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Monthly Archives: June 2007

An evening with Roger Waters

Roger Waters

Tonight my son Sean and I went to see Roger Waters in concert at the Qwest Center in Omaha. If you do not know who Roger Waters is, he is one of the original members of the progressive rock band Pink Floyd. Sean is the one who purchased the two tickets (they were $99 apiece) a couple of months ago, and asked Dad (me) to go with him. I obliged. (Woo Hoo!) This might be kind of funny to most of you especially knowing that he is only 19, that he likes Pink Floyd. But it is not so funny or odd to his mom and I any longer. You see, he likes the music we grew up listening to. Which is good and bad, if you know what I mean. Anyway back to the concert tonight.

For the most part I thoroughly enjoyed the show. Waters started with “In The Flesh” and ended with “Comfortably Numb” both from the album “The Wall”. In between were two sets split by a 15 minute intermission break. The first set was a mixture of Waters solo material and old Pink Floyd classics like “Shine On You Crazy Diamond”, “Have A Cigar”, and “Wish You Were Here”, all from the album “Wish You Were Here”. He did one of my favorite Floyd songs “Sheep” from the “Animals” album. For this one they brought out a large, inflatable pig, all tattooed with anti-government graffiti. The second set was composed of the complete music from the ever popular “Dark Side of the Moon” album in sequence as it appears on the album. This was such a treat to witness. My son was beside himself. He mentioned later that he felt like he was participating in a part of history. Some of us old school Pink Floyd fans probably noticed the video they played with the song “Money” was a record album with the original “Dark Side..” record label and the phonograph needle playing the first song which is where it exists on the vinyl album.

I am only going to mention one negative side to the concert. Roger Waters like so many of his music artist peers used his artist platform to push a political agenda. He presented some Bush bashing messages throughout the show, on the giant screen, and on the inflatable pig. He used some profane words to try and get his political point across and that was a turn off.

The concert as a whole was very enjoyable. Except for the profanity used in his political messages, Rogers was a class act. He seemed sincere in his thanks to the crowd’s applause after each song. He also expressed sincere gratitude for the resounding call for encore from the Omaha faithful. Sean hoped he would do some songs from “The Wall” and he was pleasantly satisfied with “Another Brick In The Wall”, and “Comfortably Numb”. Waters’ band performed very well behind him. The lead guitar player who played a Fender Telecaster guitar most of the evening was excellent. If you had your eyes closed you could imagine the same licks and riffs being played by original Floyd member David Gilmour.

Rock On!

15 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 30, 2007 in Concert Review, Music

Locking arms (and hammers) in ministry

27 Jun

This weekend (June 29th and 30th) I will be joining several bible & tools men from OBC heading down to southeastern Nebraska as part of a prison ministry opportunity. The family in need are parents of a prisoner we have been in contact through the Omaha Correctional Center. The father of this prisoner recently had a stroke and is unable to do the repair work needed for his home bathroom. They are also in need of a shower instead of their current tub because of his lack of mobility.

Praise the Lord for he has assembled a team of skilled workers and go-fers like myself to do His work. The Lord willing this weekend we will be replacing the rotten flooring, leaking plumbing, and their tub with a shower stall assembly. We will basically be remodeling their bathroom. The team will be heading down on Friday afternoon to re-examine the plumbing needs and do some cleaning of the basement. Beginning bright and early Saturday morning we will be doing everything necessary to rebuild the bathroom for this family.

I thank God for the leadership of OBC who provide the way for those who desire to serve Christ in ministry. Serving Christ should be the desire of every believer in Jesus Christ and OBC is obedient to the Lord’s calling for believers to disciple others. If you would like to participate in this ministry endeavor or any future prison ministry opportunities please contact me through this blog site or via my email which I will leave at the bottom of this posting. There is definitely a place for you.

barrydean4ut@hotmail.com

4 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 27, 2007 in faith in Christ, Prison Ministry, serving

Music review Tuesday

26 Jun

It is rare to find a band with the staying power to continue recording albums for almost 25 years. But this is the case with the band for this Tuesday’s music review. That band is Bon Jovi, and the their new album release “Lost Highway”. The release date was June 19th, which was just last Tuesday. I know when the name Bon Jovi is mentioned most people think of the “big hair” bands of the 80’s. While it is true that the 1980’s is the decade in history when Bon Jovi rose to a powerful force in the Hardrock genre and no one, I mean no one had bigger hair than Jon Bo Jovi. But in 1992 with the release of “Keep The Faith”, Bon Jovi shook off the cliche riddled lyrics and began to record music with a more mature sound.

Much like the turn in 1992 Bon Jovi is once again re-inventing itself with their new release “Lost Highway“. While most of what I have read so far about this release is that they have created a more Country oriented sound on this release, I think otherwise. Other reviews have assumed that the reason for this change is because of the popularity of their Country mix release of “Who Says You Can’t Go Home” which featured Jennifer Nettles of Sugarland. Although the music does have a certain Nashville sound to it on certain songs such as “Whole Lot Of Leaving”, “We Got It Going On” featuring Big & Rich, “Seat Next To You”, and “Stranger” featuring LeeAnn Rimes, for the most part the album sound has not changed much from the previous release “Have A Nice Day“. If much of a change exists they have definitely made it a very subtle change.

