Scripture Memorization is for Old-Timers

I would say I have internalized a fair amount of Scripture. Maybe more than average for an American my age. Maybe less than average for a pastor.

And some of that internalized scripture is indeed memorized. In other words, I can quote the verse(s) with some confidence in the accuracy of the words and their order. But the vast majority of my Scripture memory is less specific. I can recall the message, I know what's being said, and I have enough of the words in my head to go find it, but I don't have it memorized verbatim.

Worst of all, though, is my memory for references. Even my ability to find the book that contains the verse in question is sorely limited. Did Jesus say that in Matthew, Mark, Luke or John? Did Paul say that in Ephesians, Galatians, Philippians or Colossians? Or Romans or 1 or 2 Corinthians? Or was that Peter?

Don't get me wrong: often my recollection will get me close, but it's bad enough to give me a type of biblical inferiority complex, and to damage my confidence when talking about scripture with a "memorizer".

But here's my question for you. Does it really matter anymore?

Certainly, in the past it has been vitally important for rabbis, or ministers of the gospel to have a thorough grasp of Scripture. Torah teachers typically had the Old Testament memorized from cover to cover, and most certainly Jesus did as well. And as difficult an undertaking as that would be, it was important. Hardly anybody had a copy of the Scriptures in their home... they had to take what opportunity they could get, when they had access to the scrolls, to internalize them thoroughly, so they could then access them from their minds anytime they chose.

Even in subsequent (Gentile Christian) cultures, where learning and interpretation were less pervasive, this practice would be crucial for those teaching Scripture and ministering to the people. And this remained true until Gutenberg's invention of the printing press, and well beyond it, until the possession of vernacular Bibles became commonplace.

At this point we see the importance of Scripture memorization begin to wane. If everyone who wants one can have a Bible on the shelf, complete with a concordance, then thorough memorization is not necessary for mere reference purposes. Having a firm grasp on the contents and message in the Bible, along with a fair collection of verbatim verses, is probably sufficient.

But now things have changed further still. Not only do I have a few Bibles on the shelf, I have access to virtually every translation, commentary and word study ever written with the click of a mouse. I can view countless maps, diagrams, and photos without even getting up. In additiona, there are so many writings and interpretations of Scripture on the internet that Google has replaced any Bible website as a concordance, since every verse I might want to find has been written about dozens, if not hundreds of times over, for public consumption.

So let me ask you, what place does Scripture memorization have in the age of the internet? Naturally, it helps us to meditate on the words of God in our hearts, and to have an answer ready for those who ask, and to find what we need when we do have the internet in front of us, but how much time should we be spending specifically on memorization?

How much time do you spend? Is it less than you would like? Or is your "spiritual growth" time better spent elsewhere?

P.S. Yes, the title is just a provocative attention grabber, nothing more.


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The Party Ends in Hell

South & Walnut, Downtown Springfield - View Larger Map

"I'm going to ask you for the ninth time. Have you really sought God's direction as to whether this is the message he has for you to give these people?"

"Jesus was very clear..."

"No. I'm asking you a personal question. Have you prayed about this? How do you know, out of the thousands of sentences you could write on a sign like this, that "The Party Ends in Hell" is the best one?"

"It's a good message."

"But have you asked God whether it's his idea or yours?"

A girl about 18 years old had been standing in observation of this exchange, between myself and the bearded sign-holder at the corner of South and Walnut, and she broke in.

"OK. Let's say I'm one of the people who came here to party, and let's say I come up to you holding your sign, and ask you how I can keep the party from ending in hell. I mean, I know I'm going to heaven. But if I didn't, and I asked you how I could get there, what would you say?"

"I would say to avoid adorning yourself with braided hair, gold and pearls or costly array; to adorn yourself in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety."

"Wait," I said, "Nothing about the cross, about Jesus' blood?"

"Jesus said if you love me you will obey my commandments, and we will to do these works through the blood of Christ."

The girl spoke up again, "But if I don't even know Jesus, and I don't love him, then I could put on a turtleneck and a long skirt and it wouldn't do me any good!"

"She'll be a very modestly dressed hell-dweller," I quipped.

Our conversation with this middle-aged sign-holder had been going for fifteen minutes or so before this particular exchange began, and it continued along this vein for a few minutes more. He was not a hot-head as you might imagine. He was at all times either thoughtful, patient and shy, or somewhat of a dead-eyed automaton. If any words came quickly, they were clearly words which had been well-rehearsed, and more often than not, unhelpful to the question being asked. Nevertheless, his manner was calm and respectful.

As we went round and round, another sign-holder stepped up, with only a one-word message in his own hands: "Repent." This was a younger man, with blond hair and beard, with whom I had talked once before. Unlike some of the other sign-holders, I thought I had seen a glimmer of real reason in his eyes, and had been impressed in the past by his heartfelt motives, even if I severely differed with his method.

This younger man stepped in, ostensibly to bail out his middle-aged friend, who was apparently having trouble.

"Galatians 5:19 says that adulterers, fornicators, drunkards and revellers will not inherit the Kingdom of God, and Jesus says that those who love me will obey my commandments."

We both protested. "But it is the blood of Jesus that actually saves people."

"You are caught up in faith-only theology, pitting Paul against James and Jesus."

"But I think Paul, James and Jesus all agree about faith and works."

"Jesus taught that you are saved when you obey his commandments," the young sign-holder said.

"It sounds like you're saying that you have to earn your salvation, " I suggested.

"Look," he said, getting more agitated. "I was raised with the preaching that God forgives everything... that we can all do whatever we want and God will always forgive us no matter what. I was in the youth group, and I just sat in the back of the bus whenever we went anywhere and smoked pot."

"I was raised learning salvation by faith, and I never heard a pastor suggest you can live however you want. Works are the sign of a living faith," I said.

"But faith alone always ends up in people doing whatever they want."

"So what you're saying is that you've paid for your ticket to heaven by being good."

"I don't deserve the credit. Jesus made it possible."

"But it sounds like he's just keeping his end of the contract. What's so great about that? He said himself that a worker deserves his wages. If I do a good job, and Jesus pays me with a ticket to heaven, then what was the whole point of the cross? Jesus didn't even do me any favors; I did it all myself! He's no different than an employer writing paychecks..."

"But your boss did you a favor by hiring you, right?"

"Maybe, but if I turn out to be a good employee, you could say I did him a favor by applying in the first place."

Things were started to get heated. I felt like I was maintaining my composure well enough, but I could see the fire in his eyes; his agitation was obvious. This was not the same thoughtful young man I had met before, so I began to wonder what had happened to him between then and now. Had he become more committed to his message since then? or less? I don't know if it was right or not, but I was starting to feel like Jesus talking to the Pharisees.

"You know, I used to think that your heart was in the right place, but now I hope you don't win anyone over at all. You would only set them on a path of legalism and self-righteousness. It's like you'll travel over land and sea to win a single convert, only to make them..." he didn't let me finish.

"So you're saying I could sit in the back of the bus and smoke pot and still be saved?" He was started to sound like a lawyer badgering the witness for a confession. Objection, your honor...

I stalled momentarily. "It depends on whether your heart is..."

"Yes or no!" he demanded. "Could I smoke pot and still be saved?" I paused for a moment, slightly stunned, while I decided whether or not to play his game. Technically he could still be saved, but clearly "yes" was an oversimple answer. Nevertheless, his expression made it clear that he would only tolerate a one-word response. Right or wrong, I took the bait.

"Yes."

In a furious about-face, he and his companion turned their backs on us, and stormed away down South Avenue, away from the party, away from the drunkenness and revelry and fornicating. The three of us who remained just stood there for a moment, stunned by the fury and impulsiveness exhibited by a group we had formerly assumed to be gentle and patient. It occurred to me that anger and hatred are listed along with fornication and drunkenness in the Galatians 5 passage they loved so much.

"What do they have to be angry about?" the girl wondered aloud. "What did they think they were getting into by coming here with those signs?"

"It's like going to play paintball and getting angry when you get hit with a paintball."

"Oh no!" she said "nobody told me there'd be paint in these balls! Now I have paint on me!"

Maybe we were wrong to joke around like that. But the tensions had run so high over the past 30 minutes that it felt good. We stood around a little longer, two girls who were friends (one of which never spoke during the exchange) and two guys (myself, plus one who had randomly walked up,) who were acquaintances from a year ago.

We talked about how we should really pray for them, and I wondered if I would ever get a shot at another conversation with the young hot-head. If so, what could I say? I don't think another debate would be appropriate. A heart-to-heart maybe? I don't know, really. I thought about making a sign of my own to hold while standing next to them that says, "Talk to these guys to learn how to earn your own salvation," or something of the sort, in the interest of full disclosure. An interesting idea, but probably a bad one.

