blake studdard

every now and then, it gets to me …

every now and then, i start feeling like i’m losing myself to the things that i’m doing or not doing.

every now and then, i see my instability and start to wobble back and forth between being in control and falling from whatever i’m supposed to be balancing on.

every now and then, i feel like i’ve forgotten how to connect with anyone or anything.

it’s the kingdom of darkness. the thing responsible for sickness, hopelessness, pain.

every time it’s the ‘every now and then’ that i described above, it’s the same …

i’m doing, and not being. i’m trying and not letting. i’m paying and not taking. i’m straining and not receiving. i’m looking and not beholding. i’m hearing and not listening.

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don’t do anything. just be with him. don’t try to be with him, just let him be with you. don’t pay for the thing you never bought in the first place, take the thing sitting on the table before you. don’t strain for these things to happen, and just let them happen. don’t look for him, behold his face as he is right in front of you. don’t hear the empty words sitting on the pages of the Bible, listen to the one who is speaking them to you.

don’t do. be. don’t try. allow. don’t pay. take. don’t strain. let. don’t look. behold. don’t hear. listen.

and it’s killing me.

okay, maybe it’s a little bit fun. but not when i have an assignment due at 9:30 (8.5 hours from now) and I just now got the page to appear on my domain… no links work yet, but the images are somehow magically on the server after hours of uploading and re-uploading.

here’s the link, you may or may not even see anything, depending on what i’m doing as i fumble through my newly learned language of HTML and how to make sense of web hosting services, domains, and all that nerdy stuff. (i really want to be a web nerd now, which is new. I always thought I was just a print guy, but i’m definitely getting hooked on this stuff… can’t wait to get this site working as an online portfolio for potential clients.)

I have a LOT to tell you, but it has to be in a separate post, fo sho.

wrote this a while back, forgot about it… interesting.

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so what do you do?

i’m in school and i work.

what’s your major?

visual communications… graphic design… its the same thing.

when are you graduating?

may 2010. if i stick with the school part.

what do you do for work?

i’m a musician and a photographer.

what are you going to do after you graduate?

i’m a musician and a photographer. maybe i’ll do some design work too.

what happens when you have to support a family?

i’m not there yet.

are you preparing for retirement?

i don’t know what that means.

do you have backup plans, like a career marked out with benefits, etc?

i don’t even have plans for what i’ll do after this conversation.

I care about my family.

Who are the ones in my family?

The ones that hold the various keys to different parts of my destiny.

But as soon as I care about them because they hold the key to the next part of my life, I am derailed.

I’m learning how to be in a family. And my best/favorite teachers are those who have loved me selflessly and cared deeply and ignored my paralyzing faults, refusing to let go of the iron-sharpening-iron atmosphere where growth and destiny come from.

Ones that are teaching me at the moment :

Brett, Stephen, Phil, Madison, Kate, Charlsey

To the ones (many that are not listed above) that hold the keys :

Thank you for loving me when it’d be easy to leave me alone in my cave. Even though I draw a lot of life from secret places, it is sickening to think of life apart from community. I wasn’t created to do this alone. For right now, I was created to do this with you. I’m sorry for the times I’ve taken the easy way out and didn’t engage. In those times I was not connected to the Father’s heart that causes me to engage. Thank you for loving me as Jesus loves me, and know that it is my heart to connect with you and do life with you in whatever way pleases the Lord.

I love you.

(click image to enlarge)

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this is the first sketch of a first draft of a first idea of the artwork for the record. Critique welcome, you won’t hurt my feelings. But know that this is merely a sketch for the feel of the final artwork.

Philip and I just dropped off the hard drive at Blackwatch for mixing. 4.20 marks the day we opened our hands and let the record get the polish and finishing touches required for pressing. 5.9 marks the day we get it mastered in Tulsa, and 6.6 marks the day we release it officially, printed, packaged and ready to play.

“Visions of Choruses . 1 : Philip Rice and Blake Studdard” is the name of the record. The thread that ties the songs together is the theme of choruses… as in a choir. Each song has many layers consisting of several parts that would normally be found on an indie rock record…. not that this isn’t one. We considered the songwriting and producing in an expressive way, tying the tone of the record to the content and atmosphere from which the song was originally composed.

That’s a little update, I’ll let you in on more later.

I’ll get to that later.

Today was awesome. Scratch that. I hate when I say that. It tells so much about nothing at all.

Today was nuts. boom. 

