the story of the boiling frog. If you put it in cold water and slowly bring it to a boil it won't recognize the difference and will cook.

I started this academic year with an excitement that has gradually been drained by school, music, etc. Each day's time gets filled with one thing or another and we soon get into a schedule. We all enjoy structure, so a schedule is really comfortable. It's like a nice warm bath...I'm just trying to figure out how to not get cooked.

What happens when my vision goes bad is that I only see the few steps ahead of me (or I only really see me) rather than the whole path ahead. Focus turns from God and others to myself. C.S. Lewis said in The Screwtape Letters that it is silly for a human being to ever claim ownership over anything, including time.

"They will find out in the end, never fear, to whom their time, their souls, and their bodies really belong - certainly not to them, whatever happens."

So to me there is a difference of mindset that comes when I decide how to use God's time instead of seeing it as my own. Because God's vision of productivity is drastically different than ours.

2006-09-13T21:41:00.000-04:00

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

If you live anywhere near Murfreesboro, please make it out to Bonhoeffer's coffee house (next to MTSU) after the football game tomorrow night.

Rumor: Bonhoeffer's has free coffee.

True. (with suggested donation, of course)

Rumor: Dietrich made a killer vanilla latte during his prime.

Not sure. (but I'll bet the coffee house named after him does)

2006-09-12T12:28:00.000-04:00

The "Nun Bun" was stolen from Nashville's Bongo Java just over a year and a half ago (it even made the news in Europe). Thankfully their coffee is good enough to keep people coming back...though it was a joy to look into Mother Teresa's eyes for 30 seconds as I waited for my drink.

I'm calling for a reinstatement of the Nun Bun. We need to find her and return her to the original display case. And I believe that tonight is the night we should do this! Anyone sharing in this Nun Bun passion please meet me in the top floor of Bongo Java at 7:00 sharp. We can do this together, but not alone.

Ok, actually I'm just playing a concert tonight at Bongo with Gentry Morris. Please don't come with pitchforks or torches or anything looking for revenge. That would be bad.

2006-09-08T13:01:00.000-04:00

Orange Beard has gone to Philly. Will's going to be living in the inner city for the next year with an organization called Mission Year. We'll be missing him on the bass while he's gone, but please keep up with his adventures on his blog.

2006-09-05T15:04:00.000-04:00

"The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority, they show disrespect to their elders.... They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and are tyrants over their teachers."

Naturally, one would assume that this person was speaking of America...but that is impossible. In this quote, Aristotle was speaking of the youth of his time. Funny how things haven't changed?

Let me suggest something: it is often easy for "progress" to mask cycle. What I mean is, just because our country (and media) is heading down a path doesn't mean that it's right and good. America (AKA, "The Leader of the Free World") may actually just be experiencing the back end of a cycle that many other world powers have already withgone.

In Harvard Sociologist Carle C. Zimmerman's 1947 book, Family and Civilization, he presented a list of symptoms for a declining nation. (Remember that this was long before the US went through many changes in the following decades.) Zimmerman took a close look at other centuries' world powers like the Roman Empire, Greece, France and Germany. From observing cultural changes, he determined some consistent factors that appeared in all of their declines. Since Zimmerman was purely a historian and an expert in the sociology of a family, I find this list fascinating and unbiased from a religious or political standpoint. It is hard, however, to not see America bleed through this list. Just take a glance at any current entertainment magazine or newspaper and compare it to this:

Marriage lost its sacredness; it was frequently broken by divorce.

Traditional meaning of the marriage ceremony was lost. Alternate forms and definitions of marriage arose, and traditional marriage vows were replaced by individual marriage contracts.

Feminist movements appeared, and women lost interest in child bearing and mothering, preferring to pursue power and influence. (Disclaimer: Understanding that this list was written during the post WWII 1940s, this point may be driven by that particular time period. I interpret this to mean a complete value transfer from child bearing and mothering to pursuit of power and influence. I am not trying to make a statement about gender equality here. Personally I believe that raising children is far more valuable than any career or pursuit of power and influence. Also, please remember that this is a list of symptoms and not causes of a declining nation.)

