Giving Away My “Stuff”...

I am the product of a perfect storm of frugality. Born to a mother who lived through the Great Depression, raised by grandparents with a Hutterite heritage of simplicity and never wasting anything, I came of age in that save-the-earth era of the 1960s and 70s. I rode my bicycle the ten miles to and from my high school on the first Earth Day in 1970. In adulthood I fully bought into the reuse, reduce, recycle, green, save-the-earth mentality of the 2000s. Our recycling dumpster is usually full on garbage collection day, our trash dumpster almost empty. I have three (3!!!) compost bins in the backyard. With such an impressive resume of environmental concern, one would think I'd have figured out by now what to do with “stuff”... those things that fill my life that I don't want or need anymore, but I just can't seem to get rid of. “Stuff”...

I spent most of my childhood and part of my young adulthood believing that everything I owned I would keep until 1) it broke, 2) it wore out, or 3) I outgrew it. Any other option seemed like an irresponsible waste of something that was still useful.* Over time, I learned to let go of clothing and household items I was no longer enamored with by donating them to thrift stores and agencies that collected such things. But what about the “stuff”...those things that were just one small step above being actual garbage, the “stuff” that could be useful to the right someone, surely, who would be happy to repurpose it and give it a new life? Now, in the downsizing stage of late middle life, I had to face the fact I had a basement full of “stuff” to deal with.

I never had a desire to have a garage sale, having a hard time imaging people would pay for anything I would be willing to part with. But the concept of having a giveaway “sale” was something I had been entertaining for a number of years. Finally, when the “stuff” in the basement had gotten to a critical level, I made note of the days of our annual neighborhood association garage sales and got to work moving boxes of items into our garage to give away. I printed signs that read “GIVEAWAY – EVERYTHING FREE! (REALLY!)” and listed our address, posting signs at the two entrances to the neighborhood and putting two more signs on the front lawn. We filled the garage with “stuff”, my husband chalking lines around the free stuff, marking the interior “free”, the exterior “not free or for sale”. (We really did want to keep the canoe and the lawn mover and the garden tools...)

My husband had serious doubts about this giveaway thing.** He brought the boxes up from the basement, muttering under his breath that nobody would want this “stuff” and we would just put it in the garbage dumpster at the end of the weekend. But he humored me, putting up the signs and willingly sat in the garage the first morning of the garage sales to keep an eye on the canoe and lawn mover while I went off to Bible study. He had to be somewhere before I returned, saying he would just shut the garage door for the fifteen minute gap in time before I returned. I pulled into the driveway about noon, opened the garage door and was amazed to see the garage that was full of stuff at 9 am was now down about a third of its volume. I sat in the garage that afternoon and experienced what I imagined my husband had experienced that morning.

Several neighbors had real garage sales around us, so we benefited from their traffic. Cars would slow down, look toward the garage, some stop, some move on only to come around again. “Is it really all free?” was a common question. I got into the habit of addressing each approaching newcomer by saying “It's all free. If you can use it, just take it.” And they did. Some would offer money for their finds. We would decline, saying if they felt the need to pay for it, to just send something to their favorite charity. Some people would come, look and leave without taking anything. I imagined they probably had their own basement of “stuff” to deal with.

My husband returned and joined me in the garage, telling me about his productive morning. He graciously said he had come to see the greatness in the giveaway idea. People love getting free stuff, and surprisingly the not-quite-garbage was in fact useful finds for many people. The two dozen glass jelly jars I used to store dried herbs in? Snapped up by some woman. The three dozen plus metal teas tins (Yeah, we drink a LOT of tea...) was excitedly taken by a man who was looking to organize the hardware in his own basement. (I had used the tins for the same purpose, but was unable to break the habit of saving them, even when I had more than I needed...) He also took two old lawn chairs badly in need of restrapping. Old flower pots, boxes of old crayons, random plastic storage containers, old books and magazines, Barbie cars, cheap jewelry and small toys from Happy Meals, sports trophies my children had no interest in keeping, obsolete electronics and various and sundry other “stuff”.

