what would Jesus play? [and other reflections on Arisefest 2010]

sometimes i like to picture Jesus in a modern day setting and wonder how His life and ministry would have looked if it was 2011 when God decided to come to earth in human form to settle the original score instead of 2000ish years ago

would He have watched movies or played computer games? Would He have had His own Facebook page or blog? Would Jesus own a cellphone (my thorts are He probably wouldn’t because He seemed to be quite an in-the-moment in-the-place kind of guy) or gone and watched five days of a cricket test (i suspect He might have done this, and used it as an opportunity to spend some time bonding with His little band of followers throwing out “The kingdom of God is like a slip cordon…” and other teachings)

we don’t really know and i imagine if we put even three people in a room and asked them a bunch of those type questions we would have a variety of strong but differing opinions on most of them

looking back over the last two days of Arisefest – the christian band festival i was privileged to be a small part of (as mc for the main stage) – i thort through that scenario again and came up with a few thorts on the matter

in the unlikelihood (i.m.o.) of Jesus being part of a rock/hardcore/hip-hop/indie etc band that played at the festival…

…He wouldn’t invite girls to throw themselves at the single band members and then take off his shirt and call on people in the crowd to do the same…

…He wouldn’t disrespect the festival organisers and the other bands in a tightly packed band schedule by ignoring signals from the side of the stage to end His band’s set so that the next band could go on, just because He wanted to stay on the stage…

…He definitely wouldn’t lead crowds in vociferous “Jesus is my King” chanting or intense praise and worship and then follow it by launching into “just one more song” when told to leave the stage because He was already a few minutes over…

…and i’m fairly certain He wouldn’t have one of his band members try and physically back the mc off the stage and then Himself physically push him away just for a last few minutes of crowd fervour as He played an extended instrumental ending to the “just one more” song He’d decided to do making Him now 15 minutes over His allotted time…

at the same time as some of this was going on, there were a couple of moments that really stood out for me, and reflecting back on them now, the ones that come to mind pretty much all involved bands that i am friends with some or all of the members of (that makes me happy) – moments like the Harbourlight guys playing their set with such a Jesus-focused passion that spilled over to the crowd, Rash from Versus the Wolf taking some precious minutes out of their playing time to address the crowd and share their hearts for doing what they do (which is glorifying God and reaching people with the hope that is in Jesus) and Tyron from Skylit City – the organiser of the festival – full on passionately singing their bands songs and later on leading the crowd in a time of rampant worship and then finishing their band set and leaving the stage ten minutes before their time had even run out (maybe something along the lines of “It’s all about You” honestly being lived out there)

what would Jesus do? We wear the bracelet, maybe we ask the question, but to be honest i’m not sure it’s hitting the heart of the matter because we can only guess and ponder and hypothesise and possibly argue about it… what might be a better, more accurate question is “What would Jesus have me do?” and it really was a festival for me of seeing some bands and people legitimately answering that question while others simply chased the applause of the crowds or got caught up in the experience of the moment…

to Be The Change (festival theme) you HAVE to start with being changed…

quality dilbert

i went thru a phase of really enjoying dilbert comics and bought a whole bunch of the annuals and watched the super-secret-flippinly-weird-but-fun short-lived dilbert animated series (thankx simon van wyk) and i really dig it because that’s what got me hooked on Pearls Before Swine cartoons by stephan pastis which are really amazing and which arrive in my inbox on a daily basis and so i have not read dilbert for a long time but then this one arrived on my fb wall and it is a classique:

http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2007-12-02

‘raped’ as a fun catch phrase, tweeting tragedy instead of assisting…

what next? leaving the old people outside for the coyotes to finish them off…?

sounds far fetched maybe, but i have just been thoroughly revolted by what i have just read [and i know in this day and age we can get mildly upset and tut tutty and each-to-their-own-device but maybe it’s time for people to stand up and SHOUT WILDLY AGAINST THIS KIND OF FILTH…] and we need to draw a line…

it started with me reading my good buddy Bruce’s rant [totally justified and i agree wholeheartedly with the sentiments expressed] or question [but i know the rant is simmering beneath] about the question of whether there should be a filter on what we tweet, which you can take a look at here:

http://baristabruce.wordpress.com/2010/11/17/who-am-i-allowed-to-chirp-what-am-i-allowed-to-tweet/#comment-302

well actually, to be honest, it began a little earlier with this blog i wrote after my encounter with two horrible t-shirts and then the recent one i wrote about young people using the word “rape” to describe a bad sporting or examination encounter…

but then i went on to yahoo and happened to catch site of the heading of this article where firstly a guy passes out and everyone is too busy tweeting and facebook statusing to go and help him, and later ends with people taking phone pics of a guy as he dies on the street…

