Music Day - She

Picture this.

North American Christian culture, 2003. At this time it was still a very common belief that video games of any kind were spawn of Satan himself. VeggieTales' Jonah movie was the only film that millions of Christian children had seen in theatres because all the others were demonic in some way (Harry Potter had magic, Star Wars had magic, The Lord of the Rings was simply 'too scary'...), and were you really a Christian if you didn't listen to Adventures In Odyssey every weeknight at seven o'clock?

Into this culture came a group of three women who found instant popularity with pre-teen girls with their inspiring, poppy, uplifting (in every sense of the word) melodies. Behind trendy, pop art album covers in bright purples, whites, yellows, and oranges, they sang catchy, bright songs with slick production. Were you really a Christian girl if you didn't have a ZOEgirl album in your CD wallet?

In 2003, ZOEgirl dropped their best -- sorry, third studio album, Different Kind Of Free. The pop sound had matured along with their listeners -- now solidly into their mid-teens -- and the record took on an acoustic R&B vibe (probably influenced by BeBe and CeCe Winans, Nicole C. Mullen, and Out Of Eden, who were all big names on Christian radio at the time). Even the bright colours of ZOEgirl's previous offerings were muted, with a palette of blues and greys decorating the album.

DKOF still offered uplifting, poppy lyrics in the first half of the album. The album kicked off with their trademark energetic songs of dedication to God. This is a simple goal, but difficult to execute well. Executing these well had always been ZOEgirl's strength.

But halfway through the album, the subject matter takes a wildly different turn. The electronic bass, staccato rhythm, and lower vocal register of Wait was the only warning the listeners got of the shift. It was skillfully subtle -- I doubt most people realised what Wait was about, as the topic of suicidal ideation was absolutely never touched in churches at the time -- but to those of us who knew, we knew. Those of us who already felt the cold tentacles of depression tightening around our souls and minds knew that song was for us.

In an artistic move both bizarre (given the subject matter) and necessary (given the parents of the target audience), the next song was perhaps the breeziest and most carefree song of ZOEgirl's entire career. Feel Alright was a stylistic, if less manic, throwback to Upside Down from their first album. It was also the song I skipped over the most (despite loving Upside Down when it first come out), because it was the least relatable and the least intellectually stimulating. But they had to put it there, because the following song was a doozy.

She was a slow burner for me. My best friend at the time, a year older than me and a pastor's daughter to boot, caught the significance of it immediately, but she had no way of expressing to me what she saw in her life and in the song. I found the song too slow and boring and brushed it off as album filler. But as our ways parted and I saw the absolute worst the evangelical church had to offer in the wake of my calling and my cousin's death, I began to see what she had seen... enough that when I found Daniel Amos' brilliant album Doppelgänger in 2013, I 'got it' immediately: the church of North America was extremely broken. In Doppelgänger, I could see the indictment of the church in the lyrics clearly. But ten years had passed by then, and I had forgotten about that soft little ZOEgirl song which had sharp teeth.

The other day, out of nowhere, my brain started feeding me lyrics: She's alone / Caught up in the undertow / Where it takes her no-one knows...

I started listening, and the rest of the lyrics arose from my dusty memories from over half my lifetime ago. Then I dug the track out of the bottom of my iTunes and listened to it for real.

What a ballsy song.

To release a song not only about teenage sex and pregnancy out of wedlock, but to also use that song to point the finger directly at the failings of the church on an album specifically targeted to young teenage girls would have been CCM PR suicide if not handled with kid gloves. So they tucked it in one of the 'filler' slots (it's track eight out of eleven), mellowed down the music so it wouldn't attract immediate attention, and trusted God would open the ears of those who needed to hear. My guess is that most listeners, like me, assumed it was a typical 'don't have sex before marriage' song (yes, those are a thing in CCM), and completely failed to see that they weren't placing the blame on the girl, but on the church that didn't have compassion on her.

She went to them for help

But blindly they cast the first stone

They could have taken her in

But instead they left her on her own

All alone...

And it worked. No feathers were ruffled, DKOF is still regarded as their best album, and ZOEgirl made another successful album before calling it quits.

