fathers day. or, as it’s been better known throughout my life, “national abandonment day.” here’s a little factoid for you: more phone calls are made on fathers day than any other day of the year. being that half of all marriages end in divorce, I’m pretty sure that the reason for all the phone calls is because half of the country doesn’t live with their father at home. another odd little thing about fathers day is that while a tie or coffee mug seems like an appropriate gift for dad, a spa weekend or week of maid service is a good mothers day gift. kinda makes it seem like even the dads that are at home aren’t really worth but so much. that’s actually pretty sad to me. dads, on behalf of kids who don’t know any different, thanks for sticking around.
by now, it shouldn’t really surprise anyone that the whole subject of fatherhood is kind of a touchy thing for me. in my journey so far I’ve had to come to terms with what I didn’t have growing up. honestly, it’s been pretty painful to go through. I think I’ve kind of come out on the other side of that though. the first stage to any growth is realizing what you’re lacking. but it’s not growth if it stops there. I know what I missed, and in the process discovered what should have been there. now, it’s time for me to move on.
all this time I’ve focused a lot on earthly things. in that, there’s not a lot of hope. but as I’ve said before on this blog, hope is the key and God is the difference. it’s only been very recently that i’ve been able to think about God as a father. that term never made a ton of sense to me, but i knew what it was trying to convey. it’s that God provides for us and takes care of us and watches out for us like a good father should. it’s in learning what a good father is really like and mentally preparing to become one myself some day that’s shown me the kind of father that God longs to be in our lives. a good father knows when their child is ready for certain challenges and how to equip them to overcome those challenges. a good father loves to freely give gifts to his children. maybe most importantly, a good father lets their children know that they are his beloved and can offer them an identity because of who he is. that’s what I want to be for my kids someday, and I’m learning more and more that I get to have my heavenly father be that for me.
so here it is, the first father’s day I get to really celebrate. not for myself, but for my real father. the father that my earthly one should have been modeling for me and introduced me to.
thank you, God, for being who you are and offering to me what no other person could. I’m immensely excited for what you’re showing me and challenging me to become. even more than that, God, I’m thankful that you’ve shown me that you love me as a true father loves his beloved son.
day of the dad
guilty
this is hard to write about. i kind of need to though.
some months ago i went through a very freeing spiritual experience. also, the recent theft of my music equipment and subsequent donations of music gear that i received had also brought up some issues for me. on top of all this, i’m currently going through a book writing discussion questions in preparation to start leading a small group for guys that grew up like me. this ended up being kind of the perfect storm of introspection. honestly, i know this is good for me in the long run, but this really sucks right now.
up til now, it was definitely a subconscious thing. i know what made me confront it though. of all things, it was the intense generosity of my friends and family. after all my music gear got stolen, people were coming up to me left and right offering their sympathies, money, and pieces of equipment. i couldn’t believe it. it was overwhelming generosity and made me feel so loved on. people truly cared about me and were willing to show it.
and i felt like absolute crap.
nothing added up. i couldn’t figure out why people going out of their way to be a blessing to me made me feel so guilty. in total, i was given over $1600 and a few hundred dollars worth of equipment, and as absurd as it sounds i felt like i was that exact dollar amount of a burden on the people who gave it. and my poor wife; she was so on board with just emptying our savings to buy some stuff back and instead of appreciating her heart i just lashed out with how irresponsible that was, especially considering how little money i’ve been making playing music the past year. i knew how irrational these feelings were, but at the same time it felt so strangely in line with how i live life. i had to think a lot about this and then talk to my wife to figure out what the discrepancy was. i didn’t really like what i found, but at least know i know what it is.
my entire life i have felt like a burden to everyone around me, and guilty that my life would so weigh them down. i know such blanket statements tend to be exaggerations typically, but every word of that statement is true. i think i figured it out when i was a very small child. i remember the day when i learned that my mom and father were never married. i also remember the day when i put together that we didn’t really have money. then i put two and two together and realized that my mom would be so much wealthier if there wasn’t some other mouth to feed, that she would be so much happier if she could go out on a date and not have to worry about abandoning some little kid to do it, and that her life would just be that much easier if some little kid hadn’t forced his way into the universe. no one told me this lie, but i believed it. i had believed it so much that it had become true to me. now i know what it means when people talk about God setting them free. after this recognition of the lie, i had one of the most powerful feelings i’ve ever experienced. i can honestly say it changed me and sort of scared me. i literally said to my wife, “i wonder what it’s going to be like to be loved and not feel like i’m a burden,” and then caught the smallest glimpse of what that really meant. it’s the kind of love that God wants us to feel, and the kind of burden he took on himself so that we could be free.
rough couple days
by now, i think most of you have heard about what’s happened to me. for those who haven’t, here’s the story. sunday night after playing at church i loaded up all my gear (two basses, amp, big ole speaker cab, and pedalboard) into my car. then me and amanda went out to dinner with a couple friends and came home. we both stayed up kinda late and slept in for a while. i had had a very long sunday and she was working that monday night. neither of us had gone out to the car until amanda was about to leave for work around 6:15. i noticed something wasn’t right though. it took a second to put together, but i saw into the back of the car where all my gear was and noticed that it, in fact, wasn’t there. none of it. none of my equipment was in the back of my car. and there was a window that was mostly not there either. so here’s what it looked like from the outside:
here’s what it looked like from the inside:
and finally, here’s the sight that brought the nightmare home:
apart from the obvious feelings of loss, violation, anger, and depression that come along with something like this it feels like there’s something larger at work. i’m starting to connect the dots on everything and it feels a little too coincidental. i feel as if it were an act of war and i’ll explain what i mean by that.
