Stooping is the New Standing

 The following is an excerpt from my personal journal dated July 4, 2015.

“…but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; and he went home marveling at what had happened.” (Luke 4:11-12, ESV)

     The resurrection of Jesus Christ still seems like an “idle tale” to many “...and they did not believe.” In our cynical, reality-obsessed culture, we gravitate towards the gritty. We are suspicious of happy endings. Real life isn’t tied up neatly with pretty ribbons and bows. The resurrection seems to us like a fairy-tale finish to an otherwise powerful and poignant tragedy. It’s too good to be true, so we dismiss it as false.

     The disciples apparently felt the same way. Jesus was dead. That was real. They saw it. They knew it to be true. It must have seemed a cruel joke in poor taste for these women to come barging in with wild, “idle tales” of a risen Jesus. Yet there was one man among them who dared hope their words were true, enough to get up and go see for himself. 

     Peter’s last encounter with Jesus ended badly. Betrayal. Vehement denial that he even knew Jesus. Cowardly self-protection at the expense of His Lord. Worst of all, Jesus had known him better than he knew himself. He told Peter he would do this.

     But He also said, “When you return…” He knew Peter would deny Him, yet offered him hope that there was a way back. So when Jesus was killed on the cross, that hope had died. Jesus was gone and Peter never got the chance to make it right again before He was killed.

     Until today. If He was alive, then maybe… He got up and literally ran to the tomb. And here’s the part I personally love in the text, the specific word picture Luke uses: “stooping and looking in.” To stoop means to bow down, to get low. It means to make yourself smaller so you can enter. It’s a humbling of self. Had Peter refused to make himself lower, all he would have seen was the stony outside of a garden tomb. But “stooping and looking in, he saw…” There is a whole different perspective awaiting the one who will stoop and look in. You have to want it bad enough. Peter did.

     Ordinarily, it would be nothing special for a person to bend down in order to see into a small, low space. But there was more going on inside Peter. The action was pregnant with spiritual implication. Peter, whose pride and self-preserving instincts wouldn’t let him risk his own safety to identify with Jesus just a few nights earlier, now had to lower himself to peer into a tomb to know if there was any hope for him beyond his own death.

     Did he see Jesus? No, and that’s a good thing. If Jesus had been in the tomb, then all hope for redemption was lost – for Peter and for us. Instead, he saw the shell of empty grave clothes laying there, no body to fill them, as if to shout, “I couldn’t hold Him! He is too strong! I was no match for Jesus!”

     Maybe the reason the story seems like an “idle tale” to so many is because they will not stop to look in for themselves. Maybe they are afraid of what they will see if they do. If they dare get low in front of all their peers and take a hard, honest look inside that tomb, it might really be empty. And if it really is empty, then Jesus might actually be alive. And if Jesus rose from the dead, then He has claims on their lives that they cannot shake. No, it’s too risky. Better to stay home with the scoffers. It’s safer that way.

     Safer. At least until the sky cracks wide, and that Risen Jesus returns in triumph to claim His place as rightful King over all. The those who rejected Him, who refused to stoop and lower themselves, who dared not look inside for fear of what they would – or would not  -- find there, they will cry out for the mountains to fall on them and for the rocks to cover them. Anything to escape the penetrating gaze of that “Idle Tale” turned “True Story.” For them there will be nothing left but the wrath of a Holy God who did everything in His power to save them except force them to love Him.

     For the Christ follower, stooping is the new standing. It is a permanent position of humility before a glorious Savior. Jesus stooped far lower than He asks any of us to do. Yet stoop we must. Lower ourselves we must. If we want to see for ourselves what is true and live a life of freedom, hope, and victory, then we must do it from the stooping position.

Feeling all "misty" this morning...

 

 

Reading in James this morning...

"Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin." (James 4:13-17, ESV)

There are two important facts about being a human on planet earth that James reminds us of:

1. Our days are numbered. Literally.
2. We have no idea what that number is.

I have no idea if this is my last day on earth or not. The coffee I sip now could be the last cup I ever taste. The good-morning kiss I just gave my wife a few moments ago could be the last kiss we ever enjoy. The sentence I am hastily scribbling across the page of my journal may be the last thing I ever write. I simply do not know the number of my days.

So to live as if I did know, or as if it didn't matter, or even worse, as if God did not have a say in how I spent my numbered days is actually evil, arrogant, and sinful. James calls it "arrogant boasting" because we do not stop to ask God what He wants to do with our lives. Planning our futures -- even in the short term -- without seeking the Lord's will is actually "evil." It actually works against what is good and right and true.

