The new website was designed by Kyle Steed, who also did the album artwork for my “Enter the Worship Circle: Chair and Microphone vol 4″. He’s an amazing designer and a great friend, even if he never takes my culinary suggestions at restaurants. (I tell him the waffles are amazing here, he orders the toast. He is, boldly, his own man.)

My hope is this new site will be a place of discovery. I’ll share the things that I’m uncovering in life and are inspiring to me- new music from myself and other artists, thoughts on God and the gathering of worship, and overall anything and everything that moves me. I hope it moves you too.

And the first thing I’m extremely excited by? As I’m writing, music is being mixed and fine-tuned by David Wilton in the other room (producer who’s worked with Josh Garrels, Trace Bundy, Aaron Strumpel, Karla Adolphe, etc. I love Dave.) The album should be completed in the next few days, as it’s in its last stages.

I’ve named it “Potomac” and it is a collection of songs I’ve written (and one from A. Strumpel) paired with American Spirituals. Here now are the track listings (subject to change!):

“Twenty-Three/ Trouble So Hard”

“Jaw/ God’s Gonna Cut You Down”

“Sing Your Song Over Me/ Do Lord, Remember Me”

“Keep Being Found/ Down by the Riverside/ Wade in the Water”

“Not Scared Here/ Swing Low”

“Everything is New/ Battle Hymn of the Republic”

“Let Us Break Bread Together”

So yes, “mash-ups” if you’re familiar with Glee.

You’ll be hearing more in regards to my thoughts, heart, stories along-side, etc dealing with this album in the next few months. It’s been a journey to make, and it will be a joy and honor to share.

http://www.theworkofthepeople.com/index.php?ct=store.details&pid=V01079

A friend of mine named Tyler Schwanke (best. name. ever.) does stream-of-concious writings in which faith and heart issues seem to be voiced and processed. I asked him to do a late night walk in Denver, with Lent on his mind. Here are his incredible meanderings:

“An Evening Stroll Entree Salted With A Purging”

My inauguration into the season starts with me leaving my familiarity. I open the front door to the outside world and begin to drink in a night of simplistic self discovery. I breathe in the simultaneously dirty and clean evening air as my eyes bounce around coupled with the dance my neck does in syncopation to the thoughts flying in my head. My thoughts are at once non-existent and drag racing down narrow streets. My hand fumbles in my pocket for what could surely lead to an early demise. With hesitation I take a step forward to the tune of my lungs exhaling smoke. Accompanying the rhythm of my breathing is the clanking of my keys reminding me how distracted I am, always somewhere else, always adrift in my thoughts, and rarely present with my surroundings. It’s time to focus. It’s time to take in my surroundings like the breath oxygenating my blood.

With every step on this journey do I undergo a metamorphosis? Is their existence between street lights, or do we fade away like the happiness does when we find ourselves alone? Either way I’m dressed to impress, and time will tell if anyone was. We all want to leave an impression. It’s apparent when we present ourselves to dates, or the words we desperately grasp at like life rafts in interviews. You can catch it in the way I walk down the street in a part of town unknown. Why should I fear, or more importantly, why do I fear? Isn’t it the fear of what lies inside or fear of judgment of what’s inside? Insecurity is my motto. Can I crave security and adventure with the same brain? I only give you a glimpse when I’m dying to be understood. It’s like trying to form an opinion on what that house holds, when all you see is the light piling out of a third story window. What dreams are being created inside? What possibilities are found, and how many lie undiscovered? As far as I’m concerned it lies somewhere between endless and the forethought of tomorrow. I am both frightened and encouraged by that prospect. But isn’t that us? Aren’t we fearfully and wonderfully made? Whoever is in that room, holds treasure, holds hope, and will change the world. Where do I, in my one life, fit into this equation?

Quickly I realize on these streets I am an outsider, though I do belong to an established family. I share the common connect of disconnect with all who walk tonight. It may not be blood, but it breeds understanding, and that’s half of what it means to be a family. Still, I am but one bastardized orphan in a long line, and as unfamiliar to others as I am to myself. I’m not the kid asleep at the bar, nor am I the prostitute or dealer walking the same slanted sidewalk as me. A breath of honesty rises as I pass through the spot-street-light. I’m not confessing when I say I’ve partaken in their trademark in one form or another. Let’s try this again. I am, after all, on stage and the only one in the audience. I need to acknowledge the visible differences that make us individuals, yet I am forced to see that we both bleed. We both desire the same things, so why draw another line in the sand? I’m too divided already. Why not call her sister? Why not call her by her God-given name?