It comes to mind that quite a few people stood around while I did most of the debating with these two sign-holders. I tried to give them opportunities to chime in, but most seemed content to simply observe. I can only hope that they observed something different in me; that I could debate without being hateful, and disagree without being disagreeable.

I hope that they saw less of me and more of Christ. But looking back on the exchange, I can't be sure.



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Nebraska

I know I've been neglectful of the blog this past month, so here's a good way to ease back into blogging mode.

Check out a few pictures here from our trip to Nebraska at the beggining of July. You can see the rest of the album on Facebook if we're Facebook friends.

Christina and I at our campsite, on Calamus Lake.

I dropped our digital camera in the sand, and pretty much ruined it. So the next three pictures are from a cheap-o disposable camera, and you can tell. This was the beach at Calamus Lake.


Here's a skillful self-portrait of me, Christina, and my Grandma, sitting out for Burwell's city fireworks show on the fourth.


And this is a sample of the undulating landscape of my Grandma's land, which we hiked around, doing our best to avoid manure and cacti.




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Broken

Please pray for my dad.

He was on his bicycle yesterday, and was almost home when he hit a slick patch on a turn and wiped out. My mom tells me that he laid there for a minute, in shock, until a fellow pastor and his wife drove by and noticed him there. They were able to get out and help him, and he thought he was going to be ok, until he tried to stand up. That's when he realized something was broken.

Fortunately there was an emergency room literally across the street, and he was quickly diagnosed with a broken hip. So he is there this morning, waiting for hip surgery, where they will set the bones and put in a pin. If experience is any guide, it will be a long recovery. But of course, we're praying otherwise.

It's hard to accept this. My dad always seemed sort of invincible. Even though he's nearly 60, he's in some of the best shape of his middle-aged life. For at least the past 5 years, he's been committed to eating healthy and getting a lot of exercise. And of course it's painfully ironic that the latter would have been the instrument of this injury.

Once again, please pray for this surgery, and that his recovery will be nothing short of miraculous.

San Francisco

OK... I know this trip was almost 2 months ago. But I really wanted to share some photos and thoughts with you about our day in San Francisco.

I'm going to let the pictures do most of the talking for a change. Here goes...

We stopped at the Golden Gate Bridge on our way to meet my parents and brother for lunch at Fisherman's Wharf. A word to the wise: always carry lots of quarters when you drive around San Francisco, because the only places to park are often metered, and only take coins. This was the case with the spot we found at the Bridge. Fortunately, there was 11 minutes left on the meter (and we had to rush anyway in order to meet my family,) so we grabbed the camera and ran up the hill to take a few snapshots. As you can see, I could use a bit more practice with my self-portrait skills.

This may be the coolest candy shop in the world. It's one of the places we stopped at Fisherman's Wharf, after lunch.

After FW, we made the short walk over to Pier 39. There were a lot of neat stores and restaurants there, although it was a little too manufactured for my tastes (think Silver Dollar City meets San Francisco Bay.)






Here's a classic San Francisco shot. That's Coit Tower at the top-right, and the famous Lombard Street running just left of center. We were driving a rented minivan (which was not part of the plan until the wedding party asked me to drive the one they rented the day before,) which isn't necessarily the type of vehicle you'd want when traveling up and down these hills. At least it was an automatic.

I knew San Francisco was hilly, but when you pull up to a stop sign before a street like this, and you pretty much have to look straight up to see where you're going... there's really no preparation for that. I just waited to make sure no other cars were in the street in front of me at the time (thank God it was Sunday,) and gunned it, Christina putting fingernail marks in my forearm the entire way up.

Caption: "I don't really need to use the toilet, but when will I ever see another one this cool?"

This is on the grounds of Coit Tower, pictured in the previous photo. Neat place, but once your car is in the hour-long line to get to the tiny parking lot at the top of this hill, you're going to Coit Tower whether you like it or not. I liked it.





While looking down at the city from Coit Tower, we saw this cathedral, called Saints Peter and Paul Church. Must have been a merger at some point. But we were absolutely stunned by the elegance of this building, and on top of that, we found a (free!) parking space just off the park square in front of it, so we stopped and headed in to see if they give tours.

To our surprise, we walked in and were greeted and handed a song sheet. OK... this is not a tour. This is mass. We were now unwitting attendees to Saints Peter and Paul's 5 pm Sunday Mass. So we sat down to take in the experience.

As you can see, the interior is just as striking as the exterior. It was easy to ignore everything going on and just stare at the walls. And it was a little funny that, despite the glory of our surroundings, the music and the mass in general were pretty anticlimactic. Acoustic guitar instead of organ, priest with a small, throaty voice instead of a soaring or booming one, and only a smattering of parishioners.

Nevertheless, I gleaned something from my moments under this vaulted ceiling: God was big. Everything in this space pointed upward toward his exalted nature, his omnipotent wonder, his eternal existence. God is tremendously big and we are painfully small.

And yet, the genius of an edifice such as this, is that there's more to the story. It's not just that we are sitting beneath a soul-crushing mega-force. Rather, the architecture lifts us up, it raises our souls to mingle with the divine among the stained glass and mosaics and telltale marble inlays. Although we are seated in pews some 90 feet below the ceiling, that distance gives our hearts room to reckon with a God who has lowered himself to be reckoned by us. The Creator of all, who deserves the bend of every knee, has bowed within our reach. And there's something about this space that reminds me once again of the dumbfounding reality of incarnation.

I began to wonder if I, and most of the people I knew, were missing something important in our worship experiences. Even the loudest and most fervent song services can't convey God's power in this way. And certainly not our humble little community venue, with our sorry chandelier, our little prayer groups, and stumblingly conversational sermons.

But maybe that really is part of the wonder. Not every gathering of believers must convey every facet of the body. In other words, maybe we need to get out more; that every time we meet a new group of Christ-followers, we discover a new facet of the face of God. And never, ever should we doubt that God has made us peculiar for a reason; to be ourselves, and not envy the unique divinities that he has impressed upon those who gather elsewhere.

When the service was over, Christina and I got up to look around some more, and came upon the candle room (although I'm sure there's a better name for it.) At the time we were worried about our Dwarf Rabbit, Steamer, whom we'd owned for 6 years, and had to put through surgery recently. We weren't sure if he would recover, so we lit a candle and prayed for his healing. Whether or not the candle made any difference, you'll be glad to know that Steamer recovered beautifully, and is chomping away at his kibble as I write these words.

As we left the church, we walked up the street, past dozens of colorful restaurants, bars, coffee shops, boutiques and the like. We found one that looked worthwhile, and stopped in for a cappuccino. We drank it as we sat out on the sidewalk, listening to an impromptu accordion performance.

That was our day in San Francisco. I'd say it was a good one.




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Unfortunate Son of American Family

I feel like I've been disowned by American Family. (This blog post is going to seem very out of place, but some things just gotta be said.)

I inherited my relationship with the insurance giant American Family from my own family. My parents have used them for years for auto, homeowner, and other coverage. They recommended Overland Park, KS agent Kathy Skahan to me, who is very helpful and friendly. No complaints about her.

So I'd used American Family for years for my auto insurance, and renter's insurance. Then, in October 2005 we bought a house. So we tapped AF for our homeowner's coverage as well.

In January 2007 Springfield suffered its worst ice storm in decades. Portions of our roof and siding were damaged, and American Family came out, took a look, and cut us a check. Of course, this was their only option in the fact of cut-and-dried damage from a major weather catastrophe.

But something more insidious was going on underneath. When we lost power for over a week, one of our hot-water pipes (which are used to being nice and toasty) got cold, and apparently, cracked. But here's the catch: the leak was underneath the kitchen floor, in a crawl space which is virtually inaccessible to human beings. So the very minor leak began to express itself, and we had no idea.

Fast-forward to October 2008. Half of our kitchen floor is sagging, our dishwasher and refrigerator are leaning, counters are separating from walls, and water is leaking ever-so-slightly from doorjambs. Upon investigation, we discover that our crawlspace is filled with steam, to the point that it had been venting up through the walls, and filling a portion of our attic. The floorboards and joists are soaked and rotted, and there is evidence of mold.

We call American Family to come out, since water leaks are supposedly covered in our policy. But there's one minor detail we weren't aware of: leaks which persist for a matter of "weeks, months or years" are actually NOT covered. Which means: don't leave your house for more than two weeks, or you might come back to discover a pipe leak which won't be covered by your insurance company.

I'll spare you the ensuing details except to say this: When I was trying my best to get a re-inspect scheduled pursuant to our original storm claim, it took American Family 2 weeks to even get an adjuster assigned, and no one returned my repeated phone calls for one whole week of that. Apparently the supervisor was "out" and his supervisor was "out".

When I finally did get them to look into it, they spoke very condescendingly and rudely, and acted as if I was inconveniencing them. They seemed angry that I would even pursue this claim.