Neighborhood kids would come and rummage through all the kids stuff there, taking some, coming back with friends to take some more. “This is the best garage sale in the neighborhood because everything is FREE!” said one young repeat customer. After he returned a twelfth time, he said he came just to talk to us. His mom had told him he couldn't bring anymore things home. A Hispanic family came toward the garage. I spoke my line about everything being free. The husband spoke something in Spanish to his wife whose eyes lit up and she happily began gathering up her finds. Their children shyly began picking through the toys, perhaps stunned by their good fortune. Some people would ask why we were doing this. Some people asked about the logistics of it, they themselves thinking it was something they might want to try.

One of the items we were giving away was an old metal garden rake, its wooden handle broken in two. My husband wanted to put it directly in the dumpster, but no, I said, I had seen on a craft website that some creative person had sawed off the handle of just such an old rake and turned it into a wine glass hanger. My husband rolled his eyes, left the rake alone and said that if some one took the broken rake, he would declare me a true giveaway genius. We watched as people approached the rake and passed it by, or took it up to look at it and put it down. One man took the rake, got as far as his car, brought it back and said he remembered he had a broken rake just like it at home. The other item that was to become a measure of my recycling-reusing giveaway genius was the box of unwanted sports trophies. I had previously talked to someone at a trophy store, asking if they recycled sports trophies or knew of anyone who did. He said no, but he had heard that some crafters take them apart and use the colorful columns and stone bases for craft projects. The last day of the sale such a crafter came by. She and her husband were staying with relatives in our neighborhood on the way to Kentucky from a trip out west. She took the box of trophies, saying she did indeed take them apart and use the various pieces for different craft projects. She also took the broken rake. She was quite excited to get both and she and her husband gifted us with a railroad spike from a collection of spikes they had in their car from their trip through the Dakotas.

By the last day of the garage sales, there was little left in the our garage. Sadly, books and magazines did not disappear. The books went to Goodwill, the magazines in the dumpster. Aside from those items very little else had to be disposed of. With the big box of sports trophies gone and the broken rake on the way to being repurposed, my husband declared me the genius of the garage giveaway.

***

This year we repeated our successful giveaway when the neighborhood garage sales rolled around again. We had a smaller collection of “stuff”, but again most of it went. Kids' sports tee shirts, excess water bottles, old coffee mugs, backpacks, an obsolete under-the-counter cassette player/radio, a futon without a frame, and boxes of hair paraphernalia all went. A huge box of scrap lumber dwindled to a few random pieces. We put out more books, and this time there were some takers. We had repeat visitors in the neighborhood kids, again sorting through a new batch of small toys and costume jewelry. The man in the neighborhood who took the thirty plus tea tins last year came back and told my husband that thanks to those tins he now had neatly arranged all the hardware in his basement. He said that last year, when he left our garage, he stopped at the local Walmart with the old strapless lawn chairs in the back of his pickup truck. When he came out of the store, they were gone. Those giveaway items had unexpectedly and unwittingly been “given away” again...

*If you desire to delve deeper into my save-everything mentality check out:

http://marynapier.blogspot.com/2014/03/mentalshelving-myhusband-grew-up-in.html

**If you want to delve deeper into his throw-away everything mentality, see above link...

And Now for Something Completely Different...

“What's with The Angle?” you may have been wondering. “Has she given up writing?” I haven't been posting much on this blog site the past year because I've been working on a new blog – Haban R Us.* Unlike the “eclectic ramblings” of The Angle, the new blog has required more research and reading and remembering and is still very much in process. However, I feel I've written enough to launch it, so check it out. It's an exploration and history of my family's spiritual roots. I hope to make it long on stories and succinct on the historical narrative. I plan on posting to the new blog frequently (the definition of frequently yet to be determined...) and there seems to be enough family and historical material to keep it going for a long while. The new blog can be found at https://habanrus.blogspot.com/

I'll continue to link my new blog posts to facebook, but I'm leaving this note for those who bypass fb and come directly here. I'll continue my eclectic ramblings in The Angle when the mood strikes me. Probably during fishing season...

*Most of my readers are probably thinking “Whaat?” Some of my readers, however, might recognize the word and think “Oh, goody! Grandma and Grandpa stories!”

