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Up | the new Pixar movie

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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.)

pixar-friends

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.

Religulous in Next-Wave

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My pre-review of Bill Maher’s documentary Religulous was published in this month’s issue of Next-Wave Church & Culture E-zine. Next-Wave is a cool publication I discovered when one of my former seminary professors wrote an article on the theology of the TV show Lost for their June issue, and my theological review of the new Coldplay album was published in the August issue. The editor’s at Next-Wave titled my most recent article “I Might Go See Religulous” and ran it next to another article about the same film, that one titled “I Did Go See Religulous.” I really like the juxtaposition between the two articles; one written by a person (me) thinking about seeing the film, the other by someone who has just seen it. And perhaps the coolest part is who that other person is… Dan Kimball (pastor, speaker, and author of The Emerging Church, Emerging Worship, and most recently, They Like Jesus but Not the Church).

Here are links if you want to check them out,

If you like the articles, please leave a comment (or vote for them) on the Next-Wave website.

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By the way, I saw Religulous last week and although it was quite predictable in format and content (especially the people Maher chose to interview), I thought it offered a humorous look at an otherwise serious topic (especially because of the people Maher chose to interview). I actually really enjoyed it, with the exception of the last 5 minutes when Maher shares his belief that “all religions must die” and religious leaders are basically brainwashing people. As someone who is part of a religion and is somewhat of a “religous leader,” I took offense to those comments. Regardless of how much I agreed/disagreed with, I would definitely recommend that people of all faiths (especially pastors and ministry leaders!) see this film, because although it offers a rather harsh critique of the current state of our religion, churches and fellow believers…it is often right on! Which should scare us but also inspire us…to honestly and humbly think about what we believe and how we express those beliefs to others (both in organized and unorganized settings). But that’s just my two cents. You should see it for yourself and then share your thoughts if you’d like.

Phil Wickham

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There’s a good chance you’ve never heard of one of my current favorite musicians. I’m not writing this to say I know more than you, I’m just stating an opinion of fact. His name is Phil Wickham and his music is mostly mellow and chilled out, but at times it gets a bit more energetic. He has two studio albums, a self-titled debut (2006) and Canons (2007), along with a new live recording that I’ll tell you more about below.

Before I keep going, I know what some of you are thinking, “I really don’t have the time or the money to invest in new music right now.” Believe me, I understand that sometimes it seems like too much work to catch up on a new artist or band’s collection of music, so I’m going to make this really easy for you. The rest of this post will be a reading & clicking exercise that is totally optional, kinda like the choose your own adventure books you read as a kid. Are you ready? Here we go…

Do you want to learn about some great new music? (If yes, read on. If no, go back to whatever you were doing. The choice is yours.)

Do you like free stuff? (Same deal. Yes = read more. No = check your facebook account again.)

Cool. I’m glad you’re still reading. You no doubt already know that you can check out Phil Wickham’s music the same way you’d check out any new music (iTunes, myspace, youtube, etc.). If you chose to follow one of those links and didn’t like what you heard, feel free to stop reading now (thanks for playing a long this far). If you want to stay in the game a while longer, lower your eyes and read the next paragraph.

If you made it this far you probably fit into one of the following categories,

a) you followed a link and liked what you heard (and you want to hear more)
b) you didn’t follow a link but still have an interest in following along (these are the risk takers)
c) you want to learn more about other FREE options to check out new music (even though you didn’t know this was an option until now)
d) you were already a Phil Wickham fan (possibly even before I was)

Regardless of which category you best fit in, you’ve made it to the pot o’ gold at the end of the bloggy rainbow. I’m glad you’re here because I have great news to share with you. How do I know you will think it’s great news? Because any readers who don’t like great/free music have already been filtered out. As a reward for your good taste in music and commitment to finding free stuff, here’s the good news I promised a few sentences ago.

Good News #1: Phil Wickham will be leading a night of worship at Journey on Sunday, October 5 at 5:00 pm. If you live near the twin cities, please mark your calendars (and tell your friends). It will be FREE!!!