My question for American Family: What was I supposed to do? What is any of us supposed to do when a leak develops in an invisible, inaccessible part of the house? I'll tell you what you do: you wait until there's a symptom, you discover the leak, and you fix it with your own damn money (which you don't have,) and you continue to pay your premiums like a good little boy.

I'm tempted to apologize for my attitude, but I imagine you're a grown-up, and you can handle my true sentiments, without the sugar coating.

At any rate... we're continuing to pursue this claim along more aggressive lines, and I now gag every time I see an American Family commercial about being there when you need them.

Some family.

Waste It All

I meant to write you a Merry Christmas post, but I didn't.

I meant to tell you more about my life and thoughts these last few days. But I didn't.

These two things are actually related. So let me express my hope that you had a wonderful Christmas, and that your New Year's celebrations are full of love and happiness.

Soon I hope to explain more of what's behind this... but for now I will just give you the poem that has been wrung from my heart. They read more like song lyrics than poetry, because I would like to make them into a song very soon. I hope you like it.

Waste It All
By Ryan Wiksell

The dice are warming in my hand
The chips are stacked and sorted
But they cannot stay, they cannot stay

There is no easy way; no stepping back
It’s all on red, it’s all on black
My life drops in the wheel, drops in the wheel

It may not work
I may be fooled
But anyway, we all are gambling fools
So I risked it all on you. I risked it all on you.

My portfolio must be the joke
Of brokers’ break rooms
My returns are few and lonely, few and lonely

But we spend it all on something
Something big, something dumb
We release it quick and hope it returns, hope it returns

It may not work
I may be fooled
But even the brokers are broke in the end
So I’ll go broke for you. I’ll go broke for you.

Is Judas disingenuous
To reprimand, to advocate for those with less
I broke the flask; I poured it out. I poured it out.

A year of paychecks on the floor
On the feet that carry everything I hope for
Rinsed with my tears, and dried with my hair, dried with my hair

It may not work
I may be fooled
But to really love is to fear no waste
So I’ll waste it all on you. Waste it all on you.



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The Story Has a Middle

If there's one book I've started and finished more than any other, it's The Cross and the Switchblade, by David Wilkerson.

I recall the first time clearly; reading about the author's refuge for troubled teens in the ghettos of Brooklyn, and the times when they had nothing to carry them over from one day to the next.

They gathered in earnest, and prayed simply and boldly that God would bring them food for their next meal. I recall the emotions that were stirred in me to read the experiences of those falling back on God for their moment-by-moment needs. The strength of spirit. The weakness of flesh. The clear view to the face of God.

And I envied it. I knew at the time that it was dangerous, but I didn't care.

And now I can't help the feeling that I've arrived. No, I'm not begging God for my next meal, but I am begging him not to let us go... not to let the Front Porch fail... not to let us fall into financial ruin. And I don't know whether to thank him for answering my prayer, or hate him for tormenting me when I'm just trying to do what he asked.

Faith is always suspended above a great chasm, as on a bridge. Most of my life, that bridge has been a cable-stayed, 6-lane suspension superhighway. At this moment it may have more in common with a swinging footbridge. And I can see the river thousands of feet below me when I look past my feet, through the remaining boards.

And as long as I'm looking down, it's easy to despair. As if this is where it ends. The bridge has brought me this far, just to drop me off. So to speak.

But my eyes don't belong on my feet. Apparently there's a genre of punk-rock called "shoegazing" because its performers do just that. And that may be ok for a rock band, but not for this metaphor. Because my eyes belong on the landing ahead of me. The story doesn't end here... I'm only halfway through.

Have you seen (or read) Lord of the Rings? How did you feel when Gandalf (or Aragorn) fell to his death? Did you storm out of the theater? Did you hop onto the web and write a scathing review of what a disappointment the Fellowship of the Ring turned out to be? Of course not... because you knew there was more. This story isn't over yet.

This story isn't over yet. It has a middle, and here we are.



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Walking Abbi

Yesterday the weather was perfect, and my wife was sorely in need of a quiet house for a nap. So I took our perpetual puppy, a black lab mix named Abbi, out for a long walk.

Usually when I want to take her for a long walk, I'll go to Commercial Street. It's the most interesting neighborhood that I can walk to and back without developing blisters on my feet. It's kind of a weird place to walk a dog, since there is really no grass along the whole stretch of C-Street, but she gets plenty of pooping opportunities (pooportunites?) on the way there and the way back.

So it's not really for her, it's for me. I'm not terribly routine-oriented, and I like to pepper the routines I do have with some kind of variety. Commercial Street is one of those places that you can walk over and over and see something different every time. Some people would say it has a sense of place. But it certainly helps keep me sane in the mundane.

I just wanted to take a casual post here to share a few observations I've made from walking Abbi. Here goes...

The Smell of Weed

Even though Abbi is technically full-grown she still acts like a puppy in most ways. One example of this is her difficulty remaining focused on the sidewalk. We may walk by acres and acres of grass in an hour, but she will find the ONE BLADE OF GRASS that for some reason, just smells amazing. And for a 15-pound creature, she can be remarkably hard to pull away from her discovery.

No Fear

Another surprise for such a small dog is that she is freakin' fearless. I used to think she was afraid of heights, but once she got used to us that went away. I even took her across the Jefferson Avenue footbridge, and she readily hopped up the steps, although she occasionally hunkered down into an army-type crawl when she got a sense of the height.

But one thing she is never afraid of is other dogs. Once I was leaving the Front Porch with her, just as a man was walking two Akita dogs down the sidewalk. These dogs are humongous, and it was all the man could do to keep them both in check as they vigorously sniffed out Abbi. And although each of them could have swallowed her whole, she didn't recoil for a moment, but pulled toward them. It worries me a bit, frankly.

I'm certain that she views most dogs she encounters as potential friends, unless they have two characteristics: 1) they are bigger than her, and 2) they are black. It's obvious that our dog is not racist, since she is black as well. But she just doesn't trust those big black dogs, and has, on occasion barked wildly at them if they get too close. One time she lunged for the neck, and I was barely able to restrain her in time. Fortunately her teeth aren't terribly sharp, but once again, she probably needs to get a better sense of her size if she values her life.

The Puppy Jackpot

I talk a lot about building community, and stepping out of your comfort zone to meet new people. If this is the least bit difficult for you, and I would say that applies to most of us, then get a cute, friendly dog. Abbi draws a lot of attention when she's around people, even before they learn that she's full-grown. But when they discover that she is a perpetual puppy most people are astounded. Yesterday someone on the footbridge said I had hit the puppy jackpot. One guy at Missouri State proposed that she was part black lab, part hamster.

Back Alleys

One of my other ways of keeping things interesting while walking in a very familiar area is to take the back alleys. Our neighborhood was built up between 80 and 120 years ago, and at the time they firmly believed that most houses should have an alley in the back. The majority of them are gravel, but we're actually fortunate enough to live in a house with a paved alley. I've even noticed a few houses that are located on alleys, and usually have addresses ending in 1/2. When I pass those houses I always wonder what it would be like living in a tucked-away house like that.

But there's a reason why I like the alleys besides the simple aesthetic variety. I guess it's because I get to look at the part of people's houses I'm not really supposed to see. I've always been a little bit that way. The funny thing is, I'm not a gossip or a particularly nosey person when it comes to people's private lives. But I've always enjoyed exploring, and finding ways to see what's off the beaten path, what doesn't show up on Google Maps Street View.

And in a neighborhood like ours, where there are huge discrepancies between one house and the next, walking the alleys is an even greater exercise in incongruence. There's so much variety that I don't even want to give examples. The backyards I see run the gamut from impeccable landscaping with swimming pool to absolute wilderness. One moment you'll hear automatic sprinklers gently showering an English garden, and the next you'll hear monkeys and macaws screeching from somewhere deep within the uncharted morass.

Of course, all Abbi notices is the blade of grass that a squirrel peed on.



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To Be Part of the Ocean

I'm sitting at the soundboard at the Front Porch, a concert is underway, and I just finished the last pages of Mitch Albom's 1997 book, Tuesdays with Morrie.

It's gotten a lot of acclaim, this book has. Everybody who reads it speaks highly of it, as a heart-wrenching account of an author's renewed relationship with a favorite professor in the midst of his ALS death throes. It's a true story, and it wants us to know that you're not ready to live until you're ready to die.

Personally, until the very end I wasn't that touched. No doubt it's well-written, sensitive, and thoughtful. But I considered putting it away several times before I reached the end, because all its platitudes about life and love and relationships and facing the end seemed a little cliche to me. A little overplayed... lacking poetry, poignancy, or both.

I think there may be a reason. Having spent my whole life in the Church, the subject of death is not entirely uncommon. Even if it's not a pleasant topic, it's nevertheless quite prescient to the church's theology. And for all its failings, somehow the Church did manage to instill in me a strong impression of the importance of love, relationships and living selflessly.

