Tim... "grab a corner"

iPad 2

2011-11-02T00:04:00.004-04:00

So I have new toy.

So far I've justified purchasing it by complaining how slow & old my regular computer is comparatively, that it keeps me from having to lug my laptop home every night, that it's easily transported to the youth room for teaching lessons & plugging into the stereo up there for music, that I'm able to paperlessly lead worship from it on Sunday mornings, that it helps entertain our kids from time to time, that I can use it as an e-reader for books, and that I can listen to (or watch!) my podcasts. And if that wasn't enough, now I can say I can blog from it (though I'm much more likely to continue "micro blogging" via twitter).

Family Experiential Lent Calendar

2011-03-31T17:17:00.004-04:00

Last year I blogged about my experience with the season of Lent and mentioned a calendar I was using that I found here. Since I work with students, children, and families in my ministry, I had an idea to come up with a similar kind of calendar intended specifically for families, the 2011 Family Lent Experiental Calendar. Before Ash Wednesday, I distributed it and posted it on-line. My hope is that as families participate in fasting-from and living-to during these forty days, they will draw closer to God leading up to Resurrection Sunday. I feel like our own family has benefitted from this already.

Click on the link highlighted above if the picture is too small to read. Just thought I'd share...

teenagers and "moralistic therapeutic deism"

2010-09-02T14:52:00.005-04:00

There's an interesting article on cnn.com about teens and faith. Check out the full write-up here.

I didn't really agree with the whole thing (mostly because their claims relied on weak anecdotal support); however, I thought this passage in particular was compelling:

How 'radical' parents instill religious passion in their children
... [Dean] says parents who perform one act of radical faith in front of their children convey more than a multitude of sermons and mission trips.
A parent's radical act of faith could involve something as simple as spending a summer in Bolivia working on an agricultural renewal project or turning down a more lucrative job offer to stay at a struggling church, Dean says.
But it's not enough to be radical -- parents must explain "this is how Christians live," she says.
"If you don't say you're doing it because of your faith, kids are going to say my parents are really nice people," Dean says. "It doesn't register that faith is supposed to make you live differently unless parents help their kids connect the dots."

What do you think? Comment on here if you have any thoughts.

Pentecost and Babel

2010-05-22T23:03:00.006-04:00

In honor of Pentecost Sunday tomorrow, I thought I would post an unique message I wrote a few years back.

Pentecost and Babel (Genesis 11 & Acts 2)
Think about the events surrounding the first Pentecost, and let’s look how it fits in the story of the Bible, God’s story—the story of Redemption. All the way back in the beginning, God created human beings in relationship to himself—in Eden, we see a picture of humanity at ease with God, close to him and one another, in a place of their own where they belonged… and it was good. When sin entered the world, God cast them from their home, sent them away from himself and began to tear them apart from one another. The good that was God’s image within his creation was marred and broken—we see this in Cain and Abel, in the evil during Noah’s days, and in the tower of Babel story. But in Genesis chapter 12 in the story of Abraham, God begins the work of redeeming his people, restoring what was lost, the beginning of bringing his prodigal sons and daughters back into the family.

In this story of God’s redemption of humanity, Abraham is the beginning of God fixing the problem and Jesus is the climax (and of course, the great wedding banquet in heaven is the final resolution). So what you have is a kind of roller coaster movement… it starts up with Eden, goes down with the Fall, begins to ascend again with Abraham, peaks with Jesus and resolves toward the restored kingdom at the Day of the Lord. So now at Pentecost we begin to see God working things out, the beginnings of the restoration, the reversal of the curses enacted at the Fall.

If you have studied literature to any extent, one thing you would be taught is to pay special attention to foreshadowing and mirroring in the texts because they bring fuller meaning to what is being said. This happens all the time in Scripture, too. God indeed is the Great Storyteller. The big theme is the curse and its effects and then the redemption—the reversal of the curses—and its effect. People, place, presence taken then restored. God’s image taken away and then restored in us.

But I want us to look particularly at two stories of two communities: Babel and Pentecost. Babel is the last story before the beginning of redemption and Pentecost is the first story after the climax of redemption in Jesus… immediately before the upturn and immediately after the downturn… the perfect spot that you might expect to see some parallels.

In Babel, the evil of mankind had grown and grown, their focus had moved away from God and completely on themselves (v.3-4). They had replaced the worship of the Lord with worshipping themselves and their own greatness. On Pentecost, however, we see a community that was amazingly selfless (v.42-47). Their focus was not on themselves but on God.

Again, in Babel, we see a people building a great tower so as to “reach the heavens,” essentially trying to achieve through their own strength a place with God. You see here humans working upward to God. But with Pentecost, you see God reaching down, entering into humanity’s lowliness. Men and women confessed their weakness and need and God gave himself to them there (v.37-38).

And what was the curse of Babel? What was God’s judgment on their self-centeredness and seeking achievement? Disunity through confused language (v.6-8). Ever since Babel, humanity has been cursed to live separated from one another, primarily by language—but more than that—by a failure to be on the same page and to have a singular purpose.

What happened at Pentecost? I admit there’s a lot about the Holy Spirit evidenced by tongues that I don’t understand, but could it be that Pentecost was an indication of God’s redemption, beginning to reverse the curse proclaimed at Babel? What do we see with this early community of believers? Not just understanding each others’ languages, but the restoration of unity, the beginning of real fellowship and community, living lives together with a single purpose… “All the believers were together and had everything in common…” (v.44-47).

So what does this mean for me? Are you living together with other believers? What is keeping you at a distance from real fellowship and community? Have you allowed all of God’s redeeming grace to work in your life? Have you allowed him to save your soul without letting him repair your relationships with others? Think of the community we could be by living in unity!

Listen to what God says about this kind of unity: “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.” God wants to make us great and empower us—not for our own glory and not to attain a place with God—but in humility and by God’s Spirit we could make a huge impact for the kingdom of God right here. If what we celebrate at Pentecost is the birth of the church, what does this say about what church should be? I guess it means that church is a community of selfless people where God has come and, therefore, shares in real unity and fellowship with one another.

I love the story of God. Because Jesus has come and died and lives again, God has begun to restore us to his family and is making that family whole once again. Won’t you be a part of that story with me?

notes from symc

2010-03-08T22:50:00.001-05:00

Last weekend, I attended the Simply Youth Ministry Conference in Chicago, Illinois with two of my youth volunteers. I always love these conferences, and here I'll attempt to give a few notes from that great trip. (Note #1: Gino's East pizza is amazing!)
One of the best quotes from the weekend was from Doug Franklin's seminar on student leadership. He said, "Youth ministry is not the church's ministry to students; it's the students' ministry to their world." When I heard it, I realized he had articulated clearly what I've been thinking for years. I love this shift in perspective, and I hope I can instill this in our congregation and students.

The "Branding Your Youth Ministry" workshop gave me a lot to think about (and makes me really wish I was a professional graphic design artist!). The purpose of branding is to build trust and connect with the group of people you are targeting. I know it sounds kind of business-y, but our church can do so much more through images, phrases, music, video, and other medium to speak more effectively to our culture. I sometimes go back and forth on how much to do this in my youth ministry (that, and I'm pretty uncreative), but I think I'd like give significant attention to our youth space in the upcoming year.

Also, we have a youth-led worship Sunday coming up in May, and I have several great ideas for it. Some possible skits and creative things, as well as some themes and thoughts to share with the congregation about our student ministry. I get excited thinking about our students leading in worship.

One of the workshops I attended was related to family ministry, basically supporting and communicating well with parents. I really liked some of the ideas for getting families more involved in my ministry, but an idea that I thought of while I was in there listening is a parent experiential calendar much like the Lent calendar I am following throughout this season. It would have a different exercise each day for parents to do, such as pray with your kids, lead a family devotion, write an encouraging letter, share a particular memory, play together, etc. I might try to do it next year during Lent or Advent, or some other time of the year when I want to encourage parents to step up in their role as spiritual leaders for their children.
Finally, this was the first year I attended one of these conferences with some of my volunteers. We had a great time eating Chicago pizza, hanging out, and talking about working with teenagers. Usually this has been a conference I attend with my wife, or even sometimes I will have been their with my brother who's a youth minister, or have seen other youth pastor friends around. But it was nice to see a few of my adult volunteers experience this kind of atmosphere where 2500 youth workers who love God and have a passion for students come and hang out together. I'm excited about what this might mean for them and what God is doing in their lives.

Random other notes--
* Set up a shared google document with my volunteers to share ideas and notes, especially with my small group leaders.
* "If you add something, you must drop something else." Very wise.
* One Meal One Day event sponsored by Compassion on October 20th, I'm looking at participating in.
* I heard Les Christie, a workshop leader, say that creativity is often tied to location, and so we might need to find other places than our office to spark creativity. I think this is true for me.
* Doug Fields' final thoughts to wrap up the weekend: Lead Strong + Love Stronger = Lasting Legacy (1 Timothy 1:3-5).
* Oh, and here's a little video from the conference for your amusement :)

inconvenience at SYMC

2010-02-27T12:26:00.002-05:00

Well, I'm not having any luck finding free wi-fi internet, and on top of that the local CBS channel is showing the Notre Dame game instead of the UK/ Tennessee game. Not cool, people. Not cool. :(

Lent

2010-02-25T11:27:00.001-05:00

As a typical Baptist, I don't usually do Lent very well. It has always seemed a little too stuffy, religious and legalistic to me (as most traditions do). But over the years I have slowly come around.

This year has been significantly different already. This is the first year that I received ashes on my forehead. The Ash Wednesday service at the Episcopal church was beautiful and meaningful, but I was still very aware how out-of-place and uncomfortable I was with it all. Nevertheless, I was glad to be connected to something that Christians all over the world were a part of.

Then there is the commonly observed practice of giving up something for Lent. It is meant to be a time of self-denial and repentance (which in it's true form indicates a change of behavior) that leads to the Cross of Good Friday and the Empty Tomb of Resurrection Sunday. So with a fairly honest assessment of my life, I committed to drinking only water for 40 days. Giving up soft drinks (of which I typically consume several each day) was the big one, but it includes everything else, too. It may be healthy, but it is not meant to be a diet or for health reasons; it is meant to set me free from something in my life that has been addicting. I cannot allow anything in my life to compete with Jesus for control over it.

Another part of Lent this year is our church's emphasis on listening through the New Testament together. We have been encouraging the congregation to join us each day in listening to a few chapters of an audio version of the New Testament. I have to admit, after trying out the material we were distributing, I went back to my old copy of The Bible Experience audio Bible because it is so much better of a dramatic reading. I'm now in the first few chapters of Luke, and this has been a really nice part of this season as well.

Finally, thanks to a link on a friend's blog, I found Mars Hill Bible Church's Lent 2010 experiential calendar. This calendar is set up so that on each of the 40 days I will participate in an activity that challenges me and stretches me to grow toward Christ and his love. This includes activities like doing something you've been putting off or making a phone call to someone you've had a falling out with or shoveling snow from a neighbor's driveway or fasting from food or technology or music. I like that it helps Lent to be about more than just giving up something for a duration of time, but it also adds in spiritual exercises to your life in a wide variety of areas.

The funny thing about this season of Lent is how these added observances have bumped up against my regular life. The ashes coincided with a youth mission project, which helped me reflect on serving others as a proper response to repentance from self-centeredness. The audio Bible listening has been mixed in with a variety of activities throughout my day. The nothing-but-water fast creates tension whenever I go to the refrigerator or out to eat. My experiences from the Lent calendar are not always convenient with my day-to-day schedule so I have to find ways to make it work.

Tomorrow I'm headed to the Simply Youth Ministry Conference in Chicago, and I'm going to be thinking and talking a lot about youth ministry. I'm hopeful that my deeper observance of Lent this year will also pay off in a fuller understanding of ministry as I reflect and study it together with some other great youth leaders. (Btw, I'm planning on blogging from there this weekend, too... or you can follow me on twitter.)

what's up? oh, not too much

2010-02-18T22:04:00.004-05:00

So here it is, late February, and I'm just now getting around to my first blog post of 2010. Sorry folks. It's not that there hasn't been anything going on to report... in fact, it's probably because of the opposite, too much going on that I haven't found (or made) the time to post.

Here's a little taste... (if nothing else, you can enjoy the pictures)

The kids are big stuff.

Kate has moved up to a "big girl bed" now. When she saw it, she said, "Thank you Daddy for making me a bed." Even though it's passed down from Amy's great-grandmother, she thinks I made it just for her. She so sweet. And on top of that, in the past few weeks, she's even graduated out of pull-ups at night. She really is becoming quite the big girl.

Ben has started taking piano lessons. Not only is he doing great so far, but he also loves it. As my mom can attest, I, however, was not so accommodating when I was a kid. He makes me proud, and I love to listen to him practice.

And Will and I have a new connection. I'm leading the music for preschool chapel, a new initiative with his preschool on Friday mornings. All the preschoolers love it, but I'm still not sure if he thinks it's cool or not that his dad is doing the music.

Also because of the snow-pocalypse of 2010, the kids have now missed ten days of school. But at least we've gotten to enjoy the snow a little bit.

Thanks to the Elswicks, we've had a couple great afternoons of sledding on the slopes in their backyard! Kate loves to push, and Ben and Will really enjoy the sledding. (I think Ben offers the most promise for a snow skiing companion in the near future!)

And then there was the water leak. One Sunday morning as I was getting ready to head out for church, I heard a hissing sound and looked up to see a water stain line across our living room ceiling. We turned off the water into the house and got a plumber to look at it on Monday. He couldn't find it the first time, but when the water had been turned on for a few hours, the water stain came back. The plumber came back and cut a hole in the bathroom closet looking for the leak. Couldn't find it there. So he cut a hole in the living room ceiling where he found the leak in the cold water pipe leading into the bathtub on the second floor. Leak fixed, but now we had a huge hole in the ceiling and closet.

