Vampire Weekend Takes on God: Part II

Vampire Weekend begins their faith pondering with an infectious groove entitled "Unbelievers."  In this song Ezra Koenig seems to be wrestling with the message of condemnation he hears from Christianity (and maybe religion in general).  He writes:

"We know the fire awaits unbelieversAll of the sinners the sameGirl you and I will die unbelievers bound to the tracks of the train
I’m not excitedBut should I beIs this the fate that half of the world has planned for me?"

The last line is quite the punch in the gut.  Koenig perceives that the world of Christianity is actively planning his condemnation.

Now, a brief listen to this song could lead us to write it off as a simplistic rant against the nature, reality, and/or message of hell in the Bible; but if we dig a little deeper a different theme emerges.  This song is rather a poignant lament of the weight of the law and a yearning for a message of grace from the church and God.

Vampire Weekend Takes on God: Part I

When I read Rolling Stone's review of Vampire Weekend's new album "Modern Vampires of the City" prior to its release I couldn't wait to get may hands on it.  About the album Nathan Brackett writes:

"God, of all people, looms large: He is a foil on "Unbelievers," where Koenig sings about the fundamentalist half of the world wanting to throw him and his lady under the tracks of the train. The sweet "Everlasting Arms" is partly inspired by a 19th-century church song; "Worship You" references Paradise Lost (and Nick Cave). "Ya Hey" (rhymes with "Yahweh" – get it?) retells the Old Testament story of the burning bush, over a dubby groove." 

"Blogger" stats are killing my will to blog

The other day I was listening to Tullian Tchividjian give a talk called "One Way Love: Inexhaustible Grace for an Exhausted World" at the Mockingbird Conference.  During this talk he gave a piercing personal illustration.  He confessed that after publishing his first book, he became obsessed with his Amazon Rating to such an extent that on days his ratings were high he'd be happy and on days they were low he'd be depressed.  Through this Tullain discovered that he was trying to find his identity and worth in things other than Jesus' finished work on his behalf.

I watched this talk after checking my "Blogger" stats for the twelfth time that day and it got me thinking.

That's about right...

Karl Holl on the Newness of Jesus

"The God who rigorously insists on the highest does not will that any man should come within range of His judgement...  Therefore He seeks them out.  And the means by which He lays hold on them is His pardoning grace.

In all other doctrines of salvation the belief in liberation is founded on the conviction of the ineradicable nobility of mankind...  The god-like in man must come into its own.  Jesus, however, instead of this, sees a deep gulf between God and man...  Jesus stress is laid... on the fact that man has forfeited his worth but that nevertheless God accepts him.

Jesus' conception of God was new...

an interesting critique of the "radical" faith movement

"The reliance on intensifiers demonstrates the emptiness of American Christianity's language. Previous generations were content singing "trust and obey, for there's no other way." Today we have to really trust and truly obey. The inflated rhetoric is a sign of how divorced our churches' vocabulary is from the simple language of Scripture.

And the intensifiers don't solve the problem. Replacing belief with commitment still places the burden of our formation on the sheer force of our will. As much as some of these radical pastors would say otherwise, their rhetoric still relies on listeners "making a decision." There is almost no explicit consideration of how beliefs actually take root, or whether that process is as conscious as we presume."

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2013/march/here-come-radicals.html?paging=off

Paul David Tripp Quote

Great quote from Paul David Tripp in his book "Dangerous Calling: Confronting the Unique Challenges of Pastoral Ministry."