I was forced to consider the perspective of those raised without those insights. Those who may bristle at the raw consideration of death, and who have few opportunities to realign their thoughts to what is eternal. For them, I suppose I'm not surprised that Tuesdays with Morrie would be such an impactful book, and a truly beneficial one at that.

These were my thoughts at the half-point. But like I said, as it reached the end I started to feel differently. One passage that forced me to stop for a moment was a story told by the old professor himself. It was about a wave riding along the surface of the water, enjoying life. Until he notices what's happening to the waves ahead of him, as they crash violently on the shore. When the wave begins to panic, the next wave over comforts him by the notion that he is not a wave at all, he is part of the ocean.

As I said, this made me stop. Does it seem as silly to God for a human to fear the death that lies ahead, as it seems to a human for a wave to fear the shore? I've read a little about Buddhism lately, and their concept of "no-self". It is the process of getting rid of self-thoughts, to understand that "self" is an illusion, and that it is our membership in the universe, in humanity, in family, that really matter.

Don't think I'm buying into all this wholesale, but it is certainly stretching me.

And the whole topic brings me back over and over again to my nearest experience with death. About a year and half ago, just after our third wedding anniversary.

My wife Christina had an uncle who was essentially her father. Andrew Myers was brilliant, and proportionately eccentric for being brilliant. Few people have ever possessed greater potential. He was a doctor, and in his younger years gained a quick reputation in the ER for instant diagnosis. It was almost a shining. He could look at you, and tell what was wrong right away.

Although I never experienced this firsthand. My only hospital experience with Andrew Myers had him on the other end of the stethoscope.

As I said, it was about a year and a half ago. Andy's wife had just passed away six months prior, and he took a long downhill slide as a result. We all worried quite a bit about him... One might expect a bout of depression in his situation, but something else was bringing his health down drastically.

It didn't take long for his doctors to discover the cancer. Lung cancer. Our guess is that he knew he'd had it all along, but wanted nothing less than to be a cancer patient, subjected to wave after wave of destructive radiation. So he did what he could to alleviate the pain, and live his life while he could.

Fast-forward to the hospice room. When he was diagnosed, there was no doubt things would progress quickly, so there were few surprises that led us to this place... Christina and I together at Andy's side, or a fraction of Andy, anyway. The man we knew as a tall, robust individual was now a wisp of a man, with pure white hair and cheeks sunken severely beneath the oxygen tubes.

By many standards, I live a pretty colorful life. But it's also been fairly sheltered. In other words, until this point I'd never really witnessed death. Never really been there in the moment. And honestly, I could not have asked for a more precious introduction to humanity's greatest fear.

Andy had been mostly comatose during his short visit to the hospice, punctuated with short periods of looking around, or eking out a word or two. But in his final day, there was little to speak of. Christina and I stayed nearby, talking to him, holding his hands, and sharing warm conversations with friends and family who stopped in to visit.

The hospice nurse was nothing short of astounding. She was one of the most compassionate, encouraging and informative people I've ever encountered in the health care field. She told us how it would end. And we watched as it all unfolded.

His breathing became slower and slower, degenerating into intermittent gasps. And several other symptoms of passing matched the predictions perfectly.

But one blessing came to us that we didn't expect. Despite Andy's steady and unresponsive descent into darkness, his soul found the strength right before the end to open his eyes, and his mouth, as if he were witnessing something truly amazing. We held his hands a little tighter and smiled sadly to be part of such a breath-taking moment.

Then he closed his eyes again, to finish his breathing. The gasps got more and more sparse, and began to lift his chest as the effort became more and more intense. Then his chest would collapse, his chin would rise, the air would rush in sharply, and his body would rest for five seconds before it happened again. Then it was ten seconds. Despite their intensity, the breaths were thinning, and finally one gasp stopped midway, before Andrew Myers' body descended heavily into his bed. Christina and I squeezed his hands and looked at each other with emotions that don't fit into categories.

The nurse had asked us to inform her the moment he passed away, so I gave my wife a kiss and walked out into the hallway. I didn't have to walk far, because she was right nearby. Like I said, she was a wonderful nurse. She told me that we could take as long as we wanted with him before they began preparing his body for the funeral home. I questioned her about it, and she said some people take hours.

I returned to the room, and Christina and I sat and talked gently about Andy... trying to recall some of our happier moments with him. It seemed strange, mentally, to have casual conversation while a corpse is within arm's reach, but it also felt right in a way. I think we felt his presence more now, than we did when he was alive but comatose.

We prayed, and remarked to each other how relieved we were to know that Andy was with his Savior, whom he'd trusted in life. For although we mourn, we don't mourn like those who have no hope.

As I watched, and absorbed this new experience, and as I sit here to write out the story behind it, I am still a wave on the sea. I am moving, always darting in and out, never losing sight of the rocks ahead of me. But I am also part of the ocean, part of the larger picture that now holds Andrew Myers in the depths of its peace. Sometimes my heart can accept this, and sometimes it feels overwhelmed.

But despite the chaotic, the foreboding, the unknown, I can rest assured that in Christ, no fear is necessary. The sting of death is gone.

Not Alone

Despite the apparent uniqueness of the Front Porch, it is great to see that there are others out there dreaming and doing the Way of Jesus in ways we can relate to.

Back in December I wrote about one example of this located in Hamilton, Ontario, called The Freeway.

And just now I read a post on Kingdom Grace called "My Secret Fantasy" that reminded me again that we are not alone in this vision. There really is a movement afoot, and one that seems to have the stamp of Jesus on it.

It's hard not to become giddy when I read the way this vision takes on myriad variations in every cultural context, and in every impassioned heart to create a space of radical hospitality, and authentic community.

If you're reading this, and you know of any others, please speak up. It's really exciting to see continuity among so many who don't even know each other.

Peace.


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Kansas City on Google Street View - Our Story

I've known about Google Street View since they first made it public, with only 4 cities online: New York, Las Vegas, Miami and, um... Denver?

Anyway, I've watched them gradually add more and more cities to the network, and was thrilled when I saw that Kansas City had been added. Not only that, it has thicker coverage than almost any other city on Google Maps!

So that means I can easily show you the places in Kansas City that are important to me. Later I plan to create a post with neat, touristy pictures of my high school hometown, but for now I'll keep it more personal.

Here is the house I lived in with my parents and younger brother from 8th - 12th grade, and that they continued to live in while I was in college:


My wife Christina and I both went to the same high school, but only for a year, since I was class of '97, and she was '98, and she transferred in for her junior year. Sorry there's not a closer view, but you can see the stadium on the left, and part of the building on the right. Shawnee Mission South, everybody:


Although we'd glimpsed each other in the halls at school, both of the times we actually met were at this place, a Messianic Jewish congregation called Or Ha Olam. The reason we met twice is because the first time was when we were 15 or 16, and nothing clicked. But the second time we were 20 and 21, on Friday evening, June 16, 2000, to be precise, and I knew I had to ask her out:


My initial way of asking her out was to invite her to join me and the other college students at Or HaOlam at Steak 'n Shake after the service. This is where we first really hit it off. And the others that were with us said it was obvious:


While we were hitting it off, I asked her what kind of music she listens to, hoping against hope that she didn't say Country. What she said was, "Well, my first love is Jazz." That's it! I was sunk. So I asked her if she wanted to go with me after Steak 'n Shake to an after-hours jazz club I knew about near downtown. She said yes, and hopped in the car (parents' minivan... not exactly a chick magnet) with me, and off we went to the Mutual Musicians' Foundation:


There you can see the front stoop, where we hung out most of the time we were there, talking to some of the younger jazz musicians that stopped by. It was a gorgeous night to be sitting out discussing the deeper things in life at 3 am. And I know that's how late it was, because it was 4 am by the time I dropped her off at her house:




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Ticketshyster

At the risk of gloating, I would like to make all of you aware that I am going to the Radiohead concert in St. Louis on May 14.

Tickets went on sale on a Saturday morning in the middle of February, and my wife and I were sitting at the computer, poised to obtain tickets for us and six of our friends so we could all go as a group. I'll spare you the details, but since Ticketmaster's website made it clear that there was a four-ticket-per-person limit, we decided that I would by four, and my wife would buy four.

To be honest, I'm not the only one who was disappointed in the idea of buying Radiohead tickets through Ticketmaster. Radiohead's immense popularity did not come as a result of heavy radio airplay (despite their name) or aggressive marketing. With the exception of providing some music for Baz Luhrmann's immensely popular film rendition of Romeo & Juliet in the mid-90's, Radiohead's rise to prominence has been overwhelmingly grassroots. So it seems antithetical that they would rely on a corporation that so completely exemplifies "the man" to distribute their concert tickets.