I just... I am in awe if the finesse they needed to pull this off, especially at that time, and it worked. Nowadays critique on Christian culture in Christian music is more common (and still sorely needed), but at that time for a Christian band to make a song blaming the church instead of the girl was revolutionary. It was countercultural. It could have ended their careers. They could have been excommunicated from the church for a song like that, but they did it anyway. They hid a scathing critique in plain sight for those of us who needed the warning the most and they lived to tell the tale. And those teenagers in 2003 are now the ones calling out the hypocrisy of the evangelicals.

Maybe that's why I can never quite let this group go. I've always chalked it up to nostalgia (which is definitely a factor in my enduring love for them), but the more I listen with my jaded adult ears, the more I realise there was more to this little pop-vocal group than any of us realised.

The Sovereignty of God

May I ask a question of the evangelical church of North America?

Why, when my cousin died, did you continually insist, 'Well, you know, God is sovereign. There must be a reason. Even if you can't see it, there must be a reason. Just trust Him'...

meanwhile...

...when I mention that, after YEARS of prayer and soul-searching, I suspect God might be calling me to be an artist, you counter with 'But there's no money in it! You'll die alone, impoverished, and probably mad. You have to pick a career that will pay. It's the wise thing to do. It's your God-given responsibility. You can't expect a free ride from anybody. You have to be smart'?

Look. If God is sovereign, God is sovereign. He is not sovereign only when it gets you out of a raw situation (i.e. comforting someone who's grieving). He does not lose His sovereignty when you want to dole out advice to some younger person with different talents than you. If God was sovereign when He decided to let my cousin die despite our prayers, He was also sovereign when He made me and planned out my life.

You, church, people of God, cannot flip-flop between whether or not God is sovereign. Can you help guide my path (as the Spirit of God leads)? Yes. Absolutely. I have no problem with that. (In fact, if the Spirit is leading, please do.) I do, however, have a problem with you cloaking your nasty opinion of my gifts in the phrase, 'well, God told me...' If God did not tell you that, very, very, VERY clearly, then you are taking the name of God in vain -- using Him as a vehicle for your own opinion, using His glorious name as a mere trump card.

And then you wonder why nobody thinks much of God... maybe if you had respected Him enough to attribute to Him the consistency of character that you insist He has, we'd have a more formidable picture of this great and glorious God.

On Encouragement

'Encouragement' is a concept I've pondered a lot since I began to take my calling as a performing artist seriously.

We as artists say we want to encourage people. We as Christians say one of our goals is to encourage each other.

So how does an artist encourage someone? Especially if you're a dance artist -- one who performs without words? Anyone can write a song with the lyric 'don't give up,' but how do you communicate that clearly in dance? Do you bother trying to say something so abstract so clearly? What about all the art that deals with the hardships of life -- the stuff that actually resonates because it touches on things so deep yet so common? Can only sugary sweet, 'safe and fun' art encourage?

Yet in my own artistic intake I continually find myself going back not to the happy, smile-a-minute songs, but to the ones that acknowledge -- no, press into -- deep pain. My favourite Terry Scott Taylor album of all time was written out of the loss of his grandfather and his oldest child within months of each other. It was in these expressions of melancholy and frustration and deep pain that I found solace. It was these songs, these albums, that gave the me courage to keep going. It was that knowledge -- that at least one other person on the planet, at at least one point in their life, had felt this despondency -- that kept my own despondency from swallowing me.

I came up against this concept again last year when, in the most intense and prolonged mental/emotional/spiritual struggle of my life (thus far), my church hung me out to dry. They told me I was too negative. Many stopped speaking to me, and those who didn't made no secret of their frustration with my despondency and repeatedly told me, 'you need to be happier,' 'you should be over this already,' 'you're not trying hard enough.' One person in leadership actually told me (in writing), 'Kate, it is your responsibility to encourage people by being happier.'

I was dying -- literally dying. And all they told me was 'it's your fault we don't give a crap about you.' They wanted me to earn what they should have been giving freely.

The other day, out of nowhere, the thought struck me: does 'encouragement' exclusively mean 'making someone happy'?

If so, then why do I get more encouragement out of one song born out of deep pain than out of an entire album that is so cheerful it causes a sugar coma? Why does one make me take a deep breath, wipe the tears from my eyes, and say, 'thank you,' while the other makes me writhe in near-physical pain from the confounded cheerfulness of it all?