Public disrespect for parents and authority in general increased.

Juvenile delinquency, promiscuity, and rebellion accelerated.

People with traditional marriages refused to accept family responsibilities.

Desire for and acceptance of adultery grew.

Increased tolerance for sexual perversions of all kinds, particularly homosexuality, with a resultant increase in sex-related crimes.

2006-09-02T00:08:00.000-04:00

Cincinnati was the destination for this holiday weekend. "The Queen City," "The Queen of the West," "The Blue Chip City," "The City of Seven Hills" and "Porkopolis", "Cincy," "Cinci," "Cinti", "The 'Nati." or "The Dirty Nati", "Cin-City", "The Nasti Nati." Call it what you will, this place has great ice cream.

I just watched a 60 Minutes clip about Dikembe Mutombo spending $8 million to help build a hospital in his native country, Republic of the Congo. It's really great to hear about people giving back to where they came from, especially if it's someone giving a large sum of money to help those in need.

I do admit, though, that sometimes those encouraging thoughts are accompanied by feelings of frustration. During Mutombo's NBA career he made probably at least ten times that much money. Maybe this is just coming from an ignorant, not-wealthy college student, but why not give another $8 million dollars and build a second hospital? In fact, why not build 8 or 9 more while you're at it? In Shane Claiborne's book, Irresistible Revolution, he mentioned that maybe it's not how much you give, rather how much you're left with. What if that is how God measures true generosity? It's hard for me not to believe that God values generosity with sacrifice on our end somehow attached.

The flip side that I often fall into is that I have so little that it really doesn't matter whether I give my $20 or $30 to the Church. But if I have the mindset that I'm called to give what I can (check out this great story), it changes my whole mindset. I heard Steve Garber recently say that if we focus on impacting just what is in our proximity, it is easier to not get overwhelmed with the big picture. Let that sink in for a second.

2006-08-30T18:34:00.000-04:00

The White Minivan. Few things can compare, indeed. Some people have found it humorous that I would name my publishing after a car. Well, this little inanimate object has a name: Drips. Yep. Me and Dripsies on the road again. (She got her name from the time she became a little overzealous and tried to take a curb straight on. You know the saying...it only takes a moment to ruin a reputation. Or something like that. OK, maybe that didn't really relate.) Anyway, I like her because she's like a pick-up truck with a roof. There's a lot of space (this much) back there to load up instruments and free chairs. She always gets me where I need to go.

Thanks again to everybody who made it out to the Curb Cafe last night for the show. Hopefully I'll be able to put some pictures up of shows once I get my computer back. By the way, if you check out my MySpace page, I put up a new song demo called Gloria. Peas!

2006-08-28T17:13:00.000-04:00

Alright, first off please disregard the "Atlanta Parent" portion of the picture. We're operating on a low budget here. Every other part of this picture, however, we hope will come true. My friends and I are planning on inviting the whole street over to our house sometime within the next month. Have no fears...we're going to be out in our front yard to avoid any sort of social hospitality disaster.

We figure that we'll provide everything but the meat. I'm realizing that it's easier to be joyfully generous if our money and possessions are going towards something that is relational; something that we are somehow personally tied to. What that means is that we have to get involved and can't stand on the sidelines.

Let me know if you guys have any ideas or suggestions for what we're trying to do. Also, just a reminder, I'll be playing with David Condos tomorrow night at the Curb Cafe - 8:00.

2006-08-25T18:10:00.000-04:00

If the world were a city
Every country in one
Would you stay in the richest of neighborhoods
Or pretend there were none?

This is the first verse of a song I've been working on recently. One of the biggest questions I've been facing recently is, "Who is my neighbor?" and "How do I serve them?". Jesus told us in the book of Matthew that loving our neighbors is second only to loving God. He said that the whole law and prophets hinge on these two things.

So I was basically faced head on with this realization: I don't love my neighbors like myself, let alone really know the people living next door to me. Now I know that my neighbor is not only the people on my street, but also my classmates, the people I meet at the grocery store and so on. But I honestly don't really know the people next door. Also, I realized that there are people that I'm living with in my own house that I don't have a solid relationship with. As a believer, it is my duty to be the one that serves and loves those around me. I would be embarrassed and ashamed if, for whatever reason, I let these opportunities slip away along with their chance of experiencing God's love.

