For Wednesday night -

Hey, I was thinking about putting this under the comments on the Worship Plan post, but in case people don't look at the comments as often I'm gonna do it here...

For putting together the media stuff, I will need all the materials for it - feel free to bring anything you think might be good to include, but these are the things I know I'll have to have soon:

• The Weather Man movie - Eric
• Greeley Pictures - Ryan, anybody else who has some
• Songs you want incorporated - everybody (I don't know if we have any of these for sure, but now's the time...)
• Worship Lyrics - Some of these are probably on the computer at Atlas, but I guess one way or another we'll need to find them. I know Justin and Ryan's songs might not be on there, so I'll need those.
• Disposable camera pictures - Do we want these to be incorporated? I can scan them in if we do.
• Poems - I don't know if we want any of these displayed, if so, let me know. Also remember the litany and other general written stuff.
• Scriptures - Right now I'm seeing Genesis 1 and 2. I can get these myself in NIV, but if we need anything more specific than that, or a smaller/more specific part of the passage, say the word.

This probably isn't an exhaustive list, but if you guys can just be thinking about what things you've worked on that we will need, just bring it and I'll get it ready to go. You can email it to me, - werepants@gmail.com - bring a cd, usb stick, memory card, hard copy of pictures or text, or whatever format you've got.

I think that's everything... be safe out there

Worship plan

So, Tim is still being a cheater and not making an account, but he sent me the worship plan to post, so here it is:


Restoration
April 27th, 2008

Open- Welcome and Prayer (talk about slides underneath being pictures of Greeley, original works...)
Reading Gen. 2 account of Adam and Eve (Ben playing trumpet piece)
Reading of Litany of Restoration Scripture (with music building)
"All Who are Thirsty"

Restoration of Person to God

"I Need Thee Every Hour" (with Harmonica. Flows right into song from "All Thirsty")
"Ryan's Song"

Karen Badly shares

Restoration of Person to Self
clip from "The Weather Man" (I am fastfood)
Time of Confession (Where in life do you feel like you are not who you're meant to be?)
"Fix You"
"Be Thou My Vision"
"Breathed in Me" (Justin performs acoustically)

Restoration of Person to Creation
Video of "Planet Earth" (Aaron creates)
"All Creatures of Our God and King" (end by reading Gen. 1)

Restoration of Person to People
Eric Long's Hospital poem
"Give Me Your Hand" (by A. Strumpel)
Mosaic Activity (take something that was broken...create something out of it?)
"All Who Are Thirsty" (recap)

End
Read "Restoration Wedding" (Sam Performs)
Video of Kids reading Restoration
Band outro's with "Bitter Sweet Symphony"

***Please walk yourself through the evening in your head. If there's something that doesn't fit, comment on it. Offer things we could change... I feel like each section should have some scripture in it. Any ideas?

FreeCulture deploys in New York

So, this group called Free Culture is offering a prize of 1 iPod shuffle to whoever takes the best pictures in Manhattan on Friday, March 28th.

Here's the original post.

To be included, pictures have to be Creative Commons licensed, which means that they can be legally distributed, printed, copied, and/or used in derivative works, while still allowing credit to be given where it's due. It's a very pro-creative license, encouraging people to share art and make more of it.


I think it is kind of neat that this just happens to fall right around the same time as our proposed photo-expedition in Greeley. Also, I think it is an amazing way to help the community come together and contribute to a common cause.

What if we did something like this in the future - got some sort of prize together, asking businesses to donate or whatever, and then created a massive collection of all the photos - it could be a website, or a flickr group, or whatever.

The things I like about the idea: community building, getting people out and about on the streets of Greeley, showing people beauty in places that they never would've seen before, and getting basically a huge stock photo type collection - I could see this as a potential benefit to all sorts of Greeley-based organizations, just having a huge base of area-relevant images for presentations or marketing materials or just as something to hang on the walls.

What do you all think? Is there enough interest in Greeley? Would it flop? Are there any other benefits/challenges you can think of?

I love Bradley Hathaway

I do. I really do. But you will too. I don't remember if Eric or someone read this once or not... sorry if he did and I'm just being repetitious...

