Culture

During the summer of my junior year in high school I attended a week long art camp at Denver Art Institute. It was supposed to be one of those once in a lifetime, career charting experiences, but I remember practically nothing about it. The only thing I recollect is the last day; the closing ceremonies party. About twenty-five of us were gathered in a parking lot behind one of the buildings enjoying the outdoors, the Denver skyline, the complimentary snacks and a live DJ spinning top-40 under a tent in back. I was watching the DJ. He was thoroughly enjoying his craft even though no one in our little crowd was paying much attention to him. He was mainly mixing for himself. At one point he picked up a record, smiled at no one in particular and placed it on his turntable. Then, as if everyone suddenly noticed there was music playing, people started dancing. It was an up-beat song: a four-on-the-floor kick, a euro-dance synth, and a bouncy female vocal singing something in Spanish. The groove was catchy and our group loved it. One of the students leaned over to me and answered my unspoken question, “It's called the Macarena.”

Last year, Tastyfresh.com gave out its first awards. The music industry has the Grammys. The television industry has the Emmies. Tastyfresh has the Freshies. They Freshies are our way of recognizing the achievements that Christians have made over the past year. In 2008, the senior staff picked the winners. This time around, so do you. We’re going to have the staff picks and the community picks. This month, you will be able to nominate people for the various awards and next month, you will get to vote for the winner of each category. The staff will weigh in with their own collective picks and all will be revealed in March.

This article is not an official article written by the police or the news, it is written from personal experience from someone who has seen more in this world than I would hope most others have. It is also written not just for this generation but for the next, the generation where kids bring weapons to school and murder each other on city streets. This is for you, kids, because I was one of you once, and I remember growing up in a confusing world and trying to keep my head screwed on straight. I would read the book of Proverbs because I found it pointed out a lot of wisdom and direction for a kid trying to grow up in a world by myself with no real authority at the time and terrible role models. I found God is faithful when no one else can be found or trusted. Even if He sometimes comes through for me at the very last minute, literally at one second to midnight.

Laodicea was a town in the southwest of what today is Turkey. It is also the site of one of the earliest Christian churches. Laodicea is mentioned in two places within the Bible. The first is in Paul’s letter to the Colossians and then again in the book of Revelation. The contrast between these two mentions is astounding. In fact, it is so astounding that it is something we really need to think about as we are discussing not only what it means for our scene to be united, but as we decide what direction this scene will take and what the cornerstone theology of this movement will be.

The first article in this series seemed to have raised some hot bottom issues. I knew that some of what I said would not go over very well, but it did what I had hoped it would and sparked a very productive discussion on the forums. The main concern that evolved in the discussion over last months article circled around one issue… a fear of inflexible central control. Let me assure all of you that such a thing was very far away from anything I was considering when I wrote the article. It has been a fear that I have been aware of for years now and it is one that I believe has kept us from growing and developing as a scene. In fact, you could make a very strong and convincing argument that there really isn’t a Christian EDM scene… there is seemingly only Tastyfresh when it comes to a global movement.

In September 2000 The Christian Herald published an article that began with this statement: "This past summer, Toronto's mayor, city counselors and law enforcement officers debated how to clean up the city¹s rave scene. A group of Christians are one step ahead of them, throwing dance parties with no drugs, no weapons, no drinking, no smoking, no sexually provocative clothing and no one being wheeled out on a stretcher." We didn't just not invite drug dealers and gangs in - we actively kept them out.

The following is an archive of the discussion regarding part one of the Unity series. As I strongly believe that these discussions on this series are just as vital as the articles, I’ll be archiving each one with the rest of the series. I hope you find this helpful. Some edits were made to assist in readability and grammar. Thanks to everyone who took part in this.

The population here at Tastyfresh is very diverse in two specific areas: political views and spiritual views. No matter which side of these debates a person is on, their views of politics and God are mashed together in ways that seem diametrically opposed to someone else on the site. This isn’t the root cause of our disorganization or disunity, but it is a conduit to quickly explain some of our issues.

This article is the first in what will be a serious of discussions regarding unity in our scene. There is no doubt that we have been less united in the past, but are we really as united as we think we are and could we become even more closely united? This is exactly what I hope to examine over the course of the next several issues. Enough of the intro, let’s dive into the meat.

Whether you want to promote events, start a record label or DJ agency, run a website, radio show or magazine, or anything else in the scene, the following tips should help you get started. Only you know what you uniquely have to give. Don't be afraid to step up, learn some new skills and make something happen. Once someone takes the lead, people are likely to follow and come along for the ride.