Everything I Need to Know I Learned From Classic Rock

Having established my fogie credentials last time, let's turn our attention to the greatest decade in rock 'n roll, 1967-1976. These days, I spend most of my radio time listening to KVRK, the local Christian rock station, but when they're playing something I don't like, I'll sometimes wander off to the classic rock station for a bit. Occasionally I'll think, "that's a good line, I need to start writing those down." I've been thinking that for probably ten years. Now I finally have. With apologies to Robert Fulgham, here's classic rock with you all you need to know.

Education
When I think about all the crap I learned in high school, it's a wonder I can think at all.

Kodachrome, Paul Simon

Contentment
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes, you just might find
You get what you need.

You Can't Always Get What You Want, Rolling Stones

Introspection
I can never see what's right and what is wrong.

Amie, Pure Prairie League

Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned?
I know it sounds absurd, but please tell me who I am.

The Logical Song, Supertramp

You can travel 10,000 miles and still stay where you are.

Sequel, Harry Chapin

Everyone's looking for something.

Sweet Dreams, Eurythmics

What'll you do when you get lonely, and nobody's waiting by your side?

Layla, Eric Clapton

All I want is to have my peace of mind.

Peace of Mind, Boston

It's so easy to blow up your problems.

Moving in Stereo, The Cars

I want to know what love is.

I Want to Know (What Love Is), Foreigner

I was a prisoner of doubt.

Straight On, Heart

And so you finally ask yourself just how big you are?

Thick as a Brick, Jethro Tull

Though my eyes could see I still was a blind man.

Carry On, Wayward Son, Kansas

I have become comfortably numb.

Comfortably Numb, Pink Floyd

Been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely time.

Rock and Roll, Led Zeppelin

So often times it happens, that you live your life in chains
And you never even know you have the key.

Already Gone, Eagles

Money
Money so they say is the root of all evil today.

Money, Pink Floyd

Helping Others
If I shiver please give me a blanket, keep me warm, let me wear your coat.

Baba O'Reilly, The Who

Feed the babies who don't have enough to eat.

Fly Like An Eagle, Steve Miller

Life
I found the simple life ain't so simple.

Runnin' with the Devil, Van Halen

Don't you know that you are a shooting star?

Shooting Star, Bad Company

Life is just a dream here.

Welcome to My Nightmare, Alice Cooper

Maybe tomorrow the Good Lord will take you away.

Dream On, Aerosmith

Save my life, I'm going down for the last time.

Never Been Any Reason, Head East

Be a simple kind of man.

Simple Man, Lynyrd Skynyrd

Talk is cheap.

Promises in the Dark, Pat Benatar

Relationship with People
Every girl's crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man.

Sharp Dressed Man, ZZ Top

You better find somebody to love.

Somebody to Love, Jefferson Airplane

You can't hide your lying eyes.

Lyin' Eyes, Eagles

I want you to want me, I need you to need me, I'd love you to love me.

I Want You to Want Me, Cheap Trick

These cuts I have, they need love to help them heal.

Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me, Elton John

I get by with a little help from my friends.

With A Little Help From My Friends, The Beatles

I've been searching for the daughter of the devil himself
I've been searchin' for an angel in white;
I been waitin' for a woman who's a little of both
And I can feel her but she's nowhere in sight.

One of These Nights, Eagles

This thing called love, I just can't handle it.

Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Queen

Hold on loosely, but don't let go.
When you squeeze too hard, you're gonna lose control.

Hold On Loosely, 38 Special

Teach your children well.

Teach Your Children, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

Relationship with God
I never did believe in miracles, but I've a feeling it's time to try.

You Make Lovin' Fun, Fleetwood Mac

We were liberated from the fall that's all.

Won't Get Fooled Again, The Who

Jesus is just all right with me.

Jesus is Just All Right, Doobie Brothers

I got a friend in Jesus.

Spirit in the Sky, Norman Greenbaum

A new road's waiting, you touched my life.

Feeling That Way, Journey

When the final light is over, and it's certain that the curtain's gonna fall
I can hide inside your sweet sweet love, For ever more.

