LaRosa Johnson {dot} com

Just a brief update on my “experiments”…

Experiment One: So far, I can’t say that I’ve completely abandoned hip-hop, but it has definitely been sparse. The only hip-hop I’ve really listened to are albums that needed to be put in the queue for review on Trailblazin Ministries. As the gatekeeper of the site, I need to continue to make sure that what gets covered has acceptable content. I have been listening to a lot of new music, though. I’ve found a few new jazz artists that I like, thanks to my friend Antoine. I’ve also picked up some R&B/Soul too, so that’s been a nice listen. It’s definitely been a break in the monotony. In a lot of ways, my perspective on music has really changed for the better, even to the point of openly being more critical of the hip-hop I listen to. Of late, I’ve been able to listen to a CD once, extract its content & theme, and determine whether it’s good or not; not bad for a single listen.

Experiment Two: This one hasn’t gone quite like I planned, but it’s doing better than I expected. I’ve been able to have devotions ready for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, so I count it a success. Still finding it a bit difficult to get in all of the studying I would like, so I need to figure that out. Partly it’s because I’ve found myself drained, of late, so much so that the last thing I want to do is sit at my computer and try to read. It’s one of those things where my spirit is willing, but my flesh is apparently weak, fat & lazy. I’m going to pray and see where I can do better.

Experiment Three: Things are getting better at work. My motivation is coming back, slowly, and I’m finally starting to get into a groove with things, making sure people are getting things done and that I’m able to tackle some tasks as well. Still growing here, but progress is what I’m looking for.

That’s it. Just a (somewhat) brief update. Off to do whatever.

There are some things that always make me laugh. One of those things is when I’m reading the comments that people have toward my critical album reviews. It seems that if you say anything negative about a Christian album then you’re immediately someone who is lukewarm in their faith & don’t have a “spiritual pulse.” Since when does having an opinion on someone’s music equal no longer being a believer who is maturing in the faith?

Seriously, it amuses me. I say that I want to see an artist expand their subject matter instead of recycling the same content over & over, and now I’m labeled as someone who doesn’t appreciate or have a love for the gospel. Funny. It’s funny on a number of levels. First, there’s a lot more to talk about than just the gospel in the entire canon of Scripture, so why not touch on some of that? Secondly, as it relates to the personal attacks, how many of these people even know about the ministry that I have, whose sole focus is to teach the Bible? Third, since when does someone’s opinion of music become equivalent to their appreciation & love of Scripture/gospel?

I could flip the script and start judging & gauging their maturity from the comments they post, but I won’t because then I’d be no better. I just think people need to be wiser about the comments they make, and not be so quick to judge someone’s spiritual maturity based on an album review. If they were judging it based on what I do at Trailblazin Ministries, then that’d be something else entirely, but not an album review, which is meant to be a critical look at music. Just some food for thought.

A favorite quote from one of my favorite television shows, The A-Team.

That’s what I felt like saying yesterday when I was finally able to figure out a longstanding “bug” that I was having with the Trailblazin Ministries website and the drupal engine I was using. To make a long story short, I’m using a feature to automatically publish content at a future date that I set; but, when content would get published, comments would be disabled (and I wanted them enabled by default). So, after an article was published & live on the site, I’d have to manually go back and edit it to turn on the comments, which totally defeats the purpose of being able to automate the publishing of my content.

Well, I did some playing around with my local install of TM (via Wampserver) and tinkering with the settings. The main issue is that when “cron” is run (the tool that runs background processes on the site) it runs as an anonymous user, which does not have permission to administer comments (thus they get turned off). After playing around with some test posts, I found the problem. Apparently, I was using a method of “save post” & “publish post” together with “publish latest pending revision” (I have a revisioning system setup) and that was causing the issue. Whenever a post is saved it used the permission of that user, which is anonymous in this case. So, I simply undid the “save post” & “publish post” options & just left the “publish latest pending revision” and all is well!

I’m glad I got it figured out. I had posted on the Drupal forums, but that was no help since nobody replied; but, there’s a great feeling of satisfaction knowing that I was able to figure it out on my own, especially knowing that the error was caused by my own stupidity/ignorance. Either way, I’m happy and Trailblazin Ministries is working like a charm, just like I want it to!

In recent days, today included, I’ve had a few chats with my friend Antoine. On any given day, we talk about almost anything, especially in relation to living the Christian life. A few of our more recent conversations have really stuck in my head; most aren’t really related, other than showing the evolution of my spiritual walk and maturing as a person.

The first conversation was had earlier this week; we were chatting about Christian hip-hop music. I had mentioned the name of a few albums & songs that I had come across of late. Most of them left me shaking my head, and wondering what had become of the genre. In our chat, I had made a comment to the extent that I was really starting to lose hope/faith in the genre. His response to me was, “Starting? How about lost and looking for a reason to keep it there?” (paraphrase). It really made sense, and his follow-up comment wondering why I try to convince myself otherwise was spot on. For the most part, I have somewhat of a love-hate relationship with the genre. I still support it because I dig the music (most days) and my site has found a nice niche with it. On the other hand, there’s a lot I see that I could do without, leaving me wondering why I don’t just let it all go.

With that in mind, I’m going to try my first experiment. I’m going to get rid of most of the Christian hip-hop from my Zune and car (leaving it on my computer, of course). In its place, I’m going to make use of my Zune Pass and add some of the other musical genres that I’ve been listening to of late, particularly jazz, soul, UK R&B/Pop, some electronic music, and anything else I find appealing. There are a few CHH albums I’ll keep around because I find them edifying; but it will only be a few (let’s say less than 20 out of the hundreds that I own).

Why do it? Mainly to get along without it; I’ve basically been listening to it non-stop for a little more than a decade. I’m tired of waiting for the scene to mature, and it’s not like it’s my “calling.” So, I’m just going to let it be and see where God takes me. Who knows, I may not look back. I don’t have a timeframe for this experiment, I’m just going to let it take its course.

That’s the first experiment. The second conversation was had this afternoon. I was telling Antoine how I felt that Trailblazin Ministries was in a good place right now, other than the fact that I wish that I could have content to put up daily, instead of being so sporadic. I told him that I’d like to see devotions published daily (M-F) with a full length study published monthly, along with sporadic music reviews & articles. His comment to me was, “Why aren’t you?” I told him that it was a time issue. He told me that it was a lame excuse and that if I really wanted to do it I could make it happen by simply better managing my time & prioritizing (much like I did when I picked up Hebrew this year). In thinking about it, I see where he’s coming from. There’s a lot of idle time in the day where I find myself just surfing the Internet; I could use that time for study and writing.

So, that’s my second experiment. I’m going to challenge myself to cut back on the “idle” times and be more diligent at studying and writing. I don’t think I’ll immediately get to writing devotions every day of the week, but I can start with at least two or three per week, and build from there. As far as devotions go, I’ll probably have to pick up a few additional topics of study so that I can remain fresh without focusing too hard on a single subject. That will help because if I get stuck in one topic/study, I can move to another and keep moving with content.

Experiment number three? Nothing major, just continuing to improve my management skills at work and keeping myself motivated. That’s another talk Antoine & I had. His words of wisdom have had immediate benefit, making for a productive end of the week. I just need to keep growing and learning, figuring out what works best for me, instead of simply doing what may have worked for someone else.

Let the experiments commence…