That's why James says, "Hey, if you know you are a mist, and if you know you are subject to the sovereignty of God, and if you know you ought to ask Him what He wants to do with the number of your days -- and yet you spend it pursuing your own plans without a thought to His plans or purposes, then you are sinning against God." We are basically giving Him the middle finger as we run off to do whatever for a few years before launching out into eternity. And then we get to stand before Him and explain why our plans were somehow better. (Cue Dust in the Wind by Kansas...)

Father, what do you have for me this day? If it is my last day, let me live it purposefully for Your glory. Use me to tell someone the good news of the love of Christ. All my plans and hopes and dreams I yield to Your gracious, sovereign will. I am a mist, here for a little while, then gone and eventually forgotten even by my own great-grandchildren. I am only two generations away from being forgotten entirely by my own family!

God, help me to live in light of the glorious reality that this mist may only last a little while, but in Your hands it can accomplish something eternally significant in Your Kingdom. I am Your, Father. Live through me today, in Jesus' name.

So I came across this in Proverbs...

"To do justice AND righteousness is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice." 
(Proverbs 21:3, ESV. Emphasis mine)

     In scripture, righteousness and justice are always mentioned together. Like conjoined twins they are inseparable. They are two sides of a single coin; both are necessary for the coin to be of any worth.

     Justice is big these days among young evangelicals. They are understandably sick of the apathy, sick of the lazy church sitting in pews and singing dry, dusty hymns while the world goes to hell all around them, sick of the hypocrisy of claiming the title: Jesus-follower" but not actually following Jesus into the world to heal the sick, care for the poor, touch the leper, and love the outcast. There is a lot to admire about the "social justice" movement in the church these days. The world is dying to see if there is an ounce of authenticity left in Western Christianity. But there is a caution to be taken if we are to follow Jesus into the world: Justice is never far from righteousness. Never. Ever.

     Many want to cast off the holiness of God in the name of His justice. Some would feed hungry stomachs with bread, but starve their souls of the Bread of Life in the process. They want to reach out and embrace the marginalized and outcast, but not require repentance from sin. They cast off God's unflinching call to purity and holy living because, after all, who are we to tell anyone how they should live? Aren't we all sinners? Isn't everyone broken in one way or another? We imagine that enough efforts to promote justice will somehow excuse us from the demands of righteousness.

     In fairness, the vast majority of American Christians have done the inverse: we have reduced the gospel to a set of doctrinal statements and a moral code of conduct: "If you agree to the truth of these statements, and can manage to avoid these particular sins (usually sexual in nature), then you are a Christian." Meanwhile, the cries of the oppressed and impoverished largely go unheeded. They can barely be heard above our state-of-the-art sound systems in our multi-million dollar facilities. Justice is re-labeled "Missions"and left to those who "feel called" to it. (BTW, you don't "feel called;" you ARE called. You either listen and obey or you don't.)

     But the truth is that Jesus requires both. The Proverb above doesn't say, "Righteousness is acceptable to the Lord, but justice is optional." Nor does it say, "To do justice is better than righteousness." It says that both together were more acceptable to Yahweh than merely superficial religious ceremony. Why? Because they are the metric of our spiritual maturity. They are the barometer of our hearts -- where they are, what they desire, how we regard the Lord.

     Righteousness is how we live before God. It measures our moral choices as they flow from the affections of our hearts. Like water that will seep through and rise to its own level, what -- and who -- we really love will be revealed by how we live. God is very concerned with what our hearts desire and how we go after it. There are ways to live that promote human flourishing in every area -- physically, materially, emotionally, mentally, spiritually. And there are ways to live that destroy us, sometimes quickly and obviously, but more often quietly over a lifetime, like a slow poison working its way through our bodies, shutting it down one system at a time until we stop living.

     Morality is what we think of most when we talk about righteousness but it is actually much more than that. It's not rule-keeping; it's loving God more than we love ourselves and trusting that His commands are an expression of His love and protection towards us. Righteousness deals more with our relationship to God, while justice is more about how we treat other people because of our relationship to God.

Righteousness and justice always go together. To attempt one without the other is to accomplish neither.

     Jesus said this was the sum of the whole Law and Prophets: "You shall love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength (righteousness), and you shall love your neighbor as yourself (justice)." He told His followers to "seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness." Righteousness and justice always go together. To attempt one without the other is to accomplish neither.