The Story in Your Eyes, Moody Blues

You are like a hurricane.

Like A Hurricane, Neil Young

Your love has set my soul on fire.

Heartbreaker, Pat Banatar

I know I'm worth nothing without you.

Bargain, The Who

Writing lessons from two Dan's

(For those reading this on FB, I don't know if the links will make it, if not you might want to read it on the blog.)

In the early days of the 80's, Dan Fogelberg released a song titled Same Old Lang Syne. It was a straightforward "story" song, along the lines of Taxi or You're So Vain. (No, there haven't been any decent story songs in the last 30 years and yes, I'm an old fogie. Now get off my lawn.)

The song told the story of the singer running into a former flame in the grocery store on Christmas Eve. It is a bittersweet reunion, as they sit in their car and reminisce (they "couldn't find an open bar"), and think about what was and realize that it is still "was" and will never be "is". The last line is one of the most memorable, bittersweet lines in American music.

As I turned to make my way back home, the snow … turned into rain

The symbolism is unmistakable, but more than that, those last five words evoke a mood, paint a picture in our minds that is so clear, so descriptive, we might as well have been there. You can see this played out on the Web, as you read story after story of people who heard the song and immediately thought of a lost love of their own.

Five words, and we have the complete visual in our head. That is masterful writing, as evocative as a John le Carré sentence that communicates more about the subject than any three pages from another author. If it weren't for "the reckless raging fury they call the love of God", it would be my favorite line ever (and if you know me, you know the highest praise I can give is to put it second to Rich).

I thought of that song this morning as I was reading another Dan. Dan-i-el is a popular book for children's Sunday School classes, because it has some great, kid-friendly, stories in its first half. However, no one reads the last half of Daniel, or admits to it, because it is, to say the least, confusing. (Google "Daniel" and "seventy weeks" sometime, it's very entertaining.)

In Daniel 10, Daniel has been praying intently for the nation of Israel, and as a result is visited by the archangel Gabriel. As almost always happens in Scripture when an angel shows up, everyone is petrified, so much so that Daniel's companions run for cover. Of himself, Daniel says, "No strength was left in me." And then he says this (from the ESV footnote):

My splendor was changed to ruin.

What a wonderful phrase! By this time, Daniel has been the servant to four kings (Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Darius, and Cyrus) and two kingdoms (Babylon and Media-Persia). He has been the third highest person in the kingdom. He has, to use Rich's words again, "seen the best that ever was." This Dan knew splendor. But in the face of a mere messenger of God, all of that splendor faded to nothing.

This is what Isaiah meant when he said, "all of our righteous acts are like filthy rags" (do a word study on that "filthy" — it's a lot filthier than you think). The best we have is worthless when we stand before God. Whatever we think we have or are in ourselves is exactly nada in God's economy.

I am too often impressed by my "splendor," too self-satisfied with what I've done, where I've been, how I've contributed. It only takes a second before God, if I'm really before God and not just going through the motions, for all of it to turn into the nothing it really is. And that's a good thing, because then I can reflect the splendor of Jesus, which is of course how it's supposed to be all the time.

How long has it been since your splendor turned to ruin?

Blind-sided

In Sandra Bullock's new movie, The Blind Side, her character Leigh Anne Touhy has a scene where she has just fixed up the guest bedroom for Michael Oher, the 17-year old black young man her family has taken in off the street. There is just a hint of a look of self-satisfaction on her face — she's doing a "good deed." As Michael looks around the room, slack-jawed, he says, "I never had one before."

"A bedroom of your own?" Leigh Anne asks, expecting a "yes," thus confirming her good deed.

"A bed," Michael replies, and you see in her face that Leigh Anne's world has just been turned upside down. Living in her half-million dollar house, driving her $100K 7-series BMW, she knows there's a world out there that's not as privileged as hers. But she has parameters for that world, boundaries that define just how unprivileged "unprivileged" is. Michael shatters those boundaries, and she has to go to another room and sit down for a few minutes to collect herself.

Leigh Anne was blind-sided by a reality that was quite different than the reality she had constructed.

