Jon Acuff's Blog, page 141

The guy who says he only uses his iPhone to read his Bible in church.

What's that you say? Am I checking my email, right here in the middle of church? Sir, I am insulted you would even ask that. How dare you!

This is 2011, I can't be carrying all kinds of bound and printed words on paper. What do you call them again? Oh that's right, books? Yes that's it, books, specifically the Bible. I've got the entire thing right here on my iPhone. Not only that, I have access to every translation ever written. Can your printed piece of paper magically transport you to the Douay Rheims 1899 Edition of the Bible?

I think not and you know how often I've got to cross reference a verse during the middle of the sermon and the Douay Rheims is the only one that will "Dou." See that, a pun? Thank you iPhone!

And no, I'm never tempted to play Zombies vs. Plants during one of the "down times" at church, though everyone knows the roof level is the hardest to conquer. I never use the three minutes of announcements to check what time the game is on today or look up an email or download a new song that just popped into my head or text somebody about our lunch plans. I don't use the amount of time it takes for the offering basket to get here as a small window of multi-tasking.

I'm the one person on the planet who is focused and attentive with their iPhone and never drifts away to verify on IMDB that Steve Buscemi was not the little kid in the movie To Kill a Mockingbird despite them both having really crooked teeth.

Well, I do have a small confession. The other thing I do use my iPhone for during church is to take notes. To capture words of wisdom if you will. Sometimes I will email them to someone who needed to hear the sermon but wasn't here. And no, I don't check other emails then either while I am doing that. I also archive my notes for later review and sometimes even set an automatic reminder. Does your paper do that for you? Do your fill in the blank sermon notes ever ping you in the middle of the week to remind you of a nugget of wisdom from the sermon? I thought not.

Enjoy your paper, Gutenberg, I'll stick to the iPhone. But wait, what happened to Steve Guttenberg? How come Howie Mandel has had some sort of renaissance and the Gutt is still denying us his craft? I should Google an answer to that right now.

Meet the entire Acuff family at the Nashville Quitter Event tonight!

Tonight, in addition to a huge fun book signing/$500 giveaway/tweetup/Quitter event, I will be joined by three special guests-Jenny, L.E., and McRae Acuff.

My whole family is going to be at the event tonight and I hope you'll come too. I'd love to meet you and it's going to be a lot of fun! (Plus, the person who drives the longest distance to get there will receive a life size side hug cardboard cut out of me, as seen in my office in the photo below.)

Here are the details:

Thursday, May 12, 2011 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm

Barnes & Noble

1701 Mallory Lane

Brentwood, TN 37027

615-377-9979

Quitter comes out today!

Today is the official release date of my new book Quitter: Closing the Gap Between Your Day Job & Your Dream Job.

It's available online right now:

Order on DaveRamsey.com

Order on Amazon They are still waiting for inventory and should have more today or tomorrow if it's not available. (You can get it on Kindle too)

Order on BooksAMillion.com

Order on Barnes&Noble.com (You can get it on the Nook too)

Order it from

What's it about?

Check out the trailer for a sneak peek at Quitter.

Still not convinced? Read the entire first chapter for FREE.

Want to help spread the word about the book?

Please tweet about it using the hashtag #Quitter and post on facebook.

(Example: The new book #Quitter from @jonacuff came out today! Check it out at http://bit.ly/iwxVKX )

If you already bought it, thank you! (A lot of people have mentioned that they're reading Quitter together as a small group and that is awesome!)

I really appreciate the encouragement you guys have shared with me over the last few months as we worked toward this day. I honestly believe this is the best thing I've ever written and that there's going to be a lot of hope in this book for people like me who have ever felt stuck at a day job. I spent 12 years feeling like I was called to do something else before I actually closed the gap between my day job and my dream job. This book is everything I learned about chasing a dream and all the things I wish someone had told me a lot earlier.

It's time to be a Quitter.

Jon

p.s. Regular SCL content will resume tomorrow!

Dallas Quitter Event Tonight!

Today is the first stop on the Quitter book tour. Come buy a copy of Quitter, get an endless supply of side hugs and your chance at $500 cash. It's going to be a fun night and I'd love to meet you! Here are the details:

Wednesday, May 11, 2011 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm

Books-A-Million

3000 Grapevine Mills Parkway

Grapevine, TX 76051

972-539-0636

Agreeing to disagree.

Recently, a new book came out that caused a stir in Christianity. Different authors choose different sides. Words got heated. Social media blew up.

