"Dear Saint Isaac" Album Review

I’ve never written an album review before. Playing drums, bass, mandolin, guitar, singing, rapping—those are things I’ve done for albums. For me, writing is simply a way of expressing things I believe in, which is exactly why I am writing about this self –titled album by “Dear Saint Isaac.” I gladly give my music reviewing virginity to this album.

For almost 10 years, I’ve believed in the music of Symon Hajjar. We’ve gone on several embarrassing adventures, played countless shows and formed a band together in college. Early in our friendship, I asked him to join me in swimming to an island with a lamb. The waters gave us minor hypothermia, the lamb escaped, but I saw something incredibly rare—something I see in this album.

On the island, we lacked food, warmth and shelter. In this, Symon expressed an almost carefree, optimistic demeanor. Instead of plotting for escape, he settled in. This is Symon. He’s a man comfortable in the midst of tension. In fact, I’d say he’s only comfortable in tension. 

As long as I’ve known him, I’ve seen this tension, and I see it in this album. Beautifully naked melodies, joyfully layered folk ambience, and a naive attempt to reconcile the contradictions in his heart. This work showcases the pulling of his heart, a longing for a future in Heaven while seeing Heaven today.

“I’m living in a world where everybody is running like hell while Heaving is standing still.”

Just like his response on the island, this album is foolishly optimistic. The lyrics acknowledge our pain, fears and confusion, but the conclusions these songs encourage are strange.

“If you’re anything like me, you’re thoughts are never still.

You stumble into love as you trip over your fears”

While most of us are embarrassed by our fears, or in denial, somehow Symon acknowledges it as a tool to stumble into love. Foolishly optimistic, but that’s just who Symon is. This album embraces the mystery, the contradictions, but ultimately a steadfast confidence in the beauty of it all. Normal people don't come to conclusions like this. Listen to this album to help you articulate the contradictions in your heart, get lost in hopeful anthems, and embrace whatever this life offers. It's a great listen, and I fully suggest you get it.

Click here for a link to their 4 song pre-release.

Jesus is More Important Than Books

It’s 2014, and I’ve recently taken over as the leader of Momentum, a young adults ministry in Highland Township, Mi. In order to lead this community well, I’ve been reading and studying a lot. The books I’ve read in the last two months include the following:

• Start with Why
• Deep and Wide
• Made to Stick
• Communicating for a Change
• Tribes
• Good to Great

These books are all very inspiring, informative and helpful for building strategy. However, I watched a documentary last night called, “Compelled by love” and it stirred me more than all of them. This movie is about Heidi Baker’s missionary journey in Mozambique. I’m not going to summarize any of these writings, but want to leave you with what stirred me.

These last few months, I’ve been trying to consume as much information of ministry possibilities as possible. Why? Because I want to know about all the available options for directions God can take Momentum. For example, if a person is trying to select a flavor of ice cream at Baskin Robbins but does not know that Pistachio, as a flavor, even exists, he or she will not select that flavor. I am simply want to know about every effective flavor of ministry possible.

Books and research allow me to know what people have done before me so I can choose to go that route or not. I can learn from their mistakes, instead of my own.

This movie, though, highlighted the adventures of a few missionaries who simply went to countries with the goal of loving people like Jesus would. They didn’t have plans or strategies. They weren’t trying to operate as “Level 5 Leaders” or craft the perfect vision statement. Simply attempting to love God and people in a country not their own with a language they did not know. Somehow, despite having the perfect strategy, God moved in radical ways.

Radical obedience and compassion always trumps knowledge insight and strategy, it seems.

Whereas I believe in learning and growing, I am reminded that the Gospel is simple. Difficult, but simple. Strategies, philosophies and disciplines are everywhere, but as ministers, as lovers and followers of Jesus, we must not depend on secret knowledge that opens the door to better ministry. We must abide in the true vine Jesus and let life giving ministry flow from Him. We must depend on love.

Is Jesus still your primary ministry strategy?

Is Jesus still your first love? For me, sometimes I forget that “Unless the LORD builds a house, the work of the builders is waste.” I will continue to study to show myself approved, but my first focus is Jesus. Simply Jesus. 

Nothing I do without Him matters.

 

Tongue Scrapers Eliminate Bad Breath [Practical Stuff #1]

To my wife’s joy, the tongue scraper I bought two months ago helped my breath smell better. I’m a preacher, so I try to impact people with my words. Unfortunately,  my jokes, and content did not deliver the strongest impression—my breath did.