It happens to all of us eventually, in various degrees. For me, it's happened a few times as we've walked with our church as it's become involved in the issue of sex trafficking.

First, "sex trafficking" looks rather pedestrian on the page. We had identified it early on as one of the most "unjust" of the justice issues we looked at, but I know that for me at least it was a concept more than a reality, or said differently, it was an antiseptic reality that had little relation to the reality faced by the young (as young as five years old) girls who lived in it.

My first wake-up call happened when I read a book by a sex-trafficking survivor. She spoke of being raped seven to ten times a night and more (sometimes by groups of men), of watching a fellow victim shot in the head while she and other girls were forced to watch, of policemen being perpetrators instead of protectors. This reality wasn't pedestrian or antiseptic, it was real and raw and disturbing. I was blind-sided by the depths of the depravity.

My second happened in Cambodia a couple of months ago on a trip our church took to investigate how we can be involved on the ground. We were at a ministry that runs an after-school program for kids in the town. There was a roomful of kids that looked to be from first grade to middle school (in U.S. parlance). They were singing along with one of our group who was playing the guitar, and in general looked like a roomful of happy kids anywhere. As we watched, the director of the ministry running the program turned to one of our team and said, "Probably 80% of these girls are still being trafficked." We were blind-sided by the persistence of evil.

But in that same town, we visited families who had been healed, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, by the power of the Holy Spirit. We saw the local church active in its work of rescue, redemption, and reconciliation. We saw a community being changed by the power of Jesus in the face of obstacles that would cripple a church ten times its size in the United States. We were blind-sided by God's glory in a dark and dirty world.

What has blind-sided you today?

The Liquor District

On a recent mission trip to Cambodia (more on that later), our LEADER, a former resident, was showing us around Phnom Penh. As we passed one area in the van, she said, "And over here we have the liquor district, where I spent many an hour…" and I thought "Reaaaaaly? That's … interesting."

And then she finished her sentence. "… shopping. They make great wicker furniture here, and there are a ton of shops just in that one area." One of the guys behind me exclaimed, "Oh, good, I thought you said liquor!" I said the same, and we all had a good laugh.

Sometimes it's the small things. One letter made a big difference in what we thought about that area of town (and our LEADER, for that matter). Left uncorrected, those small things can lead to large misunderstandings, or worse.

I thought of that again the next day at church. One of the songs they sang during the service was "Above All." Having abandoned KLTY (our local CCM radio station) long ago for a Christian rock station (go KVRK!), I hadn't heard that song in years. (The few Western-oriented churches in Cambodia are largely stuck in the late 80's/early 90's, music-wise. Ironically, I heard the song again this past Sunday on KLTY when I had no choice due to KVRK being temporarily off the air. It reminded me why I abandoned it in the first place. But I digress.) As we were singing, I was struck again by how large a difference a small phrase can make.

The ending of the chorus, speaking of Jesus on the cross, says, "And [He] thought of me, above all." There was a time I didn't think anything about that line, I just went along for the ride. (Yes, that means there was a time I listened to Michael W. Smith. I've repented.) It was a nice thought — ahhhh, Jesus, on the cross, thinking of me above everything else. Isn't that wonderful He thinks of me so much?

Except, of course, that it isn't true. If we know anything about Jesus from the Gospels, it's that His thoughts were always primarily on what His Father wanted of Him. If Jesus had any thoughts on the cross, I have no doubt they were directed towards His Father, not towards us. Because, above all, Jesus was obedient.

They are such a small thing, those six words. And yet they represent a very large, very dangerous, theological error. Jesus was not me-centered. He was God-centered. Jesus is not me-centered. He is God-centered. God is not me-centered, He is Himself-centered. Singing otherwise leads to thinking otherwise leads to acting otherwise leads to … trouble.

All of this does not mean, of course, that Jesus doesn't love us. Of course He does — He died for us. It just means that His primary motivation wasn't His love for us, His primary motivation was His love for, and obedience to, His Father. Just as our primary motivation should always be our love for, and obedience to, our Heavenly Father, not ourselves.