Now, my drywall skills aren't all that great, but I think I did a pretty good job fixing the holes. I got the texture pretty decent but still need to see if I can match the color better with some primer. All in all, I'm pleased with my results.

On top of that, as our Christmas present from Amy's mom, we had all the carpet and linoleum replaced in our house. A very nice upgrade in our home, but it certainly was a lot of work and adjustment to have it installed.

In the midst of the chaos when our carpet was being installed, my cell phone was lost (while our home phone was disconnected because of the work being done). The next day I got online and found that someone had used my phone, and, long story short, I got it back by offering a "reward" and driving to the next town over to get it from a guy who handed it to me with a washcloth because he didn't want his prints on it. Honestly, I'm just glad to get it back.

It's been a very active time in ministry, too.

In January, I had the chance to pray with Faith and Angelica to receive Jesus, and I was blessed to have the opportunity to baptize them during worship. Truly, this is the best part of my job!

We also set some record numbers in 2010. On the 17th of January, we had the highest attended lock-in since I've been at GBC with 58 students. Here's a video with some of the kids dancing to the Nintendo Wii game, "Just Dance." (I think there's some dance footage of me floating around somewhere out there on the internet, too.)

We had a record number attend our annual winter retreat, too. We took 36 people (29 students and 7 adults) to Pigeon Forge a couple weeks ago. We had a great time together with our games and teaching sessions based on Francis Chan's book, Crazy Love. We also had a good time in downtown Gatlinburg, at the Comedy Barn, and at the outlet stores before heading back. It went remarkably smooth for the number of students who went. I have amazing adult volunteers that make this trip so much fun every year. We also collected a record number of warm clothing items for our association's annual Souper Bowl Party where they distribute the clothes to low-income individuals and families in the Lexington area. Last year, we collected probably about 50 or 60 items from our church to donate to the project. This year, the students turned it into a huge competition between the 14 adult Sunday School classes (complete with weekly skits and videos) to see who could donate the most, with the prize being a tasty continental breakfast for the winning class. The competition was fierce, and we ended up collecting almost 1000 items. Our students did a tremendous job, and I'm very proud of their hard work!

And just in this last week alone, we celebrated Chinese New Year (see Amy's blog here), Ben broke his bed by jumping on it (!), our youth group delivered 28 meals to some of our senior adults, and our church staff celebrated Mardi Gras (oh, and Ash Wednesday). And yesterday, because it was yet another snow day, we decided to get the youth together to shovel some snow and then go out to the movies and dinner together. A busy, but fun, week.

Oh, and every time I thought about sitting down to write a blog there was another big distraction--UK basketball!!! What a great season we're having! So, with that acknowledged, I guess you should expect my next update sometime after April 5th :).

camera phone

2009-12-31T10:23:00.007-05:00

So I was copying the pictures off my phone and realized there were some highlights from the last few months that I've neglected to share with everyone.

A big one is Kate's first day of preschool. You may remember our first-day-of-school ritual. In the same way, I took Kate out for breakfast on her first day of preschool. It was later because she started later in the year, shortly after her birthday. And, as you can see, she picked a hearty breakfast from McDonalds to celebrate.

Ben and Will also helped our youth group with raking leaves. They had a lot of fun... and literally helped "grab a corner." I'm excited about my kids getting opportunities to be a part of mission projects.

And just last Tuesday, our church took some college students to the Kentucky basketball game. I had an extra ticket at the last minute, so I was able to take Ben with me. He had a great time with his dad and learned a lot about basketball... plus, he got to see John Wall break the UK single game assist record and experience the number one program in college basketball history. Go Cats!

2010 GBC theme poll

2009-12-09T10:40:00.005-05:00

Just like last year, we're choosing a theme for our youth group for the coming year. This will be a word or phrase that we use along with a Scripture verse and design for a youth group t-shirt. It is also used throughout the year in lessons and events.

A quick survey of my last three years:

2007 "Becoming"
"Don't worry about your youth. Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity." 1 Timothy 4:12

2008 "Love Wins"
"We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us." 1 John 3:16

2009 "Reclaim the World"
"In Jesus we see God's original purpose in everything created. For everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him… all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe get properly fixed and fit together all because of his death on the cross." Colossians 1:15-16, 20 The Message

I'd love your feedback on the two finalists for next year.

reclaim the world

2009-12-09T09:42:00.005-05:00

Our youth group was challenged to "reclaim God's dream for the world" in 2009. With all the brokenness surrounding us, I'm proud of the many ways that they have done what they could to show love and bring restoration to those they have served. I want to share some of the ways they have done that just this year.

They have--

• Purchased Christmas gifts for a local family of five through the Share the Joy program
• Collected 56 shoe boxes from our church for Operation Christmas Child for kids around the world
• Visited Dover Manor for their Thanksgiving service
• Raked leaves for a senior adult in our congregation
• Went around the neighborhood to invite families to Trunk-or-Treat
• Tutored resettled refugee children in Lexington
• Worked with the resident farmers at Quest Farm to prepare for their harvest festival
• Kandice Kidd organized a blanket party to make and send 65 blankets to kids in an orphanage in Zambia
• Participated in “Sleepless in Lexington” to raise money and awareness for homelessness
• Spent a week in Chicago with CSM serving in soup kitchens and working with urban kids programs
• Participated in the community-wide Serve the City mission projects
• Served lunch and helped out at the Lighthouse feeding ministry in Lexington
• Canvassed the neighborhood asking for food donations for a feeding ministry
• Collected money to buy shoes for girls in a Guatemalan orphanage
• Collected blankets, coats and other warm items for the Elkhorn Association’s Souper Bowl party
• Prayed for missionaries and their work around the world
• Sent cards to many in our congregation

a hard funeral revisited

2009-11-22T00:27:00.001-05:00

A few weeks ago, I was asked to perform a funeral service for a man who was only four months older than me, who left behind a wife of 2 years and a step-daughter and a one-year old son. Though I don't know all the details, he apparently had a secret drug problem he kept hidden from his friends and family and died as a result of an overdose. Tragic and awful... and I had the task of saying something at the funeral to help bring comfort and make sense of it all.

This past Thursday, there was another tragic death. This time a twelve-year old boy from my church. Needless to say, I'm really struggling trying to deal with this one. My heart aches for everyone involved. I guess I just want to share some of the remarks that I offered at the funeral a few weeks ago:

If you’re familiar with the Lord’s Prayer, would you pray it together with me this afternoon?
Part of this prayer of Jesus that sticks with me today is “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” With the death of Chris, a lot of us here are thinking about heaven, this place that our imagination tries to picture—free from pain and tears and hurt and sin, a place filled with God and with those who have been transformed by Jesus—a place that is now reality for Chris.
But what Jesus says that we should pray for in this prayer is that we would live the life of heaven here on earth now. And that’s the problem, right? Our lives sometimes look nothing like heaven. We are broken people… splintered, misshapen, fractured, spinning off in the wrong direction, cracked, shattered, distorted, crushed. In all the ways we can describe it, broken.
Not that there isn’t beauty and love and hope, but alongside it is brokenness. This was certainly true for Chris. Even with his sweet wife, and his adoring kids, even with his supportive family and loving friends, he was still a broken person. And if you and I were to sit down together, I know many of you here this morning could tell me about your brokenness. Relationships splintered—we’re often either getting beat up, or ignoring someone else’s pain, or maybe even the one causing the pain. Sometimes our brokenness is internal. Maybe you sense it within yourself most deeply. Look at our splintered hearts, our crushed minds, our cracked spirits. It’s the inward brokenness of guilt, shame, over-obsession and insecurity.
What about our relationship with God? Maybe for you it is torn apart, cracked, misshapen. God wants to come close to us, and we push him away. God wants to come into our lives, and we crowd him out. God wants to show us the best possible way to live, and we refuse to even listen. We fail to love and obey him, and we find our relationship with God shattered.
It’s not a mistake that at the beginning of the story of Jesus, the first message of God to humans was “peace on earth.” Remember the Christmas story and the angels announcing peace to the shepherds? In the Bible, the word “peace” literally means… to put back together, to put back in, to restore as it was originally intended to be, to bring fulfillment. This is what the angels were so excited about. “Peace on earth!” They were announcing the peace of God on all the earth.
Whatever else you think Jesus is about, I want you to know this: God sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to begin the process of putting back together what is broken in us.
In the beginning of creation, the Bible tells us that God created us in his image and his dream for us was to live unbroken lives with him forever, but, when sin quickly came, that image was broken. God’s intention for creation was distorted. But God wants to restore what was broken, he wants to put back in what was lost. God has not given up on his dream for the world. And the coming of Jesus signals the restoration.
So Jesus, who is known as the Prince of Peace, his life means that our shattered lives can be put back together like new—better than new! God takes the pieces of our lives that are broken and splintered and shattered and miraculously reunites them. He takes our crushed relationships with others, within ourselves and with him, and fuses the pieces back together.
Through Jesus, God is restoring his people. He longs to take your pieces—all the junk in your life—and make you whole, without cracks, without splinters, without defect. Look at your life… do you think this is the way God intended for it to be? I know some of you could look at shards of glass and say, “that’s me.” You need to know your life was meant to be so much more than all this junk. I believe this isn’t all there is.
I’ve seen God put back together some of the broken pieces in my own life. Several years ago, I struggled through some depression… maybe not as severe as what maybe some of you are dealing with. But I know what it is like to feel like there’s something messed up and broken in my mind and find help and healing and to cling to the hope that God did not give up on me.
I think Chris’ family would really want you to hear this: If you’re here and struggling with some junk in your life, please get help. It’s okay if you’re not religious, but as one who has experienced it, I know that God can do a miracle in your life and make you whole. At the point you turn your life over to him, he will begin to heal the fractures and make your life into the life he always dreamed for it to be. It won’t always be easy; healing never is. But it’s worth it.
Now if you’re here and God has made a difference in your life, I need you to hear this: God is looking for partners. God’s renewal and restoration in your life is an invitation to join him in sharing the peace of God with other people. God is looking for men and women who will seek out those who are broken and cracked and help them to find wholeness. He wants to restore the world through you. Don’t be selfish: you were not saved simply for your own well-being, he wants you to be a part of his work in other people’s lives, too. God wants you to be the healing in their life, get your hands dirty—you be the remedy.
In a way, this is sort of like what my wife and I recently experienced. You see, we returned one year ago from adopting our daughter, Kate, from China. We already have two biological sons, and we could have said to ourselves, “thanks God for giving us a great family.” But, no, we saw so many orphans around the world without a family—huge brokenness—and felt that part of God’s calling in our lives was to reclaim one life out of that brokenness and be her forever family. At times it’s been hard, but we love our daughter so much and are so proud to be her parents.
Here’s what I need you to do this afternoon. 1. I want you right now to turn to the person next you and tell them, “This isn’t all there is.” Take a second to do that now. 2. I challenge you to be there for this precious family that Chris left behind, not only now, but down the road, too. Send cards, give hugs. In a few years, Elizabeth is going to need driving lessons… and I sure hope she doesn’t get them from her mom.
Let me end with this paraphrase of Hebrews 13:
“May God, who puts all things together, makes all things whole, Who made a lasting mark through the sacrifice of Jesus, the sacrifice of blood that sealed the eternal covenant, Who led Jesus, our Great Shepherd, up and alive from the dead, Now put you together, provide you with everything you need to please him, Make us into what gives him most pleasure, by means of the sacrifice of Jesus, the Messiah. All glory to Jesus forever and always!”
Live the life of heaven now.

operation christmas child

2009-11-18T10:14:00.004-05:00

I'm posting this video commercial that our youth made to publicize Operation Christmas Child for this year's shoe box collection. (Windows Moviemaker wouldn't let me add two audio overlays, so you will just hear the narration... when we showed it, we played music quietly in the background, too.)

It's pretty funny stuff... enjoy :)

More "24 things I've learned about my daughter"

2009-10-13T22:17:00.005-04:00

Last year after the first week with Kate Nana, I posted a list of 24 things I learned about my daughter. Since today is the one-year anniversary of her adoption, a.k.a. "gotcha day," I thought I would add to the list what I've learned.

