zugito

Never underestimate the power of Jesus to speak via the iTunes shuffle algorythm

Posted by bryanzug - 2011/07/07

Here are a few of the best questions adrift in my head
Who’s driving this airplane? Did I live hard enough?
Is it gonna rain? How well have I loved?
How well have I loved?

…

Let’s walk through the jungle, put your arm in my arm
Should this ground start to crumble, we’ll come to no harm
Lean on me if you stumble, ‘neath the bright shining stars
and though the whole world may crumble, we know who we are
we know who we are

Questions by Mike Scott (of The Waterboys)

Roo & Tug —

It’s been a rough couple of months.

Jesus is teaching me to believe the best of the beautiful people around me, especially when we disagree on substantial important things.

He’s teaching me those ancient odd rhythms of being humble while not hiding from conflict — reminding me of who I am even when I am filled with doubt.

He is giving me the encouragement I need to dive deep even when it is very very hard and there is no guarantee that there will be short term happy endings all around.

And while that all sounds “worth it” in theory, I’ve found myself doubting whether this deep desire of mine to walk as a “poet + warrior + magician” is more than I can handle — whether this dream of mine to live a life alchemized of passion and grace is more pipe dream than possibility.

I wonder whether it is just a mirage that will annoy me until all the bent things are made straight in some far off age to come.

And just when I am about to get swallowed up in my doubt, Jesus shows up in the strangest of places — reminding me that these things are no illusion.

Just the other day He showed up in an iTunes algorithm when this song “Questions” by Mike Scott (of the Waterboys) shuffled into my ears.

I was heads down, cranking out the work, when all of a sudden I heard Scott’s familiar voice belt out…

“Here are a few of the best questions adrift in my head… Who’s driving this airplane? Did I live hard enough? Is it gonna rain? How well have I loved? How well have I loved?”

And then he followed it up with this ringer…

“Though the whole world may crumble, we know who we are, we know who we are”

Exactly the reminder I needed of a few important things…

1) These checksums of the self are very important inquiries.

Am I living as the best version of myself that Jesus has enabled me to be?

Am I at peace enough to risk?

Am I loving enough that the world around me gets a hint of the thankfulness that inhabits my heart?

2) A joy that trumps circumstances is real.

There is a peace that supersedes any scene I find myself in. Something beyond an identity of the moment, a transcendent unshakeable name that enables great wide living in this life.

3) That anytime I begin to doubt any of this, Jesus shows up.

He drops into the scene to remind me that there is a great deep immersive safety in this wild ride we are on.

My great hope for you both is that you would deeply explore these things on your own when the opportunity presents itself.

Much love —

Daddio

Questions by Mike Scott (of The Waterboys)
Written in London, May 1996, and appears on the album “Still Burning”

Who’s the man with the potion
dressed in velvet and gloves
causing grief and commotion
talking ’bout love?
What on earth is he thinking?
Where on earth has he been?
Why do I feel like I’m sinking?
What does it mean?

Let’s walk through the jungle
Put your arm in my arm
and should this ground start to crumble
we’ll come to no harm

I once had a coat I was proud of
I wore that coat a long time
Just when the music got loudest
I left it behind
I could pretend that I’m dreaming
but one thing I just can’t see
Who on earth am I meaning
when I say me?

Let’s walk through the jungle
Put your arm in my arm
and should this ground start to crumble
we’ll come to no harm

What’s around the corner?
What’s around the bend?
What’s around the corner?
What’s around the bend?

Questions upon question upon questions
crowding round the side of my bed
Here are just a few of the best ones
adrift in my head
Who’s driving this airplane?
Did I live hard enough?
Is it gonna rain
and how well have I loved?
How well have I loved?

Let’s walk through the jungle
Put your arm in my arm
and should this ground start to crumble
we’ll come to no harm
Lean on me if you stumble
‘neath the bright shining stars
and though the whole world may crumble
we know who we are
we know who we are

St. Paul (Hewson aka Bono) on the difference between grace and karma

Posted by bryanzug - 2011/07/06

Roo & Tug —

One of my favorite missionaries of all time is a fellow named Paul Hewson. When he was a kid, his friend Guggi gave him the nickname Bono. That’s what most folks call him these days.

He and I share a deep affection for a faith of Mere Christianity that plays itself out in the narrative of the public square. We identify with a circle of friends like G.K. Chesterton, C.S. Lewis, Tolkien, Mother Teresa, and MLK.

