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eLi: LIVING LIFE ON THE EDGE OF CONVICTION NOW

                  Bringing Conviction Back to Christianity & Christian music despite controversy

 

By Deborah L. Kunesh

©Copyright by Deborah L. Kunesh, 2002

 

 

 

 

“I’ve decided this is who I am.   I’m going to bring my vulnerability to the table.  I can’t pretend to be aloof.  I can’t be this mysterious artist which makes people go, ‘Oooh, I want to, I’ve got to be around this eLi guy,’ this or that.  That’s just not who I am.  I could sell more albums, I could be cooler, I could be sexier, I could be more mysterious.  I’m not. That’s just who I am.  This is it.  What you see is what you get.  It’s not as exciting, it’s not as mysterious, it’s not as intriguing.  And you know what?  It’s fine.  I mean, really.  I understand.  Look, I know what it takes to be more successful, I’m not a stupid man.  But I’m just saying, this is what I am and I can’t be anything that I’m not.  ”  eLi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“…that my hair would not stick up in weird places, and I’d be someone someday…”  Relevant words, lightened up with a twist of humor.  To any Eli fan, those lyrics are very familiar, ringing true to life and captured in his song “Things I Prayed For,” off the CD of the same title.  What may surprise some is that those words ring true to life in how Eli sees himself, even now.  Despite the success, Eli is still very much a down-to-earth guy who takes his faith and his stand that he is just “one of us” very seriously. 

 

“Well, you know what’s so funny?” asks Eli.  “I’m not the brightest bulb in the pack.  I didn’t catch on to this until about a year ago.  I don’t get, like… it doesn’t sink in that people are coming to the concerts to see me.  It still doesn’t register.  I don’t know what I’m thinking,” laughs Eli.  “I guess I just try to make sure I don’t indulge myself in those kinds of thoughts, you know?  I never thought there would be anything about me. I mean, it’s me.  I don’t understand that because it’s me.  You know?”  As he asks in his bio, “I’ve been doing this 10 years-am I somebody relevant?  It’s time to find out…and let myself be me.”

 

Eli doesn’t embody most of the trappings of the modern-day music industry…the tour buses, polished, high-end show production, celebrity status.  What he does embody is an everyman with a servant’s heart for Christ. There is no façade, no agenda, no pretense. Instead, what you see is what you get, and that is a man, his guitar and a voice that powerfully and emotionally relays a strong conviction of faith that was earned the hard way, and a true sense of what it means to be Christ-like. From his purposeful, direct eye contact when he’s speaking with you, his open accessibility to all who come to see him and wish to correspond with him, to the passion he has for what he speaks and the ability of his lyrics, his voice and his music to stir the soul, he proves himself to be a person that really believes (and acts on) what he preaches.

 

Spend a little time with Eli, whether talking with him one-on-one, listening to his CDs and really taking in the lyrics or sitting in the audience at one of his concerts, and you will experience something that is very rare these days.  Along with the very apparent gift of faith, musical talent and ministry that he has been given, there is an almost unheard of transparency there.  The ability and willingness to literally bare his soul and expose who he is emotionally and spiritually, sharing his personal struggles and weaknesses with all those he comes in contact with, allowing himself to be vulnerable for the good of others, as well as sharing his sense of humor and gentle sarcasm. 

 

Okay, let’s back track for a minute here.  Pulling up to the First Baptist Church in Aurora the morning of the interview, I wasn’t sure what was in store.  I knew Eli’s music and had been touched by songs like “Stand” and “King of the Hill,” a song which brought me to the cross and made me feel as if I was right there, hearing Jesus’ innermost thoughts and cries; and I had laughed along with the lyrics of “Things I Prayed For”, relating especially to the lyrics that dealt with hair and grandfathers, since every time he sang that it made me think of my own hair’s tendency to want to do it’s own thing, as well as remember my own grandfather, who had passed away several years ago, as well as a desire to know a grandfather whom I never had the privilege to know. I had his CDs, was intrigued by this guy with the unique and passionate voice, and had seen his picture on a large poster at our local Christian bookstore.  Having been at this music journalism thing for a while now, I know the drill.  None of that prepared me for the real deal.

 

 

  

Debbie Kunesh with Eli after the interview

 

This had been an interview I had wanted to do for quite a while.  “King of the Hill” was the first Eli song that I had heard and it had touched my heart, and after hearing a radio interview done with Eli several years before, I was intrigued.  I picked up a copy of “Now the News”, his most current CD, listened to it, and my intrigue and appreciation grew. This was not your usual Christian music fare.  The issues were deep, and as a listener I was being told that I should “take off my stupid bracelet unless I’m going to do what Jesus would.”  Now that’s where it’s at, I thought. 

 

After visiting the little lady’s room, I went back in to the church office where my husband was waiting and found Eli entertaining both my husband and the janitor with stories of his recent trip to Amsterdam, and these were some colorful stories. I think I remember hearing words like luggage, and, oh yeah, prostitutes and people in the churches there using a four letter word as translation for Eli’s famous saying in regards to manure (more on that later if you’re not familiar with it).  You’re going to have to keep reading if you want to know the scoop on that conversation!  Boy, this was going to be some interview!  With curiosity mixed with a bit of trepidation, I followed Eli into the sanctuary to conduct the interview.  It was a hot day and the sanctuary was the only air-conditioned part of the church building.  Sitting in that pew, somewhat nervously asking my questions and listening intently to Eli’s responses, something happened that I had not prepared or bargained for.  That interview and the concert later that evening, became life-changing events for me in how I saw myself, the world, my faith and Christian music, and personally brought a lot of healing to my life. 

 

After conducting the interview and attending the concert that evening, I had a whole new appreciation for this artist that I had always admired.  I had come that day to conduct an interview, and left having been ministered to & having a whole new perspective.  Eli was also gracious enough to grant me a phone interview as well and the result of those 2 fairly lengthy interviews is this article.  I have never experienced such upfront honesty and openness, as well as a willingness to really serve and care about people, as evidenced by the complete acceptance that he shows each and every person that comes to his concerts and the time he spends with them. But don’t take my word for it.  Read on and decide for yourself.  This article is a culmination of several hours worth of interviews, but I think you’ll find what Eli had to say very inspirational, enjoyable and well worth reading.  He had a lot of interesting and important things to say and was quite candid and upfront.  This is far from your typical interview.  So pull up a chair, grab yourself a hot, steamy mug of your favorite beverage and be prepared for some life-changing, thought-provoking, eye-opening and surprising reading.

 

 

Simply Eli: Getting To Know The Man Behind The Music

 

 

Eli has been described as Christian music’s Cat Stevens, (who was one of his original influences, along with the likes of Jim Croce, John Denver, etc.), his voice and sound having been compared to Stevens.  The similarities are most evident on Eli’s own version of “Morning Has Broken”, a song which Stevens had originally recorded and made popular back in the ‘70’s, and which Eli recorded on his first label release album, “Things I Prayed For”.  He has also seen his share of troubles, having lived some of them in the public eye, and he’s dealt with concerns and controversy over everything from how the public would perceive him after going through a divorce, with his record company expressing concern regarding his public image and their worries that he would be seen as either gay or a womanizer due to his divorce; to most recently dealing with criticism and skepticism within Christian radio and media regarding his last release “Now the News.”  Beyond the comparisons and the controversy, who is Eli really?  If you’ve had the chance to meet him, attend one of his concerts or listen to his music and take in the lyrics, then the answer to that question is quite obvious, as he pulls no punches and puts himself right out there. 

 

“I’m just one of them,” exclaims Eli, after being asked to describe himself.  “I think that’s the thing.  The purpose of the concert, especially…People have to take time to investigate.  That’s why the songs are there, and it’s not a ploy to get them to buy them.  That’s why I put them out there.  I’ve done all I can.  People have to take the time to investigate.  They need to come to a concert.  They need to listen to a CD.  There’s plenty of bootlegged stuff out there.  We let people bootleg the concerts.  We encourage them to.  Pass the stuff around to your friends.  We don’t care.  It’s obviously not about money for us.  We’re trying to do whatever we can to encourage people.  Money’s obviously not our goal and people can tell that by now.  I’m every person you’ve ever met.  I’m the majority.  I represent the average male in America and average person, you know?  The hopes and the failures of every man, woman and child.  I’m just the voice of a person in this country or in this world, and I know what it’s like to fall down and I know what it’s like to get back up.  That’s who I am.  I don’t throw stones, you know?” 

 

Having started his music career as the indie artist formerly known as Paul Falzone (and no, he hasn’t taken on a symbol for his namesake), he was given the name Elijah by his adoptive father and laughingly jokes with audiences that Paul Falzone is dead. “I’m adopted,” said Eli.  “It’s an adopted name.  It’s a long, dysfunctional family thing, but I was adopted by my stepfather, so I was given that name later.  It’s not my birth name, so I have two names.  The man with two names.  Many names.  The police are still looking for me under my other name.  You always need one to fall back on when leaving the country,” laughs Eli. 

 

Eli had some rough beginnings, and has seen his share of struggles, beginning at a young age.  Having grown up in a really rough neighborhood in LA, “it was a really bad one.  It was a really nasty, gang-infested area, and the cops wouldn’t even come into my neighborhood unless there was 2 patrol cars and there were 2 cops per car,” he recounts a time when he was in second grade and there was a sniper with a high-powered rifle and scope shooting at the kids at the school from across the street, and he remembers well the fear and humiliation tied to that experience.  His father left the family while Eli was still fairly young, and Eli dealt with many personal demons and struggles from a very young age, from drugs, alcohol and promiscuity, to other personal struggles, including living homeless on the streets of L.A. at one point, and divorce later on in life. “I was drinking in elementary school,” states Eli, with some pain still evident in his voice when he speaks of the struggles of his youth. Reminders of a past that he would sometimes like to re-write, but has come to realize and appreciate instead that these very experiences have made him who he is today.  “I was a full-blown alcoholic and drug addict in elementary school. I was sleeping around. I was stealing. I was partying.  I was a full-blown everything.  I had run away from home, I was living on the streets. I was living la vida loco man,” exclaims Eli, fully realizing that some of the truths he puts out there about his own struggles sometimes cause people to take a step back or get freaked out initially.  He chooses to allow himself to risk and be vulnerable, and to put it all out there, because he knows by experience that in doing so, in being honest about his own shortcomings and failures, that it will allow others to be able to deal with their own shortcomings and be set free. 

 

Growing up, Eli was exposed to church and faith, but feels that as a family that they were not Christian.  “No, we weren’t Christians growing up,” states Eli.  “My parents exposed us to church and we’d go to church once in a while.  My Mom believed in Jesus and stuff, but my Dad was kind of a whacko and he was on and off with God, go to church once in a while, we’d go for a year or two, and then he left when we were 9 for the last time.  Then my mom started going to church a lot when he left, but then she got remarried, that stopped it.  They stopped going to church.  Didn’t need it I guess, anymore, I don’t know.  But I didn’t go to church.  I was a druggie.”

