THE FIVE SENSES

A New Year

2012-01-17T20:34:00.000-05:00

So much for trying to blog every day. Maybe in this new year things will be different. I won't set such audacious goals. I will try and make time to write. We will see what this year holds...

Long Car Rides

2011-10-05T21:34:00.001-04:00

Today has been a long day. It began this morning by crawling in a minivan with four of my friends and my wife at 5:30am. Once we stopped for a little Tim Horton's coffee and breakfast, we were on the road for Atlanta. I certainly was not looking forward to the trip. Each trip that I have made from Lansing to Atlanta and back has turned into a longer than desired excursion. What should be 12 hour trips turned into 16 plus hours because of traffic jams, food stops, weak bladders, and what not.

Today's trip was better than normal. We had some required stops like Skyline Chili around Cincinnati. We had multiple bathroom breaks because I had too much liquid today. And, we had to stop for gas. Even with those stops, the drive came in at a "best" for time at just over 12 hours. The silly thing is there is some excitement and accomplishment in making it in that time. When, in reality, we still spent 12 LONG hours in a van driving down the road.

The trip didn't feel long until the last hour or two. By that time, my wife and our friend Sarah had become stir crazy in the back, back seat of the van. They were laughing histarically at almost nothing, which was a sight in itself. Everyone else was simply cramped from sitting too long.

As I sit now in the hotel courtyard enjoying the cool Atlanta weather and the stars in the sky, I've been thinking about our journey. We left from one place to come to another to be challenged by the Catalyst Conference. To get here, we endured over 800 miles of pavement. Life is like that sometimes. We want to get to a different place with life, which means we have to move in some way from point A to point B. While the drive today was long, it was doable. It could have been done quicker by plane, but that would have cost even more.

When we want to make changes in our lives, it costs us something. To get skinny (or at least skinnier than we are) we must eat less junk and move our bodies more. To get smarter, we must read, study, and learn and stop doing mundaine things like playing on Facebook and Twitter. To change, we must realize that where we are at is not where we need to be, and we must move ourselves to a new place. And, doing that takes effort and discipline, while overcoming our feeling of entitlement to where we were.

Where are you? Where do you want to be? What do you want to become? For me, where I am is not where I want to be. I've had goals for change for quite some time. I've always wanted to be skinnier and smarter. But, I have never fully given up my love for food and time wasting and grown any discipline.

May this journey be the beginning of a new me. May you join me in journey.

Dangerous Church

2011-09-15T23:54:00.003-04:00

When I was growing up, I wasn't allowed to run with scissors or poke metal objects into electrical outlets. That would have been too dangerous. We didn't have BB guns because guns were dangerous. I lost my bike privileges for awhile because I had crashed a couple of times in one week. I was being to dangerous. Being dangerous was something that was not encouraged because being dangerous meant the risk of injury. My parents wanted me to live past my growing up years without maiming myself. Thus, to me, the idea of being dangerous was always bad. Needless to say, when I received John Bishop's book, Dangerous Church, from Zondervan for free to review and blog about, I was intrigued.

Bishop's book, interestingly enough, is about challenging the church to be dangerous in order to give it life for the sake of the Gospel. Rather than encouraging the church to be safe by sitting still and going through the motions, he calls his readers, the church, to ask hard questions about their motivations in ministry, their vision for the lost, and their actions to those whom Jesus would call, "the least of these". These are all great questions that we need to be asking ourselves as we live out our faith.

For me, the highlight of this book was the chapter entitled, "When We See Jesus and Want Hand Sanitizer", where Bishop tells of his experience at a leper colony in India. He shares about what he feels inside when he comes face to face with a leper who has no nose. Its a compelling story - one that challenges us to think about how we are being Jesus to everyone around us.

I encourage you to take some time and interact with Dangerous Church. I'd love to hear what you think.

Cell Phones

2011-08-29T23:35:00.000-04:00

I remember the day when my brother got his first cell phone. It was an in the car cell phone, all wrapped up in a leather bag/case. It had a wire the ran from the bag to a cool looking antenna that was on the back of his SUV. It was such a cool gadget . . . and so much smaller than the big brick looking cell phones that other people had.

I remember the first cell phone I had. I thought I was so cool. It was small compared to my brother's bag phone, though I still had to pull the antenna up for better reception. It was too big to fit in my pocket, so it had a lovely leather sleeve that fit over it with a belt holder. I could make and receive calls. To check the voicemail, you had to call another number. It did nothing else. Well, I probably could have sent a text at that point, but it would have cost lots of money. I was so high tech.

I currently have an iphone. It is miniscule compared to my brother's bag phone. It has no needs for external antennas or a constant power source other than to charge the battery every other day. And it fits nicely in my pocket. Furthermore, I can do so much more than just make phone calls. I can surf the web, video chat with my friends in other parts of the world, play any assortment of games made specifically for it, control my desktop computer in my office from anywhere I have phone signal, and use it as a compass if I were ever lost in the middle of nowhere--all without roaming charges! What a difference two decades of technological advances can make.

Though, with advances come with a price. Before the age of cell phones, the only way people could reach you was with a land line. If you weren't there, they might be lucky enough to leave you a message on your answering machine, if you even had one. Otherwise, they were forced to call you back at a later time, write a letter, or travel to you to speak to you face to face. Now, I can't get away from anyone. In all honesty, my phone is closer to me than almost everything else. It is always within arm's reach. Which means, anyone and everyone I am connected to is really only an arm's length away, in addition to all the information and stuff I choose to encounter through my phone. I can't get away from anything, unless I put my phone in time out.

More than that, before the age of cell phones, the only way I could really annoy someone with the phone was to repeatedly call them so they had to get up to answer the phone that was in another other room or physically trip (or choke) them with the coiled 30 foot handset cord. Now, I have a plethora of annoyance possibilities from talking loudly in line at the supermarket or texting in the middle of a movie to forgetting to shut off my ringer during church.

I wonder how Jesus would have used a cell phone, had he had that technology available to him. I'm sure he would use it in all the positive ways--sending emails of encouragement and communicating to others about the Kingdom of God. Would he have a twitter feed that stated, "just fed 5000!" or "healed a blind guy today!" Probably not. He certainly would have remembered to silence his phone at the temple and the synagogue.

I want to be honest here. I'll be the first one to admit that I need to gage the amount of noise that I let technology create in my life. I probably do need to put my phone (and for that matter, the internet) in a time out and make some silent space to be still and listen without interuption. It will probably be good for me . . . and the world won't fall apart while I'm gone.

How about you?

What Should We Do?

2011-08-24T00:26:00.000-04:00

I read a post today by the bassist of Third Day, a Christian band that I have liked for a long time. I think his comments are on target. I encourage you to read his thoughts.

Africa has been on my heart a lot recently. It makes me feel like a contradiction. I am a contradiction. On one hand, I feel so strongly that I need to do something to help. On the other hand, I cannot stop being who I am, feeling like I am entitled to eat what I want, do what I want and so on and so on and so on. I know I need to do something, yet fail to do anything. My heart wants to be thousands of miles away with the people of Africa, yet my eyes can't see two feet in front of me to get my mind to move.

I wonder if the boy who gave Jesus the five loaves and two fish to feed the 5000 went through the internal struggle I am going through. He probably didn't have all the entitlement pressures we have built into our beings here in America--not that that gets us off the hook. Even if I could work through my personal dichotomy and actually do something, I fear I would end up being like the disciples as they responded to Jesus' challenge for them to feed all the people. "We can't do that! We don't have the resources. We don't have the money. They are so far away. You are crazy!!!"

Lord, help me to see the five loaves and two fish. I will try my hardest to not eat them for myself. Rather, I will do something with them for Your creation. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear!

Could Anything Else Go Wrong?

2011-08-21T16:20:00.000-04:00

Today during worship, we had a few hiccups. It all started with me missing one of the verses of the song, Great Is the Lord Almighty. Actually, I started singing verse two instead of verse 1. Obviously, I could have went back and sang verse one after we sang verse two. But, it wouldn't have been right, singing about Jericho before singing about God bringing Israel through the Red Sea. So, I stopped the song about half way through verse two and started over. I should have known that wouldn't be all that would happen.

A few songs later was special music. During rehearsal we had done the song, The Beauty of the Cross, flawlessly three times. It was perfect. However, when we started it during our offering time, something wasn't right. Either I was in the wrong key or someone else was off. That, in turn threw off our soloist. I don't think we recovered well, even though we pushed through.

Then, on the next song, I broke a guitar string. Granted, I'm known for breaking guitar strings every once in awhile. This time, it was frustrating, though, since the strings on my guitar are only two days old.

Needless to say, I was ready to step off the stage for Frank to preach. When I sat down beside my wife, Stephanie, I leaned over and said, "did everything sound as bad as it felt like it went this morning?" Her response was, "It was shaky. You should have said something like, 'even though things have not went as we wanted, God still finds worth in our praise.'"

God wants us to worship Him with everything we are. He wants us to do the best we can all the time. But, I think He knows that we aren't always going to be perfect. Because we are His children, I think He understands that at times, we are going to be off key or that a string is going to break. I think it gives Him joy just like a play put on by elementary age kids would bring joy to those that are there watching. Its a different kind of joy. A joy that's not based on super-human ability. Rather, a joy that is full of love, hope, and humility.

The Cost of Convenience

2011-08-17T22:34:00.002-04:00

I read an article the other day on how the government pays for empty seats on planes so that out of the way places can still have air service. Millions of dollars go to the airline companies every year so people in remote West Virginia or wherever don't have to drive an hour and a half to the airport to fly somewhere. Seems a bit backward to me. But, we do live in a culture where we buy bottled water for the same price as a soda. Even worse, we'll drop $1.50 or more for a 20 ounce soda when you could spend 50 cents more and get an entire two liter.

I think the thing that gets me most about the article is entitled attitude that everyone has. Like the guy who says this:

"It's very convenient to have this place," Williams said. He said his family sometimes drives to Pittsburgh, to pick him up, but "that's a stress on them, and it's difficult to get up to Pittsburgh on time with all the road construction. So it would be terrible to have this go away."

Really? It would be terrible? We should spend $45 billion a year to keep some airports open just so some guy's family doesn't have to drive to Pittsburgh? I think $45 billion a year could pay for the taxi service needed to get the few passengers from one place to another to catch their plane. Or maybe the government should rent out Garmins for those who are directionally challenged.

The thing that frustrates me most, and really cuts deep in my own soul, is that we sit here thinking we are entitled to these things like cokes in whatever size we want and so on and so on while people in Africa have to make decisions on which child or children to leave behind to starve to death while the rest of the family goes in search of food.

Lord, forgive us. Help us to see the things we need to do and move us into action!

Motivated

2011-08-09T12:55:00.000-04:00

Not much to write today. I'm really focused on the tasks in my NOW list. That is a great thing!

What are you all reading in Scripture? If you struggle to stay consistent with your Bible reading, you should go over to YouVersion. I really struggled for consistency. Having it online has been a huge help. You can set your browser to default to their page. The thing that helps me most is I don't have the excuse of saying, "I don't have my Bible with me right now." Its always there, on the internet--the same place where time wasters are like Facebook.

YouVersion has all kinds of different translations to read, a search function, the ability to put two translations side by side, and best of all, multiple reading plans. A great start for a reading plan would the plan for reading through the gospels. As you read, you could be on the lookout for all the times Jesus talks about the kingdom of God/kingdom of Heaven. It will change your perspective of who we are and how we are to live.

Happy Bible reading!

New Eyes

2011-08-08T11:25:00.000-04:00

My friend David Joe recently had some major eye surgery. Before his surgeries, his eyesight was bad enough that he took away his own driving privileges. Post surgery, he has been amazed at the things he has been missing, even though his vision has not fully adjusted. The problem is his brain. The doctor fixed his vision so that his eyes themselves see perfectly now. But his brain has been trained over the last few decades or more to see things with not so perfect eyes. It is receiving perfect signal now, but doesn't know what to do with it. It has to reprogram itself.

The human body totally amazes me--that it can reprogram itself; that it can heal itself. Even more, most of the time it will do this all on its own as long as we stay out of the way. We may need a doc or a mom to do some repair and put things in order, but the rest of the process is automatic.

Now, that is not to say that we don't get in the way of the healing that our bodies can do. We can be unwilling to change our diets to heal our fatness and all the bad things that come along with that. We can be unwilling to admit that there are issues with things, like our sight, and allow broken things to perpetuate into even worse problems.

I think that is the problem with our spiritual lives. If we were to be faithful and chase after God, living our lives for him in the way that he has called us live, everything else will heal itself. Now, I understand that as we talk about our spiritual lives and the things we do, there is more than just ourselves involved. Our living and spiritual lives also involve those around us, from our spouses, family, friends, co-workers and so on and so on. I think that is why it is so hard when God steps in and makes all the perfect repairs. Our living needs to reprogram itself. And that is challenged by us and those around us.

This is why it is so important for the church to be the Kingdom of God. If we are being what God has called us to be, then we are creating a place where people can come to heal from life in the world and learn about life in the Kingdom.

At The Last Minute

2011-08-04T22:55:00.023-04:00

Why does it seem that our world always runs in a constant stream of deadlines and procrastination? The recent debt debacle in our nation is only one of many examples in our world. We push and fight and push and fight and end up leaving ourselves no time to make great decisions and solve the problems. Shockingly, I am not any better. Why is it that we cannot get organized, motivated, or (the most dreaded word of them all) disciplined?

If you take a close look, you can see the products of un-organization and un-motivation all around us. Sure, some people have discipline, like Seth Godin. The rest of us want it, but somehow can't move ourselves to deal with our credit card debt, our super sized waistlines, our poor relationships, multiple task lists at work, our home projects, the things we really want to spend our time on, and so on, and so on, and so on. We are such a mess.

Fortunately, I can only speak for myself. That's probably a good thing, especially since I have my own problems with procrastination. I certainly don't need to be pointing fingers. I have lots I need to get done. I have lots of wants, desires, and aspirations. Yet, it seems like every day, the things I want to get done are still there when it is time to head home. Each day starts with hope and ends with the thought of maybe tomorrow. Its like our productivity is stuck in Groundhog Day. The problem is, not changing the routine will only get us back to yesterday.

I think my solution is this. I need to get past the overwhelmed feeling I have sometimes at all that I need to get done and simply be disciplined. Well, that and make a plan of attack. I read a post on Lifehacker today that encouraged the reader to, "reduce everything you want to do to an action you can do right now." What I read between the lines there is this: take all you want to do, write it down, and make it doable. Break it down into tiny "baby steps", to quote another Bill Murray movie, and then do it.

Why does it seem so simple, yet its so difficult? Oh wait, because we strive to be lazy and wait to the last minute to get things done. I'm tired of the pressure. I'm tired of the doing average things--that is what it feels like I do. I'm ready to change and become disciplined and motivated. Lord help me!

The Humility of Manasseh

2011-08-03T09:42:00.000-04:00

This morning I spent some time in the story of Manasseh, one of the kings of Judah. The story can be found in 2 Chronicles 33. Manasseh is the son of the great king Hezekiah. You should go and read about them...

The story of Manasseh caught my attention today because of the polar opposites in it. As the story begins, Manasseh is a dirt ball king. He sacrifices to other gods, builds new places of worship to them, and sacrifices is children. He even builds altars for them in the temple of the Lord and places a graven image the he made himself in the temple. Once the writer is done listing all the bad things that Manasseh has done and encouraged his people to do, the writer says this:

But Manasseh led Judah and the people of Jerusalem astray, so that they did more evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites.

The Lord spoke to Manasseh and his people, but they paid no attention.

All of these things are bad news, especially if you are the king. Living bad means one thing--God is going to beat you down. And that's what happens. The king of Assyria comes to town, makes Manasseh his prisoner. He binds him and puts a ring in his nose--not a pretty nose ring that one would wear as jewelry, a big, nasty nose ring like a cow or bull would get. Then he drags him off to Babylon.

Here's where the story takes an unexpected turn. The text says that Manasseh humbled himself greatly before is God. And God heard his cry, and acted. As you read the rest of the story, you will see how God returns Manasseh to Jerusalem, allows him to rebuild parts of the city and, most importantly, that Manasseh leads his people to only worship the Lord.

If there is one thing I've really picked up from reading through Chronicles the last few weeks, it would be the roles that humility and pride play in our existence in the Kingdom of God. All through Chronicles, the writer shares how this king was humble and how that king was prideful. And, it never fails, when pride rules, God's presence and engagement disappears. Yet, when humility reigns, God is directly involved for the good of those being humble.

From the story of Manasseh, I think that repentance can be connected to humility. Manasseh called on the God of his ancestors to come and save him, even though his attention before that moment was fully focused on other gods like Baal and Molech. God showed mercy, forgave, restored, and enjoyed once again the worship of his people.

How am I being humble and repentant with my life? How are you being humble and repentant? And once we've answered that question, how are we being mercy to those who have wronged us?

These are the things we are to be as we live out the Kingdom.

Wash Your Bad Luck Away

2011-08-02T10:30:00.000-04:00

I read this article this morning on Thai monks who are offering funerals for people who need to get the bad luck out of their lives. For a mere $6, the monk will put you in a coffin, pray over you for your bad luck to go away, put a sheet over you, and then pull it back for you to start your new life with good luck. Sounds familiar, eh?

As I sat here and read this article, I couldn't help but think about how much these actions parallel our view of baptism. We enter the water with the expectation of something more and something new. We are buried in the water just as Jesus was buried in the grave, and then we are raised to new life (see Romans 6).

My brain, being my brain, had two questions that popped up then. What is different from coffin/sheet baptism to a new life filled with good luck and our baptism to new life? And, even more intriguing, how would outsiders to Christianity compare the two? The second question, in my opinion, influences the first question.

If we were to ask people who had no idea of the church and our practices compare the two, would they see any difference? Would they see the weight of becoming a Christian explained into the conversations leading up to the baptism event? Would they see the changed life that is supposed to be there on our part and on the Holy Spirit's part after the baptism? My fear is that they wouldn't see a difference. I fear they would see the same schtick, "come, do this ritual, and everything will get better!"

If outsiders won't see it as different, do we? I think the answer is yes, we would understand that it is different. But, then that leads to another question, "How do our actions surrounding baptism--the journey into it, the change of life that is to follow as we live differently afterwards--show that we see something different? Do our words and challenge for people of the world to join us and live out the Kingdom of God really give them the full perspective of that life? Jesus was very bold in saying you have to die to yourself to follow him, so much so that he even told one guy to skip his father's funeral (see Luke 9). Which, to try and read between the lines there, maybe the guy asking to become a follower is the first born. Maybe its his duty to bring closure to his father's life and take on his inheritance. Jesus' call is to leave everything about his family behind at that moment. That's intense.

What is our call to people as the church? Are we as bold as Jesus? Do we call them to higher things? Do we tell them they need to give up lust? Do we tell them they need to be tenacious with love and forgiveness? Do we tell them that they will have to change and live for others, which will probably force them to change their views about their stuff? Even more challenging is this: do our lives show that we have given up these things? Do we live the way Jesus has called us to be so those deciding to join us in living out the Kingdom of God see and experience what that actually is?

I fear two things. One, we don't really know and understand what the Kingdom of God is to look like so that we can live it out. Or, two, we understand what it is and choose not to live it. Neither is good.

I'm not pointing fingers at anyone here. I need to check my life just as much as the next person. The point is, we need to do it so that we are true to what we've committed to, and so the world can see that there is a difference between new life (see Romans 6 again) and getting your bad luck swept away.

A New Month

2011-08-01T16:31:00.000-04:00

Where did July go? For that matter, where did June go? Next thing you know it will be Christmas. I don't remember time going this fast when I was younger.

With a new month brings new possibilities and new changes. You may notice a change right now here on this blog. Well, two changes, actually. First, I have blogged now three days in a row. That is an accomplishment for me. Per my post a few days ago, I am doing to do everything I can to blog on a daily basis. We will see how that goes.

The other change is a small change that is powered by my high C personality. Do you see it? I am sure that my wife already noticed. The change comes because when I blog from my ipad, blogger.com does not allow me to mess with certain settings, like the font. Thus, after I post, I have to at a later point, go in and change the font of the post to what everything else. Uniformity in the life of a C personality reigns supreme!

I'm tired of having to go and change the posts. So, the new font you are reading now (unless you are reading on an RSS reader, at which point, everything is out of my control) is the standard default font, instead of Verdana in the normal size. I know, you could care less. Remember, change is hard for us C people.

To show you the depths of my insanity, I must admit that I contemplated this change a few days ago. But, I couldn't make the change in the middle of the month. If someone was going to look at July 2011 in the future, the fonts wouldn't have matched on the page. So, I waited for a new month for the switch.

Its a good thing I didn't think of changing until today. Then I would have had to wait until September for the switch . . . not that it would have taken long to get to September as fast as time is.

Attached At The Hip

2011-07-31T17:38:00.001-04:00

As you read last night, I'm in a serious mode of reflection, self evaluation, and hopefully change. I'm going to blog more. I'm going to read more. I'm going to study my bible more and try to teach more. All for the point of engaging myself in this thing called life more than I have been recently.

However, I am not able to do that right now. Currently, I am sitting at our dining room table. My daughter is sitting as close as she can to me on the chair beside me. She's wrapped around my arm being silly and watching me type. Not necessarily because she wants my attention right now. No, she's here wanting me to stop what I am doing so she can have my ipad to play on. Now she's looking up at me with her cute puppy dog eyes saying, "Please, may I play with your ipad?"

It is a battle of wills. I will win this battle. Yes I will.

Interestingly, she is reading along as I type. She had the nerve to tell me that something I said in the first paragraph was incorrect, or at least it seemed incorrect to her. She's just like her mother.

Now she is growling at me and told me I have lots of "white" hairs in my sideburn. Does she not know that I could send her to her room to play with her non-electronic toys until it is bedtime? Luckily, her mother is editing pictures and videos from the previous 3 years of Lowman life. Every time a movie plays, she's off to watch the current selection. Don't worry, she'll be back. Here she comes now.

As I sit here and write, I wondner how much this back and for tussle models our relationship with the Father. We sit close and engage him and he thoroughly enjoys it. He wants us to be patient and wait for Him, to engage with him. Yet, we get caught up in other things as we wait. We end up focusing on all that is not perfect and question Him about it. Or, we are so focused the shopping list of things we have brought to Him that we miss the deeper things he wants us to see, feel, and explore.

As I sit her trying to ignore her batting eyes and mischevious giggles, I wonder how God puts up with us sometimes? How has he not given up on us when we don't get it . . . when we don't stop to listen, engage, and think. Lucky for us he loves us beyond measure and that his patience and tenacity for us is incomprehensible.

May I have immeasurable love, patience, and tenacity for this little girl. May I be able to model for her what is important to life and what is not.

99 Percent

2011-07-31T01:15:00.000-04:00

I really would like to say I have an excuse for not blogging. I don't. Well. That's not exactly true. I've been busy the last month or so. I spent two weeks at Michiana Christian Service Camp helping lead the two Sr. High Discipleship weeks there. I also spent some time in Ohio seeing my family. I also installed a new garage door opener in the sweltering heat.

Nonetheless, I've had things to write. I simply haven't written them. I hope that is going to change. . .

I use the Flipboard app on my ipad. It puts news, RSS feeds, Facebook, Twitter, and other mindless stuff in one place for me to read every other day or so. One of the websites that I have found in the process of exploring this app is The 99 Percent. It is a great site - you should check it out.