But I continue on. I look on and wonder who they are. Without my realization they see me, walking about, moving toward them on the same sidewalk. At best we resemble two trains on the same track, pulling our weight, heading for impact. They are probably thinking the same until we’ve successfully disappeared from each others view. Modern street magic. Now, I see, we are family in thought, and our familial crest is the painted picture of two souls trying to be oblivious, trying to ignore one another. We’ve mastered the mark of many families, namely the tragedy of being too busy to know what’s going on. It leaves us isolated. Alone. Removed from life. Stop. Look within. It’s my sin. It’s safe to say there is enough lumber here to build a house, and oh what a glorious mansion has been crafted. But what would lie inside except me? Empty rooms. Empty promises. I have a funny feeling I’m going blind. What I thought I saw, I can’t. I don’t recognize the me reflected in the frozen mud puddle.

My talent, God-given though it is, is lying in wait. I’ve stared at it, even poked it, touched it, groped it, but I don’t know it; nor do I own it. But you can be sure as tomorrow will come, I will ring that bell when I’m hungry, and complain when what I find presented before me isn’t a five star supper. When will I stare it in the eyes, put it in a headlock, and master it? The same can be said for my surroundings – I’ve peered, wondered, and judged what is what, never taking the time to understand what makes me myself and them they. Have I ever looked past my skin, or do I know as much about me as I do what lies inside these buildings? They all carry titles, but what can you tell by a title? What lies inside? Unwrap me like a present were the last words I whispered.

As I see the ambulance haul away another one of tonight’s entertainers, I realize I’m next. A purge is coming. I smell it between the aroma of alcohol, burgers, and cigarettes. ABC. Next it will be me. Here it comes. I will not back down. As my teeth begin to clench, my spine turns to iron. My eyes will not look away. My resolve will be met before I am. I will stand, greet the four horsemen with a handshake, and force them to look me in the eye. Take me. My purge demands more than release. I confess I don’t know how to purge without an indoctrinated ceremony, so I will crawl onto the altar and lay bare hoping that the very doctrine is removed like the tumor of conformity that lead to its birth. Before I can relax it begins raking over me; invasive as the police walking down the street in full riot gear. Is this what I signed up for? What has been dug out of me? What was found inside? This is beginning to feel like too much. I’m wondering if I have the will to see it through. Please, make me purge as I pass through the drive-thru. It will have to be either a botched surgery or introspection on the run, on the run through the darkened streets I have never known.

As I careen down the dark at breakneck speeds, I find myself down streets I do not know. Streets with names hailing the accomplishments of someone somewhere. They left an impression. They are remembered in the history records of street sign literature; almost some sort of ancient aesthetic, or an artistic annal if you think about it. But again, this is my adventure, my story…or is it? Isn’t my story part of their story and vice versa? And isn’t it time for me to admit to myself like I have professed to others that I am simply following, or at the very least trying? Should I focus on another in my story; perhaps the Story-teller? But could one argue that a dizzying point of purging through introspection is to fix what’s incorrect so you’re able to be more outward focused?

I stand lost in these street signs once again, holding a monument of granite that came from some bizarre inward dimension; namely me. This strange boulder was what was removed. Is this what we call a heart? In the midst of this stone obelisk is something beating and red. It faintly reminds me of something familiar, something I once knew well. I think I will keep it in the palm of my hand. Clenched. My heart. My treasure. I notice a man who calls the street his home looking at me as I look at him. His eyes start to tell a story before his lips have moved. I fear what it could tell, and believe perhaps I should move, though in which direction I am uncertain. Yet I cannot deny the magnetic pull nor the magnetism of this interaction at this intersection. It’s funny how at that moment of uncertainty a familiar feeling rises from the ashes like a long forgotten phoenix as bright as the neon lights haloing the distant buildings. I wonder if this is the same feeling that walks beside him? Does that make us brothers? I believe the feeling is universal, and that if  I were to describe this to someone they would begin to feel it almost instantaneously. Brothers. Is it that feeling that binds us, or more? Something sure does, because I can’t look at him without feeling. And this feeling trumpets action. Oh, it’s you again. I might have known. After a moment I continue onward. In the next few steps I resemble a child fumbling with a treasure that only they see, or in this case I see. When I open my fist clenched around my treasure, to my astonishment everything has changed. What was once a magnificent monument of cold reality, was now loose. It resembled the old tattered wrappings of some ancient mummy from a land that sounds interesting. At once I realized these were facts. Facts that more resembled beliefs than scientific insight. These facts I had stuck to my heart like stickers on a lamppost. This is what the purge was after, and what you were after. As I hold it with an open hand to my surprise and expectation I find much change. There in the moment pieces of truth begin to fall off like the leaves on Autumn trees. What remains is a sliver of the monster I once clenched, and yet a terrible burden of weight swells. My arm aches from the load. My hand strains to keep hold. Again I walk the streets until something hits me and leaves me dead in my tracks. Frozen. Our eyes meet.