She is even more absolutely perfect-er (cf. last year's #1).
She is brilliant. Watching her play, interact, sign and learn new things, I'm convinced she's a genius.
She is now an incurable "mama's girl." The first several weeks of her new life with us, she was the ultimate daddy's girl, never wanting to leave my arms. But coming home and with me going back to work during the day, she soon attached herself to Amy and now has an unmistakable preference for her mom. (It's okay though, I'm learning to deal with it and am waiting a few years until she reverts back to daddy's little girl.)
She's a feisty, independent woman. Kate loves to do things on her own. "I do it," she says.
She loves to do whatever her brothers are doing, including playing trucks, screaming at the top of her lungs, or wrestling as pretend superheroes.
She won't wear hair bows or barrettes, so we're forced to cut her bangs (which kills me). Sometimes she'll let us put her hair up in pig tails.
She can get her feelings hurt pretty easy when you tell her "no."
She is quite athletic... she's maybe the best of the three kids at soccer!
She is very excited about starting preschool in two weeks. She talks about it non-stop.
She is potty trained... mostly.
She loves houseboats, pools, and "baybing soos" (bathing suits).
She likes to eat treats (ice cream, candy, gum, milkshakes, "emmies"-M&Ms) and meat (hotdogs, chicken, bologna), but mostly just stares at fruits and veggies (though she likes lima beans and asparagus most of the time).
She loves to talk on the phone... which is funny because very few of us can understand her, especially when she gets to rattling off some big story.
Like most women, she changes her mind early and often.
She sings like an angel. Part of our nighttime singing ritual usually includes "The B-I-B-L-E" and "Jesus Loves Me."
She is getting more and more used to her reconstructed palate and learning to make lots of new sounds and funny faces with her mouth :) And her ear tubes have worked wonderful so far to keep away earaches. We're still hopeful that she'll eventually have full hearing in both ears.
She is ticklish everywhere and has a contagious laugh, along with the most beautiful smile... careful, it will melt you!
She doesn't seem to have many of those tearful "grieving moments" anymore... though she still requires one of us to stay by her room until she falls asleep each night.
She loves to "help." Whatever it is, she wants to be in on it with the excuse "I want to help!"
She likes to wear dresses, tights and anything pink... or with Spiderman on it!
She is growing very big and tall. It's hard to believe she'll be 3 years old soon!
She likes to go on trips and doesn't like to be left home when anyone is going out.
She's still very hot-natured... it's funny how easily she works up a good sweat.
And she's still much more wonderful than I deserve!!!! I'm so thankful to be her dad.

top 10 advice to young aspiring ministers

2009-10-06T21:24:00.007-04:00

Last week I spoke at Georgetown College's Intro to Ministry class and shared with them my top ten words of advice. Since they are young aspiring ministry students, I thought of what I would have needed to hear the most when I was in their place 11 years ago. Here's my list:

1. Do what is life-giving. Do what you are gifted in and what gives you life regardless of recognition or pay; don't settle for the supposed "optimal career path." Ministries like student ministry, education, missions, etc. are not stepping stones to "real ministry." Also in whatever ministry they end up in, I want to encourage them to make sure they get to do a good chunk of what is life-giving, not just life-draining. For me, it's things like my guys small group. I have at least 3 other adult volunteers who could do this for me, but because it is something that gives me life, I make sure I get to do it.

2. Affirm truth/ faith/ good/ creativity wherever you see it. Don't be that guy who thinks that God only works through you. Be willing to affirm God's work around you. It's not a threat to your value or success if other's are doing good. It's like the disciple John in Mark 9:38 who says, "We saw a man driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us," but who Jesus affirms saying, "Do not stop him... anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to Christ will certainly not lose his reward."

3. Play well with others. Be willing to network with others in your field, which for me is other youth ministers. And also foster good relationships with the people you minister to and with, which in my context includes other staff, parents, and schools. You'll need to lean on these relationships sooner or later.

4. Eat your frog first thing in the morning (this is my key to working efficiently). Mark Twain is quoted as saying, "Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day." What I have learned is that when I do the thing I least want to do first thing in the morning, it makes the rest of my day much more productive. What happens if I put it off is that I spend time distracted, wasting time avoiding it, and worrying about it so that it grows bigger and bigger and becomes harder and harder to eat. Small frogs are not fun, but it's better than the big ones.

5. Think relationally... specifically close, long-term and vulnerable. Most ministry students have probably heard the importance of relational ministry, but let me be a little more specific with what I mean. I think it's extremely important to minister in close proximity to those you hope to influence. This is especially evident when I have participated in inner city mission work... nothing can replace getting down on your knees, touching a hand and looking directly into the eyes of a child of God suffering under poverty and homelessness. Also, the value of long-term ministry is sometimes neglected. Youth ministry has been perpetually plagued by brief stays and quick departures, and studies have shown how deeply it has impacted ineffectiveness (it's not hard to imagine why that is). Longevity can make a huge difference. And finally, you need to understand that your healing is interconnected with the healing of others. Recognize that you're not in ministry because you have it all together and want to make everyone else whole... rather, we are vulnerable in admitting that we find our own healing in bringing healing to others. As I stated in a recent blog post, I believe God made us in such a way that our salvation is interconnected. "We cannot fully recover until we help the society that made us sick recover." That's why we care about the lost, the orphan, the hungry, the planet... so that we will find healing for the brokenness in our own soul through it.

6. Major in English... and maybe philosophy. Good writing and communication skills are an issue of credibility. I admit I'm personally put off by something poorly written, poorly edited, or not well-thought out. In whatever ministry context you find yourself, you will need to be a good writer as you prepare lessons, sermons, bulletin announcements, newsletters, prayer updates or whatever. Your writing skills will make a huge difference on how your material is received.

7. You don't know what you don't know. Any education you can get is great. With that said, seminary is really only one tool along with other very valuable and up-to-date resources like internships, low pressure ministry jobs, mentors, learning experiences, conferences and books. I think I learned the most from early ministry jobs that allowed for a lot of room to mess up (mostly because they didn't pay very much and were just happy to have someone!). And since you don't know what you don't know, by all means learn to listen and allow people to give you helpful advice. (By the way, I'll be accepting applications for next summer's youth ministry internship soon!)

8. Be ready to reinvent ministry. Change is guaranteed, so learn to embrace it in creativity for new generations. Lord help us if ministry looks the same tomorrow as it does today!

9. You are a human being, not a human doing. Jesus says in Matthew 16:26, "And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?" So don't neglect who you are becoming because you are focused on what you are doing and accomplishing. Your value is not in what you do, but in who you are. So the question isn't "what do you want to do when you grow up?" but "what do you want to be when you grow up?"

10. The world needs you... even if they don't know it yet. You're right, this isn't so much a piece of advice as much as it is an encouragement. When you are called to ministry, I want you to know that what you are doing is extremely valuable. You are giving yourself away for the sake of the world. However, so that you don't get carried away, you should also know that you need the world, too. (And, by the way, don't ever let this become an excuse to neglect your first ministry-- your family!)

What do you think? What would be your top ten list of advice?

creativity and prophetic imagination

2009-09-16T16:00:00.001-04:00

After all these years with Jesus, I think that sometimes what recaptures my heart and thoughts is the creativity, beauty and imagination in Jesus' message. I believe there is amazing tranformative power in creativity.

Think about it... When God wanted to do something about the brokenness and corruption of his beloved creation--humanity--he sends Jesus. The incarnation, Jesus, God-in-flesh coming to earth to show us what the invisible God is like. Why didn't he just send some new guidelines to follow to make us better... or "zap" us to fix the problems... or just give up, destroy us and start over? He came up with another way... completely unexpected and creative, and by it to show us that he loves and values us, even in our brokenness... and showing us in the flesh-and-blood Jesus that "being fixed" is less about following all the correct rules and more about the long journey of a heart learning to be fully fixed on him. Beautiful!

Then there's the church. When God wants to bring restoration to all the earth, he decides to use broken and messed up people to do it. Why wouldn't he just use angels or create an army of super-christians to go around fixing the mess... people who would always get it right and know how to get the right outcome in an efficient manner? Instead, in his amazing creativity, Jesus chooses to create us in a way that we find our own healing in the midst of the healing of others... interconnected salvation. "We cannot fully recover until we help the society that made us sick recover." That's why we care about the lost, the orphan, the hungry, the planet... that's why I am in ministry... because I need healing for the brokenness in my own soul, and I find it in ministering to the needs of others. Brilliant!

And the cross? Why would God use a cross instead of an army and an empire to inaugurate a new kingdom? On the cross, Jesus suffered death at the hands of violence and power to reveal the impotence of violence to accomplish redemption and transformation and to show what true power looks like. What is the stronger power... to fight back (with all of heaven's might at your disposal) or to resist and actively love your enemy? Exactly. God's imagination is so amazing... and I never would have thought of it in a million years.

What about the Sermon on the Mount and Matthew 5:39-41? Jesus gives examples of revolution as turning the other cheek, giving up your cloak as well, and walking the extra mile? Here's how it's explained in the book, Jesus for President (with insight from the work of Walter Wink):

You gotta love Jesus' imagination... When someone makes you walk a mile with them, go with them another mile (v.41). This may seem like a strange scenario, but for first-century Jews, it was common to be asked to walk a mile with a soldier. With no Humvees or tanks, soldiers traveled on foot and carried large amounts of gear, so they depended on civilians to carry their supplies. I'm sure there were plenty of Zealots listening to Jesus who threw a fist in the air when they were asked to walk with a soldier. Roman law specified that civilians had to walk one mile, but that's all. (In fact, going a second mile was an infraction of the military code. It would be simply absurd for a Jew to befriend an occupying soldier and want to walk an extra mile with him.) It's a beautiful scene to imagine a soldier asking for his backpack but the person insists on another mile. When asked to carry a pack, don't spit in the person's face but walk with them, even two miles instead of one. Get to know them, not as an enemy but as a person. Talk with them and woo them into our movement by your love--that is, if they'll break their own law to walk two miles with you... 'Evil can be opposed without being mirrored... oppressors can be resisted without be emulated... enemies can be neutralized without being destroyed.'

This is what Walter Brueggemann calls "prophetic imagination." That the people of God can transform the world through creativity and imagination.

Where are the modern examples of this kind of prophetic imagination? What is today's "Jubilee" (an ancient Jewish festival every 50 years of debt forgiveness and slavery freeing) that needs to happen here and now? How do we frame the teachings, "blessed are the poor, the mourners, the meek, the hungry," with creativity for today's hearers? What are the new stories of the Good Samaritan who creatively challenges us with neighbor love? How can I use imagination and creativity to partner with God in reclaiming the world and share the message of Christ's kingdom?

Because I am so very bad at this, here is my prayer: God, help me to join others in reimagining the world. Let me listen and (re)act with with your creativity. Amen.

fantasy football team

2009-08-25T22:14:00.003-04:00

This is my first year participating in a fantasy football league. We had our league draft last Tuesday night, and this is my team, "The Men In Tights":

Starters--
QB: Tom Brady, NE
RB: Clinton Portis, Was
RB: Brian Westbrook, Phi
RB/WR: Ahmad Bradshaw, NYG RB
WR: Brandon Marshall, Den
WR: Roy E. Williams, Dal
TE: Chris Cooley, Was
D/ST: Chargers
K: John Carney, NO
*****************
Bench--
QB: Jake Delhomme, Car
RB: Darren Sproles, SD
RB: Fred Taylor, NE
WR: Percy Harvin, Min
WR: Michael Crabtree, SF
WR: Steve Smith, NYG
TE: Jermichael Finley, GB
K: Garrett Hartley, NO

Will's birthday party

2009-08-17T23:11:00.003-04:00

This past Saturday we celebrated Will's birthday here at the house (with the swing set, the inflatable pool, sand box, toys and food). He enjoyed being the center of attention for the day. We had lots of guests including the four of us, 5 grandparents, a cousin, 6 friends, and 3 parents of friends. We had a beautiful day and a whole lot of fun! I'm so proud of my big guy :)

Amy once again did a great job on the birthday cake!

School Starts and Tradition Continues

2009-08-12T14:43:00.006-04:00

This week was the beginning of a new school year in our house. My oldest son, Ben, began First Grade on Monday. This is his first time going to school all-day, every-day, Monday through Friday. He's a great student and loves school.

And today was the day that my second son, Will, started his second year of preschool. He goes half-day, three days a week. He loves it and is so creative and smart. I know he'll have a great year.

I'm so proud of my kids, and one way I try to show them is by taking them out to breakfast before school on their first day of class. I want to honor their love of school and try to be a part of this milestone in their life by doing something special with them. It was fun listening to them for several days in advance trying to figure out where they wanted to go for the annual "first day of school breakfast." Ben picked Big Boy on Monday, but because it didn't open until 7:00am, we ended up going to Waffle House and getting waffles and bacon. After we dropped off Ben at school this morning, we went to Big Boy and had the breakfast buffet. I look forward to when I get to do this with Kate and continuing the tradition with all of them for many years to come. I'm such a blessed father!

Crossings '09 Camp Highlight Video

2009-08-05T09:49:00.002-04:00

Chicago (part 2)

2009-07-16T22:56:00.005-04:00

Sorry about the long delay between posts... I hope to have a chance to update more next week.

In this post, I want to tell a few details about our mission trip to Chicago. Part of the problem, however, is that our team was split into two groups for most of the activities, so you'll have to settle with about half the story... But I do have a few pictures I can share from the other serving group (and maybe I should invite Donna to be a guest writer to share more).

We got to town on Sunday evening (with some minor traffic delays on our way to pick up Kandice from the airport) and got settled at our housing site. On all 4 CSM trips I've been on, the housing has been different. This year in Chicago we were housed on the edge of North Park University in the Albany Park neighborhood. We stayed in a row house that was actually owned by the college and rented by CSM. The other church groups there were in other buildings, except we shared our house with a group from Utah. The house was an old building with little furniture (a few bunk beds), no air conditioning (so we were thankful for mild temperatures all week) and three floors. The guys slept on the first floor and the girls on the second, and sometimes we used the basement for our evening debriefing. Because of the old pipes and large number of people, we weren't able to shower there. We had scheduled shower times in the evening where we walked over to the campus and showered in their locker rooms... which meant community showers for the guys (insert giggles here). We didn't spend a lot of time at the house because of our busy schedule, but we had our breakfast and "quiet time" devotions each morning and we had debrief, showers, "quiet hour" and "cell phone access half hour" each evening. All in all, it worked very well for us.

After we got settled at the house, met our city hosts (Wesley, Dale and Brooke) and had a brief orientation, we headed out for dinner. Each evening we ate at a local ethnic restaurant as a way to experience the culture of the city. On Sunday night we started out with dinner at a Thai restaurant in the Uptown neighborhood. It was great food, and I was pleased with the kids' good attitudes and willingness to try new things. It was served family style, but they only brought out one dish at a time... it was almost like a meal with eight courses.