I am of course talking about the Francine Rivers vs. Karen Kingsbury street fight of 2011. Long dedicated to being a place of mirth, I won't go into the details, but in talking about this situation, my wife reminded me of something interesting:

"You know, the current fracas is bigger than this phrase, but for years, if you were going to disagree with another Christian, you had to say, 'Let's agree to disagree.' Or you could use the slightly more serious version, "It's not a salvation issue, but …"

She's right, in addition to big debates like the one that is going on right now, we've long had much smaller, but equally awesome, discussions about our differences. And when we've had them, as a pretext to sharing your opinion, you're supposed to say, "Let's agree to disagree, but …"

So today, as an olive branch of peace, I thought it might be good to get some of our differences out on the table, especially some of the ones we've discussed on SCL:

1. Let's agree to disagree, but I'm pretty sure God uses a Mac.

2. Let's agree to disagree, but I'm almost positive that a "3 contemporary songs to 1 hymn" ratio is how they structure worship services in heaven.

3. Let's agree to disagree, but the NIV (1984 edition) is the greatest version of the Bible ever.

4. Let's agree to disagree, but those Willow Tree faceless Christian figurines are a little scary.

5. Let's agree to disagree, but the offering bucket is way better than the offering basket.

6. Let's agree to disagree, but if your VBS does not have a jumpy thing, I'm not sure you're really "loving on" your community.

7. Let's agree to disagree, but what a side hug lacks in warmth it makes up in speed of delivery.

8. Let's agree to disagree, but I'd prefer you use the gnarled church pencil instead of borrowing/stealing my uniball micro pen during church.

9. Let's agree to disagree, but I think people who always correct you and say, "the Sabbath is actually a Saturday" aren't any fun to invite to parties.

10. Let's agree to disagree, but I believe that secretly every pastor wants to do a crazy sermon on the Song of Solomon.

11. Let's agree to disagree, but sitting in a pew feels at least 17% more "churchy" then sitting in a seat.

12. Let's agree to disagree, but I still contend that giving someone a back massage during the middle of a sermon is distracting.

13. Let's agree to disagree, but now that I am a dad, I'm glad there are some Christian radio stations that are "safe for the whole family."

14. Let's agree to disagree, but the bootleg cookies you get at VBS do not accurately reflect the majesty and awesomeness of God.

15. Let's agree to disagree, but the guy who screams "Jesus!!!" at concerts is probably worshiping but he's also screaming directly in your cochlea.

16. Let's agree to disagree, but it's not a sin to keep your eyes cracked during the prayer so you can watch the secret society of "people who move things off stage" go to work.

17. Let's agree to disagree, but there were a ton of Jesus Jukes when Bin Laden was killed.

18. Let's agree to disagree, but staring at the sound guy when something messes up probably doesn't help fix the sound issue.

19. Let's agree to disagree, but I believe the most powerful person at a church is the secretary.

20. Let's agree to disagree, but sometimes we spend more time arguing about the faith of U2, than we do sharing our faith with our neighbors.

21. Let's agree to disagree, but it's hard to follow someone's very serious/sad prayer request with something of your own that is light hearted.

22. Let's agree to disagree, the digital age is awesome, but no app will ever surpass the warmth and effectiveness of the flannelgraph.

23. Let's agree to disagree, but I think every guy who ever attended a Christian camp secretly wished he was the guy with the acoustic guitar that only knew three chords.

24. Let's agree to disagree, but the first and third verses of a hymn are vastly superior to the second and fourth verses.

25. Let's agree to disagree, but there is no such thing as "," too many times.

Whoa, I feel better already. My friend Rachel Held Evans did a restore unity event last week on her blog and I'd like to think that I played a tiny roll in doing that same thing today. Unless you're reading this while wearing pleated pants. Everyone knows flat front pants and/or jeans aren't nearly as judgmental as pleated pants. Let's agree to disagree.

Have you ever encountered a minor issue that got major debate, requiring someone to throw out a "Let's agree to disagree?"

Did you disagree with anything on my list today?

Quitter comes out Wednesday!

We decided to push the release date of my new book Quitter back a day. We printed a whole bunch of books and they should be available on Wednesday.

If you ordered on DaveRamsey.com we'll be shipping them your way today. (And you'll get an email with the audio book in it.) Look for an exclamation-laden post about the release of the book tomorrow.

Thanks

Jon

Last day for the FREE Quitter audio book!

My new book Quitter officially releases this week. That means that today is the last day you can order it on DaveRamsey.com and get the audio download for FREE. I added a bunch of extra material to the audio book that's not in the printed edition and just like the last two books, I'm the one who reads it. So, you can expect my silky baritone for 4-6 hours of audio awesomeness. (Depending on the speed you play it at.)

