I was able to spend last week in Belize, taking in the vision of Pathlight International and getting ideas about an arts-based trip next Spring. My in-laws have been doing work in Belize for the last 15 years plus, so it was a blast getting to see that part of their lives. If you want to read about our trip, read Roy Goble’s (the founder) post on our trip. For pics, check out my wife’s Flickr page.
More to come on the trip…
Here’s a little song I worked up last night… No lyrics or melody yet, but those will come. Enjoy!!
My buddy Nick and I started a side project about a year ago called Under the Streetlight and have been writing on and off ever since. Today, we’re headed to the studio to begin work on a little EP of our stuff. So, I thought I’d post the opening loop of a song we wrote called “The Day Past Tomorrow.” Enjoy…
With a little magic from PayPal, I’ve figured out a way to upload music to re:birth.
So, to start, I’ve uploaded the score that I wrote for my wedding – both the processional, entitled “Friends and Family,” and what Rach walked down the aisle to, called “Rae’s Theme.”
“Friends and Family” – A starting piano theme that is joined by a sitar, a triangle, an Indian drum called a dhol – to tie in Rach’s travels to India and Thailand – and then a full orchestral arrangement and development, only to come to an end with another solo piano.
“Rae’s Theme” – A full orchestral piece, led by a piano sound adjusted by a delay effect, happy and bright, and full of the hope and joy that comes with the girl of your dreams walking down the aisle to marry you.
Below are my notes from today’s Emerging Ministries event in Fremont, CA (click here for more info about EM). It was a great time of connecting and reconnecting, and to learn from some great teachers and leaders. Below are my notes from the different talks (sorry Roy, I didn’t have my notes out for your talk… son-in-law #fail). I’ve seen other people do this on their blogs (most recently from Catalyst 09, etc) and have LOVED the info. So I thought I would pass this along. If you were there, what were your notes like? What did you take away? If you weren’t there but are going to go through this copious mess, what are your thoughts/reactions/etc? This is by no means the definitive re-statement of the talks given, nor do I give preference to one speaker over the other. This is just what I was able to get down.
Note: The bolded portions are either speaker emphasis or my emphasis. 
Notes from the EM event 10.14.09
Mark Scandrette
-our three components:
a. my story => our story (community)
b. Christ conciousness => The Gospel
c. people and place => society, micro-culture we live in
Real transformation takes place when a-b-c are all connected
-disconnect from c = irrelevance
-disconnect from b = loss of power / transformational potential
-disconnect from a = lost of soul integrity… not a credible manifestation of God
What is most challenging for you?
Revisit these tension points (a, b, and c)
Discipline: We’re small in comparison to what God is doing in the Bay Area
-we’re plagued by a sense of alienation in SF Bay Area
Tension Points in Bay Area:
-highly educated vs. post-modern, bohemian
-wealth vs poverty
-power vs. powerless
-English language vs. everything else
-movement vs. lethargy
-progressive vs. conservative
-community vs. global
-established vs. starting (not figured out yet, searching)
-gay vs. straight
1) Trust your story
2) Be a deep listener
3) Translate
4) Be open to surprise
Bart Garrett
-How do I posture myself? Posture my organization?
-Chariots of Fire => difference between Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell
Eric: “I believe that God made me for a purpose … [the mission], but He also made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure.”
Harold: “You’re brave, compassionate, kind: a content man. That is your secret, contentment; I am 24 and I’ve never know it.
“I’m forever in pursuit and I don’t even know what I am chasing”
-gifts become a way of justifying our existence
Mark 8:37 and on… “What good is it if you gain the world and lose your soul?”
-The Father said to Jesus, “This is my Son, in whom I am well pleased”
-The Father says to us, ”Son, in you I am well pleased”
-Parable of the Talents
-Support each other, w/o competition… fight the sense of inadequacy
Nancy Ortberg – Organization
(speaking on previous speakers)
-encourage yourself in the Lord
-be happy for someone else even though you ache a little inside
-diversity of the Bay Area
-we can’t be overly prescriptive
-let God out of the box
-1 Thes. 1 => commending the Thessalonians
-Isaiah 29
-the power of God in us every day
-posturing => why?