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20101117/sc_yblog_thelookout/if-the-science-guy-passes-out-and-nobody-tweets-it-did-it-happen

as a society we are becoming sicker and sicker and what is the worst part is that it is becoming the norm, it is becoming acceptable – we have legalised abortion (baby-killing) and made divorce easier than getting a visa to fly overseas and our government seems to have an anything goes policy when it comes to government officials being involved in corruption/mismanagement of funds and so on…

where does it all end?

i’ll tell you where it ends. with the church!

will the real Christ followers please stand up? because this is where the call to be holy, to be set apart, to be different is at its most vital…

Engage the young guys who are wearing those shirts. Refuse to let someone get away with a statement of how they were “raped by that exam” without being challenged to never again use that word (and sentence) lightly. Leave your flippin phone in your pocket and go and get up on that stage and see if that man is okay. Shout, scream, make a noise – IT IS NOT OKAY – THIS IS NOT ACCEPTIBLE – I WILL NOT STAND FOR THAT.

Cos there HAS to be a line. And we need to speak and act and react in absolute love and compassion and know when and where and how to speak and act. [and the Holy Spirit will guide us in this area, if we pay attention] But we cannot stay silent any longer!

i like it on my breast cancer awareness campaign

a brilliant response to the latest pathetic facebook/twitter status “i like it on my…” where do you like your purse which is somehow meant to raise awareness for breast cancer campaign…

check it out

why soooooo serioussssss-a?

just some amusing pics a friend of mine – aka the katester – linked to on the ‘book

sack race accident [may contain traces of plant]

getting fired via facebook

spot the real joker

marriage to the right person – highly recommendable

so in exactly one week’s time i will have been married to the beautiful Val for exactly one year – and what a year it’s been!

as i say often to people – ‘marriage is highly recommended… to the right person!’ and the ‘to the right person’ bit is the key – not cos i believe in any kind of God-brings-this-person-and-that-person-together necessarily or that i believe that there is only one ‘the one’ as opposed to a number of ‘the potential ones who could be the one’ but because i have experienced or witnessed both

i have some friends who have hurt or are hurting a lot because they dated or got engaged to or even married the person who ended up not being a good match for them – and i have some friends (and myself) who by the grace of God managed to somehow end up with someone who is a the-one match for them (cos history knows i tried my best to work it otherwise on occasion, or so it would seem looking back)

having been married for one week less than a year i can declare with absolute abandon and complete integrity that marriage works – it is incredible – it is a journey and an adventure and an absolute trip… but not without adding ‘to the right person’

because it is also a tough path at times (inevitably you are going to end up hurting – or being hurt by – or disappointing or miscommunicating with the one you love and having a moment or an argument or even – gasp! – a fight – and that completely sucks, cos this is the person you love most in the world and you hate hurting or being hurt by them – the pain is deeper because the bond is so strong)

it is a journey requiring effort and sacrifice and surrender – which we as selfish and prideful human beings really struggle to embrace, especially having grown up in a world constantly screaming the mantra ‘this is all about me’ – and the trick in marriage is really embracing the effort and the sacrifice and surrender and continuing to try and get it right in lifting the other person up above yourself (the beauty is that if she is doing the same thing then we continue to be as lifted up as if we were focusing on ourselves, but with the added benefit of relationship)

it is a path of discovery (new person in my life, new habits, new quirks, new likes and dislikes) – of hey we both find this extremely funny and wow we’re pretty good working alongside each other in the kitchen (which both our families would question in pre-marriage times) and hey she really digs it when i do this and i am so glad that she has chosen to do that chore so i don’t have to and i can do this which she absolutely hated to have to do

it is a choice – day in day out – every single day i have to wake up and choose again – choose the beautiful val over the not so beautiful brett (especially on my bad, lazy, selfish, overcompetitive, procrastinationary, grumpy, i’m right days) – choose to live out those five pages of wedding day vows – promises i make again every day, every day