I went to Bradley Hathaway's show on Saturday in Ft. Collins, and it was AMAZING. I've seen him once before, read and heard some of his stuff and always liked it... but this show was really just an awesome, spiritual time. Really... it was a time of worship. it was a time of meditation, of reflection, of crying out to God, of celebrating His love... even just as I sat there in my chair and drank my hazelnut latte and closed my eyes and soaked in the words...

this is from his old cd... but he read it then, and i'd love to share it now.

Celebration Wedding

Bradley Hathaway

This is for the ones whose hope is falling
And you no longer hear your savior's calling.

This is for the ones whose backs are turning
And that passion-filled heart you once had has stopped burning.

This is for the ones abandoned.
Now all alone with no solace
and you think you're stranded.

This is for you empty, by life branded,
That had a vision that took leap, but it never landed.

This is for the ones who are plagued.
By those mysteries of life.
And you feel torn inside
by this mind of spirit and strife.

This is for the ones whose desire to do good is always outweighed
and you don't do as you should.

This is for the ones who mistakes are too many to count
and the guilt on your chest just continues to mount.

This is for the ones who have been done wrong by sins.
At the corrupted hands of perverted men.

Hold on.
HOLD ON!

Because soon will come the Celebration Wedding
and bundles of restoration will be our bedding.

Soon will come the Celebration Wedding
and bundles of restoration will be our bedding.

The trumpeter is taking a breath
The guests are taking their seats.
The Bride is putting on a veil.
The Father is making last-minute preparations.

There's Thousands Times Ten Thousand
angels waiting in holy expectation.

The readied groom is readied.

Soon will come the Celebration Wedding

If you are hurting, your hurt will cease.
If you are restless, you will find peace.
If you are empty, You will be filled.
All of these doubts, they'll be stilled.

If life for you is just to trying, Your tears will be dissipate.
There won't be anymore crying.
If the only thing you know is shame, you will be cleansed
and never again feel the same.

If you can't see straight.

foucus.
persevere.
And wait...

10 Q!!!

Good Friday went SO well :)

Thanks to each of you for putting stations together, showing up to setup/cleanup.

From the person who tried to do it solo last year, getting by with a little help from my friends was definitely better :)

~H

my new blog

i have been quite impressed with the user-friendliness of google. so much so that i have decided to switch my blog from xanga to blogger. so, if anyone is interested in reading my thoughts on life, the url is ohmysweetlord.blogspot.com

this video, i believe, really speaks to the idea of being restored. this womans name is evelyn glennie and she is considered the best percussionist on earth... oh yeah, and she is also over 80% deaf.

When it comes to spirituality in nature

Heather's nature metaphor got me thinking (because I think about these things a lot) about something cool I recently read on a science website.

For a photon (a particle of light) neither time or space exist. It moves at the speed of light, and Einstein's relativity theory says that when you move at the speed of light time is essentially frozen. So, if there were to be a little person riding in the photon, from their point of view it would take literally no time at all to travel from place to place. He would move from one end of the universe to the other without experiencing even a single second, or any sense of distance. You would be everywhere and nowhere, forever and never. Existence is 0 dimensional for a photon.

It is interesting to me as a metaphor for God because we have such a difficult time understanding things like being omnipresent or eternal, and good analogies for those things are hard to find. But it does seem to me that somehow this little fact about light perfectly explains how time and distance are totally different things from a divine perspective.

the people living in darkness
have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of the shadow of death
a light has dawned

We <3 TS Eliot!

Of all that was done in the past, you eat the fruit,either rotten or ripe

And the Church must be forever building, and always decaying, and always being restored.

TS Eliot


Sometimes when I ponder the earth, creation, and people in general, I wonder if restoration was hard wired into us when God first created us in the Garden. Or was it something he intended/started after the Fall. Things like grass, which Planet Earth recently told me is the fastest regenerating living thing on earth. It is destroyed, and is rebuilt, more frequently than any other living thing. We see this pretty clearly out in the fields, which were only burned last weekend, yet little green shoots are all over the place.

And with people...we want to be restored. We want others to be in right relationships with us, and it is always so satisfying to forgive, or to be reconciled to one another.

Is this original design? Or something God built in after the fall?

Death and New Life

My cousin Scott died on Friday. Two days before, his Older sister gave birth to her first child. Somehow this speaks to me of the sadness and beauty in the world. There is always death, but there is also new life bringing restoration.

