When I started a website exploring the intersections between faith and pop-culture I did not have this in mind, yet while visiting the COLLIDE Magazine blog this morning I found this video and just knew it had to be shared. I mean, isn’t a church choir singing rap songs pretty much the epicenter of the intersection between faith and pop-culture?
I don’t want to ruin any of the surprising humor of the video, but if you’d like to know titles and artists of the choir’s selections, read the rest of this entry.
If you’re anything like me, you’re a big fan of Pixar movies. (Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo are among my all-time favs.) There’s just something incredible about how they develop characters and tell stories, and they always include touching moments of friendship (with forgiveness often being a major theme). Seriously, how amazing and unexpected is it that we’ve learned life lessons from toys, bugs, monsters, fish, super heroes, cars and rats. (I intentionally left “robots” off that list because I still haven’t seen Wall-E.)
The newest sure-to-become-an-instant-classic from Pixar is called Up, and it’s scheduled to come out at the beginning of this summer (May 29, 2009). So far, it looks, well…different. But honestly, didn’t talking cars, gentle monsters and a family of clumsy super heroes all seem a bit different at first too?
According to Pixar’s website, Up is about a man named Carl Fredricksen who “spent his entire life dreaming of exploring the globe. But at age 78, life seems to have passed him by, until a twist of fate (and a persistent 8-year old Wilderness Explorer named Russell) gives him a new lease on life.” The movie promises to “take audiences on a thrilling journey where the unlikely pair encounter wild terrain, unexpected villains and jungle creatures.”
Just like with all the other Pixar movies, I have no idea what to expect, but I think it’s safe to assume Carl and Russell are the next unlikely duo whose friendship will teach me lessons I never realized I needed to learn, and after getting to know them and learning from them, I’ll know that I’m somehow better for it.
Here’s the trailer:
Feel free to share your thoughts on all-things Pixar, explain why one of their movies in particualr is your favorite, and if you’ve never heard about the lunch meeting where the ideas for all the current Pixar movies were born – from Toy Story (1995) to Wall-E (2008) – do a google search for “pixar’s legendary lunch meeting.” It’s an amazing story of creativity and collaboration.
Update: I went to see Wall-E tonight and really liked it.
I doubt anyone is aware of this (I didn’t even realize it until today), but on November 4, 2008, anewdoxology.com turned one-year-old! Since there was no birthday party (and I’m sure most of you forgot to get a gift), this is your opportunity to share your belated thoughts on year number one and perhaps even offer some well wishes for health (and existence!) in the years to come. To sign the online birthday card, just leave a comment. (Even if you’ve never left a comment on a blog before, just give it a try. I promise it’s even easier than it looks…plus it will mean so much to this young and still somewhat self-conscious blog. Maybe you could even comment on how mature anewdoxology.com is for its age, or something complimentary like that.)
As I wrote in the very first post on this site just over a year ago, the word doxology means “words to glorify,” and through the thoughts, links, videos and images shared here, I am seeking to find new words to glorify God. Words that are relevant in today’s world…for today’s people.
God is still active in the world, and today more than ever I believe that the music, movies, reality tv shows, books, magazines, art and other expressions of popular culture are windows into the lives (and faith) of the younger generations. People like me, and perhaps people like you as well. This is why I started anewdoxology: I wanted a place to share some of my thoughts on how I saw God’s activity intersecting with my life. Not in forced ways that were restricted to moments when I was in a church or reading the Bible, but even when I was doing regular/everyday/normal stuff like watching tv or listening to music. Because if we really believe that God is active in the world, then we must acknowledge that God is somehow (mysteriously?) present in many – if not all – of the various expressions of art, life and faith in our culture (even, or perhaps especially, those considered “secular”).
I appreciate all the support and encouragement everyone has shared toward what I’ve been doing the last year. It’s been cool to witness all the random and unexpected ways God has used these “reflections of faith in an MTV world” to connect people with the love, grace and hope of God as revealed in Jesus (something that’s even more transforming than a really great movie and more life-changing than a soldout concert).
If it’s not too much to ask, I’m hoping you, the readers of anewdoxology.com, might be willing to answer a few quick questions about how you discovered this little corner of the world wide web and how you think things are going so far.
Thanks again for making this a great first year!
Clumsily following Christ,
Andy
P.S. If you’d like to give the perfect gift, I’d appreciate nothing more than if you told someone about anewdoxology.com!
I’m not sure why I don’t read Psalm 46 every day – or even every hour of every day – since every time I read it I am led to take a couple deep breaths, relax my body, slow my thoughts and remember that I’m not in control of everything…or anything. And I never was. In case it’s been a while since you’ve read it, or maybe if you aren’t sure which one number forty-six is, I’ll post it below. Read it out loud if you’re in a place where that’s socially acceptable. Let the words speak to you and don’t forget to just…be…still.