if you read the last entry to my little blog you would have read about what exactly music means to me and how i commune with God. and i also just kind of briefly mentioned that the reason i know exactly why God called me to play music was because He’s the one who created me this way. i really don’t believe in some kind of sadistic God that creates people to experience Him in a certain way and would then make it impossible to participate in. i don’t really see that God in the bible. i’m definitely not the first person in the world to have this happen to them. i know this kind of stuff (and worse) happens every day and i know one of the first reactions so many people have is this: “how could God let this happen?” i know that God didn’t “let this happen.” there’s a reason the Lord’s prayer asks for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. God’s will isn’t always done on earth, and THAT was not God’s will. it was not his will that the tools i use to connect with Him, lead his people in worship, and even as a source of income be forcibly taken from me. there was another will at work when my gear was stolen.
there’s way too much that’s been going on in my life right now to chock up the theft of my music gear as random or coincidental. i don’t think it’s too coincidental that when one of my friends found out told me, “the enemy’s pissed you’ve been using that stuff.” it’s not coincidental that sunday afternoon i finished my last small group leader training for a small group that God’s already doing work on. it’s not coincidence that the level of spiritual growth in me and my wife’s marriage has been more intense in the last few months than in the preceding three and a half years. it’s not coincidental that this happened after a day of playing at my church. it’s not coincidental that every time i’ve played at church recently people have been encouraging in ways i hadn’t imagined. it’s not even coincidental that of all mornings at my church my main bass wasn’t working and i had to go home to get my backup and that’s why both my basses happened to be in my car that night. it’s also no surprise that because of this happening, feelings of insecurity and worthlessness have been creeping back in. it’s hard to feel the loss of the tools of my trade while simultaneously feeling like i need those to perform a job i haven’t had but a few times for months. top that off with doing taxes today and seeing just how little i worked and still how much of a headache filling out the self employment forms are.
so i’ve had a rough couple days here. i think i’m in a good place though. i know that it was not God’s will that my stuff get stolen. i am praying that His will be done from this point on though. there’s nothing wrong with me praying for a miracle that i get it all returned. i know that God is much bigger than the events that have occurred so far. He can use this to bring other people to Him whether i get my stuff back or not, and in the grand scheme of christianity i’d rather have that happen. not my will, but His be done
a lot of you know that recently i’ve been playing at sandals more often than usual lately. what you may not know is that every thursday night is rehearsal for the following sunday, and that there’s a kind of small group time that is the first thing on the agenda for the night. the big discussion topic for last night was the idea that all of us on stage are leading worship, not just the person who is singing the song at the time. the follow up question for us to answer was this: “what inspires you to lead worship? and also, what would be something that hinders you from it?” it was funny because as other people answered the question they would frequently mention that seeing people who are really into the music and reacting to it is a big deal for them, and flatteringly enough, more than one person mentioned how they love seeing me get into it on stage like that. i didn’t get a chance to say anything at that time because i always have trouble putting thoughts into words and it takes me a long time to do that. i really thought about that though.
what inspires me to lead worship is music. i don’t think a lot of people know this about me, but i don’t really hear music, i feel it. for whatever reason, God wired me up some way that music deeply affects me. i don’t mean lyrics or words either, i mean music. the right tone in the right chord with the right melody can cut right to my soul and bring me to tears faster than anything else on earth. being at a radiohead concert or listening to arcade fire is for me what hiking into the woods and seeing a perfectly blue sky is for a nature loving person. and when i’m playing music, it’s as if God has told that nature person “now BE the perfectly blue sky.” there’s a reason i move around like a big dumb goofball on stage. i honestly can’t help it. and very few people know this, but when you see me on stage you’re just seeing my body. i’m in another place. i guess to continue the analogy, i’m in that peaceful meadow after a day of hiking laying down and looking at the sky. which is why when i’m playing music, i don’t feel like anything could take me out of that and hinder me from that focus. i can play songs i don’t like with people i don’t care about for people i don’t know, but in that moment i’m communing with God.
so. what inspires you to worship?
the old president
so i’m watching the inauguration for our new president on cnn, and at the bottom of the screen is the abbreviated schedule of events. it’s during the parade part so the schedule looks something like this:
“now – pres. obama watches parade
next – former pres. bush lands in texas
later – inaugural balls”
and my mind keeps picturing this little scene for the old president. mr. bush with head leaning out the passenger car window all googly eyed and smiling with his tongue hanging out, and the car coming to a stop on some country road. cheney opens the door for him and he hops out all excited and saying, “wow look at that! where are we? ooo, i wanna know what that smells like! hey where you going?” and then cheney just says “run boy! you’re free now!” and bush scampers off into the woods.
childish, i know, but i can’t help but have that scene play like a little movie in my mind