 

It wouldn’t be until later on that he came to the faith.  “Yeah, I was in rehab.  I had run away and I went into a group home and ended up in rehab.  About a year-and-a-half later was when I became a Christian,” said Eli.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Young Eli             

 

It is these very struggles, some of which at times, the church has been guilty of turning their backs on, that give Eli his vulnerability and his ability to relate to all of us as a fellow Christian who has struggled and failed and gotten up again, and who has found that there is forgiveness and wholeness at our Master’s feet.  It is the very thing that his fans find so comforting and familiar about him.  As the words of his song “Unqualified” state, “Who am I that you should treat me like a hero, I am no superman but just another face…” Eli sees himself as one of us, and not a celebrity of any sort, refers to his concerts as a foot washing service, in reference to Jesus washing the feet of the disciples, evidence of his servant’s attitude, and readily admits his mistakes and failures so that we can all deal with our own piles of manure, so to speak. 

 

“Is this concert tonight about them or about me?  It’s about them.  What do they need?  This is a foot-washing service.  It’s not an eLi service.  Let me tell you, I am sick of hearing myself sing.  Listen, I’ve got the CDs at home somewhere.” eLi

 

He is quick to point out, however, that at times, the relevance of his past as a real testimony to faith, as poignant and real as it is, can sometimes be wrongly glorified.  After one of his concerts, Eli was approached by a young man who was struggling with the sense that he had no real testimony to his faith, as he had grown up in the church and had never experienced the type of struggles that Eli had experienced and overcome.  “The sad part is that we’ve glorified people like me because I’ve done all the stupid things,” states Eli.  “That’s a sin of the church.  Basically it came down to (the fact that) he was struggling with condemnation.  He was condemning himself for the fact that he hadn’t sinned.  A part of him was feeling like maybe he should go out and slip up so that he could feel more of God’s grace.  I’m going, ‘I understand that maybe you feel like you should do that so that you can feel more of God’s grace because right now you’re feeling these struggles, but do you realize that you and I are both in the same place right now in our walk as far as going deeper with the Lord?  But the difference is, we’re here, but I’m carrying extra baggage.  I’m carrying guilt, condemnation (a different kind of condemnation,)’…and to see him just open up and get it, I said, ‘you’ve got to feel pain, you’ve got to be a partaker of Christ’s suffering.’ 

 

(Eli begins to read) 1st Chapter of 2nd Corinthians, Paul says, “What a wonderful God we have,” starting in verse 3, this translation is probably a little different,” states Eli, “but it says ‘What a wonderful God we have, He is the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the source of every mercy and the One who so wonderfully comforts and strengthens us in our hardships and trials.  And why does He do this?  It says, ‘When others are troubled, needing our sympathy and encouragement, we can pass on to them the same help and comfort God has given us.’  We’ve been partakers of Christ’s suffering, so that we can be partakers of His comfort and pass that comfort along to others.

 

“You’ve got to be partakers of his suffering as well though if you’re going to be a partaker of that comfort.  You’ve got to experience the suffering as well,” said Eli.   “And part of that means, you can’t learn that from reading the Bible, you can’t learn that from reading books or going to church services, you’ve got to experience a dying to yourself and it has nothing to do with sinning.  You can go out and sin all day long, that’s not the road to suffering.  That means drinking from His cup and that means being a disciple and that means dying to yourself from the inside, and that just means the hurting, and that means God will use the things in this life, and whatever it is, it’s a cross you carry. That’s what God will use, and when you see it like that, and when you see, your perspective changes, (and) that becomes your crown as well as your cross.  God is saying, ‘This is what I’m using to make you like me,’ and all of a sudden you realize how blessed you are and you’re saying, ‘Oh, this is what you’re using to give me a ministry like you Jesus.’  And he’s saying, ‘Yeah.’  So the next time you see that person crying and weeping you’re able to have true compassion for them, not fake compassion, but true compassion to where when you reach out for them, and they feel true comfort and peace and they look up at you and you’re able to see them become whole, and you walk away and go, ‘That was worth a freaking million dollars.’  And that person walks away going ‘Thank you, that was worth a million dollars.’  You walk away going ‘Wow.”’ You’re like, that was worth everything.  You’re like, okay, I get it now.  And you’re able to go, ‘that was worth it.  All the pain, all the…that was worth it.’  And I told him, ‘You couldn’t sin your way to that dude.’  He was like, ‘Okay I get it.’  So sin isn’t the process to that, you can’t sin your way to that either.  It’s dying to that, and I and everybody else thinks it’s the sin process.  It wasn’t that.  It’s Jesus and dying to that and you and I are both getting there now.  My thing is, I did the other stuff as well and found out a long way around the barn that… ‘Oh,’ and he finally got it.  The New Testament says that the prophets did the right thing and though they suffered for a while, they’re really glad they did now.  All these different lessons I’m learning and these different things you’re seeing.  And he’s just like, ‘Oh, okay.’  But we don’t know unless we talk about it, unless the church is going to continue to gather together and unless we’re going to read His Word and find out about it “states Eli.   “So like I said, it’s a good time we’re having (laughing.)  It’s pretty cool.”

 

Eli has traveled a road from rough beginnings to recognized success and it has been at times, wrought with some inherent confusion.  He recounts the many times that he has had people approach him or write to him, asking that he would take a second to come and say hi to a family member who is a fan.  “I’m sitting there, and people are coming up to me, and they have for years,” said Eli, “going, ‘Man, my son is 16 or my kid’s 8 or my nephew or my wife or my husband or my brother, they’re HUGE fans, would you please come over for just a second and say hi to them?’ I’m like, ‘Wow, I’d be so honored.’  I’d be like, ‘Sure.’  After that I’d give my foot, okay!” laughs Eli.   What was confusing to Eli initially though was the reaction to those meetings.  “I’d be like, ‘Hi, how are you?  It’s such a pleasure to meet you,’ and these people just stare at you, they just look at you!”  At first, that led to Eli walking away wondering, “Why do people do that to me?  The kid doesn’t even know who I am!  Why do people lie to me like that?  Do they feel sorry for me?  Do they try to make me feel better?” says Eli with a laugh.  “Then a week later I’d get a 2 page e-mail from this person.  ‘Dear Eli, thank you for taking the time to meet me.  That was the most incredible experience in my life.’ And I would be like, ‘Okay, now I’m totally confused.  You just stood there and just looked at me.  You didn’t say a word.  I went to reach out for your hand and you were like a cold, lifeless body,’ and then all of a sudden I realized, that’s when I started to realize with people that they weren’t living in the same zone that I was walking in.  That I was already, because I’m living in fast forward because I’m having all of these experiences in a quick amount of time that a lot of people aren’t having, and that they’re doing it in a slower pace and I’m seeing the world in a quick amount of time, and I’m meeting all these people all the time and so, and just because of my personality and these things that I’m experiencing, are and have forced me to open up and to be the way I am, and that’s why I realized that, yeah, you know, that by me taking the chance and by me being vulnerable first, it has the effect, it just doesn’t have it in front of me.  It has it later.  And I was like, oh, you’re just going to have to take the chance and just do it and realize that it will have it’s effect but you just won’t ever get to see it in front of you.  You know?  I do sometimes, but a lot of times it’s like, my life is always about throwing the grenade and maybe hearing the explosion a week later.  It’s so weird because a lot of times it’s about with my eyes, looking and going, okay, I know this is going to do something later.  It’s about always planting the field but never physically seeing the harvest.   You know what I’m saying?  It’s so weird.  So now where I’m at, it’s such a confidence and it’s such a thing of laughing, when everybody is standing around you, you know, the locals, standing around you laughing and going “You know, this ain’t never gonna be corn!  And you’re just laughing going ‘Alright man, I’ll be back for the salad.’  And you’re so confident that you’re plugging in the refrigerator and you’re leaving all of your salad dressings and your fixings and your silverware and they’re just looking at you like, ‘Dang, this dude’s not kidding’ and you’re like, ‘I’ll be back buddy.  Don’t unplug that refrigerator because I’m coming back to eat the rest of that salad.’  And they’re like ‘Dang, this dude, he might mean business.’

 

There is a downside to all of this vulnerability and accessibility at times as well, unfortunately.  Allowing yourself to be vulnerable, while living your life in the public eye, does have its inherent pitfalls.  There are those who, despite the vulnerability that Eli allows himself to expose, and his humble, down-to-earth personality, feel that it is their job to put him in his place and teach him humility, and at times he has had to deal with others who feel that, because he debases himself and makes himself so readily available to all of his fans, that they can approach him with unkind and rude remarks about himself or his appearance, call him names or make inaccurate accusations or insinuations.  It has been upsetting at times, but Eli tries to take it in stride. “(People) will always write me back and say, you know, ‘you were so disarming and you were so real and down to earth and thank you’, and some of that does have it’s down points where people have very much crossed the line in the sense of being rude or cut in with me, and I’ve had to lately draw the distinction, because there have been some people who have been, um, insulting, and tried to be funny and things like that,” states Eli. “I very rarely if ever get the whole ‘Oh my gosh’ rock star thing.  And if I get that, I’ll quit.  I never want that.  Or you get the whole, ‘this guy must be a real, this guy must be really…he must need some humility and I’m going to be the one to teach it to him’, even if they’re fans.  I’ve had people just treat me and say the most HORRIBLE things to me because they didn’t know what to do. People come up and go ‘Oh man, you look like you’re gaining weight, you’re going bald.’ You’re just looking at them going, ‘you know what?  I’m a human.  You’re talking to a human.  And I know that we live in a society that people like me start to look and feel like caricatures to you, but I’m a man and you need to knock it off’, and I’ve had a couple of times where I’ve had to tell people, I’ve had to verbally kind of let people know, ‘you need to knock it off, you’re going too far.’ Because of my vulnerability and approachability and the way I debase myself in a way to let people know that I’m approachable, they feel like they can come up like, “Oh, there’s the idiot!  There’s the clown!  Ha ha.”  They don’t understand that no, that’s not you’re place.  That’s not you’re place to come up and make fun of me and (say things like) “Hey stupid!”  You know sometimes they don’t realize…I call it being socially retarded, people who don’t know any better.  This is a hospital and there are people who, you take licks, you take some pretty hard ones sometimes.  We’ve got all kinds, and people don’t understand that I take risks and I take real hard ones where I take beatings from people who don’t even realize they’ve just hit me in the head with a Mack truck, and in the heart with one.” 

