[invite] jazz, sushi and Jesus

The month of April is ‘Jazz Appreciation Month’. You may find this hard to believe, but even though it does not have any greeting cards associated with it, jazz music is still an important aspect of American culture. Jazz music is an American art form. Truly American. Unlike classical music, which is from Europe, most music that is considered American finds its roots in jazz music. Blues and rock especially. I must admit, however, jazz music is an acquired taste. In some ways, I think it’s difficult to understand or appreciate jazz music without being invited to experience it. You almost have to go a jazz club to truly appreciate what is the ‘experience’ of jazz music. It’s hard to appreciate when you have not experienced; it’s hard to understand when you have not experienced. Thinking about it more, eating Sushi and befriending Jesus are much the same.

I remember my first time trying Sushi. I was on a break from playing drums with a wedding reception band at a golf club on the south side of Charlotte, NC (where I live). Without asking anybody, I heard that the wedding buffet had sushi on it. Being curious and having always wanted to try sushi, I ate some. Within about an hour, I was using my next break to relieve my stomach from the faux-sushi. Later that night, I told one of the other musicians about my experience. They laughed. That was my first sushi experience. Alone and hugging the porcelain god, it was not a fond memory.

My second time trying sushi was different. I was in Okinawa, Japan to play a concert with a jazz trio. The two other guys in the band are good friends of mine. The first thing they wanted to do after sleeping off the jet lag was to eat some ‘real’ Japanese sushi. I was a bit hesitant, but only because of my history with the wedding reception replica of a California roll (aka: faux-sushi). My friends laughed when I told them about my introduction to this raw delicacy and insured me that the ‘second time will be a charm’.

As we sat around the Sushi bar, the little plates of various Sushi paraded by us and with every passing dish my friends told me the name of it and what was in it. After asking me what I liked to eat, they suggested what they thought would be a good piece of Sushi to start with. Then they taught me about Wasabi, Soy Sauce and Ginger Root. They described what they tasted like; how to combine them and what they preferred. In short, they personally walked me through this meal, this experience. I asked questions, they answered – if they could. I tried some Sushi I didn’t like and I gagged – they laughed and so did I. It was fun. Not to gag, but experience something new with friends. I’m now a Sushi lover, and I like inviting other people to try it because of this experience.

Meeting Jesus is the same way. People need to be invited into the experience, the friendship. Jesus invited Simon to be His friend – to follow Him. In response, Simon invited a few of his closest friends to party with him and his new friend, Jesus.

In a post-Christian culture, it’s not healthy to work off of assumptions anymore. We can’t live our lives assuming that people know about Jesus – the Jesus that you’ve experienced. Just like faux-sushi, there are plenty of faux-Jesus’s out there. As well, living a life of assumptions does not create change it only maintains those assumptions. Saying nothing changes nothing.

While I was on staff at a church a few years ago, I had a guitar player that played in one the worship bands. Because a jazz musician friend of mine was in town for a few days, I had planned on meeting him and hanging out at a local jazz club after our worship band rehearsal. I invited this guitar player to join us. He had some things on his mind and I thought we could continue our discussion at the club.

When we got to the club, it was packed and my friend already had a table and a beer for both of us. Not knowing I had invited someone to join us, we quickly ordered another beer and began to watch the jazz trio (piano, bass and drums) play a song. As they started the song, I leaned over to my guitar player friend and gave him a ‘play-by-play’ of what was happening musically. As we sat in the smoky club, the guitar player felt free to ask both my friend and I questions about what was musically happening with the trio and about jazz music in general. There were no bad or ‘dumb’ questions. Nothing was taboo. We watched, we talked, we learned. We laughed a bunch, too!

So…jazz, sushi and Jesus – how do we connect the dots?

It all starts with an invitation. Take a moment to look back at early grade school. Remember how you felt when you did or didn’t get invited to a birthday or a sleepover? Although those feelings may age, they do not mature, we do. Maturity is how we hide and bury our feelings. Right? Invitations are powerful and the beginning.

By invitation I don’t mean an invitation to salvation, but an invitation to friendship. For those of us who follow Jesus we have this as a responsibility. This is two fold (or more). First, it is natural. We need to live our lives in such a way that who we are is naturally inviting to others. Not what we do, but who we are. Not our words but our actions. Second, it is intentional. We need to be very intentional in our personal and communal relationship with Jesus. As well, we need to be intentional about our activity in the community in which we live. This could be involvement in civic organizations or this could be something simple like using the public library instead of buying your books online. Make an effort to be around people.

Along with an invitation to friendship, we must extend an invitation to experience. We must be willing to participate in the experience with those whom we have invited. If I invite someone to eat Sushi and then don’t eat, that doesn’t make much sense does it? The invitation should lead to a friendship, which allows for a common experience. This experience creates conversation, ensues education and builds stronger friendship and healthier community. All the while, we are building trust.