After dinner was the prayer tour. This is one of the best parts of CSM for me. It's hard to explain, but it provides a powerful beginning to the week by taking us around the city and sharing insights into where God is at work there. What we do is we load up in the vans and our city hosts guide us around the city where we see some the obvious tourist sites... but the impact of the prayer tour is that we pause and think rethink their significance or we will reflect on some not-so-obvious meaningful places. For example, a not-so-obvious point along our prayer tour was the once all-white country club that over the years had been integrated and made open to the public and became a symbol of progress in that neighborhood. Another example was the well-known and brand new U.S. Cellular Field where the Chicago White Sox play baseball. What we reflected on was its positioning in the southside of Chicago and how they tore down all kinds of housing to build it and the resulting strain on the homelessness in the area... all the while, refusing to tear down the old stadium because they didn't want the baseball team to be without a home for even a short time. The implication: the homelessness of the baseball team took priority over the homelessness of the residents of that area. Another powerful illustration from this prayer tour was driving Michigan Avenue. You may know the "Magnificent Mile" and all the shopping and beautiful downtown buildings of Chicago that line that street, but what you may not realize that this same road stretches south and it's the very same road that quickly becomes lined by pollution, liquor stores, pawn shops and other signs of poverty. It may be the same street, but there's a world of difference from one end to the other.

You see, it was on a prayer tour just like this in Philadelphia several years ago I found myself in a park overlooking the city when God hit me with something that has moved my heart for missions in a powerful way. This may seem a little strange to you, but I remember looking up at the bright stars filling the sky and my middle school science coming back to me, thinking about the difference between these stars and the sun. The sun is simply another star (actually it's even a weak star in comparison to the others) and yet it has so much influence over me and the rest of the earth (heat, growth, power, etc.). And looking up at all those thousands of stars in the sky, they are beautiful, but they really don't have much practical influence over my life. The difference? The sun is closer. Proximity equals influence. Sometimes I think I'm not the most beautiful or powerful Christian around, but when I am willing to get close to the broken and needy, then I am able to make the biggest difference. I don't have to be the best, I just need to come near... and then I'll be able to have real influence in their lives.

(the other serving team at CCO)

Anyways, Monday was the first day of serving at our ministry sites. The other team loaded up and headed to their anchor site, Cornerstone Community Outreach (CCO), a women and children's shelter where they ran a VBS program for the children who were staying there. My group headed out to the YMCA to help with a children's program. We were split up to help out in three different areas helping the teacher and giving these children a lot of extra positive attention. We read stories, played games, reviewed lessons, danced around, chased on the playground, and anything else we could do to pour our lives into these young children for the brief amount of time we had that morning. It was the Monday after Michael Jackson died, so I remember one of the teachers bringing a MJ album to play in her cd player while the kids were playing on the playground. Fun memories.

That afternoon, we went over to the Uptown neighborhood and were given a task to perform. We were divided into two groups, given $5 and were told to talk to people in the area and find a way to help someone with that money. I was so proud of Jennifer's group who went and bought a bunch of water bottles and gave them away to people they met as an act of kindness. They really blessed a lot of people through that creative generosity.

Later, we had a chance to visit the CCO where the other team was doing the morning VBS, only we were there to help prepare and serve dinner Monday evening. I love feeding ministries because of the opportunities to actively serve (through passing out meals and cleaning up) and to meaningfully engage the people who are there in conversation. Here I spent most of my time washing dishes, but our students did a great job jumping in wherever they could.

That night, we met back up with the other group at a Lebanese (Middle Eastern) restaurant in our neighborhood, and I got to try pickled radish (not so good) and felafel (not so bad). We went back to debrief, shower, and head to bed.

And that is where I will pick up later... with Tuesday.

Chicago (part 1)

2009-07-06T22:12:00.001-04:00

This past week, I led a team from our church on a mission trip to Chicago. It was an amazing week, and I'd like to share a few thoughts about the trip... probably over the course of several posts :).

First of all, I really like working with CSM for several reasons. (By the way, check out their blog here.) CSM is great about offering a variety of ministry opportunities. Whereas on most mission trips, you build a house, offer a backyard Bible club, or do some kind of evangelism campaign, with CSM you get to do several things during the week-- even several things a day! So, when I have a student who complains about having to wash dishes, I can say, "No problem, we'll be doing something different in a couple hours." For example, this past week we had two groups (a group of 10 and a group of 11, not counting CSM hosts), and between these groups we served in three childrens programs (CCO, YMCA and By the Hand), four city "experiences" (the prayer tour, Meet a Need, Immersion and Ethnic Plunge), and four feeding ministries (Living Room Cafe, CCO, CCIL, and Humboldt Park Social Services). On top of that, the students experienced the city's cultures through four different ethnic restaurants (Thai, Lebanese, Indian and Mexican). These experiences expose the youth to a whole host of issues pertaining to the city they are serving... you really get a better sense of "Chicago" because of it.

In addition to the variety CSM trips provide, they are great because they are very flexible and customizable to our group, they do all the legwork, and they provide you with great city hosts to work alongside the groups. And it's nice to know that once we leave, CSM doesn't. CSM has an ongoing presence with these great ministries we work in. It may be short-term for us, but they are constantly supporting and providing volunteers to many of these ministry areas.

I'm also a big fan of doing urban ministry with my students. I've now taken youth to work in the inner cities of Toronto, Nashville, Philadelphia and Chicago. Sitting at a table across from a hungry family at a soup kitchen, kneeling down to deliver a bag lunch to a homeless person on the street, looking into the eyes of kids who are becoming hardened by the streets, driving through neighborhoods where there is no one who looks like them, being confronted by the reality of poverty, hopelessness, and injustice-- these are truly cross-cultural trips that show a part of the world that kids from Kentucky are rarely ever exposed to (without the cost of having to fly overseas). And I believe there is great value in just being exposed to it... to see it with your own eyes and to feel the weight of it bear down on your soul. You can't leave the city unchanged.

Another exciting thing about this year was our student participation. The first year I was at GBC, we took a group of seven to Nashville. Last year, we had 14 go to Toronto. This year, we again jumped by seven and took 21 with us to Chicago (and an extra van). Because we were split up, I missed getting to spend time with Alex and Donna and the nine kids in their group, but Jennifer and my group were awesome! It gives me a lot of hope for the direction of our youth ministry and the priority of missions in the lives of these youth. Along with the attendance, we had a couple of our youth participate by contributing to our morning quiet times. We have a tradition (handed down from my own experience in youth group) of having a half-hour morning quiet time where we have our Bibles, a pen, and a couple written pages to lead us in morning devotions and prayer. Usually I put these together myself, but this year I was excited to have Andrew and Rebecca write one each for our trip (Monday & Wednesday). They did such a great job, and I'm so proud of the work they put into it. Also, almost all of our group prayed out loud at some point during the trip, whether for a ministry site, a meal, or during our debriefing time. They all worked so hard all week. Great participation by everyone!

More to come later...

beach pictures

2009-06-15T14:57:00.005-04:00

* We all shared our pictures with one another, so most of the good ones were taken by Wendy or Mom!

UK basketball continued

2009-05-26T23:33:00.002-04:00

And because I'm just that obsessive, I worked up this little chart for comparisons.

By the way, I failed to mentioned that I will get to see Coach John Calipari on July 17th (thanks to my parents).

UK basketball

2009-05-26T20:41:00.000-04:00

*(warning: I'm a little bit obsessed with my college alma mater's basketball program) April 1, 2009. The day that may soon become a state-wide holiday. The day the University of Kentucky hired their new head men's basketball coach, John Calipari.

What has Coach John Calipari accomplished in his first 8 weeks as coach at UK (since the season doesn't start until November)? Not much... just the recruitment of the #1 incoming class in college basketball (and maybe the #1 class in the recent history of college basketball). (Oh, that and over 95,000 followers on twitter.)

Consider the two classes that have been talked about at the top of the all-time recruiting list: Michigan's 1991 class, "the Fab Five," and Ohio State's 2006 class, "the Thad 5" (named after their coach, Thad Matta). Here are their rankings when they signed with their schools--

* A few things to note about this comparison. First, Raymar Morgan, although offered a scholarship by Ohio State, ended up at Michigan State. They instead signed Junior College (JUCO) transfer, Othello Hunter. Also, the rankings are a little difficult because the major recruiting services (Rivals and Scouts) weren't around in 1991, so Michigan's rankings are based on Bob Gibbons' rankings. Also, this chart uses Scout.com; if you look at Rivals.com, they listed OSU's 4 freshman as #1, #13, #18, and #36 (three 5-star recruits and one 4-star). Either way, these were two amazing recruiting classes, both as prospects and, as we learned from watching them, in actual performance. Four of Michigan's recruits eventually made their way to the NBA, and three of the Buckeyes' recruits were selected in the first round of the 2007 NBA draft.

Both these recruiting classes ended up getting their teams to the championship game of the NCAA tournament in their first year (and Michigan got there again as Sophmores)... though each time they lost in the finals. Michigan lost by 20 points in the 1992 championship game to the Duke team that beat UK in the final four (you know, the game with "the shot" that CBS shows over and over again every year during March Madness). Then Michigan lost in 1993 to North Carolina, with Chris Weber's infamous time-out technical. Then, more recently, the Buckeyes lost in the 2007 championship game to Florida.

Now to Kentucky's 2009 recruiting class. Calipari has signed 6 players for the upcoming basketball season. (I wish I had a creative name for this class, sort of like "the Fab Five"... maybe "the Cal Six"?)

Name- position/ rivals.com ranking (& stars)/ scout.com ranking

John Wall- Point Guard/ #1 (5-stars)/ #2

DeMarcus Cousins- Power Forward/ #2 (5-stars)/ #3

Daniel Orton- Center/ #22 (5-stars)/#17

Eric Bledsoe- Point Guard/ #23 (5-stars)/ #37

John Hood- Shooting Guard/ #40 (4-stars)/ #45

(who recently won the Kentucky high school high jump championship... reminds me of Jeff Shepherd who was a high jump champ)

Darnell Dodson (JUCO transfer)- Small Forward/ nr (4-stars)/ nr

Now, granted, we don't know how this recruiting class will turn out yet, how they'll perform as a team during the game. But the reason I say this might be the best ever is because there are three things that have never happened before (at least since the modern era of recruiting services): one team recruits the #1 and #2 top freshmen in the country, one team recruits four 5-star freshman, and one team has 5 freshman recruits in the top 40 in the country.

Don't forget that this goes along with some strong returning talent. If Jodie Meeks (last year's leading scorer in the SEC), who currently has his name in the NBA draft, decides to come back for his senior year, we will have two returning first team all-SEC players with him and Patrick Patterson. On top of that, we have a leading shot-blocker in Perry Stevenson and a maturing scorer in Darius Miller (who looks like he was made for Calipari's "dribble-drive motion offense").

The only problem UK has is too many players for not enough scholarships. Here's where we stand now.

13 scholarships=

6 new recruits +

Patrick Patterson (Jr.) +

Darius Miller (So.) +

Perry Stevenson (Sr.) +

Ramon Harris (Sr.) +
maybe Jodie Meeks (Sr.) ???

So far we've already said goodbye to Jared Carter and Michael Porter (who graduated) and Donald Williams and AJ Stewart (who are transferring out). So, if Meeks returns and all the new players qualify academically, this leaves only two scholarships for these four remaining players:

Kevin Galloway (Sr.)

Matt Pilgrim (Sr.)

DeAndre Liggins (So.)

Josh Harrellson (Jr.)-- who, according to his facebook status, is officially coming back next year :)

All of this is translating into an amazing turn around in the Kentucky program. At the end of last season, all of the Wildcat fans were bemoaning our poor performance in the NIT, looking at the probable loss of Patterson and Meeks to the NBA, worried about our anemic recruiting, staring at the looming loss of "winningest program" status, and annoyed that we had a coach that didn't even seem to care. Now with the arrival of John Calipari and his recruiting class, we are projected to be a preseason top 5 team, a final four contender, an SEC favorite, and optimistic about remaining the all-time winningest program (and beating UNC to 2000 wins... by the way, it's currently 1988 to 1984, with Kansas at 1970 and Duke at 1876). The future looks bright.

Go Cats!

By the way, here are some good blogs for lots of UK basketball updates and links to news stories:

UK athletics page

Aaron's basketball blog

Kentucky Sports Radio

relationships and obedience

2009-05-13T16:15:00.001-04:00

I had an interesting teaching moment this past Sunday during our morning youth Bible study that I've gone back and thought about several times since... and I think it's worth sharing.

We were studying the first chapter of the book of Daniel in the Old Testament. In it, Daniel and his three friends (Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego) make the tough decision to refuse the king's food and instead restrict themselves to a diet of only vegetables and water. Whether the problem with the food was an issue of Jewish dietary restrictions or whether it had been a part of idol worship or whatever, Daniel felt that eating it would have a negative affect on his relationship with God. Obviously the easy thing would have been to keep quiet and eat what everyone else was eating. The hard thing was going against the flow in order to honor God.

And so comes the question: Why? Why would we ever choose the hard task of obeying God when it's more desirable and/or easier to go the way of the rest of humanity?

Before I get to the payoff, you should know that earlier in the morning we played a game in which three of our students tried to get as many followers as they could. Each one had the task of convincing the other youth to do what they told them to do (and not what the other two potential leaders were trying to tell them to do). One of the leaders, Kandice, was getting people to hold hands and was successful in getting two guys who were sitting next to one another to follow her instructions and hold hands (and, being a guy, I know this is certainly not something we normally want to do).

So, when I asked the question, why would we want to obey God when it's hard and inconvenient, this illustration hit me. I asked Tyler (one of the boys who agreed to hold hands with another boy), "Why would you do something that you obviously wouldn't normally want to do?" He said, "I don't know... it's Kandice."

Exactly. It's because of his relationship with her that he was willing to do it. He may not have agreed to do it for most anybody else (including me), but, for her, no problem. It didn't matter that it made him uncomfortable or that she didn't give him a great reason for agreeing to it; he knew and trusted the person who asked him. In fact, if he didn't do it, he knew there was the potential to hurt her feelings... and, as a result, the quality of their friendship.