God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy place where the Most High dwells.
God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.
Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Come and see the works of the LORD,
the desolations he has brought on the earth.
He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth;
he breaks the bow and shatters the spear,
he burns the shields with fire.
“Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.”
The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
I spoke at Journey again tonight. This time about living generously and sacrificially. We’re in the last few weeks of a church-wide series called 40 Days of Community, and for the last six weeks we have been discovering how much better we are together (through small groups, service projects, community events and worship). It has been a great fall, and tonight’s theme offered us thoughts, inspiration and a challenge to respond to God’s love and Jesus’ sacrifice for us by living generously, as individuals and as a community, with God’s love as our guide.
I will include portions of the message text below, but the reason I’m writing about it here is because much of the message was delivered through select scenes of a documentary that I want people to know about. It’s called The Shadows of Virtue, and it was made a Minnesotan named Chad Amour. Released a few years ago now, the film takes a close look at how God’s love compels us to respond to issues in the world and to the needs of God’s people.
“Living Generously” by Andy Jolivette | Journey, 11/2/08
What does it mean to be sacrificial?
What does it mean to be generous with our lives?
We can’t be sacrificial all the time, can we?
What do we have to give?
What can we give up?
Does God want us to be sacrificial and generous?
Absolutely, but how much?
These are all very relevant questions, but they all come from the same route questions, “what do I have to do?” and “how much is enough?” They also severely miss the point of what we read in the Gospel of Matthew last week.
In Matthew 22, Jesus talks about one of the greatest commandments being to “love our neighbor as ourself,” and it’s probably safe to assume that this kind of love toward others includes being generous, and at times even sacrificing a bit of ourselves and what we have, for others.
So while the questions “what does it mean to live sacrificially?” and “how generous should we be?” are very honest questions, they are also very difficult to answer. (The honest ones usually are.) But seriously, can anyone tell us when our generosity is generous enough? or when we’ve sacrificed an acceptable amount?
The short answer to these difficult questions is this: there’s no way of knowing, so it doesn’t even make sense to respond with specifics, but we can trust that every day we will be faced with opportunities to be generous, greedy or something in between, and all we can do is try to be as generous as possible – as often as possible.
Many will point to Jesus as the example or standard, but we all know that is not really fair. Sure, we want to “be like,” “give like” and “love like” Jesus, but who of us is capable of living up to this standard? I’m not saying don’t try (if “WWJD” bracelets works for you, keep wearing them the rest of your life!), but we also need to be realistic.
Remember that even Jesus only gave his life for us once – it’s not something he did everyday – on other days he went for long walks, met new people and listened to their problems, went on fishing trips, and just hung out with his friends. At times he even separated himself from others because apparently even Jesus needed to be alone and get away from other people sometime.
Not to minimize Christ’s life and ministry, but if we’re truly going to look to the Gospel’s revelation of Jesus as our guide for living generously and sacrificially, we need to look at the whole story and recognize that even Jesus’ life included days when he wasn’t so obviously “sacrificial” or “generous” (at least not in ways that would inspire people to write worship songs about him) – but overall, no one could deny that Jesus was a generous man whose life was sacrificially given for others, for you and for me, for all of us.
I contend to you that Christ’s example for us is not just that we be blindly, or even constantly sacrificial, but that we become more consistently and even strategically generous and sacrificial.
In short, we need to live on purpose…with a purpose. We need to live out Jesus’ words in Matthew 25: Loving God with all our hearts, minds and souls; and loving our neighbors as ourselves.
That might mean freely giving away our time, our skills, our possessions or our money, or it could just mean not buying so many clothes and lattes so we can afford to be more generous in other ways. It could even mean calling a friend who we know needs to talk, but who drains our energy every time we talk to them. Regardless of how we choose to live generously and what we choose to sacrifice, we can be assured of one thing…living like this will always require living in opposition of our own desires to do what is best/easiest for us.
Living generously and sacrificially will always require love, not just any love, but the love of Christ – God’s perfect and unfailing love that has been given to us as a free gift – the love we’ve been called to share with the world. Love is a difficult thing to understand no matter how you look at it, and it’s an even more difficult thing to accept and share with others.
So here’s the challenge for all of us…
Take time this week (more than 10 minutes) to think about how you could sacrifice a bit of what you have (time and energy, not just money) and be generous in a way that will truly benefit others.
Make a plan for how you can make it happen (be strategic, purposeful).
Do it (don’t just talk about it, be about it…the longer you wait, the less likely you are to actually do it).
Don’t tell anyone what you did. (This is probably the hardest step, but remember it’s not about looking good to others, or even feeling good about yourself, it’s about loving someone else for no other reason than to remind them that they have “unsurpassable worth”).