Highlights on the album are “Summertime” (very reminiscent of the Kenny Chesney song with the same title), “Make A Memory” (the first single), the title track “Lost Highway”, the boot scootin’ “We Got It Going On”, the slow, moving, ballad “Seat Next To You”.

In conclusion I’m not going to jump on the “Bon Jovi has gone Country” wagon train yet, even though some of the songs have a Nashville tint to them. I think Bon Jovi has been blurring the lines between genres for the past few albums. Besides, I am not one to label certain artists to a particular genre anyway. I like the sound of this new release. As I mentioned before it is another re-invention for the hard-working band known as Bon Jovi. I give it four and half stars out of five.

gold star

Check out the video from the new song “Make A Memory” below.

3 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 26, 2007 in Bon Jovi, Lost Highway, Music Review

Love, love, love

26 Jun

As the title might indicate this is not a posting about the The good Samaritan popular Beatles song. It is about the word love as it is used in the scriptures. Last night at OBC we were lead by Mike Holloway (a former elder to OBC) in a study about the word love, especially as it is used in Galatians 5:22. We are doing a 9 part series about the fruit of the Spirit on Sunday evenings throughout the summer.

Mike first established the definition of the word love as it is used in our culture today and as it is used in the New Testament. As you might suspect there are some contrasts. First of all the word love as we use it today is the Greek word eros, which is used to indicate romantic love. This form of the word love is not used in the New Testament. Another form of the word love is the Greek word philia. The city of Philadelphia derives its name from this form, meaning brotherly love. This form of the word love is rarely used in the New Testament. It is often used in the context of friendship. The last form of the word love used in the New Testament in the Greek word agape’. This form is used over 250 times in the New Testament. It is mostly used in the context of charity or love with grace. I would content this form of the word is impossible to do without the Spirit of God. This form of the word is used in Galatians 5:14.

For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Without the spirit of God within you this form of love in the verb since is impossible to do. You may love out of what you perceive as unselfish motives but without God it is not a work in the purist sense, as used in 1 Corinthians 13.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

As Mike summed it up by challenging us to do a self-examination of sorts. How are we as believers in Christ doing in this form of love, agape’ love which we are to walk in. Are we loving our neighbors as ourselves? Are we loving the ugly, the repugnant, the undesirable, the unworthy and unattractive? This same love we have experienced from Christ when we were ugly, undesirable, unworthy and enemies of God. He loved us enough to send His son to die on a cross for us. Below is the link to the audio of Mike Holloway’s sermon on the fruit of the spirit which is love.

The Fruit of the Spirit: Love

This is something for us to consider daily. It is a challenge for me to be sure.

Relating to the weaker brother or sister

22 Jun

I continue to read through the book of Romans and today I sumo vs boy am in chapter 14. In this chapter Paul (through the inspiration of the Holy spirit) addresses how believers should relate to one another especially in cases where one is weak or a newly converted believer and the other is a stronger believer.

1 As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. 2 One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. 3 Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him.

First I want to try and define each of these believers. What do I (or Paul) mean by a weaker believer? It almost goes without saying that anyone who is a new convert to faith in Christ would be a weaker believer. This would also pertain to anyone who might bring extra baggage from another religion such as the abstinence of eating meat and only eating vegetables. In the New Testament Christ does not hold up one type of food over over another. As a matter of fact in Acts 10 Peter is told by the Lord that we are not to honor one food over another such as was called clean and unclean but to honor the Lord for He has made it clean. So if someone remains in the conviction that they should not eat “unclean” food then I would contend they are weaker in the faith. Paul tells the believers in Rome that if one is of the opinion that some food is unclean and another eats the same food, the one who eats should not despise the one who does not. The stronger believer would be the one who is able to eat and drink without falling into guilt from an issue of conscience.

In order to love one another as Christ commanded we must not condemn one another on these matters of opinion. They are not sin. If we notice a brother or sister refraining from drinking wine because of personal conviction we should not push them to consume because God has not forbidden us to drink it. We may want to show them in scripture where wine is a blessing from God and thus can be consumed by believers. The same would hold that if a weaker believer saw another believer consuming wine they should not despise them. Because abstaining from wine is based on their own personal convictions.

For my two cents…..I remember this very thing being a topic of some debate when my wife and I first began attending Omaha Bible Church. There were some who regarded the abstinence of wine as a higher calling. Since there exists such an evangelical stigma with alcohol consumption some folks have made the consumption of it a sin, and binding what the Lord has not bound. I think we should be very careful not to despise those who have made this a “personal conviction”. Definitely steer them away from regarding it as a sin. And those who do abstain should be very careful not to despise those who do not have this “personal conviction”. Jesus gave us the command to love one another so that the world will know that we are His disciples. The weaker should love the stronger and vise versa.