I tried to explain to the teenagers that this is the exact (and only real) reason for obeying Jesus... out of a relationship with him. So, when Jesus asks me to do something hard or uncomfortable, why should I do it? Because it's Jesus... and I love Jesus. Which, by the way, if this is true, it should never be surprising when someone who is not a Christian, doesn't act like a Christian and doesn't obey Jesus' words. They don't have a relationship with Jesus and have no reason to listen to him. But, on the other hand, if we claim to have a love relationship with Jesus, when we choose to disobey him, we should really be concerned about what that implies about the quality of our relationship. Or as Jesus puts it, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching... he who does not love me will not obey my teaching" (John 14:23-24). Or as John says, "If we claim to have fellowship with [Jesus] yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth" (1 John 1:6).

So, going back to the book of Daniel, one of the things we know about Daniel was that he had a strong relationship with God. If you know the story of the Lion's Den, then you know he was punished precisely because he was more willing to sacrifice his life than he was willing to sacrifice his relationship with God through prayer. Daniel was able to make the tough decisions and obey faithfully because he had a relationship and thoroughly trusted the One who asked him to follow.

The life of adolescence is filled with tough decisions... and "small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it" (Matthew 7:14).

t-ball

2009-05-10T23:47:00.006-04:00

So last week, as I was breaking in the boys' baseball gloves in preparation for t-ball season, it really hit me that with Ben and Will I was moving out of the phase of being "the daddy to these little kids" and was now "the dad of boys"! Somehow breaking in baseball gloves made it real that my boys were growing up (though Will's meltdowns bring me back pretty quick).

Here's a few pictures from Saturday's game (btw, if you know me, how great is it that their t-ball team is named the "Cubs"!). Ben is #6 and Will is #1.

(Ben playing 3rd base)

(Will playing "in the field")

(their biggest fans!)

(after the game, watching Saturday cartoons)

Chicago

2009-04-28T15:02:00.001-04:00

This past weekend I had a great trip to Chicago. The express purpose of the trip was a pre-trip meeting with the city directors of CSM to plan for our youth mission trip there this summer. However, I used this as an opportunity to have some fun, too!

I invited one of my friends, Alex, to go with me (he's going on the mission trip with us as an adult volunteer, too). Alex is a great roadtrip buddy (in January we went to the Liberty Bowl in Memphis together)... we have great conversation for the long car rides and he's up for a little adventure, even we have no clue what we're doing.

We left Thursday afternoon--stopping for dinner, fuel and our first Jamba Juice in Merrillville-- and arrived in Chicago around 9:00pm Central Time. One of the coolest things about our trip was where we stayed. We called a while back and made arrangements to stay with "The Jesus People." The Jesus People USA, or JPUSA (pronounced Ja-POO-za), is an intentional community of Christians who live, worship and work together. Started over 36 years ago, members of JPUSA live in an old hotel in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago. Currently they have about 450 people living together, and through their faith community they support one another and share resources (like food, transportation, kids' education, bills, etc.) by the money they make through the businesses they run (roofing supply stores, coffee house, skate shop and even the large outdoor music festival, Cornerstone). They also run five shelters in the Chicago area (one of which our youth will be working in during the mission trip). It was great to see the place in action and hear them talk about what life was like living there. Alex and I stayed in the single men's apartments and helped out by washing dishes on Saturday morning.

(cross collage in the cafeteria)

On Friday morning, after devotions at JPUSA, we headed over to the offices for the Center for Student Missions on the edge of Northpark University campus in the Albany neighborhood. CSM is the organization that is coordinating our youth mission trip this summer. We met with the city directors, Julia, Kelly and Tim, and talked about what we would need to know to prepare for our trip. Because this is a larger group than we've ever taken before, our group will be divided into two groups for most of the project sites. So we talked about our city hosts, our ministry sites, transportation, the logistics of picking up one of our students from the airport, other schedule issues, and some things we wanted them to know about our group. They took us by the housing site where we will be staying and explained the challenges of accommodating so many students in the summer (food, bathrooms, fans, etc.). Then they took us over to Cornerstone Community Outreach, the shelter run by JPUSA for women and children, and explained about the VBS we would be running for the kids while we're there. Afterward we ate lunch at a Thai restaurant (one of the features of our trip is that we'll be eating dinner at local ethnic restaurants like this one each night).

After the visit with CSM, we got metro passes and jumped on the elevated train (aka "the L") into the city. It was a beautiful day, so we spent a long time walking around town and people watching. We walked by Navy Pier and eventually found ourselves at a movie theater watching "State of Play."

After walking around some more, we took the train to the Wrigley area, got some pizza, and found another Jamba Juice.

As you know, Saturday morning Alex and I washed breakfast dishes for JPUSA and chatted with people there til lunch. Then, since we needed to kill some time and it was a beautiful day, we headed down to the waterfront and sat and read. After a while, we made our way back into the city to find a good spot to watch the NFL draft (btw, I think Cleveland drafted pretty well overall this year). Right when we were getting ready to head out, there came a downpour. I thought there was a Jamba Juice pretty close so, while Alex went back to the car, I decided to go find it. It was not close. So about an hour later (and a couple miles, a hail storm, and being very cold and wet), I finally got back to the car with my smoothie. We stuck around a little longer to hear our friend, Brad's band "Suzy Brack and the New Jack Lords" play at the Bird's Nest on Southport. They were great, and I'm glad we stuck around to hear them play.

So, finally at 9:00pm (10 o'clock our time) we left Chicago and headed back home. Yes, that's right... we didn't get home until after 4:00am, and I was up for church at 7:30am Sunday morning! My meager three hours of sleep turned into a very long Sunday, but it all worked out and we had an awesome trip. In fact, the trip really got me excited for our youth mission trip, and I can't wait to go back to Chicago again in June with 19 teenagers :)

"fast" shoes

2009-04-16T09:57:00.006-04:00

Today I'm fasting... sort of. It's not a typical fast, i.e. going without food. Instead, I'm going without shoes for the day.

I'm participating in the "one day without shoes" campaign sponsored by a small internet shoe company called Toms Shoes. Part of the mission of Toms is that for every pair of shoes they sell, they give a pair away to children in need. To date, they have given 140,000 pairs of shoes.

Also, last month our youth group took up a collection to give to a local church's mission team in order to buy shoes for girls in a Guatemalan orphanage.

Shoes can make a big difference. Consider:

In most developing nations, people go barefoot (possibly as much at 4 out of the 6 billion people on our planet).
Walking is often the primary mode of transportation in developing countries. Children can walk for miles to food, clean water and to seek medical help.
Wearing shoes prevents feet from getting cuts and sores on unsafe roads and from contaminated soil. Not only are these injuries painful, they also are dangerous when wounds become infected. The leading cause of disease in developing countries is soil-transmitted parasites which penetrate the skin through open sores. Wearing shoes can prevent this and the risk of amputation.
Many times children can't attend school barefoot because shoes are a required part of their uniform. If they don't have shoes, they don't go to school. If they don't receive an education, they don't have the opportunity to realize their potential.
In Ethiopia, approximately one million people are suffering from Podoconiosis, a debilitating and disfiguring disease caused by walking barefoot on volcanic soil.
Podoconiosis is 100% preventable by wearing shoes.
There are children here in our own state who have to go without shoes, too.

So today I'm fasting from shoes. In many ways it's like "regular fasting." It is an intentional effort to change my focus... to become less selfish and thoughtless of others, to becoming more focused on God and the suffering of his children. Also it provides me with a constant reminder (through its discomfort or the public awkwardness) of what I am doing and, more importantly, why I am doing it. It's a call to pray and ask for God's intervention. Like the hunger produced from normal fasting, going shoeless also gives me an opportunity to feel what others feel, to more fully understand another person's plight. And in my life that is often far too flippant about things, fasting shows that there are some things that are worth taking seriously.

Unlike typical fasting, I am doing this publicly (c.f. Matthew 6:16-18 where we are told to keep our fasting private). I am hoping that by going barefoot today I will help raise awareness of the need for generosity and aid for those without shoes. In addition to this blog, facebook, and twitter, I have fliers to give people I see today. I want people to know that I am standing in solidarity with my fellow human beings, shoulder to shoulder, trying to give them a voice. I am urging us to have greater compassion for the shoeless children of our world.

You know, yesterday there were many demonstrations about the fair tax, and I admit my ignorance about the whole issue. I have no idea if it's good or not. But it seems there's a big difference between what they did yesterday and what those of use who are going shoeless today are doing. Yesterday they demonstrated on their own behalf, hoping to get what they feel is in their own best interests... standing up for their supposed "rights." Today, I don't stand up for myself or my own rights (I'm already too spoiled); instead, I am standing up for someone else.

I want to encourage you to get involved. Go barefoot! Find ways to support shoe delivery efforts around the world. Give generously. Have compassion--walk a mile in their shoes (?).

"official" image for the GBC youth 2009 theme

2009-04-15T16:16:00.004-04:00

* I know it's April, but I just now got the "real" image.

Springtime

2009-04-13T23:50:00.005-04:00

Spring is honest-to-goodness finally here, with blooms on the trees, a freshly tilled garden (wish us luck)... and, of course, some pictures!

We had a very nice Easter, too... even if the kids wouldn't sit still for pictures!

Stations of the Cross: A Virtual Journey to the Cross

2009-04-07T13:34:00.009-04:00

Last Sunday morning, I put together a wholly different kind of lesson for our youth--"The Stations of the Cross." It is a self-guided prayer time, where the students physically walk around the room to different stations representing points along Jesus' journey from his condemnation to his burial. At each stop, there is a Scripture passage, an image, a meditation, a prayer, and an activity to perform. I'm posting here the material I compiled and invite you on a virtual journey to the cross (or you can come by the church before Friday and walk through it yourself!).

******************

Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Explanation of Stations:
Today I’m inviting you to participate in an activity called “The Stations of the Cross.” This experience is designed to help you bridge the gap between this Sunday, Palm Sunday, and next Sunday, Easter Sunday. If all you knew were these two Sundays, all you would know would be celebration and victory. But there’s more than that going on in the life of Jesus in the last week of his life.

Take a moment to review the events of Jesus' final weeks: Palm Sunday (triumphal entry), weeping over Jerusalem, cleansing the temple, intense time with his closest followers, Maundy Thursday (washing feet, Passover meal, Last supper, high priestly prayer, garden, betrayal), Good Friday (arrest, trial, humiliation, beating, execution, on the cross, burial).

There will be Easter and resurrection and victory, but not yet. Don’t lose sight of the significance of the journey by rushing through the messiness and gruesomeness of Thursday night and Friday in order to get to the victory of Easter Sunday. Take time to focus on the cross and all that it means so that you can fully appreciate the Resurrection.

There are 7 stations and each one represents a point along Jesus’ journey from being condemned to die to his death on the cross and being placed in his tomb. At each station I want you to read the Scripture, look at the picture, read the meditation and thoughtfully participate in the activity. Take your time. This is for you.

The first point to note is that this is prayer. It isn't an intellectual exercise. It is in the context of my relationship with God. I could read through the text of each of the stations, and look at the pictures, but that wouldn't necessarily be prayer. This is an invitation to enter into a gifted faith experience of who Jesus is for me. It becomes prayer when I open my heart to be touched, and it leads me to express my response in prayer.

The second thing to remember is that this is an imaginative exercise. Its purpose is not a historical examination of "what really happened" on that day in history. It's about something far more profound. This is an opportunity to use this long standing Christian prayer to let Jesus touch my heart deeply by showing me the depth of his love for me. The context is the historical fact that he was made to carry the instrument of his death, from the place where he was condemned to die, to Calvary where he died, and that he was taken down and laid in a tomb. The religious context is that today Jesus wants to use any means available to move my heart to know his love for me. These exercises can allow me to imaginatively visualize the "meaning" of his passion and death.

The point of this exercise is to lead us to gratitude. It will also lead us into a sense of solidarity with all our brothers and sisters. In our busy, high tech lives we can easily get out of touch with the terrible suffering of real people in our world. Journeying with Jesus in the Stations, allows us to imagine his entry into the experience of those who are tortured, unjustly accused or victimized, sitting on death row, carrying impossible burdens, facing terminal illnesses, or simply fatigued with life.

Beyond all the good statements and the sentimentalism associated with the Cross, finally it is about faithfulness, servanthood, the commitment of God to his creation that will not abandon that commitment even when rejected. In a real sense, the cross is about the power of love, the commitment of God to humanity, the God whose faithfulness and grace knows no limits and will yield to no boundary, that will risk even death itself for the sake of new life.

Station 1: Jesus is Condemned to Die
Now Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" Jesus said, "You say so." But when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, "Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you?" But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly amazed. . . . So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, "I am innocent of this man's blood; see to it yourselves." . . . and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified. (Matt 27:11-14, 24, 26b) As the journey with him begins, I view the scene, I become moved by both outrage and gratitude. I look at you. Your face. The crown of thorns. The blood. Your clothes stuck to the wounds on your back. Pilate washes his hands of the whole affair. You stands there silently with your hands tied behind your back. This is for me. That I might be free. That I might have eternal life. I express my love and thanks.

Jesus, I wish you would speak! I wish you would proclaim who you are. I wish you would confront the disbelief of the crowds and the arrogant cowardice of the powers that be. Surely someone will speak up for you! Where are the lepers who were healed? Where are the blind who can now see? Where are all the people who ate the bread and fish on the hillside? Where are those who followed you so easily when they thought you would become King of the Jews? Yet no one speaks. No voice in the crowd comes to your defense. You stand alone.

You stand before Pilate, the power of Rome. Weakness stands before strength. And yet, Pilate, the ruthless enforcer for the Empire is not really in control here. He cannot make you confess. He cannot quiet the crowds. For all his power, he cannot find the courage to do what is right. So he does what is safe. He yields to the crowds for the sake of order. Courage and strength do not always sit on thrones or judgment seats. Power is not always in the hands of Empires.