One of my favorite riffs of his concerns how the natural way of the world around us is completely upended by Jesus — how the reap what you sow rule of the universe known as Karma is completely turned on its head by the Grace of Jesus.

I’ve pasted the full quote below.

I especially like the part where he describes how love interrupts this natural devolution of things.

That’s pretty cool.

Much love —

Daddio

Excerpt from the book “Bono: In Conversation with Michka Assayas“

Bono: …the thing that keeps me on my knees is the difference between Grace and Karma.

Assayas: I haven’t heard you talk about that.

Bono: I really believe we’ve moved out of the realm of Karma into one of Grace…

You see, at the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics–in physical laws–every action is met by an equal or an opposite one.

It’s clear to me that Karma is at the very heart of the universe. I’m absolutely sure of it.

And yet, along comes this idea called Grace to upend all that “as you reap, you will sow” stuff.

Grace defies reason and logic. Love interrupts, if you like, the consequences of your actions, which in my case is very good news indeed, because I’ve done a lot of stupid stuff.

Assayas: I’d be interested to hear that.

Bono: That’s between me and God. But I’d be in big trouble if Karma was going to finally be my judge. I’d be in deep shit.

It doesn’t excuse my mistakes, but I’m holding out for Grace.

I’m holding out that Jesus took my sins onto the Cross, because I know who I am, and I hope I don’t have to depend on my own religiosity.

A Good Friday / Easter diversity challenge to my friends from other meta-physical (or materialist) tribes

Posted by bryanzug - 2009/04/10

Roo & Tug —

It is Good Friday / Easter weekend here in Seattle and I wanted to invite some of our neighbors to church. Not to be converted to Christianity, but to gain a deeper understanding of the the big “S” story arc that informs who we are as a people.

This seemed like as good a place as any to post it.

Much love —

Daddio

: : :

A Good Friday / Easter diversity challenge to my friends from other meta-physical (or materialist) tribes

Amigos and Amigas —

It’s a very humbling experience when someone graciously lets me know that I don’t know what the fuck I am talking about. There is a kind of love wrapped up in that sort of exchange that runs deeper than most of the surface levels we usually connect on.

One context where that has happened to me in the past is when I’ve made drive by comments about tribes and sub-cultures that I really have never spent any substantial time interacting with or trying to understand.

Gay tribes. Muslim tribes. Online community tribes. Blue tribes. Red tribes.

You get the idea.

I’ve learned a ton and become a much more generous person by meeting and getting to know real people (with real names!) from tribes very different than my own.

And since it is Good Friday / Easter weekend, I thought I’d issue a little challenge of my own.

If you are not a Christian, go to church for a Good Friday service and an Easter service.

Most Christians agree that Easter cannot be understood if it is divorced from the horror of Good Friday. And if you have no appreciation for the horror of Good Friday, and that Christians believe that we are personally responsible for that horror, well, as they say, you don’t understand much.

So please come. Seriously. 4 hours over 1 weekend doesn’t seem like a lot to ask to me.

The Zug’s will be at our church in downtown Seattle on Friday at 7 and on Sunday at 9. Look for the geek film crew with the tripod in the front and come say hello.

Much love to you all —

Bryan

My Mother is an engineer, My Daddy is a healer

Posted by bryanzug - 2009/02/08

Roo & Tug —

There is a common theme to the works of art that move me. One that goes back to this notion Blaise Pascal wrote about ages ago.

Man is neither angel nor beast; and the misfortune is that he who would act the angel acts the beast.

Blaise Pascal, Pensées (678). 1670

Whether it is a masterpiece like Magnolia, a song like Bruce Cockburn’s The Burden of the Angel Beast, Andrew Bird’s recurring theme of the Noble Beast, or The Choir’s rollicking list of the multiple personality disorders of our humanity in Kissers and Killers.

Peter Kreeft has a wonderful exposition on this idea of Pascal’s in his book “Christianity for Modern Pagans” where he writes —

The two fundamental human heresies, the two banes of modern philosophy, are animalism and angelism. Man has lost his place in the cosmos, the place between angel and beast.

Chesterton says, describing St. thomas’ philosophy of man, that “man is not like a balloon, floating free in the sky, nor like a mole, burrowing in the earth, but like a tree, with its roots firmly planted int he earth and its branches reaching up into the heavens.”

