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From the failblog

This scan reminded me of something that once crossed my desktop that I almost didn’t catch. In an article to get people to volunteer to teach English, one sentence read, “Let’s do our part to help stamp out literacy.”

There’s a great lesson here about always keeping your intended audience in mind, but I was too busy laughing to tears to notice. (HT: Provocative Church)

Here’s something else that’s weird but true: in the day-to day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship — be it JC or Allah, bet it YHWH or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble Truths, or some inviolable set of ethical principles — is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.

If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you. On one level, we all know this stuff already. It’s been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.

Worship power, you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to numb you to your own fear. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. But the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they’re evil or sinful, it’s that they’re unconscious. They are default settings.

They’re the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that’s what you’re doing.

These are the words of David Foster Wallace, an author I somehow had not heard about until his untimely, recent death. Infinite Tragedy is now on my ever-lengthening to-read list.

The above quote was copied from Purple State of Mind, the blog of Craig Detweiler.

I caught a little bit of Spiritualized before leaving early to get a good seat for the final two groups I wanted to see Saturday night. Spiritualized might be classified as progressive rock. I thought they might be a little Flaming Lips-ish. I’m still not sure. All I know is that they did a very inventive, wall-of-bass-reverberation, rendition of Amazing Grace. And I was standing far too close to the subwoofers; my heart was leaping out of my chest with each note.

I grabbed some grub then met my wife who had strategically positioned herself in front of the soundboard. We didn’t have to mess with people pressing in behind us or to one side of us, and the mix was excellent.

John Fogerty (of CCR fame) was first. In his early 60s, the man can still rock. His guitar skills are still as sharp as ever, and his band was fantastic. I searched Wikipedia later that night and saw that for around 20 years in the 80s and 90s he wasn’t allowed to sing his own CCR songs for legal reasons. Fortunately, and eventually, his label bought another label which owned the rights to his CCR songs, so we got to listen to nearly all of the songs one would want to hear from John Fogerty.

Then one of the highlights of the Festival came on stage: Alison Krauss and Robert Plant. They’re an interesting pairing; the angelic Krauss and the devilish Plant, the bluegrass country girl and the classic rock god. But the place from where they sing is their common ground. It’s a place of sorrow, longing, and ultimately hope.

I thought, Is Plant trying to atone for his past sins by singing with this saint? Or is Krauss falling toward the dark side in dueting with the devil? Or is this just two incredibly talented musicians collaborating and making great music? I think it’s a little of each.

Of course, another highlight was looking up at some point during the night and seeing Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters less than a foot away from me. He sat by the soundboard during the Plant/Krauss set.

So go listen to some CCR. Then buy Plant and Krauss’ Raising Sand.

After having the fortune to be chosen as a three-day, $50 ticket lottery winner following last year’s ACL Festival, I was excited to attend this year because I didn’t feel pressured to get my money’s worth. The wife and I didn’t go last year because of the expense, but now it seems like we’re living extravagantly because she didn’t even get to attend the first day, and I only saw a few acts. But heck, $50 is the price of one ticket for most of these acts in the first place.

I saw Jakob Dylan and the Gold Mountain Rebels first. He’d never been to ACL and I’d never seen him live, so we both had a unique experience today. His band started off fairly mellow, and it took the sound guys about three songs to finally get the mix right. But the group simmered for awhile until they really started to rock, pulling out a few Wallflowers songs. And yes, Jakob Dylan was more intelligible than his father. But give him another 20 years and we’ll see. (Better review here)

Then I wandered around. I started to see the rise of the dreaded, ominous, and foreboding dustcloud of doom. One would think the event planners had planned well enough to prevent the cloud. But it was happening, and it’s only Friday, typically the lowest attended day. A few years ago we saw Coldplay finish the Festival, and the cloud of dust was horrendous. I hope that doesn’t happen this year, for everyone’s health and sanity.

On a sidenote, I wanted to Twitter from ACL, but was prevented from doing that and even being able to contact anyone because my phone had no signal. Ironically, AT&T is a sponsor of the Festival. One would think they’d know their towers would get hammered. So I wasn’t able to contact a friend there, but, and this is one of the stranger things about this Festival of 50,000 people (I think?) - you typically run into your friends or aquaintances or long-lost roommates at the most random moments. It’s a swirling mass of humanity, but you’ll always find someone you know. It’s weird the first time, but expected to happen thenceforth.

So I met the friend I had tried to text earlier. Not ten minutes after we met up did her text get through to me. After catching up with her, I slung a Stubb’s chopped beef sandwich down my gullet. We met my friend’s friend at the very front of the stage for David “Same As It Ever Was” Bryne’s set. I didn’t know much of his music; I just knew he was creative, talented, and a might bit eccentric.

The set did not disappoint: from the percussionist’s fantastic syncopated abilities, to the drummer’s double-bass, double-snare, double-hi-hat rig, to the frenetic choreography throughout the set and Bryne’s own leadership in the style of cool funk, the hour-long set passed too quickly. Although I think his dancer’s were about to pass out. And when you can sing a song from an office chair while having your dancers enact the words while also sitting in office chairs?

Eccentric, yes, but there are reasons we pay to see shows like this; we need something that is not the norm, especially when the specter of WaMu and all that it now represents hangs over one of the main stages as a sponsor. The world became as small as that stage, focused on the choreographed frenzy of light, sound, and movement. (Better review here).