I have been alone. I have been falsely accused, and no one has spoken for me. I have been treated unfairly by those who could have used their power for better purposes. I can understand some of your feelings as you stand silently before Pilate and watch him proclaim his own innocence as he condemns an innocent man.

But perhaps I have treated others unfairly as well. Perhaps I have not spoken up for others when they needed a voice. There are those around me who have been treated unjustly. Have I always had the courage to come to their defense? There are those around me who feel alone and abandoned. Have I always been there for them? O Lord, forgive me for not always being who I should be.

Pray: Jesus, I see in your silence the quiet strength that reveals a peace and a resolve. O Lord, help me deal with the unfairness of life without becoming critical of others. Help me to be sensitive to the pain and feelings of others. Give me the courage to do what is right without being swayed by the demands of others. Let me understand that this was for me. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

*****************

As the journey begins, ask to be with Jesus. To follow his journey.
Spend a few moments looking at yourself in the mirror. Think about how it feels to be treated unfairly. Remember what it feels like to stand alone.
Know that he stood alone, so that you would never have to stand alone again. Say to yourself, “He did this for me. He did this for me.”

Station 2: Jesus Carries His Cross
Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into a crown, they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt before him and mocked him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!" They spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. After mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him. (Matthew 27:27-31)
Carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha. (John 19:17)

You are made to carry the cross on which you will die. I contemplate the wood of that cross. I imagine how heavy it is. It represents the weight of all our crosses, our burdens, our anguish, our sufferings. What you must have felt as you first took it upon his shoulders! With each step you enter more deeply into our human experience. You walk in the path of human struggle and experience its crushing weight.

Jesus, I see you accept the Cross in the midst of such mockery. You could have refused. What more could they have done to you? Yet you begin this journey, knowing full well where it will lead. I hear no words of complaint, no protests of innocence, no cursing the injustice. And yet I am so prone to complain and whine. Sometimes the troubles of life are very real and bear down on me. But I so easily fall into self-pity. I too often assume that I am the only one who bears a cross, or that my cross is larger and heavier than any others.

You told me, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24)

Pray: O Lord, forgive me for forgetting that in my weakness I am driven to trust on you, and that in that trust my weakness becomes your strength. Forgive my attitudes of self-pity that make me more bitter and ugly than loving. And when crosses come, give me the strength to bear them as one who follows your example. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

********************

Jesus bore the weight of the world on the cross.
What are some of the weights that your bear?
Write your struggle or burden on a slip of paper. Join your link to the chain of sorrow, misery and sin.
Give it to Jesus and commit to trust Him with it.

Station 3: Simon Helps Jesus Carry His Cross
They compelled a passer-by, who was coming in from the country, to carry his cross; it was Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus. (Mark 15:21)

Jesus, I can only imagine the awful weight of that cross you carry. It is not just the weight of beams of wood that presses down on you. It is also the weight of the burden you carry for those whom you have loved. You came to offer them life, and yet they return only death.

So I see you fall from the crushing weight of pain and grief. I don’t know how many times you have fallen, but I know that your physical strength is failing. The soldiers must recognize this as well, because they force a man from the crowd to help you carry the cross the rest of the way to the place where you will be crucified. Perhaps they are afraid that you will die before you make it to the top of the hill. The man of Cyrene was just a bystander passing through on his way into town from the countryside. And yet he bears the weight of the cross to save your strength.

I look into your face and contemplate your struggle. Your powerlessness. Your dependence on another. I see how you look at Simon, with utmost humility and gratitude. This is for me. So I feel anguish and gratitude. I express my thanks that you can continue this journey. That you have help. That you know my inability to carry my burden alone.

I would like to think that if I had been there I would have rushed from the crowd and volunteered to carry that cross for you. But would I have had the courage to face the Roman soldiers and risk being forced to join you on a cross? Would I have been willing to risk everything to ease your suffering for a few moments by letting you know that you were not alone?

Besides, I have my own crosses already. I have as much as I can bear without taking on the added burdens of others. And what would people think of me if I were seen consorting with criminals and enemies of Rome in such a public spectacle? So instead of offering to help, I tried to become invisible in the crowd. And when the soldiers were looking around for someone to press into service, I looked away and pretended not to notice what was happening.

It is easy to pretend not to see the needs, the grief, and the suffering around me every day. It is easy to pretend not to hear the cries for help that come in many forms from those among whom I walk every day. It is easy to convince myself that I am too busy, or too tired, or have too much on my plate already to get involved in the lives of others. There are simply too many who need too much.

And yet I remember something that you said, something about becoming a servant of all, of putting myself last and others first. Is this what it means to be a servant? Jesus, are you showing me what it means to be that kind of servant. Is this man from Cyrene modeling for me the path of discipleship?

Pray: O Lord, forgive me for becoming so preoccupied with myself that I have become deaf and blind to the grief and suffering of those around me. Forgive me for my indifference. Constantly remind me that I cannot love you without loving others as well. Help me always remember that to be a follower of yours means that I share in the burdens of others. Lord, show me someone whose cross I may help carry. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

******************

Put yourself in Simon’s place.
Be a burden-bearer.
Light a candle for someone near you. Quietly pray a prayer of encouragement for that person.

Now put yourself in Jesus’ shoes.
Pray a prayer of thanks for those who have helped and encouraged you.
Open up your life and allow others to come alongside you who might share your burdens… giving you the strength to fulfill your purpose.

Station 4: Jesus is Stripped
When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four parts, one for each soldier. They also took his tunic; now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. So they said to one another, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see who will get it." This was to fulfill what the scripture says, "They divided my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots." And that is what the soldiers did. (John 19:23-25a)

Part of the indignity is to be crucified naked. You are completely stripped of any pride. The wounds on your back are torn open again. You experience the ultimate vulnerability of the defenseless. No shield or security protects you. As they stare at you, your eyes turn to heaven.

I pause to watch the stripping. I contemplate all that is taken from you. And how you face your death with such nakedness.

I reflect upon how much of yourself you have revealed to me. Holding nothing back. You have trusted me with everything of you, revealing the depths of your heart to me. And I realize how much I hide from you. I conceal my ugliness, my weakness, my sin. I am so scared that if you really knew me, I would disgust you. You are so good; I am filled with so much darkness.

Can I trust you with my real self? Will you still find me worth loving? Or will you give up on me? If I reveal too much, I’m afraid you might leave me alone and naked.

As I look at you in your humility, I know that this is for me so that I could trust you not to reject me. So that I would not have to hide anymore. I share my feelings of gratitude.

Pray: Jesus, help me to trust you enough to have the confidence to expose myself to your Spirit. Forgive me for my distance and hiddenness. Make me free. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

************************

Take a moment to stand in front of the fan.
Feel the breeze as it penetrates and overwhelms you.
Allow God’s Spirit to blow through you.
Feel the Spirit strip away everything you hide behind. Everything that is not His.
Ask Him, “Remove everything that stands between us.”

Station 5: Jesus is Nailed to the Cross
And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh; but he did not take it. And they crucified him, and divided his clothes among them, casting lots to decide what each should take. It was nine o'clock in the morning when they crucified him. The inscription of the charge against him read, "The King of the Jews." And with him they crucified two bandits, one on his right and one on his left. Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and saying, "Aha! You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself, and come down from the cross!" In the same way the chief priests, along with the scribes, were also mocking him among themselves and saying, "He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Messiah, the King of Israel, come down from the cross now, so that we may see and believe." Those who were crucified with him also taunted him. (Mark 15:23-32)

Huge nails are hammered through your hands and feet to fix you on the cross. You are bleeding much more seriously now. As the cross is lifted up, the weight of your life hangs on those nails. Every time you struggle to pull yourself up to breathe, your ability to cling to life slips away.

I make myself watch the nails being driven through your flesh. And I watch your face. I hear your words spoken from the cross:
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
“I am thirsty.”
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
“It is finished.”
“Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.”

I contemplate the completeness of your entry into our lives. Can there be any pain or agony you would not understand?

This is for me. The brokeness that makes me whole. The surrender that gives me life. I pause to experience and receive how completely you love me. You are indeed completely poured out for me. As I treasure this gift, I express what is in my heart.

Pray: O Lord, thank you for this gift. I am amazed that you did not give up on your dream for me to be with you, even when it cost so much. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

**************************

Take piece of ice in your hand.
Hold it in your palm.
Hold onto it as long as you can through the rest of the stations.
As you feel the cold stab through your hand, remember the nails that pierced his flesh.
Let it remind you of his suffering… and love.

Station 6: Jesus Dies On The Cross
From noon on, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And about three o'clock Jesus cried with a loud voice, "Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?" that is, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, "This man is calling for Elijah." At once one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink. But the others said, "Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to save him." Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now when the centurion and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were terrified and said, "Truly this man was God's Son!" (Matthew 27:45-54)

I watch as, between two criminals, a mocking title above your head, with only Mary and John and Mary Magdalene to support you, you surrender your last breath. Outside the city, as a convicted criminal, you are executed.

I stand there, at the foot of the cross, side by side with all of humanity, and witness our salvation. The One who gives life now passes from life to death, for me. Behold the ransom paid, the price of my rebellion given for me. I am bought with the highest price.

Can you imagine how much God loves you?

Pray: O Lord, may I understand this more and more. Let my heart more fully experience this unapologetic and unconditional love for me. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

********************

Take to heart the price of salvation.
Express your deepest feelings within you. Write your words on the cross.
Communicate your feelings of love, thanks, adoration, whatever.

Station 7: Jesus Is Laid In The Tomb
Then he took (Jesus’ body) down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin. The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. (Luke 23:53-55)

What tender mourning! As you are taken down, I behold this scene at the foot of the cross. The preparations for burial. Gently touching your broken body. I remember all that your hands have touched, all who have been blessed by your warm embrace. I pause to let it soak in. Your lifeless body is laid in the tomb. A profound sacrifice, complete.

They take your body to its resting place. The huge stone over the tomb is the final sign of the permanence of death. In this final act of surrender, who would have imagined this tomb would soon be empty or that you would show yourself alive to your disciples, or that they would recognize you in the breaking of bread? Oh, that our hearts might burn within us, as we realize how you had to suffer and die so as to enter into your glory.

For me. That I might love as I have been loved. I pour out my heart to the God of all mercies.

I stand for a moment outside this tomb. This final journey of your life has shown me the meaning of your gift of yourself for me. This tomb represents every tomb I stand before with fear, in defeat, struggling to believe it could ever be empty.

Pray: In the fullness of faith in the Risen One, given by your own Holy Spirit, I express my gratitude for this way of the cross. I ask you, Jesus, whose hands, feet and side still bear the signs of this journey, to grant me the graces I need to take up my cross to be a servant of your own mission. “We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have reclaimed the world.”

************************

Pick up a stone.
Carry it with you this week.
As you wait for Easter Sunday, when the stone was rolled away, use it to remind you of Jesus’ journey to the tomb.
Of your journey with Him.
Bring it back with you next week.

Amen.

* Here's some of the places I found material for this.

1956

2009-03-25T08:33:00.004-04:00

Here's a couple pictures of my mom from 1956... If you've seen her granddaughter, Brianna, or childhood pictures of me or my brother Rick, you'll see some strong resemblances.

Not Fair Video

2009-03-13T16:39:00.004-04:00

One of the highlights of the National Youth Ministry Conference!

my team

2009-03-11T15:45:00.001-04:00

I have a great team of volunteers who labor alongside me in the kingdom of God to minister to the teenagers in our church. I am honored by their unfailing support and encouragement.

I went to a youth ministry conference last weekend, and one of the presenters, Mark DeVries, spent some time talking about volunteers. And somewhere in there, he asked, "Who's the most important person on a football team's offense? (Obviously, it's the quarterback.) Who's the second most important... or at least the second highest paid? The left tackle." If you don't know, the left tackle is the guy on the offensive line with the task of protecting the quarterback's blind side (that is, of course, assuming the QB's right-handed... and actually, in the case of my Cleveland Browns, Left Tackle Joe Thomas is THE highest paid player on the team). The point is this: An unprotected leader is vulnerable... and even though the leader of a youth ministry is important, don't neglect the importance of someone in your life who looks out for your blind side. This football analogy really made sense to me and got me to thinking about some my volunteers...

First of all, there's my left tackle, my wife Amy. More than anyone else, she defends my blind side. Without her, I'd be toast. She keeps me in check in everything from balancing my time with work and family, keeping my ministry priorities in line, and helping diffuse frustrations. She's the one who sees the things that threaten my attitude... the things that can easily make me ineffective. And she'll go to bat for me every time, even when I make some pretty clumsy plays. In football jargon, she keeps my uniform clean.

Then there's my starting running back, Alex. In football, the running back can run the ball out of the back field, stay in as an extra blocker to pick up a pass rush, or go down field as a receiver. In most offenses at least half of the offense goes through the running back. So, needless to say, Alex is my work horse. He has led Sunday morning Bible study, taught the guys small group, went on mission projects and last summer's mission trip, chaperoned for many events, and basically fills in any time I need him. He's a great friend who I trust to make great decisions, and we've gotten pretty good at coordinating clean hand-offs. He's very versatile, and I can depend on him to "pick up the hard yardage through the hedges" over and over again.

Also I've got this amazing receiving corp, including Melissa, Blair, Christa, Erin, and Scott. The reason I think of this group as my receivers is because they're the ones who make the big plays and show up on the highlight reels. I love to watch them work... it's so fun to see them loving on these kids and making a significant impact in their lives! They each have their own strengths like receivers in football (e.g. speed, good hands, tight routes, athletic agility, big targets, and even down field blocking). Some of these volunteers have just the right timing with words, some of them give just the right nudge to push a kid along, and some are always showing up to be there for a kid when they need it the most.

