I taught two classes at the National Worship Leader Conference this week: Basic Blogging and Advanced Blogging (I know, catchy titles). Most of the folks in the basic class don’t have blogs (yet) and were just attending to figure out what on earth a blog is, why people blog and decide if they should do it too. One of the main things I wanted them to understand was that a blog is a two-way communication device, like a phone, and not one-way like a megaphone.
Yes, I admitted, there are some bloggers (a lot of pastors, in fact) who don’t allow comments on their blogs or allow them but don’t respond to them. These blogs, I said, aren’t really blogs; they’re pamphlets.
After the class, we broke for lunch. I joined a few folks under a tree, opened my boxed meal and bottled water and did a lot of listening in an interesting conversation. The National Worship Leader Conference is well organized, held in a beautiful location, expertly staffed, well attended. It’s a great conference. The folks under the tree with me went on and on about all the great stuff they’d heard and seen. But then one guy said, “I wish there was a way for me to take this experience with me, pass it around when I get home and keep it going.”
After lunch someone in my Advanced Blogging class made the same kind of remark. “And I wish we could share our own ideas - like if there was a time where everyone here could share one or two of their best ideas.”
Both of these people seemed to me to be saying that they want conferences - learning in general - to be more like a telephone than a megaphone. This is the same thing some people seem to be looking for in their formal education or at church. Some people are craving more interaction with information and the “expert,” more opportunities to share their own insights, and a way to keep the conversation going when the class or conference is “over” - a way to spread the stuff they learn and love.
Have you been to a conference that does this well? A church or a school? Tell us about it.
Becky let me know before we left for Austin that she had only two goals on this workation of ours: 1)Sleep late 2)Eat lots.
She’s a simple woman. And I love this about her.
After sleeping eleven hours the first night (apparently, she was a tad on the sleep deprived side) I set out to achieve her second goal. Yesterday evening we ate at The County Line. Sausage, Chicken, and candy disguised as pork ribs. Jesus, you have blessed me tremendously in my short life but none has pleased me like the plate of goodness that was County Line Bar-B-Q. Thank you. Amen.
None of it was raw. None of it was what one might call healthy. I ingested exactly zeros vegetables. Even so, it is well with my soul. My entire digestive system fro my esophagus to my colon has not stopped smiling.
Then we were off to The Oasis on Lake Travis, billed as the “Sunset Capital of Texas.” We’d been warned by many that the food is so-so and a tad expensive, so we just went for the big show and some sopapillas for dessert.
The Oasis burned down - struck by lightning - in 2005 and has just recently been fully reconstructed to its original six-story self. Six stories of decks and balconies, all facing the water and packed with sunset-watchers every evening.
We sat on the second level under an umbrella, talking without any interruptions and with nowhere to be next. The show began.
We talked about how time speeds up the older we get, like the sun moving across Earth’s sky: It seems like gravity is pulling the sun down faster in those last few inches toward the horizon.
We dated for five years and this month we’ll have been married for eleven. Maybe, we thought, time seems to be speeding up because we see each so much less than we did in college. Maybe time apart has a pace much quicker than time together.
But that must not be true, because the hours we spent eating, laughing, wondering about the future, retelling the past and staring out across the lake didn’t feel long enough.
It’s simple math, I think. One year to a five year-old is one fifth of their life. That’s a long time. But one year when we’re in our thirties is a much smaller percentage of all we’ve already experienced. The older we get the smaller that percentage becomes and the more rapidly time seems to pass.
With our lives somewhere around high-noon (as far as we know), we wondered out loud what might be ahead of us, realizing we’re horrible prognosticators. We remembered all the things we thought the future would hold before we met. She wanted to be an accountant in Paris married to someone stable who never travelled and was always home for dinner. And I wanted to be a songwriter in Dallas living down the street from a Pappasito’s.
Then, when I was nineteen and she was twenty-three we became friends. And then we became friends who kissed. And then, years later, we were married and moved to Tennessee - far from Texas and even farther from France. These days I travel and I’m not always home for dinner and there’s not a Pappasito’s in sight. And Becky falls behind on her sleep. And there’s a house to clean and a yard to mow, a garage door to fix, a toilet to repair, bills to pay, business to run, planes to catch. Life moves quickly now. But last night we slowed down, hung out watching the sun set, talking like old friends, and even kissing a little - enjoying the show while it lasted.
Worship Leader Magazine‘s National Worship Leader Conference set worship leaders on fire this week in Austin, Texas. God is thought partly to blame.
The first incident (picture above) occurred Tuesday afternoon when an unidentified worship pastor from somewhere other than Texas attempted to walk across the parking lot of Riverbend Church at approximately 3PM. He burst into flames seconds after setting foot on the black asphalt. Conference organizers were quick to express sympathy and to point out that covered walkways and metrosexual-friendly army green “Fidel Castro style” caps were made available to conference goers and none of the victims took advantage of these provisions.
“It’s just literally as hot as hell here,” conference speaker and renowned songwriter Paul Baloche told police. “If you go outside you’re real real dumb."*
Julie Reid, COO of Worship Leader Magazine, said she and other conference organizers plan to use the comparative temperatures of Austin and hell to their spiritual advantage at the conference’s closing session. “We’ve decided to have a special alter call at the end this year instead of singing something by Chris Tomlin again. Stuff like this gets people’s attention you know? We expect a lot of pastors to get saved."**
--------
*Paul Baloche did not say this. He does not say “hell,” nor does he think or say anyone is dumb. He is a worship leader.
**Julie Reid did not say this stuff either. No pastors will actually be saved at the National Worship Leader Conference.
I’m speaking about blogging at the National Worship Leader Conference in Austin this week. Becky’s here with me, savoring four days of sleeping in, eating out and doing whatever she wants whenever she wants.
My parents arrived yesterday to hang out with our kids for the week - drove all the way from Texas to Tennessee - I have incredibly generous parents. And how did we repay them? With a broken toilet.
Just before Becky left home for Austin, the kids’ toilet overflowed, brown water everywhere, every towel in the house used to corral it away from the hallway and neighboring bedrooms. She plunged, Redneck Neighbor plunged - nothing worked.
We phoned home this morning to see how life with no towels, three kids, two adults and one toilet was going. My dad got a plumber out to the house and he found the problem: Thomas. Yep, Thomas the tank engine was lodged deep in the potty.
Becky and I, on the other hand, are in a nice hotel with lots of towels, a working toilet and no children. For fours days.
So, my blogging will likely be sporadic and not all that deep or entertaining this week. It takes time to be consistent, deep(ish) and entertaining and, well, I’d rather spend those hours with Becky and lots of Tex-Mex right now. Forgive me. And come back when our four days of workation are up.
