(The latest iPod Devotional from theFish.com) A song from a career long, long ago and far, far away cued up on the iPod today. Right out of high school I worked as a disc jockey at a small radio station in Southern Ohio. I remember being so excited to play a song from The Doobie Brothers called “Jesus Is Just Alright”. The song was also recorded by The Byrds. Hearing The Doobie Brothers sing about Jesus was pretty amazing in my still young faith journey. I was sure they had to be believers to release a song like this. I know. I was incredibly naive. Apparently none of the group was particularly religious but the song became an anthem for the incredible Jesus Movement that swept the land. My buddy Ed Underwood has written a great book about the power of that movement called Reborn To Be Wild. I remember one critical Christian (hard to imagine that) hearing the song
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Watching the news on television is depressing. Election years seem to pour fuel on the culture war fires. I much prefer to spend my leisure moments reading, listening to music and walking with canine friend Hannah. Today a song on my iPod from Seventh Day Slumber caused me to ask some questions about the way the church engages our culture. The song is From the Inside Out. My heart and my soul I give You control Consume me from the inside out Lord Let justice and praise Become my embrace To love You from the inside out Change happens from the inside out. I wrote about the culture war in my book “When Bad Christians Happen to Good People”. Here is an excerpt from that discussion. If I were to ask the average Christian what victory in the culture war would look like today, I would probably get answers along these lines: Abortion would be outlawed. Homosexuality would be less
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Every year they rudely awaken Punxsutawney Phil long enough for the prognosticating rodent to let us know whether six more weeks of winter awaits. Phil always looks about as happy as I do when when I am disturbed in the morning. Twenty-six years ago a funny and underappreciated movie came on the scene. Groundhog Day told the story of a self-absorbed news reporter (redundancy alert?) that finds himself stuck in an endless repeat of the same day. Bill Murray is perfect in the role of reporter Phil Connors. Reporter Phil is less than thrilled that he has been assigned to cover Punxsutawney Phil’s annual peek outside to predict winter’s duration. He feels he is “above” such an inane assignment. Connor’s looks into the camera and cynically reports: “This is one time where television really fails to capture the true excitement of a large squirrel predicting the weather.” The premise of the movie is that Phil Connors realizes he is doomed to live
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