A promising new offering from Clay and Sally Clarkson, The Lifegiving Parent, will become available tomorrow, May 1st. Modern parenting is a vocation in need of much more than superficial self-help programs—this book fills that need with lasting impact, offering abiding wisdom and true mentorship to tired mothers and fathers. “In today’s world, it’s easy to become overwhelmed and even paralyzed by the constant flow of parenting advice. We’re flooded with so much practical information that we wonder if we’re choosing the right way. And we may be missing the one thing God really wants us to give to our children: His life. God doesn’t include a divine methodology for parenting in the Bible, but He does provide principles that can enable any faithful parent to bring His life into the life of their home.” – The Lifegiving Parent website You can purchase the book at the Rabbit Room store and explore its website here.

We’ve got some good news for you to ring in the weekend! Two new releases have graced the Rabbit Room Store: Sing the Bible Volume 3 and a paperback version of Henry and the Chalk Dragon. Happy Friday to all. Click through for links to both items in our store. Click here to view Sing the Bible Volume 3 in our store. And click here to view Henry and the Chalk Dragon in paperback form. Enjoy, and The Rabbit Room wishes you a delightful weekend.

I have found through the years, as I am sure many have, that some of my favorite albums are those connected to a live performance. The album itself tells a story, but the subconscious narrative underneath is the memory of what I shared in a room with the artist that first time. In the spring of 2004, Maroon 5 had just made their somewhat lyrically scandalous splash among college students around the country. When a few friends and I heard they were playing in the gym of a small nearby campus (…the band’s hard work in that era seems to have paid off), we made the trek to see the show. We stood through the sadly forgettable first opener, and then a girl took the stage with her piano and small backing band. She opened her mouth to sing, and as the jazzy-pop melodies tumbled out of her mouth, mine fell open. I need to know this person, I thought. I need this music. This feels like ME. Judging by the pictures I took, I enjoyed Maroon 5’s set after hers was over, but I remember none of it. My goal was to get to the end of the show so I could reach the lobby merch table. She was there when I dashed out, and she introduced herself as Sara. Her freshly run independent album, Careful Confessions, sat in small stacks on her table. I wish I could remember the specifics of what we said to each other—I probably gushed, trying to articulate what had just happened to me. I may have tried to describe how the way she wrote and sang had given a key to sounds in me I had never known how to let out. How if I wrote more songs, they would likely sound like hers. How she had illuminated a part of my musical puzzle that I didn’t know was missing, interlocking with pieces that artists like Jennifer Knapp and Plumb and Jars of Clay had begun to stir in me. In reality, I am sure my 19 year-old self was nowhere near as coherent as all that. I bought the CD, she signed it, and we took a picture together. I was floating and ecstatic and couldn’t wait to get back to school to play and write. My copy of that Sara Bareilles CD is scratched to high heaven. It didn’t leave my car CD player for months. I knew—and still know—every word and vocal inflection. I wondered at her wordplay, at how she carried her songs on the piano, at her soaring long-held vocals at perfect moments. The delicate melancholy floated around my brain unceasingly, starting with the opening major seven and nine chords preceding, “Something always brings me back to you, it never takes too long” on “Gravity.” It continued into “Undertow,” with the bass line intro under a dejected vocal and then descending, suspenseful chromatic piano chords before the full band arrangement kicked in. The punchy, syncopated beginning to “Love on the Rocks” was reminiscent of “Benny and the Jets” (which I probably didn’t even know at the time—in some ways, Sara Bareilles became my education on Billy Joel). It gave way to the rhythmic acoustic guitar of the next two songs, setting up a musical familiarity with melodies I just couldn’t stop singing. The top note in “Have I already tasted my piece of one sweet love?” served as a constant playground of flipping into head voice and figuring out how to do such things quickly. “Fairytale” was an obsession of mine—she had taken my beloved princess folktales and flipped them on their heads, defiantly singing against age-old ideals of femininity. The sass and bravado made its way into my brain in both the way I belted out the song in my car and the copycat versions I started to make up with different lyrics but much the same chord structures and patterns. This first time-capsule of an independent female trying to make music that didn't quite fit in the boxes set before her changed my life. I felt understood, seen, inspired. It gave voice to musical parts of me I hadn't yet found. Jenna Badeker The album contains seven studio tracks and ends with four live recordings of other songs. They are imperfect. But I was utterly delighted to be let in on performances like the Hotel Cafe shows I read about and dreamed of attending across the country. In those tracks, the loneliness of “City” gave me an endlessly emotional ballad to sing on late-night drives. I pondered the glimpse into the darker side of performing for a living and what I would do in that position. I wondered who sang the harmony parts at those shows and daydreamed about doing so. “Red,” with its bouncy energy and encouraging sentiment, became a watershed song for me. I served at a week-long summer church camp for years, and it always had a counselor/staff performance night. I had played Careful Confessions for many people at that camp, resolutely assuring all the fellow music-lovers that they would love it, and a group of younger girls had indeed joined my unofficial fan club. I grabbed a few of them who also loved to sing and play so that we could figure out a performance of the song. Until this point, I had always recruited someone older and more experienced to play guitar or piano for me, passing the job of determining chords and arrangements to more capable musicians. For this performance, for the first time, I figured out the chord progression by listening, tested it with the girls, and played it on piano myself. It was clumsy. It was messy. But, with a girl playing guitar and three of us harmonizing together as we belted out the line “How you love is who you are,” something changed. We were a group of passionate young women who stepped out of our comfort zone of having an older guy play for us. We took it into our own hands. For the first time, I could influence what happened on that stage instrumentally. I knew I wanted to do it again and again and again. Careful Confessions isn’t a perfect album. Her subsequent records pursue greater depths of songwriting and musicality—she re-recorded some of the songs from her debut for her first label album, and her later record The Blessed Unrest was nominated for a Grammy. But this first time-capsule of an independent female trying to make music that didn’t quite fit in the boxes set before her changed my life. I felt understood, seen, inspired. It gave voice to musical parts of me I hadn’t yet found. It gave me the courage to press into the role of songwriter and pianist, no longer only a girl who sang songs other people wrote. The tattered lyric booklet and CD will always remain on my shelf for when I need a reminder of what it felt like to imagine that kind of life for myself and to start tiptoeing into it.

In a conversation with a friend a few years ago about why I’m a Christian, my answer boiled down to this: I’ve seen too much. There are too many good and beautiful things, too many stories that cry out for things to be made right, too many lives changed, too much healing, too many examples of humble sacrifice in the face of great evil for there to be no meaning, no bright love on the other side of the veil. You can pick up Resurrection Letters: Volume I in the Rabbit Room Store and listen to “I’ve Seen Too Much” here:https://rabbitroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/04-Ive-Seen-Too-Much.mp3