Looking at Billy Graham from a Catholic Pew

Billy Graham was someone who flitted in and out of my Catholic awareness growing up...the tall, handsome man with the booming, yet surprisingly gentle voice, preaching to large crowds in stadiums on TV...the person seen with presidents during times of national and political crisis...the face on the back of the latest bestseller at the local Christian bookstore. My hard-of-hearing grandfather would watch Billy Graham's crusades on the television, holding a small speaker to his ear to catch every word, commenting at some point that the Catholic Church needed to have more preachers like Billy Graham. Grandpa knew Graham wasn't Catholic, yet he recognized the universal appeal of Billy Graham's message to Catholics, Protestants and anyone else out there that might be listening. Grandpa knew that every person Billy Graham invited to enter into a relationship with God could, as the iconic crusade hymn sings, come “Just as I am”, with their sin and imperfections, and receive forgiveness, salvation, eternal life along with that all important relationship with a loving God. Pretty good deal for anyone. But I think my grandfather also recognized Billy Graham offered something that the Catholic Church lacked - process – simple, thoughtful, make-a-decision process. The word process is defined as a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end. The process that Billy Graham offered went like this: listen to the gospel message, decide to fully buy into it, come forward publicly to acknowledge the buying in, and start (more deeply continue, for some) to live a changed life, one more lived for God than oneself.

Growing up Catholic, I was familiar with all the words Billy Graham would use during his crusades, but I didn't know a thing about process. In my second grade-first-communion-preparation understanding of the Baltimore Catechism I came to understand the gospel message that Jesus's death and resurrection was all about forgiveness, salvation, eternal life and getting into a relationship with a loving God. We get to go to heaven because Jesus died for our sins. We get to have a relationship with God because Jesus died for our sins. We get eternal life because Jesus rose from the dead...after he died for our sins. I bought into it all, though looking back now, I bought into it at arm's length, without process. It was all out there, somewhere, waiting to be taken in, something to be assumed, but never anything to concretely act on. For many Catholics, process is often stumbled upon accidentally, in a sermon, on a retreat, or, as in my case, God provided the process Himself. Somewhere in my high school years I felt a strong challenge from what I could only call Someone-not-me. Did I really believe all I had been taught in twelve years of Catholic education about Jesus' death and resurrection? Did I want that personal relationship with God? Did I want to spend the rest of my life living in that relationship and everything that may mean? Answering these questions was my process, and life for me was different from then on.

Fast forward 17 years...

I was now married, living in Rochester, New York, attending a Catholic church and involved in a Catholic Charismatic prayer group. Our group, though distinctly Catholic, rubbed shoulders regularly with the other denominations in the city, going so far as to cancel our regular prayer meeting once a month to go and pray with some of the other churches for revival for Rochester. It was, therefore, no surprise to us that a short time later, the Billy Graham crusade was invited to give a crusade in Rochester. Also, a bit more of a surprise to some, but not to us praying Catholics, was how enthusiastically the Catholic bishop of our diocese got behind the crusade. In a letter to be read at mass in all the churches on a Sunday before the crusade, the bishop encouraged all Catholics who were able to attend the crusade to do so, that what Billy Graham had to say needed to be heard by everyone. Our parish promptly put out sign up sheets and promised to charter buses to the crusade if enough people signed up. The response was so great that the parish ended up chartering one bus for every week night crusade and two buses for each of the two weekend sessions.

Many of my Catholic prayer group friends were involved in the logistics of the crusade, from being prayer counselors during the crusade to hosting followup Bible studies afterward. I had not gotten involved, expecting my third child days before the crusade was to come into town. Still, I wanted to be part of the Billy Graham experience, to see first hand what happens when this man comes to a city. The crusade was to take place at Silver Stadium, an outdoor minor league baseball stadium, home of the Rochester Red Wings.* Could we go to the stadium on one of the crusade days? I wasn't sure that my born-a-Catholic-will-die-a Catholic husband was open to such a decidedly Protestant adventure. But, the bishop had given his permission, and my husband knew I wanted to go, so he happily facilitated the trip to the ball park. We found a sitter for our two older children, packed up our month-old daughter and headed out to the stadium.