     You cannot claim a zeal for justice and embrace or accept something God calls sin. You are not being just towards those who are trapped in that self-destructive lifestyle, misleading them to believe they are safe from the wrath of God and penalty of their sin. Nor are you being just towards God by treating His Word and His holiness as something that can be casually dismissed whenever it's expedient or unpopular.

     Conversely, you cannot claim a zeal for righteousness -- holding up your morality and doctrinal positions as evidence -- if that never results in action taken to oppose oppression, injustice, exploitation, corruption, or abuses of power. What kind of righteousness leaves the helpless undefended, the hungry unfed, the naked unclothed, the sick uncared for, and the captive left to rot in captivity?

     The Proverb is saying, "Don't look at your religious service as the metric of how well your relationship with God is going. Rather, look at the interplay of both righteous living before a holy God and compassionate justice towards those made in His image. That's what God is really after." James affirms this in his letter:

     "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world." (James 1:27, ESV. Emphasis mine.)

     Justice AND righteousness. Never one without the other.

     Father, help me to live a life pleasing to You. I fear there are days when not only do I not do both, but some days that I do neither. God, make me more like Jesus, who loved You more than life itself and expressed it by loving others. In Jesus' name I ask these things. Amen!

   

His way is through the sea...

 The following is an entry from my personal journal dated August 30, 2015.


"Your way was through the sea, Your path through the great waters; yet your footprints were unseen." -- Psalm 77:19, ESV

     The psalmist is a man in trouble.

     He emphasizes, not once but twice, in verse 1 that he is crying aloud. Not praying silently or murmuring under his breath. He is shouting his prayer to God! His is a desperate situation. There seems to be no way out. He can't sleep. He can't speak (v. 4). He is so troubled that it is literally debilitating.

     So what does he do? I love these next few verses. They are so raw, so honest, so unflinching...

"I said, 'Let me remember my song in the night; let me meditate in my heart.' Then my spirit made a diligent search: ..."

     This desperate man makes a diligent search in the deepest places of his being. He asks a series of questions to himself. He is grappling with how to interpret his circumstances. He is taking what he has always believed to be true about God and holding it up to what he is experiencing and asking the really hard question: "Is it really true?" Was it just a nice little faith, a quaint set of beliefs for when times were good? Or does it stand up in the storm? If I could sum up his questions in verses 7-9, I would say it like this: "Has God given up on me? Does He care?"
 
     What follows is nothing short of amazing. God answers his question. Not audibly. Not in a miraculous show of thunder and fire from heaven. In the deepest places of his soul, the Spirit of God whispers, "Remember..." 

     And that is exactly what he does. He rehearses the things God has done in the past when everything seemed hopeless and, by all appearances, God had abandoned His people. In pondering these things one particular story comes to his mind: the parting of the red Sea to deliver Israel from the Egyptian army.

     If you go back and read the story in Exodus, the people of Israel were freaking out. Behind them, the armies of the largest, most powerful kingdom in the world were bearing down on them, intent on slaughtering every single one of them. In front of them was the impenetrable barrier of the Red Sea. They were trapped, it seemed, with no way out.

     Ah, that's the magic word: way. 

     God's specialty is making a way where there is none. It's His signature move, ultimately perfected in the resurrection of Jesus. The psalmist remembers this and it dawns on him like an epiphany: "Your way was through the sea, Your path was through the great waters..." Key word: through.

     When the Israelites in Exodus 14 saw their predicament, they did exactly what the psalmist did: they cried aloud. "What have you done, Moses?! Have you brought us here to die? What's the matter, there weren't enough graves in Egypt, so you hadda lure us out here so they could kill us?!" All their questions amount to one big misinterpretation: There is no way. We are doomed. God has given up on us.

     Moses' response to their questions is beyond epic. It's so epic that Bible publishers should just go ahead and pre-highlight it for people...

"Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. (Now you see them; now you don't!) The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent."

     Freaking awesome. "God's got this! Your part is to shut up an watch!"

     Then God did something no one expected. He took no way and made it The Way! He took the very thing that trapped them and turned it into the escape route. He took a wall and made it a door.

     When the psalmist remembers this his heart is lightened. That changes everything! Maybe the reason God has not delivered him from his troubles is because they are the very thing He is working through to bring true freedom and deliverance.

     "Your footprints were not seen..." We may not be able to distinguish a clear set of footprints to track the movement of God, but that doesn't mean that He isn't working. Verse 20 reminds us that "You led Your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron." Then the psalm abruptly ends. Boom. Over. No neat wrap up or summary or conclusion statement. In the words of the great Stan Lee, "'Nuff said!"