Remember St Patrick on his day

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Lorica of Saint Patrick

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through a belief in the Threeness,
Through confession of the Oneness
Of the Creator of creation.

I arise today
Through the strength of Christ's birth and His baptism,
Through the strength of His crucifixion and His burial,
Through the strength of His resurrection and His ascension,
Through the strength of His descent for the judgment of doom.

I arise today
Through the strength of the love of cherubim,
In obedience of angels,
In service of archangels,
In the hope of resurrection to meet with reward,
In the prayers of patriarchs,
In preachings of the apostles,
In faiths of confessors,
In innocence of virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I arise today
Through the strength of heaven;
Light of the sun,
Splendor of fire,
Speed of lightning,
Swiftness of the wind,
Depth of the sea,
Stability of the earth,
Firmness of the rock.

I arise today
Through God's strength to pilot me;
God's might to uphold me,
God's wisdom to guide me,
God's eye to look before me,
God's ear to hear me,
God's word to speak for me,
God's hand to guard me,
God's way to lie before me,
God's shield to protect me,
God's hosts to save me

From snares of the devil,
From temptations of vices,
From every one who desires me ill,
Afar and anear,
Alone or in a mulitude.

I summon today all these powers between me and evil,
Against every cruel merciless power that opposes my body and soul,
Against incantations of false prophets,
Against black laws of pagandom,
Against false laws of heretics,
Against craft of idolatry,
Against spells of women and smiths and wizards,
Against every knowledge that corrupts man's body and soul.

Christ shield me today
Against poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against wounding,
So that reward may come to me in abundance.

Christ with me,
Christ before me,
Christ behind me,
Christ in me,
Christ beneath me,
Christ above me,
Christ on my right,
Christ on my left,
Christ when I lie down,
Christ when I sit down,
Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me,
Christ in the eye that sees me,
Christ in the ear that hears me.

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through a belief in the Threeness,
Through a confession of the OnenessOf the Creator of creation

St. Patrick (ca. 377)

Stuck in the Middle with you

Here's a story of small restoration that might make a difference someday but who knows.

I have two friends who are splitting up with each other irreconcilably. They were engaged at the beginning of the year, lived together, and one of them cheated to sever the relationship, so you can imagine all of the trauma, drama, and craziness of the past few months.

I'm not a professional counselor. I don't even have any experience in the area of so-called "serious" relationships. (I top out at a wopping 5 months for relationship record...) So when my friends lean on me for support during split ups of all sorts I kind of feel out of my element. (As Anne Lamott says, there are basically only two prayers we pray: Help me, and Thank you.)

Whilst at dinner with the female of the two (who was the cheater), we were talking, and she made this comment, "Wow, we really know how to fuck things up don't we?" I'd been listening to her intently without saying much for about an hour. And it occurred to me to mention, "We know how to fuck things up, but it amazes me how much human beings take that broken thing and can end up creating something beautiful." She paused and then asked me if that's why I love Charlie Brown so much. Yep, everything he touches falls apart, but somehow his friends find a way to put it back together to make something lovely.

She said that was the first time she had smiled in a long time. It amazes me sometimes what happens when I just listen.

I asked my 13 year old sister about times that made her feel joyful, trying to explain in different terms stories of restoration. this was hers...

"it's like when someone you haven't seen in a while comes off an airplane and you see them and you're so excited like "ahhhh!" and you hug them."

Oh Captain

Since we don't have the Project this week, I would like to know what Captain Coons thinks about our stories.

Yes, this is a challenge.

Bullfrogs N Butterflies

So...that's an old song from my childhood: Bullfrogs and Butterflies have both been born again...yeah, don't ask. Atleast I didn't have to listen to that annoying Charity Churchmouse :X

This morning I was listening to Morning Edition and they covered this story.

When caterpillars go into their chrysalis to become buterflies/moths, their entire body basically becomes mush (I believe the lady used "minestrone" to describe it) and then reforms as the new insect. After always associating butterflies with rebirth/new life in God through Christ, this kind of made me think...they become completely new...and yet.....

Research suggests that even though their brains get gooified with the rest of their bodies, they can still "remember" (bug style) things from their caterpillar days. Interesting...as our mind still remembers (in its human style) that old lifestyle it used to lead. And even more interesting: they tested this by applying negative receptors: shocks, poison-type gas. How much of our brain remembers old things which were negative which are now gone because of what Christ did for us?