I had already “processed” my personal relationship with God, but my husband, a life-long practicing Catholic, had yet to personally grapple with those process questions I had dealt with in my teens. He knew enough about Billy Graham, his message and the format of the crusade to know somewhat to expect. When we arrived at the ball park, my husband pointed to the seats high up in the last row of the stadium. That's where I want to sit, he said. He told me he remembered seeing a crusade on TV, and how Billy Graham, when calling people to come down to the field to acknowledge their decision to accept Christ, would specifically point to those sitting in the very last, highest row of the venue, telling them not to worry, he would wait for them, there would be plenty of time for them to come down. I want to be one of those people, my husband said.

Billy Graham Crusade, Silver Stadium, Rochester, New York, September 1988

The format of the crusade was simple. There was a time of choir-sung worship music, followed by Billy Graham's gospel message. His voice was simultaneously strong yet gentle, showing no evidence he had spent several days before the crusade in a local hospital being treated for a spider bite. His message of God's love, the forgiveness of sin, the promise of eternal life and the personal relationship with Jesus available to all was clear, followed by a call to come forward onto the field for prayer for those who wished to commit their lives to God. Those who came forward were prayed for as a group by Billy Graham and then individually with one of many trained counselors, given a copy of the gospel of John, and given information about follow-up Bible studies available at local churches. True to his word, my husband was one of those people who came down from the last, highest row to the field of the stadium to formally commit his life to God, accompanied by his wife and infant daughter. In the not-so-random way of God's serendipity, a counselor on the field approached my chemist husband, they exchanged pleasantries and found they both had science backgrounds. They talked, they prayed together, and then the counselor handed my husband the gospel of John and a small book with steps (more process) on how to grow in one's relationship with God. With your scientific mind, he told him, this will all make sense to you if you study it. He did, and it did. In the weeks that followed the crusade, my husband attended one of the follow-up Bible studies, hosted by our Catholic parish. He grew in his new (renewed?) relationship with God. We were now together in the demographic of Catholic born-again Christians.

Billy Graham passed away last week. He was 99 years old, and it is estimated that he had preached to 2.2 billion people in his lifetime, counting radio and television audiences as well as in-person crusade attenders. It is believed that 3.2 million of those hearing Billy Graham's message responded by accepting Jesus Christ as their personal savior. These millions come from all walks of life, different religious backgrounds, including no religious background at all. God provided the forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life for them all. Billy Graham simply delivered the message of that forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life and the process to grab hold of it and make it one's own. Millions of people are grateful for that, my husband and I being two of them...

Just as I am - without one plea,

But that Thy blood was shed for me,

And that Thou bidst me come to Thee,

-O Lamb of God, I come!

- From the Billy Graham Crusade hymn Just As I Am

*The most famous person to appear at Silver Stadium before Billy Graham was Cal Ripken, Jr. He spent the 1981 baseball season as the third baseman for the Red Wings when it was a minor league team for the Baltimore Orioles.

Down the Lyrical Highway

(Reprise)

When Your Internal Musical Age is Nineteen...

 

In 1972, I turned nineteen. It was also the year that I probably reached a high point in my musical acquisitions, buying record albums every time the department store in my small college town had a sale. I would take them back to my dorm room, put a record on the turntable, pull out the liner notes and lay on the bed, reading the lyrics as I listened. I had done this with all of my music listening since junior high – remember, music is all about the lyrics with me – but during this time of my life there was so much great music out there, I wanted to absorb as much of it as possible. That year, I cut hair on campus, for free, for friends, and did mending of favorite pairs of ragged jeans, also for free, being paid back in drinks in the downtown bars on weekends. One of my friends, a disc jockey at the college radio station, paid for my sewing skills in loans of his extensive record collection. I was free to borrow whatever I liked from his vast array of albums, but often he recommended music to me. “What? You like the Byrds but haven't listened to Sweetheart of the Rodeo yet? You gotta take this...” “You haven't really heard “Nights in White Satin” unless you listen to all of Days of Future Passed. Take this. You won't regret it.” I took it. I didn't regret it, except for the fact that both those albums, and others my friend recommended, had come out several years previously. I felt like I had almost missed out on some great music. In that moment, I promised myself I would keep up with the current music of the time, no matter what that time might be. Over the years I've managed to keep that promise, except for a brief period of time when my children were infants. (Fortunately it was the 1980s. I don't think I missed anything...)