“What does it mean to be home? Sarah Jane sat on the edge of a cliff asking herself this question as she listened to the wind carry whispers of new places through Juniper Vale. She knew the answer lay beyond the boundaries of her village, so for the last time she said farewell and hopped atop the shell of Senalala, her turtle companion, her place of rest. Together they venture through a world overgrown, searching for a sense of home.” – from The Traveler’s Tales Through Juniper Vale One of my favorite new music discoveries is Through Juniper Vale, an artistic collaboration between singer/songwriter Sarah Wood, songwriter/producer Vian Izak, and visual artist Hein Zaayman. The music is catchy, percussive and joyous, but what fascinates me all the more is the way that the journey is presented across different forms of media. In addition to the thoughtful songs and their beautifully imaginative album art, there is an online comic and a series of audiobooks, fleshing out the world of Juniper Vale beyond the music. Because Juniper Vale is vast, there are a lot of web links to share. For your convenience, I have collected them here. Once you’ve had a taste of the art and music in this post, dive in for more at these links: Through Juniper Vale – Website | iTunes | Patreon | Instagram Also from Vohnic – Vian Izak | Vohnic Music | Vohnic Media It was a joy to interview Sarah, Vian and Hein and hear their insights on the project. My questions revolved around two things: the project’s preoccupation with the concept of home and the collaborative process that brings it to life. Before we get started, can you each introduce yourself and describe how you got involved with your chosen creative field? Sarah: I’m Sarah Jane Wood. I grew up in Pueblo, Colorado and my dad has always been very musical. Growing up, he and I would sing and jam together, and when I got into high school he helped me start playing gigs all over town. I moved to Nashville in 2013 to attend Lipscomb University, and during my time at Lipscomb, I started a folk band called The Arcadian Wild with a couple guys from my choir class. We spent all four years touring and playing house shows all over the country. It was truly such an unforgettable and invaluable experience. It was through the band that I met Vian and Hein. Vian ran sound for one of our shows and ended up producing our first album for us. After that album was released, Vian and I started co-writing and creating pop songs, and Hein’s illustrations are just so phenomenal we decided it would be a neat idea to pair his artwork with the music. And so Through Juniper Vale began! I learned how to play banjo with The Arcadian Wild, and now we use that folksy banjo as a driving percussion element in our music. We have so many fun plans for this year, new singles, comic books, and fan focused projects! I am grateful and so excited. And working with these guys is always such a blast and a blessing. Vian: I got started in music at a young age and played in bands all through school. I studied audio engineering and opened a studio on Music Row in Nashville after graduation. Since then I have been producing artists like Through Juniper Vale and releasing my own music. About a year and a half ago I launched Vohnic Music, a digital label, to promote these talented indie acts. It’s been very exciting for us to create every month and to engage with fans. Hein: I got started when I was in middle school, just drawing and sketching characters. Before I knew how to draw, though, I built all sorts of fantasy worlds. Worlds with moving sand oceans, god-like robot people, or flying machines. These were sort of primitive and played off of a lot of fantasy tropes. Through school I learned to build worlds that cultivate dramatic stories and are now more commercially focused as well. So the world surrounding the Through Juniper Vale project is focused on the concept of home, just like Sarah’s music, while also creating opportunities for dramatic stories that reflect things in Sarah’s life. I am now always playing this game of how to meld the art and music in a meaningful way. Vian, you have your own catalogue of music, also illustrated by Hein. Is this mix of music and visuals a staple of your Vohnic label? Vian: Absolutely. Vohnic launched initially as a label focusing on my friends’ music and my own music, but over time it has evolved into a “Concept Art meets Music” label—the folks at Spotify, for example, are starting to see us as the “comic book” label. Through Juniper Vale and the Vian Izak project have definitely been at the forefront of developing what we are about. We recently signed new acts that are also developing their own concept worlds. It’s something we enjoy immensely and are starting to focus on more and more: concept worlds and music merging so that fans can explore. Hein is such a talent when it comes to creating captivating landscapes so I am so excited for what is to come! Sarah: We are always trying to come up with cool, out-of-the-box ideas to create a unique experience for our fans. Vian is about to create something very similar to the Tales Through Juniper Vale audiobooks for his own music, and we are also about to start doing a little more with platforms like Youtube and Twitch. We just launched a Vohnic Instagram, in addition to the blog posts on the Vohnic website, and we are about to launch a Patreon that we are hoping to make the main hub for each artist with exclusive artwork, music and news. We are trying to come up with the most creative ways to connect with our fans and to give them a chance to really step into these worlds and almost have a voice in the work we are creating. Hein, how much direction are you given on your illustrations? Do you have free reign to experiment or is it a collaborative effort? Hein: It really depends on the project. For some I take direction from the artist and try and bring their vision to life. For Through Juniper Vale, I start with some direction and then Sarah is really awesome about just letting me work. This usually leads to the best stuff. With the Vian Izak project I am given complete creative control, which is daunting at times. I usually check with the artist once I have a sketch, and then again when the line work is done, just to make sure they like it. Sarah, what led you to build this project around the concept of home? Sarah: While I was at Lipscomb, I was in a lot of incredible Bible classes through the Theology department, and I was reading a lot of books on the eucharist and thanksgiving. I think that season of growth was really what sparked this search for home. I was taken aback by the idea of heaven existing in the moments that we give thanks and commune together. I think it really hit me that we are truly created for the giving thanks and the being together, and when we are participating in those acts we are the closest to being who God created us to be. Around the same time, I was moving out of the dorms into an apartment with some friends, and my family was uprooting from Colorado to Murfreesboro, so there was this questioning of home inside of me. How many different types of “home” feelings are there? Maybe, like the Greek language has multiple words for love, home can also be defined in many different ways. And is it our “homes” that bring us together, that connect us? And what would happen if we really leaned into what is “home” to us as individuals? What would we learn about ourselves or how would we connect with others? Maybe we all can find home in every person and every place we go. If the grace of God is in every corner and in every face, I believe that home may be be found everywhere and in everyone. What would happen if that “home feeling” is the first thing we recognized in strangers or odd places? Maybe the more we find this grace and seek out the comfort of home the closer we are to being fully alive and fully who God created us to be. Do you deliberately focus on the idea of home while writing the songs? Sarah: The way that I have been writing music has started to change as the project becomes a little more developed. Recently, instead of sitting down with the banjo or piano and writing a song all at once, I have been bringing Vian some hook ideas and we have been writing the songs in the studio. So Vian will make some cool dance beat on Logic and then we will mess around and sing over it and try a bunch of crazy ideas until we find a melody that fits. Then we will usually have deep talks about what is on our hearts and the lyrics will stem from those talks. And because my mindset is sort of stuck on thinking about home all the time, the songs usually have something to do with this home idea even if we don’t realize it at first. It has been such a blast, just a lot of trial and error until we find exactly what the song needs to be! Vian and Hein, as Sarah explores the concept of home, how has that focus affected you? Do you find yourselves bringing your own ideas of home into the project? Hein: It has definitely affected how I approach the project. The entire world has a calling towards home in it, and I try to reflect aspects of home in the album covers. As far as character design, the fact that she rides a giant turtle (who carries its home on its back) came out of Sarah’s focus on home. As for how my thoughts of home have made their way into the project, I don’t really know. I am sure they have. I mean, with art, your subconscious really becomes the loudest voice. So I am sure if I reflect back on all the work I have done for the project there is probably a ton there—like how I immediately came up with a traveling home rather than a stationary one for the characters probably says something about me. Vian: We are both (Hein and I) originally from South Africa, so I think moving countries and re-learning how to create a home in a new culture plays a role in how we see this project. I think that finding home is a journey undertaken through a lifetime. For example, I’ve noticed lately that life is a series of resurrections. Every moment of learning new information is a moment where the old must die for the new to take root. And that process of deaths, if they lead to truth, is a daily process of slowly learning what home is. So with Sarah’s project I have lately tried to listen more than steer the ship, so to speak, and learn from her perspective. She is very perceptive and has changed the way I think about home and life quite a bit. So the Through Juniper Vale project has been vital in how it has shaped my life concerning home. I’m grateful and can’t wait to learn more as we dive into this very layered concept. That’s awesome. I love how the collaborative process helps perspectives grow! Vian: Absolutely. It’s wonderful when people come together in the pursuit of truth. We’ve all been challenged in the last year in the best of ways. I’ve learned that there’s nothing better than being challenged on your previous assumptions about the world. “I might not be right about this” is a great place to live as it seems like that’s where creativity and connection through vulnerability thrive. The songs clearly influence Hein’s artwork, but does the artwork ever influence the music in turn? Sarah: Awesome question! With the latest single we kind of decided to take more of a 1920s feel with the art and the music, so we sample a song from 1918 in “Everything Is Color.” But then Hein made the album art and I think just seeing the Art Deco design is influencing us to take more of a jazz approach to the upcoming songs. We are also going to be focusing on more comic book type projects with the releases, so the art and music will definitely continue to play off one another. I have to know—what is the song from 1918? Sarah: The song is called “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows.” Once we started writing “Everything Is Color,” we looked up songs from 1918 and this one fit perfectly. So the sample at the beginning is from that tune and then throughout the song we say “I’m always chasing rainbows” to point back to that sample throughout the song. One final question: Where did the name Juniper Vale come from? Sarah: I really wanted to find a band name that payed homage to my hometown in Pueblo, Colorado. There is a lake in my town that is surrounded by Juniper trees, so that aspect of the name eludes to the Juniper Breaks on the lake. My hometown is also located in the Arkansas Valley and the word “vale” means valley. So Juniper Vale is home to me, but then became the name of the world that these characters Senelala and Sarah Jane live in. You can listen to “Everything Is Color” here:

At my church, a small processional begins each service. The acolytes walk in holding a processional cross, the Gospel, and some candles. And as the cross passes in procession, it is appropriate to bow. I am relatively new to this, so most of the time, I have taken a tiny bow, almost non-existent. I’m not usually one to make commotion out of my ignorance. I tried to keep the bowing as calm and unnoticeable as possible. But a few weeks ago, I got bold and took my first deep bow as the cross passed by. And as I rose my chest up again, it occurred to me perhaps for the first time in my life that my body could be a means of worship. It hit me hard in the heart and it was with tenderness that God spoke quietly, “How could you have hated this good thing?” As an Anglican, there’s a focus on embodied liturgy. Giving nod to the Incarnation, this takes seriously the thought that it’s not just our minds and our hearts that Christ dwells in, but even our very bodies. We don’t just worship him with our adoring thoughts, but action too, allowing our bodies to move on behalf of that adoration. This could mean, among other things, feasting, fasting, crossing myself, or kneeling at his Table. For me, though, this becomes a little complicated. In short, I have hated my body for fifteen years. There is probably not a more graceful way to say it. This fact is almost incomprehensible to me. But it’s true. Since about the time I was eight years old, before my body began to even consider puberty, I have felt much shame over my flesh, at times with a hatred that has frightened me. Though I have battled raging shame for most of my life, something essential in me knows that my flesh was not made to be an enemy to God or to me. It was made for delight. Kelsey Miller This hatred has changed shape over time, almost in the same way that my body has changed shape as I’ve matured and grown. It has been all-consuming, ravenous, much like the hunger I’ve forced myself into at my worst. It has been lonely and isolating, similar to when I’ve been in obsessive modes of calorie-counting. Sometimes it has led me to cling closely to a mirror, inspecting myself at every angle, and other times, it has led me to avoid any mirror at all costs, lest I am disgusted by my own reflection. At all times, it has put me at odds with the Creator of this flesh, confused about my anger towards the only skin I’ve got. That same Sunday that I took my deep bow, our priest added right before we went to communion: “I’m going to be in the back for prayer. I encourage you to come if you’re having difficulty feeling God’s delight for you.” My face was wet with tears. Though I have battled raging shame for most of my life, something essential in me knows that my flesh was not made to be an enemy to God or to me. It was made for delight. That is the task right now, to take back the delight I have been sacrificing on the altar of my self-made condemnation. Delight in God’s creation, including my very own flesh, requires reverence, a declaration of authority: “Look with awe! God is in this. How could he not be?” It is hard for grace and shame to live in the same room, to breathe the same air. One will surely extinguish the other. Kelsey Miller Of course, this is not a magic fix. I am not suddenly healed of almost two decades of embodied shame. I have wished that was the case, and naively thought it was the case before and the reality is that there are no quick fixes in this life and we know that, even by the way that God’s healing is coming into the world. It’s slow, often painfully quiet, but it’s coming. The same follows in the healing He does in us: it’s slow, it’s quiet, but I really do believe it’s coming. Instead of magic, God gives us habits, and for better or for worse, we are shaped by our repetition. Right now, I am awkwardly learning some new practices, the ones that sing of delight rather than despair. And as the work continues, I notice the hatred is a little quieter these days, perhaps even softening. It is hard for grace and shame to live in the same room, to breathe the same air. One will surely extinguish the other. I have found healing in small places, in small doses, in the careful repetition of healing habits. In practicing yoga at my home, toppling over while attempting crow pose. In inviting friends to eat at our home. In wearing less makeup. In my husband’s touch. In bowing deeply to the cross. But most of all, on my knees at the altar, hungry and thirsty for the meal Jesus gave us. It turns out God has never asked me to make myself smaller for his sake. He's never asked me to starve. Kelsey Miller These are my new habits, the ones that bend towards worship, rather than my old twisted form of self-idolatry. Every week I will keep bowing towards his cross, bending my body on behalf of my adoration. It turns out God has never asked me to make myself smaller for his sake. He’s never asked me to starve. He’s asked me to delight in him with my whole self and he matches that delight, filling my cup to overflowing. How could I have hated this good thing? I’m not really sure. With time and healing, by the sweet grace of God, I await with hope that the end of the hatred is fast approaching. It is about time.

The first quarter of 2018 has come and gone and we’re delighted to be able to say “Thank You!” to our members with an exclusive special edition download of The Orchardist’s latest album, People, People (they’ve even included coloring pages!). Members check your inboxes, and enjoy the music! Keep reading for a look at what’s been going on in 2018. We are a 401c3 non-profit organization, and we rely on the generosity of our members to support the work the Rabbit Room does. If you’re interested in joining us in that work, for a monthly gift of $25 or more, we’ll send you an exclusive hand-made Rabbit Room mug, a free copy of Every Moment Holy, a free download of over 20 hours of audio archives from Hutchmoot 2018, and an amazingly powerful Rabbit Room Membership card. You’ll also receive a thank you gift from us for each quarter that you maintain your membership. Visit donate.RabbitRoom.com to join. We’d love to have you on our team. Become a Member The first quarter of 2018 has been an exciting time. Here’s a look at what we’ve been up to: Conferences and Conventions – We’ve enjoyed seeing many of you at the Great Homeschool Conventions across the country as well as a number of other conferences such as the Festival of Faith and Writing and the Grove City Christian Writers Conference, and we look forward to more of these opportunities in the coming months. We’ll be at the FPEA homeschool convention in Florida in May, and we’ll be at the St. Louis Great Homeschool Convention in July. The Local Show – The show is in its fourth year now and we love this chance to introduce our community to new songwriters and voices. The Spring season of the show is underway and we’d love to see you there. Dates, line-ups, and tickets are available at store.RabbitRoom.com. The Rabbit Room Retreat – Laity Lodge in Texas hosted our third Rabbit Room Retreat in March. This year our guest speaker was Russ Ramseyand the entire weekend was a refreshing time of contemplating the power of art in the world and in our communities. If you haven’t been to Laity Lodge, you must. Look for the 2019 Rabbit Room Retreat to be added to the calendar in the coming months. Hutchmoot 2018 – Hutchmoot tickets went on sale in March and sold out in 9 minutes! We hope to see most of you there! We held our first planning meetings this week. Our keynote speaker is Andy Crouch, and we can’t wait to announce the rest of what we have in store. Every Moment Holy – The third (!) printing is due here the first week of May, so if you’ve been waiting for your pre-ordered copy, the wait is almost over. We’d also be delighted if you’d pop over to Amazon and leave a review of the book. Believe it or not, those reviews are a big help! Henry & the Chalk Dragon Paperback Edition – The hardcover edition was released a year ago this month, and we’re excited to release the paperback version next week. We’re so proud of the way this book has been received by kids, parents, teachers, and libraries and we can’t wait to see what new opportunities the lower-priced paperback edition will open for it in the future. The Molehill Vol. 5 – Editorial work is well underway and we hope to have this new volume of our literary anthology out this summer. We’ve got a number of other irons in the fire and we’d be grateful if you’d keep the Rabbit Room in your prayers. Thank you for being a part of this work we’re doing. We couldn’t do it without you.

