Pandora – the musical world is now your playground

So I have this awesome friend, I’m looking at you Danny, who pointed me to the coolest thing I have seen in some time, let me introduce you to Pandora:

Now, you may be wondering, what is so special about this site?  It just looks like a music site to me.  This is where I slap you with a bagget and say “Hath ye not heard of the musical genome project?!”.  From the websites description:

On January 6, 2000 a group of musicians and music-loving technologists came together with the idea of creating the most comprehensive analysis of music ever.

Together we set out to capture the essence of music at the most fundamental level. We ended up assembling literally hundreds of musical attributes or “genes” into a very large Music Genome. Taken together these genes capture the unique and magical musical identity of a song – everything from melody, harmony and rhythm, to instrumentation, orchestration, arrangement, lyrics, and of course the rich world of singing and vocal harmony. It’s not about what a band looks like, or what genre they supposedly belong to, or about who buys their records – it’s about what each individual song sounds like.

Basically you give the website something to start with, so for example I typed in “Relient K” because I like their music.  Then it went off and found me a Relient K song but after that was done each other song was some song I had never heard but was awesome!  I then added “Foo Fighters” to the mix and now with both bands running I got a new mix of songs and man it was so great the songs were so classic they brought me back to high school!  Anyways, check out the site here and enjoy:

http://www.pandora.com/

Seeing clearly – something worth praying for

Part 1 – The Past

Since we left California last year I have been more or less spiritually bankrupt in a few areas.  I think much of this is because of the transition to a new church and a new church body, but also perhaps just from lack of motivation on my part.  It was really hard for me to leave a group of people that I deeply loved (you know who you are) and to then try and become part of a new group.  To be quite honest this has taken a toll on me spiritually because I haven’t been able to experience God in two very tangible ways: 1) I have not been serving other people and 2) I haven’t allowed myself to be served by others (through small groups, etc.).

Part 2 – The Present

So the reason for this post is because of a song written by Brandon Heath called “Give me your eyes”.  I have been hearing this song on the radio for about the past month and it has really sunken in.  I think that if every Christian yearned for what the song is speaking to that there would be no such thing as a “sunday morning christian”.  More importantly for me currently is that I grasp onto what the message of this song is and relieve myself of the previously mentioned title that I feel I have earned.

I think most people have read this scripture before but in case you haven’t, let it penetrate you.  This is how I would sum up the song.

2 Corinthians 4:18
So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Here is the best video I could find on you tube for the song (there isn’t an official video) Update: Here is the offcial video.  Enjoy it even if you have heard it before.  If you haven’t, give it a listen and let me know what you think.

Part 3- The Future

What does the future hold for me?  Only God knows…but whatever it is I intend to face it with open eyes and with an open heart, relying on Christ for the strength to succeed.

I will leave you with a verse that is probably one of my favorite verses for inspiration:

1 Corinthians 9:27
No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.