As our kids grew up, my husband and I shared our music tastes with them, having 90s kids well-versed in the music of the 60s and 70s. In turn, we listened to their music, the Cranberries, Dave Matthews and David Gray interspersed on the car tape deck with Eric Clapton, Neil Young and the Grateful Dead. Now, at my present age (which you all figured out from the first line of this post), I still have my ear to the current music of the day, and of course, the music of the day that grips me is the music with the most skillful lyrics, those songs that turn a phrase and tell the best stories. Oh, I'm not immune to the occasional pop song with a catchy tune (That must be why Daft Punk's “Get Lucky” ended up on my iPod...), but most of my music tastes fit into genres that have words like “alternative”, “indie”, “folk rock”, and “Americana” in them. Here are some of my favorite musical artists of the moment, and the very recent past, those that turn me back into my nineteen-year-old self, grabbing the liner notes or going to Azlyrics.com, reading along as I'm listening:

1.  The Decemberists. Any band smart and quirky enough to name themselves after the rebels of an 1825 Russian revolt hold great promise in their song writing and lyrics. How many contemporary songs contain words such as “plinth” and “panoply”? The Decemberists' Colin Meloy tells stories, some dark, some personal, some historical, in rich poetic lyrics. I think the music is good, but the lyrics are so rich, I revert to my inner nineteen-year-old, liner notes in hand, with every song. The Crane Wife and The King is Dead are my two favorite collections.

Hetty Green
Queen of supply-side bonhomie bone-drab
You know what I mean?
On the road
It's well advised that you follow your own bag
In the year of the chewable Ambien tab

- From “Calamity Song”

A barony of ivy in the trees

Expanding out its empire by degrees

And all the branches burst to bloom

In the boom

Heaven sent this cardinal maroon

To decorate our living room...

...And years from now when this old light

Isn't ambling anymore

Will I bring myself to write

"I give my best to Springville Hill"

- From “June Hymn”

2.  Mumford and Sons. Another group of lyrically rich song writers, Marcus Mumford and his three musician friends have managed three albums of songs with solid lyrics and great musical arrangements. Their debut album, Sigh No More, loosely borrows from John Steinbeck's novel, East of Eden, taking on a literary feel in many of the songs. Marcus Mumford's parents are the leaders of the Vineyard Church in the United Kingdom, and Marcus grew up in the worship tradition of the Vineyard. Though a secular band, Mumford and Sons songs have the energy and drawing-in ability of a good worship band, and the lyrics often deal with spiritual themes. Sigh No More and Babel, their first two albums, have a folkier, acoustic sound, with their third collection, Wilder Mind, expanding to a more energetic, electric sound.

It seems that all my bridges have been burnt

But you say that's exactly how this grace thing works.

It's not the long walk home that will change this heart

But the welcome I receive with the restart

 - From “Roll Away Your Stone”

Whispered notes from the piano in the corner of the room

Hold your throat is that healing that you're hearing in her tune

Wanting change but loving her just as she lies

Is the burden of a man who's built his life on love

You told me life was long but now that it's gone

You find yourself on top as the leader of the flock

Called to be a rock for those below

 - From “Those Below”

3.  Lin-Manuel Miranda. Huh? Not exactly an indie/folk/rocker, but the musical genius behind the Broadway musical Hamilton makes this list, having driven my nineteen-year-old self to the liner notes again, though in this case they're more of a libretto. I had read Ron Chernow's biography Alexander Hamilton recently, and then listened to the soundtrack of Hamilton, hearing that Lin-Manuel Miranda's reading of that 800 page tome had inspired the musical. IT...IS...AMAZING! Seriously, AMAZING!!! Chernow's book, though telling the story of Alexander Hamilton, is really a thorough history of the early days of our country, from pre-revolution until the early 1800s. Lin-Manuel Miranda read, understood, and successfully retells the ENTIRE story, with all (yes, pretty much, ALL) its nuances in a rap-hip-hop-showtune musical. If you are familiar with the musical, but haven't read Chernow's book, know that Lin-Manuel Miranda is even more of a genius than you thought, that the story he tells is historically accurate as well as entertaining and amazingly lyrically clever. If you have read the book, but are unfamiliar with the music and lyrics of the musical, get a copy of the original Broadway cast soundtrack and prepare yourself to be blown away. Lin-Manuel Miranda takes the Chernow book and creates a concise (well, as concise as a two and a half hour, 46 song musical can be) clever, nuanced, accurate, poignant, entertaining retelling of Alexander Hamilton's life and his considerable contributions to the early days of the United States. And the lyrics, the lyrics, THE LYRICS...are... AMAZING!!! (I really can't say that too many times. I heard a theater critic call Lin-Manuel Miranda the greatest playwright since Shakespeare. He may not be exaggerating.) Below are some of those lyrics. I'm trying not to get carried away here...really...