Why am I encouraged by the things that acknowledge the brokenness and sadness?

Maybe because 'encouragement' is actually not so much about joy as it is about coming alongside someone -- walking with them, whether the journey is easy or not. Think of Sam coming alongside Frodo. It was dark, it was difficult, it was by no means happy. But Sam was an encouragement to Frodo because he was right there, literally beside him, sharing the experience of the darkness, even though he could easily have checked out and gone home. Maybe encouragement is about companionship and empathy, not fake smiles and fluffy words. Maybe encouragement is a lifestyle -- a commitment -- not something that gets switched on and off. (And I am almost certain that it's not dependent on whether you think the other person 'deserves' it or not.)

I've always said, since the very beginning of my career, that I wanted to do for others what my favourite artists have done for me. So that's my goal: one day, I want to be able to give the next wounded soul the same companionship and comfort -- the same encouragement -- that my favourite artists have given me.

Society, Silence, and Christian Expectations - A Brief Rant

Found in the Notes app in my phone. I still stand by this.

K. Rant time.

I am sick of society DEMANDING we keep silent about the things that bother, hurt, or frighten us. I am tired of people expecting everyone to always be happy and always be okay. I am tired of people misinterpreting others' pain/struggles as 'they're just looking for attention' or 'they're just whiny.'

I hate this unwritten code of silence. And it's at its absolute worst in the churches and 'Christian communities' of North America.

Christianity, by definition, follows a guy WHO WAS BETRAYED BY HIS FRIENDS AND EXECUTED BY THE GOVERNMENT, yet somehow Christians expect everyone's life to be trouble-free? To the point where if you DO struggle, you're blacklisted because it pokes holes in their theology?

That's not Christianity, people. That's Cloud Cuckoo Land.

The People Of God

The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians, who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door, and deny Him by their lifestyle.
That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.

(Quoted in dc Talk's 'What If I Stumble?,' 1995.)

Lately, as I navigate my calling as an artist (and all it entails), coming to terms with the trauma in my past, the faith community that has by-and-large told me God can't love me because (any number of stupid self-centered reasons but mostly because God made me an artist), and the loss of several friends because I'm 'too depressed,' I'm becoming increasingly disillusioned with the whole thing.

I grew up in the Christian bubble. I freely admit that. In a lot of ways, I'm still in it. But I don't like what I'm seeing. It doesn't make sense. And it's not necessarily God that I have a problem with (although I do still have trust issues with Him due to my cousin's entirely unnecessary death in 2015). It's the people.

The people of God -- oh, that's a lofty title. The people who reflect God -- all His love and compassion and kindness and joy and wisdom and justice and gentleness and patience. The people entrusted with His work of restoring broken people and reminding them they are valuable. The people originally called 'little Christs' because they were so much like Him.

You know who the people of God really are, on an individual level?

They are that person at church who tells you you are too negative and that you need to be more happy or else you can't be friends anymore.

They are that church leadership figure that actively stifles your gift (and no-one else's) because they have a 'feeling' that 'people might not like it.' (Not 'is this a direction God wants us to go?' not 'is this gift forbidden or approved in Scripture?' not even 'does God have something to teach us through this person's use of this gift?')

They are that other church leadership figure that talks behind your back -- telling your friends not to associate with you because you're 'too negative.'

They are that friend who's been through darker valleys than you have, who literally stops talking to you BECAUSE you're 'too depressed' -- then gets upset when you go to someone else for support.

They are that friend who, even after learning you're in therapy following a suicide attempt, keeps telling you to 'get over it.'

They are that best friend who basically cuts off the friendship -- hoping you won't notice -- and when questioned, their excuse is 'you're too personal.'

They are that person who told you they cared about you and then began literally grading every email you sent them, based on 1. whether they were 'too long' or not, and 2. whether or not they had a 'good balance of positive and negative.' Without addressing anything you actually said in the email.


I sense a theme. God's ambassadors are consistently telling me that I'm annoying and too talkative and too deep and too negative. Ergo, this must be the way God feels about me too. I mean, that's what His representatives are telling me.

You know what's really stupid?

All these same people keep telling me 'God loves you...'