[Note from Joe Sutphin: A few years ago my buddy Sam (S.D. Smith, author of the Green Ember series) asked me to do a few doodles for a serial that was running on Story Warren. It was a great little Mark Twain-like story about an everyday kid whose world is turned upside down the day that a shyster’s son comes to town. The story was tentatively referred to as Tumbleweed Thompson and was written by Glenn McCarty. I met Glenn later at a children’s conference in Charlotte and we became quick friends. Glenn texted me sometime last year to gauge my interest in revisiting the story of Tumbleweed Thompson and to tell me of his hope to put together a Kickstarter campaign to self-publish the book. Knowing what a great storyteller and all around great guy Glenn was, I certainly was interested. We talked more about it at Hutchmoot last year and set our plans in motion. I’ve now illustrated the cover and Brannon McAllister has created the cover layout and title design. I’ll also being illustrating the interior of the book, with Brannon doing the interior layout. Now, with the Kickstarter having launched this week, I asked Glenn if he would introduce our Rabbit Room community to The Misadventured Summer Of Tumbleweed Thompson. Here’s Glenn.] Community. Collaboration. We pay lip service to these ideals often, but it’s only in the presence of the incarnated form of them that we can truly appreciate their value. I’m not sure I would have come to this realization as keenly as I have were it not for my experiences working on The Misadventured Summer of Tumbleweed Thompson. This week I launched a Kickstarter campaign for the book, a frontier adventure for young readers that has its origins at Story Warren, where I’ve published several short stories featuring the main characters. It’s not an exaggeration to say this book wouldn’t exist without The Rabbit Room. Over the past three years that the book has taken shape, I’ve crossed paths with dozens and dozens of folks who have embraced, encouraged, exhorted, challenged, and inspired me with a vision of the faithful Christian artist that has helped me get this close to the finish line. Like many of you, I’m by nature a bit of a lone wolf. Give me a laptop and a quiet room, and I’m cocooned in perfect contentment. But when you’re writing a novel, which is pretty much like building a house by yourself, this sort of bravado is fool’s gold. The voices of self-doubt, what Steven Pressfield calls “The Resistance” in his book The War of Art, seem to grow louder with every passing moment alone with the work. But at every step of this journey, so many people have denied me the tantalizing chance to attempt this thing solo. They’ve grabbed me around the shoulders, yanked me close, and held me until I knew my work mattered, and that I needed to persevere to the end. Here’s a scene for you. November, 2015. I’m just home from my second Hutchmoot, staring at my computer screen and about to lay out the story pitch for a Tumbleweed Thompson novel to six trusted collaborators (and Rabbit Room regulars) through video chat. Was I scared? Well, laying out a story pitch is the ultimate exercise in vulnerability, kind of like juggling chainsaws naked. But I wasn’t really afraid. I knew I was among friends. They were locked in and committed to help me take the story somewhere I couldn’t take it alone. I owe so many of you a great big 'thank you' for helping to incarnate the truth that we're meant to labor in the field shoulder-to-shoulder, that we've got to hold each other up to face the light with clarity of vision and firmness of resolve. Glenn McCarty Over the next six months, as I drafted the story, they held me upright, lashed me to the mast of my vision for the book, and wouldn’t let me get wrecked on the rocks of the Resistance. There’s so much of them in this book. And that’s the way it should be. Through the long days of revision, others have stepped in to offer critique and encouragement, over and over, even when I thought I had overstayed my welcome and over-extended their offer of assistance. It turns out that with friends and collaborators, that offer of grace through collaboration extends much, much farther than I thought. When I made the decision last fall to Kickstart this thing, still more have stepped up to say how much they support the decision. Dare greatly, they said. Take the plunge. At a house concert a month or so ago, when my nerves were decidedly frayed, Jeremy Casella pulled me aside and gave time, wisdom, and encouragement about the whole process. It’s a crazy ride like no other, he said, but you’ll make it. So here we are. I owe so many of you a great big “thank you” for helping to incarnate the truth that we’re meant to labor in the field shoulder-to-shoulder, that we’ve got to hold each other up to face the light with clarity of vision and firmness of resolve. And now, it’s time to take the next step together. I can’t wait to share this book with you! You can visit Glenn and Joe’s Kickstarter here.

What do you do when life gets hard and you just don’t want to feel anything? There are so many ways to hide from suffering, but real change comes in facing the pain, with the hope that Jesus will meet us there. This week’s Rabbit Reads selection is an excellent memoir about sobriety and so much more. Let us introduce you to Seth Haines… Why We Love It: “…we seem to have a way of losing ourselves in our manmade salves—the bottle, the pill, the cheeseburger, self-inflicted starvation. I suppose we’re all drunk on something.” It could be easy to ignore a memoir of sobriety if you’ve never found yourself in the middle of specific, debilitating addiction. At least, that’s how I felt, and if I wasn’t already interested in anything Seth Haines has to say, I might’ve overlooked this book. But I am so glad I didn’t. Coming Clean is, indeed, the story of alcoholism and sobriety, but it’s so much more than that. It’s about faith shaken and found, a father’s ache, anxiety, forgiveness, and the ways we all seek to numb our pain. It’s about going straight into the dark cave of your fears and disappointments and facing the dragons. And whether we find ourselves medicating through alcohol, drugs, social media, or elite theology, Seth’s wisdom has something to say to us all. This book came to life as a journal through his first 90 days of sobriety. He tells the story of his son Titus who was born with a mysterious health condition, the fear for Titus’ life that led him into alcoholism, and the long journey through the pain and into a deeper understanding of God’s grace. Much like Russ Ramsey's Struck, this is a book that resists easy answers, running headlong into the pain and finding hope on the other side. Jen Rose Yokel Perhaps the most compelling thing about this story is how it isn’t about looking back on a hard time and compiling neat lessons on the experience. Instead, we’re invited to journey with Seth through those first 90 days: the brushes with temptation, the confrontations with the past, the sweet memories of a child meeting God among the Texas mesquite trees, the setbacks and questions and doubts. Much like Russ Ramsey’s Struck, this is a book that resists easy answers, running headlong into the pain and finding hope on the other side. Perhaps the author’s own introduction best describes what readers are in for: “This is not a program; it is not the last chapter of a journey. This is the beginning—my beginning. Maybe even yours.” So it turns out Coming Clean is a book for everyone. Not just recovering or hoping-to-recover addicts, not just for those in the middle of darkness. For me, I read the book a year before a particularly difficult season, and found the lasting resonance of it comforting when I needed it most. Perhaps it could do the same for you, wherever you are. Learn more about Seth Haines on his website and pick up a copy of Coming Clean on Amazon.

I think I’ve cried more while listening to this song than any other in my career, and it’s partly because I didn’t write it. I wish I had, because it’s everything I love about songwriting. You can pick up Resurrection Letters: Volume I in the Rabbit Room Store and listen to “Remember Me” here:https://rabbitroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/03-Remember-Me.mp3

We have a stellar lineup this Thursday evening at The Local Show: Andrew Osenga, Josh Wilson, Ginny Owens, and Zandy Fitzgerald of The New Respects. If you haven’t yet listened to The New Respects, we’re here to remedy that. To put it simply, they play like they love each other. Their songs overflow with life and energy, well-crafted yet well-worn, like your favorite pair of shoes. And as you listen, you get the sense that they’re laying it all on the line with every lyric and melody. There’s no hiding here; only heartfelt, transparent truth-telling. What’s not to love? There are still some tickets left for Thursday night—grab them here for a chance to hear Zandy Fitzgerald, lead singer of The New Respects, in the intimate and song-centric setting of The Well Coffeehouse. Tickets available here.