-you are worthy to make someone else proud
-community: we tell each other we’re proud of each other
(speaking on Organization)
-tied to culture, tied to God
-community =>collection
Main Points
1) energy
2) expectations
3) entity
1) energy
-moniter, navigate, and steer energy
-be a student of other people
-Who did God make this certain person to be? What can they give to the organization?
-pay attention to energy
-When do you feel the energy of God?
Right people in right place => EASY
Right people working together => HARD
-team = community
-being and doing are inexorable linked
a. What is our purpose?
-transform people spiritually
-serve outside the walls of the church
-vision is a collaborative project
b. How do we deal w/ conflict?
-intimacy leads to community
-enjoy outcome after conflict
-we avoid conflict so we don’t grow
“Mercy to one is tyranny to others”
2) expectations
-transformation… not in a cumbersome way
-the reason we’re a team… b/c we can recruit people and the world can change
-passion can bring arrogance
“You can change the world… except for the part you can’t”
-you want strong leaders in every facet
-sometimes: “I think that’s your call”
-you don’t develop leaders unless you let them make their own decisions
Results: we can posture ourselves based on #’s
-comparison = serious sin
-great leadership is 80% perserverance
-you have to die to your dreams vs. return to the dream that God might have
-hope along with God that there will be results
3) entity
-organization = person
-organization is worthy of attention, just as important as any one person
-understand it’s call and mission
-everybody should understand the importance of the organization
-live authentically in a way that people are drawn in (Acts 2 church)
-our organizations should flourish
Yesterday I spent 6 hours in the ER as doctors tried to figure out why my throat and chest were constricted. Starting at 7AM when I woke up, it felt as if there was a rubber band wrapped tightly around my esophagus – from the base of my neck to the center of my chest. On top of that, my chest felt as if there was a weight pressing down on it. Sucky, to say the least.
Like an idiot, I went to work at 9AM thinking that my throat would loosen up and I’d be able to get along with the day. I lasted about 30 minutes until my colleges and bosses told me to go rest, as I was completely absent from the meeting I was a part of. By then, my throat and chest had tightened more, and I began to freak out a bit. And the freak out came from just not knowing what was going on. Was I having an allergic reaction? Was it something more serious? It’s a crazy thing when you know you’re body is seriously not right but you have no idea why or what to do.
So, I took a benedryl, which didn’t help. After a short car ride with Mom, and then an ambulance ride, I found myself in Kaiser Walnut Creek’s ER. Thankfully, Dr. Moorely and the Kaiser team were able to pinpoint the issue, and they diagnosed me as having (enter the ridiculous)… pill esophagitis. Yep. That’s a real diagnosis, not made up as some kind of joke. Pill esophagitis…hahahaha.
As I look back on yesterday, I laugh at most of it. Fears of a severe allergic reaction or even a heart attack gave way to laugh after laugh as I recounted the story to friends and coworkers. Granted: a pill did get stuck in my throat, sit there through the night, and cause my throat to seize up the next day. Not exactly what one wants to happen on a Monday morning. But ridiculous at the same time. I mean, an ambulance ride and all those crazy anxieties for everyone??? Just for a stupid pill??? AHHHHHH.
But my wife and fam were right: it’s worth it. When you don’t know what’s happening to you, you have to take every precaution you can. The reality is that it’s not worth it not to.
And now I sit at home, having enjoyed some clam chowder and a dvr’d Daily Show, thankful that all I have left over from yesterday is a still-sore throat, a crazy story, some good laughs, and the realization that life can change in a moment’s time. It can go from wonderful to horrible and back based on what the doctors say. And our family knows that all too well recently.
Health is this precious thing that I’ve never thought much of until the last couple years. Health, and more, life. So precious. Every moment, every conversation, every little interaction or kiss of a loved one or bit of encouragement received, every great phrase read or lyric sung or riff played – every bit of it is precious.