There was a recent article was called On showing up, changing your life, and limited goals. One suggestion that was made to writers was to write every day. Even it if is only 100 or 200 words, write. Keep the mind and the creativity flowing. When I read that section of the article, I thought of this place and how infrequently I post. I thought about all the grand ideas of things I have allowed to pop into my head, roll around for awhile, and then shelved in the "someday" section of my cerebral Wunderlist. I thought of all the things I could and should be doing, thinking, saying, writing, blogging, reading, and on and on and on and on . . . but for whatever reason I am not.

Things need to change. . .

Hope in the Darkness

2011-06-06T12:12:00.000-04:00

Over the last month or so, I have been like every other web junkie when a tragedy happens. I've spent too much time taking in all the images and the videos that people have posted. I marvel at the power the earth, whether it be in the form of a tornado or an earthquake and tsunami. Yet, while marveling, my soul hurts for those affected.

South had a group of people go to Tuscaloosa a few weeks ago to help with the disaster relief. Last week we got to hear about their experience first hand and see the images and videos they shot. They put together a video with some personal testimonies about their experiences. One of the comments that stuck out to me was by Justin Beauchamp, one of our members. He said, "How could a loving God let a tornado like that take place?" He then goes on to talk about how even in the darkness of the disaster, God is shining through and using what happened for good as people are cared for and get to know that God and His people love them.

I've been trying to wrap my head around all that has happened over the last few months in the world. While I don't think God specifically caused any of the natural disasters to happen, the statement, "how could a loving God allow something like this to happen" is a tough thing to grasp. Why would he let things like this happen?

This all makes me think of Job. Job was a man who lost everything. He had every right to question God and ask, "What is going on here!?" In Job 1, God allows the tempter to beat up on Job. He loses his oxen, donkeys, and camels to thieves and his servants are killed. His sheep are burned up by fire from the sky.
Then, a strong wind blows down the house that his sons and daughters are in and they all die.

What was Job's response?

At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said:

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.”

Put in Job's situation or the situation of any of the people who lost loved ones in the disasters that have recently happened, I hope and pray that I would be able to have the same attitude. I think Job has something to teach us. I think he would ask us the question: Is it our job to really comprehend what is going on around us and why it is happening? Or, is it our job to be faithful and trust that God is in control even in the darkness? Maybe its a combination of the two, with more emphasis being on the being faithful no matter what.

Guilty Conscience

2011-05-24T07:41:00.000-04:00

Yesterday during dinner, my daughter looked at my wife and said, "I need to go to the bathroom." This isn't anything out of the norm. I continued to eat while they headed off to the restroom.

Normally, the bathroom trip doesn't take that long. Since Hannah had said something to the effect of, "I don't like the taste of my food," before she left the table, I figured that she needed to take care of some business and make some room, if you know what I mean. This would make sense for the long delay in the restroom. However, when my daughter returned, you could tell she had been crying. Steph didn't look all that thrilled either. I kept to my burger and fries in hopes of steering clear of what had transpired in the bathroom until later. That was not the case.

It turns out that earlier in the day, Hannah had did something at school she shouldn't have done. She didn't get in trouble for it, but was asked about it by one of the teachers. She didn't lie about it. She readily admitted she was in the wrong, and the teacher told her not to do it again. She certainly could have let it go and hid it away in the not so happy, yet private place where you store things you don't want anyone to know. Steph and I wouldn't have known anything. But, my daughter has a guilty conscience.

When she does something she knows she should not have done, it will eat at her and control her. You will be able to see it in her face and in her body language. She won't have an appetite (which is surprising because she is my daughter) or have any real desire to play or do anything. She simply looks like she knows the world is about to end.

And then she will give in and confess everything.

One time, she was jumping on our ottoman in the family room. She knew she shouldn't do it and she never got caught. A day or two later when she was putting on her pajamas for bed, she burst into tears. It took awhile for my wife and I to figure out what was going on. She had been wearing those pjs when she jumped on the ottoman a few days before. Putting them on again reminded her of doing something she shouldn't have been doing and she had to spill the beans.

As I've thought through the events of last night's dinner time, I come up upon a hard question. Where and when did we lose this gift of a guilty conscience? I'm sure we all had it when we were little. At what point does it go away? Where did we learn to to create the not so happy, private place where we store our ugly history? Why are we so afraid?

I pray that Hannah Grace never loses her guilty conscience. I don't want her to walk around with baggage and hidden secrets weighing her down and holding her back. I want her to know that she can share everything with her mom and I, no matter how horrible. I want her to know that she will be loved unconditionally and that we are a safe place . . . a place to not be afraid.

I pray that we unlearn our ability to hide from our past, to love one another, and to let forgiveness reign.

Cars, Trains, More Trains, and Lots of Walking

2011-04-08T01:08:00.001-04:00

Ok, so the title isn't as catchy as the old movie, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. It felt like we were stuck in that movie a little today. This morning my girls and I left the house promptly at 7:30am. We met up with one of the guys who attends South, so he could take us to the Amtrak station so we could catch our train to Chicago--the place we are vacationing for the next few days. That trip went smoothly, as did the train ride to Union Station in Chicago. We were even ahead of schedule! Unfortunately, that's where things began to get a little squinky.

When we got off the train in Union Station, our first task was to find the CTA Multi Day Ticket Kiosk. We needed some passes to use the rail and bus system here in Chicago because little seven year old legs and luggage (and toys) for three people is too much to walk around town for four days. Putting my male dignity aside, I asked someone where it was because, though I looked it up the night before, I had forgotten where the kiosk was in the station--the big, big station. The Amtrak lady was nice enough to tell me where it was--up the ramp and to the right at the Metra Ticket area. No problem! We proceeded up the ramp to the Metra Ticket area to purchase some ride passes. That is where the trouble began.

First off, there was a line. I'm ok with lines. We were only two deep at the kiosk, with two or three more people behind us. Not a problem. Both people in front of me successfully executed purchases of multi day passes. The odds were in my favor. I stepped up to the machine, selected what I wanted, and proceeded to pay for my passes. Unfortunately, the screen read "Bank card declined, try again." So, knowing that this was some sort of a glitch because the card I was using is in great standing, I tried again. "Bank card declined, try again." Giving up on that card, because obviously, there was a glitch in the system, I tried another card. "Bank card declined, please try again." I gave up for the moment and went over to the Metra Ticket station to see if they sold the tickets I needed. I was sternly told, "No." Time for plan B.

As I'm crisis managing the situation in my head, I have a flashback to when I was in Chicago three or four years earlier. I remember seeing kiosks at the entrance of the various rail stations we used back then. Problem solved, we'll walk to the Clinton Blue Line station, purchase our tickets there and be on our way to the hotel . . . so that we can check into our hotel and proceed to a LATE lunch. I stress late there because my girls get a little cranky when we get off schedule with meals. Knowing we are on vacation and we want this to be a happy trip, food is extremely important!

So, picture this. me in my bigness toting a pull behind suitcase in one hand, backpack on my shoulder, and Hannah's hand in my other. Right behind us, because there isn't space to walk three wide, Steph is behind us, dragging another suitcase, with an extra bag on top of it, her purse, and the toy bag (because you can't go on a five hour train ride without toys for a seven year old). Its not a long walk to the Clinton Blue Line terminal. Its mostly downhill. However, this line is a subway line. There are steps down into the belly of the beast. Lots of steps. . . that we had to navigate with two rolling suitcases, a backpack, a hand bag, a toy bag, AND a seven year old who is bouncing off the walls because she can't believe that we finally made it to Chicago!

One hundred steps later, we arrive at the ticket gate. I look to my right and see all the kiosks that my brain had remembered from the previous trip. All of them were single fare kiosks. No problem, my brain says as it begins slogging through the new crisis. I step up to the window where two CTA employees are talking and ask to buy some multi day passes. All our problems will be solved at this moment, we'll go farther down into the belly of the beast, get on our train and head off to the hotel, so we can check in and then get food. I've already mentioned these things. . . they are extremely important tasks that we need to get done. These are the thoughts in my head as I'm talking to the nice lady. unfortunately, you can't buy a multi day pass at ANY of the specific rail stations, only at Union Station or the CTA offices. Then the lady said this, "if you would have went out the other side of Union Station, you could have went into the CVS and purchased your passes there." All I could think at that moment was, "That's nice to know NOW!"

Still in damage control mode, I repeated what the lady said to me back to her to make sure I understood her correctly. I think my words were something like, "so your telling me I need to go all the way back to Union Station to get what I need?" All I could think as those words spilled out of my mouth was, "I'm going to have to drag my girls, all this luggage, and the toy bag back up the stairs, back the three blocks we walked to the CVS for tickets. They are going to have to go with me because I simply can't just leave them here. I wouldn't be a good husband/father to bring my girls all the way to this point and then leave them in the bowels of the beast while strange people walk by them continually while I search for ticket mecca." I guess the thoughts in my head caused my facial expressions and body language to show the lady that I was in a spot of need. She became an angel and let us onto the train without paying. I would have hugged her, but I was already a bit sweaty from the slogging we had already done.

Quickly through the turnstiles, we headed farther into the beast. In keeping with the recent problems we had been having, we quickly noticed that the down escalator was broken. We forged forward down another 1000 steps to the platform to wait on our train.

At this point, I must confess that previos to this trip to Chicago, I had only been one other time--at the end of January, when it was -50 degrees outside. I guess there aren't as many people visiting Chicago then, nor to people go out when it is cold. I know these things. My brain, on the other hand, did not process the change in seasons. When the train arrived, it was packed. We tried to be discreet when entering the train, but seriously, how descreet do you think a 300 pound, 6 foot 4 inch man who is dragging suitcases, a small child, a wife, and a toy bag behind him be--especially when the train is full. You get the picture. Lucky for us, the people of Chicago must be used to commotion and oddities because they continued on in life with little acknowledgment of our grand entrance.

To get to our hotel, we must go from the Blue Line into downtown and transfer to the Red Line and go north. Not a problem in my mind. We've already defeated the kiosk problem by getting a free ride and we've walked down a million steps already. We should only have to walk down a long hallway to make the transfer. Right? That's what my brain remembered. Not so much. To get from the Blue line to the Red line there are another million stairs and a long hallway to walk through. At this point, I looked at Steph to see how she was doing. She smiled back at me. That is code for, "I'm doing ok, but this isn't what I expected or remembered."

We made our transfer with much success, averting slight disaster by realizing that we were going to get on the South bound Red Line train BEFORE we actually got on it. This time the train wasn't as full, so it was a bit more comfortable. And, we were seasoned pros by this time! We were at our exit in no time and proceeded to climb out of the belly of the beast. No escalators again, only millions of stairs to go up . . . with suitcases, a seven year old, a starving wife, and a bag of toys.

I forgot to mention one thing. While we are enduring this trip from Union Station to our hotel, my daughter is continually asking, "where's our hotel? Is that our hotel? Is that the Grand Canyon?" She can be a bit persistent. All seven year olds can. It brought me great joy to say, "there is our hotel!"

That is not where the story ends, though. We go up to the sixth floor to check in. We are there too early. Our room is not ready. We'll need to drag our stuff--all of our stuff, including the toy bag, back down the elevator and check it with the bell hops AND then return in an hour or two to settle into our room. At this point, I know two things. One, my girls are a bit frazzled at this point from the helter skelter CTA fiasco. Two, they are hungry. They are angry hungry. I must feed them. I quickly pull out my ipad to find a pizza place or something to avert total first vacation day meltdown. I can't get on the internet. I try and try. I'm good at these things. I know how to get online. Seriously, I KNOW HOW TO DO THIS! Oh, wait. I need my room number to login to the FREE wireless network. Wait. I don't have a room number yet.

At this point, the abort sirens are going off in my head. This was supposed to be easy. Get off the train, multi pass kiosk, one million stairs, hotel check in, food for the family. I swallow my man pride again and step up to the front desk to get my room number so I can get online so I can figure out where we are going to eat, so I can then take all our stuff downstairs to the bell hops. AGain, my body language and distress on my face must have communicated a need for divine intervention, because the nice lady promptly said, "I just had a room finished up, we'll check you in so you can get to your room." THANK YOU JESUS!

I would have hugged and kissed that lady, too, but by this point in the game, I'm beyond glistening with sweat. She wouldn't have appreciated my appreciation. I wouldn't blame her.

We learned something today. Some people are still nice! They are willing to do everything they can to help you out, especially when you find yourself in a tight spot. Thank you CTA lady and front counter lady for saving us from total disaster!

And, next time we will splurge for the cab . . . though I don't know if that would turn out any better!

Full Tilt

2011-04-03T22:09:00.000-04:00

The last few weeks have been insanely busy in my life. This week was no exception. Following worship last Sunday, Frank and I piled into a van with another one of our people here at South and headed to Atlanta, Georgia for the Drive Conference. It was a great time away to see how others do church. The drive home was not so memorable. Well, it is memorable, but only because it was highly painful. We left at 1:00pm and got home at 4:00am. We spent about two or three of those precious trip hours in traffic jams.

The following day was spent taking care of everything I hadn't done the previous three days while away at Drive. That included planning some worship and doing a audio video cast for the next day's Dave Ramsey Simulcast.

Friday was the simulcast. It was good. The event went off without a hitch and it was good material. But, I must admit. By this time in the week, I was toast. I hope I didn't show it too much.

Yesterday was another interesting day. While away in Atlanta, our administrative assistant called and said another church needed to use our facility. That's not a problem, we like to help out when we can. We especially like to help Art Foster, a guy who used to go here who planted a church downtown. He's a great guy. So, I found myself again at the office yesterday running sound and stuff for the funeral.
Being in ministry, you go or participate in a lot of funerals. Some are joy filled. Some are sad. Some are downright miserable because of the tragedy that is staring you in the face. Yet, in all the funerals I've been at, I've never attended an African American funeral. Yesterday was my first, and it was an experience. I don't have time to write about it now. I'm still processing. There were moments of beauty in it...and at times, complete pandemonium. It was a beautiful thing.

Finally, today was no exception to the full tilt life I've had recently. This morning was worship, followed by a party at the church for one of the kids of my bass player. It was a good time of fellowship. Then, I actually got to take a nap! After which, I was off to church for a coffee house and a concert by Brian Carter. It again, was a great time. But, I'm pooped.

So, why am I telling you about my busy life. I don't want sympathy. This is the life I live. Sometimes its a bit more than I would like, but it is what it is. I am writing to say, that though I'm wiped, I am filled. God has given me many different things to think about, chew on, and ingest this week. Yeah, some of that was intentional because of the conference we attended and the simulcast we hosted on Friday. But some of it was out of sheer grace, being put in a certain place and a certain time. And, that is a good feeling when you notice it and soak it in.

Today in my morning life group, we were talking about the simple statement that the Holy Spirit has emotion and prays for us. The idea that God is engaged in our lives moment by moment is something that I think we too often overlook. Our self sufficiency unfortunately overpowers it. As we talked, we kicked around things we could do or ways we could shake out of our routine and selfishness to listen for God around us and move in His way, not ours. Living life at full tilt lately has helped me know that God is in control. That He needs to be in control. Its a scary and humbling thought, but it carries much power and hope.

Lord, may I learn to continually live life under your spirit's direction. Open my eyes and ears so I can see you and move in Your Way.

New Toys, New Looks

2011-03-18T11:12:00.000-04:00

Well. This year has been a year of new things for me. I had some ipad envy when Apple introduced them a year or so ago, but resisted the urge to run out and get one simply because I didn't know how functional it would be for me. I didn't really dig into it much because I knew I would really, really want one and I would have trouble holding back. To my surprise, I received an ipad as an anniversary gift from the people of South Lansing Christian Church in January. Its an awesome piece of hardware that is both functional for my ministry and very fun to play with.

The other new toy I got this year was a 24 inch imac computer. When my friend, Mark, bought it a few years ago, I had a bit of computer envy. It is simply big and beautiful. Lucky for me, he wanted to revert back to a windows system. He made me a great deal on it, and so now it has a new home on the corner of my desk in my office. It is beautiful!

With the ipad and the new/used imac, though, I got a new perspective of the look of pages on the internet. Back in the day the standard was a standard aspect ratio--800 by 600 or 1024 by 768--just like my current 27 inch tube tv. Now everything is in a widescreen or HD format. Since my ipad is intuitive and wants everything to look perfect, it resizes and shifts everything to where it needs to be. My imac, on the other hand, shows everything like it is, especially when the web browser is set to full screen. That made my last blog layout look horrible since it only filled half the screen and was justified to the left. That called for a new look.

As with my last rework of this blog, this one was just as painless. I searched for a little bit, downloaded a few templates, and did some experimentation. What you see is the result. Thank you nerdy people who build templates for nerdy/yet incapable people like me.

Now if my imac and my ipad could help me to be more cool . . . I know, I'm already cool enough!

Stuff and Things

2011-03-14T23:25:00.001-04:00

Its been awhile since I've blogged. I've had some stuff on my mind and wanted to write a few things down, but haven't had the chance or taken the time to do that. I'm trying to do some of that tonight, though I don't know how profitable it will be for me or for you. We will see what spills out of my brain.

My mind tonight is torn between joy and thanksgiving and utter sorrow. I'll start with the joy and thanksgiving first. This past Sunday, the church that I work for celebrated the 10 year anniversary of our Childrens minister, Betty Allen. To thank her, they are sending her on a two week vacation. She and her hubby will first spend a week at a time share in the hills of one of the Carolinas. Then, they will head to the coast and take a cruise to somewhere beautiful and warm. Not too shabby, eh? I received similar blessings a few months earlier when I celebrated my 10 year anniversary. Its a joy to work at a place that loves on you like that. It makes you work harder and love them more. Its a beautiful thing.

This past weekend I got to participate in Statewide, a yearly teen conference put together by some of the area ministers. I've been involved for 10 years. Its always great to watch the yearly planning come to fruition in a great weekend. This year's convention was even better than expected in my opinion for several reasons. One reason is that my friend, Jason Miller, was the main speaker. I've known Jason since the mid 90s. Back then he was a preppy high school kid at Michiana Christian Service Camp. He's grown into an amazing worship leader and teacher. Its been cool to watch him grow up and have at least a small influence on his life. God has done some amazing things in his life and will continue to do so!

The second reason the weekend was stellar is a man named Merl Judy. Merl is a retired guy who lives in Buchanan, Michigan. He has served alongside the people responsible for planning and facilitating Statewide. For the last 11 years he has handled all the registration details of our conference--interfacing with the hotel each year to make sure we have all the rooms we need, dealing with all the paperwork that the churches send in to register, and so on and so on. He has been an amazing blessing to us. unfortunately, his health is getting in the way of him continuing on with us. This was his last year to work with us. Its awesome to work beside faithful people who love something with passion and tenacity. Merl is an example of servanthood!

Yet, in all of this good, there is such sorrow. In the midst of all my joy and thanksgiving, the current events of the world pull at my heart. As I sit here tonight in my dining room and revel in the life going on around me, people on the other side of the globe are awakening to their fourth day of hell as they cope and come to grips with the destruction and death that happened during the earthquake and tsunami on Friday. Before blogging, I came across another video of the water coming on shore and destroying a city. I sat here for six minutes and watched the power of the water and the destruction that happened. Just before that I looked at the various pictures posted on Boston Globe's Big Picture website. Its hard to fathom the amount of destruction and loss of life.

I feel so helpless right here, right now. I've been praying for Japan and those affected since I saw the first images on the tv Friday morning. We took a little time Saturday morning at Statewide to pray. But, embarrassingly, life has continued on. I've prayed when I thought about it and when I visit my Yahoo page, but it hasn't been a constant. When I see the images my heart hurts for those there. But, as I continue on, life goes on around me . . . it feels like it distracts me. It makes me feel like there is something more that I need to do. Feel is to easy and soft. It makes me know there is something more that I need to do. The question is, what do I need to do and how am I going to do it.

Lord, give me direction to what actions you want me do.

The Exodus

2011-01-31T12:26:00.000-05:00

Today I spent some time in Exodus 14. Its where I am at in my journey through the Bible this year. (You could still get in on this. Seriously, go to YouVersion and start right now!) Exodus 14 is the account of Israel crossing the Red Sea and Egypt chasing after them. The things that stood out to me today are total opposites.

On one hand you have the Israelites, willing to beat down Moses for dragging them out in the wilderness to die. It says they cried out to God and then yelled at Moses in verses 10-12. Though they have seen so much with all the plagues and so on, they are still faithless.

The opposite of this is God. In this chapter God is at the front of the line for these people. He's leading them out by himself! When the going gets tough and the Egyptians begin pressing in from behind, the cloud - God Himself - moves in between Israel and the Egyptians. He fights for them by confusing Pharoah's army and making their chariots not work.

On the heels of Exodus 14 came Matthew 21, where Jesus goes in, clears the temple of those using it for exploit, and then healing the blind and the sick.

The challenge for me is wondering why we don't see God move in this way anymore? Why doesn't he come to our defense as a cloud and beat down those who persecute us? Why doesn't he hear our cries sometimes and come to our rescue? Why don't we see the blind being healed now? Because of this, one might say he's not as engaged as he was back then. Some also might say that he's still engaged, but choosing not to do those "miraculous" things.

My personal thought is that the problem is us. Do we really trust that God is there and willing to step in the middle for us? Do we act like he is there? Are we crying out for rescue? Do we even think we need rescued? Are we looking to rescue others or are we too focused on ourselves and being safe? How are we being the Kingdom of God? How are we advancing that Kingdom? Are we doing it in ways where God HAS to show up because our faith is so big?

If I am real and honest with myself, my answers to these questions are embarrassing. I am no better than the Israelites who cry out against Moses in faithlessness.

Lord, help us to be real with ourselves. Help us to ask the hard questions, to make changes, and to surrender our lives to you and your Kingdom. Allow us to see and feel you move around us as we live out our faith.

Another Birthday

2011-01-18T02:08:00.001-05:00

When I was young, I always felt like time took forever to pass. Days seemed like weeks, and weeks seemed like years. Maybe its because there was so much anticipation for what was coming next - the new experience that was right around the corner. One specific that I remember was the Friday/Saturday routine I had. I would watch The Dukes of Hazzard and then go to bed, hoping I would fall asleep as quickly as I could and that the time I spent sleeping would seem like nothing so I could get up and watch cartoons the next morning.

Time moves too quickly now. I want to slow it down and savor every day and every moment longer. Not because I am afraid of what is to come, but because I want to enjoy those who God has put around me and revel in the friendships and love that I share with them. But, for some reason, time continues to pass, day by day, moment by moment.

As I type those words, I come face to face with the realization that I need to do better at spending time with people since I cannot slow down time.

My daughter turns seven today. A few short moments ago I was cradling her in my lap listening to her coo and squeak, mesmerized by everything about her and unable to focus on anything else. While I am still totally mesmerized today, there are times when I'll catch myself too focused on other things to pay attention to the never ending singing, playing, dancing, and so on that continually pours out of her being. Those are the things I can't get back. . . the things I need to seek out more and savor as much as I can now, especially since she'll only be seven for one year. And the way the years are flying by, the next thing I know, she'll all grown up.

Happy Birthday, Hannah Grace! You are crazy and beautiful! You are my treasure and my joy, just like your momma. I love you with everything I am!

Checking Off the List

2011-01-13T23:17:00.003-05:00

As I stated in my last post, I am planning to make this a year of change for me. One of those changes was to blog more, which I really have not done well at. I have thoughts and ideas of what I want to blog about. I actually have a list of things I want to write about. The challenge for me is making time. I guess the fact that I am blogging for a second time and it's only the 13th of the month is an improvement from last year. We'll see how it continues.

