Family Fun-4.jpg, originally uploaded by Elijah Stephen.

Celest and I are teens again. That includes taking cute-silly-fun photos. I’m thinking about getting braces. Does anybody else have an irrepressible desire to TP something?

photo.jpg, originally uploaded by Elijah Stephen.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it, but I really love my kids. This is an old pic. But I dig it. (I took it with the iPhone… Shhhh… don’t tell).

I love this!  Since I finished school, I have started writing songs again and redoing some of my old ones so that my church can sing them—It’s amazing what not taking seven classes at once can do for you.  I’m looking forward to sharing my progress ASAP.

In addition, a lot of the time that I have freed up has given me a chance to study the Word and read a bunch; I’m totally loving that.  God has been teaching me so much.

I am a worship leader, which I have mentioned.  I have been craving understanding of what that title means—for many that title doesn’t even come close to being applicable, and I have had a deep fear of that being the case for me as well—may it never be so.

The more and more I search, the more clear and inescapable the discovery: the roll of a worship leader is simply to point people to Jesus and turn them loose.  I strive to do that every time I am put before a gathering of worshipers.  Simplistic?  No!  There is infinite depth and beauty to unfold from such a manner of leading.

There is no New Testament title of “worship leader;” Paul did not go into cities and appoint pastors, teachers, and guys-that-play-guitar-and-sing-songs.  We who do this need to be very careful to evaluate our rolls in the church.

What the New Testament does call for, in terms of roll, is people who will lead well.  This means leading a Godly life, loving the Word, “adorning the doctrine of God,” as Titus 2:10 puts it, “adorning,” meaning to make it the main thing people see, “doctrine of God,” meaning Jesus—DOCTRINE, not doctrines; it’s singular for that reason.  As a result, the art that follows will be good art.  Lets be about that worship leaders.

I’m starting my sixth paragraph.  Why have I said all of this?  It’s because I am surrounded by a community.  Even after all this time of not blogging, somehow there are still people checking in and reading my rants, and what I’m up to.  Your reasons are your own.  I do, sometimes, wonder about you, however, my fine, wonderful, perhaps somewhat crazy, friends

I want to state my trajectory and be very clear about what I’m about.  This is accountability.  It lets me share what I have worked through in my heart and head as the Lord has been teaching me.  I also want to lay a foundation over the next few months about what it means to be a worshiper.  It’s amazing how such an old idea can get so far from Biblical.

What I am doing is not cool.  It is not hip right now to have an opinion.  It is not hip to use words like doctrine.  However, I am certain that this language needs to come from the perspective of a worship leader because I am convinced that so many who “worship lead” do a better job at using the music itself to stimulate a response, a tragedy, rather than the person of Jesus, who brings people to their knees on his own terms.

I don’t know what the Lord will do in my life over the next year, but I look forward to opportunities to share my journey with anyone who cares if it gives God the glory.  I will be writing songs, taking pictures, making videos, writing blogs, and anything else I can do to communicate how incredible the God who loves to redeem us is.  Our redeemed state is to worship him.  That is so much bigger than so many of us have settled for.  Lets change that.

I am eternally impressed with Killer Whales—thank you documentaries.  The question is which you think would win a fight: a Great White or a Killer Whale.  The show went on to prove that it is indisputably the Killer Whale.  Shock and awe right?  How could Shamu take out the King of the Sea?  (Hmm… I just did a google search and apparently the term “king of the sea” is reserved for Tuna and King Triton from Little Mermaid—thank you Google image—my bad).

Anyway!  What really fascinated me was not the sheer coolness of the big black and white fish; it was the genius that is behind the way that they go about their attacks.

To kill a shark, the Orca has learned that it merely has to flip the shark on it back.  Once flipped, the Shark is paralyzed and can’t correct because a thing called tonic immobility kicks in—game over!  This actually got captured on video in the waters near San Francisco during one of the largest gathering of Great Whites on the California Coast

The most amazing thing about the event is that every one of the Great Whites in the area vanished the same day. One of the Sharks had a tracker on, and it headed straight to the continental shelf and dove 1500 feet and toward Hawaii.  Total panick!