I had  some craazy talks with some very powerful spiritual leaders in my life. Then I went to a prayer meeting where the fire alarm went off after someone prayed, ’set this place on fire!’ and the alarm intervals went perfectly to the beat of the music. Then, 

here’s the ‘first:’

I went to hug my friend and he started speaking the word of the Lord over me and I fell down. not a first. I started trembling while laying on the floor and listening to my friend (who had now idea what had happened that day) tell me things from the Lord that were relevant only to today and the conversations that happened. not a first. I probably looked like I was having a seizure. not a first. 

But then I heard some people laughing, like something funny was happening. Apparently someone who saw what was happening called 911 and the paramedics and firemen came to check me out. FIRST. My friends were laughing hysterically and waving the emergency workers away, saying everything was completely fine. 

Awesome evening to cap off a great day.

Then, as if it wasn’t enough not to have the cops on my trail, I got pulled over for having a break light out. Also a first. All this in one day. The day of significant conversations and the eve of some intense conversations to be had this weekend.

Significant?

I recently received a comment on my about me (“blake?”) page that I found extremely encouraging. 

Keeping with the month 11 theme, Mozambique has continued to pop up in many areas, but to receive a mozambican comment that quoted my words from last year really sent me over the edge. ‘It messed with me,’ is what I’d normally say.

The fact that it was from mozambique was the cute part. It’s almost expected that the Lord would be reiterating the theme He has me on right now. But what really messed me up was that the person quoted me in their comment…

“‘So, we don’t know each other. Found your blog in some random way. was hooked by this comment.

“The thing about allowing the Lord to take His place as your God is that you’ll just live the most messed up, crazy life. And you will be left each day feeling like you’ve actually lived.”

I love it.. I was encouraged by it.. I needed to hear it. Im living in Mozambique at the moment. (originally from SA). God is incredible and the more I submit to Him the more He seems to take me on this incredible adventure. It’s so fun.

Keep Blogging, keep making music, keep dreaming.’

Lauren”

I don’t have time to look up the date when I wrote that. It feels like I wrote it last year. Regardless, I remember writing it. I remember feeling like a broken record. I can’t imagine how many times I wrote things along those lines, things about fire, numbers, dreams, etc. 

Some guys prayed for me last night at celebration (Norman Community Church’s first-Sunday-of-the-month service with all the housechurches together), and some things that came up as they prayed were about a shift happening in my life where I’m being set on fire again. I’m being taken back to the place of open dialogue, the place of fervent intercession and focus on the fiery love of God that moves me. (It’s hard for me to remember much of what was prayed, honestly, because I was more in a place of experiencing the moment – paralyzed – than of analyzing and bookmarking the various words given.)

I say all this to say :

I’m going back. Not back in time, not back to the old comforts by the names of pain and travail (sometimes I wish I could), not to some method that worked before : but back to intimacy. Back to secrecy. Back to the mysterious place of oneness with the Lord. And man, it feels so good to be back in that.

Something robbed me of the secrecy and intense oneness last summer. I’ve had such a great series of seasons between then and now, but this Spring is definitely bringing life back into the prayer closet.

K, back to studying.

Yesterday marked the 11th month since our return home from Mozambique, Africa. I won’t go into the details of the past weeks, but I will say that the Lord has been highlighting the trip in supernatural ways. Madison (my assistant leader and close friend) and I sat down last night and began (emphasis on began) unpacking and accessing what had become an aquifer (aq⋅ui⋅fer    [ak-wuh-fer]  Show IPA –noun

 of secrets, questions, mysteries, and revelations that’s been brewing since last year.

We hit some heavy revelations, such as the fact that God is calling us to interpret the trip as we would a dream, vision, or picture. Little moments, happenings that we have been confused by are the ones He wants to use as keys to access the next room of intimacy in the house that the Mozambique trip constructed in hour hearts. It’s just like that – it’s as if the trip created a house full of chambers and passageways and it resides in my heart. If I don’t discover what has been placed there, I will be neglecting parts of my own heart, losing touch with the One who speaks to my heart.

11 is the number that reminds me of the prophetic : it’s an imperfect number, just as prophecy is imperfect. If it was perfect, we would be God. But we prophesy in part, not wholly. We see things God is saying (many times) as if we are looking in a dirty mirror.

So month 11, appropriately, is becoming the month God is bringing revelation to the many questions I have about the Mozambique trip. I loved the trip. I love the people I met. But even during the ideal moments, I just felt the Lord carving something deeper in me than just a memory of a nice trip. We’ll see how far the rabbit hole goes I guess…