Archive for the ‘Storytelling’ Category
Welcome Ben Thomas!
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Today I want to introduce the first of two new and exciting additions to The Orchard’s creative team! #2 will be tomorrow.
The first…..is Ben Thomas!
I met Ben for the first time about three months ago while attending a small concert he was performing at in downtown Aurora. Walking in that night I knew absolutely nothing about who he was or where he was from. But I kid you not……within just a few minutes of hearing him perform, I felt a strong and immediate connection with both his songwriting and singing. A week or two later we met up at St. Arbucks and began what eventually ended up being a series of really great conversations. And finally after both of us sensing what seemed to be God’s hand in all of this, Ben began his journey through The Orchard’s formal interview process.
And as you can see, it went very well!
So I’m excited to announce that Ben will be joining our team as The Orchard’s new Creative Arts Director where one part of his role will be to lead our worship and technical art teams. We’re also excited to have Ben help lead a culture of creative storytelling through art in both our city and church community.
Ben is currently wrapping up his final week of serving on the team of a great church in Naperville, IL. He’s married to his wife Joy and they have two beautiful children.
And in case you can’t tell….I’m excited! Ben is excited! Our teams are excited! And if you are not yet familiar with Ben, you should be so that you too can be excited! You can listen, purchase, and download Ben’s music and albums here. May I suggest this one?
Welcome Ben Thomas!
My Thoughts on STORY 2010
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Finally getting a chance this morning to decompress my time at STORY this past week…
First of all, let me say thank you to Ben Arment for the privilege of being a part of Story again this year. I’m thankful for our friendship and the opportunity to work together on such a unique event. It’s been awesome watching this dream come to pass.
Secondly, this year’s Story was exceptional. It feels to me like Story hit it’s mark in 2010. In many ways, it feels like a new community has been birthed – one that’s made up of diverse, yet like-minded creatives who really want to embrace the call to create and inspire the world around us.
Here are a few thoughts:
- The volunteers. Amazing. Seriously. Every volunteer I came across over those two days complimented and contributed to the environment so well. Their role was essential and they made it happen. Thank you for everything you guys did.
- The opener. Blaine Hogan . Dude. You nailed it.
- The speakers. Loved the eclectic mix of speakers. Loved how unpredictable their presentations were. And I loved the fact that many of the speakers were unfamiliar names to me. That’s how it should be more often IMHO. (Perhaps TED is on to something? Ha.) I also thought the mix of practical vs. inspirational was really good.
- The music. I loved it all. And trust me, that’s saying a lot. Kari Jobe was the perfect opener for the event. Josh Garrels was exceptional (listening to “Lost Animals” album now btw). And Sons & Daughters made me hungry for more of their music. Can’t wait to hear their new project. (BTW…I thought the audio quality/mix in the auditorium was stellar.)
- The venue. Well of course I’m partial to last year’s venue – The Paramount in Aurora – but Park Community Church in Chicago was a great #2!
Loved the intimate feel of their auditorium. And of course, the view through their auditorium windows is just sick. Wow.
A few other thoughts…
- Dan Allender – perfect choice as the first presenter. Loved his demeanor. Made me want to attend Mars Hill Graduate School.
- Charlie Todd – loved hearing how he does what he does. He stretched me. And made me laugh.
- Richard Walter – Chairman of graduate program in screenwriting at the UCLA film school for more than 30 years. Are you kidding me? What a privilege to hear from him. Loved his stories.
- Jason Fried – loved his contrarian ideas on organization and productivity. And kudos to Tim Schraeder on a great interview!
- Gary Dorsey - inspired by where he’s taking his art. And if it wasn’t for his cool tattoos I’d be a little upset about how much sleep I lost that night after watching his Thief in The Night clips. Oh the memories…
- David Wenzel – looking forward to going back and listening to David’s talk again. What a story… Loved his honesty and authenticity. It’s good to listen to people who are living with a different perspective towards life than the average person.
- Wesley Hill – so glad Wesley came to Story. I think he was an integral part of what made this year’s experience what it was.
- John Sowers – loved interviewing John. It was very clear to me that John is doing what he was created to do. You could see it in his eyes and hear it in his voice.
- Leonard Sweet - great way to close out Story. Couldn’t write fast enough to keep up with all the ideas that were hitting me during his talk. Loved this quote, “Too many churches are stuck in a Gutenberg mindset in a Google culture.”
Congratulations Ben and everyone involved on a tremendous STORY experience! Can’t wait to see where this goes in the months and years ahead.
How about you? Were you at Story? I’d love to hear your thoughts, ideas, ways to make it better, etc… Who are the creative voices you’d love to hear from?
