On jealousy…
“If have a hard time seeing other people succeed or look at other people’s work and then get upset about it, what that really means is you are valuing creativity and your work over the cross. So it’s not a character default. It’s sin.” – JB (8:25)

“Because of the cross, we can now take these gifts, bounce them back up to Him as worship, not as sacrifice. Huge difference. He doesn’t take sacrifices any more.” – JB (9:45)

On Christians borrowing/copying culture’s art…
“What you have to see here is that a lot of people see this stuff and say “Oh, this is cute.” It’s not cute. It’s dark. Because when you look at this, what they’re really saying is Jesus needs my help…You think way too highly of yourself if you think it’s your job to sanitize everything for Jesus.” – JB (12:20)

“Being an artist is not a higher calling that being a Christian.” (17:00)

“The big idea here is that God will love you whether or not you get any better.” – JB (19:05)

“We get questions on how can we get more followers like you guys, twitter followers, and blog… We’re not seeking that. We’re creating the stuff that we want to create and it’s opening a door to an audience that wants to see our stuff.” – DC (26:30)

“All I want to do is make honest work. And it has to be a representation of Jesus Christ.” – DC (34:00)

“What happens in the church is, everybody talks about how to make Jesus relevant. If I need to explain to you that you don’t make Jesus relevant, we’ve got a big issue. Jesus makes you relevant.” – JB (37:15)

Anyway, I’m literally writing this as a stream of consciousness (no editing, no nothing) so good luck actually reading it. If you’re interested in some of my thoughts on God and Creativity, read on. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it though.

So I want to start with this verse…

Ecclesiastes 1:9-10
What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun. Can one say about anything, “Look, this is new”? It has already existed in the ages before us.

and this definition…

Create -
1. to cause to come into being, as something unique that would not naturally evolve or that is not made by ordinary processes.
2. to evolve from one’s own thought or imagination, as a work of art or an invention.

The tension between these two things has always been pretty apparent to me. I fully believe the Bible, and yet, I still have this incredible yearning to create something new. Then, for me, I’ve got this other part of my head that analyzes everything and says, “Hold on, there’s an inherent problem if you want to do something you don’t believe can be done.” Things don’t really add up without something more.

I’ll start at the beginning. God is the creator. For me, there’s no question about that. I think it takes just as much faith to believe that all this came from nothing as it does to believe in a divine creator, but that’s a whole different issue. So, for this, God is the creator.

God created me. He created me with a purpose and with desires. One of the purposes He gave me is to glorify him. One of the desires he gave me is to create something new.

I believe that when I create, God is working through me to reveal something that I didn’t see before. I don’t necessarily believe that I’m making anything new, just that I’m seeing something new.

I watched an interview last week with JT from Paper Route and in it, he said something along the lines of…

I guess I love to write/create because maybe, that’s the only time I truly believe in God.

I think there’s something to that. It’s hard for me to even imagine really, truly believing in God without seeing a lot of the creative things that I have. There are times when a song lyric or melody reaffirms my belief in God. There are times when I see a painting or a piece of architecture, and I think God had to have something to do with that.

Ben Sollee has a song that I’ve always found interesting, and I’ve never really known why. He meets God and has a conversation with him. It ends with this…

I saw God on the mountain
Tearing at the sky
I saw God on the mountain
With tears in his eyes

He said; ‘Son,
I used to know where I put things,
I used to know
I could have shown you all the beauty in the world
but now I need you to show me
Yes, show me’

I don’t think God has forgotten where He put the beauty He created. I do think he’s waiting on us to show it to him though. Every day, I see something new and beautiful. A lot of times, I see it in things that I’ve seen a million times before.

I think God has created a lot more than we see, but He’s waiting on us to reveal it to each other.

At one point in my life, I looked at creativity as thing that I could compete at. I could be more creative than another guy and he could be more creative than me, but now I realize creativity is about collaboration.

It’s about a musician and a painter and a gardener and a builder doing what they can to reveal God to each other and to the world.

That’s how I reconcile the fact that nothing’s new with the definition of creation. For me, I think it should become much less about my creation and more about His revelation.

So, remember when I wrote this post about Born of Water a couple of months ago? No? I didn’t expect you to, but I promised that they would be releasing some new music soon. That time has come.

Today, they release their first EP, The Wanderer. I’m openly biased, so I’m not going to share my thoughts on the album with you quite yet. I want you to make your own judgments.

All you have to do is head over to www.bornofwater.com where you can stream the whole thing and download it for whatever you want to pay (that includes nothing). I know these guys like brothers, and the most important thing to them is not making money, but having as many people listen to and collaborate on this project as possible.

Collaborate? Yes, you can submit your own Born of Water inspired projects. Below are four that I did. All you have to do is create it and send it to info@bornofwatermusic.com and we’ll take some of them and post them on the site.

Follow @_BornOfWater on Twitter or like them on Facebook. Also, be sure to follow Tom and Jon on Twitter.

To listen to even more of their music, head over to their music page..

To see more Born of Water art by different artists, head over to their art gallery page..

Go check out more from Grégoire Guillemin >>

So I haven’t posted anything in a while (like 2 months), but I came back in today to get things going again and I found this saved as a draft…

I got up at 7:00am on a Saturday morning this weekend. Do you know what it takes to get me to do that? I’ll say this… if you were in danger of getting mauled by a ravenous panther at 7:00am on Saturday, there’s a good chance I’d say this to you: “Find a sharp stick and let me hit the snooze button one more time real quick.”

I have no idea where I was going with that, but I imagine it was going to be insightful. So I guess that’s as good a place to start as any. Time to get back on blogging horse and ride I guess.