I love that!  Doesn’t that feel like justice has been served?  I think that surfers should take up the Killer Whale as their official mascot.  It blows my mind how we continually come to know new and fascinating things about the creation around us, and the amazingness of its creatures.  It’s a beautiful thing.

I came across this quote today and it totally rocked me:

“All the beauty to be found throughout the whole creation is but the reflection of the diffused beams of that being who hath an infinite fullness of brightness and glory.  God is the foundation and fountain of all being and beauty.”  –Jonathon Edwards

I love that! I think that the guilt of giving God a tiny throne in a dusty corner of a lackluster life is the unfortunate pathology for many of us today—because we fail to see life the way Edwards described it!  God’s throne is certainly not confined to the periphery of anyone’s life.  When God is relegated to middle management we can be sure that this flows from—in the most gentle terms—a small view of god, rather than a massive view of a redeeming holy God.  It’s one thing to say that Jesus is King; it’s another thing to enjoy living on his land.  Do you know what I mean?

In light of what Edwards said about everything good being “but the reflection” of God’s glory, think about this: if we can bring to mind the best of all moments that we have ever experienced in life, we will have imagined only a dim caricature of God.  God is infinitely greater.  The fact that the Lord is, not only the giver of every good moment, but unimaginably better than the best moment, blows my mind.  My mind is blown.

It’s getting that perspective right that gets any of our ideas about serving him right.  If we miss that, we miss everything, we don’t get the gospel, we don’t understand the cross, and we cannot love his world or his people for whom he came to save.  Worship begins there.

What is up my friends! It’s good to be back. I have much to share. I could tell you a thousand stories, but I’m not going to; I just want to start by sharing about the massive shift that Jesus has been doing in my heart.

What an insane last few months. My life will never be the same. I might even—dare I say—know what I want to be when I grow up. Maybe. Lets not get crazy. What I know for sure is that Jesus is at the center of it all, and he is continuing to reshape my thinking moment by moment.

It has now been two years since a day I delved inside and pulled out the words that became a song I wrote called Blinding Light. Thinking about the words in this song, I realize that they signaled the beginning of a long process of change that God had begun in me. I was drifting into the confusion that grips our culture of complete uncertainty and doubt. It was an awful time. But God was setting me on firmer ground, removing me from sinking sand that was probably about to take me under.  Totally gripped by the truth of gospel in God’s word, and the fact that God has preserved truth in every word, I wrote:

A blinding light awakes my soul tonight
Beauty bright lovely heaven’s eyes
The haze is lifting the maze untwisting
I’m coming back to the start
Oh a peace is passing my understanding
I’m coming back to your heart
And I’m finding my life in you; I’m coming home.

That blinding light is Jesus, the light of the world, totally wrecking us for anything but him. Though we look to lesser versions, they don’t satisfy.

My life has been re-routed. I realized the misdirection, and I had to make a change. All of my iPhone GPS user friends know what I’m talking about, because they have experienced a micro version of this: “The stupid blue location dot is nowhere near the purple line! Totally lost.  Why am I in the middle of a field?  Crap.  Edit. From ‘current location.’ New ‘Route.’ Ah, peace and sanity!” Of course with the iPhone we end up doing that ten more times, but that’s another blog. The point is that I have a new clarity that I have never known my whole life.

Ok, but that was two years ago; why the sudden mention of it?

The work (sanctification) that God does in our hearts show’s its results at varied pace; I have been learning, slowly, what it means to join God on his mission, rather than trying to attach him into my life like an accessory—for sure, he is more Kinglike than capelike. I had those two confused.

All of that clarity has been sharpening into focus this whole time. Fast-forward to now. Have you ever had that moment where something previously confusing all of a sudden made perfect sense—perhaps, why women insist men lift the lid, or something like that; I had that moment over the last six months. The realization, despite my light-hearted tone, was nothing slight.

