Let me tell you about the worst Christmas present I ever opened.
My parents would sometimes allow me the scandalous privilege of opening up one present on Christmas eve. One year when I was 9 or 10 my eyes were drawn to a curious cylindrical package. With approval from my parents, I was able to open this gift early.
Filled with the giddy excitement of getting a head start on Christmas, I made confetti out of the wrapping paper.
Then, my heart sank. Continue reading
If a bell rings and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound?
If a Salvation Army bell ringer stands outside a department store all day and not a single cent drops into the bucket, was it really worth the ringer’s time and effort?
If a church holds a rally and not a single soul gets saved, was it worth the church’s time and effort?
Many of us have been to a church-sponsored camp, revival or other event where we heard a speaker attempt to rouse a reluctant crowd, saying, “If only one person chooses to follow Christ tonight, then all of our work here will have been worth it.”
But what if no one came forward that night? What if no one chose to give their life to Jesus at that rally? Was the work still worth it? Continue reading
Christmas tastes like Egg Nog.
For some, Christmas has a Peppermint taste. Gingerbread is the flavor of Christmas for others. Still many think Christmas has the flavor of a Chocolate Covered Cherry. (I will refuse to recognize the mentally unstable people who think Christmas tastes like Fruitcake.)
For me, though, Egg Nog is what my holiday palate craves. I wasn’t on the Egg Nog bandwagon until a few years ago. The name, color, and reputation of Nog was off-putting to me. But I decided to be adventurous and give it a shot.
I’ve been an Egg Nog advocate ever since, taking in all the different flavors including the famous Egg Nog Latte from Starbucks. (For the record, I’m not all that big on alcoholic Egg Nog. Just pour me a class of the rich, thick liquid without any add-ins and I’ll happily put it down.)
As the Christmas season wears on and my Egg Nog intake adds up, I begin wondering why the sweet treat isn’t available year-round. Why must my taste buds be deprived 11 months out of the year?
The question then becomes this: Would Egg Nog still be so special if it was available all year? Continue reading
The Doriot Family Nativity Scene was a war zone.
Every year my parents put out a handmade wooden Nativity scene. There’s a swinging fence, hay on the ground in the barn, a reverent recreation of the first Christmas.
And every year I couldn’t help but desecrate it.
The first thing I did when the Nativity Scene came out of the attic was hijack it to use with my wrestling figures. The barn became the backdrop for an epic wrestling match. I called it the annual Christmas Clash.
The Christmas Clash was the centerpiece of my make-believe wrestling federation – the biggest card of the year, my own personal Wrestlemania. For some reason I loved having this beautiful barn as the setpiece for my miniature grapplers to have their most important matches.
The baby Jesus sat in the background and an angel looked down overhead as Shawn Michaels and Diesel wrestled all around. This is what I turned the Christmas story into as a child.
What have we turned Christmas into?
The mission of POP GOD has been to seek God in the present tense of pop culture. You would think it’d be easier than ever to see God’s presence in pop culture during Christmas. But Christmas has become less a celebration of the arrival of a Savior and more of a pagan holiday celebrating generic platitudes like giving and happiness and togetherness.
God has allowed us to redefine our worldly celebration of the birth of His Son in many different ways. Still, if you look closely, you can see the spirit of Christ amongst the masses. Just as the baby Jesus was present in my Nativity Scene Smackdowns, the Lord is present in the pop culture of Christmas.
So this season on POP GOD, I don’t want to ask the question of “Where is God underneath the wrapping paper?”
Instead, I want to ask, “Where is God in the wrapping paper?”
Where is God in the minutiae of this holiday? Where is God in the cheesy Christmas songs and movies? Where is God in egg nog and Christmas Tree Cakes?
I used to think I was being blasphemous with the way I used my wrestling figures. Now I think I was just embodying what Christmas is all about – the presence of the Lord descending into our everyday lives.
As a child though, I relegated the savior to the background as my wrestling figures brawled before His birthplace. This year on POP GOD, we’ll be celebrating the presence of God in the midst of every aspect of Christmas in pop culture.
Stay tuned to POP GOD during the Advent season for a special Christmas countdown. We’ll have a new post every weekday leading up to Christmas including a few Guest Posts and a special Christmas music episode of the POP GOD POPcast.
(If you don’t want to miss anything, enter your email address in the box on the left side of the page to subscribe to POP GOD and have every new post delivered to your inbox.)
Christmas does not mean what it once did. God’s presence is in the background of how the world celebrates the season. But He is still there – if only we will look.
Did you ever misuse your family’s Christmas decorations as a child? What’s an unusual place you’ve seen Jesus at Christmas? Leave a comment below and join the Christmas conversation:
Hand Turkeys are not high art.
Surely you crafted a Hand Turkey in your younger days. Perhaps your child or grandchild made one for you. Or maybe you created some other elementary artwork as well – a Christmas ornament made from an ashtray, a picture frame glued with glitter and macaroni, etc.