     God didn't deliver from trouble; He delivered through trouble. And though His footprints were not visible to the naked eye, His direction and provision were obvious in Moses and Aaron.

     Why? Why does God make a way through  instead of just avoiding the trouble to start with? The answer to that question is in what He said to Moses at the Red Sea:

"... I will get glory over Pharoah and all his hosts, his chariots, and his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I have gotten glory over Pharoah, his chariots, and his horsemen." (Exodus 14:17-18)

     When the psalmist reflects on the story of God's deliverance through the Red Sea, he makes an astute observation that I completely missed on the first reading -- God led them there on purpose! "You led Your people like a flock..." It was no accident that they ended up at the Red Sea. God led them there "by the hand of Moses and Aaron," knowing full well that Pharoah's armies would come charging after them and trap them against the waters. Here's the crazy thing: It was God's plan to do that the whole time! Why? Why would He do something like that? That seems so.... mean.

     We often misinterpret our circumstances because we are working at cross purposes with God. We are not interested in what He is doing or why. We just want out.

     We are looking to return to comfort as quickly as possible.
     God is looking to make Himself known to the nations.
     We are interested only in our pleasure.
     He is interested only in His glory.

     Knowing God's agenda in advance puts us at a remarkable advantage over our "day of trouble." Endurance is made effective by knowing the end to which we are suffering. The writer of Hebrews tells us that Jesus endured the cross "for the joy that was set before Him." How we handle the "day of trouble" will reveal whether we are on the Kingdom plan, or if we have a plan all our own we are trying to get God to endorse.

     The psalmist, the Israelites, and I all have something in common: In the "day of trouble" when we are so desperate that we can't sleep or speak and we cry out to God, "Why have you abandoned me?!" -- we forget stuff. And we need to remember. We need to remember that God's way is through, not from or around or over or under. We need to remember that we don't always see His footprints but we can trust that He is leading us.

     The question then is: Are we following? Am I yielding to His leadership by submitting to godly leaders He has placed over me with a proven track record of walking with God and experiencing His power? Am I so busy trying to find a way out or around the "day of trouble" that I am missing "the salvation of the LORD" that runs right through it? Am I so busy complaining that I can't hear God saying, "You have only to be silent."?

Thank you, God, for this great reminder. Help me to remember in my day of trouble that Your way is THROUGH the sea, Your path is THROUGH the great waters, even though your footprints may remain unseen. You lead Your people like a shepherd leads his sheep. By Your grace, make me to trust Your promises. Help me to look for the ways You are getting glory and making Yourself known in my day of trouble. Help me endure for the joy set before me, of knowing You are leading me and bringing Your Kingdom through me. In Jesus' precious and holy name I pray this today.

5 Songs You Need to Hear! Vol. 3

Greetings lovers of new music everywhere! Welcome to the third edition of 5 Songs You Need to Hear. If you are tired of everything you are hearing on the radio and bored with everything already on your iPod/iTunes/iPhone/iDon'tCareAnymore... then this is the blog for you.

You know how this works. I give you 5 Songs You Need to Hear. You listen to them. If you like any of them, you go buy them, then you tell all your friends about them, and support the artists who created them so they can keep on making more great music in the future.

So let's not waste time. Here we go...

1. Back to You - Twin Forks. Another Noisetrade.com discovery. I don't know much about this band except I love this song. Also, they do an amazing cover of Taylor Swift's song Mean. In fact, I actually like that song better than this one even, but I'm saving it for a special covers songs edition.

2. Be My Girl - John & Jacob. One of the catchiest dang songs I've heard in a long time. I absolutely love the chorus of this song. It reminds me of classic Foster & Lloyd. Country but with a Beatlesque sensibility of melody and pop hooks. You will be humming this one the rest of the day whether you want to or not.

3. There's a Rumor - The August Empire. Amazon.com offers a lot of free music if you are willing to take the time to sift through it and find the gems among the rubble. Among the treasures a diligent seeker can find are a set of samplers from a label called Mishara Music. I have all of them and there is some absolutely brilliant music on these singer-songwriter collections. One of my favorites is from a guy-girl duo called The August Empire. This song is beautiful, haunting, flawlessly written and performed. It was featured last year on an episode of NBC's The Night Shift and almost immediately scored them 20,000+ views on their YouTube video. I predict you will buy this song within 24 ours of hearing it. You're welcome.