In particular, I think of Christa as my slot receiver. The receiver who lines up in the slot is usually a possession receiver (a.k.a. you count on them to make the play to keep the drive alive) with great hands that is willing to run across the middle of the field, knowing they'll take the big hits from the defensive backs. Not only is Christa clutch, but she has been willing to take some "hits" for the team. When she's in there, she's definitely a momentum changer.

Similar to the slot receiver is the tight end. However, tight ends are unique because on any given play they can function as either important possession receivers or stay on the offensive line as extra blockers. The primary tight end on my team is Donna. Even more so now that she's on the personnel committee, Donna picks up some key blocks by advocating for me or the youth ministry whenever she can. On the other hand, Donna is one of my favorite passing targets. Tight ends are known for being tall and big (so they can block effectively) which means they have a larger throwing window, i.e. there are a lot of places you can deliver the ball and it will still be caught. Tight ends are often athletic and can catch passes thrown at their feet or way above their heads. Many times I've not delivered the ball particularly well to Donna, but every time she has found a way to make a great play out of a bad pass. In fact in a lot of offensive schemes, the tight end has become sort of like a pressure release valve. When the quarterback is in trouble and about to be sacked for a loss, he'll often dump it down to the tight end and can count on him to make the play. When I'm feeling the pressure I have a lot of confidence in Donna to help me out of my mess. She is indeed "clutch."

Though these are a few of my "go to" players, there are a host of other teammates who come in and play valuable downs, helping to take the pressure off the starters. I have depended on great volunteers like Tia and Aaron, Dianna, Connie, Alyssa and Paul, Christie, Charlene, Karen, Jamie, Terri, Jennifer, Sabrina, Kevin, Heather and Matt (and others who work behind the scenes or cheer us on from the sidelines).

I have a great team. And this is really the point: We are a team. These important volunteers are not simply chaperones who babysit the youth. They value the goal, they buy into the system we've put together to reach them, they work hard at their responsibilities, and they believe in me to lead them. They truly take ownership of this ministry. Do we mess up? Yes, I often draw up a terrible play. But we're getting smarter, working together better, seeing some great results, and having a lot of fun, too.

Many times when I've gone to the kinds of youth ministry conferences like the one last week, I've sat there feeling depressed about how much work I needed to do to have a stronger ministry. This last weekend, as the guy talked about healthy, sustainable youth ministry, there were a lot of youth pastors there having these same kind of obvious difficulties with their programs. The interesting thing was that I really had this sense that, even though we're not there yet, my student ministry at GBC is getting there, and I felt good about it. And I think the thing that made the biggest difference--my team.

By the way, as we approach the time when we finally have our new senior pastor in place, I hope that he's looking for a teammate. I'm hoping he'll let me be his left tackle (or maybe tight end!).

the story of stuff

2009-03-05T11:27:00.000-05:00

God, save us from our stuff.

wrapping up my thoughts on the NYMC

2009-03-02T22:37:00.004-05:00

I had a great time this weekend at Group and Simply Youth Ministry's National Youth Ministry Conference in Columbus (next year it's in Chicago!). It's was great to hang out with excellent and passionate youth workers from all over the country. I hope everyone goes away with something that will ignite their heart for students.

Since the last time I blogged, I got to experience some tremendous seminars. After checking out a couple issue-specific workshops I was interested in earlier, I got back on my original seminar track on Sunday--"Secrets to a Healthy Youth Ministry." Mark DeVries from First Presbyterian Church in Nashville and Youth Ministry Architects basically presented on his recent book, Sustainable Youth Ministry: Why Most Youth Ministry Doesn't Last and What Your Church Can Do About It.

I have to admit, I love these two words when talking about developing a youth ministry--healthy and sustainable. I think they are great ways of thinking about long term goals for what a student ministry should look like... not "big and exciting," but "healthy and sustainable." As Doug Fields likes to put it, "healthy things grow and thrive." I want a ministry that goes beyond this group of students, this group of volunteers, or even me. The sustainability of a youth ministry cannot totally rely on the lead youth pastor, so I'm learning to build a structure for the long haul that will be able to outlast me.

I also got a lot of practical tips for thriving in ministry (which, by the way, I had the foresight to bring a flash drive and download his powerpoint notes to go back and look at). I especially liked the section "monkeys, frogs and balconies," which I'm sure will become starting points for future blog posts. But as far as the frogs part of that section goes, he gives us the advice to do the hard/dreaded task first-thing in order to help us become more effective the rest of the day. Based on the Mark Twain quote, "If you eat a frog first thing in the morning, the rest of your day will be wonderful," DeVries urges us (wisely, I think) to eat the frog so that it doesn't grow and multiply as we procrastinate to do it. Oddly enough, Mark also recommended "planned procrastination" where we intentionally put off other things so that we actually benefit from time constraints. Lots of great stuff there that I hope to see become reality.

My final workshop was this morning, and it was on working with the college-aged ministry, "Preparing Your Teenagers for Life After Youth Group," led by Chuck Bomar (see also collegeleader.org). It was good, and I'm still hoping to get the powerpoint notes from that one, too. Here he spent quite a bit of time on the philosophy of having a college-aged ministry and how to affect the mindset of youth before they leave the youth group, but I was mostly looking for new and transferable ideas to bring back and apply. I was late to this, so I'm sure I would have gotten more out of it had I gotten there earlier (I guess I'll have to read the book that comes out later this year!).

There's not much else to really share about the last few general sessions. They were funny and worshipful and challenging, but that's not what sticks out to me about the conference. Besides Kay Warren's talk and the workshops, what sticks out to me is the word Doug Fields emphasized at the beginning: accessible. It was fun to see the presenters all over the convention center, chatting with Matt and Josh, eating lunch next to the Skit Guys, participating in the live podcast, riding the elevator with Mark DeVries, and following the live twitter feed. I just want to say-- accessible works. It works really well, and I hope they keep it up no matter how big this conference gets over the years. I know it's harder and takes more work to make yourself available like that, but I think it really pays off. I think the Youth Specialties conventions I've been to over the years has sort of lost that, but not here, not this year at least. Thanks guys! Accessible works.

a long day at NYMC

2009-03-01T00:06:00.001-05:00

*video from last year's conference replayed last night... thought it was pretty fun.

This morning's worship included a simple devotional activity and lesson from Rick Lawrence and Duffy Robbins based on the passage "taste and see that the Lord is good." What can I say? You can always count on Group Publishing for some good object lessons. They gave us packets of condiments for us to taste, including salt, pepper, vinegar, honey and Dijon mustard, taste at least 3 of them, and think through some ways it reminded us of God. Shawn (the youth leader at the Crossroads Christian Church campus in town) and I tasted the Dijon mustard, then the pepper, then the salt, and finally the honey. I was surprised to find that the pepper taste wasn't very strong, so the thought I wrote down was this: "The taste of pepper reminds me that You are more subtle than I sometimes expect You to be (even while others attack my senses); and You show me Your goodness when You make me aware that You are there." A good way to begin the day.

One of the areas I want to work on this year is helping our children and preteens transition smoothly into the youth program. My first workshop this morning addressed that specifically. "Bridging the Gap: Transitioning Kids from Children's Ministry into Youth Group" was a good, interactive workshop led by Rick Chromey. Understanding that it's "better to build a fence at the top of the cliff then to build a hospital at the bottom," we talked about starting earlier and more intentionally with our kids. With all that our preteens (5th and 6th graders) are experiencing physically, mentally, socially and spiritually, we need to think through some ways of tailoring our programming and events to respond to where they are in the development process. One thing I took away from it was the desire to find some possible ways of getting our youth small group model going (in some form) with this younger age group. With the nature of early adolescence and the onset of puberty, I think they would greatly benefit from some small, gender-specific groups with several caring adult volunteers who spent significant time investing in them.

After lunch, I went to Jana Sarti's "Creating an Intern Ministry From Start to Finish." It's funny to sit and listen to Jana talk about Saddleback's intern program, thinking about how unbelievably different it is from what we've recently started at my church. They have 15-25 interns who come from all over the world and commit to coming to Southern California for two years at a time without any compensation (by raising their own support). Don't get me wrong, I came away with tons of new ideas and helpful suggestions, but I guess I had to listen better and work a little for the take away. It also got me more excited about our summer intern this year and having a great experience where both the church and the intern come away with a win!

Finally, the worship tonight was great. I have to admit I wasn't expecting a whole lot from Kay Warren. I knew she was Rick's wife and had an outreach to orphans of the AIDS epidemic in Africa, but I can't say I knew anything else about her. Let me just say that I've read a couple of her husband's books and heard him speak at Catalyst the year before last, but she really blew me away tonight more than he ever has. It may just be where I am in my journey with God right now because it's hard to pinpoint anything new she said that I hadn't heard before (I've even used some of her illustrations in my own teaching), but as she spoke God was really working on me.

As she focused on the words "dangerously surrendered," "seriously disturbed," and "gloriously ruined," my gut was wrenching and my heart bursting. Surely not outloud, but inwardly, I have prayed the prayer she said used to pray, "Lord, ask me to do anything as long as it doesn't threaten my family... if you mess that up, the deal is off." If I pray that, I'm recognizing that God might ask risky and dangerous things, but it reveals in me a disbelief in God's goodness and a fear of the unknown/uncontrollable. He's not safe, but he is good. If he's good, why can't I trust his plan to be ultimately good for my family? My temptation is to use Amy and the kids as an excuse to play it safe... you know, for their sake. All the while the world continues on...

Part of my struggle is with the nature of youth ministry itself. It's legitimate. It's safe. It operates within structures that are legitimate and safe. As entrenched as it is, I struggle to know how to change the world from within it. Kay mentioned that the church has so often spiritualized the phrase "carry your cross" without realizing that, for Jesus, it meant being willing to actually die for something. Do I love what God loves so much that I'm willing to put my very life on the line for it (especially since God says he loves the neglected and marginalized of the world)? How do you communicate that in a youth Bible study class? As she said this, it also occurred to me that, for Jesus and his audience, the cross was also a loaded political symbol. The Romans used it as an object lesson (!) to make a statement about power, displaying the tactics and methods of how the empire would exert its will through violence, domination and control. How does this change the meaning of "take up your cross"?

I'm still struggling with all this, but I'm praying and seeking... I have confidence he'll reveal himself at the right time.

blogging (and twittering) the NYMC

2009-02-28T13:44:00.006-05:00

I am here at the National Youth Ministry Conference having a great time learning, talking, and processing youth ministry. I'm sorry I'm not getting to this earlier, but I've been trying to avoid the internet fees that my hotel charges to get on-line.

I'd like to make a few observations thus far (and you can also follow my twitter updates for more up-to-date microblogging):

* I'm glad I have a self-evaluation in hand that I finished earlier this week... it has helped me to set some goals for what I want to think about while I'm here, specifically summer internship program ideas, bridging the gap between our sixth-graders (and other preteens) and the youth ministry, some possible administrative improvements, and building a long-term sustainable youth ministry.

* The first general session was really good. I liked the effort at trying to set the tone for the conference as being open, accessible and conversational... the morning workshop today was a pretty good example of this. I'm wondering if I can use this reasoning to get Doug Fields to reveal his secret blog address :)

* I wasn't especially impressed with the Harris brothers speaking last night. I like what they had to say (that our students can think deeply and that they are up to the challenge of doing great things), and I really think I'll like the book once I get to read it. But last night, for some reason, I wasn't particularly engaged. (See my tweet about the devil shaking about students reading systematic theology.)

* One last thought: I've been thinking a lot about the concept of "Empire" and the way America and our culture is steeped in maintaining affluence and status, even while it can only exist at the expense of other people (see $8 hot dog video at http://www.workofthepeople.com/). This leads to thinking about Christianity as having the task of undermining and subverting that way of life. It's really hard to go to a conference, see the bigness of everything and feel connected to the broken around the world. With that said, I'm really proud of the way they featured the Compassion speaker. But at the same time, it's hard to sing the chorus we sang last night, "You're the Defender of the weak; You comfort those in need" when most of the time I'm not defending or comforting anyone but myself.

I hope to stay updated better now that I have internet. Look for me at the live SYM 100th episode podcast! And click on these links for others who are blogging NYMC and posting twitter updates!

he did what?

2009-02-19T13:11:00.006-05:00

We started a new teaching series in Youth Sunday Morning Bible Study called, "He Did What?" It's a 4-week series on some of the miracles of Jesus. When we look at Jesus' miracles with fresh eyes, they should leave us shocked and amazed. Last week we talked about the man born blind who Jesus healed by making mud with his spit and smearing it on this guy's eyes. This week we're looking at the healing of the paralytic who was lowered by his friends through the ceiling of the house where Jesus was teaching. We'll end the series with a week on the healing at the pool and a week looking at Jesus healing the sick woman. It's good stuff... I'm excited about it.

Also, our youth t-shirts are in and ready to be picked up. Thanks Katie for the hand-drawn cityscape and Hands On Originals for the rest of the design. They look great (especially on me!). So if you ordered one (or want to purchase one of the extras) bring me your $8.

benediction

2009-02-12T16:54:00.006-05:00

Last weekend, at our Winter Retreat in Gatlinburg, our theme was "Be the Change." It was a great time with some amazing teenagers and adults.

This was our benediction for the weekend--

"Now may you, my brothers and sisters, fall more in love with the God who wants to change the world. May your heart be consumed with the things that are important to the heart of God--love, mercy, justice, grace, compassion, generosity, deep concern, selflessness and sacrifice. May the change God wants to see in the world begin with you--that you be the change--even when it seems crazy, even when you stand alone, even when it is hard, and every chance you get. May you lift one another up, may you spur one another on, and may you annoyingly encourage one another to outbursts of love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24)... and may you do it with the love of God and the strength he gives. In Christ's name, Amen."