The way we live here in America doesn't really promote the kind of community that we were intended to experience. The richer we get, the farther apart we build our houses and the more we distance ourselves from our neighbors. I don't want you as a reader to just push this truth aside, or just think it's nice that I'm learning something usefull. The Bible sets a pretty high standard for how we should love each other, including considering others better than ourselves. I can't say I'm really there yet, nor can I say that I've seen a whole lot of people that are really living life like that.

I've had some good talks with one of my roommates, Clint, over the past few days. We decided that we really want to start serving and loving our neighbors and roommates. Willingness to learn and do something can make up for any lack of training. That was all it took. It was as if the opportunities had been there all along, but now our eyes were seeing them. We've had numerous conversations that we previously wouldn't have had if we weren't looking to build relationships with those around us.

The Christian faith and Church is built on two things: loving God and loving other people.

2006-08-23T14:30:00.000-04:00

One thing I've learned in the past week: computers and coffee don't play well together. In fact, usually the coffee wins...at least in my case. It's so bad that I (as much as I hate to admit it) am forced to use a Dell in my school's library. (No offense to any PC users out there.)

But in other news, I'm still waiting for my computer to get fixed. There's a great place here in Nashville called MacAuthority where you can get products made by other companies that are compatible with Mac computers. By the way, if you're reading this and are anywhere near, I'll be playing solo at the Curb Cafe this Tuesday night.

the Church

2006-08-21T19:25:00.001-04:00

What follows is an excerpt from a journal entry written by my girlfriend Brittany on July 22 this summer. Her church college group took a trip down to help with Hurricane relief in Mississippi, and the opportunity proved to be an incredible experience for all who were involved. They experienced life as the Church; one unified Body of people acting for the glory of God.

It has been an incredibly long time since I've experienced the unity of a group like I felt this whole week. Barry said it best when he told the group that, though he was sorry he didn't know every one of them, he felt love for each. I felt and understood this. Finally, I found the Church. Here it was, and here I was within it. At this converted Napa warehouse without so much as a cross, I found the Church. We were functioning as one Body with many parts, and the poor and helpless were the benefactors. We lived together and learned daily from one another, though none of us was ever isolated from the world or the need faced by so many. The needy had faces and names, and we served out of love rather than obligation. We took no offering for the "poor" but spent our days meeting their needs. We received outside support from people like the man who brought the ice cream and bread for family night. This trip was a beautiful illustration of so many ideas I have been analyzing this summer.

So here was the Church, but the beauty and mystery didn't stop there. It went further because Jennifer, the massage therapist from Boston, also sat in on the devotional that night. In the middle of the sharing time I was praying that God would help her see something different in our group, and I was praying for her heart. I was so joyful when I saw her hand shoot up to share. She began, through tears, to describe to the group how she came to Mississippi to do something for herself by serving others. She’s going through a divorce and didn't even know exactly why or how she ended up at Camp Katrina. It was hauntingly obvious to the rest of us that God had drawn her there intentionally and with a very specific purpose. She could hardly speak as she told us that she had never before experienced such immediate love and acceptance, and she realized there was something to what we believed. It was such a beautiful moment to see her free to share to a group she had known for only one day. I am excited to hear what God continues to do in her life. What a joy she was to our group!

thelongbrake takes a shot

2006-08-19T13:53:00.000-04:00

Many thanks to everyone who made it out to Higher Grounds last night. It's always a joy to come home to Fort Wayne and be with such amazing people.

As some of you know, Josh has enrolled in a photography class at a local school. I look forward to seeing that gift grow and be used to impact those of us who vicariously live through his trips and journeys. It's hard to tell where his camera's aimed in this picture, but frankly I don't trust him.

DaVinci Deception

2006-08-18T14:59:00.000-04:00

"If we Christians would take all the energy we put into proving we're right and others are wrong and invested that energy in pursuing and doing good, somehow I think that more people would believe we are right."

Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christian