The beauty of the common experience is that it doesn’t matter whether it’s good or bad because we’re together. It’s not whether you like sushi or appreciate jazz, it’s about inviting others to experience Life, to be together. There are no ‘dumb’ questions and sometimes there aren’t any real answers, but one thing is clear, we’re together. The freeing thing to know is that you won’t find out until you try. Be free to know you are not the source, just the conduit. It’s overwhelming for all of us to live in and think about the complex issues of our post-Christian world - we share this as humanity. And yet it is amazing the hope that can be found when we are intentional about focusing our attention on one simple part of our responsibility in following Jesus: to invite and to experience Life.

supply & demand [thoughts on being relevant]

“And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power."

We face the same challenging decision that Paul did when he entered the city of Corinth. To be simple: so that ‘your faith might not rest on human wisdom but on God’s power’. Or, to be wise: ‘with eloquence and human wisdom’.

The culture of this world demands of us that we be ‘in the know’. It’s not socially acceptable or fashionable to be simple or to even admit personal ignorance. In turn, this creates a barrier for real friendship and real vulnerability – real community. It forces you and I to NOT be ourselves.

Our innate understanding of ‘supply and demand’ has us, as the body of Christ, naturally feeling an urgency to meet this cultural demand by supplying not necessarily answers but socially acceptable and fashionable messages that meet this cultural demand. In turn, this enables us to control whether or not people are ‘getting it’ or ‘receiving Christ’. We call this relevant, but is it really? Have we fooled ourselves into thinking that relevancy will meet the deep spiritual longing of our present culture?

By definition, to be relevant is to be closely connected or appropriate to the matter at hand. How can we be closely connected or even appropriate with anyone without the Spirit of God? His Spirit is the only thing that can truly connect not just your spirit and my spirit, but more importantly, His spirit to my spirit and His Spirit to your spirit. This creates a closely connected spiritual community; a truly appropriate and relevant people.

Paul came ‘in weakness with fear and trembling’ with the simple intent to demonstrate the power of God through God’s spirit, not his own. Have we confused what is true relevancy by without know that we have infused it with a cultural doctrine of supply and demand?

Relevancy is connecting people to the matter at hand, which is Jesus – Christ crucified and His Spirit thereof. Relevancy meets the needs of the present by infusing it with the future, God’s Kingdom-at-hand; lest our faith – and the church – ‘rest on human wisdom’. Better said, what WE think relevancy is.

Father, help us to understand what it truly means to be relevant.

2:1 [prayer]

two thoughts:
“The inner life is always a life for others.” -Henri Nouwen
“Jesus taught us how to be in prayer what we are in life and how to be in life what we are in prayer.” -Dallas Willard

one point:
Just as we are able to build relationships with people through physical proximity, we are able to build relationships through prayer or an ‘inner life’. As physical proximity is to our flesh, so prayer is to our spirit - by and through the Spirit of Jesus.

Our proclamation of citizenship to the Kingdom of God enables us and empowers us to build relationships and community that the world around has never seen before.

Pray for others through words, but more than that, visualize them. Ask God to place yourself in their life in the Spirit and see how this ‘inner life’ will not only be your prayer for that person, but your life with that person and the community you build together.

2:1 [pure @ heart]

two thoughts:
“Blessed are the pure at heart, for they shall see God.” Matthew 5:8 TNIV
“He must increase, but I must decrease.” John 3:30 NSRV

one point:
Blessed are those who are free from their own will for they allow themselves – their true selves – to be seen, to be exposed to, God.

Purity is freedom. Freedom from the rule of others and from self-rule – truly, a free will. No agenda, whether of yourself or from others. In this state of being, you truly believe, because you are truly free.

Purity is belief. Truly believing that God’s sovereign will for your life is taking place. That you are actively involved in it – regardless of what you may be doing.

Believing is being seen. It’s not so much that we will see God, as if to say God will appear to us. It’s more that we will appear to God. God is already present. He – just like the encounter with Adam in the garden – has been waiting for us. We must reveal ourselves. We must become present to Him. God accomplished His part through Jesus – He is alive. Now, as Jesus states, we must present ourselves or be fully present (exposed) to be – as well – alive.

Transparency makes us visible to God. Happy (or relieved) are those who are free enough from their own agenda (and the agenda of others) to actually reveal themselves to God – for they will be seen by God.

Spirit sees spirit. As we become more transparent and shed our humanity, more of our spirit can be seen by God’s Spirit. Our ability to decrease our old flesh (our old self) - and increase our spirit (our real, spiritual self) – will bring us into an increased awareness and deeper relationship with God and His Spirit.