“Heaven’s kingdom realm can be compared to the tiny mustard seed that a man takes and plants in his field. Although the smallest of all the seeds, it eventually grows into the greatest of garden plants, becoming a tree for birds to come and build their nests in its branches.” It could have been any sort of day, the day when the seed was planted. I imagine, for I know the sensation, that the seed felt like a splinter grown infected. The heat and tenderness of the spot made it almost intolerable. It had to be removed. I wonder what it was that brought it to the surface, for the Artist was full of seeds, many thousands. Perhaps this one travelled quickly, burst from its bounds by a keen disappointment, a crippling loss. Perhaps she went to draw water from a familiar well and found it dry. I couldn’t say. But those seeds, the ones dug like bullets from visible wounds never produce as much as the other kind. The others are all but invisible, all but forever. They float from the deep, fathomless dark, rising to the surface oh, so slowly, spending time like a profligate. Those seeds surface without a ripple. They settle lightly, never eager to make themselves known. Seasons strip the earth or color it anew, and they wait, until one day, as an afterthought, the Artist tunes his attention to their presence—forgotten, familiar, ubiquitous. It must have been one of those seeds she planted that day, and if I could, I would thank her for planting it. She could have cut the skin and drawn the seed out and flung it away or ground it between her teeth in payment for its long torment. But she knelt in a barren place and moved the earth with her fingers. She placed the seed in the ground and covered it and sang a song over it before she walked away and left the land, by all accounts, unchanged. That’s years ago now. When I came upon the tree, I’d spent what felt like half my life plodding through a wasteland. The road was no more than a rut between scattered stones, and the sun beat down on my head with scorn. The little weight in my pocket had grown over the miles until my gait was uneven. I had walked beyond the memory of the past, and without hope for the future. I knew the road and the glare of the light and the golden haze at the edge of the horizon, and nothing more. Well, one thing more. On some mornings I woke to a throbbing point of heat in my forearm. The irritation grew until I thought my whole body pulsed with the fury of this little thorn. I slipped the blade of my knife beneath the skin of my inner arm. A drop of blood welled up, then another, then a rounded fragment of something. Not a thorn. Something tiny and rounded, like those already in my pocket. I pinched it between my fingers and held it up, squinting, trying to unravel its mysteries. But like the rest it was unremarkable, and I dropped it in my pocket and went on. On that day, instead of dropping the seed into my pocket with the others, I remembered the shade, and the Artist. I took two long strides away from the road and dug a hole in the dusty soil. I planted the seed and covered it up. Helena Sorensen It was at a point of utter weariness that the tree caught my eye. I’d run out of defiance. My feet shuffled through the sand only because they feared to stop. Then I saw it. A fragment of darkness bisected the sun and settled into a larger darkness. Another joined the first, sinking into the branches, and I heard a cry of greeting from its fellow. Birds. They’d come to make a home in the wide, welcoming shade of the tree. I sprinted for the cover of the tree, for the break in the glare. After uncounted days in the white heat, its shade felt like the beginning of the world, like the cradle that soothed me before I set out on the road, like a home that waits at journey’s end. I sat awhile with my back to the trunk and watched how the green of the leaves altered the sunlight. I watched the birds assembling their nests and listened to the music of their comings and goings. I fell asleep and dreamed of water—deep, subterranean wells of clear water. It’s the dream I carry with me now, and the memory of the shade. Understanding came later, on a day when the sun pressed so hard I sat beside the road and hung my head. I felt the familiar prick of fire, this time beneath my tongue, and in a heartbeat, with the flick of a blade, I had it. I held the thing between thumb and forefinger while my mouth filled with saliva and blood, and I thought of underground springs. On that day, instead of dropping the seed into my pocket with the others, I remembered the shade, and the Artist. I took two long strides away from the road and dug a hole in the dusty soil. I planted the seed and covered it up. I would like to thank the Artist, the one who waited, the one who planted. Were it not for the memory of her courage, I would have stopped there to watch, to see what grew. But she didn’t think that task worthwhile. She pressed on along the road, along the path of heat and sorrow, to the edge to plant the seeds, and back to the road, and the road again. So I set my eyes to the sun and walk. One day something may grow so tall its shadow falls across my back. And if I feel its shade, I will not turn, but smile. There are seeds to be planted, and the road is calling.

Have you ever tried to cook ten pounds of pasta all at the same time? Add a guest list of thirty people plus two bands of hungry musicians, then imagine trying to cook ten pounds of pasta in water that refuses to boil without experiencing even a pulse of anxiety. Miraculously, the water boils (after you frantically separate the unyielding noodles into three separate pots) and there’s more than enough penne for everyone attending the event, plus extra penne which you later find has melted together at the bottom of the cookware. The night isn’t a blur, exactly—it starts and stops. You meet a man who’s lived in Nashville since he was a kid, a woman who came for school and stayed for one reason or another, a girl who moved to England and then moved back to embrace the joys of culture shock. Friends are there, strangers are there, you make sure there’s toilet paper in the bathroom and you triple check that you didn’t forget to bring all necessary capos, tuners, picks and instruments. Between greeting folks and hearing blips of their stories and making sure there’s enough cheese on the charcuterie table, you realize that moving between the roles of Martha and Mary is not unlike being a windshield wiper that sticks to one side but continues a twitchy, almost laughable attempt at full function. And you realize that the creation of space and the pursuit of community are intensive work, and at the same time are almost painfully simple. We conceptualized Supper & Songs out of the desire for a community of supporters and fellow musicians in the place where we live, the place we call home, that feeds us. As people, we have community. As a band, playing live shows in Nashville has, at times, felt like trying to dig our roots into the soil of the Bermuda Triangle. Trusting in the power of presence and consistency (and food—as a band rule, we never underestimate the power of food), we’ve now pulled together the resources offered to us so we can offer others some kind of togetherness as we search for it ourselves. Funnily enough, scrambling from kitchen to guitar-tuning and back again can feel like a perfect storm for isolation, regardless of the goal for unity with others. It fades, or cuts in and out, as we play the music we’ve set out to share and welcome our friends onstage after us (the “stage” being a living room rug and our friends being the outstanding Liz Vice, in this case). And we notice people are really listening to the music and to each other, and really receiving, and that beautiful fact is the thing we receive—that’s where the togetherness begins. It reminds us that success isn’t a matter of flawless vocal performance or a diverse enough charcuterie selection. It happens with or without our competent hosting or punctual cooking, as long as we bring ourselves and as long as the listeners do the same. All that is to say, the first Supper & Songs was indeed a success—not because everything happened more or less according to plan or because the house didn’t abruptly collapse, but because people came with open hands and kept them open for the duration of the evening. We move forward excitedly, humbly, and resolved to keep our own hands open. With another Supper & Songs event around the corner, we move forward having been reminded what it is to give and receive. The next Supper & Songs show will take place May 14th. Tickets are available here. You can learn more about Supper & Songs and The Orchardist here. And be sure to check out Liz Vice here.

I found a dead baby mouse on the bricks of our driveway. I picked it up and looked it over. It was so perfect, as if it were only sleeping. Tens of thousands of soft, little downy hairs lined its body, its muzzle covered in minute whiskers. Delicate little ears and fingers and toes. One of the sweetest little innocent babies of this world, and a true work of art. I contemplated how God could put such care and thought, even tenderness into his creations, only to allow them to fail. Then I began to look around at all the creation in my reach. Tiny green sprouts growing into complex structures capable of reproduction, capable of completely overthrowing and eradicating other species if they were designed that way. So complex, each tender sapling growing into a hearty, wooded pillar, each intricate insect crawling within countless individual blades of grass, each one a work of art, and each one disposable. My heart ached for this little dead mouse as I carried it to the field out back and laid it beneath the stalk of an ironweed. When I make my art, when I labor to conceive, compose and create it, it hurts when it fails. It hurts even more if I came close to completion and then it failed. And none of my drawings or paintings have ever breathed. None have ever utilized photosynthesis or reproduced on their own, thought their own thoughts or even thanked me for their creation. None told me they loved me. That little mouse was absolutely a work of art created by an intelligence and a heart that of which I cannot conceive. It was beautiful, well designed, and to my eyes perfect. And God has been making them by the billions since the beginning of our time, each to exist in obedience to His Word, and to pass away without cause, never to be remembered again. Does it cause His heart to ache, as it did mine, to see that little mouse lying dead on the bricks of my driveway? It seems to me that He doesn’t get attached to each individual piece of His art. He’s capable of letting go. After all, nothing He has made, save our souls, is indestructible. All is ephemeral. All will pass away. All is disposable. Yet, He still made it all. Even though He purposed that it all would pass, He made it. Even though it would hurt and suffer and fade away, He made it. With care and affection and attention to a billion different details, each one unique and flawless and functioning perfectly within a grand design, He made it. Why would He make beautiful art that hurts Him? Maybe He takes more joy in the constant rebirth and newness than in the aging and ancient. No matter the reason, I cannot help asking myself: Could I repeatedly put my heart and soul into creating beautiful works of art if I knew that each one would last but a breath? If I knew each one would suffer through pain, heartache, misery and then death, could I still create art? What if no one were ever to appreciate a single one? Like the countless creatures He has placed in the remote places of the world, each to take its first gasp of breath and then pass away with only His knowing, could I create that kind of art? I don’t know if I could, but our God clearly loves to design and to create, and He has created an overabundance of disposable beauty. And that thought alone makes Him unfathomably great and mighty in my eyes.

When my dad answers the phone on Easter Sunday, he doesn’t say, “Hello?” He says, “He is risen!” And he won’t say anything else until you respond with “He is risen, indeed.” I thought it was goofy when I was a kid, and now it makes me cry. Dad didn’t invent it, after all. That response from my Lord is what I ache for more than anything—to one day see him in the misty dawn of a new garden, and for him to lovingly call my name. In the meantime, we’re called to rush away from the empty tomb to tell everyone with ears to hear it that he is, indeed, risen. You can pick up Resurrection Letters: Volume I in the Rabbit Room Store and listen to “Risen Indeed” here:https://rabbitroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/02-Risen-Indeed.mp3

Last year, the seemingly inexhaustible lead singer of Switchfoot, Jon Foreman, released the second four-EP project of his career, called The Wonderlands. The four EPs, Darkness, Dawn, Shadows, and Sunlight, track the hours of the day and explore a variety of themes. As if such a project were not already ambitious enough, Foreman decided to celebrate the project by playing 25 shows within 24 hours in his hometown of San Diego. This musical experience took place between October 24th and 25th of 2017, and a film crew was there to capture the action. For those of us fans not able to be there for such a momentous occasion, we can now experience it through the film 25 in 24, an hour long documentary just released. Jon Foreman has long been a personal hero of mine, but it’s particularly inspiring to watch him play shows at various spots in San Diego that relate to his own personal journey and community, and to rally a group of fellow artists and fans together around music. Watching Jon live out his gift and his passion feels like a boost in the arm for my own creative efforts. 25 in 24 is available on iTunes, Amazon, and Vimeo.