Music review Tuesday

19 Jun

Today I plan to begin a series of music reviews that will be posted on Tuesdays. Tuesday is typically the day of the week that new music is released for purchase in retail outlets. I will not always be reviewing brand new, just released music, but most of my reviews will be on new music. I may throw in the occasional older release just because I want to or due to it’s being a topic of conversation either here or in the news.

Today I will start the series with an artist I been fond of over the years and has just Chris Cornell - Carry On recently released a new record album. (I know, old school term) The artist is Chris Cornell. Chris Cornell has been recording music for quite some time. He has been the lead vocalist for some very popular bands such as Soundgarden and Audioslave. He also collaborated with musicians to create the “Temple of the Dog” project in 1991. These same musicians later formed the multi-platinum record selling group Pearl Jam. Chris has done one other previously released solo project in 1999 which did not fair well commercially.

Chris Cornell’s newest project is entitled Carry On. Carry On was released a few weeks ago on June 5th. The album is produced by Steve Lillywhite who has produced albums for U2 and Rolling Stones. The songs on the album are fairly different than anything Chris has done with his other bands. The tone of the songs is smoother than the usual rough edges like those from Soundgarden and Audioslave, but the voice is definitely the same powerful instrument most of us have come to love.

The album contains 14 songs, including the hit “You Know My Name”, the main title song from the recent James Bond film “Casino Royale”. There are also some diverse songs on the album, from the blues flavored “Safe and Sound” to the slow paced cover of “Billie Jean”. The music of each song is unique on its own and definitely very different from Cornell’s previous projects. The album begins with “No Such Thing” one of the harder songs on the album and a potential hit with folks wanting for more Audioslave oriented style. For most of the album I get the overwhelming hint that the intent of the album was to focus on his distinctive vocal prowess. The lyrics are pretty good in a definite secular tone. No theology here.

Album highlights are “Scar On The Sky”, “Your Soul Today” (music sounds like old Stones), “Billie Jean” (even though my daughter Crysta frowned on it), “Silence The Voices”, “Safe And Sound”, “You Know My Name” (James Bond rocks!). My favorite is “Disappearing Act” for its diverse orchestration. Overall, I really like Carry On and I really appreciate Chris Cornell’s raw emotion found in the songs.

I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

3 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 19, 2007 in Chris Cornell, Music Review

New widget

14 Jun

box.net logo

I am playing with some functionality with WordPress. I have created a new Share Box widget. It is located down the right column right after my Blog Stats. I have included some songs that I like and will share with you. The first tune is Wind In My Sails by Spoken. Spoken is one of my favorite heavier Christian bands. They get a lot of video circulation on TVU, the Christian 24 hour music video channel. The next tune is Sweet Euphoria by Chris Cornell. Chris Cornell is well known for his powerful lead vocals with Audioslave, formally with Temple of the Dog, and the more popular Soundgarden. The last song in the list, at least for now is a new song by Third Day called Cry Out To Jesus. This is an excellent song by them and if you are a fan you will thoroughly love it. In order to use these songs on your site, all you need to do is follow the directions in the box. It will provide you with HTML code to embed into your web site or blog site.

Rock On!

2 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 14, 2007 in box.net, Music, Personal

Grafted in

13 Jun

What do I mean by the title? First let’s look at the word grafting a grape vine grafted or grafting. Grafting is basically a process used in horticulture to fuse together part of one plant, much like a branch, and affix it to the tissues of another. The basis for deciding to do this is for plant propagation.

I have been reading through the book of Romans and in chapter 11 the apostle Paul uses this term to describe to the readers how they, the Gentiles, have come to share in the rich root of Christ.

17 But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree, 18 do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. 19 Then you will say, Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. 20 That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith.

By God’s grace I, who am a Gentile, have been grafted in to the root system of Christ. Paul is saying that God’s chosen, the Jews, have been broken off. They represent the branches that were broken off. They rejected Christ and thus have been broken off. In horticulture, the plant to be selected to sustain the branches to be grafted in is selected because of its rich root system. The other plant or branch to be grafted in is selected for its stem, leaves, or fruit. Paul is using this analogy which would be understood by those in the Roman church. They would understand these terms because many of the members would have been farmers or wine makers.

Praise our Lord for choosing us to be grafted in to the root system of Christ. He alone sustains us, and He has promised to produce fruit through us.

2 Comments

Posted by barrydean on June 13, 2007 in grace, grafting, Romans, salvation

The bondage to corruption

07 Jun

When you think of evil, what do you imagine? Do you imagine a scary image such as some of the demons or so-called demonic depictions in the movies, or do you imagine someone like Jeffrey Dahmer. Below is a clip from the TV series “Supernatural” that airs on The CW. The two main characters in the clip are Sam Winchester who, along with his brother Dean, (not seen here) travels the country fighting demons. The other is one of their powerful foes “the yellowed-eyed demon”. (Warning: scene may be too intense for the faint-hearted)

Is the yellow-eyed demon something like you imagined evil to look like? Maybe evil looks more like the image below. The image is of the video taken outside the Target store of the suspect who abducted eighteen year old Kelsey Smith a Kansas City girl who was subsequently found dead.