Friday Happened - A Rant

Friday happened -- but Sunday's coming.

This was a common sentiment on my Facebook page over Easter weekend this year. Right from the first it seemed odd to me. I'd never heard it before -- and I grew up German Baptist in the Bible belt and am currently attending one of the oldest, most recognisable Bible colleges in the country. Believe me, I know all the cheesy phrases.

But the main thing that bothered me was how much this little statement trivialises the pain and grief of Good Friday. It brushes all of it aside with a wave of the hand and a 'yeah, yeah, that's not important.' But it is important.

Maybe I'm more sensitive to these things because I have gone through hell the past two years and have had all of it waved aside by nearly everyone I know (I do say, 'nearly' -- there are about two or three people who 'get' it or at least valiantly try. I treasure them greatly).

The sermon at the Easter Sunday service I attended focused on Mary Magdalene on the first Easter morning. It was a phenomenal sermon, but one of the things that he emphasised that I really appreciated was just how despondent Mary was that day. Any other time in the Scriptures when an angel appears, the human they visit falls down in fear and trembling and takes them seriously. Not Mary -- the angels of God are telling her that Jesus is alive, and her grief and despair is so thick that the freaking angels of God can't penetrate it. (This wasn't one of his points, but it's something I thought of: most times in Scripture there is only one angel at these kinds of things. But here there was more than one. That's a very unusual occurrence, yet their message still failed to get through to her.)

Furthermore (back to his sermon) -- the thickness and heaviness of her despair (depression) is so great that Jesus Himself shows up and she almost misses him too.

People -- grief can be intolerable. Even in three short days it clouded Mary's vision to the point she could not see that the best thing that could have happened in the wildest childhood story had actually happened in real life.

You cannot brush the grief and despair of Good Friday aside with a mere 'yeah, yeah, it happened.' If you're going to remember and commemorate an event, you have to at least try to feel what our spiritual ancestors felt that day. That's the only way you can do justice to it. Sit with the grief a bit. Feel the heaviness of it. The good news of the resurrection will mean nothing without the emotional backdrop of grief to give it context. No, it's not a pleasant feeling. Suck it up. Get out of your comfort zone for half an hour and realise just how dark the darkest day was. You cannot see the light of Easter morning properly without realising just how bleak things really were. And then you will take the light of Easter morning for granted because you have no emotional reference point for it. Don't just share a Facebook meme and think you've done your duty. Think -- really think -- about this weekend. It's not about duty. It's about love -- actual, real love, with action, not lip service. And pain -- actual, real pain, that changes things permanently. And how they intermingle.

Yes, Sunday's coming... but Friday happened.

Don't trivialise the pain. Don't trivialise the grief. Don't trivialise the weight of the despair. Don't just assume anybody 'gets over it' in five minutes. You don't. And some of us are so blinded by it that we are unable to see Jesus Himself standing in front of us, calling our name. Don't mock us or get upset at us for having a worse life than you -- often through no fault of our own. We ask your patience, your listening ear, your gentle restoration, and your constant prayer, not your rolled eyes, your self-help tips, and your holier-than-thou attitude.


You're too afraid of hurting
Been playing cover-up
Expose yourself to dying
And in this real world
It is your calling...

You've been a wide-eyed innocent
Come to the garden
Come to the hill
Come to the tree
Come to the kill
Won't break your bones but it can break your will...

~ Daniel Amos, 1983 (Angels Tuck You In)

Music Day - Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music?

Title pretty much says it all.

I was first introduced to this sentiment at about age four through one of my dad's mixtapes which contained Chris Christian's knockoff of this week's song, and that's kind of been my rallying cry (both as a fan and as an artist) ever since. Why do Christians have to settle for a subpar subculture? Why does the music we make have to be seventeen times blander than than 'regular' music? What makes us so 'special,' so sensitive? Are our stomachs so weak we can't handle quality songwriting/musicianship? (Of course, one usually answers with the argument 'that's what the labels want' -- but I'm asking this of the labels themselves.) Why must Christian music -- or any kind of art done by Christians for that matter -- be the vegan-friendly, gluten-free, low-fat, caffeine-free alternative to music?

I digress. But you can see even in that mini-rant how profoundly this song has shaped my life, even through the indirect channel of Chris Christian's reference.