Thankful? yes. Laughing at myself and life? yes. But at the same time so sad at the stories that don’t end up like this one. This life is precious. Every minute…
A couple nights ago I was part of a conversation among friends that is still sticking with me today. We were chatting about Middle East politics (which is always fun at a twenty-something birthday party) and there were two sides that ultimately emerged by the end of the talk. On the one hand there were arguments rooted in a religious worldview, specifically a biblical worldview. On the other there were arguments from a seemingly secularist worldview – specifically that religious text should never be used in determining any facet of modern day politics.
Honestly, I was surprised to hear an educated guy make secularist arguments that were, to me, completely out of touch with the reality of the 21st Century world – especially the Middle East. The world is NOT a post-religious world. While our universities are, in large part, proponents of post-religious philosophy, that kind of worldview is not held by the majority of Americans, let alone the majority of the world (case in point: Israel-Palestine). Whether it be the Judeo-Christian influence on the West, the Islamic influence in the Middle East, parts of Africa, and the Pacific Islands, Hindu influences in India, or Buddhism etc in the East, the world’s religions have not only played a huge role in shaping the societies of the past, but are still playing a major role in shaping the societies of today. The debate is not whether or not those countries are religious countries (i.e. theocracies). Some countries are, some are clearly not (i.e. America, most of Europe, etc). But one’s understanding of geo-politics must take into account the religious history of any region. If not, that understanding has a gaping hole in it.
As an aside, I readily admit that our founding fathers were heavily influenced by Enlightenment thinkers – who were very much secularists. So don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that the US is or should be a Christian nation, etc. What I’m arguing is that to hold a purely secularist view of modern day politics is to not grasp the depth of the religious roots that are found in the foundations of many countries around the world. Religion must be taken into account in any discussion of global politics. It has to be. To not include it is to do many-a-country’s history a big disservice.
I just finished rereading Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, which I hadn’t touched since high school. It was my short break from Steinbeck (after East of Eden but before The Grapes of Wrath), and it’s hard to say I loved the book, even though I want to love it. While Hemingway is known as a master of narration, I felt like, despite being only 127 pages, the story dragged a bit. All that said, the last 20 pages are great, with the most memorable part being the final scene where a tourist mistakes the Santiago’s giant marlin for a shark. The scene is so well written: as the story progresses, you grow to love the old man and his big catch – only to watch the tourist (whom you have to dislike or at least feel sorry for) dishonor the whole story with her ignorance/naivete/etc. This part of the book depicts so clearly how one man’s world can be completely lost on an outsider, how the little nuances of one person’s determination, courage, struggle, victories, and defeats is easily lost on someone who doesn’t know him.
Which gets me thinking about how every life has its victories and defeats, its times of struggles and its times of relative ease. For our family, our summer was a serious mixure of both: intense joy and intense sorrow to say the least. Not only did I get married in late August, but my older brother got married in late June – and both were wonderful celebrations of love and life with family and friends. Smiles, dancing, excitement, and fun – entire nights dedicated to the enjoyment of not only what has been but also what can be. Then, in between the two weddings, my brother-in-law got diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer (you can read about his story here). Smiles turned to sadness, dancing became hugging, holding and crying, and our hope for the future became a serious questioning of God and His work in human life and the unfortunate realization that cancer will severely affect life for us from here on out.
It’s been an interesting go, for sure, this summer of 2009. And this experience of ups and downs is something that I know my family is not alone in. We are not unique in our joy and our sadness. Life grabs all of us in both wonderful and harsh ways. I’m realizing though that I don’t want to be that tourist who doesn’t understand the nuances of another person’s courage, determination, stuggles, victories and defeats. I don’t want the beauty of life’s wonder and horror to be lost in ignorance or naivete.
I can’t help but comment on one of the many fun parts of this new marriage, namely that it feels so right to be living with the girl that I love most in this world. I’ve known very acutely that “man is not meant to be alone” in the context of singleness, but I’ve never known the truth of those words more than now – even though my marriage is only in its infant stages.