What does it mean to walk in redemption? What does it mean to tell others about redemption? What is redemption? Isn’t the Christian life redemption?—it is indeed! Isn’t redemption, the biblical promise since Genesis 3, freedom from the curse? Are not Christians to be joining with God in that redemption back to the state of how he saw it: “And God saw that it was good?” Why are Christians so caught up in what they are against, rather than what they are for? Isn’t the gospel good news? Is the Church not the body and bride of Christ? Then, shouldn’t the Church look like Christ, and be devoted to his purpose? Is there any other way for the Church to look like Christ than that it be gathered together, and living sacrificial lives toward each other and the needy? Is not the gospel the thing that unites everybody, even natural enemies, providing the basis for every good deed? Does the gospel not affect every aspect of life? Did Jesus set precedence for a life of comfort and affluence, or avoiding it for his sake? Then why do we say that we follow Christ and yet structure our lives toward that which he didn’t? Is there any motivation toward any of the previous unless you are one-hundred-thousand-percent convinced that you are justified purely by faith apart from works, on account of, none other than, Christ’s payment for your sin and righteousness to your account?

Some of my theologian readers snapped to their wide spread wrestling stance while reading the previous paragraph, due to the pervasive liberalism in the Church—calm down. I am not that, though I have been there, and have great sympathy for those, and their struggles. The gospel is doctrinal truth, internally transformative, socially revolutionary/regenerative, perfectly balanced between all three. Please, your grace is needed since my space is limited.

I love the Church. I am so completely committed to her. The bride of Christ is Christ to the world until he comes. The world God created, that he called good, is the world, which he is redeeming every aspect of. Every aspect of our lives has been redeemed for his glory; we are alive!  We live in grace as our mode of existence, and that grace, seen in every word of scripture, is the deepest beauty, infinitely to be unfolded, that he has brought into the lives of believers through the Church, that has become his visible representative to all, to come into and experience love, actually lived out between people; this is our origin in him, the point to which we must return.

To trust God is to trust his word. To trust is to stop focusing on the command to not eat of the one tree: it is to reclaim the freedom to love and enjoy fully all that he has created for and because of new life, by the Holy Spirit, because of Jesus, to the glory of God: the gospel in a sentence.

I love that I have been called to lead people to worship God.  That is my roll in the body of Christ. This is worship: that we get our eyes off of the idolatry of self, and let our desire for God shape every aspect of our lives as we enjoy him, in response to his love; our response is that we join him in his redemption of creation, every Christian on mission, bearing the name of Jesus wherever they find themselves, at all times. It is to this end that I aim to use every inch of this blog.

Grace and peace,

Elijah Stephen Meeker.

This was funny but sad.  Anger is funny to me.  I don’t know, it’s just one of those weird automatic reactions that you can’t help.  When I see somebody get angry at something that could otherwise be handled calmly, I just laugh.  Other people might get sad or embarrassed about lame behavior like that and that’s probably more appropriate but I can’t help my reaction.

Last night my wife and I went to the movies (a cheap date when you find movie passes that you forgot you had) and we witnessed this silliness.  We walked into the theatre and it was about 3/4 full.  We sat down a couple rows up where we found a couple open seats.  Separated by one seat, we sat next to a bigger girl in her 20’s and her date.  The seats in front us were all empty.  We put our feet up on the seats in front of us—which happens to be seat-choosing criteria for us—and the couple next to us was doing the same.  We were totally comfy!

The previews were rolling and in strolled the antagonist: a group of 3 that moved into our comfortable foot chairs.  It was sad for me but it was not the proverbial end of the world.  The girl next to us, however, flipped out!  I began to smile.  Luckily she didn’t see me or she may have tried to beat me up—angry people don’t like it when you smile.  Over the noise of the theatre she started cussing and saying stuff that I can neither repeat or remember and the person in front of her totally ignored her—another thing that angry people totally hate.

As the tirade went on so did the smiling and ignoring.  The smiling turned into small chuckles that had to be held in and finally her totally embarrassed date ended it by offering his seat since it was still empty.  She declined and that was the end of it.  See, angry people don’t really want what they are trying to get that bad, they simply can’t handle having things taken from them, a little something that lingers from when they were 2.  At any rate.  It is my own vice that I am amused by such behavior.  I apologize.  Does anybody have any counsel or empathy… perhaps a similar story?  Care to share?  You’re not “that guy” are you?

Alright… I’m back… Taking a quick breath from all that stuff.  I mentioned my wife’s surprise party in the fog of a blog that I posted last Thursday.  Easily the highlight of my month!  And hers too!  She loves surprises and this one worked out pretty well.