[WASHINGTON]

Pick up a pen, start writing

I wanna talk about what I have learned

The hard-won wisdom I have earned

[HAMILTON]

As far as the people are concerned

You have to serve, you could continue to serve—

[WASHINGTON]

No! One last time

The people will hear from me

One last time

And if we get this right

We’re gonna teach ‘em how to say

Goodbye

You and I—

[HAMILTON]

Mr. President, they will say you’re weak

[WASHINGTON]

No, they will see we’re strong

[HAMILTON]

Your position is so unique

[WASHINGTON]

So I’ll use it to move them along

[HAMILTON]

Why do you have to say goodbye?

[WASHINGTON]

If I say goodbye, the nation learns to move on

It outlives me when I’m gone

Like the scripture says:

“Everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree

And no one shall make them afraid.”

They’ll be safe in the nation we’ve made

I wanna sit under my own vine and fig tree

A moment alone in the shade

At home in this nation we’ve made

One last time

 - From “One Last Time”, George Washington explaining why he wants Hamilton to write his farewell speech, why he has to not run again for president

HAMILTON:

I imagine death so much it feels more like a memory

Is this where it gets me, on my feet, sev’ral feet ahead of me?

I see it coming, do I run or fire my gun or let it be?

There is no beat, no melody

Burr, my first friend, my enemy

Maybe the last face I ever see

If I throw away my shot, is this how you’ll remember me?

What if this bullet is my legacy?

Legacy. What is a legacy?

It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see

I wrote some notes at the beginning of a song someone will sing for me

America, you great unfinished symphony, you sent for me

You let me make a difference

A place where even orphan immigrants

Can leave their fingerprints and rise up

I’m running out of time. I’m running, and my time’s up

Wise up. Eyes up

I catch a glimpse of the other side

Laurens leads a soldiers’ chorus on the other side

My son is on the other side

He’s with my mother on the other side

Washington is watching from the other side

Teach me how to say goodbye

- From “The World is Wide Enough”

4. Dawes. I've heard it said that this folk rock band has a sound reminiscent of Crosby, Stills and Nash, Joni Mitchell and Neil Young. As a fan of all three of those classic rock staples, I can't say I really hear the resemblance, but I do like the music of Dawes and love their lyrics, so maybe I do pick up some unconscious connection. Taylor Goldsmith, songwriter and lead vocal, writes songs such as “A Little Bit of Everything” and “Most People” unveiling Everyman personalities, people we don't know, yet seem familiar. The music is easy to listen to, the lyrics irresistible for me to ponder.

Like the memory from your mother's house

From before you got too old

Like the feeling from a photograph

Before it's meanings all got told

The words I say can be silver

But what's left unsaid can be gold

So get to know me once I go away

- From “If I Wanted Someone”

All these psychics and these doctors

They're all right and they're all wrong,

It's like trying to make out every word

When they should simply hum along

It's not some message written in the dark

Or some truth that no one's seen

It's a little bit of everything

- From “A Little Bit of Everything

5. There are many excellent up-and-coming singer-songwriters flying under the radar out there in the music world. All of the really good ones are passionate about their craft, working hard to write, perform and get their music seen and heard. Many have their original music online, on CDs available at their performances. I can't promise you liner notes, but you will almost always find some great music. Some of these singer-songwriters are hard to find unless you are looking for them – on music sites online, in small venues, clubs and pubs, coffee houses and cafes. And we should all be looking for them. Their lyrics are cleverly written, the stories they tell, real. They are so worth finding...