The first couple weeks of our version of marriage reveal this relational institution to be something that is brand new yet refreshingly “done before.” To us, everything is fresh and brimming with possibility and entirely up to us, yet I catch us doing things that I’ve seen married couples do for years! And we’re only two weeks in!! And the fun part is that while I love the new, I don’t mind the “done before.” Because it’s our version of “done before,” our take on those same things that so obviously characterize married couples. My creativity is loving being married because to be married means that I have all kinds of influences to draw from that I can then use to shape not only my behavior but also the home that I’m living in. How I treat my girl, what chores I do, how I shop, what my desk looks like in the context of “our” studio, etc – now, instead of me creating my life, I’m commissioned to help create our life.
In one sense, it’s just a deeper realization that I’ve moved from I to we. Not a very original concept at all, but true nonetheless. When I becomes we the creation process is inevitably a co-authorship, two fully-functioning human beings strapped together and given the sweetened opportunity to carve a path for themselves. And the best part is that the path is both original and unoriginal, fresh and lively as well as steeped in the tradition of the many couples that have come before us. Marriage is a creative endeavor for sure, and ours is just at its inception. Amazing how one ceremony and celebration at the end of a day in late August can be the spring board for something so fun.
My grandma was a writer, and she always used to say that when you start a new phase of life, you start a new chapter. Marriage absolutely christens the beginning of a new phase of life, so I thought it would be fun to mark this new phase with the beginning of a new writing project: re:birth. And more, my wife wants me to start a blog so that one day I can become famous like the woman from Julie and Julia.
August 23rd, 2009, 555PM, at Wente Vineyards in Livermore, CA, I was married to Rachel D’Aun Goble. It was an incredible event, filled with family and friends, love and hope and laughter, goofiness and creativity, and an appreciation of the God that not only brought us all together but will continue to guide us as we navigate life together. The day was both a blur and filled with little moments that I wish cherish forever. From dress mishaps to homemade sensory deprivation goggles (courtesy of my groomsmen) and jokes with my mom as I escorted her to her seat; from almost-tears as my girl walked down the aisle to just wanting to be pronounced husband and wife; from a face covered with lipstick to great food and wine and pictures and cake cutting and dancing and bouquets and garters and joyful smiles; and finally, driving away in a ‘36 Ford, the celebration over and life together brilliantly begun – it was a gift of a night that will always mark the wonderful start of Kevin and Rachel Carey.
I got the idea for this blog while we honeymooned in Italy (Rome and Florence specifically). The home of the Renaissance seemed like the perfect launching point for two lives becoming one – a kind of spiritual, emotional, and physical rebirth of once disparate worlds now joined together for as long as the two will live. And I love that after the immensity of August 23rd, we got to take in the immensity of a country whose influence on the western world cannot be overstated.
So I’ll close with some thoughts on family, since that’s what began on our wedding day. First, my family. Through so many ups and downs, my family has been so incredible in their love, their steadfastness, their support, their encouragement, their understanding, and in the way they challenge me to be a better man. Their presence in my life, especially over the last three years, has breathed new life into me and fueled the rebirth that I get to write about now. And the way we’ve been able to deal with the craziness of this summer is something I’m so proud of (and will write about more). Secondly, Rachel’s family. They have taken me in and shown Rachel and I love and support that a son-in-law could only dream of. They say when you marry a girl, you marry her family, and I can’t think of better family to marry than the Goble’s. And more, watching the Carey’s and the Goble’s come together over the last year and half has given me so much confidence and hope for our future together.
And lastly, the girl that I get to spend the rest of my life with, build a home and a family with, embark on adventures with, travel the world with, and pursue God’s heart with is so incredible that I can’t help but laugh when I think about the gift I’ve been given. As I look forward into a lifetime together, I’m so excited to watch our lives meld to produce something wonderfully brand new. A rebirth of sorts.
Yes, Grandma Carey, a new chapter has begun for sure.