4. Blackbird Song - Lee Dewyze. OK, if you're a fan of The Walking Dead you probably know this song. What you may not know is who did it. This darkly haunting, gruff-voiced masterpiece is performed by none other than former American Idol winner Lee Dewyze! Yeah, I know, I couldn't believe it either! Regardless of who did it, this song is one of my favorite tracks of the last year.

5. Beneath the Brine - The Family Crest. And now for something completely different.... The Family Crest defy categorization. I think they may have invented their own genre. How do I prepare you for what you are about to hear? Hmmm.... words like epic, majestic, sweeping grandeur all come to mind. Aw, heck, just listen to it yourself and tell me what you would call it. Here's what I can tell you... you will never, ever hear this on the radio or in the mall at Hot Topic. It's far too cool for that.

There you have it, folks. Get busy. You've got work to do. And remember, you don;t have to listen to the crap they tell you to listen to. You have a mind of your own. Now go explore...

5 Songs You Need To Hear! Episode 2

Hello fans of great music everywhere! Welcome to my second installment of 5 Songs You Need to Hear. As an avid fan of the unheard, unsung, unnoticed makers of aural art, my goal is to seek out and discover greatnew music wherever I can find it, and pass it along to you. If you hear something you like, be sure to share it with your friends and help get these artists the recognition and fanbase they deserve.

People ask me, "Jerry, do you consider yourself a hipster?" No, I do NOT consider myself a hipster. A hipster is someone who takes pride in appreciating something no one else has heard of and holds everyone else in scorn and derision because of they are not as cool as he thinks he is. Hipsters deliberately keep their discoveries a secret so they can hold it against everyone else, and somehow make their own pitiable, gray lives seem a little less msierable. That is not me! I love great music everywhere I find it -- even on (gasp!) the radio! Even made by -- (horror of horrors) popular artists!

No, I am not a hipster. I am a servant, really. I want to share what I've found. I want to bring sunshine and happiness to people's music libraries. I want to broaden the horizon of musical tastes and styles. And I want these artists to succeed so they will keep making great music for many years to come.

So with that in mind, here are 5 Songs You Need to Hear....

1. Empty Me Out - Liz Vice. It's like someone dropped an old Gladys Knight vinyl LP from 1970 onto the turntable. This stuff is solid R&B gold. I discovered Liz Vice on Noisetrade.com ( a gold mine of free music from new indie artists of every style and genre). This whole CD is amazing but "Empty Me Out" is by far the standout track.

2. Shelter Song - Temples.  While we are in throwback mode, let me hip you to one of the coolest bands out there right now. Temples is a British band that perfectly replicates the acid-drenched, lava-lamped psychadelic sound of the late sixties. This song was a freebie on Amazon.com last year and it has been in permanent rotation in my iTunes ever since. If you're not a fan of Cream, Hendrix, early Pink Floyd, or more obscure bands like the Electric Prunes, Vanilla Fudge, or Frijid Pink, then this definitely NOT for you. But if you crave a bit of paisley in your diet, I highly recommend Temples.

3. Morning Fades - Jameson Elder. Another Noisetrade find. This song is absolutely beautiful. Elder is a troubador of the highest order, able to capture nuances of emotion and pathos with nothing more than an acoustic guitar and a his voice. This brilliant singer-songwriter has a lot of great tunes, but "Morning Fades" is a standout. I couldn't find a decent YouTube video for the studio recording (there is a fanshot video of a live performance in a club, but the quality is poor), but you can listen to it on Spotify here.


4. Something About You - Carey Brothers.  No, it's not the Carey Brothers (as in siblings with the last name Carey); it's one guy named Carey whose last name is Brothers. And yes, it is the old Level 42 song from the 80s. I confess I was never a big fan of the Level 42 version when it was originally released. To me, it just sort of blended in with the rest of the bland, souless, Euro synth-pop-with-a-drum-machine crap on the radio. In fact, I had completely forgotten this song even existed until I heard this remake. Carey Brothers managed to strip away all of the keyboards and outdated production and find a real gem of a song buried underneath it all. This is a surprisingly beautiful song with a lovely melody and heartfelt lyrics. It just needed the right treatment. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do...

