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Life, Music and More….
By BlackCalvinist | June 14, 2005
More personal blogging…..
Last weekend: the conference in PA was SPECTACULAR! Me and Derek drove up. It was good meeting up with Cindy from the Calvinist Singles List (she’s good peeps), as well as all of my brothers and sisters in Christ up at Calvary OPC. As you can see from Cindy’s comments (on the link above), I spoke a lot. 
Jeff and Ozzie’s presentations fit in PERFECTLY with mine and vice versa. We all complimented each other in great fashion. I can’t wait until the CDs get here so I can MP3 them and upload them to the site. I have a few pics up in my photo album here on the site.
My notes (9500 words) will be posted as well. In fact, my notes will actually become a few separate articles on the site with the next update or so.
No wonder I’d been under attack so much coming up to the day of the conference. And now, mysteriously, all the folk who’ve been approaching me, propositioning me, etc…. have all dried up and disappeared. Praise God for His faithfulness in keeping me from myself.
One of the highlights of that day (aside from the conference) was gettin’ to meet up with James Johnson ( blackpuritan.com ) and his cousin, Dex. Both GOOD peoples. You can catch a glimpse of us on the side of the highway here.
After that, me and Derek rolled to Sandtown to a Christian rally held by the folks at New Song Community Church. Kewl enough, they invited down Shai Linne and Timothy Brindle to minister. Now, if you happen to be one of those folks who think that ‘Christian Rap’ or ‘Christian Hip-Hop’ is an oxymoron or that it’s all corny…. you need to peep these cats. Put it this way – if these guys did ‘battle’, I would bet they could go toe to toe with any mainstream and most underground cats up and runnin’ now. I’d BET MY SITE ON IT if I were a bettin’ man.
If you want a preview…. check out Shai, Timothy and the group CHRISTcentric for free at this Live365 station. Streaming MP3. Enjoy.
So anyway…
… I got a chance to meet up with Dj Essence, Tim and Shai, which was GREAT. I shot the breeze with Essence for a few mins – he’s really cool peeps.
For those of you who don’t know, Sandtown is str8 inner city – Guns, sex, drugs, violence and everything else you’ve seen in a ‘hood movie’…. but real. Shai and Tim not only rapped, they PREACHED. And one person (on staff for New Song’s School) noted that ALL of the drug dealers, folk fresh out of jail, etc… heard EVERYTHING… They brought the gospel… and brought it well. Praise God for these guys’ ministry.
Seeing them last weekend has only helped give me some more resolve about gettin’ my own projects off the ground. I figure that the average cat ain’t gonna sit and listen at length to me talk for an hour on the Sovereignty of God… so why not put it in a format they can identify with and ’summarize it’ ?
I just came across an old copy of Apple’s GarageBand software, so I’m sequencing now. 
Matter of fact, I’ve dragged one turntable, my mixer and mic out of the closet… patched them into my computer. I now have, for all intents and purposes, a studio set up in my living room. I got a midi interface cable for 24.99 @ Music & Arts all because it didn’t have the software disk with it (which I DLed off Yamaha’s website for FREE…)… and my old Korg keyboard is coming in handy for this purpose (sequencing).
I figure the easiest thing to do is put out an EP of about 5-7 songs.
Projects currently in the works:
1. Welcome – intro track to me and the project
2. *Unnamed track (ain’t got a name for it yet, but I’m debating between ‘Holy Anthem’ or ‘Reformation Anthem’ or something….). They lyrics are done – now, I just need about 5-10 rowdy-sounding people in the background to chant the anthem for the hook.
3. The Holy Life – Actually the first FULL song I’ve written. I just need some folk to do vocals for me on it, but it’s just about DONE. Theme: Sanctification. How does the Christian account for sin in light of 1 John 2:3-6 ?
4. How Do You Know ? – Prov. 1:7, Pslam 19:1-6 – this is a take off of one of the themes at the conference I just spoke at last weekend. How does the unbeliever account for truth, love, beauty, right, wrong, etc… if they deny the Triune God of the Scriptures ? As an accompaniment to it, I’m writing an article right now on the necessity of the Triune God for understanding ANYTHING….
I think I’ll call the EP…the 8611 EP (after Ps. 86:11 of course).
In other news…. I may remodel the site (my blog, not the ministry site!)…or rather, a friend of mine may remodel for me. She’s pretty decent with web work, so I may stop being stubborn about design and let folk help me out for a change.
On the personal front…. been doin’ a lot of thinkin’ about moving out of my apartment. I pretty much, on a teacher’s salary, cannot afford to stay here AND faithfully tithe. I pretty much have two major options, short of moving back home (which I absolutely do NOT want to do unless I absolutely have to). Option #1 is to find a roommate and a new apartment that doesn’t run more than 1000-1100 a month. I could save about $200 a month on expenses, and put aside enough money to have somethin’ decent saved up for a house. Only major drawback…. no matter where I move, I’m going to be limited on space. SOMETHING will have to go in storage.
Option #2 is move to a cheaper apartment. Problem – finding a cheaper apartment in a decent area is a pain. Wherever the rent’s cheap (in most cases), the neighbors suck. Wherever the neighbors are good, the rent’s high. If I had an extra $200 per check or around $300 per month, staying here (where I am now) wouldn’t bother me as much.
Option #3 is move home. We discussed that already.
Option #4 is get a part-time job to supplement my income and have that be ALL tithe money or something. I may have to do that.
Option #4a is to buy a vending machine and strike a deal with someone, somewhere to let me have it be stationed there. They do (on average) about 150-300 every few days in high traffic areas and only cost about 60 to fill with junk. Costs about 1500-2000 or so for a decent machine. So I’m heavily considering this one.
Pray for wisdom, that I might take the right course of action.
There’s more to blog on… and I have. Members get a peek at that one.
Topics: life | No Comments »