Have any "liquor districts" crept into your theology?

Unoriginal Screenplay

My wife and I went to see Seven Pounds a couple of weeks ago. If you haven't seen it and plan to, stop reading now and go see it. No, seriously stop reading now. You need to go into this movie blind. (Frankly, you should never watch another trailer again as long as you live if you really want to enjoy movies, but this particular movie even more so.)

If you haven't seen it and don't plan to, stop reading now and go see it anyway. Forget the critics, IMDB and I never lie.

Most of the bad reviews the movie has received is due to it's being viewed as a Sixth Sense kind of movie, with a big "tell" at the end, except it isn't that big and so a few people with high expectations give it grief. The problem is that isn't a Sixth Sense kind of movie and it's not trying to be. In fact, the first scene tells you exactly what's going to happen, if you're paying attention, and from there it's not hard to figure out a large part of what occurs going forward.

It's the way the story and the relationships unfold that get you.

A short outline:

• Prologue: Guy tells person he's talking to what's about to happen
• Guy decides he wants to "drastically change" some people's circumstances, for the better
• Guy looks for good people whose circumstances he can "drastically change"
• Guy weeds out not-good people
• Guy develops relationship with good people he's picked
• Guy decides their life is more important than his own
• Guy makes ultimate sacrifice for one he's fallen in love with
• Two people whose circumstances were "drastically changed" come together

The reason the story grabs you is that it's one we've heard before. And the original is a doozie. You just have to substitute "God" for "Guy" in the above outline.

• Prologue: God tells us what's about to happen (Genesis 12:1–3, Isaiah 7:14, etc.)
• God decides He wants to "drastically change" some people's circumstances, for the better (Isaiah 9:6, John 10:10, etc.)
• God develops relationship with people he's picked (Genesis 12-50, Matthew-John)
• Jesus makes ultimate sacrifice for the ones He loves
• People whose lives were "drastically changed" come together, as the church

Now that's a story. For all the similarities, notice the big (HUGE) difference. God didn't choose good people. God didn't weed out the not-good people. "While we were yet sinners, He died for us." (Romans 5:8) "For God so loved the world..."

If Emily and Ezra had rejected Ben's gift, it would have a tragic waste of a life, and not much of a story.

Let's make sure the original version of the story ends well.

Taking a Bite of the Apple

Real life has reared its ugly head the last few months, and although I've written several posts in my head, I never found time to put them down in the ether. Sorry about that, I'm going to see if I can do better in '09.

Popular notion has it that the fruit Eve ate in the garden was an apple. We all know how that worked out for her (and Adam). I've swallowed my own Apple, and I'm not convinced yet the end is going to be any different.

A new MacBook Pro has been calling my name for some time now. Given the switch to Intel, the subsequent ability to run Windows in a VM on OS X (I have to use Windows for work), and the brain-dead decision by Lenovo to mess with the Thinkpad's keyboard, I decided to see how the other three percent live. So, after twelve years as a staunch ThinkPad user (I'm on my fourth; we recently found my first one in a closet somewhere -- it was almost three inches thick. Amazing.), I made the leap to the other side.

The Good

• Startup was dead simple. Answer a couple of questions, and BAM!, you're in.
• Network setup was equally easy. Leopard handles multiple locations out-of-the-box, so I set up one for home with my wireless, and one for Work for my client setup.
• As soon as the network was setup, my other two home computers showed up on the Sidebar in Finder. Nice!
• When I took it to work and plugged into their network and started to figure out how to add the printer (I figured it was going to be a big deal trying to get it to work with a Mac), the work printers showed up automatically. Pick one and you're done. Very nice!
• When I plugged in my AT&T air card, it hummed for a couple of seconds and I was on the network. No installing software, no network preferences setup, no nothing. True plug-and-play. Nice again!
• Installing a new application? Drag an icon to another icon. BAM! It's installed. Awesome!
• Running Windows side-by-side with OS X turns out to be as easy as everything else on the Mac (but see "Bad" below).
• Now we can Skype our friends in Italy. We haven't managed to get together after three weeks of having it, but we can!
• The screen is brilliant. My brother-in-law refuses to buy one because they're only glossy screens, but I haven't had any problems with reflection, and next to it, my ThinkPad looks like it's dull as dishwater, even when it's on full brightness. In fact, the screen is so clear I took my default font down a point on my text editor.
  