so whether it’s coffee in bed (one of the highlights of my day – being able to make it for my wife and greet her with a morning kiss) or flapjacks made with packet waffle mix (better than the packet flapjack mix strangely) or scrubs/I.T. crowd/ or Summer Heights High or Eddie Izzard/Michael Mcintyre/Bill Bailey or p.d.a. facebook statuses (within reason) or tag teaming together in a counselling situation or lying together at night solving all the mysteries of the world (or at least our day) or laughing together (a lot! one of the highlights and if you can’t laugh with your person then i seriously think they are probably not a ‘the one’) and private jokes and scrabble or kucky san or trying to lose gracefully at settlers or her asking me random (to me but thoroughly interested and trying to figure out how the world works to her) questions about things i can’t possibly know and woolworths prawn cocktail chips and Terry Pratchett passages and mielies and marshmallow steri stumpies (for her) and purple and that elusive couch (and wedding photos) and dream league cricket and watching her get passionate about justice and not letting us not help people in need and getting to really know her better and totally speak what she is thinking or really meaning and and and

thank you tbV for almost a year of incredible journey – it grows daily – i love you very much and am looking to an even kicker asser year ahead – you really do complete me (you and God)

note to single people: enjoy, thrive, live to the full, desire your ‘the one’ but don’t let it consume you – make the most of the time and freedom you have as a single person and be content in every area of your life (while continuing to keep your eyes open and to ask God and to want that person if you do)

note to dating people: enjoy, thrive, live to the full, don’t live as married people yet cos you’re not and save the stuff for marriage for the person you marry (which may not end up being the person you are dating now so don’t waste it on them now cos it seriously will be a waste if they turn out not to be that person), enjoy each other but keep it uncomplicated and grow in relationship to see if this is your one and part peacefully if not

note to married people: enjoy, thrive, live to the full, husbands, love your wives, uplift each other, keep private stuff private, never diss your spouse (even in jest) in front of others, especially not just for a cheap laugh, if you’re struggling ask for help, choose every morning to serve and lift up and that-person-first and kill selfishness and pride whenever it rears its head, run to say sorry when you have been wrong, don’t ever go to bed angry or fighting, don’t give up, don’t feed temptation, love each other, let’s fight together for marriage – it works, it’s incredible, it costs, it’s worth it!

not the God you don’t believe in

so the other nite we were hanging with some mates from church at our place and the giant of the group (aptly named klein (small) frans) came up with this saying “the God i believe in is not the God you don’t believe in” which i think is brilliant and which i blog posted and made my status line on facebook and twitter (some might say ‘overkill’ – i might say ‘collective ramifications’ but just because it’s a nice sounding phrase – go on, say it out loud… not SO loud, you don’t want to freak out the people in the office, sheesh!)

and i was thinking about it this morning briefly (but very quickly – so a lot of thort in a short space of time – i think my mind just works that way when i set it free as i do from time to time) the idea is we’re comparing Christ followers to unbelievers – so the idea or understanding or concept of God that unbelievers have is not a true representation of who God really is and i would go so far as to say that i also don’t believe in the God you don’t believe in (as a quandary, or a corollary, or whatever it’s called, to the original theoretical!)

but then (at an rpm of millions per second per second) [squared] i realised that actually that statement sadly covers a lot of christians as well – or people calling themselves christians at any rate (the ones who may never be accused of excessive Christ following) – i think churches (as in the buildings and the meetings) are filled with people who have a completely skewed picture of who God is and how He sees them and what His intentions are of relationship with them.

and so it’s sad, but i think it’s true, that i can say to a lot of the christians out there, ‘the God i believe in is not the same God you believe in’

for example, my God would not choose religion over relationships ever (as was hugely demonstrated to me on sunday when an old guy in my church went all psycho on me because some kids had got overly excited when communion was happening, and he chose religion over relationship with me, with them, and definitely did not act or speak in love)

the God i love and serve would never insist on you jumping through hoops of any kind to be ‘good enough’ to be worthy of His love and attention and acceptance – He has already done all the hoop-jumping necessary in sending Jesus – the price has been paid, you just need to accept it and live in that freedom

and so on.