GYC Europe (From the i of my Phone)

Can't be weary in this place. Nope.
Even when I am tired. :)

I pinch myself over and over. Is this Europe? Is that our logo?
And am I really here?

I am. And it is.

I tingle. We all do. I have seen --I am seeing something great.
Something history will remember always.

It's a blur. But I'm doing my best to remember every waking detail.

coming home from outreach

friends from home :)

Sign Here Please

"By signing, I would have been giving away comprehensive and exclusive rights to all of my music, everywhere in the universe, for perpetuity! No!"

We still laugh every time we remember it.
Our incredulous friend-since-childhood, turned celebrity and world traveler. And us.

We'd just finished sharing a stage. And now under discussion was the paperwork so often required for such appearances...

- - -

Comprehensive, exclusive, universal... For perpetuity.
My rights.
Sign here please.

I bristle. Don't you?
The last thing I want to do is give up my rights.

But do I really have any?
Oh yes, "We hold these truths to be self evident..."

But on the cosmic stage...

On the cosmic stage, I'm a criminal. And I already gave my rights away.
But I still claim them. My right to myself. My right to my powers. My right to pleasures...
It's all death. And they're not even really mine...
I don't even have the right to life.

Unless Jesus Himself gives me His.
The right to His power, His pleasures, His life... Himself.

It's crazy. But He offers it anyway.
And so we trade.

That's when I sign away my claims to myself.

Sign here please.



You bet.
My rights, comprehensive, exclusive, universal, for perpetuity.
I release my claims to myself.

Christ claims my powers, my gifts, my breath,

I claim Christ.

Until Next Time...

Mics and pop filters, and preamps slide back into their boxes,
until next time.

They've been out, waiting for the "All Clear" from Mastering... just in case.

And now with the Master and the artwork set to meet at the replicators early next week, their job is finished for a time.

Once again our hearts overflow with gratitude...
Once again this project has taken on the pathos of the season slipping away, and the joyful anticipation of another on the horizon.
Once again God has proven Himself faithful through the hands and feet and prayers of people like you.

But this one's a little bit different.
It's a plea.

A dollar from every disc goes to a cause we love.
Just which, you'll have to wait a wee tad longer to find out. :)

Pre-orders opening soon...

Neighbors

There are the schedules, the checklists, the trips, the itineraries, the suitcases, the sermons, the songs, and the symphonies of Heaven heard by exhausted servants...

And then there are the rest of the moments that make up life. 

Moments that are often skipped when cataloging mileposts...

The colloquial, the common. The spontaneous... 

The blink-twice-and-they'll-be-gone opportunities. 

...to love people.

Here's to those. 

Sabbath night with the neighbors. 

Only One

I've learned something about love.

It feels the pain of strangers.

Somewhat overwhelmingly so, at times.
Or maybe it is that it knows no strangers.

Under a tiny sliver of moon in the sultry south I sit on a red-brick retaining wall, and ponder:
This joy that's mine, this peace, this hope--

These become torture, when I recognize in the eyes of a stranger the fingerprints of pain, and I can't do anything about it. Because as quickly as they come, they go...
And there are hundreds of them, and there's one of me.

Only one.

And I can only be in one place at one time.
(ruthless limitation.)

But then I remember:
There's just one of me, but then, there are the footprints.


They can't go where I've not gone,
but they can stay after I leave.

Jesus, let me leave only prints You could claim as Your own...

- - -

I have only one life to live.

And that one, I intend to give away.

There is a Sanctuary

These days begin early, pass quickly, end when the sun is gone.
We move from strategy session to our intersecting orbits around home base, and mulch gets spread, and ditches get dug, and flowers get planted, and tasks disappear from our corporate checklist in the cloud.

Sunrise (literally) finds me on my knees in the cactus garden burying drip irritation for the moss roses.
By 10:00 I've moved on to a sunny spot in the lawn, me surrounded by bags of irrigation parts for the Anniversary Garden
At noon, it's in the office with me. Answering the emails from early risers in Europe. By 2:00 I'm in full swing with the laundry room all torn apart, sanding and finishing cabinets. By 5:00 I'm back in the office, for more emails, more ProTools, more design concepts for the next album cover...

By 9:00 I'm exhausted.

But I'm learning something...
I've been learning slowly over days blurring together. Over knees in gravel, knees in mulch, knees in grass wet from the morning's artificial dew...

Days ago, I grunted out animated passion with every striking of the pick to gravel.
"I. Don't. Just. Fight. For. Myself..."

Moments later, huge raindrops from a benign looking cloud drove me temporarily into the shed doorway, and I stood, arms folded, watching rain stream down.

And I realized:
Full days notwithstanding;
Long lists notwithstanding... Speaking engagements coming up, Europe travel coming up, design and replication deadlines coming up, the wedding coming up--

Whenever I pause, wherever I pause...
Wherever my knees touch the ground,
there is a sanctuary.