Today's post is a song by one of my favorite musical artists. I've done a couple of her songs before, but she's got a new one that is gaining all kind of popularity in the Christian music scene. As a huge JJ Heller fan, I'm absolutely thrilled for her. This song was used as the music for an audition for So You Think You Can Dance. Since then, it has received all kinds of acclimation. I do hope that folks go back and pick up her back catalog as she is one of the most talented musicians I've heard. There is just something about the singer-songwriter that makes me happy.
Part of the break from blogging has been that there's been a lot going on in our family lately. Lots of good stuff, but I've also had to deal with some more difficult issues as well. These caught me a bit off-balance for a time. There is a sense of equilibrium that has been restored, but those seasons always remind me that there is Someone who holds me close. Someone who knows me and who loves me despite my flaws and my fears. Someone who doesn't change my circumstances, but who has given me friends and family to help me work through them.
So here's Your Hands by JJ Heller.
I have unanswered prayers I have trouble I wish wasn't there And I have asked a thousand ways That You would take my pain away That You would take my pain away
I am trying to understand How to walk this weary land Make straight the paths that crooked lie Oh Lord, before these feet of mine Oh Lord, before these feet of mine
When my world is shaking Heaven stands When my heart is breaking I never leave Your hands
When You walked upon the Earth You healed the broken, lost, and hurt I know You hate to see me cry One day You will set all things right Yea, one day You will set all things right
When my world is shaking Heaven stands When my heart is breaking I never leave Your hands
Your hands Your hands that shape the world Are holding me, they hold me still Your hands that shape the world Are holding me, they hold me still
When my world is shaking Heaven stands When my heart is breaking I never leave You when...
My world is shaking Heaven stands When my heart is breaking I never leave... I never leave Your hands
Sorry for the long hiatus. It wasn't really intentional, just how life went for a few weeks.
Anyway, I should be back to more regular posting this week. I've got a few ideas that I've been mulling over for the past few weeks and I hope to have some time this week to flesh them out a bit. It's difficult to say how successful that will be, but I'll have a go at it anyway!
I hope that you have had a good start to 2010 and thanks to the couple of you who have been nudging me back to writing again!
I'm sure I've done this song before, but when I start thinking about my favorite Christmas songs, this one leaps to mind. Hark the Herald Angels Sing has one of the best lyrics I've ever heard. I just can't get over the third verse of this hymn. In those few lines, it conveys the beauty of the Christmas season more beautifully than I can imagine.
For our Christmas Eve service at Chestnut Ridge Church, we're doing the Israel and New Breed version of the song. Not the whole thing (regrettably!), but at least a portion of it. They've added a whole extra flavor to it that is just fantastic, so I'm including that recording here. Definitely take the four minutes to listen! Also, if you're inclined, you can listen to our version of it at noon on WVAQ radio. They have free online streaming, so you can listen to it while you hang out with your family.
I'm not sure if I'll get back here to write again before Christmas. So if you celebrate Christmas, I wish you a joyous day! And if you don't, I wish you a great day anyway!
Hark the herald angels sing "Glory to the newborn King! Peace on earth and mercy mild God and sinners reconciled" Joyful, all ye nations rise Join the triumph of the skies With the angelic host proclaim: "Christ is born in Bethlehem" Hark! The herald angels sing "Glory to the newborn King!"
Christ by highest heav'n adored Christ the everlasting Lord! Late in time behold Him come Offspring of a Virgin's womb Veiled in flesh the Godhead see Hail the incarnate Deity Pleased as man with man to dwell Jesus, our Emmanuel Hark! The herald angels sing "Glory to the newborn King!"
Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace! Hail the Son of Righteousness! Light and life to all He brings Ris'n with healing in His wings Mild He lays His glory by Born that man no more may die Born to raise the sons of earth Born to give them second birth Hark! The herald angels sing "Glory to the newborn King!"
We tend to see that a lot on the interwebs and television before we're even into Thanksgiving leftovers. Ultimately, I think it's a good sentiment. But perhaps not for the same reason that many who are shouting it think.
What does it mean to me to keep Christ in Christmas?
1. Be Generous. I think this is one of the easier ones to remember at this time, though I think we can get caught in the trap of equating generosity with monetary or physical gift giving, when we can all be generous, regardless of our financial situations. Most of us have time to give to serve another. We can open our home to spend an evening with friends. We can donate an unused toy or piece of clothing to someone who doesn't have as much. We can be generous with our smiles, with our patience and with our love.
2. Tell the Truth. The amount of speculation, half-truths and downright lies about what people are doing to Christmas is just astounding. Aside from it being just bad form to spread untruths, these kinds of things can stir up anger and hatred toward our fellow humans. If something seems like a particularly egregious offense, take a minute and see if it's true before passing it on.
3. Laying Down Offenses. The Bible talks quite a bit about choosing to put others in front of ourselves. If I choose to get all worked up because a minimum wage worker at CVS tells me "Happy Holidays" or that a corporation sells "holiday trees," I'm choosing offense over love. Philippians 2:1-11 is one of my all-time most favorite passages of Scripture and I think that it speaks to this pretty strongly. When I keep Christ in Christmas, stupid stuff like a happy greeting that isn't worded the exact way I want shouldn't incite me to behave like a jerk.
What are some ways that you can keep Christ in Christmas?