As for the original, it too was a rallying cry for a previous generation of artists who were Christians. It was also a bit of an apologia from the father of Christian rock to his brothers and sisters in the Lord who would rather pretend he didn't exist. However, I suspect none of them ever heard the message, given that it was couched in a swinging '50s rock arrangement. And even if they had tried to listen to it, they no doubt would have turned it off after hearing 'They say to cut my hair / They're driving me insane / I grew it out long to make room for my brain...'

Full of verve and sass and musical bounce. This was music that was unashamed of itself. That's rare in Christian music, kids. Observe and enjoy.

Title: Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music?
Artist: Larry Norman
Album: Only Visiting This Planet
Year: 1972
iTunes here; YouTube here.

The Problem With My Church

I've ranted before about the church -- both the specific church I attend and the church in general. I've gone on and on about the apathy, the cliques, the exclusion, the frustration of disorganised people and (the worst) people who say they'll do something and don't follow through, often texting me at the absolute last possible second -- oh sorry can't make it, can you fill in for me?

Sure -- except I'm also filling in for about six other people right now. Get off your lazy butt and keep your word.

Yesterday though, two things happened.

One: Yesterday was the official farewell service for our associate pastor and his family. Two: The White Heart Facebook page (you just knew they'd show up in here sooner or later) posted a status asking what is one thing we'd like to change about our churches.

I have to set up the first one a bit. The previous associate pastor had been phenomenal. He pretty much single-handedly introduced me to the real God -- not the sadistic white-bearded 'God' of popular imagination, the real, holy, beautiful God. It's thanks to that pastor's work that I still attend church at all.

So when he left and the next associate pastor came in, naturally our standards were very, very high. Perhaps too high, especially since this one was fresh out of Bible school. Of course, it took him some time to get a handle on the job and it took me even less time than to dismiss him as sub-par (it sounds so horrible when I write it out now, but it didn't seem so bad in my head).

For two years I mostly just tolerated him. Looking back, he implemented some really great stuff that I personally am genuinely thankful for, but I didn't see that. All I saw were the times when he would cancel something and tell everyone involved but me. The times where he would be leading the song service and I would be on PowerPoint and he would randomly change the order of service on the fly, leaving me scrambling and the congregation completely lost.

But today, at the farewell service, several very different people got up and talked about their memories with him and his wife. All of these people had nothing but gratitude in their hearts and in their words. And it wasn't just because the pastor was leaving and they wanted to make it look good -- no, they meant what they said. Every one of those people confirmed each other's statements in their own previously prepared speeches. Every one of them saw his creativity, his passion, his desire to help people.

And I got to thinking: if they all saw the same thing... then I'm the one in the wrong.

Here I had been all high-and-mighty. At least I tell everyone when plans change. At least I arrive at meetings on time. At least I know what I'm doing.

What I failed to realise until this farewell service was that it wasn't that he didn't know what he was doing -- he was just doing it differently than I would have. Different, but not necessarily wrong. After all, he accomplished a lot of stuff in two and a half years -- far more than I would have in his position, that's for sure.

Suddenly I began to realise what I had missed, simply because I was too busy picking apart his flaws to see his strengths. I was ashamed -- for the words I've spoken behind his back, for the thoughts of fury in my mind when his spontaneity clashed with my 'perfect' PowerPoint presentation and made me look like an idiot in front of 175 people. Note the use of the word 'me' in that sentence. It was all about me. He was making me look stupid. He wasn't up to my standards. He was more of a relational person, rather than the theology nerd I wanted.

I was so focused on how he was 'ruining' my plans that I didn't bother to look at him.

Exhibit two: the Facebook status.

I re-read the status after I posted my (severely self-censored but still lengthy) rant on it and noticed it said one thing you like about your church and one thing you wish would change. I had put down two things and three, respectively. Oops.

First up was the clique issue. There's a lot of venom behind this one. I spent five years wasting my time and energy and my parents' gas money attending youth group only to go completely unnoticed. Eventually one of them finally told me I was stupid and annoying. I stopped attending youth group and began plotting my own demise in earnest. If the Christians couldn't love me, nobody could.