Jesus. I saw you earlier, but I missed you. I was caught up in whatever I felt was important for that inconsequential second. Still, I can’t help but wonder what you’re doing here? It’s cold and windy. Where’s your jacket? Wanna step inside and a have a beer? I have a few questions to ask. First let me say it feels like molting. It feels like you’re forcing me to rid myself of all that truth I hold so dear. My facts that I take for granted. Do you realize the things you are ripping from me? It is doctrine. Theology. Politics. Religion. The very things someone told me that make you up. All that I was taught, which I was told meant I was following. Even the comfortable rebellion I have raised to keep me far from them. Christians. Everything that has caused separation. Everything that keeps me from everyone else. Are you aware that this leaves no room for division? That this leaves no room for any sort of me versus the world mentality? Does it come to your attention that in this state I am without defense? After my successful vent, painted with the carefully crafted curse, you sip, smile and whisper. What I hear shakes me. That was the point. My lips part, and a thank you spills forth. I entertain the thought you propose. I need to start over. I guess I will learn to love – everyone. Had you left me to my own devices, left me to my disconnect, I would have been standing alone when the music stops. Even now I wonder why it hasn’t already as I recall the times it should have. Yet, once again, I feel lighter. Better. I feel as though I’m ready to step outside and see what’s in store. Adventure. My mind swells with what wonder waits beyond that next step towards home.

Below are some of the photos that were used in the evening as slides and reflections. They had great depth in their simplicity and I wanted to share them with you. Thomas Nash was the designer of the room for this worship event and consequently the photographer for these incredible pictures.

Movement 1: The Cry

I love this about Lent: It addresses despair and the parts of us that say, “It’s always going to be like this”.

I’ve been realizing here recently that I love the seasons that are more about death. I love fall and winter. And I love songs about loss and I love requiems. I enjoy dark movies and books and perhaps just darker themes in general. But these last few weeks I’ve been confronted with the need to fall in love with the seasons that are all about life- spring and summer- in the same way I love the ones where everything falls asleep. It’s time for me to recognize life as something just as true as death. Wrestling with despair can birth wonderful art, but staying and living in that place would end me.

Yes, there is death, but we do not hold onto despair. A spring comes. Tomorrow will not always be like today. Things change. They grow, evolve and head towards life. We tear down deteriorating spaces and clear overgrown plots. That which needs built up can be seen heading and stretching towards light. In lent we realize our desperate need for the turning of tides to happen. Our winter is waning and being filled with glorious, warm sun.

Robert Frost has a poem about walls that begins this way:

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,

That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,

And spills the upper boulders in the sun,

And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.

Below is a picture of a way-gone wall. My two brother-in-laws used to drink massive amounts of “Bawls”, an obnoxiously named (and obnoxiously tasting) energy drink. They drank ulcer-inducing cases of this stuff (not exaggerating here. Ulcers were had. Bawls thought to be the culprit.) One spring they decided they were going to build a beautiful, blue, “Bawls” glorifying wall. They didn’t get too far before there teenage-selves realized there were better things to do.

Then over the next several years no one touched this blue structure. But here it is; decimated. And here I am this Lent, reflecting on this: there is something that doesn’t love walls. We don’t quite see it happen, but  great weather makes it’s way into our projects and constructions and tears things that need tearing down. We have hope. Things change. It’s slow and may involve some dead seasons of terrible winter. But eventually, life comes to fill where we had built our hopeless walls.

May we be blessed with hope, life, and the destruction of our walls this Lent.

Above is a song that I wrote that we recorded together. As Renee and I have been making some new music and dreaming about the next year, we are getting excited about what we’re creating. This is a sneak peak. (basic-mix, pre-mastered, basement-musings) Then below I’m sharing something that she wrote about this season.

From Renee (“Thoughts on Epiphany”):

I used to keep blankets in my car. Sneaking out of my house, late at night, I would follow the road until it turned to dirt. The light from the stereo would illuminate my car with blues until I reached the bridge that went over the river. Grabbing the blankets, I would sit on the hood of my car and face the stars.

There is an image of us alone contemplating the stars that takes form in most of our memories. Whether stopped by their brightness in our backyard, driving the long highway and catching a glimpse of their beauty, or pursuing the place where they seem to shine at their most vibrant, we have a recollection of being blown-away by stars.

