Jesus as a baby...

This holiday season has left me feeling more inspired than usual. Like my eyes have been opened to a whole new God that loves me more than I could have imagined.

I've had people asking me about us adding Christmas songs to the worship line up for R&R and I honestly cringed at first. Don't get me wrong, I love singing Christmas Carols. They're festive and fun! I've just never thought of them as a form of worship.

This last week we threw our own version of Mercy Me's version of Silent Night. You can listen to it on YouTube here. From the moment that I sampled this song on iTunes it changed my perspective on Christmas songs as worship. I think the song was well received this week.

Now to the point of my blog title...

Listen to this song & really listen to the words:
Relient K - "Celebrate the Day"

-----
Lyrics:
And with this Christmas wish is missed
The point I could convey
If only I could find the words to say to let You know how much You've touched my life
Because here is where You're finding me, in the exact same place as New Year's eve
And from a lack of my persistency
We're less than half as close as I want to be

And the first time
That You opened Your eyes did You realize that You would be my Savior
And the first breath that left Your lips
Did You know that it would change this world forever

And so this Christmas I'll compare the things I felt in prior years
To what this midnight made so clear
That You have come to meet me here

To look back and think that
This baby would one day save me
In the hope that what You did
That you were born so I might live
To look back and think that
This baby would one day save me

And I, I celebrate the day
That You were born to die
So I could one day pray for You to save my life
-----

The first time I listened to this song it made me tear up. To think about the innocence of a baby. Those of you who have had kids before understand what this is like. We are born into this world with very little knowledge. We have to learn to talk, think, eat, and interact with people. We have to learn good and bad.

It's hard for me to imagine a baby that's so innocent and knowledge less is going to die for me. It rips my heart to know that something so beautiful was done for me. The greatest thing about this season is spending it in awe of the miracle that God gave us in the form of a baby. The next greatest thing is the time I get to spend with my family.

Pure innocence is something that we only acheive once in our lives. Then we start to gain knowledge and the understanding of the world around us. Praise the lord for a child that didn't know what he was going to bear for all of us. It kills me to think of my sins and that baby.

I really don't know what else to add. Re-listen to the song and think about a baby that takes his first breath. Think about how that first breath saved your life. Think about the first thing that those eyes saw was our world, the place he was going to die for. Jesus was one of us. He was innocently born into a curropt world just like us!

Pray that we may all understand God's love for us better. Pray that we think about an innocent baby Jesus and how our sins today effect him.

PEACE!
~James

Blogs I just posted...

Hello everyone,

The last three blogs that I posted were ones that I posted on my Myspace. Today I'm deleting it and just wanted to save those three. Read/re-read and enjoy. :)

PEACE!
~James

OMG, I think I've lost you...

I'm sick of what worship is made out to be. I'm also sick of what I make it to be. I'm just too critical and I only feel connected when my guitar is in my hands. This my mountain to climb. I do however thinnk that there needs to be some sort of structure to have a working worship. By my definition a working worship is is something that flows smoothly. Something that provides a easy outlet to God. with little destractions. So how do I acomplish this in my standards? I multiply myself and do it all with my anal nature. Lol. I guess it's a long shot. I guess what it comes down to is having leaders that aren't there to perform for anyone else than God. The ONLY person that deserves the glory. I feel like I'm rambling and I apologize if my spelling is off. I'm doing this from my phone at 315am. I miss my lord. I miss a connection that I use to have with him. Things will change. I just don't know how long I have to wait.

Stop this train...

So here it is....

Stop this train
I wanna get off and go
home again
I can't take the speed
It's movin in
I know i cant
But honestly, won't someone stop this train

Don't know how else to say it
Don't wanna see my parents go
One generation's length away
From fighting life out on my own

So scared of getting older
I'm only good at being young
So I play the numbers game
To find a way to say that
Life has just begun

Had a talk with my old man
Said help me understand
He said turn 68
you'll renegotiate

Don't stop this train
Don't fall in bed and lose the place you're in
Don't think I couldn't ever understand
I tried my hand
John, honestly
We'll never stop this train

Damn! I mean... really... Damn! Does that sum my life up in a nutshell? Probably not to the tee but sometimes I just want to make it stop. Go back to high school where my only worry was how much homework I was going to get and weather I was going to do it or not. So life goes on. Maybe it's my quarter-life crisis, considering that I have another one on the way. But what the hell, at least I'm young... ya know?

I guess the whole reason for this feeling in my life is this John Mayer cd... continuum. Don't get me wrong, I love the cd but it just makes you think. Kinda makes you realize that you aren't a kid anymore and now you have to fit in to this society that you will just disappear. And yeah a few will notice that you are gone... It's just really hard for me to grasp. This is all I know. Breathing, eating, drinking, & sleeping in this body. I have no idea what death is going to be like. It literally scares me!

I think the line in the song that gets to me the most is the one about the parents. I love my dad and mom so much and I hate to think that I'll have to go through some of my life without advise from them. It really wants to make me cry. And one day Addison and my other kid will have to go without Amanda and me. All I have to say is that I better go first. Because life without Amanda would be just.... well.... not life.

So I try to find hope in the fact that others have it a lot worse than me. I'm just ready for something to happen. I am excited that we find out the sex of the baby on monday the 16th.

I guess i'll stop rambling. Just thoughts of life. I will leave you with a really awesome quote by John Wayne that I have seen like 30 times in the last 2 weeks. "Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyways." I just hope people feel that I lived up to this quote once I'm gone. PEACE!

That about sums it up...

"Whenever people ask me about having children or not having children, I never tell them what to do. I simply say, 'There is no experience like having children.' That's all. There is no substitute for it. You cannot do it with a friend. You cannot do it with a lover. If you want the experience of having complete responsibility for another human being, and to learn how to love and bond in the deepest way, then you should have children"

~Morrie Schwartz

So I have been reading Tuesdays with Morrie again and last week I read this. I haven't read this book since I had Addison. I think I can safely say that this is the truest statement that I have ever heard. I'm sure when I read this book in Teacher Cadet that I read that line and didn't even think anything of it.

There is no experience like having children. It makes you experience love in the deepest way. A way that you would have never dreamed of. It makes you understand the word unconditional.

Unconditional: not limited by conditions; absolute. (www.dictionary.com)

Absolute. Someone that is in every way a part of you. Absolute. Someone that no matter what, you will love them. And that love grows.

Children make you appreciate your parents and understand them on a whole new level. You understand why they worried about you. You understand why they tried to protect you. And in your children, you see that many of the things you do for your kids your parents did for you. Love. It has such a bold new meaning to a parent.

So my new point it this: I will always tell people that there is no experience like having children. I will not tell them to wait. I will not say do it or don't.

"There is no experience like having children."

I have always put my priorities in material things. Cars, games, clothing, electronics...etc. I have found myself in my children. They have filled the hole in my life that other things couldn't. My life is complete with them. I can only pray that they will have the joy to experience what I have through them. And that one day they will be able to read this and understand how I feel.

To Addison & Huxley: You are the loves of my life. You make me the proudest man in the world. I hope that you will always understand that Daddy loves you and that love will never end. Absolute. I love you both. ~Daddy

PEACE!

~James