Next up -- the 'college and career' group they just started. Oh wait, did I say 'college and career'? How quaint! How stupid one must be to think 'college and career' actually means 'college and career.' Hah! What a joke! What a laugh! And you thought you would actually be with likeminded people. Oh, you poor sap, Kate. How innocent you are!

Welcome to the 'college and career and junior high and senior high and whoever the freak else wants to join because you 18-and-over people aren't actually that important to us -- it's much more fun with the young people there too. You know, the ones who aren't yet being bullied by their relatives into making more money right freaking now and moving out when you're not yet self-sufficient and are still perfectly content with you finishing your education before they cram all that you're-an-adult-now crap down your throat' group.

The third rant I already mentioned at the beginning of this post (the one about people volunteering and then un-volunteering at the absolute last possible millisecond).

I posted the comment, but as I reread it, I started to feel doubly ashamed of myself.

For starters, my first two rants are embarrassingly polar opposite. I hate the cliques -- yet I'm angry that this group doesn't get to be clique-ish. Put another way, I hate the cliques... except when they include me. Then I will whine and argue and fight to the bitter end to keep it exclusive. Way to be all-or-nothing, kid.

So what's the problem with my church?

The problem is me.

I'm a selfish brat. Everything that I see as being wrong with the church stems from how much it inconveniences me. Are there issues with the church? Definitely. Do they need to be worked on? Absolutely. But maybe before I start demanding they fix everything that inconveniences me, I should let Jesus fix me first. How can I expect others to be open and loving and perfect if I'm not? I mean, I already knew I wasn't perfect, but somehow I was still expecting everyone to do everything my way. How can I sit and whine about everyone else expecting everyone to pander to their tastes when I'm expecting them to do the same thing for me?

Is this the church of Kate or the church of God?

Reeling...

I don't know what to say. My heart is heavy as I type.

We are now under a Nazi government.

Start a firestorm in the comments if you like, but you mark my words. If nothing changes, if God sees fit to leave us as Albertans in our depravity... I shudder at the thought. They have clearly stated that they will indoctrinate our children (can you say 'Hitler youth'?) and those children will grow up to lead our country in thirty years.

How shall they lead a country when all they have been taught -- all they will ever know -- are the perverted whims of a power-hungry, family-destroying, disrespectful government?

In fact, even now it is happening. I see this indoctrination in otherwise very intelligent and rational people.

The enemy does not lie in wait at our door anymore, he is already inside.

And yet we sleep...



Please, Christian brothers and sisters around the world, pray for us. We who see what's coming are despondent today -- speechless. This is a terrible blow. We are disillusioned and weakened by the shock and yet in the near future we will have to fight harder than I think any of us alive today have ever fought to hang on to our freedom. Please pray for our government to be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit, that we will be strong in the face of what appears to be swift and inevitable persecution, and especially that we would be faithful in praying for you as you have and will so lovingly pray for us.

Music Day -- And An Urgent Request

(I had a different Music Day post all ready -- complete with pictures and everything. I spent more than five hours on the stupid thing. Oh wait, heaven forbid Blogger can just put one line of text right underneath the picture, not ten tab-returns below it or beside it. So now I guess you can just read part of the text because I refuse to blow the rest of my sleeping night swearing at Blogger. I might post the pictures part later when Blogger decides it has a brain behind its operation.)

Anyway.

(*painstakingly pieced together photo montage with scary-appropriate captions that won't work goes here*)







 

The government of Alberta is taking measures to censor Christianity and erase all moral and ethical code.

In fact, it's not just Alberta. Ontario has already passed similar legislation and I think at least two other provinces have done the same. This is going to sweep Canada unless the body of Christ suits up and comes to fight. This is clearly the work of Satan, trying to make sure the future generations of Canada will not ever get the chance to hear of the just, merciful, loving, holy, majestic God who created them.

Please pray this will not come to pass. That the church of Alberta will rise up and protest -- with love and respect, but also firmly.

And we need your help now. Yes, yours.

Whether or not you homeschool your children, whether or not you even have any children, whether or not you live in Canada, whether or not you're a Christian, today is your day to speak up.

I post this at approximately 2.00 am Mountain Standard Time on the ninth of March. Two of the legal representatives of homeschooling in Canada have declared the ninth of March as a day when the pressure on the Canadian government is turned up -- substantially.