Nevertheless, I didn't make a big deal about it, because I figured it was probably a requirement of the venue (a corporately named, and corporately minded, humongous amphitheater) rather than a decision made by Radiohead themselves. Of course, the ideal concert in the minds of most RH fans would be in some dingy gothic theatre, or underground rave. But let's be realistic... a venue that cool would most certainly exclude me (and probably you) from going, if only for its smallness.

So I didn't complain about having to go through Ticketmaster. Until now. Remember I told you about that four-ticket-per-person limit? Well, like I said, I bought four tickets, and then my wife bought four tickets. So we had our two, and although we knew it would take a few weeks for them all to arrive in the mail, we started promising the other six to our friends.

Until we opened our credit card bill today. Because lo and behold, there was a charge for four tickets, another charge for four tickets, and then, three days further down the statement, a credit for the price of four tickets.

It turns out that their policy is not four-per-person, it is four-per-household. Whether it was a typo on their website, or an oversight on our part, they still let the transaction go through, making us think we had eight tickets, and forcing me to call several people today to tell them that we didn't have tickets for them after all. (Try spilling those beans to a h-a-r-d-c-o-r-e Radiohead fan living in the Midwest.)

I argued with customer service about it, to no avail. The usual shpiel... "A website can't be perfect, it let the transactions go through, and then when we discover later that two transactions have the same billing address, we canceled one of them." B.S.

A website can most certainly tell when two transactions come from the same household, when they share a billing address, and especially when they share a credit card number, and a last name.

What bothers me most is not what happened. It's that we had to find out by opening our credit card statement. Imagine going to a store and buying 8 shirts, and taking them home to give to your friends as Christmas presents, then having the clerk from the store sneak into your house that night, take 4 of them back, and credit your card for that amount.

Nonsense, right? Exactly.

Epilogue: After this debacle, I quickly called a friend who had tickets to the show, but only bought two, to see if he could get two more. Contrary to my assumption, the lawn tickets hadn't sold out at all, and he was able to get two more, which was the exact overage of friends to whom we had promised tickets. Whew! God does care about Radiohead concerts. ;-)

Ah...

choo!

The Count

It's not about the numbers. It never has been.

Of course, if you follow this blog at all, you know that already. But saying it is a whole lot easier than meaning it.

I made a commitment last year to never count people unless there was an important practical reason. Estimations are less dangerous, but still suspect.

But it turns out that so much of the survival of The Core has come to hinge on that dreadful phrase: "Sunday Morning Attendance." The more people come, the more viable and successful it will seem to those who are there. This was proven to me over the past two weeks.

Last Sunday we had our first Second Sunday Artist Spotlight, and we featured artist Jon Stanton. Prior to that our highest attendance had been roughly 25. But this time it was closer to 40 (although, in keeping with our philosophy, nobody actually counted.)

I thought to myself, "OK... that was fun. Very encouraging. Some friends and family of the artist showed up to boost the showing a bit. Now let's see what happens next week." And what happened (this morning) was... the same thing. Without the boost.

They say success begets success. That when people see something work, or they see it well attended, that their perception of it improves automatically. I've experienced this firsthand. One young lady came several months ago on a Sunday morning, and seemed to really appreciate what she experienced, although there were not many more than a dozen in attendance. She came again last Sunday, and expressed her surprise at the number of people. "I really liked it the first time I came," she said, "but I was a little worried because there were, like, only eight people there or so." But when she came the second time and saw the place mostly full, it made a different impression entirely. I guess it's mob psychology in a way... "If this many people like it, it must be good."

So now I feel like it's a whole new ballgame. It definitely feels different with 3 or 4 dozen than with only 1 dozen. We need more brunch food. The sound system becomes more important. Some people are forced to sit towards the front. Plus there's just an energy to it that doesn't exist otherwise.

Believe me... I'm as much a fan of smallness as I ever was. But when it became apparent that The Core was going to have to survive (financially) primarily by its own devices, I started to realize how important it would be to build a self-sustaining fellowship, and that that body would have to be a certain size to be viable.

From where I sit, it looks like that's exactly what God is doing, although you never can tell for sure. Each week belongs to him... it's his call whether we're supposed to have 9 or 90 next week.

Although if you want to know my preference... I hope it's somewhere in between.

Ryan the Rookie

Today was my sixth day working a new job.

It's a pretty big deal to me, since I worked at Second Baptist for 2 1/2 years, and now I am employed by Trader's Printing in downtown Springfield. This is also the first time when I've actually transitioned directly from one job into another, without spending some time being unemployed and a bit desperate. So that's nice. And a little surreal.

That's not all that's surreal. Here's a blow-by-blow comparison of the new job and the old job that makes me feel a little out of sorts at times, for good or for ill.

Second Baptist ------ Trader's Printing
private office ------ no rooms with doors
windowless office --- windows everywhere
lots of solitude ---- lots of company
niceness to a fault - name-calling
flexible work ------- structured work
not enough pay ------ just enough pay
boss is older ------- boss is my age
30 co-workers ------- 4 co-workers
20-minute commute --- 5-minute commute

There's more, but you get the idea. Not only is Trader's close to home, it's only a block from the Front Porch, which is great. In fact, they don't have a working refrigerator at the moment, so if I take my lunch with me, I keep it at the FroPo. I'm even thinking about taking the bus because the central terminal is straight across the street.

A few things that are the same: both are quite old. Second was founded in 1885, and Trader's in 1925. So they both have sort of a storied history and an established reputation. Also, I'm actually able to carry over a lot of the skills I've learned into the new job, such as design, typography, bindery, etc.

Overall, I must say that I'm enjoying it quite a bit, though it is certainly overwhelming to all of a sudden be the resident rookie. They try to teach me 30 new things every day, and I'm just hoping to retain half of it. And despite the name-calling, it's actually a very friendly environment.

The biggest difference of all? On Friday, my boss did a small print job for his buddy at Hickok's restaurant next door, and they paid him with a half-gallon of their in-house microbrew. So he set it out on the table in the back room at 4:30 for us all to drink together. On the clock.

Cheers!

Mid-December Miscellany

Here we are... 12 days to Christmas and my mind is filled with miscellany. So why even try to focus? Here's a hodge-podge, a menagerie, a winding journey through a wandering mind.

Advent Conspiracy

One occupant of my mind that only seems to grow stronger is the sense that I should be a part of helping everyone get it right when it comes to Christmas. No, I'm not talking about the culture wars of who has the almighty guts to actually say "Merry Christmas". It scares me to oblivion to think of three Christian fathers showing up at Best Buy for the only remaining Nintendo Wii, pounding each other to a pulp for it, and then all being careful to wish the "Happy Holidays" clerk a "Merry Christmas" on their way out.

Imago Dei is a church in Portland that has made a real effort to instigate a change in the rabid commercialization of the birth of Christ. It's called Advent Conspiracy, and it urges everyone to spend less, and give more... specifically to provide clean water for those in the world who have none. I encourage everyone to check it out, and I could definitely see The Core jumping on board with this in 2008. There's a great video on Tim Keel's blog about the joy of giving clean water.

Downtown Conversation

There's a lot of new stuff coming in downtown. Artist Susan Sommer-Luarca renovated, and now opened, a gorgeous new gallery just across the intersection from the Front Porch, a new coffeehouse on the square, called The Coffee Ethic, has now come online, and at the same time a quaint little shop called Global Fayre has hit the Campbell Avenue scene just a block away. The best part is, In the last 24 hours I have had great conversations with the proprietors of all three of these new establishments, and they have all been actually quite deep. I pray that there will be many more opportunities to connect meaningfully with our downtown neighbors.

Vocationality

And speaking of great conversations, I am having some of the best conversations so far with my co-workers now that I have decided, after 2 1/2 years working at Second Baptist Church, to move on. In case you weren't aware, I took a position at Second in May 2005, primarily to handle their graphic design and layout. But now I have accepted the role of Office Manager/Graphic Designer at a downtown print shop called Trader's Printing Company. It's a small, family owned business that has had a strong presence downtown for over 80 years, so that's pretty exciting. Not to mention the fact that my round-trip commute will be reduced from 18 miles to 3 miles, and that I'll be working full-time only a block from the Front Porch!

It's Getting Easier to be Green

I'll have to post some pictures on this topic soon, but I did want to let everyone know that the Front Porch's green room (the room behind the stage) is getting a make-over. We were donated a couch and easy-chair set from a furniture store across the street the went out of business. And check this out... it's a very hip set: two-tone leather worth $5500! In addition to that we've been donated a 32" flat-panel TV. So now we can deck out the Green Room and make it a comfy spot for Discussion Groups, Counseling, Prayer, Study Groups, and the older kiddos (pre-schoolers) who come on Sunday mornings. Just throw in an end table and a floor lamp and we're in business.

