{"id":721,"date":"2011-03-07T11:48:42","date_gmt":"2011-03-07T11:48:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jazztheologian\/2011\/03\/knowing-jesus-by-heart-it-takes-practice.html"},"modified":"2011-03-07T11:48:42","modified_gmt":"2011-03-07T11:48:42","slug":"knowing-jesus-by-heart-it-takes-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/03\/knowing-jesus-by-heart-it-takes-practice.html","title":{"rendered":"Knowing Jesus By Heart: It Takes Practice!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"book_finding_the_groove.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

“If I told you you were going with me tonight to hear someone who has practiced the trumpet for thirty years, what would you expect?  Your hopes would be high, and you would anticipate hearing someone whose skills were highly developed.  Perfection wouldn’t be the standard, but surely it would be reasonable to look forward to an enjoyable performance.  What if I told you I have practiced following Jesus for thirty-two years?  What should you expect of me?<\/p>\n
<\/div>\n
Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to assume of any Christian whom you encounter that they are “practicing”–that they have a basic understanding of the essential groove of God and that, while perfection isn’t expected, you can at least jam together?  <\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
What would you like to be able to assume of everyone who calls themselves a Christian?  What would your top three Christian practices be?<\/i><\/b>“<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
(excerpt taken from my book–Finding the Groove:  Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith<\/a>)<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“If I told you you were going with me tonight to hear someone who has practiced the trumpet for thirty years, what would you expect?  Your hopes would be high, and you would anticipate hearing someone whose skills were highly developed.  Perfection wouldn’t be the standard, but surely it would be reasonable to look forward…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-composing-a-jazz-shaped-faith","category-practicing-christianity"],"yoast_head":"\nKnowing Jesus By Heart: It Takes Practice! - The Jazz Theologian<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/03\/knowing-jesus-by-heart-it-takes-practice.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Knowing Jesus By Heart: It Takes Practice! - The Jazz Theologian\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"“If I told you you were going with me tonight to hear someone who has practiced the trumpet for thirty years, what would you expect? 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Author of Finding the Groove: Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith (Zondervan) and the upcoming, Strange Fruit: The Cross as a Way of Life (2011). Founder of Project 127, a ministry dedicated to seeing the day when there are no children waiting for homes in Colorado's foster care system. Robert deeply desires to see the body of Christ mobilized to serve the least of these. The poor, the down and out, the disenfranchised and disabled, those deemed unimportant and the unborn. He believes that God loves all people yet he has a special heart for the poor and the poor in spirit, the miserable and the marginalized. A Contributing Editor for Leadership Journal and Urbanfaith.com. He acquired a B.A. in Bibilcal Studies from Colorado Christian University and a Master of Arts in World Christianity (Missiology) from Denver Seminary. Robert is married to the love of his life, Barbara, and they have six energetic children (3 boys & 3 girls--one bio, five adopted--two from Ethiopia). Friend of God...Passionate about the Body of Christ...Lover of this thing called jazz! Please visit Jazztheologian.com for contact info., speaking schedule, videos, Facebook and Twitter.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/author\/rgelinas"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/79"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}