 

Eli recalls a man whom he and his staff had helped as he was going through a really rough time in his life and the man was able to pull his life back together again.  Once he was up on his feet again, for reasons that didn’t make sense to Eli, this man felt that he now needed to know all of the personal details of Eli’s life.  “Yeah, and now he said, ‘Now before I’m able to answer other people’s questions about your divorce and be able to stand up for you and support you and be able to support your ministry, I would like to be able to know about your divorce now.’  And I was like, you know? I was so hurt.  I’m like, ‘Whoa.’  I’m just like, who are you?  Yeah, it’s like all the sudden, you know what I’m saying?  I wrote back and I said, ‘You know, I’ve answered all the questions I’ll ever need to to God, to my counselors, to the public.’ It’s one of those things where we give and we give and sometimes you turn around and all you’ve been doing is giving the whole time and you just turn around and you just get kicked between the legs for it.  I’m just like, you know what?  MMM MMM, too bad.  I mean, those things hurt.  Those things really hurt.”

 

Despite all of the pain and brokenness that Eli has encountered, this is happily a story of good overcoming evil, and of God using the pain in our lives to bring about positive change, as all of these life experiences brought a wealth of learning.  Eli recounts all of the positive that has come out of the negative.  “It taught me how to appreciate life, celebrate, be thankful, be grateful, you know, it’s one of those things that taught me how to be careful for the future, how to love, and to appreciate, and taught me that when you’re a kid, your not responsible for the things that happened to you, you’re a kid, and to be forgiving of yourself, and to learn to take responsibility for what you do. You need to learn to put things in perspective and, my old adage of ‘It takes a lot of manure, you know, to make a beautiful rosebush.’ To say the things that you’ve been given, good or bad, allow God to put things into perspective and say, you know, every one of those things has molded me into the man that I am today, and I thank God for all of them, although I’m sure that He could have used them…what would I be like without them today?  I don’t know.  It doesn’t matter.  What’s done is done.  The question is, what am I going to do with it?  What am I going to allow?  What am I going to do with what I have?  That’s the question for all of us to ask.  What am I going to do with what I’ve got?  Well, that’s up to you.  Are you going to let God use it, or are you going to sit on a big old pile of manure and just be self-destructive.  That’s still a valid option and if you want roses, well, all you’ve got to do is just submit.  If you want self-destruction, well, get to it then.  One of the two, get busy, one or the other. 

 

That’s just what I tell people.  It’s like, hey, you know?  But the choice is yours, and you take responsibility one way or another, but I don’t want to hear victim crying.  That to me is irritating, because we’ve all had a tough time, we’ve all had a really tough time, a ton of people I’ve met.  I’ve met tons of victims, I’ve met tons of molestation survivors, I’ve met tons of people who’ve been traumatized, and you know what?  I’ve met tons of people who’ve had it worse than the next guy.  Worse in ways that would make most of us just go, ‘I’ve got nothing to complain about.’ So when I meet people looking for a pity party, I just say to them, you know, ‘If you’re looking for a pity party, you’re not going to find one.  Not with me.’  If you’re looking for validation, I can absolutely validate your feelings and I will validate your feelings of absolute pain and loss.  You have loss, you have pain, you have terrible heartache and sadness, you feel those things, mourn those things, absolutely.  Please do.  It’s healthy.  But, don’t slit your own throat again and become a victim again by just sitting there and getting caught up in, by just doing the pity party thing or just wanting to use that as an excuse.  Instead, do something about it by doing what’s proper for yourself.  Sometimes, by people getting a swift kick in the blessed assurance in that way, when they know you’re giving them love, it says, ‘hey man, no, no, some of this is just garbage and you know it.’  You always see them smile and go, ‘Yeah, you’re right, okay.’  It’s just what they know and they go ‘Yeah, you’re right, I’m totally full of it.’  That’s just what they need and they go ‘Okay, cool, I’m going to get on with my life.”’ Okay, great!  Because they know you don’t have an agenda, you’re just saying, I’m going to call you on that, that’s a foul right there, that’s no good. You know?  Okay cool.  Good.  I’m proud of you.  And you’re right there to affirm them again.  I’m proud of you.  You’re doing the right thing.  I’m really proud of you, I’m impressed, good job.  Keep going.  I’ll be your cheerleader, keep going, alright.  Okay.  Next time you see them they’re right back on track and they’re doing great.”

 

 

“I just went home that night and prayed ‘Lord, I have no idea how to play a guitar,’ you know?  But I really loved worship, and I just thought guys that could play guitar and sing, and worship anytime they want were just the luckiest guys in the world, you know?  Like man Lord, they can just worship you and take this guitar anywhere and just stop and worship you.  I used to sing worship songs walking behind my lawnmower 8 hours a day (Eli was originally a gardener) and the other guys just wanted record deals, you know, and I couldn’t understand it.  So that night, I found a way to figure out how to play worship songs.  It was a miracle.” eLi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eli’s concert the evening of the interview

 

This road called life would lead Eli from troubled beginnings, to finding God and becoming a Christian, and finally finding himself, unexpectedly at first at the age of 20, as a musician, whose music would eventually become a musical ministry and a niche where all that he had gone through up to that point, could now become a testament to the change that God can bring to our lives.  Eli feels that his being introduced to music was miraculous in a way. Having no family musical background to speak of “Absolutely nothing.  We have absolutely nothing musical in our family on any side, and I mean nothing!” exclaims Eli.  “My sister took violin lessons for like a month and it was horrid.  That was about as musical as we got. I think she learned “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”  That’s our musical legacy,” laughs Eli. 

 

He came into music by way of what he feels was truly a miracle.  A friend’s mother advised him that she thought he should play the guitar.  She lent him her guitar and he went home and prayed for guidance.  “A guy’s mom had walked up and just told me I should play guitar, and I’m like, ‘you’re nuts,’” exclaims Eli.  “I thought she was insane.  It was totally out of the blue.  About 6 months later she said, “You should play guitar” and she had one in her hand and she goes ‘I’ll let you borrow mine’ and I’m like ‘Oookay!’  I just went home that night and prayed ‘Lord, I have no idea how to play a guitar,’ you know?  But I really loved worship, and I just thought guys that could play guitar and sing, and worship anytime they want were just the luckiest guys in the world, you know?  Like man Lord, they can just worship you and take this guitar anywhere and just stop and worship you.  I used to sing worship songs walking behind my lawnmower 8 hours a day (Eli was originally a gardener) and the other guys just wanted record deals, you know, and I couldn’t understand it.  So that night, I found a way to figure out how to play worship songs.  It was a miracle.”

 

Due to his unexpected beginnings in music and despite his success, he still struggles with calling himself a musician and a songwriter, but has found that God has His own way of reminding him of his gift, despite his own doubts.  “There are nights that I just want to get up there and it’s just more about…I’m connecting through my songs.  Every once in a while, every great once in a while, God will just say, ‘Just get up there and sing.’  And I get up there and I’m singing and they still connect with me, but I’m still talking to them, you know?  It’s still never a show, and I realize that that will never change with me, where He’s saying, ‘Okay, I don’t want you to talk as much tonight,’ but when I talk between the songs, I never lose my connection.  It’s like okay, God is saying, “Okay Eli, I really need you to fit a couple more songs in here and I need you to really, for whatever reason, it’s been a couple of times where He’s just said, like, “Okay, alright Lord, you know?” For whatever reason, okay, and I’m just talking.  But I think that’s been His reason to show me that, He’s been like ‘you know, your songs, your songs speak to people.’ I live under a lot of insecurity that my music doesn’t speak to people and that I have to make up for it somehow when I talk. You have no idea.  I am totally insecure about my songs.  I feel like my songs, because of the way I started playing music and stuff, I still don’t feel like a musician, I don’t feel like a songwriter.  I struggle with calling myself one.  It’s hard.  It’s weird.  I just, maybe it should always be that way, but, like Kermit the Frog said, ‘It ain’t easy being green.’  It’s hard being the guy on the other side, because you’re trying so hard to put that through there still.  I think that’s just the thing.  If I ever start feeling like a songwriter…it’s a surreal feeling, like, you know, people call you a songwriter and it just goes right over my head, I don’t, it doesn’t connect with me at all, I mean, (it) totally doesn’t…I just, I’m like, it’s like me calling you a truck driver (laughing).”

 

Debbie:  Didn’t you know I did that on the side?

 

eLi:  Yeah, that would be funny.  Oh yeah, yeah, she does pull an 18-wheeler.  You’re getting more interesting by the day!

 

 

 

 

 

Excuse Me Sir, But Your Paper Is On Fire:

The Controversy behind “Now The News” and Setting The Record Straight

 

“I think that if any of the people who have questions were to take the time to actually come to a concert, I think they’d understand that we serve people and you can’t serve people and love people and be angry.  You just can’t.”  eLi

 

Chances are, you haven’t heard any of the tracks off of Eli’s last release played on your local Christian radio station, and there’s a reason for that.  There seems to be a misconception out there about Eli and his latest album “Now The News”.  A misconception that this latest project from the man of back-to-basics, soul-baring music ministry just might be too angry, too cynical, too un-politically correct for Christian radio and media to embrace.  It might (heaven forbid) offend someone.  “When did Christians become so worried that the Gospel might offend somebody?” exclaimed Eli.  “That freaked me out.  I thought, ‘what are we doing?’ It’s become really a bizarre thing that I’m becoming more and more embraced by non-believers than by the church, with the Gospel, and that’s creeping me out because I’m one of the few artists whose whole desire has been to minister to the church and (I’ve) been so vocal and so Christian, and yet it almost feels like the more Christian I am, the more the church has been kind of like, “Oh, you might offend somebody.  You might offend a Christian with Christ.”  I’m like… OKAY!  And I’m angry now all of the sudden, and I crack up with that.”

 

“Now The News,” released in 2001, came onto the scene and things changed for Eli.  According to Eli, there was a shutdown on this newest release, with many Christian radio stations refusing to play it’s title track or take the time to listen to any of the rest of the album, stating that the song sounded too angry. 

 

“Now The News”, Eli’s 3rd label release, was preceded by “Things I Prayed For” and “Second Hand Clothing”, both of which did very well in record sales, with singles such as “Second Hand Clothing,” “Second Hand Clothing Part 2,” “Things I Prayed For,” “Unqualified,” “Stand” and “King of the Hill” getting lots of radio play, with many of them scoring in the top 10.  His songs have also had prime time exposure on shows such as Providence, Party of Five and most recently on Dawson’s Creek, when they featured the title track off of the “Now the News” CD.

 

Both of his previous releases had a strong autobiographical nature to them, with Eli baring his soul to all who listened to his lyrics, exposing his own personal struggles and weaknesses and his own view of his life and the world around him.  If you listen to these albums, you get a strong sense of who Eli is, what he stands for, what he’s been through and how his faith in God has changed him and turned his life around.

 

“Now The News” took a slight turn in focus for Eli.  He stills feels that it is strongly autobiographical in nature, while revealing a glimpse of how he sees the world around us.  Consider it sort of a wake-up call to the church, asking us what we really believe, how we’re living out that faith, and that we need to consider and review all that we hear and see, with the title track focusing on the media’s strong presence in our culture and how it shapes and influences much of how we perceive our everyday lives, while songs like Master’s Feet reassure all who listen that there is room for everyone at Jesus’ feet. 

