Gavin's Various Musings @gavinpaulellis - Tumblr Blog

Dreams of Albion

#celtic #celticera #celticage #celticcore #medievalcore #bard #celticwarrior #celtic warrior #celtic era #celtic age

It had been 13 months since the choir had sung together, 13 long months. Yes, we'd done online videos where our director had edited together each of our solo voices into a choir. These turned out amazing and were much enjoyed, but there was something painful about recording our vocals and our visuals and sending them in. I just have to admit that I'm a part of a choir for a reason and not a soloist. Though these cobbled together songs were great for the online services, though they praised God and helped bring people into a place of worship, they weren't fun to make and definitely didn't feel like worship in the same way singing together as a choir did.

Let's admit it, this plague has been hard on us. It has been hard in so many ways. And not bein able to sing together has been harder on us than we have realized.

But here we were, 13 months later, able to sing together again. The choir had been meeting to practice for two weeks, though I'd missed both practices. I'd been waiting to be fully vaccinated before joining. Now here we were, Sunday morning. I'd run through the worship songs at home and was ready to come back to join choir as we led worship. Things still weren't totally normal. We were singing with masks on and with 6 feet between each of us. But I was looking forward to it. I really had no idea how amazing it was going to be, though, no idea at all.

It was spectacular! It felt soooo good! There's something about singing in parts, there's something about singing in harmony, it was almost transcendant. And it was clear that this wasn't only true for me. you could feel it in the room -- the energy was crackling, alive, spectacular!

And then the Pastor got up and tore it all away from me. I know this wasn't his intent. I know he was just caught up in the moment. I know he has been longing for this as much as the rest of us. But he got up after the song and started asking if people could feel the Holy Spirit in this place. He got some amens. He asked again whether we could feel the Holy Spirit as we sang together. More, stronger amens. He asked if we could feel the Holy Spirit as the piano played. Even louder amens. This was the point where I almost got up out of my seat in the choir loft to walk out, I was so uncomfortable.

You see, it wasn't the Holy Spirit we were feeling, it was biology.

He was perpetrating the same theology tht I have been hearing used to encourage people to not listen to the government guidelines about singing. It's a theology that believes that the feelings we feel when we worship are a sign/proof of the Holy Spirit. It's a theology that believes the Holy Spirit can be summoned with the right chord progressions. It's a theology that equates the same feelings we might feel at a rock concert or Blue Man Group show with the presence of God. And it's a theology that refuses to see how the Spirit has been active through these last 13 months when we were not singin together, when we met remotely.

It's a theology that limits God, making God smaller than God truly is. Our church has been one of the ones in the middle of all this chaos as we have tried to follow government guidelines throughout this pandemic, though many in the congregation have been unhappy with such a thing. And COVID numbers are getting worse in our state and in our county. And it looks like we are probably going to have to move backwards because of this. There's even a chance that we aren't going to be singing in church this coming week. The choir isn't likely going to be able to sing again together until fall. But our Pastor has just declared that the Holy Spirit was present Sunday in a way that the Spirit hasn't been present for over 13 months, and won't be able to be present for a while longer again. And people in our church, when we don't sing, will accuse us of quenching the Spirit. They will accuse the government guidelines of trying to keep the Spirit away from our worship. And it's all because we have made an idol of our worship. And it makes me so sad for us. And I'm disappointed that my pastor has fallen for this idolatry (don't get me wrong, I know there are idols I am totally unaware of that I have fallen for). Mostly, I just keep finding myself going back to the Old Testament prophets like Isaiah and Micah and Amos who called out God's people who were so focused on their worship experiences instead of taking care of those around them.

"I hate, I despise your religious festivals; your assemblies are a stench to me... Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteouseness like a never-failing stream!" Amos 5:21, 23-24

"When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood! Wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight; stop doing wrong. Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow." Isaiah 1:15-17

#covid 19 #bad theology #pandemic #church

micaillustration

Cait May

Editorial Gif for Illustrated Maps class - the Viking Sky

caitmayportfolio.tumblr.com and caitmayart.com!

It was interesting to watch "The Martian" with the family this evening after getting my COVID shot earlier in the day. It gave me a healthy new lens to see the pandemic through.

The movie is primarily a celebration of science. Early on, when trying to figure out how he's going to survive on Mars, the main character declares to his video journal that, "I'm gonna have to science the s**t out of this." And that is exactly what the movie shows him, NASA, and the world's scientific community doing.

At the end of the movie, when teaching future astronauts about his experience, he says this, "At some point, everything's gonna go south on you and you're going to say, this is it. This is how I end. Now you can either accept that, or you can get to work. That's all it is. You just begin. You do the math. You solve one problem and you solve the next one, and then the next. And if you solve enough problems, you get to come home."

When we look at the scientific community around the world and their response to the virus, we see a similar approach. When we realize how much has been done to try to save lives, how much has been sacrificed by so many, I find hope. And here we are a year after our country realized how serious this all was. We now have 1/3rd of the adults in our country vaccinated, most of these being those most at risk of real harm from the virus.

For the first time in the history of the world we are going to beat a pandemic without it being natural herd immunity that got us there. This is HUGE! We have, and pardon my language, scienced the s**t out of this!

In high school, I loved to stargaze (still do, just don't really make the time for it anymore; plus, light pollution). There was something about sitting with my walkman staring into the vastness of space that helped put everything in perspective.

Oddly, the perspective that it gave me was one of my own insignificance. There was something about realizing how incredibly small I am in the grand scheme of things that actually, somehow brought me comfort and peace like no other.

When the world seems to be utter chaos, when the problems of this world seem overwhelming and unfixable, I find myself drawn back to the stars and the reminder of my own insignificance. They remind me that it's not my job to fix these problems in the world that are so much bigger than I am. I need to leave those problems to Hands that are bigger than mine.

Instead, it is my place to shine in my own small, insignificant corner of the world: lighting the way for my kids, caregiving for the folks at work as they deal with a disease that takes a new piece away from them each day, loving my wife, being there to support, encourage, and sometimes challenge my friends--and maybe pulling out that old walkman and driving out away from the city lights to look up at that vast expanse of space again.

Finally got to spend some time gazing at the stars tonight. It's been a while since I've seen more than a glimpse of a couple stars through the clouds. Yes, it was cold, yes it would have been much better to have gone out of town a ways instead of just laying down in the corner of the backyard, but taking 20 minutes in the backyard is better than nothing.

Some Predator art taken from some filtered pics of one of my action figures:

#predator #yautja #aliens vs predator

This may be the best Predator story out there. And it's a pretty good Batman story as well.

#batman #dc comics #comics #predator #batman vs predator #dark horse comics

redarmyscreaming

Star Blazers

#predator #action figure photography #avp #aliens vs predator

I found much of Dark Horse’s AVP series to be pretty disappointing. But that’s because we were spoiled so much by the original series, which got so much right!

Here is a checklist of all the issues that tell the story of Machiko Noguchi. I included Aliens: Berserker because the characters in it meet up with Noguchi in AVP: War.