**Photo courtesy of Joshua White. See more Story photos here.
Monday Morning from Wicker Park
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It’s Monday morning and I’m kickin’ it at Filter in Wicker Park (I love WP btw). My eyes are tired and my body is moving SLOW. Looking forward to meeting up with Ben Arment and Jarrett & Jeanne Stevens in a little while. Hard to believe that STORY 2010 is already here.
Since I have way too much to say and not enough time to write it all I’m going to bullet a bunch of stuff…. Here we go.
- Had the privilege of interviewing Dawn Schiller at The Orchard this past weekend. If you’re not familiar with Dawn, you can learn more here. She has an incredible story. The audio is up and available for download here. See photos here.
- Who’s going to be at STORY later this week?
- Lots of stuff coming up this fall that I’m excited about. Will be in Minneapolis, Rockford, Atlanta, and…..I think that’s it for now.
- Enjoyed getting to know Mark Sayers last week. Mark is from Australia and has some good stuff to say.
- Celebrated the lives of two very dear people last week. Charlotte and Bruce…you’ll both be missed. Stirred my grief up a bit for my dad. October 12th will make six years since he passed away. Man…
That’s it….gotta run.
Mood Boards
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Earlier today I Twittered that I had created a “mood board” for a new series we’re starting in a few weeks at The Orchard. Several of you replied and asked what a “mood board” is, so I thought I’d try to define it and share a screen-shot of part of one I worked on today.
Basically, a mood board is a space (digital or physical) used to pull together a bunch of ideas/thoughts/concepts that help direct creative teams as they work on design ideas for a particular project.
In our context at The Orchard, mood boards are helpful to our teams as they think through everything from new series logos to music ideas to video pieces, etc… I also do a “vision cast” video for each new series where I talk about the overall theme, what I sense God wants to do through it, where the idea came from, what creative ideas I’m picturing, etc… I then send this out along with a .pdf of the mood boards. This is really helpful in that it helps me to communicate what isn’t always easy to communicate through words.
Hope that makes sense.
Now….I’ll share one of my mood boards….if you’ll consider sharing one of YOURS! Post a link in the comments to yours. I’d love to see it!
PS – I use Evernote to store ideas that I run across. It’s amazing. You need to use it if you haven’t already. I’ll share more about that later…
The Woman & The Stoners (Part 2)
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Read Part 1 here if you haven’t already.
SO….Jesus challenges the “stoner people” by holding up a mirror and reminding them of their reality – that they are flawed, torn, ragged, and broken. So what do they do? They all walk away. Starting with the oldest. (Oldest = Most Sin?)
But then Jesus does something so beautiful….so reflective of the Father’s heart.
He takes that same mirror that he had just held up to the stoner people…and now holds it up to this woman who had been caught in adultery. Except the reflection she’s about to see is different than the one the stoner people saw. Why? Because she knew her condition. She knew that she was flawed and broken. She knew that she was in a pretty desperate situation. And she knew that deserved whatever she had coming to her.
John 8:10-11 Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”
You know what Jesus was essentially saying to her?
“Yes, I know about your sin and what you’ve done. I know you’re broken and flawed. BUT…..I also know that you are of great value to me. And I know that I love you and accept you just the way you are – not the way you should be. Now YOU know. Now go…and sin no more.“
When God holds up His mirror to our lives we clearly see the reality of our sin and just how desperately in need of God’s grace we really are. But we also see something much greater – the truth of grace and unconditional love. We see the truth that we are accepted just as we are – not as as we should be.
But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. Romans 5:20 (The Message)
The Woman & The Stoners (Part 1)
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I love/hate the story in John chapter 8 about the woman caught in adultery. In case you don’t know it:
- Jesus is speaking to a crowd of people outside a temple.
- A group of religious teachers (Pharisees) disrupt Jesus by bringing to his attention a woman who has been caught in adultery.
- The Law of Moses says she should be stoned (think rock, not the other kind…).
- So they ask Jesus (trying to trick him): “The Law says we should stone her. What do you say?“
This is where the story starts getting REALLY good. Jesus brilliantly responds by saying:
“All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” 8 Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust.” (John 8:7-8)
I’ll be honest. I used to read this story and think to myself, “What in the hell was wrong with these people?! How could they have thought they were so perfect and sinless?”
But the other day it hit me. I don’t think they necessarily thought they were perfect or sinless…..as much as they were just doing what all of us tend to do whenever we forget just how ragged and torn we really are – they picked up stones.
I do it too. Every time I think of myself as being better or superior to someone else. Every time I’m quick to judge. Every time I choose to believe something other than the best about someone. If I were to look down in those moments, I’m pretty certain I would find a big fat stone being tightly clinched in one of my fists. Or maybe both. Not because I think I’m perfect or sinless….but because that’s just what happens when we forget how desperately in need of God’s grace we truly are.
Ouch.
And that’s not even my main point here. I’ll try to get there tomorrow.
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