Good God, Bad Music – Part One June 29, 2008
Posted by Josiah in Life, Music, Prayer Room.Tags: Bad, God, IHOP-KC, Music, Musicians, Prayer Room
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At the House of Prayer we do something that we’ve come to call Harp and Bowl. It’s a structure combining worship music and prayer to make it possible to pray for a really really really long time. The International House of Prayer has been praying 24/7 since 1999. The days are split up into twelve back to back, two hour long prayer “sets”.
Being a prayer format that is set to music, the musicianship of the people involved has a huge impact on the prayer meeting. If the music is good, then people stay longer and tell their friends about it later. If the music is just OK (or worse), then people leave the prayer room and may even avoid that set it the future.
As a musician, I’m not sure what stance to take on the whole issue. There are people at the prayer room who would have only the best musicians play. There are also those who would allow anyone who wants to be on stage play. I don’t agree with either one of those views.
There must be some kind of balance between the marvelous and the mephitic in our music. God loves the worship of his people, whether they can sing or play or not. Every genuine act of worship is beautiful to God, but how do we keep genuinely repulsive music from destroying an atmosphere of prayer?
-J
Alcohol, Depression, and Corey Russell June 28, 2008
Posted by Josiah in IHOP-KC, Knowledge of God, Life, OneThing, Prayer Room.Tags: Alcohol, Conference, Corey Russell, Depression, Fake, God, Hype, Hypocrisy, IHOP-KC, Knowledge of God, Life, OneThing, Prayer Room, Testimony
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I met an old friend last night at the House of Prayer. I knew him about two years ago when I kinda mentored him. We’ve both been through a lot since the last time we spoke, and we ended up filling each other in on the last two years of our lives. For those of you who don’t know, my story goes like this…
In mid 2006 I decided that if the Christian life that I was living was all there was, then what the world had to offer was better. So I gave God an open invitation to prove me wrong, and started drinking and partying at every chance I got. I was drunk more than I was sober for a good six months. I started a cycle of depression and drinking that just led to deeper depression and more drinking. Soon all my money was going to gas, rent, alcohol, and over-the-counter pain killers.
That lasted until Saint Patrick’s Day, 2007. I had a choice to go to a pub crawl in downtown Sacramento, or the Sacramento OneThing conference put on by The International House of Prayer in Kansas City. For reasons I still don’t know, I chose the OneThing conference. For most of the conference I just walked around and judged all the fake hypocritical church people that were there to get their God-hype fix so that they could continue their sorry excuse for Christianity.
To try to avoid too much attention from anyone who may recognize me from my church-going days, I went to a teaching by a guy named Corey Russell. He looked crazy, so I thought it’d be entertaining. Well, I’m pretty sure that I was right, he is crazy–crazy enough to actually get through all my pride and judgment. He shook my paradigm to the core. The phrase that caught my attention was this:
“God’s not boring, you’re boring. If you think God is boring you have no idea who He is.”
Corey did not look bored, and he didn’t look fake and hypocritical like a lot of the other people there. I decided that whatever Corey had, I wanted. From then on I was on a search for the knowledge of God. I was still drinking and depressed, but I had a purpose in life for once: to know God.
Not a lot has changed since then. I drink a lot less, and know a little more, but my purpose hasn’t changed. I still need to know who God is. Not what He’s done or why He did it, I was raised in church, I know all that. I need to know Him as a friend.
I’m so convinced that the knowledge of God is all that matters that I’ve quit my job and am going full time in a place that I believe I can find Him.
Well, now you’re all up to speed on my life for that last two years. I’ll make this a separate page from now on so everyone can read it.
-J
Work Woes June 25, 2008
Posted by Josiah in Life, Prayer Room, Work.Tags: God, Job, Music, Prayer Room, Work
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I still have to work at my old job for two weeks. To continue working there after committing to what I’m supposed to be doing with my life feels like an exercise in futility. I provide no necessary service and my performance can be judged by how many superficial conversations I have per half hour.
But I need to continue to work as unto the Lord. It seems pointless and stupid, but I still work there for two more weeks, and that means that I give them everything I have for those two weeks.
It’s so hard to keep my mind on what I’m doing at work. My mind is off writing songs, or working out my new schedule at the Prayer Room, or coming up with a new guitar part for one of the five songs that Juan does over and over.
I’m going today to get the paperwork to make my intercessory missionary status official. This whole thing feels so surreal.
-J
Desire or Despair June 24, 2008
Posted by Josiah in Knowledge of God, Life, Prayer Room.Tags: Depression, Desire, Knowledge of God, Life, Love Sick, Nightwatch, Prayer Room, Waiting
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I’m in the prayer room now. You know something funny? It’s not any easier. I don’t feel any closer to God by quitting my job. I still need grace to be here same as I ever have.
Something I heard a lot at the International House of Prayer in Kansas City was, “It takes God to love God.” I am so feeling that right now. Sitting here asking for the knowledge of God, I find that as the minutes turn to hours and the hours start to drag on, I am more and more just asking for the grace to stay here.
And yet, I can’t leave. Nothing matters anymore but to know Him. In fact, that’s all that has mattered for some time now, but until now I’ve been pursuing other things and getting depressed. Nothing is more depressing than knowing that only one thing matters in life, and circumstances making it seem impossible to pursue it.
At this point it’s still hard to just wait for God for five hours a night, but the alternative is even worse. My options are thus: continue to wait on God even if I don’t feel anything, or pursue something else and become suicidally depressed.
I want to know Him. I MUST know Him. I will wait.
-J
A Scary Thing June 23, 2008
Posted by Josiah in Knowledge of God, Life, Prayer Room, Work.Tags: God, Job, Knowledge of God, Life, Prayer Room, Quit, Religion, Work
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I’m starting this blog because I’m doing something crazy. Some would even say stupid, or foolish.
I intend to quit my job serving coffee to a caffeine-dependent public and spend 35 to 40 hours a week in a “house of prayer”. The Prayer Room pays about the same as volunteering at a soup kitchen (nothing) and most people think we don’t even need one.
And yet I must do it. I am compelled to do it; and I don’t even know why. I long to know God, not in a superficial or mystical way, but to know the person Christ Jesus. To be His friend.
So, for God and angels and demons and Alyssa and anyone else who may happen to read this, this is my declaration:
I want to know God. I’m doing what I’m about to do for no other reason than to know Him. It doesn’t make sense to me or anyone else. But I’m doing it, and trying to trust God that He’ll take care of me.
Great, now I’m crying for seemingly no reason. I’ll write more later, I have to go quit my job now.
-J