Some examples of “angelism”, which ignore the concrete earthy, embodied nature of man, are Platonism, Gnosticism, Pantheism and New age humanism. Some examples of “animalism”, which ignore the spiritual nature of man, are Marxism, Behaviorism, Freudianism, Darwinism, and Deweyan Pragmatism.

The two most life-changing revolutions in modern times were the scientific-industrial revolution, which taught man to live and think abstractly, like an angel; and the sexual revolution, which taught man to live and think like an animal. the first knows onlyt he head, the second knows only the hormones. Neither knows the heart.

The angelist reduces the world to a projection of the self; the animalist reduces the self to a species in the animal world. thus angelists find Pascal’s Christian man too animalistic, to earthy, to wretched; and the animalists find him too unearthkly, too idealistic, too hopeful.

Chesterton (in Orthodoxy) says:

Suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall and some too short; some objected to his fatness, some lamented his leanness… One explanation… would be that he might be an off shape.

But there is another explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall.

Modern philosophy has lost its sane anthropology because it has lost its cosmology. Man does not know himself because he does not know his place in the cosmos; he confuses himself with angel or animal. He is alienated, “lost in the cosmos”…

This is the main pattern I look for in life. The one I am always drawn back to. This question of right angles or curves. This idea of male or female. This notion of love or logic. This pitting of design against functionality.

And wherever the conversation starts to move beyond the words “either/or”, I stop and listen very closely.

When the answer begins to whisper the poetry of “both/and”, I stop to pitch camp for a bit.

When the question of “is it God” or “is it man” is answered with a distinct yes, well — it’s a pretty safe bet that you will find me smitten and hanging around.

Soooo, when you come across this pattern, ages from now, when your mother and I are gone — you can rest assured that we are in the room, nodding along and saying — hmmm, this here is something special.

Much, much, love —

Daddio

: : : : :

“Kissers And Killers” by The Choir

You know I love you
I think you’re so good
I like the people in my neighborhood
My mother is an engineer
My daddy is a healer
And everybody gathered here
Wheelers, dealers

Lovers, depravers
Freers, enslavers
Clowns, wicked sayers
Kissers and betrayers

Bones and ladder
Somehow rhyming
Man of Sorrows hanging
Iscariot swinging
A curious polarity
Finders, weepers
Why have you forsaken me
Losers, keepers

Lovers, depravers
Freers, enslavers
Clowns, wicked sayers
Kissers and betrayers
Saviours, deniers
Prophets, impliers
Well wishers, liars
Killers, death defiers
Killers, death defiers

I light a candle
Well before dark
They tell me jesters hide out
In the park
I never was a cautious man
My brother is a broker
And everybody in the band
Jokers, fire-stokers

Lovers, depravers
Freers, enslavers
Clowns, wicked sayers
Kissers and betrayers
Saviours, deniers
Prophets, impliers
Well wishers, liars
Killers, death defiers
Killers, death defiers

Rejoice with those who rejoice

Posted by bryanzug - 2008/11/05

Love must be sincere.
Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.

Be devoted to one another in brotherly love.
Honor one another above yourselves.

Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.

Be joyful in hope,
patient in affliction,
faithful in prayer.

Share with God’s people who are in need.
Practice hospitality.

Bless those who persecute you;
bless and do not curse.

Rejoice with those who rejoice;
mourn with those who mourn.

Live in harmony with one another.

Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.

Do not be conceited.

Do not repay anyone evil for evil.

Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody.

The letter from Paul, who had been a murderer,
to the Believers gathered in Rome.
Chapter 12, Verses 9-17

Roo & Tug —

Years from now you will reflect on the dawning of this day, when a black man was elected president of the United States, not because of the color of his skin, but because of the infectious content of his character.

One of the funny things you will eventually notice about your old man is that I tend to overflow with intense hope coupled with intense skepticism.

In times when everyone is criticizing one another, you will likely find me calling for the spread of gracious dollops of “benefit of the doubt” (which is, in many ways, the ancient wisdom of Ruth).

In times when everyone is dancing in the streets, you will most likely find me cautioning against the unexamined zeal that glorifies something just before crucifying it (which, in many ways, is the ancient wisdom of Thomas).

But I think today is a day to stave the skepticism, and join others in calling this a time to rejoice.

Much Love —

Daddio

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