Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music

The most recent Gravity group meeting consisted of taking a respite from looking at the life of Abram and instead watching a movie. That movie being Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music. The film is a documentary focusing on christian music, specifically the rock n' roll genre of christina music. Most of the film's footage was taken at the Cornerstone Festival in Illinois from the year 2000 and there are interviews from musicians, critics and attendee's of the festival spread throughout. 

The title of the film comes from a Larry Norman song. For those not familiar with Larry Norman he was one of the first professing christian musicians to use the rock n' roll as a means of expressing  his faith. Larry recently passed away but the legacy of what he was able to do continues on in the outgrowth of a musical movement. 

What the film allowed us to do at Gravity is discuss the christian music scene and discuss some of the topics and questions that were asked to people in the film. Some of the things discussed were commercialization, authenticity, preaching vs. positivism, hypocrisy and music in general. 

There is allot that can be discussed about the film and I'm sure that many more viewings of the film will come in the future. 

Abram Pt. 3

Genesis 15-16

No matter how many people I have met there is not one person who does not have one complaint about their family. There are things that our family's do that seem to get on our nerves and are like little pins being shoved under our finger nails. But they are our family and even though there may be things that will drive us crazy we ourselves are not immune to causing some havoc. 

Abram's family was not different from our modern day family. Sure there were different customs and all but for the most part the interactions between different members of the family were not perfect. In chapter 15 of Genesis, Abram did not have a family like most people had. He lacked a son to carry on the family name and even though God kept his promises with Abram, the promise of ancestors as numerous as the stars was nowhere to be found. That's why God shows up and goes through the ritual of making an oath, kind of like a handshake but involving cutting animals in half and walking through them. 

Even though Abram has this promise from God he stills finds a way to screw things up. Sarai convinces Abram to sleep with a maidservant named Hagar and you can imagine what that does. (Jealousy, fighting, arguing and pain.) Hagar gives birth to Ishmael but God does not forget Hagar and her son but lets her know that her son will have descendants to numerous to count but Ishmael will be in constant conflict with his brothers. 

Did Abram really think that God's plan involved sleeping with Sarai's maidservant? Was Ishmael supposed to be the one to carry on Abram's name? Did Abram realize that this wasn't the plan when Sarai and Hagar were at each others throats? How was Abram going to fix his family?

We are great at hurting each other. Maybe not intentionally but for some reason we do it anyway. Especially with our family. Just as Sarai and Abram tried to do things their way, we do things our way and we end up making a very big mess. We argue with our brothers and sisters, we fight with our parents, and we put ourselves into relationships that hurt our family. But there is one thing about Hagar and Ishmael that I think is important.

God did not forget about Hagar and Ishmael. Of course their would be consequences to what happened but God was still there for them. Even though we can cause allot of misery within our family or  our family can cause us misery, God is still here. God may want us to do something that we may not want to do, like Hagar going back to Sarai and Abram, but if we trust in him things can get better. 

Abram Pt. 1 and 2

Genesis 12-14 (Not even going to attempt to type the whole thing!)

This post will be an attempt to combine two weeks of meetings together into one thought provoking Gravity Blog piece. And this gives me the opportunity to make each post the current weeks study rather than being a week behind. Without further ado.

Genesis is known for allot of things in the Bible. One of those things is this guy named Abram (a.k.a Abraham, but that's later.) There's allot that we can learn from this guy who lived oh so many years ago. And lets face it, sometimes the story's of Genesis out weigh the practical applications. (Think about Noah and Flood, great story but what does that do for me today?) The life of Abram can easily fall victim to the same mentality. There are so many things that happened in his life but how does that relate to me today? So we take a look.

Abram was called by God. Why Abram? I don't know. But his calling was to leave the land he was living in and go to a land practically a world away. Maybe it would be like leaving New Jersey and having to go to Alaska. What is great about Abram's calling is that there does not seem to be a moment of hesitation. He gets his family and stuff together and goes. I can't help but think of the countless times that I have been hesitant to God's calling. You might be thinking, "How do I know what God's calling is?" I don't know the intricacy's but I do know what is in the Bible, especially in the New Testament. When things like love your enemies, help the poor, and share the gospel seem to be things that all are called to do. We get reluctant when we know we need to do the right thing cause the "what ifs'" start going through our heads. Abram certainly had some time to think about the "what ifs'" as he left his home in Ur and traveled to Canaan, he could have turned back but he didn't.

Abram wasn't immune to sin and he did mess up when he was in Eygpt but the promises that God made to Abram were still in effect. As Abram and his nephew Lot went their separate ways, Abram continued to serve God and wait upon his promises.  When Abram rescued Lot from the war between the Kings it seemed that Abram's life couldn't get any better. The King and High Priest of Salem Melchizedek was honoring him and even the King of Sodom wanted to lavish him with gifts. But Abram does something interesting, he rejects the King of Sodom's gifts. Why? Abram does not want to associate himself with the King of Sodom. Wait a second, Abram's receiving a gift for doing something good why not take it?

Melchizedek gives Abram a blessing of words and Abram gives Melchizedek a 10th of all he owns. Is there something wrong with Abram? 

It's a great feeling to be rewarded or given a gift for doing something. But I wonder, should we accept the praises of everybody? Abram didn't take the King of Sodom's gift cause the King of Sodom's character was not something Abram wanted to be associated with. Abram didn't want people to think that he had anything to do with the King of Sodom. I guess now a day's we take whatever anybody is giving us. Who cares where it is coming from just as long as I make out in the end. I suspect that this way of thinking proves our failure as a body of believers and maybe leads people to think of us as hypocrites. Then there's Abram's reaction to Melchizedek. 

By the time Abram rescued Lot, Abram was a rich and well off guy. God's promises and blessings were over flowing in Abram's life. I would think that Melchizedek's words of blessing to Abram would kind of be along the lines of saying thank you. Usually when someone say's thank you to me I just say you're welcome. Abram does something completely different, he gives up a 10th of everything he has. Imagine someone saying thank you to you and you have 100 dollars in your wallet, after they say thank you, you give them 10 dollars. Hmmm...you're welcome seems pretty lame compared to Abram's actions. But this makes me think.

We are told many times that God will bless us for the things we do and there are some who make it there sole purpose to let you know that. What if when God blessed us we didn't just say thanks but we gave back. And not just give but really give. I'm a little at a loss for words here because examples are lacking at this time. In the book of Acts there seems to be a giving out of God's blessings that is earth changing and there doesn't seem to be an attitude of wanting to get something out of God. If you can think of any ways to give back to God leave a comment.