 

Now, on the heels of a new album that he is currently in the studio recording, there is the lingering concern that Christian radio might not embrace this newest release either.  “You know, being in the studio, another song will come and another song will come, and I’m finding myself with the new songs, going, you know, they’re deep, and some of the audiences are just, depending on where they’re at, I’m finding two kinds of audiences right now in Christian music.  People who are really deep and who are really getting it, and others, it’s just going right over their head.  They’re just so much like, ‘Hey, make me laugh Eli.  That was funny!’  I am very funny and they’re like, ‘Say something funny. Hey I like that hair sticking up in weird places song,’ you know?  They don’t go beyond that.  Here it is. These songs are so deep and there’s so much meat in them and I’m just scared. I’m just sitting there going, I don’t have a song about hair for you.  I don’t.  I just have songs that are deep.  I’m worried that once again that Christian radio, that they’ll just say to me once again, ‘well, we don’t, unless you’ve got, oh where is my hairbrush, or, you know, or if you’ve got a song about cartoons or coffee or where is my hairbrush, we really don’t have a place for you.’  And that’s God’s problem, but, judging by the content of some of the comments…

 

I’m still a person who, I listen to songs.  When I hear a song I listen to it over and over again and it moves me. I’m devastated by songs.  I’m just like, ‘Wow!’  I’m a music fan still.  I’m not a pop star fan, I’m a music fan, and I still believe that there’s many of those out there.  I listen to all kinds of music.  My music tastes are totally eclectic.  So please understand, I’m totally on all ends of the spectrum.  But my songs are, I just feel like, for me, I know that what I write, it is what it is.  It’s very much, what I think it is, at least, it’s music that you can just turn on and listen to, at the same time it’s not music that’s obscure lyrically that you’re like ‘Oh it’s so deep I don’t even know what it’s talking about’.  It’s music that ‘Oh, this is about something.’  And I just go, well, you know, you can just listen to it and have it be background music, but if you want to listen to the lyrics, it’s definitely going to say something.  So it’s up to you.  I don’t know.  So, we’ll see.  But if you want it to make you laugh, it ain’t gonna do that, you know?  If you want it to be music you can juggle to, it ain’t gonna happen.  At the same time it’s not brooding or anything. I don’t know.  Some of the songs are just downright beautiful.  They’re just beautiful and amazing and I’m so proud of them.” 

 

“I’m trying to lead my staff and follow the Lord and that’s a really weird place to be.” eLi

 

 

Here, eLi speaks about the “Now the News”:

 

 

Debbie:  In your bio, you state that it takes a lot of manure to grow a beautiful rosebush and now thorns and all, you’re ready to bloom.  You also mention that you feel as if you’ve lived 100 lives, have done things you’re not proud of and you also touch on the struggles of your youth and the pain of divorce that you dealt with on the “Second Hand Clothing” album.  Can you tell me a little about this “manure” that has fertilized your faith and made you who you are today.  How has all of that shaped you?

 

 

 

eLi:  I think it’s the kind of stuff that the church is uncomfortable talking about, but it’s the stuff that enriches people’s faith.  The ability to find God in the valleys.  We keep looking for Him on mountain tops and we keep pointing people to mountain tops, but very few of us live our day-to-day lives on mountain tops, and for me too, and I’m not shying away from or saying we shouldn’t go for mountain tops, but what I’m saying is that I see a lot of valleys.  There is a lot of disappointment in life, there’s a lot of negativity, you know?  Before 9/11, I’d hear things, I see and know that some people see me as a… I know that some people, even in the Christian community, might see me or feel that I’m negative or that I’m bitter or that I’m angry and I’m not (saying it with conviction), you know?  I’m trying to say, you know, look at what’s really there and understand that in our pain and in our failures God is there too.  Why are we running from real truth, because the masses, the people who sit in the audiences every night at my concerts, are the real people.  They’re the 90 percent.  They’re dealing with things that I deal with.  They can’t pay their bills, they wonder if they’re going to be a failure, they feel like they’re ugly, they wonder if the person they love is going to love them back, does God really love them, is He real?  All the different issues we deal with, the things we don’t talk about, the hard to define moments, the quiet times, the fact that we don’t like quiet.  These deeper things that we don’t talk about.  The fact that I hear songs on the radio about tragedy, about Columbine, bam I hear songs about it.  9/11, bam, I hear songs about it.  I still don’t hear songs about what’s going on in the Middle East.  I don’t hear songs about all of these kids who’ve been molested by Catholic priests.  How come I don’t hear songs about issues?  How come we never will?  We won’t on the radio, they’re being written.  We just won’t on the radio because that’s considered, well, those artists are bitter.  They’re negative about something.  No, we’re not!  Those are issues that people are dealing with.  How do we know?  Because they’re being dealt with every night by everybody else but Christians.  What is it that we don’t want to talk about?  We are supposed to be purveyors of truth.  This is manure.  How do we know?  Cause it stiiinks!    Why do people want to know about it, why do you want to know about it?  Cause you’ve got some in your life too.  We’re curious.  How are you dealing with it?  How am I dealing with it?  I’m bringing it to the light.  I’m spreading it out and now I’m saying, God, what do I do with it?  It’s been really uncomfortable.  You have to sit and be alone with it, and expose it.  As I’ve exposed it to other people and exposed it to the light, which is God, in the sense as being a gardener, you know that parallel.  I’ve seen God use it.  In the instance of even divorce, I’ve watched how just even mentioning it, I still won’t go too much into detail because that still involves somebody else who isn’t here to tell their side of the story, and it’s personal anyway, that’s something that’s just deeply personal.  The thing that comes out of it is that there is a whole congregation of believers that hasn’t been represented, and they become, all of the sudden, represented, and they get a voice out of that and they start coming out of the woodwork and they start talking because somebody got up on the stage and just talked about it for a second.  And they get a voice and they somehow become alive and they start feeling like maybe they have a right to be part of the body of Christ.  Does that make any sense?

 

Yes, it does.  I think a lot of times in the Church, there are certain things that are taboo, that you’re not supposed to talk about.  People don’t deal with it.

 

How can that be?  The one place where we say come and this is the place of ultimate truth. I’m not saying that it’s not difficult.  I’m not saying that it’s not painful.  I’m definitely not bitter or angry about anything, but what I am saying is this.  We are fools and hypocrites if we think that the world doesn’t come in here and see that we’re lying.  Because if you tell people that God is here, then they come here and expect to see Him.  And if we open the door and all of the sudden we say, “but here are the rules God before these people come in, here are the rules Lord, you are not to talk about this, this and this,” what’s the point?  Let’s just close the doors and go home.  It’s ridiculous.  Here are the pre-nups.

 

Many of the songs on the previous 2 CDs seem more autobiographical in nature, and on “Now The News”, the songs seem to be more of a wake-up call to the church to say hey, what do we really believe and how are we living that faith out?  What caused that change in focus for you?

 

At the point where “Now The News” came about, I felt like I had spent the first two CDs… I had said everything that I needed to say at that time about who I was and everything that was in me, and I had given everything that a man could give as far as all his honesty and vulnerability, pretty much baring my soul as far as an artist could, and saying okay, this is the naked truth, the good, the bad and the ugly and qualifying myself to be heard.  I think you need to do that.  You don’t just walk out, album one, with an album like ‘Now The News” because otherwise people say, “Who do you think you are?” blah, blah, blah.  So I felt like the first two albums I spent sharing who I was, my mistakes, letting everybody see first and foremost I’m not pointing a finger, I’m not angry, I’m not judgmental.  I spent time focusing on me first.  And then it was time where I felt God was saying, “okay, now let’s take an objective view at all of ourselves and ask the hard questions” and I felt like it was still very much on my heart, it was still very much autobiographical.  Just what God was asking me, stretching me, saying “Eli, what are you doing in light of the Scriptures?  What are you doing in light of the Word and what’s going on in the world around you?”  Challenging me, saying, “what are you doing, saying, how are you affecting your world?”  What’s funny is, the people, the people get it.  What scared me was how the world got it, the world press, the secular press, got it.  What scared me was that the Christian press was afraid of it.  That disappointed me because I thought, “You know what guys?  Why should you feel threatened?  Why should you call me angry?  Why would I be angry?  It’s not like I have anything to be angry about, but yet you’re just instantly afraid of this. 

 

You’re dealing with a guy here who’s got no agenda.  You’re dealing with a guy here who’s been living what he preaches.  You’re dealing with a guy here who doesn’t want to be a rock star, who isn’t out there oppressing the masses, soaking people for money.  You’re dealing with a guy here who’s got a track record of integrity and everything, and who gives his albums away, so it’s not like he’s worried about album sales.  So all these things, you can really look at and see, “Okay, this is a person who means what he says”, and as soon as you hear a song like “Now the News,” basically a song about mainstream Media, you’re offended by it.  I thought, “How weird?”  I really got a kick out of it.  I thought, why are you so offended and why are you worried that somebody might be offended?

 

Well, I didn’t get any anger from the album at all.  I listened to the whole “Now the News,” CD, I listened to the whole thing…

 

(That’s because) You listened to the whole thing.

 

Yeah, I didn’t get that, I didn’t get anger from it…

 

You can’t, because, when you listen to a couple challenging songs, I think maybe people feel like…  It’s your perspective.  When you see an artist who, you know, I’m getting older, and you decide how you want to see me.  You know I’m getting older, it’s my third album. See, I don’t know.  I don’t understand either.  My last 2 albums were great and they sold great.  I come out with this one and it’s strong and this and that, but we started with…I mean, I don’t know.  You want socially, you want to talk about an album that’s relevant?  This album was out months and months before 9/11.  You want to talk about relevant and prophetic, okay?  And yet everybody totally, everybody ignored it still. The last verse of that song, “Now the News”, I mean creepy.  But still, not a word still.  Nobody.  I mean, calls were coming in from all over the world from the other Christian radio stations, they’ve all been playing the snot out of it, and then after 9/11, they’re like, “Oh my gosh, so what’s it like in your country?  Everybody must be asking you, “You know Eli”.  So I’m like, “Dude,” and finally, I just finally had to tell one guy, “You know what, I’m sorry, but I have not had one phone call.  Nobody even knows this album is out.  They don’t want to hear it.  Unless I’m, you know, bopping and lip synching on stage, and you know, just kind of doing the Britney Spears thing, but yet I’m sorry but, I just, what am I supposed to be angry about?  I’ve had the best time of my life.  If you gave me a choice to do that or what I love, what am I supposed to do?  I love this.  I mean, you know?  Because there’s this whole media thing, and then there’s reality, and what I’m going to do tonight (at the concert) is reality.  I live in reality. I live with people in the real world. I’m talking about the record business.  That’s not reality.  I know the record business. I’ve been there for like 5 or 6 years.  I know what reality is, and that ain’t it. 

 

You’re mentioning radio play and everything and I honestly don’t think I’ve heard any songs off of the new (“Now the News”) album on the radio.