5. Ain't No Grave - Jamie Lin Wilson. Another cover that for me outshines the original. I know I will get a LOT of push back on this, but I like this version better than the Johnny Cash recording. Don't get me wrong: I absolutely love Johnny Cash. In my book he is one of the greats right up there with Elvis, the Beatles, & Sinatra. But there's just something about the fire in this young lady's spirit when she sings "Ain't no grave gonna hold my body down/ When I hear that trumpet sound, I'm gonna rise out of the ground!" that makes me wanna have church right there in my seat! Whether you agree or not about which version is best, I hope you will enjoy Jamie Lin Wilson's take on this gospel classic.

There you have it, folks. 5 Songs You Need To Hear! Please take the time to listen and comment. I appreciate your feedback. And as always, if you have discovered some great new music that you think deserves to be heard, please let me know about it. Until next week! -- Jerry Davison

Five Songs You Need To Hear: Inaugaral Edition

For a while now I have been doing this play list n my iTunes called "Flavor of the Week" to help me assimilate new music into my library. I have about 16,000+ songs in my music library so I have to be intentional about working in new stuff or it will literally get lost in the shuffle.

I am constantly on the lookout for new music. Through websites like Noisetrade.com and services like Spotify, I add new bands and songs almost everyday. I would say the vast majority of stuff I listen to are things I discovered that way. I thought it might be fun to share some of the new songs I discover every week and hopefully do a couple of good things in the process:

1. Help people discover great new music.
2. Break people free from the thought-trap that you have to hear it on the radio before you can like it.
3. Help new artists and rising talent to get heard more by sharing their music with a new audience.

One quick note before we begin... As a pastor, I realize I am under a lot of scrutiny about where I go, what I do, what I watch or listen to. I get that my position carries influence and responsibility. Having said that, not all these songs are going to be Christian songs. Some of the artists are not folks you would want your kids emulating. Please understand that by listing a song on this blog, I am not endorsing anyone's lifestyle or suggesting you support them. I am taking these songs on their own merit, one at a time. This blog is about the song, not the writer or the performer. I will do my best not to lead anyone astray... :-)

So here is my very first edition of 5 Songs You Need to Hear This Week...

1. Geronimo by Sheppard. This is my jam. Great stuff for sunny days, windows down, driving to the lake or the mountains or the beach... wherever you feel connected. Sheppard is an Australian group made up of a brother and his two sisters (last name Sheppard, get it?) and a few friends. I like the bright, catchy, sunny fun of this song. I like the idea of yelling Geronimo and just going for it when you have a dream worth chasing down, or a calling to answer. The imagery of leaping through the curtain of the waterfall is a nice one, full of shimmery beauty and promise. I crank this one when it comes on. I am posting the live acoustic version for a few reasons: it highlights the song rather than the artist, it's not stupid like the music video, and it shows that these guys really have some talent!

2. Stars by Jessica Rotter. Found this one on Noisetrade. I am a sucker for that lonesome fiddle sound and this one has it in spades. Just plain beautiful.

3. 1612 by Vulfpeck. A buddy of mine turned me on to these guys a few months ago. Every song they do sounds like the soundtrack to a 70s cop show... I mean that in a good way! You know those ones like Barney Miller, Baretta, The Rockford Files (am I showing my age?) that had way cool music. These guys are without question the best jazz funk you will ever listen to. The musicianship is bar none. The bass player is a beast. Most of their stuff is instrumental but this track features gospel singer Antwuan Stanley. It sounds like it could have been a School House Rocks cartoon in 1973.
Trust me, you need this in your life. Just go on Spotify, search "Vulfpeck" and listen to everything. You're welcome.

4. A Little More by Eric Hutchinson. It's funny how I stumble onto these things. Never heard of this guy before. One day I'm sitting in my office working, listening to Spotify, and on the feed comes across that one of my friends is listening to this guy Eric Hutchinson. On a whim I clicked on it to sample it. Ended up buying several of his songs off iTunes that day. This is one of them. Pure retro 80's power pop at its finest. Leaves me wanting a lot more. The video is a little goofy but if it distracts you, just turn your head and listen.

5. Run Boy Run by Woodkid. I can't even remember how I found this song but it's amazing in its epicness. The video is a very interesting mix of side-scrolling video games and an eisode of Adventure Time with a lot of spiritual imagery (the demons, the sword and shield, the promise of a heavenly city awaiting at the end). Don't know anything about the artist at all. Never heard anything else by him to this day. But this track is crankworthy and a fitting closer to this inaugural edition of 5 Songs...

Okay kids, that's all this week but there are about a jillion more where that came from with more pouring in all the time. Hope you all enjoy these nuggets. Feel free to send me your suggestions of great, unheard, unknown songs. Later!