theo|digital

A crazy, stressful semester just ended. Let’s hope the pain yields deeper thinking in the end, but for now, I’ve got a month of blogging to catch up on, and desperately need un-deep things for a bit. This was the informal Everyone-Is-E-mailing-About-This-Video -Of-The-Week several weeks ago, but it’s still deadly funny. Nick and I went to Best Buy and bought the whole DVD. You’ll want to, too.

caliente pocket!

There are rumors that the bluegrass trio Nickle Creek is breaking up. This would be a loss. They just keep getting better. My favorite song – it’s hard to tell whether musically or spiritually – is Doubting Thomas.

What will be left when I’ve drawn my last breath
Besides the folks I’ve met and the folks who’ve known me
Will I discover a soul-saving love
Or just the dirt above and below me

I’m a doubting Thomas
I took a promise
But I do not feel safe
Oh me of little faith

Sometimes I pray for a slap in the face
Then I beg to be spared cause I’m a coward
If there’s a master of death
I bet he’s holding his breath
As I show the blind and tell the deaf about his power

I’m a doubting Thomas
I can’t keep my promises
Cause I don’t know what’s safe
Oh me of little faith

Can I be used to help others find truth
When I’m scared I’ll find proof that it’s a lie
Can I be led down a trail dropping bread crumbs
That prove I’m not ready to die

Please give me time to decipher the signs
Please forgive me for time that I’ve wasted

I’m a doubting Thomas
I’ll take your promise
You’ve always kept me safe
Oh me of little faith

A programmer a Google created a piece of interactive art/java application that aggregates quotes throughout the web from the KJV version of the Bible, and shows you visually what is quoted the most. The site is called exegesis.

Yeah, it turns out Revelation is quoted a lot. Judgement, etc.

The project was commissioned by Turbulence, a New-York-based fund that commissions, exhibits, and archives new hybrid networked art forms.

It takes a minute to understand, but you can click and drag the cursor in areas to scroll through the text quickly. It also allows you to search for terms and uses small blue or orange arrows to indicate results. Orange is direct word-matches, blue are matches that finds using the text of the website the scripture was quoted on.

So there’s this truck with red flashing lights and a guy wearing an orange-vest-thing on I-65 that’s called the “Hoosier Helper.”

That’s a freebie.

I’m on the road with Ty, Brooke, and Stacey. We’re listening to Kaki King in Ty’s minivan and making jokes about chain smoking. Oh, and Brooke is doing the New York accent.

We’re off to Ann Arbor, MI for GCM staff conference stuff. See you later in the week.

I’ve been writing these for a little while, but now I’ll start posting some here. Short reviews of music, literature, and media that I force into 75 words or less. They’re a fun exercise, and you get more of what I think about, for instance, the things that graduate from my “Currently Reading” box on the right.

D.A. Carson
Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church:
Understanding a Movement and Its Implications (2005)
(genre: Church and Culture; Theology; Critique)

The New Testament research professor’s appraisal of authors Brian McLaren and Dan Kimball opens with olive-branch humility and qualified praise of emergent church emphasis on experiential and ecumenical spirituality. Carson’s historical and academic breadth (well-footnoted) brings must-read cautions to the dialogue, but turns in later chapters, carrying an increasingly shrill tone that eventually misses the point, ironically calling theological fouls too fastidious for the works he critiques.

Vertical Horizon
Go (2005)
(genre: Pop Rock)

Five years after Everything You Want, Vertical Horizon reminds us that they still exist with the John Shanks (Michelle Branch) produced Go. Stereo-surround harmonies still trump the ’69 Marshall guitar amp, tipping the scales to pop hooks over any real thrash. I’m a sucker for catchy, but until mid-30’s Matt Scannell rises above his pre-teen lyrical constructions (I need you ~ I want you), Vertical will rarely find my playlist.

Don’t pick on people, jump on their failures, criticize their faults – unless, of course, you want the same treatment. That critical spirit has a way of boomeranging. It’s easy to see a smudge on your neighbor’s face and be oblivious to the ugly sneer on your own.

Do you have the nerve to say, “Let me wash your face for you,” when your own face is distorted by contempt? It’s this whole traveling road-show mentality all over again, playing a holier-than-thou part instead of just living your part. Wipe that ugly sneer off your own face, and you might be fit to offer a washcloth to your neighbor.

~ Jesus (Matthew 7), translated sans “splinter/plank” with heart-exposing simplicity by Eugene Peterson’s The Message. This got me today.

The End-User-License-Agreement is as much ubiquitous as it is ignored. Who doesn’t throw the An Important Change to Your Credit Card Agreement mailing in the can, or just hit the [Agree] button?

Trouble is that Sony says that if your house burns down, you’re legally required to delete the music they own. You agreed. And it’s important not to operate nuclear facilities while using the Yahoo Toolbar. huh.

The Small Print Project. Someone is having fun in grad school.

Found it surfing.

Isn’t the story posted along the side of the road the life narrative we really believe? Truth – when it’s presented as such – has not such real power as the billboard-illusions of our lives.

Culture is not something Christians think carefully how to face. Culture is the truth we all walk in the doors already believing.

Ran up to the Chicago Marathon this Sunday. (Not really ran, you understand, but the language is thematic.) My roommate Nick actually ran, and I toddled around with my other roomate JP trying to spot Nick along the 26.2 mile course. Running really isn’t a good spectator sport (there he is!!! NICK!! GO NICK!! GO NI.. welp, he’s gone.) But we did get some great pictures of Elvis, who was singing on a stage at mile 10.5, and saying things like “you’re looking good, baby” “keep running, doll”

yikes.

More Chicago Marathon pics here.
ps – they’re not very good – I didn’t have a good camera with me. Plus I kept yelling when I was supposed to be taking pictures.

Last month, me-and-the-posse pranked my roommate for his birthday. Of course a hidden camera was part of the joke, so here’s the vid I made after the fact.

hee.