Imagine the clever people you know.  If the clever people that you know are actually clever then go ahead and lump Celestial right into that category.  (Congrats!  Now you guys are friends and stuff.  You know each other.)  This is a problem though.  Clever people are not easy to surprise.  Extra work was going to have to go into the fooling effort since this was an extra special b-day, being the big Three O.

I needed a running start at this so I began talking to my buddy Nathan about the idea for this party back in April.  We decided on some of the gist of it back then, including making it a potluck party with the theme of, “Stuff  With Cheese On It” (Celestial’s expressed favorite dish).  But since we had budget issues we had to quickly rule out the surprise trip to Paris where all her friends would be waiting at a hotel with a private show from U2.

Keeping that in the back pocket for the 40^th though.

I’m not much of a detail guy—at all—so I stuck to the fun part, which was planning how I was going to surprise her and left the party details to her best friend Jamie (she was amazing).  Jamie threw an incredible party.  My sister Amanda and her Husband Troy made a sweet journey of Celest’s life via slide show.  My friend Adam Dj’d.  He’s one cool Puerto Rican.  And all her friends did her the wonderful honor of showing up—pretty much the most important part.  And my only responsibility was getting the birthday girl there.  I totally almost choked.

Concealing the secret was the first step.  Celest never has her phone on her but she does have mine.  BECAUSE SHE STEELS IT FREQUENTLY!!!  Yeah, in addition to being able to see all the calls and texts, my emails all show up there too.  Makes secret planning a little tough.  But we designated a separate email that Jamie and I would plan from and correspond with the guests and that worked great.

We decided that the party location would be the clubhouse at my apartment complex for 3 reasons:  It is Free.  Free.  & Free.  (ok… a fourth reason being that it was the nicest free place that we could get… don’t forget my budget).  But how would I get her to casually stroll into the clubhouse on a Sunday afternoon?  We never go to the clubhouse?  Let alone on Sunday afternoons when all we want to do is nap!

But!  2 facts about Celestial:  She loves getting packages in the mail and she rarely has her phone on (oh did I mention the phone part already?).  Perfect!

This was my “IN”!

The day before the party I would call the apartment office and ask them to call Celestial’s cell phone and leave a voice message that she had a package waiting for her.  She wouldn’t get the message until the next day after I charged her phone for her and when she did she wouldn’t be able to resist waiting an extra minute to get the package which would take her right through the door way to the party.  It was perfect!

But it got complicated.

2 weeks before the party I sent out an email to let everyone know that the party plans were going great and to remind anyone who hadn’t rsvpd to get on it.  Well, much to my freaking horror, Celestial got that email!  I was sitting on the couch next to her, I looked at her computer screen and there was my email in her inbox.  I was so stinkn sad because I really wanted everything to be perfect.  She loves to be surprised and this was totally sucking it up.  If there was anything positive about it, it was that the email was completely general and the only info that she got from it was that there was a party somewhere and sometime in the future.

No worries at all!  Because I had a plan!

I had been wanting to do a fake surprise party for a while, back when I first kicked around the idea with Nathan in April.  Who doesn’t expect a surprise party on big birthdays like this?  What better way to extinguish the suspicion than to throw them a dud surprise party first.  And we succeeded at that!  I put the plans together fast and she walked into the restaurant and there was 6 people and our kids with some balloons and a present; that was her 30^th.  We made up some pretty great excuses about why everyone else couldn’t come, ate some pasta, and then we went home.  She was totally sweet about it and tried to pretend like she had fun.

The next day was her party and it totally ended up amazing.  She got the call from the office just like we planned.  And, just like I told you, she insisted on getting the package immediately.  She practically drug me to her own surprise.  Effortless!  She was so surprised and loved it all.  Oh, and after she got totally rocked by everybody’s surprise for her, we ended the party by giving her a 3 night trip for her and me and no kids that a bunch of people at the party contributed to as their gift to her.  We ended up doing a photography road trip from Tahoe to Idaho to Oregon and back down through Shasta and then home.  Totally good times!  The whole thing came together way better than I could have imagined it.  She totally loved it.

So there it is.  Now it’s to you.  Tell us about your best surprise memory.  We’d love to hear it.