Blogging is not the only thing I am planning to change this year. There is a long list of changes that I'm hoping to implement in the coming weeks and months. Actually, I've accomplished quite a bit so far. For example, one change that I was looking to make was rearranging my office. I moved into my current office about four years ago. I've only rearranged once. Now, for some of you, that might be normal. Some of you might be saying, why rearrange at all? If it works, it works. Leave it alone. That doesn't work for me. I need to make changes every so often to shake things up. The challenge for me is this: I have a lot of stuff in my office. Plus, I really struggled to find a new layout for the stuff in my office. The bookshelves, couch, and workstations created a Rubic's Cube rearranging challenge. But, I prevailed...AND had room for a new coffee cart! Now, there are still a few boxes of stuff to deal with, but I've checked it off the list.

Another thing I have been attempting with the new year is read and learn more. Last year I really felt like my work and study stagnated. I wasn't doing horrible work, I simply wasn't pushing forward with anything I was doing. Shaking that off has been a focus of mine since October. I plan to read through the Bible this year in addition to studying specific sections more (maybe Isaiah?). I also plan to dig more into other literature and books. So far I'm doing well on reading my Bible. I'm a day ahead in my year plan (which I am doing on youversion.com). I'm also about half way through Tribes by Seth Godin. While its not a full check because we are only 13 days into the new year, its a check of being on target this far in because I'm normally off track already.

I am also trying to lose part of myself. My family history is riddled with heart attacks, high blood pressure, and other not so good things. Part of the reason there are so many issues is that we, as a family, like to eat. And we do. If you were to ever come to a family reunion or any gathering for that matter, you would see endless amounts of good, hearty food. Seriously, you haven't lived until you sit down to a full plate of cabbage rolls, Mom Lowman potato salad, and Aunt Jeanie's baked beans, followed by a slice of Aunt Garnet's velvet red cake or Aunt Ina's warm rice pudding. Now you know why I weigh over 300 pounds. My familiy taught me how to appreciate food. While I plan to continue to appreciate it, I am planning to appreciate it in smaller quantities so I can live long enough to not have the routine bypass surgery or heart attack that many in my family have had. More importantly, I want to see Hannah grow up. If I continue on the pace I am on, I'd be lucky to see her graduate. So, I've been cutting back. I'm making progress and somewhat enjoying it.

Now, I don't say all these things to be prideful. I say them to show that I'm at least 13 days into some good changes and getting them out there so you all, all five of you that read this, can maybe ask once in awhile about them to make sure I haven't digressed.

I also write about them to maybe challenge you. Where are you at in your life right now? Are there things you want to do, yet never really accomplish it? Maybe there's a habit you need to change or a new, better habit you need to start. I challenge you to do some self reflection, some prayer, and dive in. Join me in making 2011 a year of change for the good.

Happy New Year

2011-01-01T00:34:00.000-05:00

It is a new year. Hope you all enjoyed your celebrations tonight. We had a quiet evening at home with friends. Hannah Grace made it till the new year, ate a cheese curl, and then went to bed. What a funny kid.

My soul longs for this new year ahead. I'm looking forward to the changes that I look to make in my life. I look forward to the ministry that God has in store for me. I look forward to reveling in God's grace and love for yet another year.

Goodbye 2010. Bring on 2011.

Dim then Bright . . . or at least Brighter Than Dim

2010-10-22T20:43:00.000-04:00

I've really been thinking a bunch lately. I'm nearing my 10 year anniversary here at South. I've been thinking much about what I've done, what I've not done, what I should have done. Plus, I've really felt like I've been in a rut with my job. Nothing's really wrong, I guess. I think that I've simply been doing it for 10 years now, and its become sort of second nature. That's not good, in my opinion, because you just do the job then, or at least that is how I was feeling.

Then, a few weeks ago I was given the opportunity to attend the Catalyst Conference in Atlanta, GA. Simply put, Catalyst is a conference put on to encourage ministers and church leaders to continue on being the Kingdom of God and challenging their congregations to be the Kingdom of God. It was a breath of fresh air to my soul, especially being in the place I was in before going.

There is not space here to share all the great messages, challenges, and what all that we heard and saw during the whirlwind two day conference. But, I want to share what I've been thinking so I can try and unpack it out of my head and to hopefully have you all, my five or so faithful readers, enter into a dialogue about what to do with it, if anything. So, here you go.

It seemed that at every corner of the conference, there were stories after stories of people doing huge things for those in other countries who either don't have stuff they need like clean water to drink or who were being treated with injustice in some way like being held captive as slaves in the sex trade. These things really made my mind work. Within 100 miles, we have Detroit, where people live in oppressed situations. We have that here in Lansing. There are strip clubs within 2 miles of my house and 1 mile of the church that I serve. The people we heard from the stage are people who are taking action and doing something about what is around them--what they see. I have really been struggling with the question of what am I doing here? What am I seeing? What am I going to do about it?   What is breaking my heart? Is anything breaking my heart? If its not, why are my eyes broken?

In light of that, my mind has really been thinking about the freedom that the conference had to share what they shared, how they shared it. They had covered their costs with the monies from those attending. They were able to speak freely and challenge us to be God's kingdom here and now. Their vision/voice was beyond the event. The questions that bubble up to me then, is what is my vision? Am I looking beyond the tasks I need to do week to week, or am I thinking in a bigger picture of what do I need to do to help the people at South see?

Even more simpler than that, I question how I am praying? What am I praying for? Am I putting myself in the path of God? Am I praying enough and asking God what he wants to use me, what he wants me to see. Or, am I simply asking him to provide what I think I need? These are a few of the questions rolling around in my head.

I've been here almost 10 years. What have I done? How have I advanced the kingdom of God here at South? I've had the privilege to be a part of some great things here. I've had the opportunity to watch some of my students in the youth ministry understand what they are called to be and chase after it through Bible college and go into ministry. Those are awesome things. But, at the same time, I question, what more could I have done? How much more do we look like, act like, live like Jesus than we did before I was here (not that I am the end all).

That leaves me here: Since I can't change the past, what am I going to do from here. What is my roll in pushing South to become a body of people who love God in a passionate way that we seek out what it is God is calling us to be (like Jesus) and then do it. What is my roll in helping people encounter that calling, process it, and live it out?

From there, the question becomes, how do I do that?

This is where my brain is at. This is what I think about when I drive down the street and see all the people between my house and the church that I serve. I covet your thoughts and ideas.

My prayer is that God would give me eyes to see, ears to hear, and the moxie to do something for His glory and His Kingdom.

Drink Coffee. Do Good.

2010-10-06T10:22:00.000-04:00

Having coffee with Chad Cronin at this coffee shop today. Its a great little shop that has the feeling of the old Hill of Beans from back in my early GLCC years. Wicker tables and chairs, little nooks in crannies in the house, and, most importantly, good coffee.

Plus, they are doing coffee right, in that they are doing fair trade coffee a step further, by working directly with a grower in Rwanda to make sure that the small growers are getting the money they deserve for their products. My friend, Cassidy, did some work in this vein when he shot video for the Bicycles for Rwanda project.

What do you need to do? Drink coffee responsibly. Make sure it is fair trade--meaning the growers are getting treated fairly in the process. Also, make sure you are getting coffee from places who use, not abuse those they get their coffee from. You can certainly buy coffee from places like Land of a Thousand Hills and know that you are being a good steward with your cup of joe.

Like Jesus

2010-09-28T13:48:00.000-04:00

If you've come here from there, here is where I really want you to go. If you haven't come here from there, just ignore this post and go about your business.

Every Dad's Purpose

2010-08-19T22:48:00.000-04:00

This comic today on Calvin and Hobbes made me remember another part of my childhood. Each night at the dinner table, it was not uncommon for my dad to harass us kids by saying something like, "How do you like the rabbit in the soup we are eating?" Sometimes we were gullible, sometimes we could see through his antics. It always made things interesting and fun.

My daughter says that Grandpa Jr. is a tease-y guy. And he is. It what makes him who he is. And, I proudly carry that trait forward!

Running

2010-08-19T08:08:00.000-04:00

Do you ever have moments in your life where you are doing something and you realize that you have become your parents incarnate? The horror of who you have become rushes over you at that moment, and rewrites reality. I had one of those moments recently.

When I was young, workouts and gyms were really for those trying to become Arnold (I'll be back!), or those who had lots of $$. My family fit neither of these categories. It wasn't in our culture. The closest thing to workouts at that time for me was playing basketball in 7th through 9th grade and knowing that my cousin, Cathy, was a jazzercise instructor. Come to think of it, she was really the only one in our family who was really nutty about working out and eating healthy. But that's not the point of this post.

The point of this post is this - when I was young, I used to think that my parents ran funny. I remember running around acting like an Olympic champion or playing football thinking I would one day become a star. Running felt natural. It felt like I was doing it right. You know how that goes, in your head you do something and it feels like you are doing it exactly like the pros do. As you see yourself do it in your mind, you look just like the pros! This is at least how my brain interprets/compares what am physically doing to the rest of the world.

With that as the backdrop of my young, preteen mind, I remember watching my parents run and thinking, "Wow! They run funny." Not funny, ha ha, but funny in a weird sort of way, like they've never watched someone run before and their brains don't know what it is supposed to look or feel like. They ran like they were old.

If you were to come to the church and watch me walk/run, I think you would have the same thoughts that I did as a little child as you watched me go round and round in the sanctinasium. He runs like he is old, like he has never ran before.

I have become my parents yet again. However, someday soon I'll be running like an Olympic star.

Pain and Agony

2010-08-11T10:36:00.001-04:00

I've always liked food. You can look at me and say, "that boy likes to eat!" I'm ok with that. I blame it on my mom and my grandma. My house was a "clean plate" house. If it was on the table to eat, some went on your plate, and you had to eat it. Nothing got left. That's where it all began.

My grandma's involvement comes in with weekly trips to McDonalds. Gram didn't drive. So, naturally, my mom and us kids would take her out each week to the grocery store, mall, or wherever she needed to go. In the process of those excursions, we would hit McDonalds. I remember one trip in particular. I was probably 12 or 13 at the time. As we were ordering I remember Gram saying, "don't you need another sandwich--you are a growing boy!" It was all downhill from there. She gave me the "excuse" to double order. I've been living that life ever since.

Unfortunately, my love for food has been transferred on to my wife and daughter. You ask us what is good anywhere we've been and we can tell you where to eat. Grand Rapids? Arnies on 28th Street. Chicago? Giordanos. Williamsburg, VA? Chik-fil-a or Che Burger Che Burger. We are a sad, sad family.

Recently, it has seemed like I can't stop shoving anything and everything down my throat. I've become very conscious of it. It has made me loath myself a little...yet I haven't been able to keep my mouth shut. Shocker. It prompted me to get on the scale the other day at home. I don't normally do for two reasons. One, the scale at home only registers to 270. So, since I'm above that, it is really just a guesstimation of my weight. Two, I don't want to know. If I don't know, I don't have to think about it. Right?

Needless to say, I got on the scale at home and greatly exceeded the limits of the scale. What I guesstimated really freaked me out a little. When I went to the office I visited the doctor's scale that our First Place ministry has. While I was pleasantly surprised that my actual weight was lower than my guesstimation, I was still heavy. . .very heavy. If my weight were a batting average, I'd be doing good.

That was Monday. I was angry Monday. I was frustrated with myself Monday. So, I dealt with it. I had some pulled pork from Backyard Barbecue. It was stellar! Monday was not a good day.

Yesterday morning, I woke up thinking that Hannah was crying. I peeked into her room, saw she was fine and then mentally debated whether I was going to go back to bed or just head to the office. Instantly, my mind remembered the day before and I had the thought, "you should exercise!?" I had flashbacks of my run in with the treadmill. But, then I thought about how unhappy I was with myself the day before. I grabbed some clothes and headed to the office.

Now, I'm not going to share the gory details of my exercise. It wasn't pretty. It involved walking and running round and round and round our sanctinasium at church. It was way early in the day so no one had to witness it, thank God! I almost died at least 3 times in the walking and running. But, as I got close to the end, I began to feel good and loose. It was something I didn't expect. It was a good feeling. . . but it didn't last long.

Afterwords, I sat down at my desk and began working. I didn't move from my chair for a few hours. I was in the zone, so to speak . . . and I had already made coffee, so it was an easy chair roll to the right to refill my cup! However, when I went to get up to go to the copier or talk to Melissa, our office assistant, I was greeted with major muscle pain in my legs. I almost couldn't get out of my chair. Stupid exercise.

So, if you were to see me today, you would see me get up from where I am sitting and walk like a 90 year old (no offense to 90 year olds) for about the first four or five steps until the pain and agony fades from wicked horrible to somewhat horrible. Hopefully, you won't see me. But if you do, please suppress the urge to laugh out loud at least for 10 or 20 seconds, until I get moving almost like normal. I would greatly appreciate it.

And, pray for my soul tomorrow as I take on round number two of the walking and running round and round and round the sanctinasium at church. I'm sure I'll be yelling at God as I run for making food so good.

Risk

2010-08-10T08:52:00.002-04:00

It is an early morning for me. I woke up at 5:18am when I thought I heard Hannah crying. After peaking in her room and realizing she was ok, I decided to not go back to bed. At this point, I don't know if that was a good idea or not. We'll see how the day wears on.

One of the things I have already done this morning is read. I do my best to read every day. Some days I do great at it. Some days I completely fail. In the last few months, its really been a struggle for me to make time. This is the story of my life. I've wanted to figure out how to make time for it again in my day and have discipline to actually do it. Motivated by my friend's goal this month to read through the New Testament, I decided to take on the same challenge.

I've run into a problem, though. Well. Lets be honest, I've run into two problems. The first problem is my lack of discipline. Today, being August 10th, I'm supposed to be reading Luke 19-24. I'm still in Matthew 9. I think I might have read three times since the start of the month. Yeah, I know. That's 30%. Too bad bible reading isn't baseball. I'd be stellar!

The second problem is that when I actually make time to read, I get bogged down in the text. I guess this is an ok problem to have because what I'm reading sucks me in. But, for speeding through the NT, it hinders the journey. Today is a prime example.

In Matthew 9 there are three healings strung in a row. The first happens when the leader of a synagogue comes to Jesus and asks him to raise his daughter from the dead. Wrap your mind around that for a moment. A synagogue leader asks Jesus to raise his daughter from the dead. The Pharisees and the Jews are continually questioning Jesus' ability to do such things, calling him more often than not, a spawn of Satan. Yet, here is a leader in the church, coming to Jesus with the faith that he can raise his daughter. Somehow, some way, Jesus has caught his attention and he's willing to take the risk of asking Jesus to heal her, which means he is standing against everything the Pharisees think and say of Jesus.

As Jesus is on his way to encounter her, he is interrupted by a woman who has been bleeding for 12 years. She wants to sneak close to Jesus, touch the hem of his cloak, and make an unnoticed getaway. That doesn't happen. Jesus acknowledges her faith. In other gospels, it seems that he makes a scene about it by calling her out of her anonymity. Even more, she's been bleeding for 12 years. She's been unclean for 12 years. In her touching Jesus, she risks making him unclean by "Law" standards. I would guess that's why she's willing to do the covert touching to get healed. In the end, she gets what she needs.

The final part of the story is Jesus healing some blind guys and a demon possessed man who really had nothing to lose. The blind guys called out for healing using the phrase, "son of David". In doing so, they acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah. And, the demon possessed guy probably doesn't have a clue of what is going on till after he is healed. But, the people who bring him to Jesus believe and have faith . . . and trust that Jesus will be able to drive out the demon.

What amazes me is the fact that each person in need of something they couldn't go and buy or get on their own were willing to take the risk and ask for help, no matter what the cost. Their faith in Jesus overcame the risks. Even more, it wasn't like they were asking for money or something physical that Jesus had. They were asking for things that were extra ordinary--supernatural.

As I read this passage this morning, I wondered what Matthew is doing stringing them together like he did. Is there something between the lines in the order from the man with the most risk asking and leading all the way to the man who probably didn't know what was going on or the place he was in till Jesus healed him? Is there more between the lines as each of the people asking for healing are outwardly acknowledging Jesus as the Messiah and that he is bearing the power of the kingdom of God?

Even more, I think of the studies some of the people here at South and I have been doing on the Holy Spirit and its roll in helping God's kingdom break forth here on the earth. Our conversations have centered around the fact that maybe we have diminished our view of the Holy Spirit and the role of the supernatural in and around our lives.

People in the Bible aren't afraid to take risks. They aren't afraid to argue with God. They are not afraid to come face to face with Jesus and say, "come and raise my daughter back to life!" I don't think we are that way. I think we have incapacitated ourselves. We only think we can do what physically control. We can only give so much. We can only do these things because that is what we are gifted at. We cannot do those things because we don't have the money to do it.

Now, hear what I'm not saying. I'm not saying we could/should be walking through the hospital healing people or we should be going to wherever the demon possessed people are and casting out their demons. Nor am I saying that I don't think God could move around or through us in that way.

What I am saying is that if we don't think we can control it, if we don't have the money for it, or, if its out of our comfort zone, we won't do it. We've lived this way for so long that we ourselves have become blind to what we could/can do. To me and for me, it seems as though we are sitting at the feet of Jesus saying, "But we only have a little bread and a few fish. We can't do that!"

We need to get over our control issues. We need to get over our trust issues. We need to know/grasp/understand/get through our thick skulls that if and when we put stretch ourselves and take risks for God, he's going to show up and do great things.

God, open our eyes and ears. Take away the fear. Help us to be Your kingdom here on earth.

Mini Vacation

2010-08-05T10:38:00.000-04:00

I did good for about what, a week? I really do like to write down my thoughts and blog, even though this place doesn't really show it. Maybe August will be different. Time will certainly tell. It always does.

I'm stealing my girls away today and heading to the beach. We may hit a zoo tomorrow. It will be a good time away, even though I'm not a huge fan of the beach. My girls love it though. They will have a ball. Hopefully the water will be warm enough to play in at Lake Michigan. Its been hot enough, we should be good.

Keep strong in the faith today. Be bold and love the way God loves us. Be full of compassion and joy for yourself, your family, and those around you that you interact with. Peace!

Amidst the Blue

2010-06-11T10:06:00.000-04:00

At the moment I am parked at a table in a Panera Bread. I've been here for some time now. Its a place I like to come every once in awhile to get away from the office to write and think. Today's task is writing quiet time guides for camp in two weeks. Shockingly, they are not done yet.

There are two reasons why Panera is a great place to work. One, the light roast coffee is spectacular. It has good body without any acidity or burnt flavor--thus the reason its called light roast. Its good stuff. Two, there is an endless amount of coffee to be consumed for under $2 a cup. It is glorious.

Unfortunately, there are a few problems with the Panera. One, sometimes Paneras are connected to malls. The one I'm in currently in is a part of the Lansing Mall. Thus, every time I come here, the place is crawling with mall walkers. If you are here way early, they are all sitting around, hovering over their coffee waiting for the mall police to allow them into the climate controlled strolling arena they love. Or, more importantly, if you come late, they sit around after their aforementioned lapping in the climate controlled strolling arena enjoying bagels and more coffee. Now, don't get me wrong. I have nothing against mall walkers. I think they are noble in wanting to get, be, or stay healthy. Actually I admire them for their tenacity--a tenacity that I wish I had at the moment. The problem comes into the need for Panera to cater to them musically. The background music they play around here is atrocious. That, combined with "retired" talk about GM, the president, and who knows what else forces me to dawn my earphones and drown it out.

Therein lies the real problem for me. This morning I ventured into itunes and began drowning out the ambient noise in Panera with a little Mumford and Sons, a band that one of my friends recommended to me. One would think this is a good thing. . . put on the earphones, turn up the tunes, and get on to what you are here to do which is ironically write quiet time guides. Unfortunately for me, I have the attention span of a 2 year old. I quickly found myself looking up lyrics to the songs I was listening to to get a better understanding for what the dudes are singing about. From there I went back to itunes to look at what else they have recorded to see if there's something I'm missing. That led me to looking up Seasick Steve. Luckily, my coffee cup was empty and I needed to extricate myself from my earbuds to get another cup.

When I sat down, I realized I had lost too much time on the internet. . . which lead me to wishing the walkers weren't here so I could have some good background music and get something done. . . and then I had to blog about it.

I know, I should take a break, get off my duff, and go walk with the walkers. My body probably would appreciate it. But alas, the quiet time guides awake. Time to find some better music to listen to . . .

The Crystal Anniversary

2010-06-10T02:40:00.002-04:00

As I have stated earlier on this blog, Steph and I grew up together at the same church where her family and my family met. We really didn't meet. We were just there in the nursery together, probably looking across the room from the cage like kid cubbyholes that were built into the wall (seriously, they were built into the wall with sliding bars on them just like you see at the animal shelter).
There's a lot of creepy, yet not creepy things like that about us. She's the baby of her family. I'm the baby of my family. Her dad worked for Diebold, Inc. My dad worked at Diebold, Inc. Her mom was a stay at home mom. My mom was a stay at home mom. She has two older siblings. I have two older siblings. She's beautiful. I'm beautiful!

In my life, Stephanie Jo Kuhl has always been there. My earliest memories of her are from the 4s and 5s class we used to go to. I remember sitting around a funky shaped table with her and some of the other kids in the class. A little later on, I remember being in a Palm Sunday play with her. I don't remember anything of the play, who was who, and so on, but I remember sitting at this table with her and her cousin, who was also in the play.

One of my my most vivid memories of her in those pre-teen years is from a sledding night our church had at my Aunt's house. My aunt had a great sledding hill. When we would get enough snow to cover the corn stalks, we would toboggan down it. It took a little skill to maneuver the hill, but my big brother was an expert at making the turn. By turn, I mean the 40 degree left turn you needed to make about 3/4 of the way down the hill. If you didn't, you were in trouble because you were bound to encounter a barbed wire fence. Steph's brothers didn't know of this turning need. They piled on a toboggan and took off down the hill. Stephanie was unscathed, though shaken. Her brothers were bloodied a little, but they lived to sled again!

If I remember correctly, I think Steph rode with me down the hill once that night. I was probably giddy about it because she was a girl and I was a boy. That's what boys do when girls ride on sleds with them. I probably also remember this because I'm sure my big brother gave me crap about riding on a sled with her later, though I've blocked that from my memory.

Yet, in all of these memories, there was never anything remotely romantic for us outside of the sled moment we had until after we graduated high school. Only then, did we begin dating. On our first date I took her to see the movie, Juice. It was her choice. We went to McDonalds after the movie and I had her home by 9:30pm. I was such a loser then.

Needless to say, I've known this girl all my life. She's grown on me over the years. We've traversed from the icky girl/boy stage to the "how you doing" stage all the way to the whatever stage it is we are in now. Its been quite the journey. She knows my secrets. I know hers. We are one. And all of that is why I am rejoicing today. Because, 15 years ago, Stephanie Jo Kuhl became my bride. For some crazy reason, in all of the creepy above, she wanted to bind herself to me. And I am thankful for it!

Babydoll, its been 15 years of love. You were beautiful on that day you became mine. You are even more beautiful now because I've had 15 more years to fall even farther in love with you. I pray that my love for you brings you joy, hope, and peace!

I'm Still Here

2010-06-04T09:21:00.000-04:00

I'm still here. I've been busy. Camp is only 15 days away. 15 days . . .wow. Its going to be a long 15 days. If I could just quit messing around on the internet and get to the sermon I'm doing this Sunday, then I could focus on the stuff I have to do for camp.

Blogging probably doesn't help the "quit messing around on the internet" need. Oh well. I felt as though all 4 of you needed to hear from me. So, here I am. I hope you are doing well.

Sitting Outside

2010-05-03T20:02:00.005-04:00

Right now I'm sitting outside in my driveway. Hannah was riding her bike awhile ago and I came out to watch. Her and Steph went for a walk while I sat here enjoying the birds and the breeze and worked on a few things on my computer. I'm going to have to go in soon, though . . . its almost bedtime.