Over the Thanksgiving weekend, Jason and I went and updated our cell plan to get a family package. Deborah (now that she's a working woman) got her first cell phone as an early Christmas present and I finally became mobile again. We had a great time picking out phones for everyone and figuring out what plan would work best for our family.
One of the things that we insisted on was a plan that included unlimited text. I realized this summer that children Deborah's age don't communicate in any manner other than texting. She would send emails that would go unanswered as well as phone calls that would be left unreturned. It seemed that the only way she could stay in touch with her friends was to have a phone and the ability to text. Fortunately, she now has the option and has reconnected with several friends from her old school as well as a friend she made over this summer. So far she has been very responsible with not getting into texting until her homework is finished, not texting when we're doing something as a family and not taking her phone with her (or turning it off) when she's interacting with real live humans. I've seen people completely ignore folks they're with in order to take calls/answer texts and it can be pretty crazy sometimes. Hopefully her phone experience will be marked with common courtesy!
All that said, I must admit that I'm quite loving the ability to text again myself. My dear friend Tina and I have been able to have some really fantastic conversations 160 characters at a time. We've talked about silly stuff like our favorite David Sedaris lines and the weather to weightier subjects like feminism and religion. She's able to sit her her tree stand hunting and I can sit at my desk working and we're able to have conversations that would otherwise be unavailable to us. I find it absolutely fascinating that we're able to communicate that way. The two of us were big note passers in high school -- I guess that urge has never quite left us!
As this year is wrapping up, I was looking back on some of the goals that I set in the beginning of the year. I've followed up on some pretty well, some less so. One that was big to me this year was spending more time on relationships and I feel like that has been pretty successful. There are still areas relating to that where I could improve, but overall, I feel like I was able to really invest in a few people and improve the relationships that we had. I'm very thankful that there are people in my life with whom I can be very transparent and honest and who feel safe enough to be the same with me. Thanks to those who have given the time necessary to reach that point. My life is significantly more rich because of you.
And sometimes that richness is found in 160 characters or less.
A couple of months ago, my friend Rich posted a link to a Gabe Dixon Band video on his Facebook profile. Regrettably, I didn't watch it for some time, but when I finally did, wow! What a treat! They're a piano trio and I highly recommend checking them out.
A few weeks ago we did All Will Be Well in church. I think it's a beautiful song (and it was a blast to play), but my favorite that I've heard so far is my choice for today. Maybe it's just because Jason and I were a long distance couple for so long in the days before cell phones and email and even cheap long distance, so I relate to those drives when I was tired because of school and didn't want to make the drive, but definitely wanted to be with my man. So even though the time is a bit longer than our drive was, here's "Five More Hours" by Gabe Dixon Band.
We crossed the Brooklyn Bridge,
About ten or twelve hours ago
Angel takes the wheel for me
When I'm too tired to drive alone
Mesmerized by highway lights, flying underneath
Angel don't stop.
Angel don't stop
Angel don't stop
Cause we've got to go
Angel don't stop
Angel don't stop
Angel don't, I'm almost home
I've got five more hours of highway
Five more hours to go
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I know
Heaven only knows the time I've wasted
I'm so close now, I can almost taste it
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I love
The countryside between us is fortunate indeed
To feel the love from me to you, and soul from you to me
I'm drifting off
I'm driving south
I'm a December birth
Angel don't stop.
Angel don't stop
Angel don't stop
Cause we've got to go
Angel don't stop
Angel don't stop
Angel don't, I'm almost home
I've got five more hours of highway
Five more hours to go
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I know
Heaven only knows the time I've wasted
I'm so close now, I can almost taste it
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I love
Oh Angel don't stop (Oh angel don't stop)
Oh Angel don't stop
Oh-Oh-Oh Cause I'm almost home
I've got five more hours of highway
Five more hours to go
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I know
Heaven only knows the time I've wasted
I'm so close now, I can almost taste it
Five more hours of highway, till I'm in the place I love
Today is the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. There aren't a whole lot of songs celebrating natural selection and evolution, so I'm going to turn to the Johns yet again. This is from their latest DVD for kids, Here Comes Science. Enjoy My Brother the Ape!
Well, I got the invitation That you sent to everyone And I told you family picnics weren't exactly my idea of fun You replied that everyone but me said they were going to come Which is how you talked me into going to the reunion
When you said everyone, you really meant it
My brother the ape My brother the ape
I received the photos you sent And I don't regret that I went Or the sight of everybody stiffly posing under one tent But I don't feel I belong and I keep wanting to escape And I fail to see the likeness between me and my brother the ape
They all kept saying (they all kept saying) How much we look alike (how much we look alike) I don't think that we look alike at all (I don't think that we look alike at all)
But I'll admit that I look more like a chimp Than I look like my cousin the shrimp Or my distant kin the lichens Or the snowy egret or the moss And I find it hard to recognize Some relatives of ours Like the rotifer, the sycamore Iguanas and sea stars
My brother the ape My brother the ape
They say you don't get (they say you don't get) To choose your family (to choose your family) But there's no other one to choose (but there's no other one to choose)
So that's why I'm writing this now And you can tell my sister the cow That I meant to thank her for the gorgonzola And I'll allow that I've been acting like a stranger But you guys are all so strange Though I think of what I'm like And I can see we're all the same