Down the Lyrical Highway

(Reprise)

Words of Worship, Words of Truth

 

My grandmother, who lived with us when we were growing up, owned one record album. As it sometimes is today, she relied on the technological savvy of the younger generation, my brother and me, to listen to it. We would put the vinyl LP on the turntable, position the needle and turn up the sound on the old hi-fi phonograph so Grandma could hear it in the kitchen. The record was titled The Lennon Sisters Singing the Best-Loved Catholic Hymns. For those of you who did not grow up forced to watch The Lawrence Welk Show on Saturday nights, the Lennon Sisters were four girls from a devout Roman Catholic family of eleven children who sang, quite nicely, songs on the wholesome, family-oriented variety show that seemed to be broadcast everywhere in the middle of the last century. My grandmother loved playing that record, and as one of her enablers, I heard it a lot growing up. It was the first time I remember music usually reserved for church being played at home. In my late teens, after I entered into a serious relationship with God, I, myself, often gravitated toward music with a spiritual bent.

The Christian music industry rapidly expanded in the the 1970s and 80s, providing Christian parallels to almost every secular musical genre. When our kids came along, my husband and I purged some of our more raucous rock albums and acquired some Christian music replacements. When our kids started listening to music on their own, it was often a reflection of our parental tastes, a mixture of classic rock (Eric Clapton, the Beatles), what I would call “kid Christian” (Veggie Tales, The Donut Man), and contemporary Christian artists (Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith...) Eventually, I came to a place that I am somewhat hesitant to confess, but I will anyway: I really don't like contemporary Christian music...

There, I said it.

Remember, music for me is all about the lyrics, and frankly, much (not all) of the contemporary Christian music of the past quarter century sounded a bit bland and lot alike to me. Rather than pick on the genre, however, I want to instead list those songs and musicians that really draw me into a spiritual place where God's presence is more than just a nice thing to aspire to.

1) Hymns. Those Lennon Sisters did have an impact on me. There was something about songs like “Faith Of Our Fathers”, “Jesus! My Lord, My God, My All!”, “Come Holy Ghost, Creator Blest”, and “Holy God, We Praise Thy Name” that made me want to connect with God. In later years, when I jumped ship for a more evangelical church experience, I listened to the Protestant hymns I had missed out on in my youth. Amusingly, my first exposure to some of those songs was a cassette tape by the Christian a capella group Glad. I still hear the lyrics of such classic hymns as “Blessed Assurance” and “Rock of Ages” with the “ba, ba, ba” beatboxing in my head. But beatboxing aside, the lyrics of so many of the hymns, Catholic or Protestant, are rich with both spiritual truth and the ability to draw one into the presence of God. Favorite hymns of mine: “Amazing Grace”, “How Great Thou Art” and “This is My Father's World”. “How Deep the Father's Love for Us” and “In Christ Alone” are another two favorites from contemporary hymn writer Stuart Townend. These hymns always leave me with a true sense of worship.

This is my Father’s world, should my heart be ever sad?

The lord is King—let the heavens ring. God reigns—let the earth be glad.

This is my Father’s world. Now closer to Heaven bound,

For dear to God is the earth Christ trod.

No place but is holy ground.

- From “This is My Father's World”

2) The Newsboys. I shouldn't really love the Newsboys as much as I do. They have two strikes against them, fitting into the genre of contemporary Christian artists and being a music group of the 1980s. (I am of the opinion – yes, I know, some will not agree – that nothing good musically came out of the 1980s...) But love them and their music I do. Definitely a lyric thing, most likely a Spirit thing. I never tire of their clever lyrics and musical stylings. Take Me to Your Leader is a brilliantly written song on a brilliantly written CD by the same title. Going Public, Thrive and Step Up to the Microphone are also wonderful collections. The Newsboys also have two worship collections, Devotion and Adoration, both aptly named. If I want to have a good quiet time, a devotion or adoration time, I listen to one of those CDs and let the lyrics draw me into God's presence.