They -- we -- are asking that everyone who is concerned about this, no matter for what reason or where they live, to contact the Premier of Alberta or the Minister of Education today and respectfully make their opinions known. There has already been a phoning and letter-writing blitz going on this week, but it's only been amongst Albertans. Since the Premier and the Minister of Education continue to push for this legislation with alarming determination, we are inviting Canada, North America, the world, to join us.

I'll be posting some links below that outline the specific situation. Suffice to say, if this legislation gets passed, all I can see is Nazi Germany all over again. One of the governmental higher-ups was even quoted as saying, "(Whatever the nature of schooling -- homeschooling, private school, Catholic school -- ) we do not tolerate disrespect for differences." (Emphasis mine.)

Of course the statement was later 'retracted,' but if that doesn't sound like Hitler, I don't know what does.

Please pray. The freedom of Alberta, indeed of Canada as a whole, hangs in the balance. Not just for Christians, but for everyone who doesn't fit the 'Aryan' mould our government clearly intends to impose on us.

Now for the song (I had a nice segway here but it wouldn't have made sense without the pictures).

The other day on the commute from dance, while listening to the ShufflePod (as I call it now -- the iPod nano I listen to on shuffle), this track came on. And immediately I thought of music day.

So here it is.

Title: WAR

'Artist': John Piper

Year: 2007

Listen to and download the free MP3 here. YouTube here.

I'll let the track speak for itself... all I can say is it's powerful.

Again, please help us put pressure on the Alberta government to retract the changes to Bill 2. Whether you pray for the softening of hearts or you actually make a phone call or send an email, I as a homeschool graduate, a Canadian, and a Christian, on behalf of my Christian homeschooling parents, my Christian homeschooled siblings, and all my Christian homeschooled friends, thank you in advance.

Contact information:

Honourable Thomas Lukaszuk, Education Minister

423 Legislature Building
10800 - 97 Avenue NW
Edmonton, AB
Canada T5K 2B6
Phone: (780) 427-5010
Fax: (780) 427-5018
edmonton.castledowns(at)assembly.ab.ca

Premier Alison Redford

Office of the Premier
Room 307, Legislature Building
10800-97 Avenue
Edmonton, Alberta T5K 2B7
Phone: 780-427-2711 (ask to be connected with the Premier’s Office)
E-mail: Use this form.

Links explaining the details of the situation:

http://www.hslda.ca/blog

http://www.aheaonline.com/

Both pages also contain links to other very informative articles.

Restless...

This is me rambling a bit, just so you're aware.

The last few weeks have been torment for me.

It's as if I had forgotten Jesus is going to return and suddenly I remembered... and it terrifies me.

Since I claim to be a Christian, I'm supposed to be ready. And I don't feel that I am. And that in itself terrifies me even more, because then obviously I don't find Jesus as precious as He should be to me. Or maybe I don't know Him at all; maybe it's all head knowledge from a lifetime of attending church.

Perhaps there's a huge glaring sin that's separating us. Once you're God's child, sin doesn't completely cut you off from God, although it does strain the communication.

But I don't know if I'm God's child to begin with.

I 'prayed a prayer' when I was five, and then sort of renewed my commitment a couple years ago as I was beginning to understand more of what it actually meant to be a Christian. But does that count? As much as I think about pleasing God and trying to do as much as I can in obedience to His word, I feel I don't do anything... that I'm just going through the motions of life.

But what more does He want me to do today? I'm pretty sure I know what He'd like me to do in the semi-near future, but what about now? What about today? This moment? What can I do this very hour, minute, second, that will bring glory to His name, no matter if no one else notices or cares? In my daily life, how can I live it to the fullest for God?

I think the church in general has, over the years, built up this misconception that the only way you can serve God is to go live in the remote jungles of Africa and preach to an entire tribal group that formerly participated in witchcraft and cannibalism and human sacrifice. And it makes everyone who God hasn't called to that sort of thing feel either 'less Christian' or free to sit on the couch and watch televangelists all day while other people do the 'dirty work.'