I left the show thinking, Now if only I could be as cool as David Byrne when I’m older. Now I’m thinking, If only I could be as cool as David Byrne now…

It was a good first day, a nice way to ease into the Festival. Tomorrow brings John Fogerty and Robert Plant and Alison Krauss.

I told myself that I’d write about each of the speakers at the conference individually. I haven’t had a speck of time to get to writing about the second day of the conference. And I keep forgetting that my notes are at my office, and I only have time to write at home, and hopefully some day soon the twain shall meet.

In the meantime, I’m still processing what I heard and learned at the most motivational, moving, and practical conference I’ve ever attended. Not that I’ve attended many, but this conference, from the things God told me or reawakened in me, has profoundly affected me. I haven’t felt this physically good, this emotionally well, or this spiritually awake in a long time. It’s near sublime, and I keep subconciously waiting for the other shoe to drop. But it hasn’t. And I’m trusting God that it won’t. If I keep my eyes on the prize, the race is mine to be won with Christ as the goal.

Until then, I can at least say that Steven Furtick’s talk kicked my proverbial butt. Learn more about him at his blog, the Elevation Church site, and this article in their local paper.

I told myself to get some rest.

OK. I didn’t actually tell myself to get some rest. I sort of just fell to the floor in a heaping pile of tiredness. I’m physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually drained, but my mind has been racing ever since the conference finished. I’m hoping it’s not just a “conference high,” and I don’t think it is. God’s up to something big in my life as a result of what I heard and felt this last week. It’s been an astounding rollercoaster, and I hate rollercoasters.

For the three of you that will notice, I skipped posting about a day of the conference, the day that God used to break me down and tell me what I’ve been missing and what I’m supposed to be doing about it.

Those posts will be forthcoming. I just need to regroup and rest before I tackle and write more about what I heard and experienced that day.

Kem Meyer told us to stop doing so much.

OK, she didn’t actually use those words, but that’s what she said. That’s what she always says. Her blog’s mantra is Less Clutter. Less Noise. so even though it may seem she’s contradicting the Stop Talking. Start Doing. motif of the conference, she’s actually reinforcing it.

People today are overwhelmed by choice, bombarded by advertising, and struggling to redeem their time. It’s up to us in the communications business to convey necessary messages without adding to the mess. Kem listed five myths, but here are my distillations in active form:

Reduce the gap between intent and perception.
See these unfortunate domains as an example. Be warned! Most are risque. But really funny.

Focus your audience’s vision.
Watch this awareness video for an example.

Every communication piece can afford liposuction.
Have you heard about the new stop sign?

Hit the heart within nine seconds.
Nine seconds is both the average attention span for a normal web user and for a goldfish. Trigger an emotional response to engage your audience.

Spend money on the experience, then on promotions.
A bad, personal experience is worse than a typo. A cool flyer that leads to an inauthentic experience is just more dead trees.

The distillation of the distillation? Effective and engaging communications wisely communicate concisely

Shawn Wood, Experiences and Creative Communications Pastor at Seacoast Church, and recent author of 200 Pomegranates and an Audience of One, told us not to touch the poop.

OK, he didn’t actually use those words, but that’s…actually, he did use those precise words. He’s afforded some leniency because he was quoting his two-year old daughter (who wanted to touch the dog doo-doo in the backyard), but I’d even go so far to say he’s completely absolved of any verbal wrongdoings based on Paul’s letter to the Phillipians where he considers everything “rubbish,” which, I’ve been told, may have referred to something a little more pungent than trash.

As it was, he was also reminding us in the church that we’re far too enamored with our stuff when our stuff should only be used to further the good news that Jesus loves us all and wants everyone to know and feel that in the very essence of their being. Yet, we want to “touch the poop” (or in C.S. Lewis’ much more masterful terms, “go on making mudpies”), when there’s something much greater out there to spend our time and effort on.

And it’s when we become so myopic in our own ministry areas that we begin to schism, to lose sight of the big-M, Meaning Of It All.

The distillation? The church is a continent, not an archipelago.

[Of course, he gets bonus points for two things: being on Twitter and using The Office as a metaphor for a day in the life of a pastor.]

Mark Beeson, Senior Pastor at Granger Community Church, told us all to shut up.

OK, he didn’t actually use those words, but that’s what he said. Stop Talking. Start Doing. Unending conversations accomplish nothing in the church for the betterment of the world around us. There’s a reason Jesus said “Go” and not “Discuss.” While there is a time and place for earnest, thought-provoking discussion, it should not last for eternity. Brian McLaren made this point in a different way in Everything Must Change, positing that the church is much too focused on it’s own needs (What color carpet would cause the least congregational uproar?) and not on the hurting, dying world around us. In many ways, the church can become all talk and no walk. He who has feet to walk, let him walk.

Then Mark Beeson told us he’s unbalanced. Which, after listening to him describe his driving habits, was easily believable. But he said that a balanced person never moves. You have to lean into life to get the most from it, all the while remembering that leaning means a greater chance for a fall. Mistakes and failures will most assuredly come, but your team, your spouse, your friends, your family, and your God will all be there to help you back up.

My distillation came from a wise, green, midget alien: Do or do. There is no do not