Behind the Music

A few years back I bought a tiny MP3 player. My car has an audio cassette deck and a stereo. My very inexpensive CD player with car kit has no way to resume with the track you are listening and the power cable and the cassette adapter no longer work. The MP3 player allows me to carry the audio from multiple CDs with music, lectures, and programming in one tiny little box. It did not take much time to sell me on this media. Music is special

Music is potent. Portable Music is even more influential. Living plugged into music makes you feel like you are the star of your own movie. People tend to walk and move to the beat of the music and see that the music itself give meaning and movement to the common everyday events around them.

This day my prayer is that I am moving and walking and seeing the world to the music of my creator. May we come to know that he does view us like a parent behind the lens of a video camera, like a laughing mother behind the camera standing in front of her little girl. God loves us. God calls us to move in step with him.

Super Size Me

The golden arches of McDonalds have hovered for more than half a century over burger joints that now cross the globe. I have never been fond of their burgers, yet their fries. Many people talk about loving those Mickey-D fries. I high school two of my friends agreed with me that McDonalds had the best fries, Burger King the best burger, and Wendy's the best drink the Frosty. So, for lunch we drove through all three. We got hot fries from McDonalds, a charbroiled burger from BK, and we sat down at Wendy's with our Frosties. The Wendy's manager came out to observe our spread.

Donna and I typically avoid McDonalds because we like Wendy's and Burger King much better. Now that kids are in the back seat, we occasionally hit McDonalds because they have the best playground (of course). Those precious moments of glassed in separation make choking down fat a little easier.

This week we watched "Super Size Me" the movie documentary of the man who willingly chose to eat nothing but McDonalds food for one month. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were served to Morgan Spurlock by McDonalds. Now, this was Morgan's own personal adventure and he did not have the blessing of McDonalds. Spurlock went to three doctors with different specializations general practice, cardiology, and gastrointestinal. Each doctor check him out carefully. While wondering about his mental stability and mentioning minor troubles, they gave him the all clear ahead.

Over the course of the four weeks he gained almost 25 pounds from 185 to 210, which was 13% body mass increase. His body mass index went from a healthy level to the overweight level. He suffered from heart palpitations, liver damage, depression, lost energy, and mood swings. It took Morgan nine months to lose the weight he gained in just one month.

After watching the film, we were certain that we would never again eat fast food (or at least limit the frequency of eating their). The most surprising thing was a scene that was in the extra footage of the DVD. They placed several McDonald's food items under glass lids to observe how they aged over several days, weeks and months: a Big Mac, a fish sandwich, french fries, a normal burger, and normal french fries. Amazingly the normal burger and fries began to mold almost immediately within days. It took several days before any of the McDs sandwiches showed any age at all. The biggest shock was the fries. After several months, they never even molded. They looked the same. Can you say processed?

What we put into our bodies must affect the health of our bodies. It should be obvious. How we eat, consume, and store away fat will affect our health.

If we do not care what we put into our stomachs, is it any wonder that we do not care what we put into our souls? Few people are intentional about the inner development of their soul or heart or will. To me, that is ridiculous. Many are content to shop for the best tasting soul fries from one drive-thru religious vender, the best religious burger from the hot writer of the month, and choke it all down with the smoothest spiritual smoothie.

I believe that our souls are becoming who we will be forever. I believe that a soul's best trainer is Jesus Christ. This person was completely human and completely divine. Jesus shows us how to develop for all eternity, but fewer listen.

I want to intimately know Jesus and the power of his life that would not end. If it takes sharing his sufferings and eventually death to achieve this new life, then count me in for eternity (Philippians 3:10-11).