He raises a wrinkled hand

Through the dust and the flies

Wrapped in rags like we are

And with barely open eyes

He takes my finger

And He won't let go

And He won't let go

It's nothing like I knew before

And it's all I need to know

Come, let us adore Him

He has come down to the world we live in

And all I have to give Him

Is adoration

- From “Adoration”

Justin is adustin' to

The odor from Theodore's Evergreen Incense

But aroma therapy don't make him any younger

Than Oliver's All Liver Supplements

His late mate Marrilee merrily said immortality

Can't be bought in a jar

This just in: Justin's had enough of cure-alls,

Gonna quiz the neighbor kid with the

Fish on his car

He says,

I don't know why you care

I don't know what's up there

I don't know how it's done

Just take me to your leader, son

- From “Take Me to Your Leader”

3) Sara Groves. Another thoughtful Christian lyricist, Sara Groves writes songs of truth, about being made for a world beyond this one, hearing God, the spiritual heredity one leaves behind, and even the frustrations dealing with toy packaging. My favorite collection, Conversations, contains song after song with lyrics that at some point grip my heart. (Well, maybe not “Tent in the Center of Town”...) Like the Newsboys, she's part of the genre I'm not wild about, but her lyrics transcend that genre and always send me in a good direction, spiritually.

I've been painting pictures of Egypt

Leaving out what it lacks

The future feels so hard

And I want to go back

But the places that used to fit me

Cannot hold the things I've learned

Those roads were closed off to me

While my back was turned

- From “Painting Picture of Egypt”

And we've had every conversation in the world

About what is right and what has all gone bad

But have I mentioned to you that this is all I am

This is all that I have

And I would like to share with you

What makes me complete

I don't claim to have found the truth

But I know it has found me

- From “Conversations”

Nothing makes me lose my cool like

Toy packaging

Kids, you really need to leave the room

Mom's opening toy packaging

I'm sorry you have to see this sight

You must be brave, no, please don't cry

I promise it will be alright

I hope to have it by tonight

Never mind this dynamite

Toy packaging

- From “Toy Packaging”

4) Seekers and Truth Tellers. No, not a duel-named group or a true genre, but all those songwriters out there who search for spiritual truth, some secular musicians who profess to be Christians, those who came from a religious background and now question it, those who intelligently comment on or question spiritual themes and those who just paint with words mankind's longing for something else. They've been around a long time (The 1960s and 70s were rich with seeker songs.) and their numbers would include a wide range of artists - Sam Beam of Iron and Wine, David Bazan, Roger McGuinn of the Byrds, Richie Furay of Buffalo Springfield and Poco, Bob Dylan, U2, Billy Joel, Jason Isbell, Johnny Cash – the list could go on and on. Secular group Vampire Weekend in their song “Unbelievers” raises the question is there grace for those who reject grace :

If I’m born again I know that the world will disagree

Want a little grace but who’s gonna say a little grace for me?

We know the fire awaits unbelievers

All of the sinners the same

Girl, you and I will die unbelievers

Bound to the tracks of the train

I’m not excited, but should I be?

Is this the fate that half of the world has planned for me?

Jason Isbell in “24 Frames” writes:

You thought God was an architect, now you know,

He’s something like a pipe bomb ready to blow

And everything you built that’s all for show goes up in flames

In twenty- four frames

His lyrics remind me both of C. S. Lewis's comment that Aslan, his Narnian Christ figure, is not a “tame lion” and of the verse from 1 Corinthians that says:

...each one's work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done... (1:13)

These Seeker/Truthteller lyrics won't always lead me into a place of worship, but they always lead me in some way toward God, sometimes to ponder a re-expression of truth, sometimes to re-examine a long held belief at God's feet, sometimes to pray for the artist himself. (Listen to Hozier's “Take Me to Church” and hear someone who scaringly understands all too well what modern day idolatry looks like...) Some of this “genre” is hard to hear, but some is pure joy, like listening to Bono praise God in Latin - Gloria, In te domine, Gloria, Exultate, Gloria, Oh, Lord, loosen my lips – and being reminded by the Doobie Brothers that Jesus is just alright with me...

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When Your Internal Musical Age is Nineteen...