Merging and Changing

I'm keeping the details a little bit quiet at the moment, but we're looking forward to our new year of Sunday morning Worship Gatherings. Stay tuned as new ideas unfold...

What a Sell-Out!

This is just a short post to let everybody know that the Hit the Lights Fashion Show on Saturday evening was a complete success! We sold every last ticket, filled up every seat, and even let a few people in for the ticket price who knew they would have nowhere to sit. Here are the (approximate) numbers:

110 tickets sold
35 garments exhibited
25 models exhibiting them
10 designers
18 auction items sold
15 volunteers & coordinators
1 fantastic evening

I'll post some pictures within the next week. Praise God, and thanks to all of you who came, or helped!

Sunday

Let me just say that I had a beautiful day on Sunday. So good, in fact, that it made me wonder what suffering I might have to endure this week to pay for it.

I'm joking. But if the Chiefs hadn't lost, and provided a necessary smudge on an otherwise perfect day, I would be serious.

This was the second week that we held our Merge worship gathering on Sunday morning. The first week was fine. Some people came, I had some wonderful help with the music side of things, and I was ok with it.

But this time was better. Even though I didn't have any help with the music (next week Skyler Smith and Joe Terry will join me) I just really enjoyed everything. Some people showed up in time for brunch... some people brought food who didn't have to... and we had a great time eating and shooting the breeze. Jason ran sound and powerpoint, and has committed to helping out with that every week. Matt & Andrea brought their whole freakin' extended family.

Two girls I knew from the South Haven youth group came and brought a college friend. Two girls that sang for Open Mic the night before came, and are interested in helping with music in the future. A guy we met at the Drury Activities Fair a few months back showed up. One college girl that was there the first week came back, and brought a friend. The wife and son of one of our former exhibiting artists came. Christina was there, Angela was there, Amanda was there, our neighbor three doors down came and brought his 5-year-old son. One family peered in the window and started to move on, until I came out and asked them if they were looking for the worship gathering. Once they were convinced that it wasn't all young people, they came in, and really enjoyed it.

Like I've said before, we don't count people. But I will probably look back on Sundays like this, and miss being able to list off all the people who came.

Since I didn't have any help with music, I just played four songs on the piano. I apologized several times for making it look like it was the Ryan Show, but nevertheless, I felt like God was doing it his way, and the environment seemed very worshipful. After that, we all grouped up with those around us to share our needs and concerns, etc, for prayer. Every group seemed to be chatting happily when it was time to move on.

So I put a stool down on the floor, near the front of the group, and shared what I knew about the first mention of Jesus in the Bible, what some call the "proto-evangelion". This is where Adam and Eve sin, and God curses the serpent, saying that Eve's offspring will crush his head. That "offspring" is Jesus.

When I asked for a volunteer to read Genesis 2:25, I gave everyone a warning. "You need to be comfortable with the "n" word if you want to read it," I said. Everyone kind of squirmed, and after a few tense moments someone read out loud, "The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame." The tension dissipated a bit, and I realized why. "There's the "n" word there... "naked". The other "n" word is not in the Bible, by the way. I've read the whole thing, and it's just not there, so you don't have to worry about that." That got a chuckle.

The rest of the talk was a combination of sharing and questioning, and several people were happy to put in their two cents. The main thing we discovered is that this is not our story, it's God's story. Jesus is the star of the New Testament AND the Old Testament. But in addition to that, he needs to be the star of our own stories. Most of us make ourselves the star, and think too highly of ourselves. Some make ourselves an extra, and think too lowly of ourselves. God has made us to be important supporting actors in this story. We are each vital, but we are not what it's all about. Jesus is.

Another thing I loved was the set-up. Some people sat in the rows at the front, others at cafe tables just behind that, and still others in couches along the side, or towards the back. I think it was quite comfy.

So that was the AM. But there's more! Later in the evening, Christina and I took a walk down Pickwick Street, an annual fall tradition for us, since Pickwick is a beautiful place to enjoy the fall foliage. When we were almost back to our car, we passed a little store called Incense and Peppermints, which is a cute hippie store that sells hippie stuff. It looked like it had been broken into, and the owner was inside looking very distraught. So we came over and asked her if we could do anything to help. She said no, but she proceeded to vent about everything that had been going wrong in her life... her dog had died, her friend had committed suicide, and now this.

We just listened, and eventually she invited us in for a beer. So we joined her inside as she scrounged up a few chairs to sit and talk. And she talked a lot... and we listened a lot, sipping on our Bud Lights.

This post is getting way to long to go on about our conversation with her, except to say that it was beautiful, for us, and apparently for her.

That's it. That was our day.

God is good.

Sometimes I Wish I Were a Smoker

If cigarettes, cigars or pipes were a) free, b) pleasant-tasting, and c) completely harmless, I think I would be a smoker.

Naturally, these three things are ridiculously untrue. I've never smoked for even a moment (a friend tried to teach me how to puff a cigar one time, but I failed miserably) and I suppose I never will. It's never looked or smelled appealing to me, and I've outgrown any vulnerability to that sort of peer pressure.

But there is one allure that grabs me every so often. This morning I saw a guy standing out at the edge of a parking lot, enjoying the cool morning haze, making a little haze of his own. I tried to imagine him without a cigarette, just standing there, staring into space. Then I realized that people don't do that.

When I lived in an apartment building with balconies, I looked with a trace of envy at my neighbors, who could sit out on their lawn chairs late in the evening, just smoking. I didn't smoke, so I tried sitting out on my balcony with a book. Not enough light. I tried sitting out there with nothing, and I could tell that people walking by thought I was watching them. I tried bringing a soda with me... that worked a little better, but it was gone in 5 minutes, and then I was a spy again.

I could sit out with a buddy. Now I'm not so weird. But then we have to talk. We can't just sit there and BE. Because that's just two people leering at passersby. And if there's a nip in the air, or a few more bugs than we care for, it's too easy to just go inside.

My wife and I will sit out on our porch now and then, when the weather's good and we have a dessert to eat, or a beverage to drink. We generally don't just sit there... we talk. And that's nice. But I still say there's something about smoking a cigarette that helps people to understand the value of just BEING.

Do I want more people to smoke? Hell no. I would cast the accursed sticks into the nearest volcano if I could (now there's a smell.) What I really wish is that we, as a culture, would figure out how to just stop for a moment... stop talking, stop doing, stop worrying... to take a break from life and learn how to be.

Now that's smoooooth refreshment!

Perelandra and the Front Porch

I am halfway through reading C.S. Lewis' book entitled "Perelandra", the second in his renowned science fiction trilogy. My copy of the book is pretty dang old--my dad read it when he was young--which is cool. But as a consequence, I have to hold it gingerly to keep half the pages from falling out, which is annoying.

I don't feel the need here to go into a synopsis of the book, but it takes place on Venus, and one of the characters is a type of Eve. She is one of only two humans native to the planet, and the other (her husband) is missing. Just as the Lady is a type of Eve, Venus is a type of Eden, and at the beginning of the story is in an unfallen state. The Lady knows nothing about evil, but in talking to the protagonist of the story, Professor Ransom (who has been sent from earth), she begins to learn some new things. The central message of the book is stated well in the following passage:

"What you have made me see," answered the Lady, "is as plain as the sky, but I never saw it before. Yet it has happened every day. One goes into the forest to pick food and already the thought of one fruit rather than another has grown up in one's mind. Then, it may be, one finds a different fruit and not the fruit one thought of. One joy was expected and another is given. But this I had never noticed before -- that at the very moment of the finding there is in the mind a kind of thrusting back, or setting aside. The picture of the fruit you have not found is still, for a moment, before you. And if you wished -- if it were possible to wish -- you could keep it there. You could send your soul after the good you had expected, instead of turning it to the good you had got. You could refuse the real good; you could make the real fruit taste insipid by thinking of the other."

It blows me away to think about how often this happens... millions of times a day. Do you sit in a relatively good job and spoil it by fantasizing about the job you really want? Maybe the job you have is actually better. Do you have a loving spouse, and wish you could have married your high school sweetheart instead? Are you so sure you would have been happier if you had?

I think a lot about how the Pharisees were guilty of this. Their approach to the concept of Messiah was to expect a conquering king, a Pharisee of Pharisees, someone who validates them, and rewards them for their sacrifice of righteousness.

As an aside, I often wonder how many of those who actually did follow Jesus were really any better. The disciples were validated by Jesus because he picked them and not others. The sick were validated because he healed them. The children because he honored them. The women and Gentiles because he included them. I can't believe I'm saying this, but... perhaps we have been a bit hard on the Pharisees. Not because they were good, but because they were no worse than the others around them (or us, for that matter.) Everyone in Jesus' company was simply following him, or not following him, based on what was, or wasn't, in it for them. It was not until he was crucified and resurrected, and really not until Pentecost, that his followers began to be identified by what they were giving, and not what they were getting.