To be truthful, I haven’t learned anything new. It’s been six months on the road so far, and when I take stock of what I’ve become, how I’ve changed, I find myself quite the same. That’s probably not what you want to hear. It’s not where I thought I would be. We prefer stories of bravery and redemption, intrigue, salvation. And believe me, I would love to tell you about the time I rescued a baby from the jaws of a rabid honey badger while traversing the everglades upon Rusty, my faithful flying unicorn. But I haven’t, and I didn’t, and even after all this time, I find myself largely . . . unchanged. I’m willing to admit to you that I did decide to spend this year wandering the country, this year on the road to, as the ever cliched phrase goes, “find myself.” I’ll admit that I wanted a change, an adventure. I’ll admit that I thought, that I deeply believed, I’d find the elusive “it” somewhere along the way, that I’d be writing in my journal while looking over the Grand Canyon and through osmosis receive a great epiphany, that the great mysteries of life would be revealed by simply breathing in the air. I imagined I’d be walking on a Carolina shoreline, or along Chicago’s Magnificent Mile, and see some elusive unnameable something that would fix all my problems, like an emotional lottery. I hate to admit to you, that even after all this time, if one existed, if given the choice, I’d take the magic pill. But what I’ve seen, what I’ve experienced is a lot of regular everyday life, and regular, everyday life is so awfully messy. Like in New Mexico, when I lost my keys. When you live on the road, there are no friends to hold a spare for you, no place to hold a spare for yourself. They were easily replaced by the RV company for $2.50, but shipping them overnight cost $43. In Pasadena, while staying with one of my oldest friends from high school, the plumbing went out, a result of roots from her majestic front yard oak burrowing their way into ancient city pipes, so for four days, we took wet wipe baths and drove down to Target to use the bathroom. In Chattanooga, my friend Steve is a year into a messy divorce. He’s drinking again and chain smoking Marlboros. Just outside St. Louis, Pete, an old co-worker roommate has been married twenty years and has four amazing children and a wife that he is still madly in love with, but is lonely. “I feel so lost all the time,” he admitted. A tire blew out in Arizona. It was twenty-two degrees in Alabama when my heater stopped working. An elderly aunt along the way fell and broke her hip while I was driving through San Francisco, and Hank, my beloved dog of thirteen years died when I was in Nashville. I hate to admit to you, that even after all this time, if one existed, if given the choice, I’d take the magic pill. John Cal Like the prodigal son, I don’t know what I was searching for, but once I got out there, out on the road, I could only help thinking, “This wasn’t it.” Then there’s the other son in the story of course, the one who stayed home. And it isn’t puzzling to find out that he wasn’t happy either. “Not even a goat for a party with my friends,” he chastises his father. “You were always with me, and everything I have is yours,” his father replies. But we didn’t believe. We don’t believe it still, that we could be forgiven and redeemed, that joy was always ours. In San Bernardino, my friend Allan is having a baby. He turned forty last year, and resigned himself to never having a family, but then he met a woman he loves who at forty-one thought she couldn’t have a baby either, and in May they’ll become three. In Redding, my friend Casey just found the perfect school for his daughter with autism. Ella used to throw fits and cry herself to sleep every night, but now, she comes home talking about her friends. In Lake Butler, Arthur Peterson is twenty pounds into his diet. He said he wants to be around longer to watch his grandchildren grow up. And even so, at 9:00 every night, he and his wife Janis have cookies, or something else sweet as a treat to celebrate the day. In Louisville, my dear friend Whit was planning his wedding. In Tucson, Jason just returned from eighteen months of deployment in the desert. Molly, my friend Angela’s daughter in Knoxville, goes to ballet every Thursday, and when she comes home spends the rest of the evening twirling around the living room. I'm not sure why we need to be reminded over and over again that we are forgiven and redeemed, that we are always welcome home, that we never had to leave, that the Father is with us, and that everything he has is ours. John Cal “Three taps?” Dorothy implores. “Three taps is all it takes?” “You’ve always had the power to go back to Kansas.” Glinda says, the syrupy sweetness making the truth even less palpable. “Then why didn’t you tell her,” begs the scarecrow. “She wouldn’t have believed me.” Glinda replies. We didn’t believe. We don’t believe still. And I’m not sure why we need to be reminded over and over again that we are forgiven and redeemed, that we are always welcome home, that we never had to leave, that the Father is with us, and that everything he has is ours, that to label the wandering as penance or pilgrimage is superfluous, that all sorts of life, troubling and joyful, wild and precious, are everywhere. “Just close your eyes,” says Glinda. “Just close your eyes, tap your heels together three times, and think to yourself, ‘There’s no place like home.’” “Should I stay or should I go?” That was always the question in the beginning. I’m still not sure either way, or whether the decision matters at all. But I’m beginning to believe, if even only in incrementally minuscule amounts, that Kansas and home aren’t so far away.

A man plucks a simple line on an upright bass. After two bars a muted trumpet and a fragile acoustic guitar add soft harmony, and a singer moans sotto voce. Then the trumpet pauses, and the bassist and guitarist start a meandering pianissimo jazz progression in 12/8 time, to which the singer rasps a simple plea: “Fix me, Jesus.” As the bass and guitar accompaniment ascend, the singer’s voice ascends likewise, into a raspy falsetto, repeating the plea with heightened urgency: “Fix me, Jesus.” Through a verse and another pass through the refrain the singer repeats the plea several times, softly, the very softness not muting but expressing the ardor: the singer must enter the plea “Fix me, Jesus,” but will not presume to sing it in full voice—not, at least, until Jesus has begun to fix and strengthen him. So begins Jubilant Sykes’s Jubilant, one of the most unique albums of the past two decades. I discovered the album about a year after its 1998 release, and still remember how from the first listen it gripped me with that modest beginning, which spoke volumes about vocal performance, art, and spiritual discipline. It doesn’t take long to discover that Mr. Sykes’s voice is an instrument of range and power unsurpassed on earth—yet in humility he submits that instrument entirely to serve the words, music, and mood of the song. Yip Harburg once said that while words make one think a thought, and music makes one feel a feeling, songs have a unique power to make one feel a thought. And for making one feel a thought, few songs are so evocative as African-American spirituals. In these songs one hears the story of Israel, and the story of Jesus Christ, and the story of African-Americans—and realizes they’re the same story. Were you there when they crucified my Lord? was and is a rhetorical question, to which the singer would anticipate the answer yes. Of Jubilant’s fourteen songs, eleven come from the great songbook of African-American spirituals. Composer and orchestrator Terence Blanchard, whose substantial musical credits include several film scores (e.g. Malcolm X and the Hurricane Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts), gives the songs deft jazz arrangements. Mr. Blanchard’s skill at capturing moods in music is evident throughout Jubilant, and like Mr. Sykes he approaches the songs with a becoming modesty and thoughtfulness. The arrangements are spare, using only a small ensemble, and serving the singer as the singer serves the songs. The album’s mood isn’t uniformly solemn and mournful. Mr. Sykes and Mr. Blanchard romp through “How I Got Over” with infectious joy. “If I Got My Ticket”—a song about the “gospel train” which in spirituals is a double entendre referring both to heaven and to the Underground Railroad—has Mr. Sykes calling his brothers to heed the coming judgment, because they’ve “got no time to waste away.” Indeed, the references to judgment on the album—as on “If I Got My Ticket” and “Live A-Humble”—carry the exuberance that characterizes the references to judgment in the Psalms: the Day of the Lord demands humble sobriety, but it’s also the day of deliverance from oppressors. Listening to the stories as told in the African-American spirituals has afforded me a little clearer vision into the ways of the God whose grace is so extravagant that he delivers the oppressed from the teeth of the oppressor, and sometimes stoops even further to deliver the oppressor from his own snares and reconcile him to his brother. David Mitchel Jubilant saves its greatest moment for last: a stunning arrangement and performance of “Were You There?” which progresses through the solemnity of the Passion to the glory of the Resurrection. It begins with an a cappella rendition of the first verse, which Mr. Sykes sings almost as if singing to himself. Then a slow drumroll sounds, the drumroll of a New Orleans funeral procession, as Mr. Sykes meditates on the day “when the blood came streaming down.” When the singer arrives at the tomb, the singer and drummer receive the company and consolation of bass and piano. And when the song arrives finally at Sunday, the musicians and singer explode with joy to greet the morning of the inaugural Eighth Day: “Were you there when He rose up from the dead? Sometimes I feel like shouting: Glory! Glory! Glory!” Jubilant is, in my view, one of the most overlooked musical gems of the past quarter-century. As a piece of art it is awe-inspiring—blending virtuosity with impeccable musical judgment and thoughtful meditation on the subject matter of the songs. The greatest testimony, though, to the artistic excellence of Mr. Sykes, Mr. Blanchard, and all the musicians, is that by the end of Jubilant it is the songs one remembers most. These songs, of deceptive simplicity and revolutionary boldness, carry a standing challenge (both forthright and kind) to all Christians today, and particularly to those American church traditions that have been and remain predominantly white. For the white American’s perspective on the Exodus and the gospels is naturally closer to that of Egypt, or Pilate, or the Sanhedrin. Listening to the stories as told in the African-American spirituals has afforded me a little clearer vision into the ways of the God whose grace is so extravagant that he delivers the oppressed from the teeth of the oppressor, and sometimes stoops even further to deliver the oppressor from his own snares and reconcile him to his brother. In the light of such grace, one may truly hope that all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well. Check out this album on Amazon here.