I must admit, I really love fall and winter. In my opinion, you can't go wrong in either of those seasons, no matter how cold and snowy it gets. However, early spring is also very enjoyable, especially when its like today. Its nice enough to come outside and enjoy the sounds and the feel of spring. And, its early enough that the mosquitoes have not emerged. Once it warms up a little they get unbearable around my house, especially in the evening.

I hope and pray that you get time in the next couple of days to enjoy the spring--the smell of spring in the air, the look of the tulips and other budding flowers, the new feeling of the cold on your feet as you venture out once again without socks on, and the sounds of the birds and some occasional rain falling from the sky. And, don't forget the taste of soft serve ice cream or, if you are lucky, some fresh strawberries.

Go on, get out there right now, before it turns hot and yucky.

Awesome God and Guttural Sounds

2010-04-28T03:25:00.001-04:00

Music in the life of my family has been a common thing. Growing up, there was always music and musical instruments around me. If it wasn't the radio blaring WHBC in the mornings when we were getting ready for school, it was my dad playing his guitar or his keyboards every night after a day in the factory. Or, at the most in opportune times when I wanted to watch TV, my sister would be practicing for her piano lessons. It all came naturally in my family passed from my father to my siblings and me.

Music was also common in Steph's family. Marching band music and a love for the radio and records were passed along to her from her parents and older brothers. Her dad sang (and still sings) in the church choir - he and I sat nest togethe. The music around her blossomed into a passion for music. One example could be the hours upon hours she spent sitting and listening to her boom box trying to catch and record the latest chart topping hit. (If you don't believe me, we still have the tapes around here to prove it, all neatly labeled in a box in the basement.)

Thus, its not a surprise that Hannah Grace is musical. She's grown up being around my worship ministry at South - dancing to the music of many a worship rehearsal and always wanting her turn to play my guitar when I have it out practicing. At home it is no different. There is always something playing in the cd player, on the Comcast digital music stations, or in the car radio. If Taylor Swift or some other song that her and her momma likes comes on, she blitzes across the room to crank the volume. Or, if by the off chance the house is void of music, you will probably find Hannah on the floor playing with her dolls or whatever, singing away, as if they've been caught up in the most dramatic six year old opera ever produced. Its really a beautiful thing.

Music is even part of our routine. I think I've written at least once on this blog about the songs her and I sing each night before she goes to bed. Its something we've done since she was able to. Its a joy, even when I can't trick her into letting me sing the last word of the ABC's like I used to. It helps her (and me) to settle down and easily go to sleep. Its something that I will miss when she outgrows it.

This week has been a new day for Hannah and her love of music. It started on Sunday. In Kidz Worship they sang Awesome God by Rich Mullins. She's been singing it on and off since then. Its extremely cute and touching, especially since I have a huge love/appreciation for Rich Mullin's music. Its allowed us to have some cool conversations about who God is and how big He is.

As I type out this post, I can't help but think of my friend Adam. Adam is into communication. Well. That's not true. He's beyond being into communication. He's like a kid who just got a new video game when it comes to communication. He's obsessed. When someone new is around us who doesn't know Adam, I like to have him explain why he is so into communication. At that moment, his eyes light up and twinkle and he gets a giddy smile on his face as he shares about the fascination he has of how people are able to make guttural sounds with their vocal chords and combine them with body language, emotion, and so on to converse and what not. (I'm sure that is not as eloquent as Adam would have put it - that's why he's the communications guy and I play a guitar) As he talks, his whole person glows with wonder.

As I sit here and write about how music has been a part of my life and how my daughter is learning to love it as I have loved it, I can't help but marvel at what music is and how it affects us. Physical disturbances in the air, like the guttural sounds of our voices, become something more than just noise. Music gives us hope. It calms us at times. It brings us joy. It allows us to express our emotion whether we are musical or not. It stirs memories of the past and of relationships/friendships that we have had. It gives us an avenue of worship and praise from us to our God and allows us to share that awe with others. It helps me to calm my daughter for sleep and talk with her about God. It helps me better share with my wife how wide and deep my love for her is. It helps me know who I am not, who I am, and who I need to be.

A New Look

2010-04-21T23:25:00.001-04:00

Well. I used to use Haloscan for my comments. The other day when I posted And Then There Were Three I noticed that Haloscan had been purchased by another company and were not handling my comments the way I wanted because I need total control. Thus, I needed a change.

If you know me, change is sometimes difficult. When I started my blog way back in 2004, I searched forever to find my old template and edit it. It was one of the things that got me started in dabbling in web design. it took me at least a month of learning code and so on to get everything just the way I wanted it, yet another one of my issues.

So, off to Google to search for a new template. Luckily, it really didn't take too long, since I found a blog template named Möbius - the name on my truck's personalized license plate - see here. Coincidence? Maybe. I liked the template more than the other 5 or 6 I had downloaded today.

So, here it is. Hope you like it. If you don't, it is not your blog.

And Then There Were Three

2010-04-19T08:45:00.004-04:00

I should simply cancel this blog and give up. Its been almost 3 months since my last post. So much has happened since then. In that time I went from four followers to three. I've lost 25% of my constituency and readership. Those are horrible numbers. . . if you care about numbers. I don't. For the three of you that read this, thanks for reading.

I've started drinking soda again. I made it two months. Then, I realized I was being more vigilant about my beverage choices than I was about making time for Scripture. That wasn't right in my opinion, so I've tried to flip that. I've failed miserably in trying to read through the Gospels each week. The first week I made it to Matthew 16. The second week I made it all the way to Mark, by way of the NIV Audio Bible and a long trip. That's how its gone.

That seems to be how my life is lately. I have great intentions and an even greater inability to carry through on my intentions. I stare at an accomplish-able list of things I want/need to do and struggle to find the discipline and motivation to do it. This has happened to me before.

When I was in second grade, I spent a sizable part of one of the grading periods staring out the window in our classroom. I don't really remember what I was thinking. I simply remember staring out the window at the white house that was there. At the end grading period, I remember Mrs. Barkus talking to my mom and letting her know I hadn't been doing my work. Then she showed my mom the neatly stacked pile of uncompleted papers in my desk. That was not good for me. For the next few weeks, I would go home from school, have dinner, and then go to my room to do my homework, then bed.

I guess its time to send myself to my room for awhile.

A Coke and Smile

2010-01-25T06:36:00.003-05:00

Well. I am three weeks into my own personal challenge of living like Jesus. I can't say that I've done that well. I'm trying to do things like read the gospels every week, not drink soda, eat better, and so on. I read to Matthew 17 the first week. The second week I made it to Mark 2, though that was only because I had a long trip one day and I listened to all of Matthew on the drive. Last week I didn't even hit the gospels.

I ate better for the first week. Steph and I watched how much we ate and we tried not to eat out all that often (which is really one of our bad habits). Since then, my eating has been very similar to before. I've probably not had seconds as much. But, that is probably the only bright spot in the last few weeks in regards to eating.

The one and only thing I have been able to keep up with is not drinking soda. Now, if you know me, the thing I like most besides coffee is a good soda. My fridge in the office used to be stocked with Diet Coke or on occasion some Ale 8 or Livewire. Since the beginning of January, the only thing in my fridge is coffee creamer and yogurt. Dismal, I know.

The first week of this thing, I decided to drink more water. And, I actually did. I even think the first two days I drank 64 ounces of water throughout the day. I didn't really notice much difference, other than more need to use the restroom. I didn't feel any better or worse, not that I was expecting a huge change in the way I feel.

Then, we started going out to eat more. I would get lemonade or iced tea in those instances, if I didn't have water. I learned two things. One, lemonade is a decent replacement for soda. Two, iced tea is a gamble. Sometimes its good. Sometimes its just okay. Sometimes it tastes like its a week old. That's not good. Even with these challenges, not having soda has not been as difficult as I expected it to be.

That's not to say, however, that I've not been tempted. A recent trip to B-Dubs was painful. Lemonade, water, or iced tea just doesn't go with hot barbeque and Caribbian Jerk wings. Last week at the office, Caleb (Frank's son) gave me a can of Throwback Mt Dew. It is probably in the top three of my favorite sodas. I kindly took the can and gave it away. On, Saturday, the Lowman family had a nice, hot pepperoni and extra cheese pizza from Pizza Hut. A Coke would have tasted incredible with it. Heck, even a Pepsi would have tasted okay. But alas, I had Gatorade. It was adequate and the pizza tasted great. But it just wasn't right.

The biggest temptation has been on my unfortunate, yet frequent trips to Menards and Lowes. For the last year and a half I have been remodeling our house. It always seems that every time I go to do something I need some extra supply that I don't have. So, naturally, it means a trip to the home store. This requires a travel beverage. One of these delectables can be acquired from the Speedway soda fountain in 32 and 44 ounce varieties or purchased in lovely plastic bottles in the checkout line at the home store. If Hannah was with me, it was always Speedway since the girl has grown an early appreciation for a frozen soda, aka the slurpee.

Last night was extra bad. I ran into some drywall issues and needed a new piece for around a new door in the family room, which itself was an issue. By the time I admitted that I needed to change out some drywall, my frustration level was pretty high. As I got in the truck to run to the home store yet again, I could feel an overwhelming pull in my soul for a soda. It would have calmed me down. It would have soothed my frustration and made the 10 minute drive to Lowes more tolerable. I could have made it happen too. I actually have cash in my wallet for some reason--something I try not to do. I could have easily slipped into Speedway or the McDonalds drive thru for a frosty, ice cold Coke, with lots of ice and a nice straw to slurp it up with. Seeing that its been three weeks since I've had one of those, I certainly would have disposed of it quickly enough to throw away the cup when I arrived at Lowes. No one would know except me. It could be my little secret. . .

How is it that something so simple, like a beverage, can control my mind the way that it does, even though I've been away from it for three weeks? Why does it feel like my bones are longing for soda? Is it a deep down emotional need? Or, is it because of the years and years of hearing and seeking "coke and a smile" commercials? Or, the even greater question. . . how am I going to make it a whole year? I'm already having conversations in my head and with my wife like, "Root Beer isn't soda, it's root beer, right?" "Or, a slurpee isn't soda, especially the flavored ones like the orange cream that Speedway used to have, right?"

An orange cream slurpee from Speedway would be heavenly right now--a big 44 ounce one in a Styrofoam cup with two straws so I could get more of it into my system with each slurp. . .

Last night I drove to Lowes, got what I needed, and returned home thirsty. It was a good feeling to not give in. Its really the only thing I've had discipline with in this Jesus journey that I'm trying to take this year. My prayer is that overcoming the need for a stupid drink will help to grow my discipline and actually make it through the gospels in a week or that I might actually exercise. We'll see how this week goes.

So, when you have a Coke and a smile this week, think of me and pray for my soul.

Turning 6

2010-01-18T22:21:00.005-05:00

Where has the time gone? It seems like only yesterday Stephanie and I brought Hannah home from the hospital. I distinctly remember that night. It was a cold night with temperatures in the single digits. The nurse at the hospital helped us bundle Hannah extra well in her car seat. Steph sat in the back seat to make sure everything was ok on the way home. When we arrived home, we carried Hannah in and put her in the middle of the floor. I remember standing behind Steph as she sat on the floor in front of Hannah, who was still in her car seat. We had a rush of many emotions right then. Amazement, fear, hope, and hopelessness all came at once. It was rather overwhelming. Luckily, Steph's parents pulled in the drive about two seconds later. I escaped to my office at the church for awhile to gather myself, journal, and so on.

From then on, life has been different. It took us time to adjust. We had to learn new routines. We had to learn how to interpret the signals she was giving--whether she was hungry, smelly, gassy (she is my child), and so on. We learned. We failed some. We learned some more. Then, when we thought we had a good portion of it figured out, she started crawling. Which, then called for more learning and baby-proofing. We quickly realized that even though we were the parents, we were going to be shaped with the new life that Hannah was, just as much as she would be shaped by us.

Today my little precious girl turned six. As I sit here and try to think of all the things we've done together and all the firsts she has had over the last six years, I struggle to grasp how so much time has passed so quickly. It seems like yesterday she was calling a spoon a samoo. Now she pronounces spoon correctly, lacing it with an annoyed tone when you say samoo. Back then she would take naps and cuddle for hours. Now, the child is in constant motion taking in all that is around her with every bit of energy she has.

Lord, thank you for the last six years of life that Steph and I have had with Hannah Grace. We have enjoyed every moment of it. I look forward to the many more years you will hopefully give us. May you continue to teach me about me and, more importantly, about how much you love us as your little children. May I be able to share that love with my little girl.

Haiti

2010-01-16T10:47:00.003-05:00

For all 4 or 5 of you that read this page. South Lansing Christian Church is physically getting involved in helping with what has happened in Haiti. You can find out all the info here. If you can help, we would greatly appreciate it. I think it would be an amazing thing if we could fill a shipping container in a day or two and need to get another one. What a testament of our faith and hope that would be!

I spent a couple weeks in Haiti back in 2003. It was an amazing experience. The people there live on very little. They make do with what they have. One of our responsibilities while we were there was helping to dig a foundation for a new building. Now, one would think, that could be fun, especially if you get to run the backhoe. Unfortunately, there were no mechanical or powered machines involved. Just men and women using picks, shovels, and wheelbarrows. The shaping thing for me during that project was the fact that us blancs (white people) could only work 1/2 hour shifts or more at a time before the heat and the physical labor made us stop and take a break. All the while, the Haitian men who we were working beside kept swinging, digging, and moving. Even more, they sang songs, smiled, and enjoyed the work because they were doing something good--and they had work to do.

I cannot even begin to imagine what the Haitian people are going through right now. Selfishly, I don't ever want to experience it. As I looked at the pictures on Boston Globe's Big Picture my heart grows heavy my mind begins to wonder how I would respond if something like that happened here and I were to lose Stephanie or Hannah. And then I get disgusted at myself because here I sit, in a Panera Bread drinking coffee worrying about how I would feel if I ever had to feel this loss, rather than praying and hurting for the hundreds of thousands of people who were specifically affected by the earthquake.

Lord, help me to lose myself so that you can be glorified through my actions. Help my thoughts, prayers, and actions be directed to helping others experience, understand, and know what the Kingdom of God feels like. May we as a church be your body physically in the next week. Help us to pray, give, pack, and be a blessing.

Quotes From Dobson. . . .

2010-01-06T09:47:00.004-05:00

Ok. I mentioned these quotes in my last post. I'm finally getting back to Dobson's book to look for them. (plus, I needed a post since Frankly has 3 already - not that blogging is a contest).

The first quote of Dobson's book that challenges me comes from a rabbi that one of his sons studied with and is on the first page. "If you're a Christian and aren't reading through the Gospels every week, then you're not a very good Christian. How can you claim to take Jesus' teachings seriously when you spend so little time actually reading them?" The rabbi hit a nerve with Dobson. It does with me too. I've tried many times to read through the Bible every year. I get a good start every January, but then "get too busy". This year is going to be different. I'm going to do everything I can to listen or read through the gospels every week. I'm already failing miserably this week, but there are still a few days left. This may mutate into a gospel a week/all the gospels in a month goal for me.

The second quote has still not been found. I've been through almost 80 pages and not found it. Its rather frustrating. But, alas. I guess I need to read through the book again. I'm writing down some of the prayers that Dobson uses throughout his year long journey. Two that are really grabbing me right now are the Orthodox Jesus Prayer, "Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." It is repeated for each knot in an Orthodox Prayer Rope, which has 33, 50, or 100 knots in it, depending on which length rope you have. It really helps me control my mind and focus back towards God, especially when my mind decides to go the opposite way.

Another resource Dobson came across in his journey is the Amidah--a set of blessings that are a part of the Jewish prayer life. I need to do more reading on how they are used individually and communally in the life of Israel. But, from my first look at the blessings, they seem like they will be helpful to pray through. (if you want more info, or to see them, you can go here)

I guess that is all for now. Maybe the next time I blog I'll have the other quote and a specific list of what I'm actually doing this year as I try to live more like Jesus.

Living Like Jesus

2009-12-14T10:50:00.006-05:00

A few weeks ago I popped into the local Family Christian Store looking for a songbook for Christmas. I normally try to stay away from bookstores altogether because if I don't, I buy books and put them on the shelf behind me in my office. That is where the plan to read books are. So, I was taking a risk. To help me not buy anything, I took my girls along.

Unfortunately, Family Christian did not have the book I was looking for. I was ready to be in and out to control the temptation. However, Hannah got stuck in the kids section. Go figure. To kill a little time I looked at the church resource section. Luckily there was nothing there that I needed. From there I went to the Christian Living section, or I think that is what it is called. Its the good section between stuck in between the fiction and the charismatic section, I think. Its aisle 3. That is not the point, though.

While in the Christian Living section, a book A Year Living Like Jesus caught my attention. Ed Dobson was a minister at a large church in Grand Rapids. I have never interacted with any of his books, theology, writings, and such. I normally would skip right over him and look for one of the authors that my mind/theology resonates with. Yet, the title of the book, really gripped my attention. I thumbed through the book for a moment, looked at the back cover, and then put it back. Luckily my girls were ready to leave.

Later that week, I did a little internet looking for the book and for Ed Dobson. That's how much the title and idea caught my attention. It fits in so well with where I am at in my life. I'm not feeling down. I'm not feeling un-spiritual. I'm feeling like I'm in the middle of the road--not doing horribly, but not living epic (to use a word from my Merge students). I've been mulling and thinking about where I'm at for a few months now. I've been wondering how I change and add discipline to my life so I can move from the middle of the metaphorical road.

Last week I had lunch with a friend to talk about some other church stuff. In the process of that conversation, we talked about Dobson's book, and the book that he read that pushed him to live like Jesus for a year--A.J Jacobs, The Year of Living Biblically, which my friend had just gotten as a birthday present. Needless to say, my consumer mentality was calling me to buy the book. I NEEDED it.

Last night I gave in and bought the book. I'm already half done with it. I couldn't put it down. I hope to finish it in the next two days or so. I plan to buy it for some close friends for Christmas.

Please note, its not about the book. The book is good. Its the concept that is shared in the book. The idea of allowing Jesus to shape my life in a day to day manner should not really be new to me--should not be as earth shattering as it is. But, it is what it is. There are especially two quotes within the book that feed my passion for this idea of living the life of Jesus--quotes from other people that Dobson shares. And, I would tell them to you if I had the book here beside me. The book is in the car so I would actually do the work I needed to do today rather than finish the book! And, as most of you know, I stink at memorization. You'll simply have to wait for the quotes.

Now to the reason I wanted to post this--these are the things I'm thinking about doing next year. They are not as extreme as what Dobson did (like not cutting his beard and eating kosher), but they are extreme for me.

Read/Listen to Gospels once a week
Read/Listen to NT once a month
Continue my study of the Pentateuch and look into the Talmud
Make prayer more than what it is right now in my life
Better eating habits
Get back to weekly fasting
No soda
Commit to and have a weekly/daily exercise routine
Observe Sabbath
Live out the Sermon on the Mount (this includes memorizing it)

I'm not telling you these things to gloat and say, "look at what I'm going to do!" Rather, I'm asking those of you that read this to pray about these things, about my crazy decision to do them Pray that I choose to do the right things, not for me, but so that I can reshape my life to be like Jesus. Right now the list looks daunting. It makes me ashamed that I'm not doing some of these things in my life now. It is what my middle of the road soul longs for.

Thank you for praying for me and for this.

Chiding

2009-12-09T09:09:00.002-05:00

The other day Frank, my senior minister, commented that he has not been blogging much lately. His specific comment was something to the effect of, "I'm blogging like Wally." While not being offended by his comment, it motivated me to blog more. . . or at least to try and blog more. We'll see how it goes.

I started a post a few weeks ago concerning Tiger Woods while messing with ommwriter for mac (which is a cool program for removing distractions while writing). I was rather frustrated with how much the media was hounding him about his little encounter with the fire hydrant and the tree. I didn't have time to finish my thoughts on that blog when I started it, so it ended up sitting on my desktop for a few days before I tossed it. At that point, i was more messing with the software than really collecting and writing my thoughts.

A couple days later the news broke about his personal downfalls. While I was not shocked with the news, I was surprised by the media's response. A famous man wrecks his car a few days earlier and tries to be quiet about what and why happened and everyone hounds him to speak up and share the story. I remember the headlines, "Tiger cancels his appointment with the state troopers again!" The media was relentless. Then, it comes out that he has been unfaithful to his wife and it seems to be second or third page news. One would think that his unfaithfulness would be more important or dramatic than than driving his fancy SUV into a tree. (Granted, his wife did extricate him from said SUV with a golf club. That to me is funny and ironic.) But it wasn't. By the time the truth came out, it seemed to me that the media and everyone who thrives on news had moved on to the new big thing.

What is it about our society that we chase after all the dirt and all the secrets. Why is it that we pry and poke and dig until we get the "truth" and in my opinion exacerbate the situation? I am certainly guilty of this. Every morning after I get ready for the day, I find myself perusing three or four websites to see what happened in the world the day before. And, unfortunately, I continue to check back to see if anything else has happened since the last time I looked. That, in turn, gets carried into other conversations with a simple, "hey, did you see this story or that story?"

We are a reality TV society. We thrive on peeping into the lives of those around us, those down the street, and those on the other side of the world. We want to see and feel their excitement, shock, and pain. We are so infatuated with the lives of others.

The question my mind then asks is why? Why are we so infatuated? Why are we so intrigued by Tiger Woods or our latest classmate from high school we found on facebook? Is it so we can compare ourselves to them and say things like, "I've turned out better than them!" Are we looking everywhere we can for people who are more messed up to feel good about ourselves? Or, is the bigger issue the fact that we don't want to think about ourselves so we bury ourselves in looking at others to forget? Either way, I think the big issue is that we are not happy with ourselves.

Jesus has something to say about that in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7). Why do you look at the sawdust in the lives of others when you walk around with planks in your own eyes? If I'm going to look at the world and "judge" or whatever it is I will do with the world, I first need to check myself and make sure I am ok. I think the second greatest commandment hits on this too, "Love your neighbor as yourself." While it calls us to loe our neighbor, it also calls to love ourselves. That is a challenging thing to do.

Its hard to love ourselves. We know everything about ourselves. We don't need the media to dig into our closets to reveal our skeletons to ourselves. We live there in the closet, continually replaying the past and wondering why we were so messed up. We can't let go and move on, even though we should.

In my journeying through Leviticus the last few months, I have been gripped by the way that the Israelites were challenged to deal with sin. Well. It goes a bit farther than that. They were expected to not intentionally sin. If you intentionally sinned, you were either booted from the community or stoned. If you unintentionally sinned, when you realized it, you were to take an offering to the tabernacle to make yourself right in order to keep you and the community in the right with God.

What if we were to take the lead from this and actually deal with our skeletons? What if we were able to deal with our past so we could live in the now, looking ahead rather than struggling with what is behind us? How do we do that? How do we somehow instill in ourselves the want to do that? How do we overcome the fear of saying, "this is me"?

Maybe we simply need the media to focus on us and hound us, dig at our pasts until they find the truth. Then we would have to deal with it, just as Mr. Woods is right now. I doubt my life is that interesting. . .

Lord, help us to be a people who chase after your righteousness and holiness. Help us to be a people who learn to love ourselves because you show us love and grace. May we be a people who learn to revel in that love and grace and show it to others, so they can know how great you are. Move us to deal with the the planks in our own eyes so we can help others with their own sight.

