I have started blogging again, but have changed addresses.  I am now blogging at AnIdolHeart.com.  There has been, and continues to be, a lot of life change for me, and this new blog is where I will be talking a lot about it.  There will be no more updates to The Gideon Chronicles, so please join me at AnIdolHeart.com.

If you had previously bookmarked or listed me in your blog roll, would you please be so kind to update the listing to AnIdolHeart.com?  Thanks!

See you soon!

exhibit a: jay-z “blueprint 3” cover (2009)

exhibit b: delirious?’ “kingdom of comfort” cover (2008)

i’m not exactly saying he bit it… but i’m saying it’s awfully similar.  it’s not a dead ringer, but i’m just sayin…

what do you think?

peggy: “maybe we should try the new megachuch.”

hank: “i don’t want to change churches.  besides, that place is too big.  what’s it got, 5000 some-odd members…”

peggy: “…and it pampers all of them!  they have their very own coffee shop, florist, mini-mart, bike and a dry cleaner that accepts all competitors coupons!”

hank: “if i wanted to go that route i could just walk around the mall and think about Jesus.”

wow.

according to a.w. tozer, the most important thing about you is what comes to mind when you think about God.

“… the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at any given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like…  were we able to extract from any man a complete answer to the question, ‘what comes to your mind when you think about God?’ we might predict with certainty the spiritual future of that man. (a.w. tozer, the knowledge of the holy)

how you think about God will determine who you become.  you aren’t just a byproduct of “nature” and “nurture”.  you are a byproduct of your God-picture.  and that internal picture of God determines how you see everything else.

most of our problems are not circumstantial.  most of our problems are perceptual.  our biggest problems can be traced back to an inadequate understanding of who God is.  our problems seem really big because our God seems really small.  in fact, we reduce God to the size of our biggest problem.

tozer said a “low view of God… is the cause of a hundred lesser evils.”  but a person with a high view of God “is relieved of ten thousand temporal problems.”

“I don’t think the way you think.
The way you work isn’t the way I work.”
God’s Decree.
“For as the sky soars high above earth,
so the way I work surpasses the way you work,
and the way I think is beyond the way you think. – isaiah 55:8-9 (the message)

i can certainly attest this principle to be true in my own life.  i can look back on specific instances when how i approached or walked through a particular situation in my life was in direct correlation to how i perceived God in that season of my life.  i am thankful that seasons change and we grow, thus providing opportunities for our understanding and perception of God in our lives to increase as well.  there are things that happened to me in the past which, were they to play out again today, would not produce the same response from me, primarily because of who i am continually becoming as a direct result of what i continually and increasingly understand about God.

what about you?  how has your approach to life been altered by your perception and understanding of who God is over the years?

at church yesterday, pastor jamie used this excerpt from larry crabb’s book the pressure’s off.  it was incredibly profound for me and i wanted to share it.

you’ve cheapened the requirements of holiness by assuming you can do enough right things to bring about a “better life.” sometimes that works. sometimes it doesn’t. you therefore live with uncertainty and pressure, and you demand to know the way to live that will make your life work as you want.
you maneuver; you do not trust.
you negotiate; you do not worship.
you analyze and interpret to gain control over what happens; you do not depend.
you seek the “better life of God’s blessings today” over the “better hope of God’s presence.

i came away from that with many thoughts, most of which i am still processing.  what thoughts do you have after reading that?

my life changes

memory changes

my love changes

system changes

my world changes

Jesus, Jesus… never changes

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this post is completely unrelated to the fact that that it is snowing once again here in nashville, on april 6… one day after we had a beautiful 74 degree spring day… but i want to introduce you to audrey assad,  a writer and artist who i recently discovered.  her song “winter snow” has quickly become one of my favorite songs and i want to share it with you.

what a strikingly beautiful and intimate depiction of Christ coming to earth, our Emmanuel… God with us…

winter snow by audrey assad

could’ve come like a mighty storm / with all the strength of a hurricane

you could’ve come like a forrest fire / with the power of heaven in your flame

but you came like a winter snow / quiet and soft and slow

falling from the sky in the night / to the earth below

could’ve swept in like a tidal wave / or an ocean to ravish our hearts

you could have come through like a roaring flood / to wipe away the things we’ve scarred

but you came like a winter snow / quiet and soft and slow

falling from the sky in the night / to the earth below

no, your voice wasn’t in a bush burning

no, your voice wasn’t in a rushing wind

it was still, it was small, it was hidden

wow.

audrey is a client of my good friend kat at the brown book agency, and you can hear more of her beautiful music on her myspace.

u2 has become widely synonymous with ‘justice’ (as in: just behavior or treatment), largely through the extensive work of frontman bono for the world’s impoverished, downtrodden and forgotten through vehicles such as the red campaign.

however, never have u2 and justice (as in: the uber-cool french electronic music duo) collided in this manner… and it’s deliciously ridiculous… or perhaps it’s ridiculously delicious.

this should be played at high volumes, preferably in an area where you are free to flail and cavort about or otherwise get your groove on extemporaneously.  i don’t know where you can buy this yes, but hopefully it will be commercially available somewhere very very soon.

u2 – get on your boots (justice remix)

mad, mad props to stereogum!

having a palm treo with a camera for years was something that brought me and many friends much joy as i was able to document some of the crazy randomness that i tend to encounter with surprising regularity.  in september ’07 i upgraded from a treo 750 to a blackberry 8830 world edition which came in extremely handy in all my international travel throughout the following year, but did not have a camera.  well, today i put an end to that when i switched to a shiny new blackberry curve, complete with  camera!

here is a small sample of some of my camera phone goodies from over the years…

Front a center at a private event in DC where Beyonce gave a surprise performance

At an instore with Kirk in Atlanta (Oct 05), we "experienced" this crazy lady who claimed to have written all of his songs, and MaryMary's, and Kierra Sheard's... priceless!

On the Hero Tour (Spring '06), I think we were in Mississippi... this McDonalds employee was getting dressed for work in the parking lot right by the front door.

Not surprisingly, at the same McDonalds as mentioned above, saw this dude who was rocking TWO different plaids... and you know he thought he was killin it, right?

During a hurricane-produced gas shortage in Dallas in 2005, one local station had apparently run out of "regural". Classy.

I know what they meant to say, but "remodelation"?

King's Palace in Joplin, Missouri... the only Chinese buffet I have seen with mashed potatoes and gravy, spaghetti and smoked sausage.

and my personal favorite... "special gift for special people"... a figurine of a small african-american child sitting on a toilet, pants down, putting on her shoes... for the person who has everything.

the camera phone bandit is back… this will be your only warning… i’m just saying…