A very special show is coming to Brentwood, Tennessee on April 11th, called Living Letters. Featuring Broadway actors Juliette and Stephen Trafton, Living Letters presents dynamic, interactive performances that enable audiences to enter imaginatively into the drama of Scripture. This particular show will center around Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. As we have discussed here on The Rabbit Room blog, our experience of Scripture as inhabitants of our 21st-century American culture is radically different and far-removed from that of those who lived at the time of its writing. Nowhere is this more true than in the letters of the New Testament, which would have been read aloud to specific communities of people. As the website of Living Letters eloquently puts it, “What we’ve lost is the ability to experience Scripture in the powerful way its first readers and hearers experienced it—as a living word spoken directly to particular communities with particular struggles, questions, fears, and hopes.” Click here to learn more about the show on April 11th, hosted by New Hope Community Church. Click here to learn more about Living Letters at their website. And watch the video below to get a taste of the event.

Last month I had the chance to ask Audrey Assad, one of my favorite songwriters / thinkers / poets / Twitter-ers(?), some questions about her new record Evergreen for CCM Magazine. Stories of faith crisis, of dismantling and rebuilding and finding God faithful all the way to the other side, are the kind of stories most dear to me these days. I’ve had my own experiences in the dark night of the soul, where everything certain feels like it’s shifting, and I’ve accompanied people close to me as they go through their own journey. So I’m especially grateful for the chance to have a little Q&A with Audrey about this very topic. Whether you feel rock solid in your faith or no idea what you believe, I hope her words are as encouraging to you as they were to me. On Deconstructing and Reconstructing Faith: “Now that I’ve been walking through this process for about four years, I know that the “deconstruction” has in actuality been sort of a reconstruction all along. It was really necessary (albeit excruciating) for me to tear down some pretty rotten old trees in my heart’s garden in order to till the soil for new life. The deconstruction and reconstruction have all been one process in a manner of speaking. There was a lot of anxiety along the way because so much of my personal religious practice was built on how I believed others perceived me and my ideas. The best thing about all of this, aside from letting go of some pretty bad ideas about God, has been learning to let go of the opinions of other people, even as I seek to remain as part of the community.” You can read the full interview here at CCM! Then go listen to Evergreen on Spotify or (better yet!) buy it from her website.

Tomorrow night’s Local Show will be a special one indeed. Instead of the usual songwriters-in-the-round, we will have a Storyteller Night comprised of some of the best storytellers we know. There are still a few tickets left here at the store! The night will feature Andrew Peterson, Billy Cerveny, Andrew Osenga, Amy Goodgame, Thomas McKenzie, Pete Peterson, Russ Ramsey, Ginny Owens, Jonathan Rogers, and Al Andrews. One could describe this lineup as “stacked,” if we may say so ourselves. Get tickets here before they’re gone, and we look forward to seeing you at The Well on Granny White Pike.

In Ursula Le Guin’s The Tombs of Atuan, Tenar is taken as a little girl from her village because she is believed to be the reincarnation of the high priestess of the Tombs to the Nameless Ones. She goes through a symbolic ritual where she is almost beheaded but is spared at the last minute, so it is said that Tenar has died and Arha, which means the “eaten one,” lives on. The idea of one eaten by the gods, consumed in sacrifice to an immortal, is an old one. Andromeda’s parents left her to be eaten by the sea monster, the Canaanites sacrificed their children to Moloch, and Psyche was given to be devoured by the Shadowbrute in C.S. Lewis’ Till We Have Faces (a re-telling of the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche). We are often described as consumers. Consumers of merchandise, food, media. But in this act of consuming, I wonder if we are actually being consumed? “You are what you eat,” says the idiom. Are we losing ourselves to the nameless gods? Are we being offered up as a sacrifice and slowly losing our identity? Jesus is the Eaten One. He is the one consumed and sacrificed, and it is he who asks us to eat him. Hetty White In one of the more moving parts of The Tombs of Atuan, Ged, a wizard from the inner lands who has spent his life learning the ancient language of the Making, calls Arha by her true name: Tenar. She never told him her name and is astounded by his speaking it. She asks him how he knew and he says: “You are like a lantern swathed and covered, hidden away in a dark place. Yet the light shines; they could not put out the light. They could not hide you. As I know the light, as I know you, I know your name, Tenar.” Christianity talks a lot about “losing yourself.” Does the God of Christianity also ask for our identity? Does he want us nailed to a pole on a mountain? Or beheaded in a stone temple? No, he did that for us. In Orthodox Christianity, Jesus is the Eaten One. He is the one consumed and sacrificed, and it is he who asks us to eat him. Once again, God flips every other religion on its head, reversing the pattern of how men would try to please the pagan gods. Yes, we are asked to sacrifice our whole selves to God, but it’s for the purpose of Him giving our true selves back to us. The part that God asks us to sacrifice forever is essentially our “not-selves,” our “un-identity,” the part of us that is not us. That, we have to let go. Years ago I was having a hard conversation with a friend where I was telling her some patterns I saw in her life that were hurtful to me and others. She was very receptive and said, “Am I really like that?” I replied quickly, “No! You aren’t! That’s the part that’s not you. Your real self is something totally different.” God is the wizard Ged who calls us by our true name. He gives us back what the world and the evil one has taken. Let us be that to others as well. Let us remind each other  who we really are. We are not the Eaten One. But we serve him. As we take communion this week, let us remember that. Check out The Tombs of Atuan here. Image by Astrid Nielsch.