The Bad

• Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users. As just one example, getting keyboard access to a program's menu is a convoluted mess, requires three times as many keystrokes as Windows, and requires Full Keyboard Access to be turned on. The consistency between programs is non-existent; again, as just one example, Cmd-1 switches to the first tab in most programs, but opens the first bookmark on the toolbar in Safari (which is an Apple program).
  
• No dedicated PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins/Delete keys. This one is just stupid. Moronic, even. There is plenty of space to put the keys (IBM and now Lenovo has been doing it for 15 years). Having to learn, not only new keystrokes for the Mac, but new keystrokes for Windows, and having to use two hands to do it, has been the hardest part of using the machine. Again, Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users.
  
• The trackpad, although nice for a trackpad, still can't beat a touchpoint. It's easier, it's faster, and it keeps your hands on home row (again, Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users).
• Parallels, the first to the VM party on the Mac, has been something of a disappointment. The latest version (4.0) has numerous keyboard issues (again with the keyboard theme) that makes it all but unusable for a touch typist. And, it had a problem with my Bible software (again keyboard related), which turned into the deal killer.
  
• VMWare Fusion, the latecomer to the Mac party (but a longtime VM veteran and the name brand on the PC side of the house) doesn't have the keyboard issues that Parallels has, but my VPN won't stay connected more than 10 minutes or so at a time.
  

The Ugly

• iCal is a joke. After migrating my emails and calendar from Outlook (using O2M, the suggested Apple genius bar way to do it), it invented an appointment out of thin air. But only on my iPhone (which has been happily syncing with Outlook for months). That is, after syncing with iCal, I had a recurring appointment on my iPhone which didn't exist on my iPhone before, and which did not exist in iCal. After a two-hour visit to the Genius Bar didn't fix it (he gave up and gave me a new phone, but the minute I synced with iCal the appointment showed back up). Further, deleting the appointment on the iPhone and choosing "all future events" doesn't work -- none of the appointments are deleted. Only by deleting them one at a time will they go away. Since it was a recurring appointment all the way to 12/2010, I had to delete 48 entries. I actually haven't synced the phone again, so I don't know if they will stay gone or not.
• I've already lost a key. The Enter started wobbling after two weeks, and completely fell off yesterday. More on that story below.

The Key to Happiness
On the same Genius bar trip mentioned above, I asked them about the wobbling Enter key. He took in the back, and came back and said he'd let me know what they found. A half-hour later, he told me that the keyboard would have to be replaced. For one key? You gotta be kidding me. He ordered the keyboard, said it would be in in two or three days, and they'd call me.

The key completely fell off yesterday, so I went back to the Genius bar today, the guy took it back, came back out in a few minutes, and said the keyboard was in (where was my phone call?), but they had to send it in to get it swapped out, and it would take three days. Three days? This is a work computer, I can't do without it for three days. How about just giving me a new laptop, and swapping out the hard drive? Nope, the geniuses can't do that, I'll get my manager and see what he can do.

He says he can't swap it out either, but he can order a new computer and swap it out of that one. What about in the meantime -- I can't use it without an Enter key. He said he would give me a wireless keyboard to use with it.

So, although I think it's ridiculous that losing a single key requires the entire keyboard to be swapped out, it's ridiculous it takes shipping the machine somewhere else to replace the keyboard, and it's ridiculous that the keys are held on by two microscopic pieces of plastic that look like they could be broken by looking at them cross-eyed, Apple, in the form of the manager, did a good job of customer service and attempting to make things right. Kudos to them for that.

All in all, it's been a good, not great, experience so far. I have doubts about the longevity of the keys, which may turn out to be a big issue in the long run, but for now we're OK.

Happy New Year!