The Magi in the story of the birth of Christ were star seekers. I tend to be overwhelmed by the number of stars in the sky looking back at me, but the Magi were overwhelmed by one. It symbolized future, wonder, hope, life, and home.

They followed it.

I was an angst-y teenager when I would seek stars. In a way, I felt baptized by the mass of them outnumbering me and consuming me. There was a safety looking at the stars alone under my blanket. But more importantly, there was hope. A hope that whatever I was facing, questioning, or struggling with, home existed where wonder could lead me.

During Epiphany, may we feel baptized by the hope of light that beckons us to follow it home. And feel baptized by the light we shine in giant-like and pilgrim ways. In big and small ways, a resurrection is sure to await us on the other side of our journey.

Photo courtesy of Ryan Dougherty

This is a impromptu video that Travis Reed of “Work of the People” did of me. (www.workofthepeople.com)

Happy season of hope and joy to all of you!

The inspiration for this song came from a poem by Mike Morrell. I had a re-written hymn on “Frailty” (Hymn for Rob Ely), so I thought this would again be an engaging artistic endeavor.

I asked Mike some questions regarding the process of having his poem set to music and such. He graciously gave me these thoughts!

Michael: It was flipping awesome! As a non-musician and even (I’d say) a non-poet (I write mostly journalistic pieces and essays for publication, as well as being a prolific blogger), I had written this piece after being on a major “Trinity kick,” reflecting on the relational nature of God and what God’s Three-in-Oneness means for human community. Having you email me out of the blue, having already recorded a rough cut, underscores some of the Trinitarian energy I’m beginning to notice more and more in the universe – among friends, and even strangers. It’s a pattern recognition thing.

Tim: In what way can art express aspects of the trinity, perhaps where prose doesn’t?

Michael: Well, the idea of ‘One God in three persons’ is a logical contradiction. It doesn’t work as math, and it doesn’t usually work as prose without spilling a ton of overwrought ink. But a story? A poem? A song? These can truly ‘eff the ineffable,’ and bring to life a reality more sublime and nourishing than prose alone can.

Michael: Yes indeed – when it broke out into three-part harmony. : )  That was great. And having a woman’s voice be one of those strands is a nice touch.

Tim: Where does the song best embody your heart behind the poem?

Michael: The entire song reflects my heart, which is to marvel as this kinetic, dancing community we call “God” – but I have to say, when you break out in falsetto & the three-part harmony explodes on the scene…that about sums it up. : )

Tim: Thanks, Mike! And let me know if you ever want to workshop a song together/ write something together again! I had a blast.

My mother had a jewelry box that was fascinating to me.  I would go through it’s contents with my 4-year old hands, which thrilled my mom, I’m sure. I vaguely recall losing a pair of her pearl ear-rings. I think I buried them somewhere with some other treasure I’d found!

When you opened the drawer of her tiny jewelry box, it would play a simple, toy-chimes version of “Edelweiss” from “The Sound of Music”. My young self had never  seen the musical or heard the song in any other way… but that song was captivating to me. I loved it. And I would wind the box and listen again and again. All while losing more and more of my mom’s stuff.

I decided to record “Edelweiss” for this “Frailty After-Party”. “Frailty” is an album about life and death- something I was compelled to write about after I encountered my own mortality with the birth of my daughter. So it seemed fitting to go back to a song from my own childhood. For me, it’s a bitter-sweet and wonderful contrast: while pondering death, bringing back the wonders of my childhood.

The song still holds resonance for me- of discovery and a melancholy I didn’t yet have words for.

I don’t think I’ve ever really been to an after-party. In my head, it looks like heading from the Oscars at 3 a.m. to sip champagne with P-Diddy. Perhaps listening to this 3 song sampler will give you that experience…

Basically, I enjoyed the creating of Frailty so much I wanted to prolong the magic. The times in the basement with nothing but inspiration and a Zoom H2 mic… and an old casio too. So, I recorded three more songs in the same style. A poem set to original music and two covers.

Here’s how you can pick up these three new tunes:

Buy anything on my website this month and I’ll send you these new songs to your email.

So, buy the  t-shirt you’ve been eyeing, or the OTHER Tim Coons album you don’t have yet, or get something for a friend, and you will receive brand new music, digitally delivered!

Click and listen to the audio sampler above and here’s what you’ll hear short glimpses of:

1. “Trinity” (poem by Mike Morrell, music by Tim Coons and Renee Swick)

2. “Edelweiss” (originally from The Sound of Music)

3. “Enjoy the Silence” (written by Depeche Mode)