We don’t know exactly how it all went down, but we do know this: Jesus was dead, and then he wasn’t. A battered corpse was stretched out on a slab, and then the heart in the ribcage started beating again. Jesus inhaled and at once the heavy air in the tomb became more than air; it became breath. The New Testament tells us again and again that Jesus triumphed over the grave, that his body was (and is) corporeal, that he is the firstborn from the dead. Just as sure as daybreak, springtime, the sprouting of tulips, the joy of life after the groaning of labor, Jesus demonstrated his redemptive love for his creation by entering it, dying for it, and then rising from the ashes with a glorified body. In him, our best dreams have come true. C. S. Lewis knew that there were myths all around the world that whispered of a dying and resurrecting hero, and it was the realization that Jesus was the literal fulfillment of that longing that led him to faith in Christ. You can pick up Resurrection Letters: Volume I in the Rabbit Room Store and listen to “His Heart Beats” here:https://rabbitroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01-His-Heart-Beats.mp3

[Editor’s note: Today is the day—as we walk into Easter weekend, through Good Friday and towards Sunday, we now have Resurrection Letters: Volume I to keep us company. Below is Mark Geil’s review of Andrew Peterson’s latest offering. You can now purchase the album here on the Rabbit Room Store. Resurrection Letters: Prologue is also available here in case you missed it.] For all its brilliance, it could be said that the greatest moment of Andrew Peterson’s Resurrection Letters, Volume I occurs before the first note. The Prologue ends with the unresolved full stop of “God Rested.” The silence that follows has a certain density that comes from the despair of extinguished light, undergirded with just the right touch of tantalizing hope. God made his chosen nation wait centuries between the last words of the Old Testament prophets and the incarnation of the Messiah. Finally, those generations spent wandering the fallow fields of silence found a thrill of hope. Their King had arrived. But then things did not turn out as expected. “The man who said he was the Resurrection and the Life / Was lifeless on the ground.” What happened to that hope? What was God thinking? Four hundred years of waiting somehow ended in more silence. I have mourned, and I have waited, and now I dare to believe what I've believed for so long: His heart beats. Mark Geil We cannot know through firsthand experience what those three days were like. We cannot know why God chose to make his people wait, and wait, and wait again. But we must know the shadow, to know the passage of time and to prove that the sunshine exists. Those few seconds between “God Rested” and “His Heart Beats” are hard-won. We know the Good News is coming, but we mourn with a fallen world. I have listened to those few seconds again and again, and I still get a shiver of joy when I hear that faintest bass drum that heralds a resurrected heart. Andrew’s low vocal register is the hum of electricity after a knife-switch is thrown. Never has a song taken me so viscerally inside the tomb, where stale air filled dead lungs. I have mourned, and I have waited, and now I dare to believe what I’ve believed for so long: His heart beats. The story of the Resurrection Letters is well-known by now. Volume II was first, a decade ago, and took the form of songs more in response to the resurrection than actually about the resurrection. Surely it is easier to write the former than the latter. There’s a reason there are thousands of Christmas albums for every one Easter album. Consider the writing of “His Heart Beats,” and the challenge of constructing a song that captures the single most important moment in the history of eternity, establishes its significance, and redeems the silence that precedes it with fitting triumph. That’s more than a little pressure. No wonder it took a decade. Whether Andrew knew it or not, it seems that decade was spent in preparation for this album. 'Risen Indeed' could not communicate rebirth without the seedlings of 'The Sower's Song.' 'Rise Up' knows the full longing for the promised deliverance because of the winter of 'Come Back Soon.' Mark Geil The second essential reason the album excels is this: Even without the profound subject matter, this would still be a wonderful album. Its musical diversity far exceeds typical singer-songwriter fare. The piano does most of the heavy lifting here, and it’s excellent. There are thematic allusions to “Fiddler on the Roof,” a (perhaps unintentional) name-drop of a brilliant Paul Simon album, and a remarkable lyrical reference to Harry Potter (well, maybe Harry Potter, but definitely 1 Corinthians 15:26). The harmonies of the Nashville Youth Choir and the doubled vocals of Andrew’s daughter Skye are so lovely and so well-placed. There is a programmed drum line with a hard, snapping snare that comes awfully close to making an Andrew Peterson song sound like a rap song. There’s even part of a song in 7/8 time, for Pete’s sake! I know of few artists who care so deeply about every note and every word of every song. The quality that results means the songs will not just hold up through the now-required annual Lenten listenings, they’ll crack open with new meaning each year. In retrospect, the ten years it took to complete the Resurrection Letters were completely necessary. Whether Andrew knew it or not, it seems that decade was spent in preparation for this album. Ben Shive has grown so much as a producer, and on this work he has mastered his craft. The liturgy and communion fostered in the music and lyrics have been forged through gatherings like Hutchmoot, which did not exist way back then. And Andrew himself has known darkness, silence, and waiting. “Risen Indeed” could not communicate rebirth without the seedlings of “The Sower’s Song.” “Rise Up” knows the full longing for the promised deliverance because of the winter of “Come Back Soon.” There is a reason God chose Bethlehem, and then Golgotha, and that particular moment in history. There is a reason the tomb held death for the longest three days ever known. There is a reason this music can now remind a desperate world that victory has come and victory is promised. Finally finished, the Resurrection Letters have arrived just in time. You can purchase Resurrection Letters: Volume I here in the Rabbit Room Store. While you’re at it, check out Resurrection Letters: Prologue as well.

[Editor’s note: Throughout Lent, Sandra McCracken is sharing weekly writings, each of which is tied to a song from her new EP, Songs from the Valley, available at her website. Below you will find the seventh of these writings, to be read alongside her song, “Letting Go,” which you can listen to here.] When I was 17 Mrs. Lewis gave me a flowered, lined journal as a graduation gift. She was one of the teachers at my high school, and she was a woman of grace and authority. She gave it to me and said, “You need to start writing in this, every day.” The habit of journaling for me had been intermittent since I was barely old enough to write, but Mrs. Lewis’ generosity and intentionality toward me planted a seed in my heart. Writing has had a significant impact on my prayer life and my creative work. Mrs. Lewis went to be with Jesus this week and I’ve been thinking about her legacy. I’m so thankful to have known her. That generative seed has come to bear much fruit. I wonder how many other students she handed journals to? I wonder how many occasions we give a gift without knowing the impact it will have on the recipient? As a follower of Jesus, the metaphor of engagement is not lost on me. We’ve been given a ring and a promise, but the groom is taking his time. Sandra McCracken As spring is beginning to emerge, I’m feeling the thrill of the new season in extra measure this year as I’m looking forward to getting married in just a few months. Lately, I’ve realized that lent is very much like engagement. As a follower of Jesus, the metaphor of engagement is not lost on me. We’ve been given a ring and a promise, but the groom is taking his time. He’s set his love upon us, but we still feel alone sometimes. In fact, my fiancé lives a few hundred miles away, in a different state. His daily absence, his voice on the phone reminds me of the “I’m coming back for you” of the gospel narrative. And like the gospel narrative, after we have made promises of commitment, some days the wedding feels a long way off. In seasons of transition, even joyful ones, there’s often a little bit of disorientation as we’re learning a new way to live. It takes time to get used to a new landscape and to rediscover who we are, given a different set of circumstances. In the stress of life change, we have two options: we can either grasp for control, or we can simply and actively let go. In the letting go we are securely held. In opening our hands, we are filled to overflowing. Sandra McCracken The life of faith in real-time feels a little bit like floating down a river in a canoe. Our boat often rushes dangerously close to the edge of the shore. The water is carrying us swiftly downstream. It is turbulent and we are scraping unseen rocks below the surface and getting tossed in every direction. We can try to grab the branches that swipe us from the overgrown banks, or we can lean back and work with the movement of the water. We can lean into our fear and hold our balance until the water grows calm and steady again. We regain our bearings, but not quite yet. While we are tumbling down the river in this boat, the good news is already here. This week is the celebration of the cross and resurrection. We can let go because he let go for us. He let go. He did not fight. He submitted himself to the ultimate descent, and he entered into hell. There is nowhere that we can go in this life that he has not gone already lower. But death could not hold him. In his descent, he crushed the doorway of descent and rose in triumph. He ascended into the highest place. And by faith, we are raised to new life with him. As we have walked through these dark weeks of Lent, of fasting, and of confession; in the letting go we are securely held. In opening our hands, we are filled to overflowing. In tracing the slow ascent of these songs, we resound with healing. In the gospel, lament is not self-preoccupation. To pour out our sorrows before the feet of Jesus is not the same as self-pity, or theatrics. Self-pity leads us to a cycle of emptiness and addiction. It always needs to create more drama to sustain surface emotions. But as pastor Tim Keller has said, when you pray your tears you find that true lament leads to healing. There’s strength through the sorrow and onto the other side. “Planting rows of sorrow, waiting for the harvest. Look and see how far we’ve come from where we started.” Psalm 126: 5-6 proclaims this promise, “Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy.” As we prepare our hearts for Easter, let us shoulder our cross daily, that we might reap the harvest of hope. Suggestion for prayer: Ask God to bring to mind the seeds of sorrow in your life that he wants you to plant. Ask him to heal them and bring new life in those places. Where is the place within you where you need to let go? Pray your tears. Ask him to remind you of places where sorrow has turned to fruitfulness in your own story. Know the strength of his provision. Click here to listen to “Letting Go” from Sandra’s new album, Songs From The Valley.