You worked hard on these crafts. Spent afternoons in a grade school classroom perfecting the placement of buttons and stickers onto an oddly adorned flower pot to give to your mother or father on a special occasion.
But these crafts weren’t art. You were 7 when you made them. Continue reading
I fell down the rabbit hole. Like many others this week, I became fascinated by the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination.
The JFK killing appears to be a once in a lifetime time type event – one that only could have happened at a certain point in history where there was not enough media saturation to find out the truth but just enough media saturation to create the controversy and conspiracies which continue on some 50 years and counting down the road.
One podcast I listened to featured one of my favorite authors Chuck Klosterman giving his analysis on the conspiracy theories. Klosterman made an interesting point on conspiracies in general.
Klosterman hypothesized that conspiracies are often more comforting to believe than the more probable truth. He said believing that a few people somehow orchestrated a catastrophic event is more comforting than believing all things happen by chance. If we simply believe all the events of life are random and by chance, that can be even scarier than thinking a secret society or some evil mastermind acted outside of normalcy.
I think Klosterman is spot on. In fact, I’ll take his theory one step further. I think conspiracies can be more comforting than believing God is actually in control. Continue reading
I learned the truth when I was about 6-years-old.
I was watching a video in the bedroom while my parents had friends over. My father came in and he just couldn’t take it anymore.
He had to tell me the truth – the truth about wrestling.
“You know it’s fake, right? It’s all planned out and scripted,” he told me about the hulking superstars I had recently become obsessed with.
Funny, though. The revelation didn’t bother me. Even at a young age, I simply shrugged and went back to watching Randy Savage drop elbows. Continue reading
“They probably don’t even know they’re in captivity.”
My girlfriend and I were visiting the Georgia Aquarium a few weekends ago when we heard these words. We were standing in awe of the magnitude of the attraction, blown away by the wonders inside one of the largest aquariums in the world.
One guide was telling us about fish who have been born inside the aquarium. He said those words to us, and that the water is so big these fish don’t even realize they’re not in the ocean.
Of course they don’t. How could they? They’ve never experienced anything other than the aquarium. They don’t realize there’s a whole other world out there beyond the bubble they are in.
Do we? Do we realize there’s more to our life than the bubble we were born into? Continue reading
(Click Here if you can’t see the video above.)
Everyone talks about the transition from Saturday night to Sunday morning being a daunting one. But what about Sunday morning to Monday morning?
On Sunday morning you sing of hope. On Sunday you’re surrounded by fellow believers. On Sunday your tank is recharged.
On Monday morning it can all fall apart. On Monday inbox is full of problems that just can’t wait. On Monday everything that drags you down about your job is right back in front of you. On Monday the weight of commerce brings you back down to earth.
A bit dramatic? Maybe. But for some of us it’s not that far off. Maybe to keep you with a Sunday attitude you need some Monday Morning Music.
Here’s a favorite tune of mine to get my mind right for Monday morning. It’s a song from The Avett Brothers called “Head Full Of Doubt/Road Full Of Promise”. Don’t let the long title scare you off.
As the lyric goes:
Where nothing is owed, deserved, or expected,
And your life doesn’t change by the man that’s elected,
If you’re loved by someone you’re never rejected,
Decide what to be, and go be it.
Whether you’re starting a new job or walking into a familiar one, make the decision this Monday to be who you were on Sunday. Be the person God already sees you as.
God sees you not as who you are, but you are becoming. He sees past your flaws. God sees you as His beloved child.
When you’re loved by Him, what does the rejection of the world matter? Instead, you are free to reject what the world offers you as a satisfactory way of life. You can release your dreams from the cage and be free to follow them.
As you start off this week it’s time to make a decision. Who will you be? Who do you want to be?
You can change your path. You can be the type of person who influences your entire office and paves a road full of promise leading back to the Creator.
Let’s do it together. Let’s keep Sunday alive on Monday.
I’d love to know – what are you facing down this Monday? How can we support each other as we do the work of a new week?
Welcome to Episode 11 of the POP GOD POPcast – an exploration into the lives of people seeking God in the present tense.
This week’s guest is Adam Sams. Adam is a singer-songwriter who just released his first full-length album, Tightwire. Adam brings his guitar to the studio to preview a couple of tracks off the album. But first, we talk about growing up around the world, his musical influences, and his affection for surfing. Plus Adam takes the Pop Quiz, we break down his songwriting progress, reveal how he made it on stage with Switchfoot, and more! Enjoy this deeper look inside the life of a musician truly seeking God in the present tense.
Listen to the podcast here:
Subscribe and download on iTunes
Listen on Podbean
Download or order a cd or vinyl of Adam’s album on his website adamsams.com
Subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, rate it, leave a comment, listen to all the other episodes, share it on Twitter and Facebook and anywhere else. I’d really appreciate it. Thanks.
I’m so excited to open up POP GOD and share more stories of people seeking God in the present tense. I’d love to hear your feedback. Leave me a comment and let me know how to improve things, what you’d like to hear discussed, and give me your ideas as to who you’d like to see on the POPcast.
POP GOD 