 

Exactly.

 

But I don’t think that the content is different, the subjects you’re talking about.  I don’t think… like “Stand” was played a lot, “Second Hand Clothing, “ so those songs were played all the time.

 

Exactly.

 

I think those (songs) had the same conviction behind them as the songs on “Now the News,’ I mean, personally.

 

Well, that’s my point.  We came out with “Now the News” first, I just wanted to experiment and see, and immediately the feedback we got was not “it’s a bad song,” or anything else, because it wasn’t.  It was a great song.  Billboard Magazine got a hold of it, they freaked out over it.  I know Billboard Magazine knows what they’re talking about.  Our reviews for this last album were stellar, every one of them, stellar.  It was a great album.  We literally got back “Oh, we might offend somebody.”  Um, “It just seems angry.”  I thought, “you know what?  One song like that in your mix might be good, you know?”  For somebody listening to a Christian radio station, maybe they need something to maybe stir up a little conversation once in a while.  Why not have something that says, “Hey, maybe you want to think about it.”  Instead of the same safe, contrived, you know.  This is safe, this is the same thing you’ve been doing all week long.  But then after that, it was immediately like “We’re not going to listen to anything else.  This is what this whole album is going to be about” and there was a shut down and it was immediately branded, this whole albums going to be (raspberries).  And you know what?  I know you can see my face and you can tell, I’m so okay with that.  That is the album God told me to make.  And looking at what happened, I’ll tell you why.  I was really okay with it, I knew we were supposed to do it.  When I do concerts, that album, we sell out of it.  It just flies out the door.  People will write me and go “You know what? I’ve sat down and listened to it and that album is my favorite.  That album feeds me, it convicts me, it speaks to me, it’s teaching me something.”  Whoa, that’s what it should do.  This is great.  Every album has it’s purpose.  My CDs stay in people’s CD collection.  I see very few of them in bargain bins.  That means something to me.  I want them to be something that is timeless.  They need to be.  Otherwise, I don’t want to make them and churn them out.  Everybody’s got different goals.  These are my goals, okay, and I’m fulfilling my goals and that’s important to me.  Everybody’s different.  But what’s funny is this, here’s a cool thing.  Come 9/11, I didn’t have to scramble, I didn’t have to readjust my ship’s course, not one bit.  We were already on the course God had set us (on) a year before.  That meant we were listening to the Lord.  That’s important to me.  We didn’t have to jump on a bandwagon, we didn’t have to do anything.  God had already said, “Go this direction” we went, and we were already on it.  Whether the world paid any attention to us before, during or after didn’t matter to me.  You know what mattered to me?  That my Father was already saying, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”  You see?  This is important.  When I get to heaven, all the other stuff here ain’t gonna matter to this little boy right here.  This little boy from LA is going to be going “Whew, thank you Jesus.”  Once again, reprioritizing.  Listen to what I’m trying to say to you, because I really mean this.  (I’m) Really trying to get my brothers and sisters to understand, I know this is hard because I know we all want validation.  Listen, I’m guilty of this so bad.  Trying to say, with my life, humiliating, and this is back to your fertilizer question.  Guilty, guilty as charged.  In saying, look at my life here, I’m showing you by example, bad or otherwise, we all want validation guys.  But look at this example and let it show you this album sold nothing, but look at the validation that came from the Lord and wasn’t it good to be able to see when this all came down I wasn’t found with my pants around my ankles taking a dump out in the wilderness somewhere.  Instead God found me ready, and ready for battle, you know, in the sense that I wasn’t lip synching on some stage.

 

 

It seems like the church nowadays has become so politically correct…

 

In a time when the world is so open to the Gospel, which is hysterical to me.  I have yet to offend a nonbeliever.  It’s wonderful.  I sit down with non-believers all of the time.  You would be shocked at the e-mails I get from every kind of person, every kind of nationality, every kind of religion, every kind of sexual orientation, who come to my concerts.  It’s surprising the fear and the worry.  Fear isn’t from the Lord.  All this, “What if, what if…”, When you own a restaurant, not everybody who comes to eat there is going to like the food, but you don’t close the restaurant because 10 percent of the people don’t like it.  What’s freaking me out is that kind of seems to be the case (in the church).  For me, I just go, you know, Okay.  All I know is this.  As long as God tells me to do what I’m going to do, it’s not about numbers.  I just see a world, a Christian world, where we are going, “Well, our charts say… our computers say…” and I’m going “Guys, what does God say?” “Well, we don’t know, we haven’t had a fax from Him in a while,” (laughter) and the fact is, it’s funny and I use sarcasm and satire and laughter, but I’ve never once been on a rant or a rave, so I don’t know when the last time I’ve been angry was.  So, for me, I just know that if I use humor, if that’s being angry, then I hope I stay angry for a long time. (laughter).  You know, God bless him, man!  So, the people at the concerts, they sure seem to be laughing their heads off for an hour-and-a-half, so they seem to be pretty angry too then, so I hope we all stay this angry.  They sure seem to be encouraged and having a good time.  So once again, I guess it’s about your perspective.  I know we live in a sound byte society where the church is really taking the wrong lessons from the world and even that, even the Catholic church, saying they’re going to decide what they’re going to do about these guys who molested kids.  You know what, “You’re going to decide?”  I mean, as if like “We’re going to decide when we’re going to punish them.”  Well, what about the law?  I mean, that’s the one thing that always cracks me up.  I’m thinking about the government, like, when is the government going to step in and say, “Well, no, we’re going to prosecute these guys,” and I’m thinking…I mean, it’s just cracking me up, the common sense factors.  Even my story about Europe, the thing about priorities.  I can have, in Amsterdam, I can legally have a prostitute, buy drugs, swear in church, but if my bags are a pound over they want to charge me a fee for my luggage being overweight, and it’s hysterical to me and I just go, “this doesn’t make sense”.  And if everybody else tells me that that’s okay, I’m sorry, I’m still going to say, “No, that’s still crazy.”  And if everybody is going to say, “No, step in line Eli, that’s okay, why should I say, “I guess, well if everybody else is doing it.”  This is high school all over again to me.  This is everybody else saying, “No, bellbottoms are cool”.  Guess what?  I never thought bellbottoms were cool, I’m never going to think bell bottoms are cool. You know?  I’m never going to think terry cloth shirts are cool ever again, you know? It’s not going to happen.”

 

(We both laugh)

 

One of the things we had talked about…people expressing their beliefs but not living them out.  How did you acquire your servant’s heart?  What got through to you to be able to do what you do? 

 

It was a little easier for me for a couple of reasons.  Number one, I didn’t have anything to give up.  You have nothing, you’ve got nothing to lose, and I try and keep that perspective, I try and keep that lifestyle. I try and keep giving the things I have away.  It makes it easier.  I don’t have anything.  I don’t own very much.  I own very little as a matter of fact. I’ve had a house, I sold my house.  I’ve acquired things and I’ve gotten rid of them.  I don’t own very much.  I mean, what I own would fit in my van. Probably besides a couple of pieces of furniture.  But that’s because somebody else buys that for me and I keep telling (them) I just don’t want it. I moved into an apartment.  What I own fits in my van and the money I make, I just, it goes to places where it needs to go and I have people that I take care of and that I love and I don’t need much.  When you don’t have much to lose, it keeps you in a place, it keeps you a little more focused.  When you have a lot to lose it makes it harder and I think I’ve remembered that and tried to keep myself in that kind of a focus.  I still enjoy myself and still buy myself some things and then I get rid of them eventually, but in the meanwhile I enjoy them for a time.  I think that’s the thing.  I just read His Word and it reminds me, you know, I can’t get away from what Jesus says.  I’m not saying that everybody needs to sell all their stuff on some romantic notion, because my life is a hard one.  There (are) people who I spend a lot of time with when I’m off the road, and I use their cable TV, you know (laughs), hang out.  But the silence and the solitude of not having those things is very nice as well, but it can also be looked at as a bunch of romantic B.S. as well.  It’s a nice tension and balance between the two that I have to have.  I’m a lot more disciplined on the road.  When I’m on the road it’s a lot easier to be focused on the Lord because I’m not as distracted. When you live that way you see why we’re more spiritually in tune, because we’re not as distracted by ourselves.  Does that make sense?

 

Yeah. Yeah, it does.  I think that’s great because I think a lot of people would have trouble doing that.  Giving up…you know.  I think you get attached, which you shouldn’t, but you tend to get attached to your things, you know?

 

Oh, I do. That’s why I just don’t allow.  I can’t allow… It doesn’t have anything to do with ministry to me.  It’s just me personally.  I just get so frustrated, I get so agitated with myself and just get, aw, I just get to the point where I can’t stand it and I just throw it away.  I just don’t like it.  That’s a personal choice.  Other people can have those things and be fine.  For me it just frustrates me.  I just don’t want to have the TV going 24 hours a day, and otherwise I would, and just realize it’s just a bunch of mindless garbage and, you know what I’m saying?  I don’t want to sit there and watch “Behind the Music” for 24 hours a day.  I’d just be like “Dude, I could live this.  Why not? You should just go out and do it, you know?  You’re a musician.”  It’s a situation of just going, because I’m very obsessive and compulsive and I will get caught in a rut if I’m not careful, so for me, you know, serving is sometimes, I battle my flesh as well.  You set up for yourself, you know, a situation of things that you know that won’t work.  Same thing as why I don’t hang out with girls on the road.  It’s not a smart thing to do.  So, it’s just things that you know are good and right things for yourself because you know it’s the right thing to do.  Same thing with serving, just because what Jesus tells you you’re supposed to do and not because I’m a great and moral man, it’s just because what I was told to do in the Bible there, and I’m just trying to do, just like what Jesus said, I’m trying to do what my Father tells me.

 

 

Get Out the Pooper Scoopers, Because There’s Manure In The Church:

A Wake-Up Call to the Church & The Music Biz to Get Real, Live With Integrity & Conviction, Take Responsibility & Care About Our Kids

 

“I know the times I get up there and I’m faking it and I’m having a hard time, people, they know.  They’re not dumb, and we think they are, and the music business thinks they are, and the church thinks they are, and they’re not.” eLi

 

Got your attention, didn’t it?  Okay, strange subtitle, I know.  Consider it a segue into a continued discussion with Eli about the changes he feels that the church has to make and an example of exactly what the album “Now The News” is trying to do.  Get your attention.  Stir things up a bit.  Make you think…

 

Eli has a quote that is quite well known among his fans.  “It takes a lot of manure to grow a beautiful rosebush.”  He feels that his own life is a prime example of this quote in action.  Having experienced many pitfalls and made many mistakes of his own admission, he feels that he now is ready to bloom with God’s help.  Eli feels that this is one of the problems prevalent in the church today.  The unwillingness of people, who essentially are the church, to accept that there will be “manure” in the church, because there’s manure in everybody’s lives, whether they want to admit it or not.  He feels that it’s time for the people of the church, as well as those of the music business, to take an honest look at the apathy that we’ve allowed to seep in, and replace it with honesty, integrity and conviction.  In other words, it’s time to really re-evaluate and live out our faith.