Waking the Giants

2009-10-29T10:12:00.005-04:00

In the last few weeks or so I have been chewing on the idea of potential. It all started with a blog post from a seminary friend about some teaching he has been doing about money. The idea that struck me most in his thoughts was,

In week two of our series, I shared some stats. Discovery receives, on average, about $6450 per week. If each household earned $60,000 (which is much lower than our city's average household income) and each household tithed, which the New Testament would consider to be the very beginning point of generosity, Discovery would receive over $13,800 per week. More than double. Imagine what God could do with that? I asked our church to ask God that very question. "God, what could you do with an extra $7350?" I'd love to find out.

Those thoughts really dug into my mind. What potential is there really for any church if its people (me included) would do what we are capable of doing, rather than doing what we choose to do.

I shared the ideas with our staff here at South. We spent some time talking about it, drawing in some other quotes from some other reading. Our conversation spawned a sermon series idea called Waking The Giants that we decided to work on at a latter date. On the heals of that I spent time in South Bend with some students that I got to know at Michiana Camp. It was good to reconnect with them and to see what God is doing in their lives. As I sat and talked with them, it was evident that they were doing everything they could to achieve their potential and putting their whole selves into the reign of God.

At that point in my mental pondering, I was really self reflective. Am I achieving my potential? Am I moving forward with my life in a way that really puts my whole self in the reign of God? Is where I am in my life where I should be? Could I have covered more ground and done more? Unfortunately, I think I felt more regret than I did accomplishment. And, being the good human I am, I began thinking about who has held me back from achieving what it is I could have/should have achieved, rather than looking on the inside. And, for that moment, there was some slight change out of all of the thinking (see here), not that it lasted long.

Alongside all of these thoughts is a study that I am doing with some adults from South on the book of Leviticus. In Leviticus, there is a definitive focus on making sure the community stays pure and right with God, so that their sin doesn't contaminate God's space and remove him from their presence. There is an expectation that they are going to live to their potential, and when they don't they immediately make it right. The two ideas married themselves together in my mind and continued to haunt my thoughts. (Well, maybe haunt is too strong of a word, but it is very Octoberish!)

Over the last few days, there have been more conversations about this potential thing. Many of those conversations happened during a planning meeting for camp next year. I pitched the idea of actualizing potential that I have been pondering. We discussed, chewed, argued and came out with a week long theme for camp about it called What if? We'll be looking at ideas like:

What if the church worshipped with their whole life?
What if the church was a place of healing for sin, rather than a place of judgement?
What if we lived out our lives under the reign of God rather than just dabbling in it?
What if we learn to share God's love outwardly, rather than just reveling in it ourselves?

Finally, in my reading this morning (and the whole catalyst for this post) in Teresa of Avila's The Interior Castle, I came across this quote, which is yet another wrinkle/layer to this whole concept of potential. She writes in the First Dwelling,

Not long ago a very wise man told me that souls who do not practice prayer are like people whose limbs are paralyzed. Even though they have hands and feet, they cannot command them. And so there are souls so caught up in worldly matters that there is no hope for their recovery; they seem to be incapable of entering within themselves.

The entering here is to enter into the Castle of the Soul, where relationship with God happens - where the soul communes with the Father. She goes on to say,

These souls are so used to dealing with the nasty creatures that inhabit the outer walls of the castle that they have become almost like them. Even though they are naturally endowed with the power to commune with the Beloved himself, there is no remedy for them. Unless these souls strive to heal their profound misery, they will be turned into pillars of salt, just like Lot's wife was changed when she looked back.

Have I paralyzed myself by focusing too much on the world and not enough on God and his reign? Have I allowed sin too much of a foothold in my life so that it chokes away the potential that I have been endowed with? Even greater, how do I change to actualize this potential that I have? How do I grow some discipline so that my life isn't about brief moments trodding on a treadmill only to give up the next day? More stones to overturn in my chewing. . .

The staff here at South is going to hammer out the specific details on the Waking the Giants series that we will roll out in January. I'm beginning to think that its kind of a big deal since God hasn't let me move on from these thoughts . . . a big deal for me and a big deal for us here at South. Maybe it is be a big deal for you too. Are you actualizing your potential?

Soccer vs. Hockey

2009-10-15T00:04:00.004-04:00

I've always been a fan of soccer ever since my school days at Great Lakes Christian College. It was always fun to watch and yell for our team. While at GLCC, I also began to watch hockey. I don't think there is anyway you can live in MI and not become a Detroit Red Wings fan. I like it for the pace and speed of the game--and for the intensity and quick shifts/swings in momentum. It causes much anxiety for me during the playoffs--because every moment of every game really means something. There isn't down time where batter stand, adjust, spit, read signs, adjust some more and so on.

Tonight I found a little soccer on the TV. Normally, the only time I find soccer on is on Sundays on Univision. I can't understand what the announcer is saying other than, "GOOOOAAAAAAAAAAALLLL". And, even then, it normally only takes me a few minutes of watching before I'm headlong into my Sunday afternoon nap. So, my interaction with soccer is not as extensive as hockey. Now, that's not to say I don't know what the positions are, what is good form, bad form and so on. But, I'm really not writing to talk about my knowledge or lack there of of hockey.

What I am writing about is embellishment. Tonight when I was taking in some of the Costa Rica vs. USA World Cup Qualifier, I was appalled by the continual diving that the soccer players were doing. At one point, three people went up for the ball by the goal. The goalie went for the ball too. There was a bit of a collision, but nothing magnanimous by any means. Yet, the goalie fell to the ground thrashing in pain holding his unmentionables and his head. He laid there for at least 3 or 4 minutes while the trainers attended to him, all the while, the announcers continually commenting on the replay they were showing over and over (because of the lack of good action on the pitch) saying, "there's not anything there. Its time for him to get up and play."

All I could think of was, that will never happen in hockey. In hockey, you are going to get hit. You are going to get hit hard sometimes. Its a fact of life. You get hit. You marvel at who whooped you at that moment, then you get up and hit them back. Or, you marvel at him once you regain conscientiousness at the hospital, then you marvel at it and hope that your teammates took care of returning the favor. Its rather simple violence at its best. And, if by chance, if a player does embellish a little, he normally gets a penalty called against him. Its all fair. There's an expectation and an understanding of the ethic behind it.

Please. There's a point. No hate mail from all the soccer fans out there.

As I thought about this, I thought about how we all act in our lives. For some, when some are pressed for whatever reason, they respond with a fair amount of pity driven, look at how I've been slighted actions, much like the untouched soccer player who falls to draw attention to what happened in hopes of getting the other person to get a yellow card. This comes easy for us. "I've been wronged! You owe me something in return." Now, I do understand that sometimes there is good reason to be on the floor grasping at the injury. I'm not minimizing that. I'm simply making the observation that all too often when something happens, we focus on ourselves and how we've been wronged.

I grew up in an era where you only fell down when you really got whacked. There was no faking--because when you faked, you got it worse. Otherwise, you brushed it off and moved on. (Maybe this is why I resonate with hockey?) Be honest and true with what actually happened. Deal with it, and be who you are called to be in the situation. For hockey players, that means you or one of your teammates promptly tried to pummel the other guy with more violence. For us in that era, it meant you heard things like, "rub some dirt in it" or "walk it off".

For Christians, the response is love. I know. It makes no sense. As humans in 21st century America, we don't want it to make sense. But, as Christians who are basking in the grace and love of God, it should make perfect sense. We cling with everything we are to that love and grace that God gives through his son Jesus. What sense would it make if that love and grace couldn't deal with and overcome our continual pummeling of it with our sin, selfishness, and stupidity? It wouldn't. Luckily, that's not the way God and his love and grace are. And, I think we get this as Christians.

The thing I don't think we get is being that love and grace. We know how to bask in it, but we really, really struggle to give it--to BE it. Its hard to forgive the person who just wronged you. Its hard not to whine and say, but you owe me now--I have rights! Yet, Jesus says, "if someone forces you to go one mile, go with them two." Or, more pointed, he says, "Love your enemies." Our response to that is, "What? Why? How--NO!" If we are going to be people who bask in the love of God, then we also are called to be bearers of that same love and grace to all, no matter who they are to us--friend or foe. If we were to put this in hockey terms, you would get hit and knocked down. Once you got up, you would go hug the guy say, "I love you, I forgive you.--God loves you!"

God's love and grace makes life not about me. It makes life about him and how I am showing that love and grace to others, no matter how messed up and crazy it is no matter what their response is to me--the same way that God is loving me.

Imagine what the world would be if we as a people were able to BE that. How much more would the rest of the world search out us for hope and healing? I would guess it would be a much different world.

Lord, help us learn how to BE!

The Treadmill

2009-10-06T09:55:00.003-04:00

I've been feeling the need to make some life changes lately. Well. Let me start over. I've been feeling the need to make some life changes for a long time now. I've simply never had the motivation to do anything about it. I used to play basketball at our church on Tuesdays and Thursdays. That was good for me. . . however, those days are long gone. They still play, I'm simply too busy. In the last month or so my excuse has been, "I have to go pick up my daughter from kindergarten."

Well. This week I'm staying at a hotel that has a workout room. I had planned to pack clothes to do something while I was here--to use the new environment and the new month as a catalyst for the new me. Unfortunately, I forgot to pack the workout clothes. When I told my wife that on the phone, she ridiculed me a little--which put me into macho mode. I promptly went out yesterday and bought some workout clothes at the local Super Walmart.

After a light breakfast of some orange juice and yogurt this morning, I made my way to the workout room. Picture this--me, a 6 foot, 3 inch, barely under 300 pound ugly walking down the hall to the workout room. Luckily, there was no one in the hall or in the room. They had 4 machines--stairs, an elliptical,a treadmill, and a stationary bike. Unfortunately, none of them had a book holder (like I was going to read while I actually exercised. I was hoping it would distract me from the pain and agony). I once used the stair machine back in the 90s. I remember it not being a pleasant experience at all. So, it was a no. In hopes of reading, the elliptical was also out, since I thought there would be too much for me to think about--big ugly on a contraption that has nothing but moving parts would have meant physical and mental overload. And, the bike just looked uncomfortable (not that anything in the room looked comfortable). So, i chose the treadmill.

The treadmill itself looked harmless. As I stared at it and contemplated, here is the conversation in my head: "I walk. Walking on a treadmill is just like walking. I have complete control of the speed and so on at my fingertips. I might even be able to hold my book and read while I walk. I can do this!" And, with all that mental encouragement to myself, I climbed aboard and pressed the go button.

I started slow at about 2 miles an hour. I know. Rocket speeds for a man of my size. It wasn't too bad. It took a little while to get used to walking on the moving belt, though. If I were a sailor, I would say that I had to get my sea legs on it. After a few minutes, I had two realizations. One, I'm not going to be able to read. I'm just now getting to the point that I can let go of the sissy bar and walk without holding on, which doesn't mean there wasn't a fair share of staggering here and there. It wasn't pretty. (The funniest thing was trying to let go of the sissy bar to take off my sweatshirt without falling off. It took awhile to get the sweatshirt off.) However, realization two was that I could do this, especially since there wasn't anyone else in the room with me. Otherwise, they would have wet their pants laughing and I would have went back to my room.

After a few minutes, I ramped up to about 3 miles an hour. For someone who hasn't been physically active, 3 miles an hour is comfortable, but not outlandish. We continued on for awhile at that pace. Then, being a guy, I had to play with the other buttons. Soon I was walking 3 miles an hour up a 4% grade. Then I went to 5%. At this point I had gone close to a mile. I wasn't feeling too bad. I was a bit frustrated that I wasn't covering distance fast enough. So, pushing more buttons, I went to a 1% grade at 4 miles an hour. That took me to about 1.25 miles. My treadmill legs felt normal. I wasn't staggering too much anymore.

Now, one thing I haven't mentioned. One the opposing wall--the wall I am facing--the hotel kindly put a wall size mirror. I assume this is in place to help encourage the normally ripped bodies that frequent such rooms to push on in their buffing out. For me, the 300 pound goon, not so much encouragement.

By the time I reached 1.25 miles I was frustrated that I was not covering ground fast enough. Plus, at this point I had built up a sweat, but wasn't really killing myself. I ramped up. the 7% incline came first. I had to slow my walk from 4 to 3 miles an hour. Part of that was because I had knocked my phone off the treadmill from the vibrations of my goonly walk up the 7% incline. I didn't want to break the thing!

At this going I was feeling really good--really proud of myself. Being the macho guy, I wanted to finish out well. I wanted to push it up a notch, especially since I still wasn't working really hard where it feels like the vein in my neck and my chest are going to explode from my heart working so hard. And, at this point, I had not felt like I was going to pass out or fallen off the darn thing. I was feeling confident. So, I ramped up to a 10% incline at 3 miles an hour. I did almost a quarter of a mile at this setting. At one point, I tried to look through the sweat that was pouring into my eyes at myself in the mirror. All I could see was this big lurch clodding up the 10% incline--half jogging, half clomping like a scary monster shuffling after his prey. All I could do was pray that no one would walk in the door.

In total I made it two miles in a half an hour. I'm rather proud of myself. I survived. I even pushed myself some. I achieved my goal for at least one day. Unfortunately, I have to do it again tomorrow.

That's the thing with changes. Its not a one time deal and all is well. Its a daily, disciplined thing. Whether its exercise, studying the Bible, or learning to play a sport, you have to constantly be working at it to get improvement and change.

Crashing in South Bend

2009-10-05T10:54:00.004-04:00

I'm in South Bend this week, leading worship each night for the youth group at North Liberty Church of Christ. They are doing a youth rally this week called, Seriously?? I'm using the time away from Lansing as a mini retreat--something I really think I needed. So, rather than crashing with Jody, the youth minister at North Liberty, and his dog, Napoleon, I snagged a room at a local hotel--which is why I'm posting.

When I was planning this trip, I started looking at options of where I could stay and get get lots of work done. I almost stayed at Michiana Christian Service Camp, but didn't want to spend a lot of time driving and so on, especially since I plan to connect with some ministry partners and camp students who live here in South Bend. I would have been driving from the camp to SB, then out to North Liberty. It would have not been fun and would have eaten away time just traveling. A solution was needed.

So, I emailed my friend Sarah and asked if the church she volunteers at had any hotel connections. Being the big church in town, I was trying to work the system. Unfortunately, they had no system to work, just some suggestions on hotels in the area. However, she forwarded me to the blog of Jason Powell, one of the staffers at Granger. Jason I guess has a knack for landing cheep hotel rates through Priceline. He has a post on his blog about how to use the bidding system and insanely cheep hotel prices for good hotels. He even has a video of him doing it. I watched, I learned, and I went bidding. The result, a sweet suite at a 2 1/2 star hotel in Mishawaka (technically not part of South Bend if you live here) for $35 a night. Seriously, $35 a night. It is hotel bliss for my retreat--except for the skunk coffee they have here. (I must venture out to Lula's for a good cup of coffee and some time at the big table--I'll try and post a picture later)

Here's the downside to the bidding thing. I've done it once and had good success. Now all I can think about is places I want to take my family just so I can bid on Priceline and get insane deals. Oh, how the world and our consumer culture invades us.

Humorous

2009-10-05T10:48:00.007-04:00

I received this from one of the people from South today. I thought it was quite funny.

Kindergarten

2009-09-08T00:36:00.003-04:00

Well. Hannah Grace heads off to kindergarten at Wilcox Elementary in Holt tomorrow. If you would have asked me a couple of weeks or months ago how I was doing with it. I would have lied to you and told you I was doing ok. Just a few weeks and months ago I was having some serious fears about giving my precious little girl to strangers for school. Granted, these fears also come about when she closes the car door by herself, too. I know. I'm a mess.

I think I will do fine tomorrow. Somehow my mind has worked through all the fears I had. Maybe its simply that the day is coming and will have to pass. Maybe its the fact that I am slowly coming to grips that my little girl is going to grow up whether I want her to or not. I can't stop it. I can't stop her teeth from falling out (she lost her two front teeth in the last month). I can't keep her from physically growing. Maybe I'm just fooling myself. We'll see how tomorrow goes. I have a feeling that Hannah will do much better than Steph and I.

5 Years

2009-09-07T11:20:00.003-04:00

It's hard to believe that I've been blogging for 5 years. How times have changed. . . mostly the venue of coffee shop that I blog from, not that I blog that much anymore. Back in the day it was Il Baccio, the best coffee shop on the south side of Lansing. Unfortunately Dennis, the guy who owned it, decided to move to the beaches of Mexico for most of the year. I was lucky enough to run into him the other day at Taco Bell of all places. He and his wife are doing well, even though she has been battling breast cancer. We talked about coffee a little and about life. it was good to see him.

I miss some of the other people I used to talk to there regularly. When Il Baccio closed, we would sometimes run into each other at Cornerstone Coffee--the next best alternative to non-chain coffee at the time. But, that was very infrequent.

I really miss Il Baccio. It was a great mom and pop coffee shop. They were free to buy beans from wherever and make their own decisions. Dennis was a connoisseur of coffee--always having great selections to fill your bottomless cup with. It had a great atmosphere with plenty of space. It was a place close enough to the office that I could meet people there for coffee and a chat. Not that I can't do that at the chain coffee around now. Its just not the same.

So, this place here holds 5 years of periodic blogs about my life and what is going on around me. I really try to blog once a month to push myself to reflect and write. I haven't been very good at that lately--not that there hasn't been a plethora of things to write about. I guess you could say I've gotten out of this habit. I hope to change that soon. . .

To those of you who still read, thanks for reading and being patient with this place.

Mary B

2009-07-25T22:40:00.002-04:00

While I was growing up, I went to Moreland Christian Church. It was your average church of the 70s and 80s. It was started in the 50s by the big church in the area (First Christian Church), like many around the Canton, Ohio area. It is the place that I called my church home from the time I was born till I left for GLCC in 1993. It is the place that I met my beautiful wife. Actually, I don't know if you would call that meeting--being babies in the nursery together. There's not much meeting at that stage of the game. But, that's not what this post is about, so I'm going to move on.

Moreland had a tradition of great music when I was growing up. It wasn't the rock band back in the day. Our worship consisted of hymns accompanied by an organ and piano. Now, one would think this is normal and typical. Honestly, it probably was typical. However, the ladies on the benches behind the piano and organ were not typical.

Mary and Jerry, when I got involved in the worship were in their 60s. They were wonderful, sweet ladies who loved our church and loved playing music for God. By that time, I would guess they had been playing music for our church for 30 or more years. I wouldn't be surprised if they played the music for my parents or Steph's parents weddings there at Moreland. They certainly played the music for our wedding. They would meet at the church every Saturday morning to practice the hymns they were leading, along with a prelude and an offertory piece. After each song, they would lean out around their music and converse about what they just played. It was a lot like the conversations between Chip and Dale, two chipmunks from Walt Disney. "That was lovely!" one would say. The other would chime in, "Indeed!" It was rather comical.

In the late 80s, Mary and Jerry finally gave in to recording some of their music. I had the opportunity to help another gentleman in the church record them. It took a couple of evenings with his good mics and his reel to reel tape recorder. We were rather high tech then! It was quintessential Mary and Jerry. We had a blast listening to them play and make their instruments sing. And, not surprisingly, it normally only took a single take to record a song. They were that good.

Actually, that brings me to the story that I wanted to tell about Mary. I would guess that Mary had been playing the piano since she was a little girl. She was certainly a master at what she did, with correct hand positioning and form. And, she could pretty much site read anything. At her worst, it would take her a couple of times before she had it mastered. One night during a choir rehearsal, I remember her finding a mistake in the music. Someone in the notation department had missed a natural mark or something minute. It didn't get past Mary. The funny thing about that is that she had to write it in to play it correctly. Her eyes and hands were so connected when she played that she couldn't play the right note until she wrote in what was missing.

Her other memorable gift in my opinion as a musician was being able to talk one rhythm and clap another. I remember we were working on Christmas music one fall. We always got a huge jump on the Christmas music because December's Night of Music was something spectacular at our church. This particular year we were working on the music from An Evening in December. It was a Capella music with rather difficult arrangements. One of the pieces had two different rhythms going on and of course, we were struggling with it. Mary showed us what we were doing wrong by clapping out the one part while she spoke the other part. Needless to say, we were in awe.

Mary spent more time behind the piano at the church than she did sitting in the pews. She had a passion for the church. She had a passion for the piano. She had a passion for her husband Harold and her family. She loved her personal trampoline (the ones that were only 3 feet across). She overcame cancer after I had moved away to college and continued so serve at Moreland.

Mary passed away yesterday at the ripe old age of 89. Jerry passed away a few years ago. The music at Moreland is still quality. It is simply missing the special chemistry that these two ladies had as they made music together. But, they both ran the race well and are now celebrating in new ways, maybe on the benches of better pianos and organs!

Becoming Clarence (already there?)

2009-06-25T00:53:00.000-04:00

This post was originally meant to hit the blogwaves around Father's Day in honor of my father. However, I stink at things and am just now getting to this post. So be it.

The other day I was doing something that I felt was important. I don't remember what it was, but I'm sure it was something of the utmost importance at that moment. While I was solving the world's problems, it was time for Hannah to go to bed. She was supposed to be going through her bedtime routine or putting away something before bed. As any 5 year old would do, she was stalling. if you don't pay attention to her, she'll take a half an hour to go to the bathroom and brush her teeth, spending countless minutes playing with the water in the sink.

So, doing what any father would do, I communicated my frustration to her from where I was doing what I was doing. That in itself is ok, I think. In all reality, the scenario probably goes like this: Steph expressed her frustration to me that Hannah was taking too long (ie. frustrated with me that I was letting Hannah take to long by solving the world's problems at my computer when I probably should have been up in the bathroom hurrying her along), which, in turn, I expressed my frustrations to Hannah, which generated the normal five year old response of, "I'm almost done!"

All of that said, the issue is not who was communicating or why they were communicating. The issue at hand is how I said what I said, which I don't really remember. All I know is that when I said it, there was a sudden horror that ran through my being because I sounded just like my father. You know the feeling. . . when you say something that you swore you would never say because it was something that we repeatedly said to you by one of your parents. It's a bad moment.

My wife is happy to point these moments out to me. I'll sneeze a certain way or let out a small little, "woo" for whatever reason and my lovely wife will say, "ok, Clarence." My mom is good at pointing these things out also. I'll be explaining to her something that I'm doing or a new piece of musical equipment that I'm looking to aquire, and she'll say, "you are just like your father!"

Those things sting a little, because when we are younger we really want to become our own person void of any outside influence. We want to be who we want to be.

As I reflected on the yelling moment, which in all honesty has happened more than I would like to admit, becoming like my Dad is not a bad thing at all. You see, my dad is a man who loves his family. He's not outwardly open with that love because he grew up in a time when men were tough as nails and didn't really show any emotion. But, I know that he loves us. You could tell it each day when he would get up at 5:00am to head into the factory to work on a metal brake for 10 hours a day so we had food on the table and a roof over our head. You could tell it when you asked him about a specific chord on the guitar--in about two seconds, he would show you 5 or 6 different options and then hand the guitar back, forcing you to work at it more. You could tell it when he would come home from work and hop into the Monopoly games, helping the one who was losing (normally me), and take a dire situation and win. You could tell when we were sitting around the dinner table eating whatever mom made--he would tell us it was goat or rabbit or something just to mess with us. You could tell it when he anguished over not having a job and not being able to provide for his family when the company he worked for for 26 years moved his job to another part of the country.

My father is a prideful man. He takes pride in his garden, planting seeds months before the garden is ready so the plants are big and strong when they hit the ground. He takes pride in making sure what he is doing is done meticulously and correctly--even if it means painting a board with the smallest brush possible to make sure its right. He takes pride in music--always on a quest for something better sounding. He took pride in carrying for our family with everything he was.

May I grow up to be like him. . . maybe without the yelling tone.