We have to make the same choice. Jesus may be validating you... but he won't be for long, I promise you that. He will lift you up and set your feet on a rock. He will breathe his strength and peace into you and anoint your head with oil. But there will come a point where you have been rehabilitated enough to stop taking, and start giving. And that is the point where Jesus will seem to disappear.

Then you will have the choice of the Pharisee (or perhaps Peter at his moment of denial, if you will.) "Do I take Jesus as he is? Or do I keep waiting for somebody to validate me... to be the fruit that I expected to find?"

But the choice has a different twist for you then it did for them. You don't have Jesus literally standing right in front of you, calling you a viper, or a hypocrite. You have the opportunity to craft him into your likeness with your imagination, then with your words, and then with your lifestyle. You can convince people that Jesus is something else... a wish-granting pushover, or pot-smoking hippie, or a gun-toting Republican, to name a few.

You come to that point where he seems to disappear, and then you have to clear it all away--your needs, your blessings, your expectations--remove all the clutter from your vision and ask yourself the only question that has ever mattered...

"Do I trust God?"

And when you have answered it, look again at the fruit in your hand, and the fruit in your mind.

I am not the only one who ventured into the idea of the Front Porch, and The Core, with certain expectations. Many of you who are reading this have had your own. Some of you have taken actual steps to realize those visions. Some have done nothing. And a few have asked me to do it for them.

It's easy to dream when there is no tangible reality in front of you, defying you openly. But now the Front Porch is real... and it keeps tantalizing me with the promise of other-worldly delights. You know, revolutionary ministry, authentic community, dynamic relationships, transformed lives, and night after night of packed-out events. In a word... adventure. But it also taunts me with the threat of misdirection... that it might very well become something bad, or something old and tired... or perhaps nothing at all.

Don't push away from me on this... it's your battle, too. Ask yourself if you are more in the habit of finding a Jesus who will continue to validate you, or of pouring your heart out to serve the one who really exists.

I'm just trying day in and and day out to remember that it all belongs to him... that success is his responsibility, not mine.

Thank goodness.

Omniscient

You say you're omniscient.

You say there's nothing that escapes your notice... nothing you cannot understand.

At one point maybe you decided there were a few things outside your experience, so you came down and did that, too. Now we're supposed to find complete comfort in the totality of your purview... that no matter what we find to complain about, you've got it whipped.

You say you've suffered far beyond the trials of any mortal human. I'll grant you that. Your capabilities are infinitely higher than mine... your pain is infinitely more painful, and your joy infinitely more joyful. How can I argue? Why should I compare myself to you at all?

Because you started it.

You made me in your image. You said that you could relate to all my temptations, because you've been there. You, sir, have invited the comparison, and now I feel like it's falling apart.

Because you don't know what it's like to screw up.

Sure, maybe you do, in some impossible realm that will forever escape the grasp of my consciousness... some alternate universe where something is beyond you. But how can that be anything but nonsense to me?

You say you are the "Friend of Sinners", but I imagine a homeless man being befriended by the president of a seminary, or a leper by Mother Teresa. I'm thankful for the kindness, but sometimes the gift feels like cold comfort. Yay... I have a pity friend.

Because ultimately, I am pitiful. Even in your most pitiful moment you were heroic, earth-shattering, compassionate, praiseworthy. Your most pitiful moment was, indeed, your most beautiful moment.

But when I am a loser... I am just a loser. When I make a fool of myself, I am just a fool.

So what do I want? To pull God down to me? To shrink his head? To yank my rescuer out of the boat so I can drown in good company?

If I wasn't pitiful when I started writing this, surely I am now.

Serendipity

When you don't believe in luck, chance or coincidence you're typically left with a lot of churchy words to describe the unexpected neat stuff that happens in your life. And those words never really seem to capture it. "Blessing", "Divine Appointment", "A God Thing" etc. All a little clunky.

The fact is that I do believe in chance and coincidence (not so much in luck) but there is really no better word for this stuff than "Serendipity." That way you can ascribe your good fortune to whoever you want... you don't have to be presumptuous to be poetic.

I have encountered a few instances of serendipity this week. On Monday, I finally got to meet Ibiyinka Alao, a wonderful guy who had been friends with Phillip & Amy Scoggins for awhile, but had yet to bump into me. Ibiyinka is the art ambassador from Nigeria, and travels all over the world making presentations about his art and his faith. Just 5 months ago he got married to a former art student of Amy's, and they have settled down in Springfield.

Turns out Ibiyinka and his wife, Jessica, are looking for a church to call home. When he saw the Front Porch he was very intrigued. And when I asked him, he agreed to give his presentation at this Sunday evening's Merge gathering. That's serendipity of a divine order.

So that night I was able to make up a flyer for Merge to take with us to Drury for their Student Activities Fair on Tuesday. For this opportunity I have to give props to Matt & Andrea Battaglia, a recent addition to The Core family, who both work at Drury. Anyway, Christina and I set up our display for their Fair, and immediately tons of Drury students were asking us about The Core and the Front Porch. Welcome to the 60 Drury students who are new to The Core! We're looking forward to seeing you around. Serendipity again.

Finally, Mik told me yesterday about how he was putzing around the Front Porch, trying to finish up a few things, and this guy named Zach walked in asking about becoming a bartender. Apparently there's a sign on Ernie Biggs' door saying "Bartenders Wanted, please use next door". What they meant was to please use the back door. But due to the miscommunication, Zach walked into the FroPo looking for a job. Although Mik didn't have one to offer him, the two of them did sit down and talk for about an hour and a half. Then Zack offered to help him move all the appliances into the now-finished coffee bar. I don't know if he ended up getting an interview at Ernie's, but we definitely expect to see him around from now on.

Don't get me wrong... I'm not crediting Serendipity for these things. I'm just saying that it's one of the ways God does things. There's comfort, there's testing, there's commanding, there's Serendipity.

It's important to recognize this, because whenever you try to do something really big, it's like discouragement is always hovering over your head. Consequently, when God intervenes with Serendipity, you pretty much have to get a tattoo so you don't forget about it by the time you're drowning again.

Follow Me, and I Will Make You Fishers of... Snakes?

Turns out my brain is too scattered right now for a unified field theory of... anything, so here's a hodge podge consisting of unfinished past posts (time to clean up the "drafts" box,) and what happened last night.

Fishers of Snakes

Last night at the Front Porch my new buddy Richard the Sound Guy and I were trying like heck to get a 16-channel snake through a 50-foot long sub-floor PVC pipe that surfaces at one end on stage, and at the other end where our soundboard will be. For those even more uninitiated than myself, a snake is a long, thick cable that connects the soundboard to the stage, and ours has to be threaded through this pipe. Richard is quite a guy... very knowledgeable, but nevertheless he and I were having some trouble. We started by running a long aluminum wire through, but it kept getting stuck in the middle. So I had the idea to get out the Shop Vac and suck it through from the opposite end. So Richard put a ball of duct tape on the end of the wire and stuck it in his end of the pipe, and I pressed the hose down onto my end, and slowly but surely it started to move. Then... twhop! I snagged it. Unfortunately this story does not end quite so happily, because we ended up snapping the wire in our attempt to pull the snake through. Not to worry, though, Plan B looks promising, if a tad bit more expensive.

Pastor Po-Mo and the SpringMo Lib-Cons

I just liked this title. Couldn't think of how to write a post for it, though. Add a comment if you think you can figure out what it means.

Multi-Site Church and the Emerging Televangelists

I decided not to write a full-out post on this because most Springfieldians have never heard of a Multi-Site Church. It is, however, all the rage among large "emerging" churches such as Mars Hill in Seattle, Journey in St. Louis, or Life Church in Oklahoma City. It's like a church that has multiple services, except those services are often happening in different places at the same time, instead of in the same place at different times. It is common for there to be a "mother" site, and "daughter" sites, each featuring a different worship team and an entirely different group of people, but all featuring the same sermon by the same Senior Pastor, only he's on a screen at the daughter sites, and not in preaching in person.

It baffles me a little how the people who go to these types of churches are often the last in the world to watch a preacher on television, and yet that's essentially what they're doing at the daughter sites. Can you call a guy your "pastor" if you're never even in the same room with him?

I know I'm in no position to say what a pastor ought or ought not to be, but I'm going to do it anyway. If you're pastoring a church, and it grows, and decides to become a multi-site church, and has to spend tens of thousands of dollars on technology to make sure that YOU and your thoughts are the centerpiece of every worship experience, no matter how far away, then I think you've lost some of what it means to be a pastor. Hopefully, throughout all that you still manage to actually shepherd a few people, but haven't you just become a televangelist to the rest?

