Same guy.

He Slapped Me With His Prayer!

This guy is a friend of mine. He plays a bass guitar and sings crazy funk music for a living. He is buddies with Bootsie Collins. Here he is reciving an award for being the baddest funk guy around. Don't ask me which award this is. I just ripped it off his website.

While I'm establishing a visual context for Chris, I'll throw in this one, in which he apparantly is appearing as a sperm for a show. I include it because, to me, it's comical.


Okay, so there's the guy. He's a relatively new believer (<5 years), and he's really growing. Great guy. Tender heart. Anyway, I have to report a prayer I heard out of his mouth last night that blew me away. I really didn't hear the rest of his prayer because I was so taken by what he said. He was talking to God about how he felt such a huge desire to be an example to people. Now, as a religious brat, I understand that, too. Growing up, that was pressure for me. But here's what he said:

"I want to be an example, God: not of what's right and wrong, but what it's like to be loved by you, and how great and freeing that is."

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Considering that staggering prayer, I realized that I was raised to be an example to people of what IS right and wrong. That's also called The Law, which is no longer appropriate for me to traffic in. Our world is not in need of a better morality, for goodness' sake. God is getting that out of my head, step by step. Our world is a loveless place of commerce, and it's in need of the Jesus Love Bomb. And Chris is praying that THAT would be his legacy. What a killer prayer.

By the way, if you find yourself in need of funk, Chris' stage name is FREEKBASS. www.freekbass.com

Happy Confession

I am in love with this man.



Read about him and watch him at http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/03/22/afghan.christian/index.html

I am happy to report that I will soon be on a loooooong trip with him. We won't be coming back. It will be great.

Relief

Coming back from a long Chew absence is always intimidating. I feel pressure to output a whole glut of stuff. It ain't right I tell ya.


If you read the Holy Scriptures, and do the head-scratching that happens afterward, you've at least given some thought to the law/grace thing. It's a conundrum, and one that laces the Good Book from stem to stern. Here's what I see on that:

You know that Moses presented the law, aka the Mosaic Covenant. It said you need to do like 347 laws just right or you're a sinner and you need to sacrifice to get your account square with God. Jesus comes along and makes this Cosmic Super-Sacrifice after which there can never be another meaningful sacrifice in God's eyes. You can try, sure. Knock yourself out. But God isn't accepting any more sacrifices.

Hebrews 10:11 Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12 But when this priest [Jesus] had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. 13 Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, 14 because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

15The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says:
16"This is the covenant I will make with them
after that time, says the Lord.
I will put my laws in their hearts,
and I will write them on their minds."[b] 17Then he adds:
"Their sins and lawless acts
I will remember no more."[c] 18And where these have been forgiven, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin.

This young man is scoring on a sacrifice fly.

Wow. Okay. Huge. But there's still verses that talk about us fulfilling the law. Romans 13:8 says "Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellow man has fulfilled the law." Yeah, that's cool, how we can fulfill the law by loving, I guess. But the thing is... why is Paul still talking to me about there being a leftover law? Aren't they all done with? And besides, I don't feel confident that I can love. And we're back to the law. As a matter of fact, Jesus said the A#1 law is loving God. That right there (the very fact that loving is presented as a law) tells me that I will fail at it, that Steven cannot do this thing. So why is loving people an 'outstanding debt'? Why isn't that also obsolete?

I'm sure there are lots of good answers to this question, but here's one I'll throw out there: The only way you can fulfill this last, niggling law is to have the Spirit of God live in you. He is perfect in all he does, and he will always lead you in His perfection (which, incedentally, is now in you as well, since you accepted the Cosmic Super Sacrifice). That is your only shot. Steven in Steven is doomed to fail—that’s what the law was for originally, to teach me that. Then I give up trying to fulfill the law, invite God to live his love life through me, and forget about the law. The law is not my problem anymore, anywhere--it's Jesus' burden alone. And He, in his spirit, can deal with it. Then, I get to look back at how God has led me and see that he has fulfilled the law through me. People were loved, the law was fulfilled, but it wasn't me--it was Christ living in me. Yessssssssssssssssssssssssss. Relief.

Romans 13:10
love is the fulfillment of the law.


So there seems to be this one little exception law that didn't get covered by Jesus' death? I don't know if that makes me a heretic or not, but I'm quoting Paul, here. God living the perfect Jesus Life through me is the remainder to the equation. Somebody correct me on this if I'm way off, I'm open to that. But that's kinda cool to me. Am I preaching the law by suggesting this?

Viva la GOB!!

My only concern is that the snarky innuendo will be replaced by bald-faced obscenity on Showtime, which will deflate me as an artist and alienate me as a viewer. I trust that Mitchell, though.