Jelly Toast

2009-06-10T10:13:00.002-04:00

This morning I got up at 6:30am. This is nothing out of the norm. I was planning to head into the office early today to get my work done so I could get out early--today is our wedding anniversary! So, I get up, shut off my alarm, and begin to sleepily stagger to the bathroom to start my day. As I walk out of our room, I notice Hannah's door is open. This is not normal for her. So, I poke my head in cautiously to make sure she's ok. As I look I notice she's not there. This is very odd for the child. She's a good sleeper and she stays in her bed or room until we are up for the day. I figure she's in the bathroom. She's not there.

At this point, mild fatherly panic begins slowly sink in. I don't figure she's been kidnapped out of my own house while I'm sleeping across the hallway, but since the child is not in one of the two places she should be, panic is a common response.

Naturally, when you can't find someone in the house that you want to find, you start yelling for them. I called out for Hannah as I went down the steps, sleepily mind you, though the sleepies at this point had been panicked away. She responded, "I'm in the kitchen poppa, I'm making you and momma jelly toast!"

Now, the fact that she was making us jelly toast is cute and sweet. However, a 5 year old child waking up before 6:30am on her own without an alarm clock to make her parents jelly toast for their anniversary is rather concerning to me on many levels. One, how did she wake up so early on her own? Two, a five year old working a toaster that is right beside the stove on a step stool so she can reach everything holding a butter knife is an accident waiting to happen. What if she would have jammed the knife into the toaster? Three, what if the bread would have been moldy? She doesn't know to check for mold. Four and most concerning, Steph and I both slept through the child getting up, probably going to the bathroom, going downstairs, and making jelly toast? We have a baby monitor in her room which picks up the neighbors talking in their garage. We should have woken up.

So, at 6:30am, Steph and I sat in our bed and ate the best jelly toast ever made by an overly confident 5 year old for our 14th anniversary. If she's doing this at 5, who knows what she'll do at 10 or 20.

Conversations

2009-06-04T02:37:00.002-04:00

It is way too late to be writing a blog entry. It's really too late for anything . . . but I must write.

At about 11:00pm tonight, I got online to chat with one of our students at South about some family issues they are going through. We'd been trying to connect for awhile. Nothing in our schedules worked out except for chatting online. So, onto facebook we went.

Now, I'm not a huge fan of chatting online. I enjoy chatting with people. I've had some amazing conversations with people online on some old software like ICQ. I've been able to keep up with my friend, Marianne (who lives in the Philippines) through online conversations. It's all good. My problem is, once I'm online, I have a hard time logging out. Now, sometimes I get bombarded with chat requests. Everyone has that issue. Other times, I'm at fault because I like to catch up with my old students.

Tonight was no exception. In the matter of 3 or 4 hours I chatted with 7 past and present students from my youth ministry or camp. The challenging thing about tonight was that they were not all simple how's life, did you see the latest movie questions. They were weighty conversations, about life, relationships, forgiveness and so on. Good, healthy conversations about the present moment we are each living in. Good conversations about where God is prompting my friends, even in the darkness that surrounds them.

Tonight made me realize something. . . I'm not having enough conversations. I'm not having enough of the right conversations with those around me. I would guess I'm not even having the right conversations with myself. I'm too busy doing stuff, that while important, is still stuff.

Lord, help me to have more conversations. Help those conversations be centered around us learning to live under your reign in tangible ways. May you give peace to my friends as they struggle through life right now. Be their peace and hope.

Progress

2009-05-25T22:54:00.002-04:00

Well. Since my last post, much has happened. The downstairs bathroom has been completed. I still need to hang a curtain and get the towel bars, tp holder and so on, but everything else is done. It turned out rather nice in my opinion. I think my girls like it too. . . Hannah was playing in there tonight. She was making food for momma on the dryer. Now, the only major things left inside to do is paint/trim and carpet in the family room and seal the walls and rafters in the basement. It's really good to finish projects inside.

In the last month we've also redone the roof, removed the rest of the shrub stumps, and, most recently, moved the brush pile that was left over from cutting down an Ash tree last October. The brush pile was a chore. It was bigger than Mobius (my truck). It took 3 trips to get rid of it all. I also got rid of some leftover wood from the deck and flower beds that I ripped up. The yard is now clean, nicely mowed, and awaiting landscaping--which will happen after we reside the house. Hannah and I even planted some grass tonight. We'll see how it grows in. It has been a busy month.

Now its time to think about the summer--camp, my niece's wedding at the end of June, and figuring out what I'm going to do for my wife on our 14th wedding anniversary.

Its time to rest now.

Updates and Requests

2009-04-23T01:10:00.002-04:00

Well, I'm trying to become more regular with my blog. I'm actually blogging within a week of my last post. Things are on a roll. Maybe because its because I'm on "vacation". I haven't been in the office regularly this week. I had to pop in on Tuesday to do some work for the weekend, and I've been in a few evenings doing testing for Dave Ramsey's Town Hall. But, for the rest of the time, I've been on "vacation". By vacation, I mean, not working at the office, but working at home.

It's been over a year now that we've owned our house. We're about 2/3 of the way through the renovations. We did good till we moved in back in June. Then we got busy with summer and pretty much quit working on the house. My goal is to have it mostly all done by our 14th wedding anniversary in June. We'll see how it goes. I still have a lot of stuff to do. Recently, the downstairs bathroom has been the focus. I put up the last sheet of drywall tonight. I hope to paint it sometime next week and put in the flooring. Then all that will be left will be trim, installing the vanity, reinstalling the crapper, and putting in a drop ceiling. All in all, it should go quickly, depending on how the big project for this week goes.

On Monday I was hoping to start my roof. Its in really bad shape. However, when I plan to work outside, God decides that we need rain. Tomorrow is Thursday. We're starting tomorrow. Thanks a lot God. My prayer, and hopefully yours too, is that everything goes smoothly in the next couple of days so that by Sunday, we have a new, beautiful roof. Then all that will be left outside is new siding and landscaping. We'll definitely get the landscaping done this year. We'll see about the siding--because when the siding gets replaced, so do the windows.

Outside of church work and house work, my mind has really been chewing on who we are and what we are supposed to be as Christians. All of the thoughts stem from the class, Scripture and Christian Living, that I'm getting to teach at GLCC this semester. Its really made me think hard about what it is I do and why I do it.

I've been at South now for about 8 1/2 years. I think I've done ok ministry. I'm sure I could have done better ministry in that time, had certain cards played out. I've really had an effect on the lives of the students that were in my youth ministry at the start. Many of them have gone into ministry or are working towards that goal. That excites me and helps me to know I did something good. But, at the same time, I wonder what else I could have done? Since I can't change things, my mind quickly goes to what I should be doing now. How should I be doing ministry to really affect change in the lives of those I'm ministering to right now. How do I push us farther into being who God wants us to be? What does that even look like?

The challenging and sobering thing is, what I think that looks like (what we are supposed to be) is not something I have aimed for in the last few years. Rather, I've focused on what I need to get done for my job and that is that. I don't know that I've fully had a ministry mind. I mean, its there and that's why I do what I do. Yet, I'm not continually asking the question, where do we need to go and how do we get there? Normally, the questions of the day are what do I need to get done this week, and how do I get it done in the time I have?

My prayer is that all this reflecting and chewing, the study for class, and the subsequent discussions with some of my students (and the voices in my head), will challenge me to rethink who I am, what I am doing with my life, and what I should be doing for others under the reign of God. I'm curious to know what you might think those things might be--what they look like and how they get played out. Please feel free to comment below!

A Poor Excuse

2009-04-17T00:22:00.002-04:00

It seems like its been ages since I've even thought of this blog. It seems like its been months since I've posted here. It's not that my mind has not been active. I have many things that I need/want to write about. Maybe someday soon, I'll find time . . . maybe someday soon I'll MAKE time to unpack my head of the thoughts, memories, and reflections.

For all 4 of you that read this, thank you for your patience.

Prayers for Bianca

2009-03-12T08:21:00.002-04:00

When I first met Bianca, she was a high school kid who loved to play basketball. She was one of the 10 students who attended the first Deeper Life week of camp at Michiana Christian Service Camp. She was a good kid. Over the next few years, it was cool to watch her grow up and become a young lady and return to camp to serve as a faculty member. Then she got married and we lost touch.

A month or so ago, as I was continuing/feeding my addiction to facebook, I decided to look up some old students and see (i.e. spy through the Internet) how they were doing. Unfortunately, being as good as I am with remembering people's names, I couldn't remember Bianca's last name. This is not unusual for me. In fact, you should be impressed that I remembered her first name. (I know, I'm gifted) I tried scanning friends of others who have been connected to Deeper Life and so on, but had no luck and gave up, grumbling to myself that I need to do better with remembering important things like names.

Now, before I go any farther, my friend Dean continually talks about this thing called divine appointments. These are times when he thinks God has put specific people in his path so he can help and pray for them. In turn, he asks for prayer requests from anyone he comes in contact with--resturaunt servers, people he sits by on airplanes, and so on. He commits to pray for their request for one month. Not surprisingly, he has some great stories about what God has done through these connections.

Back to Bianca . . . even though I couldn't connect with Bianca, she was still in my mind and on my heart. In the process, I would periodically pray for her. It wasn't anything specific, since it had been years since I connected with her. Then, a few weeks ago, I get this email from her:

Wally,

Hey! I was trying to find some contact information you, and I guess I did. I'm pretty sure you're the Wally Lowman I know. I also saw a picture of your family. I remember Stephanie, too, but although late, congratulations on your child. It's been a long time. I don't think I even knew you had a child. She's beautiful. I hope all is well with you.

Do you remember me? I used to go to Michiana Christian Service Camp as a camper and faculty. I attended one the first Deeper Life Camp and helped work at least one with you and Eric Christian. Unmarried, I was Bianca Baker, but now and am Bianca Ash. It's been 9 1/2 years since I got married, and probably at least 7 years since I've seen or talked with you. You were a great inspiration in my life as a high school students, and I still remember my times at camp. Your worship services were the best. I'm trying to get back to my "roots" right now. I have thought about trying to get in contact with you for awhile now, but now I need your prayers. I am teaching special education at Culver Community Schools in Culver, IN, and this is my 6th year but 7th year teaching. I work with students that have mild and emotional disabilities. I have three children now. Kennedy is 7 1/2, Collin is almost 6, and Riley is 4, and I am still married to Jim.

Collin began having seizures in November of 2007. He was diagnosed with epilepsy in January 2008 and was called severely epileptic in August of 2008. We have seen three different neurologists and have tried seven different anti-epileptic medications. The medications have not worked. This past summer, we found a local neurologist who thought that Collin should undergo a surgical evaluation for his epilepsy. He sent us to see Dr. Mary Zupanc at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Collin began the surgical evaluation in October of 2008. We were told he was an excellent surgical candidate because of the location of the seizures, his age, and short amount of time he has had seizures. Collin went through numerous tests including, multiple MRI's, a PET scan, a neuropsychological evaluation, and an 8 day stay in the hospital to monitor his seizures. On February 11th, we met with the neurologist and neurosurgeon. We went in thinking that Collin would be having one maybe two of the lobes from the right side of his brain removed. We were told that he was definitely having three lobes removed (temporal, parietal, and occipital). They then went on to tell us that they believe he has Rasmussen's syndrome which is a rare neurological condition. Once they remove the initial three lobes, pathology will be done on the brain. If the pathology confirms the diagnosis of Rasmussen's syndrome, he will go back to surgery, and they will remove the remainder of the right side of the brain (frontal lobe and motor strip). This will leave Collin with a limp on the left side (should be able to walk and run), and he will lose fine finger movements in the left hand (he is left-handed). This was an extremely difficult day for Jim and I. Surgery is set for March 26th. He will be in the hospital for about a week, and we will probably be home before they get the pathology back on the brain. But, I would have to say that the doctors sounded 99% certain that he has Rasmussen's.

I am asking for your prayers for Collin, especially, but for my whole family. This has been a long struggle or Jim and I as a married couple, and we are trying our best to get through it.

Bianca

You can imagine the rush of emotion--excitement that this girl I was wanting to connect with was connecting with me at the start instantly changing to pain and sorrow for her and her family as I read about what they are enduring right now. Even now, a few weeks after the email, her story stuns and pains me.

I believe God was prompting me to connect with Bianca because she is in need. And, you and I can help with that need. I'm asking you to daily pray for Bianca and her family. Pray that God would remove the epilepsy from Collin and that there would not have to be any surgery. Pray that Bianca and Jim continue to have peace and hope, even in this painful, uncertain time. Pray that God will be the God he calls himself to be to them.

If you would like to email Bianca and encourage her, you can do so by clicking here. Thank you for joining with me.

2009-03-04T08:19:00.005-05:00

For the last few years, I've been a fan of the comic strip Boondocks. Maybe its the author's fearlessness to use his ethnicity to make something funny, while at the same time questioning why things are the way they are. For example, a few weeks ago, following the Oscars, the Huey and Riley in the strip were lamenting about how most African American movies are not considered for the Oscars and how they mostly are horrible movies (these are the words of the characters, mind you). To make up for it, they were taking movies like Kate and Leopold and turning them in to African American movies. So, the new title was something like Jamal and Shaniqua.

This morning's Boondocks is of the religious nature.

The cartoon illustrates some of the ideas my friend Steve talked about at the Michigan Statewide Teen Convention this past weekend. Our theme was Exposed--the idea that as God's light shines on us, he exposes all of the ugliness inside. The three topics we kicked around were Legalism, Hypocrisy, and Sin. (I know, lightweight topics for a youth convention). The take home of those three sessions were that we need to be a people of love, a people of integrity, and a people who deal with their sins by confessing them and doing everything we can to sin no more.

One way of boiling down last weekend is the question, "how are we living out our faith?" This is a question that I have been chewing on for years now. It started to infect (in a good way) me in seminary and has not stopped since. How are we, God's people, living out our faith in physical/tangible to show we are living under God's reign? How are we being His kingdom here on earth? Are we showing things like love, joy, peace, patience, and so on in our lives? Are we bringing those things about in the lives of other regardless of where they are with God? Are we living "salvation worthy" lives (see John the Baptist's words to the Pharisees and teachers of the law)? Are we living cross worthy lives?

I know I need to raise my living. How about you?

I want to rewrite the last slide of the cartoon above. I want Huey continue on with his commenting about the "religious". I want him to say something like, "Rather, I choose to actually think about my faith every day and allow it to shape my every breath, every footstep, every word."

As a response, then, the little brother Riley would respond with, "cool!"

At A Loss for Words

2009-02-23T08:24:00.003-05:00

Well. What should I write about? There is so much going on around me. I could write about the never ending snow in Michigan. Yet, I live in Michigan. That's a given. And, I like the snow. Even more I despise people complaining about the weather in Michigan. Hello, if you live in Michigan its going to be cold. Deal with it.

I could write about the upcoming weekend at Statewide. It is going to be awesome, especially since some of the guys and I from South get to lead the worship there. I had the chance to lead this event with some other friends back in 1997. We were in the Holi-dome in Livonia. They had a ska band play the concert that weekend, which made the room smell like 7th grade boys. It was disgusting. Plus, I remember the speaker talking about Eve being naked in the garden of Eden, which only agitated the 7th grade hormones. Maybe I'll write about this weekend's convention next time.

I could write about how cute and awesome my daughter is. She is one of the greatest joys in my life. I could tell you about Opera Chicken or about how her imaginary husband, Louie, is snoring different now, and keeping from sleeping good. But, there would be too much to write about because lately, as you can see, there at simply too many Hannah stories.

I could write about how much I love my wife. I could tell you that I find much joy in doing the simple things for her like washing the dishes, which is one task she despises. I could tell you about the wonderful things she bakes and cooks. I could tell you about how much I love to watch her and Hannah interact, play, and giggle. But, again, there is too much to write because I love her that much.

I could write about some of the rough spots our church is having. I could write about the financial strains we are having. But, I think every church is feeling the effects of the resession/financial crisis that is gripping our country and the world. I could write about how sin within the church is reeking havoc on so many things. But, unfortunately, every church is dealing with sin within the camp--chich breaks the hearts of many, including God. I would rather not dwell on the darkness of sin today, or any day for that matter.

I could write about how encouraged I am as I serve at South. Even with the struggles that loom, there is a deep sense of faithfulness and righteousness within our people. Our elders are leading through the struggles with integrity and wisdom. Their desire to do the right thing and to push our church deeper into living out our faith pushes me forward in my work. I could write about the people in the ministries I oversee and about how they continually exceed my expectations. It is nothing but pure joy to work with the people I do. They make me look better than I am. That is a good thing.

I could even write about the joys of the internet. It has allowed me to do much ministry. Just this morning I was able to connect with a student from camp who is studying abroad in China. At the same time, I chatted with Andy, who is serving his country in Kenya right now. We were able to talk about life and encourage one another through simple clicks of the keyboard and facebook.

Yet, in all of that, I'm still at a loss for words. I don't really know why that is. There is much fear/concern in my world right now--money issues at work, figuring out where my daughter will go to kindergarten this fall, re-roofing my house this spring, how the fallout of sin within the church will effect others, and so on and so on. There are so many thoughts about the church, about God, about life going on in my head. At the same time, there is so much joy--joy with my family, with my work, with the friendships I have. The tension between the two make the conversations I am having with myself and with others about life and God rewarding, painful, intense, and, even at times, uncertain. And, I am ok with it. There is a peace in all of it.

I Am Alive

2009-02-06T10:46:00.002-05:00

Where did this week go? First it was Monday. Mondays are always bad. Filled with good intentions of hitting the office hard and getting a jump start on the week, Mondays always get train wrecked somehow. Before I know it, it's time for 1:00pm staff meeting. Its always a good meeting, but afterwards I normally have a hard time getting motivated.

Then it was Tuesday. My schedule and my task list showed that Tuesday was to be highly productive--worship planning, some GTD, and Revel On Sunday band rehearsal. It was going to be a great day. And, in all actuality, it was a great day. It simply didn't play out as I wanted it. In the morning I was visited by my friend Greg. We had coffee, talked about life, planned our coffee roasting for donation to the SLCC Youth Auction, and made plans for the upcoming David Crowder concert. When Greg left, I was ready to dive into things. Soon afterwards, Mark walked in the door. Mark is a good friend who drops by periodically. Its always cool when he drops in. We banter back and forth about the problems with church, worship, and what have you. By the time he left it was lunch time. After lunch I had already planned to help another friend who had recorded some stories. That took a little longer than expected, but was well worth the time with Duane. There's always time for Duane--he's such a loving, soft spirited man. Nonetheless. Tuesday ended with nothing on the list being completed. Revel on Sunday rehearsal was awesome, as it always is!

Then came Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. I woke at 2:00am for some bathroom business of the runny #2 kind. I went back to bed not feeling all that well, but praying that all was over and done with. Unfortunately, that was not the case. I was up at 3:00am with more runny #2 and a whole bunch of puking. That cycle continued about every 1/2 hour to hour for the next 6 or 7 hours. If there is one thing I HATE, it is puking.

Now it is Friday. The last few days were spent mostly in bed, trying to recoup from the puking, dry heaving that followed. I also have a massive headache. I assume that is from the lack of caffeine in my system. I'm going to remedy that very soon with a coke.

So, I start my week again, here on Friday, with a HUGE amount of stuff that needs attention. And, I'm really not motivated to do anything yet. I just want to crawl back in bed and sleep some more.

I hate the pukes.

My Sweet Little One in Advertising

2009-01-31T22:19:00.013-05:00

This is a picture of my daughter that our friend, Jackie, took last year. Hannah got to be a model for a seminar that Jackie was doing a seminar for area photographers on how to shoot children. Hannah had a fun day! This was one of the always amazing shots that Jackie took.

If you are ever in need of great photographer, check out Jackie and the whole Canfield Jenkins crew!

Mr. P Cartoon

2009-01-28T06:59:00.006-05:00

I'm an avid fan/collector of Mr. Potatohead. This was in my yahoo cartoon section today. Funny, funny.

Ice On the Roof

2009-01-15T17:13:00.010-05:00

Its been rather cold in MI. Actually, it's been cold everywhere. We've had more snow than normal. Not as much as up north in the UP, but for Lansing, we've had a ton. It's funny to hear people complaining about how cold it is and how tired they are of the snow. Hello people, you live in MI. Get over it.

I rather like the snow and cold. Snow and cold means long sleeves, sweatshirts, and coffee all day. If we're cold at home, it means my grannie blanket comes out. There's nothing like two layers of double polyester and some quilt batting to keep in the body warmth while snuggling on the couch with my girls.

One of the hazards of it being cold where we are at is mammoth icicles and ice dams. Our maintenance guy at church knocked down some of the dangerous ones today. One might say, "how can an icicle be dangerous?" Here's a picture of Frank, my boss, with the largest one from today. You be the judge.

I think Chris got fired shortly before this picture was taken because he brought this behemoth inside and laid it on Frank's floor while we were on a Speedway soda run.

Only in Michigan

2008-12-20T22:27:00.010-05:00

Today, my girls and I went out for a little Christmas shopping. That's what happens when you take forever to make decisions about what it is you are going to buy for people. It was an adventure, let me tell you. It started out with trying to get out of my driveway. Since moving, we aren't blessed to live on a major road that gets plowed first. Now we live on a culdsac. That means, it must snow 100 feet before they will come and plow our road, and even then they'll wait till they have plowed everyone else's and save ours for last. It took us a few moments to bounce from one rut to the next and a lot of snow pushing by the front of my car before we got out our subdivision.

The crowds weren't too bad as we shopped until you got to the checkout counters. Then there were lines. Luckily, we were able to navigate to the shortest line and keep our shopping pain down. The funniest part to me was at Walmart. As we were standing in line I looked over to my left. There were at least 5 people in camo in line. Only in MI will you see more camo in the checkout lines at Walmart during Christmas than other shoppers. Only in MI. . .

Below is one of the cartoons I read today. It won't be funny to most of you I would guess. The kid in the picture had to be from MI.

A Widget Test

2008-12-18T00:49:00.002-05:00

I found a new widget for my mac today. It allows me to post to my blog from my dashboard without logging in. I'm testing it out right now.

Widgets are interesting things. They make my life easier, always being there in the top right hand corner of my desktop, keeping me posted on my calendar, the weather, and my gmail.

It would be nice if this worked. I doubt it will though, because it won't put the right font in the right size, and it will put and extra space between the last part of my post and the comments line.

I know, I have issues. I have a lot of issues. Everything has to be just the way it has to be. That's why I'm looking forward to rearranging my office over the holidays. . .

You see, my office has been the same setup for a year. Its time for a change. I thought about rearranging about a month ago and it has been haunting me ever since. Lucky for me I have a little disipline to actually do my work. Otherwise, I would have already moved things around.

Ok. I think it's time for bed. Enough rambling and testing.

Snow Goons and the Grinch

2008-12-01T20:35:00.007-05:00

Well. Tonight Hannah and I got to play in the first good snow of the season. It was a lot of fun. There's nothing better than hearing a 5 year old screaming and giggling in delight as she is pelted by snow balls. It never gets old to her. She would still be out there if I would have let her stay out. It was good snow too--the kind that crunches under you when you walk on it. It was perfect snow ball snow. Unfortunately, it wasn't good snowman snow. I could get it to roll up a little, but then when you went to pack it, it would shatter into chunks. So, rather than a nice big, perfect looking snowman in our footprint littered front lawn, we have a short, stubbing looking snow goon. He looks like one of the creatures that Calvin and Hobbes would make.

Now, after some hot chocolate and some Earl Gray Tea, I'm journaling and blogging while my girls snuggle in the living room and watch the Grinch. Tomorrow we may put up the tree. Well, Steph and Hannah will put up the tree. I may help with the lights if they frustrate my wife, but I stay out of the way of everything else. I'll snuggle into the couch with my granny blanket, marvel at my girls putting the tree up, and throw in White Christmas to fill in the gaps. It will be a great evening as it always is every year.