Struggling with stories

I'm having a really hard time with this story thing - I usually end up somewhere between an ambiguous testimonial and rambling philosophy. I really like to write, but something about the pressure of sitting down and doing it has kept it from happening.

Here's part of a song I am working on though, that tells a little bit of my mental state, and maybe something of a story.

Lord I'm in need of some help now
For I just cannot go on
Doing these things that I hate now
Knowing right but always choosing wrong

The thing that I fear is not flesh and blood
But the hurt that I do to my friends
Your hands want to use me and oh, I am longing
Teach me to love you once again

Lord, save me from who I am
How I need your grace again

Pithy Stories

I've been pondering the idea of just having a smattering of "confessional" type stories...just a sentence or two. Hit reply and post any you think are cool.

Here's mine:

~There are some days when I feel more restored by a cup of coffee than anything else. Is that bad?

Benjamin's Blog

I have some stories.

I think one that I have experienced recently, not directly me, was seeing the transformation of my step-father after his business bankrupted. After our heated meeting yesterday, I was talking with Tim about how male comradery is restoring, and it made me think of Wild at Heart. My step dad liked the book. There...the dots are connected.

My step dad owned Wildflour Bagel Co. It went bankrupt for God knows why, but it really put him in a deep depression. The summer following the bankrupcy, he sought employment. When he wasn't seeking employment, he badgered us about Everything.

House isn't clean enough.
Chores aren't being done right.
The boys are too wimpy.
Etc.

My brothers and I found ourselves swimming and going to the library constantly, mainly to avoid him.

Anyways, he wasn't in a good spot. But with the help of finding a job and being successful at it, along with love from us and my mom, he is gradually becoming a happier dude.

So I know this is a prelim' story, but I think that it may be a valid inclusion.

Tag, your're it.

Stories

Wow. I don't know why, but there seemed to be so much tension tonight. I really hate conflict. In my friendships and relationships I tend to avoid conflict as much as possible. However, somehow, working through conflict is what eventually makes a relationship stronger. I was thinking about two quick stories. The first has no restoration, but it leads into the second, which does.
1 - When I first moved to Greeley, I was a sophomore at UNC. I became friends with a girl named Moriah from my dance class. Really, she was my first friend here. She ended up moving in with me because of roommate troubles on her end. When the semester was over, we decided we were going to move into this cool old college house with a bunch of other kids from the Green party - most of whom were pot-heads. I only knew Moriah, but I could sense the environment would not be good. In December of that year, I became a Christian. The leader of the bible study that I had been going to, Jeff Cook, and his wife said that they had a room opening in their basement. At the last minute, I called Moriah and told her I would not be living with her. When she asked me why, I told her it was because I was now a Christian and I felt like I wanted to be in a place where I could discover what that meant. (By the way, Moriah considered herself atheist and was turned off by Christianity.) Really, what I was saying was that she was a bad influence on my new life. I did not explain it in a tactful way. That was the last time we ever spoke. Later, I wrote Moriah several letters apologizing, and trying to make up, but she never wrote back. I have no idea where she is now, or what happened to her.
2- Eventually, I moved into Kelly and Jeff's basement and I started to discover what it meant to be a real friend. Tim, Rob, Eric, Kelly, and all of them had been friends since college. At some point, they all just decided that they were family. And with family, you don't quit. They pulled me in and I became part of that tight community. I can't count how many times one or the other of us has hurt someone else's feeling or said something hurtful or been unfair. And yet we always work through it. It is hard, and sometimes you just want to quit. But it is always worth it.

Shipyard - Artist Community

So, this is a collective of artists who have built a community gallery thing by putting studios in these big metal shipping crates. They do a lot of mechanical/ kinetic/ electronic art.

They've apparently had a lot of trouble staying in one place, because the city isn't sure how to zone them.

The pictures and website aren't all that descriptive, but I think the general idea is amazing.

www.theshipyard.org

Oy There Good Friday Folks!

If you would, please post your station ideas here, so we've got them all in one place? I'm sure we'll have some time to chat about them on Wednesday as well.

If you're needing some brainstorming time, please let me know! I can certainly help you :)

~H