I knew my breath was bad, but nothing I tried really worked to prevent it:

·      Brushing

·      Flossing

·      Not having an empty stomach

·      Mouthwash

The Wife Test

So I tried a tongue scraper, and my wife, who has no problem telling me when my breath is bad, said it worked wonders. I asked her to give me a quote concerning this difference.

“I can’t even smell your breath anymore!”

That’s all the proof you need, folks. Nobody is more aware of my breath than my wife (we kiss).

What is a Tongue Scraper?

This is the tongue scraper I use,

Basically, a dirty tongue contributes to 90% of bad breath. That’s why my traditional attempts (brushing, flossing, etc.) did not work. This tool scrapes the bad breath content off of your tongue.

All you do is scrape the white stuff off your tongue. Simple.

Smell it, and you’ll most likely agree your bad odors come from the white gunk.

If you’re a preacher, or someone regularly holding a conversation, get a tongue scraper. It’s less than $5 and makes a huge difference! You’ll see that people will talk to you a lot more than they used to. 

40 Evangelists Working Together

My friend Matt Brown asked me to regularly write for Emerging Evangelists, a collection of 40 evangelists from different denominations all over the world last year!

It's been great to partner with him in this, and join with ministers of many styles. I love that God is helping the Church unify for greater power. I love being part of this group.

Here is a list of the blogs I've written for the site. They are all specifically about Evangelism. 

1. 7 Reasons Why You shouldn't Tell People about Jesus
2. People Don't Know Jesus Because You are Stingy
3. Your Witnessing Isn't Good Enough
4. This Could Explain Your Lack of Miracles
5. 6 Reasons Why People Don't Like Christians
6. My #1 Way to See People Give Their lives to Jesus 
7. I Won a Lifted-Truck and More!

Read these and let them encourage you to share what you know!

Miracles are Normal! Honduras Update!

For one week, I preached the Gospel in Honduras approximately four times a day. I spoke in schools, the streets, malls, churches and in a Stadium packed with 35,000 people—the most people I’ve ever spoken to!

I partnered with One Nation One Day, an event dedicated to reaching the nation of Honduras in one day. And it happened…an entire nation was presented the Gospel in a day! Hundreds of Thousands of people dedicated their lives to God, over one seventh of the population attended our meetings, and every major media outlet broadcasted our sermons!

We saw physical creative miracles, the deaf began hearing for the first time, the dead raised, and the lame walked. God made Himself famous in a day!

There are so many stories to share. I’ve never seen a nation so hungry for the Gospel. From the moment we landed, Hondurans threw parades for us, holding signs with messages like, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news,” and other very honoring messages. The president, all government officials and the military opened up the entire country for us to preach and people responded.

It was almost too easy. It was God.

One lady ran up to people on my team because she watched a tumor dissolve off of her stomach as we preached the Gospel. She didn’t understand what was happening, but felt healthy for the first time in ages, and dedicated her life to God and the ministry. The thing is, nobody prayed for her.

It was like God was even using our shadows to heal people like He did in the Bible.

This trip is challenging a lot of my beliefs on missions, and the potential for nations to be reached in dramatic fashion.

It's shown me that large scale outreach can be very life giving when done right and that honor opens the door to very effective ministry. There were times when Jesus didn't do great miracles because He was not honored. The Hondurans did not stop honoring us from the moment we landed and I believe that played a huge role in the effectiveness of our preaching and the frequency for supernatural miracles. There's so much to reflect on!

In the meantime, please join me in praying that this fruit lasts and isn’t choked up by thorns or stolen by the enemy.

Thank you for your prayers and being a part of this journey. If you have any questions, please leave me a comment.

Below is a sermon I preached the day after I returned from Honduras on how Miracles are Normal for the Christian. In it, you can hear more testimonies from the trip!

Believe God for the impossible and watch it happen! 

Powerful Night of Ministry

Working in a church is very repetitive. I, along with a team, carry the weight to facilitate four difference services to four demographics every week. With that, things have the potential to be become routine and mundane. However, there are moments in the ministry that are so powerful that you don't mind the time between spectacular events. Last week in Momentum (a young adult ministry I serve in), was one of those nights. 

I preached a message about Christians being called to follow Jesus, but fail to do so because they put themselves in a time out or "Penalty Box" from God whenever they sin. In this message, I explain that when we sin that is the exact time to run to God--not away.  

You can watch the message right here, and see the altars packed with hearts hungering for  more of God.