 

Here, eLi speaks more on that…

 

 

Debbie:  In the song, “Do What You Said,” which is kind of what we’re talking about, you really hit home about living out your faith and walking the walk versus just professing empty words, no actions, and I especially like the lyric “Take off your stupid bracelet, unless you’re going to do what Jesus would.”  I think that is really relevant now.  It’s easy to become, we all at times become complacent in our lives and in our faith.  So what gives you the courage to speak out about it?

 

eLi:  I just use my experiences, once again, and I just think, well, it’s like the pink elephant in the room, you know?  We’re all just going to not say something?  I guess the long haul is maybe it won’t matter, I don’t know.  I guess I just feel like, well, I guess that’s the thing to me.  I don’t know if it will change anything by saying anything, but I know what happens when you don’t, and that’s nothing.  And it’s always one of those things where people come up to me and go “Man, I’m so glad that you say that, I’m so glad that you do that,” and I still feel like saying to them, and sometimes I do, “Well, what are you going to do about it?”  But sometimes, they do change things. I get an e-mail where I find out that some guy gave up the cable TV and sponsored a kid with Compassion instead, that’s one life that got changed.  This thing we did last night, very few people showed up for the benefit concert for this youth program because, quite honestly, we in America, even the church, for the most part, I’m speaking a lot in general terms okay, because I know there are great programs, but I’m speaking very generally.  I’m qualified to say these things, because you know why?  Most of the people who are going to read this, don’t travel like I do.  They haven’t seen what I’ve seen.  I have.  I’ve seen hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of churches.  I see them all year long, every year, all across this country and around the world, so I know what I’m talking about, you know?  I see the big picture and for me, we as a Christian culture, we don’t care about our kids.  We want someone else to care about them for us, and even then, even if it means that “we’ve got a whole program for you, we’ve got everything in place, we’ll do it for you, will you just write the check?”  “Well, no.  We really won’t.  We really don’t care.”  And these people over here in Bourbonnais and Kankakee, they’re proving, they’re showing how they’re getting these kids off the streets, off drugs, everything, and the community, they don’t care.  You know why?  Because it doesn’t do anything to make the adults shine.  It doesn’t do anything to make the class, it doesn’t do anything for people like you and I, for our age.  It doesn’t put a plaque on our wall, it doesn’t do anything to help our career, it doesn’t even give us a pat on the back.  Until one of those kids walks into a grocery store and starts shooting everybody, until it’s another Columbine, and then after that we want a quick fix.  I mean, it’s the same cycle.  Look around you, see the cycle.  Until somebody does and says, “Okay, I’ll take the effort,” nobody cares.  It’s just the same old minutia over and over and over again.  We don’t care, put a band aid on it.  You see the problem, it blows up, put a band aid on it, go away.  It starts to fester, fester, fester, explodes, put a band aid on it.  But until then, prevention, we just don’t really care about it.  There’s never enough people to work in the day care nursery at church.  Am I right?  Half the people reading this right now, if this part gets printed, are going “He’s right, he’s right.”  Always in church, “we need help in the nursery, in Sunday School class.  We still need volunteers.”  Nobody wants to take care of the kids.  They’re such a priority, they’re the future of our church, but really, who cares?  This is how it is.  And yet, here’s this kid who walks up to me and he goes, “Man, that lyric about Jesus and taking off your bracelet.  I see people wearing those bracelets, and you’re right.  Instead of asking what Jesus would do, why don’t they just do it?”  And they get it.  And that’s a song you’re never going to hear on Christian radio.  I polled a guy, I was in Croatia with some missionaries and a radio programmer and we were talking about the state of things, and I said to him, and we were laughing about it, and these guys are one of my biggest supporters still, they play all my stuff, so, even on this new album, they play everything.  He goes, “Why don’t you write songs about this stuff?” and I laughed and I just patted him on the shoulder, and I said, “Listen, I said, “This is why.  Cause you’ll never play it.”  And he goes, “Why?”  and I said, “Because conviction and Christianity no longer go hand in hand.  I’m sorry, but they don’t.  If it makes us uncomfortable, we don’t want it in the church anymore.  And if you will just take a moment and kind of reflect on that thought, you’ll see that I’m kind of right.  We don’t want it if it doesn’t make us feel good and give us warm goose bumps and if we really take a look at ourselves we will see that that’s kind of sad because we’ll realize that, you know what?   That mentality is really weakening us and taking away the blessing of our Christian walk, because, once again, in the valleys, when you find mountaintops in the valleys, that’s when you find those real blessed goose bumps.  That’s when you find your Jesus, your rock, your fortress, your shelter.  When you find Him everywhere and you see that, you know what, He is real.  That when you see people, whenever you meet them and when you find them at their low points and you’re able to look them in the eyes and with utter confidence say “My deliverer, He’s real and He’s amongst all the ashes, He’s still here.”  And they can look at you and say, “You know what, somehow I believe you.”  Keep searching, this is no longer then a country club, this is real faith.  This is a real God we’re serving.  You know?  Then all of a sudden, when people come to church, they’re no longer coming and seeing us serving some kind of impotent God, instead they come and they’re finding a real, quirky, awkward, mysterious, immeasurable creator.  And that’s what we all signed up for, isn’t it?  Am I right?  Unpredictable and wonderful.

 

My website has been a great ministry tool.  We called it Elinews.com so that it would be news-oriented, and it would be something that people would go to and be encouraged.  Weekly updates that I write myself.  It’s a devotional, it’s thoughts, it’s not a fan-zine kind of thing.  It’s just more informational.  I personally would like to just be an independent artist for a while.  I’m working on a new album right now, and oddly enough, I think with a sense of freedom and being unencumbered from worrying about anything, like all of the sudden now, it would figure I’m writing some of the best songs in years, it’s like everybody’s looking at me like, “Where did that come from?” and I’m just like, “Just a sense of freedom.”  A sense of not having to do anything, not having anybody looking over my shoulder and saying, “It’s not Christian enough, or…” so, it’s good. 

 

Editor’s Note: One of the things eLi finds disturbing in both the Christian church and the music business today is what he sees as a lack of sincerity and conviction.  Several days before this interview took place, he had been singing somewhere else.  A Christian pop group who had performed that day as well, had been lip synching on stage.  One of the girls from the group approached eLi later that day and asked for his honest opinion.  As you may have guessed, that’s precisely what he gave. 

 

 “Two days before I was singing somewhere else.  This pop group, they talked to me later, and it was just really cheesy and insincere and one of them got together with me later and she was talking to me and she goes “Tell me what you think.”  I go, “Honestly, you really want my opinion?  You were lip synching.”  She goes, “Well, it was really hard.”  “You were lying to people.  You’re faking.  You’re lying to people.  You’re lip synching. You’re not even really singing.  It’s not like you even have any instruments to play, and now you’re not even singing?  It’s just crazy.  Just because the world does it.  So if we shoot people on stage, you’re going to do it too because the world does it?”  “Well, it’s hard, you know?”  “I don’t care.”  She was really receiving it.  I said, “You know what, whatever it is that you do, whatever kind of music, do it with sincerity.  We lack sincerity in the Christian church today.  That’s our point.  That’s not funny.  Whatever you do, do it with sincerity.  Because the people in these seats, they know it.  You know it.  The whole time you’ve been sitting here with me, you can tell if I’m a sincere person or not.  You’re not stupid.  And I remember that and I know that.  I know the times I get up there and I’m faking it and I’m having a hard time, people, they know.  They’re not dumb, and we think they are, and the music business thinks they are, and the church thinks they are, and they’re not.  Here’s a good litmus test for you and for anybody else if they’re listening if they hear this part and I don’t know if they will or not…here’s your litmus test.  Would you do what you did the other day (that performance, the kind of music you did, whatever it is, even if you’re a pastor or housewife or plumber, performer) everything you did, the same thing you did.  Now that 9/11 happened, would you do the same thing you did for the survivors and the victims of that tragedy?  Would you do that same performance you did for them?  And she just goes, “Oh, no.”  I said, “Then why do you do it at all?  If you have to adjust what you do to fit the circumstance, then what you do is not who you are.  It’s not sincere.”  She goes “I get it.”  I said, “I, whether I’m in a prison or in a complete conservative church or on television, I just do what I do.  It’s who I am.  You, even if you’re a hip hop artist, do what you do and if it’s sincere, you should be able to do it at a funeral, a wedding, a bar mitzvah, whatever and it will be received and it will be sincere.  It will have integrity to it.  You see what I’m saying?  You won’t have to apologize.  You wouldn’t dare do what you did up there because you know it was hokey and cheesy and totally about self and it was pitiful, it was a joke.  It was like, you can do more.  You can do more than just stand up there and look cute on stage.  You can do more.  I don’t want everybody to be me.  I don’t want everybody to be Eli.  I want them to truly be who they are.  Because when we’re not, we’re saying that God wasn’t smart enough, that God wasn’t creative enough and what I’m saying is, no, go deeper.  Don’t be like me, but don’t be like everybody else either.  What did God make you to be?  Let’s really find out.  Let’s not punk out and just go, well I’m going to go with the status quo.  It’s not Eli, but it’s not everybody else either and let’s find out who it is.  Otherwise we’re not really saying that we trust the Lord. 

 

If we’re going to do that, we’ve got to allow each other some wiggle room.  We’ve got to allow God to be God.  What’s that going to take?  For us to be a little uncomfortable.  That the church, Christian music, everything is going to have to be a hospital again.  The people are going to have to try to understand each other.  Not say “No, spell it all out for me, I’ve got to understand every part of it.  No, because that’s impossible.  By the time you water something down so that everybody can understand it, it’s so mundane and blah that it’s just blah, blah, blah.  You understand? It’s going to be like, no, you’re going to have to take some time and some effort here to lean in and lend me your ear, for him who has ears to hear.  You understand?  So, this church is going to have to be a hospital.  What does that mean?  That blood is going to get spilt on the floor, that the chairs are going to get dirty, that they’re going to get used.  Otherwise, it’s like the hospital that says, “Are you sick?  Oh I’m sorry, could you leave please and come back when you’re well and then we’ll treat you.”  That’s a country club.  By definition, that’s a country club.  It means that we’ve got to be willing to spill and have disease, be surrounded by disease and sickness and smell and (be) uncomfortable.  But in that we learn compassion and love and tenderness.  It’s what you see when you hang out with a bunch of poor, disheveled, uneducated people.  In the midst of that you see tenderness and love that you don’t find around a bunch of stuffy, upper middle class people who don’t know how to talk to each other.  It’s the truth.  I’m just saying.  Am I wrong?  Find out.  Anybody who doesn’t agree with me, you go find out for yourself and write me a letter because that’s the world I see all the time.  I see all the polar opposites and I’m being very general to just make points and to bring in observations.  But it’s just true.  These are just the weird dichotomies and we’re trying to sterilize God and I just think it’s weird.  It’s bizarre to me.  I’m just…sorry, I just got a little excited (laughing).