Nobody makes note of the fact that the mission field is all around us. That God can call you to be an accountant or something and still serve Him by doing that while at the same time being open about your faith and reflecting Christ to your spiritually-lost family, friends, and neighbours. Because the church seems to have decided that this sort of thing isn't important, I and everybody else have no idea where to start glorifying God in our normal daily routines. And that's a tragedy really.

What was that Jesus said? 'Go into all the world and make disciples of all men.' All men. Not just the remote tribesmen of Africa or India or Central America somewhere. All men, in all the world -- including first-world countries like Canada and the US.

But we feel unequipped for that. We had led ourselves to believe that you must be special and have been visited by an angel in order to do any mission work. (This just occurred to me... why do we want an angel to tell us to do this when Jesus Himself gave the command? Who has greater authority than Jesus to give such a command? Answer: no one. The big guy Himself, if you will, told us to do this. So hop to it. (This applies to me and everyone else, by the way.))

And this ties in to the other part of my fear.

I have many unsaved relatives and a few unsaved friends. The difficulty is, most of them would, if asked, call themselves Christians because most of them, at some point in time, did attend church. How can you show them they may not be Christians after all? I can't even know that for sure... maybe they are. Maybe if they died, they would end up in Heaven. But maybe they aren't, and maybe they would end up in Hell, forsaken by God for eternity (Think about that a minute. Eternity -- literally forever, no end, no 'undo' button).

The less spiritual fruit you see in their lives, the more you worry about their eternal destiny... and the more likely they are to be offended if you broach the subject. You want to avoid being hypocritical, especially when you yourself are struggling with a number of things, but you also genuinely worry about the condition of their soul. If Jesus came right now, where would they end up? And would He look at me and say, 'I gave you a chance to show Myself to them. Why didn't you?'

How can you answer that?

You can't just walk up to them and start preaching at them. They'd never speak to you again. But you also can't just stay silent because you have no idea how long they have and you really do want them to end up in Heaven.

There's this old Larry Norman song that talks about Christ's return. One line says 'I wish we'd all been ready...' and that's been my thought for the past couple of weeks. I want everyone in the world to be ready. I don't really have a lot of enemies, but even if I did, I wouldn't want them in Hell either.  Jesus told a parable about a rich man and a beggar named Lazarus (not the one He rose from the dead -- that guy was real). Lazarus sat outside the rich man's gate and begged for bread, but the rich man never helped him. When they both died, Lazarus, because he trusted in God, went to Heaven. The rich man, because he didn't know Jesus, went to Hell.

And as the rich man was tormented in Hell, he saw Lazarus enjoying Heaven with other people who had followed God and he pleaded with Lazarus and Abraham to help him. They said they couldn't -- the rich man had had his whole life to make his choice and now he was stuck with it. Then the rich man begged them to send someone to Earth to tell his brothers to avoid Hell at all costs. And Abraham said, 'There are people on Earth who know Jesus. Your brothers must listen to them. Because if they won't listen to the Christians, they won't believe someone who's risen from the dead either.' (This is all paraphrased... find the official version of the parable in Luke chapter 16 verses 19-31.)

You know, that's us. We are the Christians that the rich man's brothers need to listen to. They can't listen if we leave the job to somebody else because eventually we're going to run out of 'somebody elses.' Notice how the rich man didn't say 'Woo-hoo, I'm the first one here for the big party in Hell!' He pleaded that his brothers would be warned so they could avoid this terrible place. Misery does not love company in the case of Hell.

So we owe it to all the lost who have already died to let as many people as possible know what they're heading for and that there is an alternative. We can't force them to make the decision of course, but we can give them as much information as we can and love them as God does.
And pray.
Maybe sometimes that's all we can do. But maybe sometimes God asks us to do more, and we have to do it.

Don't think I'm preaching at anyone reading this. I'm not. I'm just trying to sort of my own thoughts. (That's why it probably seems to go off on half-thought-out tangents. Also, it's very likely that I didn't explain something as well as I could have, or that I've got something completely the wrong way. Check this against the Bible if you've any doubts or questions.)

If I could have one wish

I know just what I'd like to find

If I could have one dream

Come true before my eyes

More than a pot of gold

More than a pathway to the stars

More than anything I know

I want Jesus in your heart

      ~ Connie Scott, Jesus In Your Heart

(from Spirit Mover; Image 7 Records, 1985. The song is on iTunes here.)