Award shows.

For the first time in years, I gathered together with friends in Cornerstone's media department to watch the Academy Awards.  As I watched these incredibly talented and creative people give emotional speeches thanking everyone from their agent to their dogs, I wondered why it is that we watch award shows.  Why have they become such a standard of American television, garnering viewers in the millions?

I read once that the Olympian gods, perhaps, still exist in Hollywood.  That the worship that humans once threw at Aphrodite, Zeus, and Mercury, we now give to Brad Pitt, Kim Kardashian, and Conan O'Brien.  There's something in us that wants to look up to creatures like us, but better. 

Of course, they have their problems.  They fight, they argue, they cheat.  In fact, their problems comfort us.  We really aren't that much different from what we worship, after all.

As I watched the awards tonight, I didn't find these people worthy of my worship.  But, I was... inspired. 

The ellipsis is there in that last sentence because it surprised me.  I'm not someone who gets caught up in who's marrying who and for how long and what this guy said on set that was such a big deal.  I have no need for gods in my life.  I am, however, a creative person.  I am a filmmaker, a writer, a member of an academy (however small and backwater-seeming at times).  Watching these complete strangers whose work I admire greatly receive awards with humility and gratitude rekindled in me many things.

One of the strongest was a desire to write.  But not so that I would be honored with an award.  Rather, it was because I wanted to give actors the chance to experience the catharsis I remember feeling as an actor.  I want to tell stories that move people, that cause them to think, that make them feel something they haven't felt before. 

I want to be part of an Academy.  I want to see the beauty in the creative works of others and be a part of recognizing that.  To give the sublime joy of affirmation, "Yes. What you poured your heart and soul into has worth.  It is beautiful.  It was worth it." to an actor who never expected it.  Or to the first hit screenwriter.  Or the industry veteran who has continued to move us with their craft. 

So perhaps this is why we watch award shows.  Not to participate in some kind of subtle cultural idol worship of neo-Olympian gods, but to be inspired.  To see what humans are capable of in the hopes that we, too, may achieve something great.

I need you so much closer.

Oh hey.  Long time no see.  I think I want to start blogging again.

I've been terribly busy starting off 2012 right as the Year of Being Invested.  That's meant a deeper involvement in the things that I love than I had last year.  And I love a great many things.

This last weekend, the youth ministry I work with had our annual winter retreat.  It's a story in itself that I'll spare you from, but I wanted to share a quick story from our last night at the camp ground. 

Christian bands are not known for their originality.  Worship bands, even less.  Mostly, I think it's understandable.  When leading a group of people in something, sometimes you have to hit the lowest common denominator to find community and some kind of shared knowledge.  But this band this weekend didn't seem to have that philosophy. 

We stood up to sing and I heard a familiar guitar riff.  I tried to place it, but I just assumed it was one of the probably hundreds of Christian songs I've memorized in my lifetime.  Then they started singing.  "I need you so much closer...  I need you so much closer..." 

 

Right about 3:00 in...  You'll hear that beautiful line...

It's one of my favorite Death Cab for Cutie songs.  In a worship service!

Normally, I'm categorically opposed to appropriating secular songs into worship services.  Usually this is done just to be "relevant" or "edgy".  It tends to be a desperate attempt to "culturize" the church, which almost always robs both the song and the church's message of their power. 

(My church once did this awful rewrite of "Sweet Home Alabama" that was turned into "Sweet Home Up in Heaven."  I nearly died.  They've never done it since.  Praise God.  Seriously.)

This, however, carried none of that spirit.  This was recognizing that, though the original artists didn't intend to worship God with their music, God was still honored.  God can be worshiped with songs that were not expressly created for that intent.  It was beautiful.

As the song continued, we stopped repeating "I need you so much closer", but the guitar line undergirded a transition into a more familiar song, transposed and rewritten.  It was a beautiful experience and truly worshipful (at least, to me). 

I would like to see more of this in the Church, I think.  The redemption of lines, riffs, and pieces of popular songs.  It models an engagement with culture that glorifies God and calls attention to the common grace given all of us as image bearers of the Creator.  It's something I strive for in my life and, for me and the few others in the room who knew Death Cab, it turned into one of the more beautiful moments in the weekend.