I hope and pray your Christmas preparations are bringing you much joy!

Fusion, Secular Songs, the Mall, and Rhoda

2008-11-17T08:43:00.005-05:00

I know. That's a great title, isn't it? That's what happens when you don't blog for a long period of time. You'll understand my randomness in a minute, I hope.

It seems that my life is always a busy, blurry mess. Part of that is my doing. I work the best when I have a million things going on around. me. I can remember times when I was at GLCC back in the 90s. I would have all kinds of school projects, rehearsals for madrigals, and so on going on around me. I would stay up late and get up early to try and take care of it all. . . and I think I did a good job. While its not fun sometimes, my personality seems to thrive in that environment. Part of the busy, blurry mess is not necessarily my fault, though. Ever since I came to South, my job description has spanned at least two or three ministries. It was worship and youth to start. Then it became worship and discipleship. Now, its worship, discipleship, and a little bit of admin/support. Granted, since my personality seems to like that overloaded sense of security, I'm sure I take on too much. It's a sick and twisted existence I live.

One of the things that has added to my busy-ness over the last few months has been Fusion. Fusion is a youth conference that GLCC puts on. It used to be Breakaway, for those of you older, "I remember that", readers. Revel on Sunday, the worship band that I'm in, was priviledged to lead worship for the conference this year. It was our first really big gig as Revel on Sunday. So, we put in a lot of work to be ready for it. It was a blast to lead for teens in that type of a venue. And, it makes us look forward to Statewide at the end of Feb, where we get to lead worship for 800 teens. That is going to be incredible!

Since Fusion, my mind has been on Christmas. I know, everyone is playing Christmas music now and people are putting up their decorations. My focus on Christmas is not about any of that, especially since we have a rule at my house to not play Christmas music till AFTER Thanksgiving. Rather, my focus on Christmas has been from a planning standpoint. Next week I will head off to a personal retreat with a few friends where we encourage one another in ministry, catch up on ministry projects that have gotten put on the back burner, and if there is time, dream about what we should be doing in our ministries. In ministry, to go away means you have to work extra hard to get ready to go--planning ahead, and working extra hard when you come back--to catch up from being gone. So, I've been trying to get way ahead in my worship planning so being gone is not so painful. Thus, my mind has been thinking through Christmas carols and what not. If all goes well, by the end of the week, worship will be planned through Christmas eve, and I'll be able to begin to focus on other things. We'll see how this week goes.

Speaking of this week, I'm wondering what types of comments I'll get, if any, about yesterday's worship service. Yesterday, Chad Cronin, our youth minister, spoke for the first time on the "out of the ordinary life". His text was John 10:10. As a lead into his message, he requested I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For by U2. It is the first time I've used a secular song in worship here at South. I'm not opposed to using the "secular" in worship. We've used multiple video clips to illustrate the messages. Really, that's all we did--and I think my team pulled it off rather well.

Now to the mall. I'm currently sitting in the Panera Bread/Cafe in the Lansing Mall. I had to go to GLCC this morning for a few things so, rather than going into the office then having to drive across town, I came to Panera for a few hours before I hit GLCC. Panera has good coffee, bagels, and free internet! What more do you need? While I've been sitting here, I've been amazed at the scads of retired people at the mall. Now, I know that the mall is the "place to walk". But, Panera is full of retired people this morning. There's a group over in the corner talking about GM, how it got into the trouble it's gotten in and so on. There's another group to my left that are talking about gold, bonds, and their accountants. Every once in awhile, you'll hear a comment like, "They are gone to Branson, MO for awhile." It got so bad I had to break out my headphones. Now, as a song finishes up, it fades into the musac playing in the background and all the hustle and bustle of the crowd. Its been fun to watch younger people like me walk through the door and look apprehensive because of the age of the room.

Now to Rhoda. My friend Eric recommended a book called 11 to me a month ago. In it, Leonard Sweet talks about 11 different biblical relationships we should have in our lives and that we should be to others. One of those characters is Rhoda, a servant girl who is mentioned in Acts 12. With Rhoda, he says we need someone who is young and has life in our lives. Someone who inspires us by their vigor for life. For me, Rhoda is my daughter Hannah Grace. She is a pure joy, probably one of the greatest gifts God has ever given me. Any of you who have spent time with her will understand what I'm talking about. I know, that comes off very prideful and braggy. That's not what I mean at all. I am prideful and braggy with her, for sure. But, there's something about her that draws people in and brings them joy.

For example, I am always blessed to have Hannah Grace and my wife Steph along with me as I go and do ministry. Every year they go with me to camp, Statewide, and so on. Hannah gets to interact with the "big kids" and be there beside us as we minister. So, this past week when we were at Fusion, she had a whole group of high school students hanging out with her. During worship they had a dance party, which she tried to turn into an imaginary snowball fight. Needless to say, momma had to step in and break it up. Who would have thought that a little, crazy almost 5 year old girl could have a following?

The thing I love most about Hannah Grace right now is the fact that she wears her emotions on her sleeve. She is hardwired into what is going on around her. Whether she's not getting her way and pouting about it, having a blast playing with the simplest of things like ripped up cardboard, or sitting on the couch crying because a show is having a sad moment, she's engaged with everything she is. She's listening, watching, interacting, and reacting. She hasn't been incapacitated by the need to wall off the world like most of us have been. She wants to listen, watch, touch, talk to, and dance with everyone and everything, even if its something sad. There is so much we have yet to learn in life, even if it is from an almost 5 year old.

Ok. I think I'm done rambling now. . .

Raining Leaves and Frostbite

2008-10-22T23:35:00.003-04:00

Fall is my favorite time of the year. I love the brisk mornings, the almost warm afternoons, and the cold evenings. I love the smell of the cold. I love the colors of the leaves. I love cider and snuggling under blankets. I love flannel pants and slippers. I love having the excuse of it being cold outside to drink coffee all day long!

This morning when I left the house, it was around 28 degrees. It was cold and frosty. When I shut the door, my attention was drawn away from heading to the car by a sound I don't think I've really ever heard, or at least noticed. Our house tucks up against some woods. In the spring and summer that is bad news. It makes a nice haven for the mosquitoes, which are insufferable. Over the last few weeks, they have turned beautiful golds, browns, and reds. it is great. But, this morning, the leaves were raining down. The cold frost had encouraged the leaves over night to give up their lofty place and come to earth. In the process of their descent, they were bumping into everything and creating quite a noise. It was not deafening, but it was certainly noticeable enough to capture my sleepy, un-coffee'd attention.

While fall and the cold brings me much joy and peace, it does however cause much trouble inside. When the weather turns cold, most run to the thermostat and crank on the heat--one of my friends mentioned today that his house was a balmy 72 degrees today (to his defense, his mother was staying with him for a few days). That's not our house. My wife, otherwise known as the heat miser, always makes an attempt to not turn the heat on before November 1st. We have a few friends who also try to do this--in an attempt to save some heating dollars for later on in the year when it's actually really cold here in MI. One of their rules is that they don't turn their heat on till the shampoo freezes. I secretly think my wife waits as long as she can because she hates the smell of the furnace running the first few times as it burns off all the dust and junk from sitting idle for months.

Sometimes October treats us well, sometimes not. This has been a not year. This morning when I got up it was 52 degrees in the house. Its a great sleeping temperature. You put on the flannel pants, a sweatshirt, and dive under a load of covers, one hopefully being a granny quilt. Its great! However, as I sit here at the dining room table blogging and working, I can't feel the tip of my nose and my legs have that hot but cold feeling. You know, the feeling you have when you come in out of the cold and you just barely start to warm up. I think my hot tea even has ice in it now. You can feel the cold in the air. Its just not right.

They are calling for highs in the 40s by the end of the week. I don't think we're going to make it till November 1st.

Visions

2008-10-11T01:24:00.003-04:00

Tonight the band I'm in, Revel on Sunday, played at Visions Night Club tonight. Visions is a Christian night club on the north side of town. It's a great venue for worship and concerts, and a great place to hang out. It's been around for awhile. We've played there twice now.

Tonight Mike Thompson, the owner/leader of the place, spoke about collisions. The idea was, how do you have a head on collision with God? How are you putting yourself in God's path and running at him full force. The story he told to go along with this idea was about when he felt God calling him to walk to Visions from his house--13 miles. He talked about trying to talk himself out of it and how he really fought the idea, like we normally do with God. But, after giving in and walking in the rain, he shared about the focus he had from the experience and the challenge that it has been to his spiritual life.

It really got me thinking, not that it takes much. Where am I getting in a collision with God? Being in ministry, spirituality is what you do. That sometimes becomes an excuse for not doing this or that in my life. Even beyond that, where is my life totally missing with God? Those are good questions to chew on for awhile.

The other thing on my mind is how to get more people to Visions. It's a great place. Not a great location, but who cares about driving to the north side of town for a great place? Yet, on a night like tonight there were 10 or so people there. God is bringing who he wants, but what if...

Time for bed. Goodnight!

Atlas of the Real World

2008-10-08T14:52:00.005-04:00

In my quick afternoon peak at the headlines on my yahoo page, I came across a new book called The Atlas of the Real World. It isn't your normal atlas. Rather than normal geographical maps, this atlas re-sizes each country in regards to different demographics like the amount of nuclear warheads or how many of its people were on the internet in 1990. The most intriguing to me were these two maps:

People who live on $2 or less per day.

People who live on $200 or more per day.

This should make us hurt. Does it?

Go here for more on the atlas.

Unsettled

2008-10-08T11:25:00.004-04:00

I guess that one could say our nation at the moment is unsettled. We haven't been for some time. We're really in a downward spiral grappling for just about anything to slow us and stop the plummet. It's a scary time, espcially with an election in less than 1 month where, in my opinion, we're voting for the lesser of two evils.

But politics is not the point of this blog.

Within the church I serve, there are normally some ups and downs. That happens when you work with people. There seems to be a bit more wavering with people shifting from here to there, called by other jobs, better opportunities, struggling with life, and so on around here though. And so, we sit here scratching our heads, wondering if and when it will turn around.

I think the better mindset we can grasp comes from knowing that our God is still in control. That's a scary thing to lean on sometimes, but it is something to lean on. Probably, we should do more than just lean, though. We should be grasping and grabbing with everything we can, holding on for dear life. Granted, this should be a daily thing, not only when things are unsettled.

Psalm 33:16-22

No king is saved by the size of his army;
no warrior escapes by his great strength.

A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;
despite all it's great strength it cannot save.

But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him,
on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,
to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine.

We Wait in hope for the LORD;
he is our help and our shield.

In him our hearts rejoice,
for we trust in his holy name.

May your unfailing love be with us, LORD,
even as we put our hope in you.

Camping Out

2008-10-05T21:49:00.005-04:00

Tonight is a special night. It's the night that I go to Great Lakes and camp out for Madrigal tickets. I'm actually here right now in the student mall. What memories it brings back.

Madrigals is a dinner drama that Great Lakes puts on every year at a church downtown here in Lansing. There's a full 4 course meal, a Shakespearean drama written by the English prof, and an a capella conert by a 12 voice choral group. It is a great evening.

Camping out has been a tradition for some time now. I used to camp out every year. It was a tradition that my roommate from GLCC, Matt Fallott, and I began in 1993. Sure, there were others that camped out before us like the old guy in his lawnchair, but it was our tradition. We camped out our entire time at GLCC. When I moved back to Lansing after seminary, it was a given that on the first Sunday in October, I was camping out, no matter what.

The last two years I cheated, though. I didn't feel like camping out. So, I would pay a student to do my dirty work and get my tickets. It just wasn't the same, but it worked. Unfortunately, she graduated last year. So here I am, out in my own lawn chair at the front door of the college, typing a post.

Sitting here makes me nastalgic. I can't keep my mind from running back over all the different camp out times. I can't keep my mind from thinking about my time in Madrigals while at GLCC--about how it would really set my mind on the Christmas season. I can't help think about the friendships that I built during those times in rehearsals.

Unfortunately, I'm the old creepy guy in the chair now. Great.

Mobius

2008-09-08T10:21:00.004-04:00

In my lifetime I've owned a few vehicles. My first car was a 1986 powder blue Ford Escort. It was as cool as it could have been being powder blue. The sunroof helped it have some cool points. The 4 speed on the floor was good too, though it caused the tires to wear out too often because I was always being cool, popping the clutch and squealing the tires. Man was I cool back then. I bought the Escort when I graduated high school with the help of my grandmother and father. It lasted all the way to 2000, when I drove it to the junkyard and got $25 cash.

Even though I owned that car for 10 years, I never really became emotionally attached. Some people do that. They become attached enough to give their vehicle a name. For example, one of the students in the college age group I worked with in Tennessee named his truck "The Shagnasty". It was his pride and joy. It was the quintessential redneck truck, complete with a confederate flag. That's not me.

About 5 years ago, I purchased a 1991 Ford F150 Supercab truck from some guys who went to my church. They had been given the truck as a band vehicle. They were looking for some cash to pay for some recording studio time, I was looking for a good second vehicle. It was a win, win situation.

What I did not know was that the truck came with a name. As I continued to spend time with the guys from the band, I learned that one of them, Tim, grew up with the truck and had named it Mobius. He would refer to it as Mobius periodically, but I never did. However, as I spent time with the truck, putting in a new stereo, working on it periodically, and so on, I began to understand why she was named. She is a great truck. She has been a reliable truck--150,000 miles reliable. She has some quirks, like pushing the clutch through the floor to get her started, which makes her even more special. She's not pretty. She's scarred by rust, scrapes, a little battle wound here or there. But, that gives her character. I know, I'm a mess.

So, when the time came for license plates this past month, I splurged on her and got a personalized plate. It looks great on the truck, and gives her more personality, don't you think?

Interestingly, Mobius has been sick for awhile. The shifter on the transmission has been acting up. You have to go to fifth, then first when starting out the first time or two so you can get from second to third. Its slightly annoying, but it works. Also, the window in the driver's side doesn't go up. You have to be careful not to put it down all the way so you can grab a hold of it and help it back up. The latest happened yesterday. When I pulled into the church parking lot at 6:00am and parked, Mobius would not shut off. The key switch would turn, but wouldn't dis-engage the ingnition switch. Either the actuator or the switch itself is finally worn out. Not a good thing, in my opinion, not being able to shut off or start your truck. I ended up stalling it out and unhooked the battery cable to make sure it didn't kill my battery.

Needless to say, Mobius got an unwanted tow to the local repair shop this morning. Hopefully they will give her a little love and she'll live for a another day. Pray that she comes home better than before!

On a side note: To anyone who has borrowed Mobius over the last 5 years, I'll be taking donations for her repairs so she can continue to be a good Mobius for friends and family.

Don't Like Each Other . . .

2008-08-25T09:51:00.003-04:00

This is a joke I received in an email last week. I thought it was humorous!

DON'T LIKE EACH OTHER

A plane leaves Los Angeles airport under the control of a Jewish captain. His copilot is Chinese. It's the first time they've flown together, and an awkward silence between the two seems to indicate
a mutual dislike.

Once they reach cruising altitude, the Jewish captainactivates the Auto-pilot, leans back in his seat, and mutters, 'I don't like Chinese.'

'No rike Chinese?' asks the copilot, '....why not?'

'You people bombed Pearl Harbor , that's why!'

'No, no,' the co-pilot protests, 'Chinese not bomb Peahl Hahbah! That Japanese, not Chinese.'

'Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese... doesn't matter, you're all alike!'

There's a few minutes of silence.

'I no rike Jews either!' the copilot suddenly announces.

'Oh yeah, why not?' asks the captain.

'Jews sink Titanic.'

'What? That's insane! Jews didn't sink the Titanic!' exclaims the Captain, 'It was an iceberg!'

'Iceberg, Goldberg, Greenberg, Rosenberg , ...no mattah... all same!'

Brother's Keeper

2008-08-05T09:01:00.015-04:00

Last week my life was consumed with making a video for the end of Frank's sermon. His text for the day was the story of Cain and Abel. His illustration throughout was the mirror window principle, which has its origin from the book Good To Great by Jim Collins (a must read in my opinion). The idea is that when bad happens, we should look at ourselves in the mirror and do some self evaluation. The opposite would be looking through the window at others in the situation and putting the blame/issue on them. This is what Cain did with his brother. Rather than deal with the fact that he brought a poor offering--that his issue was between him and God, he got jealous of his brother and killed him. When good things happen, we look through window, giving others some responsibility, grace, and what not for allowing the good to happen. We see this all throughout the life of Joseph at the end of Genesis.

To close his sermon, Frank talked about us being our Brother's Keeper, at which point, we showed the video I built with the background music being Brother's Keeper by Rich Mullins.

But that's not the point of this post. As I was scouring the internet for images to put with the brilliant words of Rich Mullins, I came upon this flickr photostream of a guy who found healing from his wife's death by spending time with the homeless. I was so moved by his pictures and by his story, because they were so good, that there are three or four in the video. You should go read his story and then look at his amazing images.

Oh, here's my interpretation of Brother's Keeper (its 21megs--if you have a slow connection you may be waiting awhile)

One note on the video. . . those of you who aren't a part of South won't get the last image. This past February, our church collected peanut butter for Northwest Haiti Christian Mission. It became a huge thing--other staff vs senior minister. We collected over 5,000 jars of peanut butter--4 tons worth. That was a huge learning moment for us as we become our Brother's Keeper.

May you be your Brother's Keeper today.

The Cool of Evening

2008-07-27T00:27:00.004-04:00

Its been a good day. We got up, had some brunch, and worked on the house. I got more trim done. I was supposed to go to the steam show in Mason, but did not make it. I'll hopefully pop in their tomorrow to take in some nostalgic coal smell and ash as I take in the old time tractors and steam engines. It will bring back memories of my earlier days when I used to go with our family neighbor Calvin to the Steam Show in Dover, OH. Those were the days of helping grind corn at the stone mill, messing with the Ford 8N tractor, and so on. Here is a pic of Calvin and his wife, Berince, (Couple on the left) with Calvin's brother and his wife.

Calvin was like a grandfather to me. He and Bernice lived just up the road from when I was growing up. I used to mow his lawn. My family would help him bale hay, shuck corn (yes, I said shuck corn), and so on, along with feeding his cows when they were away on vacation. Any time we had something break, we'd take it up to Calvin's for a little welding job or what have you. It was the old days then. We'd help out when he needed our younger energies and in return, he'd plow our garden in the spring and our driveway in the winter. And, he'd always give us apple butter when they made some or meat when they would butcher a cow. We always got the liver--Calvin hated liver. Helping Calvin also gave us free reign on his sledding hill. It was a great hill. It set just right so that the snow would drift over the top 15 feet or so. You could make great tunnels and so on in the snow. It also gave us extra resources for the sled jumps we would build. It's a wonder I didn't end up paralyzed.

Two of my fondest memories of Calvin both involve animals. In addition to raising cows, Calvin and Bernice would get chickens from time to time. He'd build a pen in his garage, complete with heat lamps for the newly hatched chicks. As they grew, they'd move outside to a bigger pen. When they were fully grown, they would butcher them. Calvin was proud and boastful of some contraption he had made that would behead a chicken with "control". I say "control", because if you've ever butchered chickens, they are hardly easy to control, both with their heads and without. He would always let one go after whacking it to laugh and watch it run around the yard for awhile. Remember, it was the old days, back when you did such things and it was normal.

The other memory involves evenings under Calvin's pavilion. Every night after a hard days work of whatever, Calvin and Bernice would take their place on the swing under the pavilion. Sometimes there was lemonade, sometimes bread and apple butter. Every couple of days or so, my family would walk up to their place and relax in the cool of the evening. It was always a great time. In the spring and early summer, Calvin would watch for groundhogs in his field while they relaxed. If one was dumb enough to come out of the ground, Calvin would head inside for his gun. Within minutes, there would be a huge crack of the gun and more often than not, another dead groundhog to bury. Calvin took pride in being able to shoot a groundhog at probably 200 or more yards with his 22-250 rifle.

Calvin taught me a lot about doing things right. He helped me begin to learn about having honor and an ethic that was inherit in men and women of his era. He taught me about doing hard work and learning to enjoy it--about doing what needed to be done so you could sit under the pavilion and take in the coolness of the evening. He taught us about caring for your neighbor.

When I started this post, I was simply going to talk about being able to sit by the front window in my living room and listen to the bugs of the night and feel the coolness of the air coming in the window. That was over an hour ago. Since then, I've spent time reminiscing about the steam show and even greater, my time as an early teen back home in East Canton. I sometimes really forget how much my childhood and teen years really shaped me. Sometimes I get caught up in the learning I've done and what experiences God has given me to put me where I am. Then, to keep me grounded, I somehow always come across something that takes me back to then, when life was much simpler and slower. Sometimes its the call of a redwing blackbird or the chirp of a spring peeper. Sometimes its the flicker of a lightning bug or the taste of good, homemade jam. Tomorrow, lord willing, it will be the smell of coal and wood smoke and the chug, chug, chug of a steam engine hard at work.

Backstage

2008-07-14T07:34:00.002-04:00

Currently I'm sitting backstage at Rock Lake Christian Assembly. It's the first morning of camp. I've been up for awhile now, drinking coffee, journaling, and preparing for the day. It's going to be a great day in God's presence here. We're talking about our place with God in worship--that he is creator/savior and that we are created/saved. With this perspective about God in the right place, everything else becomes clearer to me. Its like having the right glasses on to see 20/20.

Camp is always a good time for me. It encourages my soul and hope in God because I get to see students and fellow ministry partners step away from the normalcy of life and reflect on God for a week. Amazing things happen when we step away from life and chew on God for any amount of time. This week will be a little different. My friend Eric isn't here. He's off with another group of students at Wolverine Christian Camp. Eric and I have been doing this camp thing every summer together since the summer of 1994. We've learned to read one another, to feed on one another, to do ministry together like a married couple, which at times is amazing, and other times comical.

This week is going to be like wearing a new pair of shoes. They'll get the job done and it will be fine. It just won't be the same as the old sneakers that are formed and shaped to my feet, that have been with me every step of the way. God will fill in the gap, I'm sure. It just won't be the same.

Be in prayer for Eric and his crew at Wolverine, along with the high school weeks of camp at Michiana and Lake James Christian Assembly. We're all ministering to high school students this week. It's a great privilege and a huge challenge. Help us to be confident and bold for God. Pray that God fills in our many gaps and deficiencies as we serve.

The Kitchen Table

2008-07-08T21:33:00.004-04:00

Right now Hannah and I are sitting at the kitchen table. Steph is sweeping the living room floor--something she thoroughly loves to do. I'm catching up on some email and updating you all about my mom. Hannah's playing with my tea accessories. You know, tea balls to brew loose leaf tea, scoops, and a Maple leaf shaped tea strainer with a stand. I know, I'm a coffee snob and a tea snob. It happens. I'm a guitar snob too. That's not the point of this post, however.

It seems that my tea balls have pulled up to a drive through (the scoop thing) and they are ordering a zipple ipple triple scooper thing. Now they are getting the dipple, dipple things. There's nothing like the high pitched play voice of my little daughter. Now they are getting camper dampers. Amazing. I wish I had time to secretly record this and post it for you. Some day, maybe.

My mom, for those of you that have been keeping us, is doing well. She's been to the doctor for bloodwork and her diabetes. It seems that her sugar, because of the meds she's on and all the stress her body has had lately, won't go down between 300. She started on insulin shots today. Hopefully she won't be on those too long.