The Best Day of the Year

Remember when you were a small child and your mom said you were going to get to go to Six Flags/Disneyland/whatever in a few days? Remember how you couldn't sleep and you kept asking "Is it today? Is it today?" and it never was, or at least seemed like it never was? Remember when the day finally got there you almost couldn't stay in your skin you were so excited?

I still get that way. Except, instead of Six Flags ($45 so I can go spend the day in 105 degrees and eat bad, expensive food? Ummm, let me think about it, NO), it's The Summit. The first day of the Summit is the best day of my year. This is my tenth year: all of them have been good, nine have been great, and four or five have been mind-blowingly un-stinking-believably awesome.

The first year was like the proverbial drinking from a firehose. I'd never seen or heard anything like it. The music was incredible (at the time, I was still in a traditional church with a traditional church service). The speakers were better (speakers as in persons speaking, not speakers as in things music comes out of, although they were pretty good at Lakepoint, too). I came home the first day and talked to my wife for an hour-and-a-half. Of all the droplets in the fire hose, one that has stuck with me was from John Maxwell: Choose who you lose.

In 2001, Bill Hybels interviewed Chuck Colson and asked him, "What is it that gets under your skin?" Colson thought for a second and replied, "People who have too small an idea of what God wants to do through them." I almost stood up and cheered. Someone had put words to my thoughts, to at least a portion of my calling -- to enlarge people's vision of what God had called them to do.

In 2003, Erwin McManus completely blew me away, not once, but twice. I could write a book just about those two sessions (and he wrote two), but one of funniest quotes was from a discussion about the names we have for groups of animals. He said a group of rhinoceroses (rhinoceri?) were called a crash, and they could run 60 mph but couldn't see 30 feet in front of them. He said, "That's what I want to be -- running 60 mph for Christ, but only seeing 30 feet in front of me, because that's all I need to see."

In 2005, Rick Warren talked about stewardship, a subject near and dear to my heart. He talked about not desiring either money or fame and being given both, and determining the influence he'd been given was to be used for those that didn't have any. He also talked about living on 10% of his income and giving 90% of it away, not taking a salary from Saddleback any more, and reimbursing Saddleback for every dollar they'd ever paid him.

Last year, Richard Curtis, a non-believing but searching film director, talked about living for the greater good, selling big red noses for a pound in England to raise money for poverty. His interview touched my pastor so much he came home and decided to raise money for a social injustice issue as part of the building campaign we were about to embark on.

We're only halfway through this year, and already it's been a great year.

Bill Hybels talked about axioms, and quoted Abraham Lincoln: "The best way to vanquish an enemy is to turn him into a friend." I needed that.

Gary Haugen of International Justice Mission (another subject near and dear to my heart these days) said if we want our leadership to matter, we need to lead in things that matter to God (i.e., are Jesus and I really interested in the same things?). He also pointed out that at the feeding of the 5000, the disciples focused on what was needed (which was overwhelming), while Jesus focused on what they had (which was little), and then turned it into enough.

Bill George said we were all born to manifest the glory of God in us, and therefore we should be asking whether we're fulfilling God's calling for our leadership. He also said that leaders who fail don't fail in leading others, they fail in leading themselves.

Wendy Kopp (Teach for America) had a host of miserable statistics about education of the poor in the U.S., but the most interesting thing she said was about a Gallup poll. When the polling group was presented with 20 choices about what was wrong with education, the top three answers given were 1) Lack of student motivation, 2) Lack of parental involvement, and 3) home life issues. However, when T4A interviews their alumni teachers after they've finished their 2-year commitment and asks them the same question, their answers are 1) Teacher quality, 2) Principle quality, and 3) Academic expectations of the students. Hmmmmm.

John Burke said people are like Rembrandts covered in mud: we see the mud and treat them like a muddy mess, but we should look past the mud and treat them like the masterpieces they are, because that's what Jesus does.

Efrem Smith had at least two hilarious rants ("No more grown men with 'Lil' in front of their name!"), but also painted a picture of the racial storm in America as being the high pressure of what God wants hitting the low pressure of what we're willing to settle for. Wow.

In short, it's been the best day of the year. At least until tomorrow (the second day of the Summit).