 

It’s okay.  You said you traveled all over the world and everything.  Is that a music ministry?

 

Yeah.  I started this year in Australia, 2 weeks there, sometimes I go for others missions.  I was in Croatia last year and the year before, quasi-music, but basically they’re doing missions rebuilding, but using my name as a draw to bring other people there.  Guatemala, I’m involved with Compassion International, I sponsor a child and I do Compassion, I talk about Compassion at all of my concerts.  I visited the child I sponsor in Guatemala.  I love Compassion.  Incredible, incredible ministry.  Obviously you see, I guess the word might be, a healthy cynicism, sometimes unhealthy, just being honest with you, I’m sometimes unhealthy cynical.  I do watch that.  But I really, I was just grinding those guys for the longest time, just really putting them through their paces to make sure that they were really people of integrity just because I wanted to make sure.  I just really enjoy being one of their volunteers in a sense.  Making sure that the money was really going to go where it does.  Wanting to be able to know that when I get on stage and talk about it, it’s the real deal.  One of those things.  Because I know what most people want.  I know their mentality because I’m one of them, you know?  I’m not one of the Elite, or whatever.  When people get up and talk about it, I don’t want to hear the blah, blah, blah.  Do you know that kids are starving?  Are you dumb?  No.  So do I need to speak to you like you’re dumb?  Do I need to give you a 30 minute dissertation about the fact that there are hungry kids?  You’re a smart woman.  You haven’t been living under a rock for the last 20 years.  Nobody else in this room has either.  We know that kids are starving.  I want to know, is the money really going to go where they say it’s going to go.  Okay.  As soon as I explain that to people, 9 times out of 10 that’s what makes them really understand, Okay, well then I’ll give.  Because I work hard for what little money I get and I just want to know that it’s really going to get there to that kid.  Because I don’t want to see some, you know, stinkin, rotten, no good guy driving around in a Mercedes instead of that kid getting fed.  Am I wrong? 

 

No.

 

Okay, case closed.  That’s just what they really want to know is going to happen.  Those are the kinds of approaches.  Just think a little about what people really need and want.  It’s them that have come and taken their time to come and sit on that chair.  Is this concert tonight about them or about me?  It’s about them.  What do they need?  This is a foot-washing service.  It’s not an Eli service.  Let me tell you, I am sick of hearing myself sing.  Listen, I’ve got the CDs at home somewhere.  Those kinds of mentalities come into play.

 

  ELI ON…

 

On Perspective and Writing “King of the Hill”

 

“Go back, life hasn’t changed, your perspective has and that’s the key.  Every time you find yourself stuck, every time you find yourself hitting the wall again, go back to the mirror and go, you know what?  I need to change my perspective.  I’m not looking at this from the right angle.  When I used to try and work on my lawnmowers, I used to be a gardener, I would try and fix something and it would amaze me that if I just kept poking my head and hand in a different direction, I would eventually squeeze it in at such an angle that I would eventually get my hand in there because I realized somehow it’s got to fit.  Somehow my perspective and angle would get in there and it would always get fixed.  Somehow.  It always did.  And that’s my point.  So literally, even in my songwriting, I was able to write “King of The Hill” because I literally closed my eyes and thought, every time I think of Jesus on the cross, I immediately think of this vision I’ve had since I was a little kid. Jesus on the cross. You get a mental picture.  I thought okay, I closed my eyes and I had that mental picture and I literally imagined myself going, okay, here’s that mental picture and having it and going, now, I’m going to walk around that mental picture and make it 3-D and walk to the left of it now, and then walk closer to it and then climb up onto the cross with him and all of the sudden I’d be up where he is and I can feel his chest and the sweat and his beard, and all of the sudden, I can hear Him say, up to His father, “Stay with me a while.”  And I’m all the sudden intimate and hearing him saying, “Daddy, stay with me a while.  It may be foolish, but I’m scared.”  All of a sudden I realized, everything’s about my perspective.  It didn’t change.  He was still on the cross dying.  My perspective did.  I thought, Okay, I get it now.  My perspective, if I’m stuck, if I’m stuck, if I’m stuck, I’m going to take the same look at something so, sometimes I’ll look in the mirror and I’ll squat down and look (laughing), from a different angle, you know?  And I’ll look over to the left and I’ll look over to the right, my perspective.  That’s what changed, my perspective.” 

 

On some of the apathy & “celebrity-ism” in Christian music today:

 

If it’s none of our business, according to Romans, even chapters 1 and 2, to be judging people for their lifestyles and for the sin in their lives, is it any of our business to judge people for the cheesy lyrics for their songs?  Because there are people who are really being blessed where they’re at right now and there are lives being changed.  And I’m just like, “Okay, I’ve got to remember that.”  It’s just hard.  God just reminds me, “Dude, that’s not your fight.”  Just stay on task with what you’re doing and don’t be afraid to call a spade a spade.  At the same time, you know, you need to know when to make sure that you’ve got something to offer and if you’re spending more time talking about everything else instead of doing your job, you know, do you have something to offer or are you so busy critiquing everybody else’s cooking that like, that the stoves aren’t even on in your own kitchen?  I’m like, “alright, I’ve got to stay in my kitchen.”   I hear what you’re saying though.  We try and spoil people.  They feel like they should be treated special.  For me it’s just like, if that’s what you’re going for that’s cool, but to deny that that’s there would just be insane (a sense of “celebrity-ism” in Christian music today).  I just sit there and say, okay, that’s great, that’s what your thing is.  You’re up there, you’re not talking or connecting.  Half of these things, I just go okay, whatever.  You’re going for a different thing.  You’re going for…I couldn’t…I would die if I just did that!

 

When it’s your time, it’s your time:

 

I’m the guy you can’t say why to, because I could never play the guitar until I was 20.  There’s no excuse.  There’s no reason.  You just try things.  If you feel something starting to well inside, you let it woo you and you just do it because.  It doesn’t (mean you) have to be a professional, or it doesn’t mean you don’t have to be, you can just say, “oh, I feel something birthing” and when it’s time, well, there goes!  And you just go, and yeah, it’s one of those things where it doesn’t matter why it didn’t, all that matters is that it did.  It’s happened and (laughing), take the money and run! 

 

On being real, on image & on just about everything else:

 

Debbie:  About just being open with people… I guess one of the questions I had is how you got past the uncomfortable-ness of it, of just exposing yourself that much, and then, how you deal with, did you ever deal with resistance from others when you do that, where people are saying, “Okay, you’re going a little too far.”

 

eLi:  No.  People don’t ever do that to me.  It’s one of two reasons.  Number one people aren’t comfortable enough with themselves to be that bold to me.  That just shows me that I’m right, and that is you know, no one will ever come up to me and ever disagree with me.  If someone has something to say, they’ll come up to me and smile and tell me how wonderful I am and then they’ll go and talk bad about me.  But they’ll never say anything to me, which is hysterical, which is funny.  You’ve got to see the humor in that.  You see what I’m saying? The other people we talked about earlier, they’re the harmless ones.  They’re the ones that don’t mean to, they’re just socially retarded.  The other people are the ones who are saying how right they are and godly they are by gossiping and the hypocrisy of it or the ones saying “You’ve gone too far” No, no that’s not.  The situation is the same.  You know, how far is too far when you’re expressing how you feel about something?  That’s, you know, who can be the judge of that, I don’t know.  If you’re uncomfortable with how I feel, well, thank you for telling me how you feel.  Well, I don’t know.  How does that work?  The thing is, I understand.  Maybe I’m not comfortable with how I feel.  I don’t like feeling how I feel either.  I’m glad you agree, you know?  The thing is, that doesn’t happen to me.  People always see my heart.  I think high school, I think just growing up, has given me an example of just saying that, people will tease you at first when you’re in high school, but I’ve never not won a person over by just proving that I feel more passionate about how I feel than you do.  And that is, I believe what I believe, do you?  I feel the way I feel about something.  I’m being vulnerable and somebody else is embarrassed by it and wants to tease me about it?  Well, why are they doing that?  Because they’re just embarrassed about somebody sharing their feelings.  Well, why are they embarrassed by it?  Because they’re intimidated because they don’t know how to express their feelings.  Well, that’s not good enough.  They want to be able to do the same thing.  Well, so should I stop or should I continue on so that, A) I can keep sharing my feelings, AND, B) they can know it’s safe enough for them to do the same.  Well, guess what?  I’m going to keep doing my part then.  You know what happens?  All the time, I keep pressing through and not only do I get to share my feelings, but the other person ends up getting to share theirs too.  Because you know what?  It’s always better to share your feelings and to let that person get to share theirs too, because that’s ultimately what they want.  Why?  Because they’re human just like me and we all want the same thing.  That’s what that song, “What we don’t talk about” is talking about.  You’ve got to be strong.  You’ve got to sit there and you’ve got to think things through.  You have to.  You’ve got a responsibility as a thinking person with a noggin in your head filled with this goop and matter called brain tissue, and just common sense.  I’m just sitting there thinking, “We’ve got to think things through.”  It’s a little scary, a little hard, but, we took all this effort to putting a man on the moon, and yet, when it comes to meeting up with a little emotional resistance, we just crumble.  And I’m just like, bag that!  It’s easier for me to deal with that, because I don’t have what it takes to put a man on the moon, but, I can deal with people (laughs).  You know?  So, I’ve got what it takes to do that.  So I think for me, I think it was a matter of just saying, you know, remembering that people are going to tease you no matter what, if they are.  People are going to say what they’re going to say about you, if they’re going to say something about you.  I mean, if someone wants to think bad about ya, then they’re gonna.

 

Yeah, there’s nothing you can do about it.

 

Well, you may as well even make up some stuff.

 

Oh, make it real good!

 

Yeah.  Shoot, you’re talking about a guy who’s gone through a divorce in public.  Hey listen, I live a public life.  So my motto is, I’m going to make some of the stuff up too.  I’m going to have some fun with it.  I’m going to take some control here.  I’m going to have fun with my life.   If I’m going to be some bitter…according to what my record label told me after my divorce, you know, they sat me down and said, “now that you’re divorced, you’re either going to be, they’re going to say that you’re gay or that you’re a womanizer.” And I said, “well, do I get to choose?  Do I get to be both? Can I be a gay womanizer?  How does that work?”  They’re like, “this is serious” and I’m like, “no it’s not.  This is stupid.  This is the dumbest thing I’ve heard coming out of somebody’s mouth.”  I said “listen, you know, I’m going to start putting the rumors out that I AM a gay womanizer and you can print that.  I am a gay womanizer now.  I am a gay, astronaut womanizer.”  You know, it’s like, whatever.  This is so stupid.  I’m not going to crumble to the fear that all these other artists do.  Well, don’t do this!  Why?  Because it might look this way.  It either is or it isn’t.  And the people who want to believe that, have already decided that they want to believe something bad about you anyway, so if you even look a certain way… That means that every time I give a guy a hug at a concert, the people that want to believe I’m gay that are there, want to believe it.  But I’m not going to not give a guy a hug who needs a hug because you’re going to believe I’m gay.  You know?  I’m going to give that guy a kiss then too!  His wife might be dying of cancer.  “Look I’m sorry brother, I can’t hug you.”  You know how disappointed Jesus would be in me? This guy needs a hug, his wife’s dying, but people might think you’re gay!