Thank you for all the prayers the past week. My mom thanks you deeply and she asks that you continue to pray. She also is singing the praises of my father, the super nurse. Now, if you knew my father, you would chuckle at that and say, "Not Junior." You see, my dad is an old school guy. he was up at the crack of dawn and out to the factory for more than 40 years of life. He worked hard so we had a roof over our heads and clothes on our backs. He endured plant closings, stolen retirements because of corporate decisions, and much hard work that has worn on his body. He's the man that is as tough as nails when it comes to anything, holding back emotion because that is what you did back then. You would never picture him crawling up on the bed, looking tenderly into my mom's pained face, and asking how she's doing.

As one of his sons, its beautiful and humorous at the same time. Beautiful to see the love that we always knew was inside coming out in raging forms. Humorous in watching him try as hard as he can, sometimes bumbling along the way.

It is a beautiful thing to see those you love, loving on and caring for one another like God has called us to do. It brings new perspectives to love one another and put others needs before your own. Its things I know and live out, but because of watching my father and my mother, I'm going to try even harder to embody and live out.

Love is a beautiful thing when lived out to its fullest. . .

Answered Prayer

2008-07-02T17:41:00.002-04:00

Thank you for all your prayers today. My mom went in at 2:45pm to get her heart shocked back into the right rhythm. On the way in, or once they got in the room, it reset itself without any electric. She said she began to feel better almost instantly.

She'll be in the hospital a few more days as they make sure all the issues are calmed down. Please pray that we are on the downhill side of this.

Thanks for all your prayers. Unfortunately, we hold prayer there as something we lean on when we need it. Or, we're too prideful to ask for others to pray. If we would just be like little children--helpless, in need, AND not afraid to ask for it. Why are we so dumb sometimes? Oh wait, we are humans.

Update on My Mom

2008-07-02T11:14:00.005-04:00

My mom, May, is still in the hospital. As her body has dealt with the 3 types of mono, which turns into viral hepatitis, and the bronchitis, mom's heart is now being attacked. Its not working as well as it should, and it is out of rhythm. I would guess that they will shock it or treat her with meds to get it back in rhythm. In the meantime, her heart is racing all the time and its causing her much stress and fear.

Please pray that she has peace today. Peace and rest so she can heal and get better.

Thank you for all your prayers so far.

UPDATE: They are shocking her heart at 2:45pm this afternoon.

Pray For My Mom, Please

2008-06-30T23:53:00.002-04:00

My mom has been admitted to the hospital again. She was in a few days ago with bronchitis and so on. They discovered that she has not one, but all three types of mono, plus the bronchitis. And, now she has fluid in her lungs. They've put her on meds and are calling in the cardiologist.

If you knew my mom, or my family for that matter, you would know that going into the hospital is something that doesn't happen often at all. Only when you are really, really, really sick.

Please pray for her healing. Please pray that her siblings will rally around her the next day or two as they deal with the fluid in her lungs. Pray for my father, that he will care for my mom the next month or two as she rests and deals with the mono. (That will be a challenging thing for my father). Pray that my siblings are a support. We're a really close knit family. Its really hitting all of us fairly hard. Mom's the rock. She doesn't get sick.

Also pray for my girls. Hannah is in Ohio with Steph's parents. Steph is away with our high schoolers at CIY. I'm home alone, working on the house and working on work . . . missing my girls tremendously tonight, and hurting for my mom.

Thanks.

Moving Day / 13 Year Anniversary

2008-06-09T23:58:00.004-04:00

Wow. Have I lost track of time. I haven't posted in months. The house is mostly done now. I'm sure we'll get some before and after pics up sometime after camp next week. We've weathered almost 2 1/2 months of remodeling now. Things have turned out really well.

Tomorrow is moving day. I wouldn't have guessed when we started the project back at Easter that we wouldn't be moving till June. I thought it would have went quicker. Oh well. What a better way to celebrate our 13th anniversary of marriage, right?

So, tomorrow night around 6:00pm, come on over to the farmhouse and celebrate our anniversary with us! You may be asked to help move some boxes, or a couch. You might even get the chance to throw a queen sized box spring out a second story window. Wouldn't that be great?

In other news, Hannah Grace is again on the Canfield Jenkins blog. She was the flower girl in our friends' wedding. Jackie has managed once again to catch all of Hannah's beauty and innocence and then some with the camera lens. Go check it out!

Home Ownership--Week 5

2008-04-30T08:11:00.002-04:00

The house is coming along. The pace is picking up now. I actually painted some things last night! That is exciting me. Especially so because I got to use my new 18" Wooster paint roller last night. It was awesome!!! Seriously, you have no idea how excited I am . . .

My in-laws arrived yesterday to help out. My father-in-law will be painting trim today, along with some other odds and ends. They head home on Friday. At that point, my brother will arrive and we'll install cabinets, bathroom items, and some new, modern looking doors. I can't wait!

Daffodils and the Orange Moon

2008-04-22T08:12:00.000-04:00

One of my fondest memories of spring as I was growing up was visiting my grandmother's house. I may have written about her place before. She lived out in the middle of nowhere. The lane to her house was about a mile long--over a huge hill and then down in a valley. It sat on about 100 acres of land--surrounded by fields and trees. Her and my grandfather bought it to house their 5 kids back in the 20s or 30s. The house at that point was already 50 years old. They remodeled, built barns, made a pond and lived life. The house itself was your standard old farmhouse. Two stories with a suicide staircase and a fruit cellar. It was flanked on the East and the South by giant maple trees that had been planted back when they bought the homestead. By the early 80s they towered above the house, providing a canopy of shade. Gram's house was a perfect place in my opinion.

Every spring, the daffodils would emerge and turn her yard into a yellow lined paradise. Now, we're not talking about 10 or 20 plants. I would guess Gram had hundreds of daffodils planted all along the side driveway, around her house, and leading out to the pond in all different varieties. Even to this day, the images are burned into my brain.

For me, spring is my second favorite season, my favorite being fall. I like spring because of the newness it brings with the spring flowers, the magnolia tree in my backyard, and the green grass. I love the smell of the new life--that earthy, dew laden smell that exists after a spring shower. I love being able to use the front porch again (and the potential of the back deck at the new house.

Spring symbolizes to me the hope that God is faithful, that he will return life to his creation after the cold, long winter. Some days I really need that reminder to get up and get moving. I definitely need that reminder every day to keep my heart and mind focused on the right things.

Thank you, Lord, for the continual reminders that you are there. Thank you for the beauty of your creation that I am blessed to see every day--things like the spring daffodils and the orange moon both in the morning and evening yesterday. Thank you for the gift of grace and love--that always brings new life and good news. May we join with creation and celebrate who you are and what you have done for us!

Home Ownership Weeks 3 and 4

2008-04-21T00:52:00.005-04:00

I know, I know. I haven't been updating regularly (sorry Julie!). I've been busy renovating and such. We are making progress. Plumbing changes have been made. We're returning the bathrooms to their full functionality, since they were gutted a few weeks ago. We've done some minor electrical--adding switches and so on. All good changes. I may replace a few doors that were moved/removed this week, and put paint on the wall. Paint is a sign that we're making progress. Paint will help my wife know that it isn't going to stay like it is right now. Paint is the sign of progress . . .

One of my friends said ministry was something of a challenge, because you aren't able to see the finished product. He contrasted it with remodeling work. When you start a project, you know it will get done. You see the stages. You celebrate the changes and progress. You see completeness at the end. Ministry is not like that. You do see some progress and change. But, its rare to see the culmination of someone's journey. Tonight, I spent some time reading the blog of one of my students from GLCC. He up and decided that God wanted him to go on a missions trip--a bold step in my opinion. As I read, I could sense the change happening in him. I could read and see some of the completeness that is coming about. Its an amazing thing--quick, yet deep growth. You should check out his blog--Luke/Beret Riggs.

Home Ownership Week 2--Cramps

2008-04-09T08:50:00.007-04:00

Well. Much has been going on at the new house. We've been finishing drywall, doing some plumbing adjustments, ordering kitchen cabinets, countertops and so on, and trying to keep up on all the dust that I have made. Things are moving rapidly and will continue to do so. This weekend my brother and his family come into town again to help with the remodeling festivities. Pray that we continue to be productive.

One of the residual effects of buying a house is cramps. Not girl cramps or anything of the sort. For me, the cramps come in my hands. For a living, I drive a desk. i type things, I plan, I play the guitar, I read and study. It is not a physically challenging position. My brother calls me a desk jockey. With the purchase of a house comes work that is done with one's hands. I enjoy such work. I look forward to it. Sometimes I even long for it. It is relaxing to me.

However, after working hard the last few weeks at the new house, my hands and forearms are nothing but cramps and pains. Even as I sit here and type this blog, there is pain. My left hand seems to be trembling a little. All because my muscles are experiencing things they haven't for such a long time. These are good pains. Growing pains. Pains of strength and determination. Pains for the coming of new life, hope, and what is to come. But, pain, nonetheless.

The biggest challenge with the cramps has been leading worship. During rehearsal this past Sunday, I began to experience excruciating torment in the fatty part of my palm below my thumb. It felt like the worst charlie horse in the world, yet it didn't fade away. As long as I was trying to hold my pick for playing my guitar in my hand, it was there, letting me know that I'm a desk jockey. It was a good bad feeling. Good, because I'm growing through this and strengthening my physical body--a good feeling for a desk jockey. Yet, bad because we're only at the beginning of this renovation. There is much more work to do and many more days of cramps and pain.

Life is like that. It is easy to sit still and do what you need to do. it can be a painless thing. Yet, if you try to move forward and do something new, you will certainly experience pain, albeit good pain. I know that I struggle when I try to change. Adding exercise to my routine is a challenge. Changing eating habits is a challenge. Why, because it means some sort of pain will be coming my way. It will be good pain, but it means change.

Why is it that we always run from what will be good for us and make us better? Why in our spiritual lives to we not endure the cramps and pain to move closer to God? Is it because we don't like pain? Or is it because we don't like surrender?

My new house is making me surrender and making me grow. No pain, no gain. I know, that's cheesy. Cheesy, but true.

Here's one thing that makes the work less painful, more enjoyable, and highly important:

So rough and tough, yet so precious and wonderful!

House Ownership--Week 1

2008-03-30T23:15:00.004-04:00

Well. Week one has gone fairly well. It took some time to get into the house, since the bank that owned the house before hand was was taking their good sweet time to get the paperwork turned in. Luckily, we only had to wait for a few hours to get access.

Since getting access, much has happened. We removed the fake wall that hid the fridge, opening up the kitchen to the the rest of the living/dining room. It looks great. It will look even better once we get cabinets back in there.

The other big project going on is the bathroom. Everything has been gutted. Now we're working on the design and will hopefully begin putting things back very soon. Once that is done, it's paint, carpet and trim.

The only big hiccup we ran into is the roof. We were planning on doing the roof in a few years. Not so. We'll be replacing the roof in the next month or two. So, if any of you have that truck full of money available, I'd be willing to help you spend it!

The Verge

2008-03-24T08:01:00.004-04:00

I have been very distant from here for some time now. It's not that I wanted to be away. Life has been busy with this and that and the other. Good this, that, and the other, but this, that, and the other nonetheless. One of the those this, thats or the others has been this:

Steph and I will be leaving shortly to go and sign the final paperwork, making 5824 Rockingham Drive our own. We'll, Providence Mortgage will mostly own it for about 30 years. . . then she will be ours. We haven't posted much about this because we didn't want to get our hopes (and your hopes) up until everything was final. Within a couple of hours or two, things will be final. So, its safe now!

In light of this, that, and the other (especially the above this, that, and the other), Steph and I would covet your prayers. Please pray that the next couple of hours go well at the Title company. Pray that no one gets hurt in the renovations. Pray that renovations will go quick and that everyone will be having sales on what we need. Pray that we would be wise with our finances as we take on a house payment. Pray for a dump truck full of money. I know, that one won't happen, but it would be nice, wouldn't it?

Frozen Boogers

2008-02-11T09:28:00.000-05:00

In honor of the balmy temperatures here in Michigan today, I give you one of my favorite Calvin and Hobbes!

Why Did You Run?

2008-01-28T23:14:00.000-05:00

Today started out as a normal Monday. I hit the office and entered my normal routine consisting of email, some audio editing of yesterday's sermon, scheduling for this week, and prep work for staff meeting. Then, there was staff meeting, which is always a joy. There were some good laughs, some reflection on the book, Making Room for Life, for Randy Frazee. There was discussion of the good and bad from yesterday's service, and some looking forward to this week. After that came TBWJ. TBWJ is short for Taco Bell With James. It's a consistent Monday activity for Frank and James.

I had planned to stay in the office and work over lunch so I could be off tomorrow for my wife's birthday. But, because of peer pressure, I went along. And, I'm glad I did.

As we were driving up Cedar Street, I noticed a guy run across the street right in front of Taco Bell. I would have thought he was just crossing the street, but he didn't stop running when he got across the road. My mind thought, "that's a little odd" and continued on with pulling into the parking lot at Taco Bell. Shortly thereafter, we were inside Taco Bell ordering some food. As I stepped up in line to order a number 5 (I think), we were all startled with a guy screaming at the top of his lungs, "Why did you run?". Startled by the shouting and the commotion, I turned and saw a big white guy with a gun strapped to his leg pulling the guy--who I had just seen minutes before running across the road, backwards over the cattle herding bars by the counter. He was quickly joined by a couple more brutes with guns. Quickly, the ruckus escalated with the jawalker pleading with the rest of us who were just staring in awe that we were getting a live version of Dog the Bounty Hunter in front of us to see the injustice that he was suffering--being arrested by some thugs with guns.

All of this happened in a few moments. Everyone in the place stopped what they were doing to watch. The taco chefs in the back even made it to the front counter to watch for a moment. Then, as quickly as it began, it was over. The arrest had been made. The Jaywalkers was on his way to a car waiting outside. As he headed to jail, we returned to our normal lives, eating our tacos and slurping our sodas.

It was fun to watch something that exciting happen in front of us. Yet, not in that moment did we wonder what the jaywalker had done to get him in the spot he was in. We laughed about his inability to run into th allotment behind Taco Bell to hide from the bail bonds boys, but we had no sympathy for him. I doubt that any of us in that place thought anything more of the incident. Not until now, as I've thought through it, have I realized how cold my reactions were today.

Why are we so cold?

Google Maps

2008-01-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

Last night I had to look up the location of the eye doctor that my normal physician has referred me to for the spot on my eye. In the process, I spent some time looking at the goole map. I looked at Africa to see where one of my students is getting deployed to in the fall. Then, I wondered if I could see the the compound of Northwest Haiti Christian Mission from their satellites. It took a moment to figure out where it was, but I was able to zoom in and see the steeple of the church across the street there. It brought back the rush of memories--being carried by a Haitian man to a boat to go to the Tortuga Island. I remember the smells and the sounds of riding the bus from Port-a-Prince--the fresh bread smell along that road at 5:00am. I can vividly see the faces of the kids at the orphanage in Port-de-Paix. I remember becoming a jungle gym for them. I think of how they clung to us as hard as they could. What a flood of thoughts and emotions.

From there I moved on the map of east Tennessee. I looked at the areal views of the Roan Mountain area--where Steph and I would retreat to every once in awhile to take in the mountain views. I looked up the Laural Falls area, where we hiked one day with Brian and Betsy Carter in the rain. I remember almost dying from exhaustion as we hiked out of the gorge back to the Appalachian Trail. I also focused in on Erwin, the little town stuck between the mountains south of Johnson City, whose claim to fame is the hanging of a rampant circus elephant in 1916. I thought back to laundry days up in the hollow (pronounced hollar) at Nathan's trailer on the side of the mountain. Those were wonderful days of frozen Skyline chili and hockey on the computer. I remember the rainy days sitting on his porch in his recliner chair, talking about life, God, and what we were doing with it. I prayed for my friend David, who is a minister and part time prof now in the area there as I looked for his house. I also peeked in on our old apartment on Cedar Grove and thought of our lives there.

Reflection is a good thing for me. It helps me to remember where I've been--where I've come from. It helps me to think about the heritage that I am carrying with my faith. It helps me to remember the beauty of God's creation that I've been able to take in with my senses. It gives me purpose and hope for today, tomorrow, and the next day.

Sunrise

2008-01-16T09:36:00.001-05:00

The only thing bad about winters in Michigan in my opinion is the lack of sunshine. Sunshine makes any day seem better, even if it is a horrible day. Sunshine makes your soul feel warmer, even on the coldest of days.

Lately, we have not had much sunshine. And, in the process, not many sunrises. One of the things I love about getting up early and heading into the office is catching the sunrise. There is nothing better than watching the dark sky explode with the color and brightness of a new day. It gives me extra hope for the day.

This morning there was a beautiful sunrise. While I sat at Cornerstone Coffee and worked, it burned my face and made it difficult to see my computer screen. It made me think of our discussions this past week in Sunday school as we talked about Genesis 1 and God's acts of creation--that he was able to speak things like the universe and the sun into existence and that he saw them as good. Even more, that he saw his creation of man better than the creation of them. It serves as a reminder to me that our God of creation is still there and in control, always trying to blind me with his presences like this morning's sunrise. Luckily, was able to have open eyes and see this morning!

Happy New Year

2008-01-01T10:23:00.000-05:00

2007 to me has been one of the longest years. When we began this year, South was in transition. We were reworking our mission statement to Seek, Study, and Serve. We were also without a Sr. minister. That meant more work and leadership for me. It was good to be able to serve and lead, but it felt like I was continually trying to catch up to everything that was going on around me.

Because of the hectic nature of work, time at home was invaluable. There's nothing better to deal with stress than coming home and saving momma from the insanity by playing on the floor for a few hours with a hyper active 3 year old. Hannah has grown so much this year. One month she'll put on a new pair of jeans that need to be rolled up 3 or 4 inches. Then the next month, she's outgrown them. It has been a bittersweet. She's not my little baby anymore.

God blessed us in the transitioning time at South. He brought the Weller family to us in August. Having Frank on staff as our Sr. minister slowed life for me down a little. It was a nice change. Well, nice really doesn't do the change justice. I've thoroughly enjoyed having Frank across the hall in the office. We have had a ball doing ministry together for the last 5 months--which has seemed like a year in itself.

The only real regret I have with this year is that I did not read as much as I would have liked. I started this year with big aspirations. Yet, this morning, as I updated my blog template, I only had a couple books listed in the sidebar. There were a few books that didn't make it there, but for the most part, life took up the reading time. That will change this year.

So, there is a new year ahead. A new year with tons of possibilities. There's a whole shelf of books waiting to be read. There is the beginning of my 8th year of ministry here at South. There's the excitement of moving my family into a "new" house. There will be the joy/sadness of seeing Hannah start preschool, continuing to grow up right before our eyes. There will be another year of life beside my wife and us celebrating our 13th year of marriage. Its going to be a great year

Christmas 2007

2007-12-16T15:29:00.000-05:00

Here's the latest Christmas picture of the Lowman family taken in the blizzard after church today.

So Long Ago

2007-12-12T08:29:00.000-05:00

When I graduated from high school, I was totally undecided about what I wanted to do. I felt some sort of a calling, if you want to call it that, about going into some type of ministry. Most of that was influenced by Ray, my youth minister at the time. At church I ran the sound system, sang in the choir, and sang specials every once in awhile, along with the normal youth group stuff. Bible college was a thought on the radar, but that meant something more than I was willing to give. So, off to the University of Akron I went to study mathematics.

That summer after I graduated, Ray invited me to work a week of camp with him at Elkhorn Valley Christian Service Camp. I had been to camp a couple of times before as a faculty brat and as a Jr. high camper. I even got baptized at camp (though not fully because of camp--I simply wanted to take communion with everyone else). Yet, I had never thought about working camp. It sounded fun. So I said yes.

Intermediate 1 (otherwise known as Jr. High Camp) was the highlight of my summer. I was already coming out of my quiet shell because of working in retail at a tuxedo shop. Camp allowed me to be "that guy". You know, the guy who is the loud, obnoxious kid who doesn't have a pause button. That was me at camp. The other added bonus was that I was the recreation guy that year. Everyone loves the rec guy. Because of those things, students were attracted to me. It blew my mind. And, I began to build friendships that went beyond that week. Back in that day, we wrote letters back and forth. I know, that's so old school. It was cool to write back and forth and encourage the students.

When Ray moved away, the camp dean of that Jr. High week became our new youth minister at my church. Jack was an odd fellow. He was your quintessential blond haired, blue eyed guy who looked like Jesus. He even had the scruffy beard to add to the look. That was about as normal as he was. He had clear shoes to show off his assortment of crazy socks. One of his claims to fame was his ability to snort very loud. However, even though he was odd, Jack began to teach me about ministry. It wasn't a straight on teaching about how to disciple or theories or anything like that. He simply asked if my best friend and I wanted to read a book together with him and discuss it. While I don't remember the book title, the main theme I remember in it was sticktoitiveness--being totally sold out to what you are living your life for. Those were some great discussions in his cold office. I began to learn some Greek words, their meanings, and why they were important. He had us helping plan and do youth ministry--not because we knew he was training us, but because it was fun and we wanted to.

The next summer, Jack moved up to Sr. High week. I was there again, with the same circle of students who I'd been writing to the previous year. It was a great time. It was a life changing time. I got to teach a class on the parable of the talents that year. I remember feeling way out of my league. I remember students coming up to me afterwards and asking me serious, deep questions about the Bible. I remember feeling totally hopeless because I didn't have any answers for them. I knew I needed to go to Bible college. That winter I decided to go to GLCC and begin my journey to professional ministry.

If it weren't for Ray and Jack challenging me to go to camp and putting me in a place to build relationships and shape lives, I'd be off somewhere doing math stuff--either for NASA or teaching in some hole in the wall community college. Because they cared and built relationships with me, subversively discipling me, I found the passion for my life--the passion that has lead me to where I am today.

They also helped me begin to build my own discipling relationships--though I didn't know it at the time. There are two students I think of most when I think back--Dawn Gates and Angie Coxson. They are the two that I most connected with. Now, almost 20 years later, we email back and forth and keep up the conversations/relationships that were started out in the middle of no where at camp.

Thank you Ray and Jack for taking a chance on a big, goofy looking high school student who didn't have a clue of what to do with his life. Thanks for giving me the chance to learn about what ministry looks like and how to do it. Thanks for helping me begin to see the importance of relationships and discipleship--things that are the bedrocks of my ministry now. Thank you Angie and Dawn for keeping up the conversations for so many years.

Christmas Music

2007-12-09T15:57:00.001-05:00

Right now I'm enjoying a concert by the Meridian Community Band. It's a 60 plus group of musicians ranging from young adults to Sr. Saints. While they aren't professionals, they sound pretty darn good. Add to them our acoustically live auditorium at SLCC and you have a great afternoon of music.

Today is a day of different music. This morning for worship we used a different setup to the normal praise band. We had a piano, my guitar, and 5 male voices. It was quite a change to the 2 electric guitars, a bass, drums, acoustic, and piano. Now, I'm enjoying a large orchestral sound, in addition to a little Bing Crosby during the intermission. What a blessing God has given us with musical variety.

My prayer is that we as a people in God's church could grow perspective and understanding of that. It's not about the worship band in my opinion. It's about us as a people coming together to worship our Maker and Savior, no matter what instruments are used. Its about our hearts and minds as we come to celebrate.

One last interesting thing about this concert. At the moment, they are playing a Jewish piece. Right before it, two ladies from the band came down front and lit a menorah. They explained a little of the tradition and sang HaNerot Halalu, traditional prayer sung during Hanukkah as they were lighting the candles. It was very cool in my opinion. I'm sure there would be someone to get bent out of shape that something like that happened in our church building. My thought is, there is much that we can learn from our Jewish brothers and sisters.

With all this good music, it is definitely a White Christmas tonight!