capturing the moment

May 4, 2003

last sunday was a joint anniversary celebration at rhcbc. musically, the joint worship was pretty hero! i'm always so impressed with the giftedness in music that so many people have at the church. it blows me away again and again. which reminds me, i need to talk to joyce to get hooked up with the tape of spencer singing it up from the easter musical. it was so very hero! but that's besides the point. since it was a joint worship, there was a baptismal that happened during the latter part of the service. i was watching as TONS of people took photos of all the people getting baptized. i don't think i've ever seen so many people bust out their cameras and take pictures of the exact same thing.

so i started thinking about that. what makes people take photos of something? it's a pretty simple reason. you want to capture the moment. you want to capture the essence of whatever is happening at a particular time, and frame that moment in a still photograph. sure, a photograph can't encapsulate all the emotions and thoughts in a particular point of time, but it can certainly help serve as a reminder for that time. reminders like that jog your memory, and help us to recall those feelings, those thoughts we once had. pictures are worth a thousand words. if you want to remember something, taking a photo of it is VERY helpful :)

in our Christian lives, how much more important is it to record or capture the moment, when God intervenes and does something incredible, something wonderful, something only God can do? do we stop, and take a moment to record what happens? or do we let that moment fade away like a fleeting thought? if we really cherish all that God does in our lives, i think it's important for us to capture the moment. maybe that's taking a photo of a setting, or maybe it's writing that down in a journal. by doing so, we can recall how God's been leading us, how God's been molding and shaping us, how God's been answering our prayers, and the list continues. we can even see the character of God by seeing how He's moved in our lives over the past weeks, months, years.

near the end of the book of joshua (chapter 22), the reubenites, the gadites, and the half-tribe of manasseh built an altar by the jordan river. they did it to serve as a witness between their tribes and the israelites and also to future generations to come - it was to proclaim that they would worship the Lord, with burnt sacrifices and offerings. i think we could learn from their example. it's not to say that we need to create altars, but we need to record or mark down what's happened in our lives, like road markings on a highway. we're running a race, and sometimes we need these types of landmarks to remind us that we're on the right track, and there we're running the right race. recording what God has done in our lives does two things:

1) it makes sure WE don't forget what God has been doing in our lives
2) it allows us to proclaim to others what God has been doing in our lives

so what are you waiting for? go out and capture those special moments :) "I will tell of the kindnesses of the LORD, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the LORD has done for us--" (isaiah 63:7 [NIV])

influential music?

if you've never believed someone who said that music has influence on you, whether you pay attention to the lyrics or not, you might want to reconsider your stance on it. i received two exit 10 demo CDs a few weeks back, and listened to it exclusively for several days. i wasn't really paying much attention to the lyrics, as i'd normally be doing work while i was listening to the songs. the CDs weren't really packaged in any kind of normal CD packaging, it was just in the white sleeves, so i didn't have the lyrics to the songs.

early one morning, as i was driving out to sheridan, i started singing along to one of the songs. i was pretty amazed that i knew the song, considering the fact that i NEVER tried to learn the lyrics or sing along to the song. it was by pure saturation of the music that i picked up the words. isn't that incredible? it blew me away. i mean think about it, the simple act of listening to a single CD for a few days enabled my brain to store the lyrics of certain songs in it! and it wasn't like a pro-active thing either. it just did it, without me knowing it. i'm guessing that's what psychologists call the sub-conscious. it's there, but you're not aware of it.

so my question is, what kind of music are you exposing yourself to? i'm not trying to start a debate between secular and Christian music. and i'm not condemning those that listen to secular music either, because there's nothing really wrong with it. i have to admit, i've started to listen to more secular music recently, just because i'm trying to broaden my musical 'palette' to include a wider variety of styles. but is it beneficial for me? is it beneficial for you? that's another story. take a look at some of the lyrics of your favourite songs, and consider what the message is saying. now, if you're listening to these same songs over and over again, they'll undoubtedely be in your brain somewhere! maybe you don't realize it, but it's there. do you REALLY want songs that are not beneficial to you, to linger in your mind day in and day out?

to say, you like a song simply for the beat, regardless of whatever the lyrics are, that doesn't cut it. you can't block your mind from processing and digesting the lyrics. it's just not possible. so what do you do? be mindful of what you are listening to, that's all!

"'Everything is permissible for me'--but not everything is beneficial." (1 cor 6:12 [NIV])