Art in Politics

Like many an American, I've caught snipits of the Democratic and Republican National Conventions during the last couple weeks. And a couple things stood out to me...

1) I actually respect both of the presidential candidates this go-around, and I don't think that's ever been the case before.

Part of that stems from my conservative upbringing and family members active in the Republican party.
But I think it has more to do with the struggles that both candidates went through before they were standing in front of America with a 50% lottery ticket at becoming the next president.
I genuinely like both McCain and Obama and the ideals they've not just talked about, but have backed up with LIFE in the years before it was cool or good campaign practice.
I will definitely vote for ONE of them, but I think both these guys love America and want a better America. And a better America that starts at the bottom and works its way up.

2)In both of the conventions, at the crowning moments when things are supposed to be reaching an emotional high...
I hear music.

"Well yah...duh, Jon. Music. It's what you do when you're announcing something big. Like a who/what/when/where/why VP candidate or the '98 Bulls starting lineup in the Finals."
But it wasn't just any music...in the Democratic convention, I heard U2 blasting from the rafters. I think it was off their last album..."City of Blinding Lights" or maybe it was "Where the Streets Have No Name". I get my streets and cities mixed up sometimes with U2...it definitely wasn't "Bloody Sunday".

And in the Republican convention when McCain announces Sarah Palin as his VP running mate...I hear the theme song from Rudy.

And I'm stirred. In both conventions.

When Barack is set to take the stage and become the first Black man to become a presidential nominee...we watch a 10 minute docu-background of his life, broadcast in gorgeous high definition, with a score that sounded composed specifically for that piece.
A week later McCain runs a similar piece detailing his incredible journey from a tortured and dying prisoner of war to Republican nominee.
FANTASTIC stories, both of them.

All this auditory and visual stuff reminded me of a very interesting thing...sound and light have the power to change me.
Think about that.
Colors and sound waves have the power to literally start a chemical process in my brain that makes me feel a certain way.
And hopefully from that...think a certain way...and then act a certain way.
Words can do precisely the same thing.
Little scratchings on paper or symbols on an LCD can make me laugh, cry, cuss, or pray. They have the power to touch my heart, and at the right moment, touch my soul.
That still blows me away. To me, this is a fantastic proof that there is a God that made this Universe, and there's a reason we who believe in such a God call him The Creator.
God loves creativity! While I'm no theologian I can see this dichotomy of God:

He is the same from eternity past to eternity future.

He loves creativity, diversity and changing things up.

(Take a gander at any episode of Planet Earth if you don't think God loves diversity. That He only loves white people or rich people or religious people.)

Skeptics hear me out...

What possible reason could there be for us as humans to say that any group of notes sounds better than any other group of notes? Why do some songs touch us in a powerful emotional way, while others are just Muzak that wifts on by? In a universe that supposedly is completely random and chaotic, we would have no right to judge something and say that it sounds good.
It should all sound the same....a jumbled inconsequential mess.

But it's doesn't. There is such a thing as music. There is such a thing as art.
And there is such a thing as good art and bad art. Now you can argue that art is in the eye of the beholder, to which I say...YES! IT IS!

God has given each of us a distinct vision of the world around us, with distinct likes and dislikes.
Every person tastes a glass of wine differently, which when you think about it, makes it pretty stupid to charge $85 a bottle when the $10 bottle may taste better to a person if they weren't told they're supposed to like the more expensive wine.

My long-awaited point is this...our creativity and love for certain things is an imprint of the Creator that made each of us. So there's all this awesome diversity and variation in Creation and in us as individuals...but at the same time there is this other much larger common thing that connects us together.

This Democrat/Republican/Human thing that hits us all at a heart level. This deeper thing that resonates and strikes a cord that is impossible to fully describe because it's so personal and intimate. It's something that words will never fully capture. Some people call it "beauty".

And I see beauty as a sign that all of us are made for something bigger than an election, bigger than jobs, bigger than sports, bigger than looking good, bigger than ourselves. That's right. We are made for something bigger than ourselves.
I believe we were made for Love.

We were made to be loved by our Lover. And I believe he can talk to us through music and images and words. In dreams, in sunsets, in a glass of water on a scorching day. In a baby's giggle and a thunderclap.

And I believe his message to anyone willing to open their ears is
"I love you. Just as you are. Do you love me too?
I'm the Love Story you were made for."

...

So yah, I went from "I accept this nomination" to "God loves you", which don't belong in the same sentence for most people.

But that's what I've come away with.
That and I want to restart "Vote or Die".
It's so Revolutionary War hip-hoppy.