The Nooma Sessions

I'm terrible with serieses. I guess I'm just not the type. I did a post about the first Nooma video, "Rain" thinking I would blog about all of them. Except that 1/4 of the time I'm not even in on the discussion, since I'm watching the kids. Also the fact that I'm terrible with serieses.

Church Marketing

Months ago, I typed the title "marketing" into blogger, and saved it in order to remind me to write a post about marketing. But it turns out all I have is feelings about marketing, and no actual thoughts. My gut says it's sick... that marketing is just an extension of sales, and salesmanship has no place in the Kingdom of God. I know that church marketing and its goons have turned a lot of people off to the Church entirely, but I'm not sure where to draw the line. Should a church list their phone number in the yellow pages? Sure. Should they pay for a little extra space for added visibility? I don't know. Should they have a full-page color ad? Personally, I don't think so. But there's a lot of leeway in there. Obviously, I think websites are great. Billboards, not so much. But what is the essential difference? How do we know when we've gone too far in trying to get the word out? How do we know when we've developed a competitive nature, or a success syndrome? Anyone?

So Here I Am

I remember lying in bed at the age of 11, on the top bunk of the room my brother and I shared, in my family's little two-bedroom apartment. My dad was in his second year of seminary at the age of 39, having moved our family the year before from my birth-town of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, to nearby Tulsa.

I was lying there thinking about how my dad was about to become a pastor. Then I thought about how his dad was a pastor and evangelist, moving the family around Iowa and preaching in many churches before getting a divorce and taking up a career with the Corps of Engineers. Then I thought about how his dad was a pastor, immigrating from Sweden at the age of 16, and preaching in Swedish-language churches in the midwest.

Suddenly I felt a sense of destiny... no small thing for an 11 year-old. Preaching seemed to be a family business of sorts, and I was next in line. My dad didn't hear the call until middle age, but I'll be darned if I was going to wait that long. If I was going to be a pastor, I wanted in on the ground floor.

The thing of it is... I didn't want to be a pastor. Pastors, to me, were a certain special type of individual. They carried an air about them... a self-conscious-model-of-righteousness air... a sense that every word they said and everything they did was of monumental importance... as if failure was not an option. They seemed so... dignified. They loved making jokes, but didn't know how to be funny. They smiled a lot when they were around people, but never seemed to be truly enjoying themselves. There was just something wrong about pastors to me, and something wrong about the way people behaved in their presence.

Consequently, I did not embrace my "calling" wholeheartedly. I got embarrased at the way people would respond when I told them about it. I lived a life that was agreeable enough, but fell far short in terms of discipline and spiritual growth. Eventually I got so uncomfortable with the idea that I became convinced I had not heard from God at all. I decided I had simply looked at my family tree and jumped to conclusions.

This was the beginning of my foray into architecture. I found that I loved designing buildings and floorplans... so it seemed natural to play that field a bit. I put away thoughts of vocational ministry, and by the time I was 17 I was accepted into the School of Architecture at Kansas State University, and had secured a scholarship and a place to live.

The next part of my story could easily fill ten pages, so I'll abridge it for you. During my senior year in high school, I was learning how to play the guitar, and leading worship for my itty-bitty youth group that met in the leader's basement. Humble beginnings, to be sure. But as I grew in worship, and developed friendships with people who taught me how to forget myself before God, I felt my heart begin to turn. After graduating from high school, I found myself at a Promise Keeper's rally at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, among 65,000 men singing their hearts out to "A Mighty Fortress is our God." It was unbelievable.

I always say that God can speak to us anywhere. There is nothing magical about a church building, or a worship song, that God has designated to serve as a vehicle for his interactions with us. But for some reason my rare moments of absolute clarity from God tend to occur in those very settings. And yet, in those moments I also feel disconnected from them... as if I wasn't really there at all.

What I'm saying is, God spoke to me at Arrowhead Stadium. He said he wanted me to turn a corner in my life, and become a worship leader.

So I obeyed... I studied music and Bible, and took every opportunity to increase my experience and skill both musically and worshipfully.

By 2004, I had a bachelor's degree, and a wife who was ready to go with me wherever God pointed us, to lead people into his presence. But instead, in another church service, he told us to stay put and start The Core (read that story.)

So we struck out on the path God gave us, and soon made friends with Matt & Melissa Stephens, who had a similar vision. We decided that Matt would be the pastor of The Core. I, then, could lead the worship (among other things,) thus fulfilling the call I'd heard in Kansas City.

But now Matt and Melissa are gone. They moved to Chicago so Matt could attend seminary. I like to say that, when I backed out of my calling to be a pastor, God very gradually "backed" me back in. It's almost as if he tricked me.

So here I am. Pastor of The Core. I want you to know that I'm still not sure what to do with that. I'm not a preacher. I'm not remarkably funny or popular. I have trouble with names. I talk too much, and I stick my foot in my mouth with startling regularity. I'm a mediocre listener at best. I have very few Bible verses formally memorized, and my daily devotionals are a bit spotty. I'm a people-pleaser, and have difficulty speaking up with the hard truths. But that doesn't stop me from being controversial or argumentative. I'm prideful. I tend to think I'm the smartest man in the room. I'm also absent-minded. I am simultaneously a reckless optimist and a worry-wart. I have NO experience. I fashion myself a worship leader, but my voice is unremarkable and my guitar and piano skills are painfully basic.

There you have it, the Pastor of The Core.... let me know if I left anything out.

______________________

So we've established now that I'm not on anybody's short list to plant a church. And yet, it seems that God doesn't care about our short lists. He consistently taps the rejects. It's as if he were the captain of a pick-up basketball team, and he picks all the short heavy kids, just to prove that he can beat the other team all by himself. But then he manages to win the game as a team, just to prove he's not a ball-hog.

Having accepted the fact that God has indeed chosen me to do this thing, I have had to struggle to understand my identity in all this. When I was 11, I knew I didn't want to be a shiny-veneer-type pastor, and I don't think God wanted me to, either. That's why I'm pastor of The Core, and not Third Methodist, or something. And yet, I find myself always observing all these other pastors to see where I'm falling short.

Lately the guy I've had my eye on is named Mark Driscoll, the founding pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle. This guy is hard-core. His sermons are sarcastic, funny, hard-hitting oratories that last upwards of 60 minutes. And people listen, dad-blast it. In Seattle!

Just so you know, I have no interest in modeling myself after Driscoll. He is a borderline chauvinist. He has a dirty mouth. He has to be so damn certain about everything he says. He's a virtual monolith. Mars Hill has multiple locations, but each one of them has to hear him preach every Sunday. Consequently, he runs himself into the ground, endangering his health over and over.

Nevertheless, I wondered if I was falling short by not "proclaiming" the way he does. By not stomping my foot, and saying "This is sick, and it's got to stop!" The fact is, I just don't do that. So who's wrong? Him or me?

Maybe neither of us. Driscoll has a death wish to transform the city of Seattle. Where the darkness falls like a heavy curtain, drastic measures are all we have. The fact is that almost nobody in Seattle is standing up and spewing light with passion and conviction. So when somebody finally does, it's like that first gasp of air for the man who nearly drowned. Some people will smear you all over the media, but others will flock to you for healing. And that's exactly what's happened in Mark Driscoll's case.

I have come to the conclusion that Springfield, in for the most part, is just as lost as Seattle... but in the exact opposite way. We have light here, but it's not natural light. It's not the real stuff that streams through your eastern window at the crack of dawn. It's been replaced with those flourescent bulbs that buzz constantly, and make everybody look 15 years older.... the ones that sap your energy by 11 am and turn yellow after a few months.

Will somebody please stand up and say that the Bible is the Word of God??? Sure... in Springfield there's thousands of them. Will somebody put their foot down regarding moral relativism? We've got that. Will someone please tell these young boys to quit moving in with their girlfriends? Those preachers are everywhere.

So what does Springfield lack? What kind of pastor does God want me to be? Honestly, I don't know for sure. But so far I have concluded that this city does not need another monolith, another gospel broadcaster, another... preacher. I am thankful that we have the ones we do have, make no mistake. I want to work with them, to receive their encouragement and accountability. I want to spur them on to a ministry that emits natural light, and tosses the flourescent bulbs in the dumpster (with that cool gun-shot bang.) And I will speak the truth right alongside them, albeit in a less proclamatory fashion.

But I believe God is calling me to fill the gaps they leave behind... to reach the people that have fallen through the cracks... to live out among them, relationally, what they have so far only heard from a distance, and to avoid the kind of communication that has convinced them that there is no real love amongst the followers of Christ.

I suppose I have had my fair share of detractors so far. Some are only interested in knocking me down. Others have criticized me out of a genuine desire to lift me up. Both groups have been partly right, and partly wrong, and I am honestly thankful for everything they've said. If you have been among them, please know that I love you, and I am as eager to see me become God's man as you are. Don't lose your cool, but don't lose your edge, either. I need it. I cannot do this by myself.