A place for my random thoughts, anecdotes and reflections of what I see and experience in this lifetime.

Monday, January 31, 2011

Watto is my hero

Thanks to Watto (and Binga), the AUS cricket team has redeemed itself (after losing the Ashes on home soil dismally) by winning the ODI series against ENG, and fittingly at the Gabba :D

Now, let's see if the stadiums in India will be ready in time for the ICC World Cup starting in a few weeks time.

Anyone have Foxtel in their house and willing for me to camp out at their place for 2.5 months?

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Anti-Self Proclamation

I was one of 2,000 people that welcomed Chris Tomlin at his 1st ever concert north of the border last night.
I don't do Easterfest, Sonfest or any of those things but as my husband and many other church friends love his songs and the way he goes about his passion for music (more on that later) we made sure we were free on this Australia Day 2011 to see Chris in person for ourselves.

Now, the extent of what I knew about Chris is pretty limited and may not be anything worthy of mention (Chris would agree with this statement, again more on that later)- an American Christian songwriter that is often seen with his frequent collaborator Ps Louie Giglio, who tours with him explaining the Christian message to those that are Christian and those that are not.

Now this was the 1st ever Christian artist concert I have ever attended. With the location at what I would call a pentacostal church I had expected there to be a mosh pit of some sort and many people filled with emotion with their hands raised. I wasn't disappointed as my expectations came true somewhat (well, minus the mosh pit).

What I was disappointed with though (and this is my personal view) was the distinct difference between the two Christian bands that were playing that night.

The first band to grace the stage was the Parachute Band from NZ. Again I don't know much about them. I got the feeling that they were the 'support act' for Chris and his band, and my viewpoint of a support act is that they should usually complement what is to come from the main artist. (I say 'usually' as I'm sure this is not always the case with many artists- take U2 for example who had Jay-Z (an R & B artist) as their support act last year.)

Anyway, after listening to both Parachute Band and then Chris, these are the things I picked up on:

Parachute Band seemed very hyped up and had the characteristics of a modern Christian band with an aim to tap into the younger generation through songs that had a modern feel to it . They used language and phrases that sounded nice and used some Christian-sounding words, but didn't have as great an impact or challenge for us to see our true selves as sinful, condemned people.

Both bands did utilise passages of Scripture throughout their sets which was pleasing to see. Without Scripture, what difference would that make to any other music artist/band?

Chris was extremely humble, which is not normally seen in any music artist. And I mean.............. truly humble.

I'm not saying that he was the 'thanks but I am just doing things that I love and feel really honoured that people will listen to my music because it comes from my heart etc etc etc' type of humbleness.

The humbleness that Chris possessed was simply ' Hi, my name is Chris. I'm so happy to be here with you all tonight, singing praises to our awesome God. All of us here on this stage are just here to assist you in encountering God if you do not know Him, and to know Him better if you do. You might be here because you saw a name shining out in neon lights. I do hope that the main reason you are here tonight is because the name you see in neon lights is no other name except the name of Jesus Christ, because there is no-one else who is worthy to be praised, honoured and glorified than Him'.

That was it- no fanfare, no statements of proclaiming one-self as being gifted or special than any other person in the room. He just saw himself as a musician that through God's grace and wisdom is able to write songs that are focused purely on everything that God is- His character, His love, His mercy, His grace, His mighty deeds, His sovereignty, His justice.

We didn't leave the concert with the thought of 'How great was Chris', but most importantly 'How great is our God'.

Monday, January 24, 2011

Lost the Plot

Firstly I had a nightmare of a dream where everyone I've ever known/knew had turned against me one way or the other, as a result of a decision which I thought wasn't that big a deal ended upbeing so important and significant for everyone else that they all deserted me.

I can't remember in detail what exactly happened but it must have extremely put them off from associating with me ever again. Therefore I was ex-communicated from all society, given the mark of condemnation for everyone to see.....................kinda like Jean Valjean having to show his yellow ticket of leave so everyone would forever associate him and treat him as an outcast.

Then I came to work and a spyware virus found its way onto my server session. This was because I now had to start from scratch all over again, researching and finding all the hens weekend activities that had been carefully planned for the past year, as our hard drive has completely died so we cannot access anything.

Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Hello 2011!

First day back at work for the new year.
Nothing much worthy of note.

BLT January is next week which will be great as we look at Missions and Evangelism which every person who confesses Jesus as their Lord should do every day for the rest of their lives.