Last week, I wrote a post about the importance of the people you spend your time with. In the coming weeks, I’ll be sharing with you some projects from the people I spend a lot of time with. The first of those was Born of Water. This is the second…

Every time I see a Quiet Entertainer show, it’s totally different. The last time, it was a hip hop show finishing with eight rappers freestyling on stage. The time before that, it ended up being a raucous dubstep dance party with he and This Is Art. There’s really only one thing I’ve come to expect every time, and that’s to be entertained.

The Quiet Entertainer is Greg Freeman. He’s a DJ/Producer who makes primarily hiphop/electronic/dubstep music. You can read what he’s all about, but long story short, he’s a guy who wants to create music that intrigues and inspires people in the way that he has been intrigued and inspired by artists like DJ Shadow, the Blue Man Group, and Earthsuit.

His path hasn’t gone exactly the way he dreamed it up, but to me, that’s the most inspiring thing about him.

You know, not every artist’s dream works out perfectly. Sometimes, you can hustle and market and create great stuff and still not get exactly where you planned when you planned on being there.

That seems to be the case with the Quiet Entertainer. He’s not at the point where he’s a household name and selling out venues all across the nation yet, but don’t let that fool you. He’s not failing to do what he set out to do.

Remember that whole “intrigue and inspire people” thing up there?

Well, I’m intrigued by his music. I’m intrigued by a guy who has hustled his tail off and still doesn’t have a sense of entitlement. By a guy who is humble and full of integrity in a scene where that’s not always easy.

I’m inspired by his love for art. By his dedication. By the fact that he’s hit some speed bumps in his dream and has kept going.

So, to me, the Quiet Entertainer has accomplished what he set out to do, and I don’t think I’m the only one. While I fully expect him to keep going and sell out shows across the nation, if he quit today, it wouldn’t be all for not.

He’s got a lot of great music released including an EP called Machismo, a mix EP called Q Gaze, and some remixes and mashups.  He’s working on the next couple of mix EPs and frequently plays shows now. As a fan, I’m hoping a new full-length album with some instrumental tracks is in the works . So keep on the look out for Quiet Entertainer and make it out to one of his shows. Just don’t be surprised when it’s sold out.

Check out the Quiet Entertainer’s website at QuietEntertainer.com to read his blog, download tracks, or buy merch.

Follow him on twitter @QEntertainer or like him on Facebook.

Last week, I wrote a post about the importance of the people you spend your time with. In the coming weeks, I’ll be sharing with you some projects from the people I spend a lot of time with. This is the first of those…

Born of Water is Tom Dyer and Jon Spear. I’ve lived with them both so I think it’s safe to say I know them well. For instance, I know Tom went through a pretty serious battle with addiction to frozen lemon cups, and Jon is roughly a level 2000 dragon slayer on Skyrim.

One thing that really stands out about them though is their respect for art. Born of Water has never been about fame and fortune or a radio friendly hit. They want to create something that honors the art of music and their Creator. Every detail is hashed and rehashed until they’ve got it exactly where they want it.

To me, Born of Water reflects God’s attention to detail in creation. If even one of the things God created in the beginning had been slightly off, this whole thing might have fallen apart. He didn’t make any mistakes though, and that’s reflected in the beauty of creation today.

In the same way, Born of Water strives to have that attention to detail. Their song Let Go feels like it might fall apart if even one note is out of place, but luckily none are. It is a simple, beautiful reflection of God in them. Their Creator in their creation.

Unfortunately for us, Born of Water has only released a few songs including a remix to MuteMath’s Odd Soul and a rendition of O, Come All Ye Faithful, but I look forward to what’s next. They’ve got a remix of a Becoming the Archetype song coming soon on a release from SolidState, and I’ve heard through the grapevine that they may release some more of their originals around that same time. Until then, we’ll just have to listen to Refuge and Let Go on repeat.

Follow @_BornOfWater on Twitter or like them on Facebook. Also, be sure to follow Tom and Jon on Twitter.

To listen to more of their tracks, check them out on SoundCloud.

22 Can anyone teach God knowledge,
since He judges the exalted ones?
23 One person dies in excellent health,
completely secure and at ease.
24 His body is well fed,
and his bones are full of marrow.
25 Yet another person dies with a bitter soul,
having never tasted prosperity.

26 But they both lie in the dust,
and worms cover them.

I sat alone, facing the wall. There was a dull roar of talking and laughter behind me, but I was silent. Unable to speak.

I was in isolated lunch.

How had I gotten here? To this lowly place where food throwers and lunch-lady disrespecters were relegated. This is not me. How did this happen?

I’ll tell you how it happened. I had idiots for friends. So when they didn’t shut their big mouths when the lights flickered, I got lumped in with them. I hadn’t done anything wrong. I had plenty of respect for Ms. Elkins flowing white hair and Mr. Held’s Dilbert-esque glasses, but they didn’t.

It doesn’t seem like much, but I learned a lot from that day in isolated lunch. I learned to choose my friends better.

To me, there’s no story that better illustrates the importance of who you hang out with than one in Exodus 17. Joshua’s fighting a battle, and every time Moses raises his staff, they prevail, but every time he lets it down, they begin to lose. Apparently, it’s really hard to hold up a wooden staff all day long, so Moses begins to get tired. His friends, Aaron and Hur, drag a rock over for Moses to sit down on and hold up his arms until evening when the battle is won.

I’ve experienced that a lot. When I’m tired, when I’m sick, when I want to quit stuff, the people I love hold me up. I have a bunch of Aarons and Hurs for friends, and if you don’t then you should probably reconsider who you spend your time with.

My friends go one step further than helping me when I’m down though. They inspire me to be better and dream bigger. I’ve been gifted with some incredibly talented people in my life in a number of areas from nursing to pastoring to art. So over the next couple of weeks, I want to introduce you to some of them. Next week will belong to the musicians so check back then.