Good News #2: Phil Wickham is releasing a live album titled singalong on Friday, August 8 and you can download it for FREE (just click the banner below).

walk for Haiti :: walk for Hope

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Just a reminder that tomorrow (Sunday, June 1) is the Third Annual Walk for Haiti. This is a great event that raises awareness and support for the country and people of Haiti, while giving people a to come together and enjoy spending time outside…and for the first time in it’s short existence, it isn’t going to be cold and raining this year. (I’m writing this with confidence since the weather.com forecast for tomorrow lists the probability of precipitation at 0% between 8:00am-midnight.) There is no registration fee for the event and there are still some “walk for haiti” t-shirts available for those who sign up soon (you can sign up at the event). To learn more about the event, including links to register online or find more info about the Haiti Mission Project, read this. Hope to see you tomorrow afternoon.

Subject: Can I share?

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[If you haven't been following the emails I've been sharing between me and my friend Jenny, you can click HERE to read Jenny's first email and then go through and read the rest in order (they are all linked together). You might notice from the time stamps at the top of each email that we seemed to stop writing after only about 3 days, but we have actually continued writing (although not as regularly) for the past six weeks, and we brought a few other people into the conversation as well. After struggling to coordinate schedules, four of us actually got together at a friend's house last week to have dinner and a really interesting conversation about a lot of the questions in these emails. I sent Jenny an email a few days ago to thank her for bringing everyone together for a great conversation and ask her if it was okay to share some of our emails here (her response is below). I want to thank her for allowing me to share these with you, not only because it is a bit of a window into her life and faith (and that can be a scary thing to share with people, especially in a space like this), but also because I think her specific thoughts and questions express the way many people think and wonder about God's role in their lives and the world. Although I realize I don't have any of this figured out any better than the next person, I hope someone got something out of reading all these emails. If you have thoughts you'd like to share (or questions you'd like to ask) in response to anything in particular, or even about the conversation as a whole, please leave a comment.]

From: Jenny
To: Andy
Subject: Re: Can I share?
Date: Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 1:22 PM

Hey Andy. I don’t mind at all if you use portions of our emails on your blog, and thank you for taking time out of your night to meet with us. I think one of the biggest things I came away with last night was the fact that faith is more of a journey, and not a destination. I think I kind of already knew that, but many of the things you shared really drove it home for me. I know life is very busy, so I really appreciate you taking the time to meet last night!

Thanks, Andy!

Jenny

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If you would like to continue reading or thinking about the questions and issues raised in these emails, I would highly recommend the book Letters from a Skeptic by Greg Boyd. Boyd is the senior pastor at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota and this book is a collection of letters between he and his father (who was not a Christian at the time). In the relatively short time I have taken issues of faith and theology seriously, I have found very few people who are as knowledgeable and understandable as Greg Boyd. If reading a book – or even buying a book and putting it on your bookshelf with the intention of reading it someday – seems like more of a commitment than you’re ready to make right now, I gave a 20-minute sermon on the question “why keep believing?” at Journey a few weeks ago (responding to several of the questions and doubts that often trip us up in our faith). You can listen to it here. (Note: In no way am I trying to imply that my short message summarizes Boyd’s book or even compares to his level of communication, but it’s just an option for anyone looking to think more about all this — I suppose it’s also a shameless plug to get people to listen to my sermon, but I can live with that.)

Whether you listen to my sermon or not, there’s something I’ve been wishing I had said in that message, and even though it doesn’t necessarily fit here, I’m going to share it anyway…

I believe God loves the whole world (John 3:16 says, “for God so loved the world”). I also believe God is present and active throughout the world; even in remote villages that missionaries haven’t visited yet, or nations where people aren’t waving the flag of Jesus Christ. God loves the world and God is doing the best God can do–given the current situation of the world and who God has to work with (us)–to make positive changes in the world.

Subject: I have a few questions #1 (part 2)

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[The email below is part of a series of emails between me and my friend Jenny about some of the biggest questions people have ever asked about God, faith and the Bible. It'll probably make the most sense if you read them in order, so click HERE if you haven't read Jenny's first email.]

From: Jenny
To: Andy
Subject: Re: I have a few questions
Date: Thu, Mar 6, 2008 at 10:03 PM

Andy,

Loving what you have sent me so far! It is very helpful and I can’t wait to hear more! Thanks for being so willing to share with me.

I did NOT know that the Hills is returning March 24!! Yippee!

Jenny