NYWC: retrospective - general session 3

The continuing retrospective of adventures involving Tanner (a.k.a. Scott), Scrammy (a.k.a. Brian), God (a.k.a. I AM), and me (a.k.a. I AM not) during our NYWC weekend.

General Session #3:

After downing a home made sandwich from the cooler, I walked in on the comedy already happening...

• Daren Streblow: Whenever there's a pre-show to the general session you know it's gotta be good. Daren Streblow opened up with some fun stuff (even though he always look a bit under the weather whenever I've seen him). In any event, the comedy was quite clean and rather funny.
  
  
• Thor Ramsey: I know he was on the schedule, but I get the feeling that YS giving him a second slot was somewhat redemptive. This time there weren't any of the groans or slight boo's from the night before. Instead, he had some good humor that piggybacked well off of Daren.
  
  Side note: There was this strange clay display on the main stage in the form of a faceless person's head. I didn't think much of it other than it was probably a prop for the speaker.
  
  
• Denise VanEck: Since Denise is the Community Life pastor at the church I'm a part of, I was definitely ready to hear her thoughts at this session. She confessed to some nervousness at the start, but once she hit her stride there was no stopping her. Using the metaphor of trying to submerge several balls under water (illustrated by a shower-capped Tic Long sitting on rubber balls in a dunk tank), Denise hit on the topic of dealing with our stuff (instead of trying to bury it and ignore it) quite well.
• There are many things we often try to submerge and ignore but yet they keep popping up. Instead of holding up towards God our doubts, jealousy, fears, busyness, and old wounds we find that they tend to pop up in the most inconvenient ways and timeframes.
• What are you holding under the water? How could that things prevent you from finishing well?
• Mars Hill has been quite a successful church plant in the past six years and it's caused quite a stir in our area. Some time ago we had a pastor come speak at our church services who began by saying, "I have to confess something... I'm jealous. I have sweat blood trying to get my church up to a 1,000 over several years and it looks pitiful compared to your size.... and I have to admit that before I try to teach you." After he said that, I was ready to hear whatever he wanted to share with me. What might that be for you?
• What can you do to pull your stuff up to the surface? Who do you need to talk to? How does God want to help you with this?
  
  
• David Crowder: Yet another great set. This time he spotlighted the rock opera song off his new CD. While I'd been waiting for more tunes off the new recording, so far he'd only played a few. As he played into some more low-key songs...
  
  
• Richard Hight: I didn't catch this guy until out of the corner of my eye I saw him messing with the clay on stage. What's ironic about this is that yet again I was seated right in the middle of the third row with a clear view of what he was doing. Apparently, this guy is an artist who works with different materials to produce inspirational artwork.
  
  This time it was clay... the faceless clay I saw on stage earlier. As Crowder played and led worship via song, I turned my attention towards the clay. Faceless... like I feel these days. When I first saw it, I didn't think much of it. And when Richard started working with it I thought, "Oh, I get it... another guy like the Jesus Painter." That was pretty much the case until the face started to predominantly face in my direction... and again - no eyes were formed until the very end.
  
  Soon a purple sash was placed over the bottom, then a crown on thorns was raised and crushed into the head. Next... "blood" flowed. And suddenly... it wasn't just a piece of clay. Or maybe it was... as much a part of the earth as the Incarnation was. And to realize that God was speaking to me again through it...
  
  dang it... I was crying again.
  
  
  
• Barlow Girl: A good rock band... just don't call them a good girl rock band or else they get upset. I liked them, and they come from my home church. I just was so moved by the time of worship, though, that I couldn't process some more music. But what I heard was good.