 

Do people actually say that to you?

 

Oh listen, you get all these little innuendos, of like, so Eli, you know?  Everyone doesn’t get it or you get the lookers, I think it’s cool.  Right on man. Yeah, I’m gay.  I’m so gay I can’t stand it anymore!  Or the womanizer kind of thing.  So, uh, yeah, I’m a womanizer.  Different woman in every city, I can’t take it.  I’m tired.  I’m so worn out.  And oh, and don’t even joke about it.  Even now I’m being so inappropriate to even joke about it, oh my God.  You know?  Forget about the fact that I don’t do that and forget about the fact that we know the guys who are doing it but we don’t care about that.  But Eli’s joking about it and he’s a jerk even though we know he’s not doing it.  It’s like the whole thing of like you know, Eli’s joking about it and doesn’t do it therefore he’s inappropriate, but the guy that we know who’s doing it we don’t care because he’s at least not joking about it.  You know, that kind of stuff.  So if I just don’t joke about it but do it, it’s okay, you know?  It’s like, oh dang it, I’m so messed up.  What’s wrong with me?  I’m such an idiot. That kind of stuff.  Those kinds of things and those kinds of vulnerabilities are like misguided because they say it.  You know what?  No.  I have not left my common sense and truth behind me because I became a Christian artist.  They’re wrong.  They are wrong.  And I’m not going to sell out my common sense because right now, just because right now something else is popular.  Just like, I never thought bellbottoms were cool. I will never think bellbottoms are cool. 

 

Yeah, I don’t get that either.  I don’t know.  And now they’re like, they were back in style again. 

 

Yeah, they were back in style again.  You know what?  You can keep bringing them back.  Or like the waiter who can keep bringing the dessert tray by.  But sir, I’m full, I’m full now, I was full 5 minutes ago and I’m still going to be full 5 minutes from now.  You can keep bringing it by all night long, but I’m telling you now I don’t want it and you know what?  Now I’m at the point of telling you every time you bring it by now, you’re tip is going down a $1.  It’s not going to happen.  I don’t want anything on that tray.  It’s just one of those things of like you’re not fooling me.  Every time you bring it by it’s not I’m like a sheep that can’t remember that you just brought it by a second ago.  It’s one of those things where like, no, I’ve decided this is who I am, I’m going to bring my vulnerability to the table.  I can’t pretend to be aloof.  I can’t be this mysterious artist which makes people go, Oooh, I want to, I’ve got to be around this Eli guy, this or that.  That’s just not who I am.  I’m not.  I could sell more albums, I could be cooler, I could be sexier, I could be more mysterious, I’m not. That’s just who I am.  This is it.  What you see is what you get.  It’s not as exciting, it’s not as mysterious, it’s not as intriguing.  And you know what, it’s fine.  I mean, really.  I understand.  Look, I know what it takes to be more successful, I’m not a stupid man.  But I’m just saying, this is what I am and I can’t be anything that I’m not.  A few years ago they kept telling me, and I think you’ll remember, that there was something called alternative music, and alternative was the only thing that Nashville was going to sign.  Alternative was it.  Everybody in Nashville was rushing to be an alternative band.  Alternative this, alternative and blah, blah, blah and if you weren’t alternative, you weren’t anything and I got signed.  I was what I was.  And then it was, now it’s this and now it’s that, and I just laugh and I go, you know what?  I’m just me and if that means I don’t get a record deal (laughs), that’s quite okay.  I’m sure I’ll get into heaven.  I’m sure I’ll be just fine.  My point is, you have to be what you are. You can’t change your name and say, I’m no longer Debbie, I’m no longer me anymore.  My name is the Amazing Kreskin!  It just doesn’t work that way.  And by denying who and what we are, we’re denying what God is in us, and there’s times where I would like to look different, be taller, whatever, you know?

 

Yeah, everyone goes through that, right.

 

Of course.  And that’s cool.  That’s fine.  And then we come back to being okay with who and what we are as well.  That’s the process.  And, these are the real people I get to do concerts for. 

 

I think that’s why maybe a lot of people don’t feel like they connect to God, because they feel like they have to achieve some kind of perfection or something, the way that the church can be at times, there’s not that acceptance.

 

I’m tracking with you and that’s why I’m saying this.  I think the one thing that maybe sometimes, the reason why I might seem threatening sometimes to a church or a radio station or whatever, is that I think that sometimes they think I’m after them or after the establishment when they hear my stuff.  What they don’t understand is, because they think I’m after the church…  What I’m after is the individual, and what the individual gets, when they come to my concert, is that I’m saying to them “You are the church, and you’re the problem.  You’re in your own way.  I am my problem.  I’m in my own way.  I need to get out of my own way.  So I say to myself, “Hey, you know, I need to stop and say, am I, am I focusing on the wrong things today?  Am I seeing God for who He really is, or am I not?  Am I fighting the wrong battles today?  Is this the hill I really want to die on today?  And challenging each individual because when people come to my concerts, it doesn’t matter if there’s 3 people or 3,000, I will speak to them as individuals.  They will know and when they leave here, they will feel as if I spoke to each one of them as individuals and they will leave here knowing that they have the opportunity to leave here and know that that’s an individual call for them and that’s what I’m doing with these albums. That’s an individual person’s responsibility.  That’s what the church really is.  And if they want to treat it as some machine… We are all going to be held responsible on our own, and that’s what I’m trying to get people to understand.  This is personal responsibility and we have to do it one person at a time, and so, to say that we’re going to be like Don Quixote and start grabbing, you know, a big lance and going after any church or this church is just ludicrous, you know?  That’s why once again, for people to understand, I’m not mad at anything.  It’s preposterous.  What am I mad at?  I have nothing to be mad at.  I’m mad at myself, you know?  I get frustrated with myself, but I’m mad at no one.  Am I mad at you?  I mean, tell me, who I’m mad at!  I’ve got no one to be mad at but myself because I understand that I get sidetracked at times.  I get blurred, double vision.  I get unfocused.  We all do.  And then we just snap back to the middle, and all I’m saying is I’m taking my mistakes, I’m taking my misguided ideas, and I’m sharing them with everybody else in understanding that this is where I veer left sometimes and this is what takes me back to Christ and people go, “Oh yeah, you’re right.” And they’re using that as well.  Examples of what to do, but also examples of what not to do and they take those pearls of wisdom home and they apply them to their lives and they go “Thanks brother.”  Not, “Thank you EeeeeeIi, you’re so wonderful,” but “Thank you brother.”  Thank you dear brother, just a brother in Christ.  But we keep on with Jesus.  That’s what this is supposed to be and He gets the glory, He gets the adoration, we adore Him and we stay on track.  You know, but it’s not, I guess, as glamorous as me being a rock star or a demi-god, but you know what?  That’s what it’s supposed to be.  You know?  But that’s why I get satisfaction out of what I do.  Because, this is what’s funny, everywhere I go, when someone sits down to do an interview with me, they always ask me, “Are you from around here or something?  You know why?  Because people love me.  They have a love for me because they know that we all just kind of love each other.  “Why do you come around here so much?  Why are they asking you to come back?”  Because we just love each other.  Because we’re just investing our lives in each other. Because it doesn’t matter about anything else.  Because these people, we’re all struggling, that’s what matters.  Because they know when they come to a concert that they’re going to get something that they need.  And that matters.  That really matters, because I’ve been there too and that’s why I’ve come to needing so badly and going “God, I need you to speak to me tonight, BAD.  Otherwise, I’m not sure if I’m going to wake up tomorrow morning.  And there are people who are going to read this who are feeling that right now.  That’s a fact, not manipulation.  But that’s a fact, period.   And I’ve been there as a Christian, man, I’ve been there, so it’s like, hey, are these things we’re going to talk about?  Because if we do…or do we not talk about them because we’re afraid that God, what?  I think that we’re just afraid sometimes that God may not have an answer.  Is it okay to be afraid?  Well if it’s okay or not, doesn’t matter, we are.  Once again, how honest are we willing to be? 

 

For me, I’ve learned that it’s okay to be just totally buck-naked honest because there’s freedom there.  There’s a freedom.  And you know what?  I’ve learned that that freedom, that that honesty, sets people, whoever’s listening, free, even if at the time if it freaks them out.  I know that that will process and within 48 hours it’s going to just set them free.  I know it does. Because it’s God doing the work, and I know that that’s my job, that I’ve got to put it out there and it’s going to cost me something, but I know that what it gives them, it’s just really cool.  I know I’ll never be like Steven Curtis Chapman or Michael W. Smith because of it.  Because I’ll never have that mystery or allure or, I’ll never have the big production, I’ll never have all that.  But you’ve got to invest in one or the other I guess.  But you know what man? I truly wouldn’t trade it.  I’m just saying that we all have our place, and I think that if any of the people who have questions were to take the time to actually come to a concert, I think they’d understand that we serve people and you can’t serve people and love people and be angry.  You just can’t.”

 

Eli, by personal admission, is no stranger to failure and mistakes, and is quick to remind his audiences that he is just one of us, and that his job is to serve.  He feels that he cannot serve from a pedestal, but must do so at our own feet, with our serving at each other’s feet.  Eli’s unique, distinctive voice, strong guitar playing, honest talk, and passionate, soul-baring songs all seem to speak so clearly of things we all need to hear and can relate to, as well as point out social issues, as well as issues within the church itself, that we all need to look closer at, and combined with his ministry and his ability to connect with his audience and his fans, provide a powerful combination that marries music and ministry on a whole new level.  Those qualities, along with his willingness to make himself vulnerable and truly approachable, make him so easy to relate to and qualify him as a major voice and a truly unique and influential figure in Christian music today.

 

 

You will walk away from an encounter with Eli feeling truly cared for, lifted up and appreciated, as if he is a member of your own family, a brother in Christ, a friend.  If being a Christian is representing Christ on earth to all we meet, doing our best to show brotherly love, care and concern to all, standing up for what we believe even when it isn’t popular, and being real, open and honest, even when it comes to our own failures, then Eli has got the Christianity thing down to a T.

 

Be sure to check out Eli’s Live CD, available on his website, and keep your eyes peeled for his next label release with a tentative release date in early fall, as well as a pending upcoming film role where he will portray a monk.  He also has an upcoming role in August where he will play Jesus in Godspell.  Check his website for more details.

 

 

Eli’s official web site: www.Elinews.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


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