Click here to order on DaveRamsey.com

The 4 types of Modern Christian Songs

One morning before church started a few years ago, I heard a song being piped in over the loudspeakers. I recognized it as a song by "Our Lady Peace," a rock band that had a few hits in the 90s.

The song kind of sounded like a Christian song and I nodded my head along waiting for church to start as the following verse played:

"Down here in the atmosphere, garbage and city lights, you gotta save your tired soul, you gotta save our lives."

Amen! That's what I'm talking about. God, you gotta save our lives. Then the next verse was played:

"Hope you remember me, when you're homesick and need a change. I miss your purple hair."

Wait, what? Did Jesus have purple hair? I don't remember that particular detail from the Bible.

"OK," I thought to myself, "that's a little weird. I'm not sure Jesus had purple hair but you know, when the sun is setting just right over the Dead Sea maybe it was kind of purple. I'm still with you." And then the next line came in:

"I miss the way you taste."

Ohh, this is one of those songs where it sounds kind of Christiany. You think at first that the guy is singing to God but he's actually singing about someone else. OK. That makes sense. It's a weird thing to play at church, but once I heard the lyrics I knew firmly where I stood.

But sometimes contemporary Christian music isn't that clear. Sometimes you don't get the purple hair clue. So to save you some guesswork, I've outlined the 4 types of songs most commonly found in Christian music:

1. God singing to us.

In these types of songs it's almost like God picked up an acoustic guitar, sat down on a big log and said, "Hey Jon, come here. I wrote this little ditty I want to sing from you. Not diddy, like the rapper, who will always be Sean to me, I mean ditty like a song." The lyrics are meant to be listened to as if God is singing directly to you.

2. Us singing to God.

Table turned. This is a message from us to God. It's a cry, an act of praise, a modern day psalm if you will. A good example of this is the Brandon Heath song that's popular right now, "Your Love." When Heath sings "your love is the only thing that matters," he's not singing to a girlfriend or to you. He's singing to God. Incidentally, the song "Your Love" by Brandon Heath is very, very different from the song, "Your Love" by Nicki Minaj. Those lyrics aren't interchangeable. I promise.

3. God & Us duet.

This is where it gets tricky. In this type of song it's like a conversation between God and the listener. You have to really tune in to know which lyrics you're supposed to sing and which verses God is supposed to carry.

4. Song about love.

In this type of song, a Christian recording artist breaks away from the previous three types of songs and writes about love. As in for a significant other that he or she loves. Mat Kearney's new song "hey mama" is a perfect example of this approach. The beat of it kind of reminds me of Michael Franti. In the song, Kearney lays out his heart for a lady friend, a "Tennessee Queen." Someone he'd like to kiss who has "Cherokee eyes" and "golden thighs." Whoa Kearney! But before you get in a huff, and say "dirty lyrics," allow me to throw out … the Song of Solomon card! Boom! This song is nowhere near as physically expressive as that book of the Bible. (And it's a great song, the lyric "You're Mississippi and I'm Oregon, you're sun tanned and I'm porcelain," is brilliant.)

Hopefully we cleared up a few things today. Of course, you could always argue that "there's no such thing as a 'Christian song,' but I've heard that so many times it turned my hair purple. Like the Dead Sea or the Sea of Galilee.

What's your favorite Christian song right now?

Unbelievable video + a Short Saturday Question.

"Unbelievable."

That would be my one word review of the new TV Special the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association just put together.

The video is called "Sowing The Seeds of The Gospel." I watched it last Tuesday and it completely knocked me over. I loved partnering with them on the Vietnam Kindergartens and Operation Christmas Child, but this was the first time I'd seen a Billy Graham TV Special. Unbelievable.

From the support they've delivered in Japan, to helping child soldiers in Liberia and their work in Los Angeles, I was really taken aback. My cousin David Acuff worked on the video and I'm really proud of him. This is hopefully one more opportunity in a long list of opportunities for SCL to share the stuff they're doing.

Visit www.billygraham.tv and watch "Sowing The Seeds of The Gospel."

Short Saturday Question:

What's one area of the world or country your church supports through missions?

Quitter is now on Kindle!

This is going to be a month of sentences ending in exclamation points.

Today's is that Quitter is now available for the Kindle! (It should be on ibooks and the nook soon. And we should have more copies of the actual book on Amazon soon as well.)

Click here to order the Kindle version of Quitter.