25 Random Things

2009-02-02T19:22:00.004-05:00

There's are notes being posted on facebook, "25 Random Things," where you write 25 random things about yourself and then pass it on to 25 friends. I thought I'd go ahead and post it here, too. Enjoy!

1. My whole family is great (and there's a lot of my mom and dad in me), but my dream is that I turn out just like my grandfather, Leland Schindler.
2. I love hanging out with teenagers, I think maybe especially middle school guys (so long as there aren't any little girls around for them to impress).
3. It's been a long time since I've done some of my favorite things-- snow ski, golf, play poker, wear bowties, or study ancient Hebrew and Greek... very sad.
4. My middle name is John. I was named after my grandfather, John Claire Swinehart... another amazing man :)
5. I don't think my wife is as amused as I am that I have so many "old flames" as facebook friends (and, Cindy, no comments on "the list"!)
6. I was a student at UK when we went to three straight national championship games and won two titles ('96 & '98)... maybe I should go back to school!
7. Amy and I met in 1996 at UK (tomorrow is the 14-year anniversary of the day we met). It turned out we had several friends in common who were helpful in getting us to start dating :)
8. My favorite restaurants are Chipotle, Sonny's BBQ, Chick-fil-a, Giuseppe's, the Melting Pot, and any kind of Hibachi Japanese place (I like meat and chocolate... but not at the same time).
9. Though I played trumpet and french horn in band, I most enjoyed choral music and eventually taught myself how to play guitar.
10. I enjoy blogging (www.grabacorner.blogspot.com) and reading blogs, listening to podcasts, texting, facebook, twitter, etc.
11. As I type this, Kate is napping next to me... so sweet! I love my daughter more than I ever imagined. Truly amazing!
12. Adoption has taught me more about God than I am able to put into words. I highly recommend it :)
13. I'm usually bad at details and better at big picture stuff. (Amy does not like this feature in her husband.)
14. I love playing with the boys. Ben and Will are getting to that age now where we can do more and more fun "guy" stuff... I only wish I had more energy!
15. Not that I want more kids, but if we had another boy, I wish my wife would let me name him "Cook"... after the English name of a kid I met in China in 1997.
16. I love football. (This will be a long offseason.)
17. Though I've got some close friends, as a whole, I've never been able to replace my college "accountability group"... Shawn, Cager, Greg, Chuck (Last one on facebook is a eunuch, Chuck!)
18. With that said, I really miss Monday nights in Somerset (Poker for Jesus)
19. I love to read... but won't read fiction.
20. I watch much less tv these days, though I still carve out time to watch the Simpsons and the Colbert Report (usually on hulu.com)
21. Because Amy won't live north and I don't want to live south, we have a short list of places we would likely live: Hawaii, North Carolina, Kentucky, overseas, and Virginia (in that order... for me, at least).
22. Images are important to me (usually in the form of metaphors or stories)... they are useful for helping me think about/ understand things I have a hard time putting into words.
23. The trip to the Liberty Bowl this year was so much fun... thanks Alex and John.
24. I truly enjoy hanging out with my brothers, Rick and Brian, and wish I got to do that more. (It's funny how things change over the years, huh?)
25. Especially since so many high school classmates are on here now, I think there should be a 15-year class reunion for PHS class of '94. Any plans in the works, Emily, Jessica, or Steve?

hard books & surgeries

2009-01-29T00:34:00.000-05:00

(* in the interest of full disclosure, you should know that I'm typing this on a decently sophisticated cell phone.)

Right now I am sitting on a lay-down chair in my daughter's warm hospital room on a cold, snowy day... and I feel especially aware of the irony of it all.

Firstly, I am so thankful to the Lord for letting Kate's surgery today go so smoothly. This was a real blessing for her and for me and Amy.

We left the house at 5am, and made our way cautiously (and safely) to the hospital. Kate had been in a great mood up until the time they picked her up and carried her away from her Mom and Dad into the OR. They began with the ear tubes and were done before we knew it. The cleft repair and minor lip revision took a little longer (about an hour and a half). She's been a combination of grumpy, scared, mad, hurting, confused, apprehensive, and sleepy all day. Honestly, she has slept and cuddled most of the day, with short bouts of crying mixed in. I knew she'd want Mommy immediately, but I was thrilled that she allowed me to comfort her quite a bit! We will talk to the surgeon more tomorrow, but the roof of her mouth looks good from our perspective. On the other hand, she may have messed up some of the stitching on her lip "touch up."

Probably not coincidentally, I finally finished reading "Everything Must Change" by Brian McLaren, as Kate lay sleeping on my chest this evening. This is one of those super hard books. It focuses on how the world is caught in this suicidal web of overconsumption in pursuing prosperity, violence in trying to attain security, and inequality that results from attempting to guarantee the other two... and it's all reinforced by a broken "framing story." He paints a bleak picture where we're all caught up in this self-destructive mess, none more so than the United States. It's shocking to read about our military... that we have enough nuclear weapons to destroy ten planet earths, or that it costs $100 million per day to keep our weapons poised and ready, or that so much of our economy is based on arms sales (even often supplying weapons to both sides of a conflict). McLaren writes about our unsustainable consumption and our gross exploitation of the world's poor.

But he also talks about hope and a new vision. This is where it gets hard because it calls for rejecting or "defecting from" the ordinary way the world works which is so pervasive and all-encompassing in favor of "the kingdom of God." Besides feeling powerless because it seems like there's little I can do to change the big societal problems, it challenges me with the inconvenience of doing many little things I CAN do (and by doing so begin to change some of the culture around me).

Ok, so here's the irony. I'm acutely aware all the sudden of how this is related to today. Inequality. How many of those here who lost their power today in the ice storm are cognizant of the millions who live without it daily? Prosperity. Did I ever think about the kind of prosperity system that makes possible a surgery like this? What do people on the other side of the world (particularly the developing world) think about my ease of access to medical care, especially non-life-threatening, life-enhancing medical care? What's it mean that by virtue of her residence in the US, Kate has this kind of care afforded her (almost as a right)? And what do I now do with this? I know as a Chinese orphan, there's a good chance she wouldn't have had this opportunity, and the adoption itself is a part of this kind of living out of the Kingdom. But despite this, is my prosperity somehow at the expense of someone else? In a global community, it seems like I should be asking questions like this. I don't know. (It doesn't help that I saw a complaint about internet access and read about a shopping trip described as "heaven" earlier, either.) Don't get me wrong, I'm extremely grateful that Kate will have benefited from this procedure. I just somehow have this sense that I've unknowingly bought into the Empire of Caesar more than the Kingdom of God sometimes.

processing stuff

2009-01-26T20:45:00.016-05:00

It's time for this blog to do what it's really here to do: help me process some thoughts.

Kate is going in for surgery on Wednesday morning. As most of you are aware, my daughter was born with a cleft lip/ cleft palate. Her lip was repaired in China when she was seven months old (thanks to the generous sponsors of the "Happy Fund" in Suzhou). There is a little scarring and a "bump" on her upper lip from the repair, but I feel like it was done well and, if you've seen her, would have to admit that she's the most beautiful little girl you've ever seen!! (By the way, the doctor also concurs that the procedure was done well... which is important.)

So, though the lip was repaired, Kate still has an unrepaired cleft palate. The cleft in her palate is complete, which means the hole in the roof of her mouth spans both the hard and soft palate all the way to the gum line. Wednesday they will insert ear tubes (to help with the constant ear infections which are common with cleft-affected kids) and repair the cleft, leaving only the gum line unrepaired (which they will repair through a bone graft once she's a little older and her permanent teeth have come in). This later surgery, along with probably pretty extensive orthodontics, will help with her teeth and under bite.

The surgery on Wednesday will be in the morning, and they are planning to keep her overnight to watch for any swelling that might obstruct her breathing. Then she will come home Thursday to a diet of nothing but liquids for ten days. This will be quite a test, I think... she loves to eat and it will be tricky to work out the logistics of feeding the boys and keeping food (and toys) out of her mouth. After the ten days, she'll have a period where she can only eat soft foods like mashed potatoes and whatever we put in the blender before she eventually returns to eating normal again.

This surgery has the potential to be so great for her. For example, because of the cleft, she is unable to suck. As much as she loves straws (she insists on having one every time we go out to eat and non-stop pretends to drink out of it), how great will it be once she's recovered from the surgery and she can actually suck something through them! We're also hoping it will help with the amount of drool :)

Also, every once in a while, the cleft has made it so that when she sneezes, food comes out her nose. (I remember the first time she did this and a huge chunk that had apparently been lodged up there flew out and landed on my arm! Nice.)

More than that, her language should progress significantly. Because of the cleft, she has a very hard time making many sounds (she was never really able to speak Chinese either). In the mean time, we've been learning sign language so that she can communicate with us, and it has worked pretty well so far. And even if she doesn't get all the sounds just right, she already does such a great job with the English words she has learned so far like "hello," "bye," "home," "help," "hot," and "mama." Kate's got a great speech therapist working with her already, and I can't wait for her to make more sounds and start speaking more and more words and phrases. It'll make such a difference in her life.

But I can't help but think, "Poor girl!" I feel so bad for her. We really can't prepare her for this. Obviously she doesn't understand the English word "surgery"... not to mention the fact that it's hard to explain to a two-year old the principle of delayed gratification, i.e. what hurts so bad now will make your life so much better down the road. She doesn't have a clue that her world is going to be turned upside-down. I mean, there she is having such a great time with us, laughing and playing. With all we've gone through to try to build trust and avoid her rejecting us; I'm afraid something like this might destroy all that we've built the last three months.

I'm praying for the surgery to be successful and the healing to be quick, but maybe that's my deeper prayer-- let this ordeal not damage our relationship with her and turn her away from us... and maybe even somehow let it strengthen her bonds with her mommy and daddy. Or at least, let her emotional wounds from this surgery heal eventually, too.

That's the problem with suffering, isn't it? Let her go through it or protect her from it? Will it drive her away or draw her closer? As a good dad, I have to submit my daughter to this trauma. I wish I could save her from it, but I see the bigger picture and the long-term benefit of the surgery. It wouldn't be real love or mercy if I let her avoid the pain. But if she were given the choice, she might choose not to have to endure the pain and she may not perceive that I did what was really best. In the same kind of way, I guess I hope that through whatever painful experiences I might have to face in my own life that I will know that I have a Father I can trust so that I don't doubt his love for me, even if in my own eyes it seems unloving. Pain usually leads to one of two things: greater distance or greater closeness. I think that if Kate really trusts me, then as she receives comfort from me in the pain, it will knit our hearts together more and more. Oh God, please help my little girl know her daddy loves her.

Reclaim the World

2009-01-22T12:03:00.006-05:00

We've been doing a series I've called "Reclaim God's Dream for the World." And last week I used this example out of Rob Bell's book, Velvet Elvis.

Another truth about the church we're embracing is that the gospel is good news, especially for those who don't believe it.

Imagine an average street in an average city in an average country, if there is such a place. Let's imagine Person X lives in a house on this street. Next door is a Hindu, and on the other side is a Muslim. Across the street is an atheist, next door to them an agnostic, and next door on the other side, someone from Ohio.

Imagine Person X becomes a Christian. Maybe she read something or had friends who inspired her to learn more, or maybe she had an addiction and through a recovery movement she surrendered her life to God. However it came to be, she became a follower of Jesus. Let's say she starts living out Jesus' teachings, actually taking him seriously that she can become a compelling force for good in the world. She is becoming more generous, more compassionate, more forgiving, more loving. Is she becoming a better or worse neighbor? If we are her neighbors, we're thrilled about her new faith. We find ourselves more and more grateful for a neighbor like this. We wish more people would be like this.

Let's make some observations about this street. The good news of Jesus is good news for Person X. It's good news for Person X's neighbors. It's good news for the whole street. It's good news for the people who don't believe in Jesus. We have to be really clear about this. The good news for Person X is good news for the whole street. And if it is good news for the whole street, then it's good news for the whole world.

If the gospel isn't good news for everybody, then it isn't good news for anybody.

What do you think?

I was impressed with how our teenagers seemed to responded to this. It feels almost like our journey together is taking us into some deeper waters (maybe more dangerous and difficult waters). What does this mean for the way we "do church"? This seems to take the focus off what we get out of being "one of the chosen" and placing it on our task of being an instrument of God's blessing to the rest of the world, specifically those who are not "us." God doesn't just care about those on the inside, the believer, the saved... he cares about the entire earth! Like Abraham's call in Genesis 12, he wants to use us as the instrument of blessing everyone and everything. "All peoples on earth will be blessed through you." He wants us to join him in reclaiming his dream for the whole world.

How do you live this out?

2009 theme update

2009-01-14T14:48:00.005-05:00

Well, for everyone who participated in my poll for possible 2009 youth themes, thank you! I wanted to post an update, too. Though "Be the Change" actually had the most votes on this site, the concensus among the youth was "Reclaim the World." (However, "Be the Change" will be the theme of our upcoming annual Winter Retreat in Gatlinburg.)

Here's our theme and Scripture passage (actual image is pending)...

Reclaim the World

"In Jesus we see God's original purpose in everything created. For everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him… all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe get properly fixed and fit together all because of his death on the cross."

Colossians 1:15-16, 20 The Message

in 2009

2009-01-06T16:20:00.000-05:00

Since I did a post on the highlights of 2008, it seems like I should list some resolutions for 2009. Since this is being posted six days into the new year, obviously one of them is not blogging in a more timely manner :)

Resolutions:

1. Read a book per month. (I have to give credit to Jeremy for this. I saw on his blog he did this last year and thought it was a great idea.) Included in the these projected 12 books for 2009 is Jesus Wants to Save Christians by Rob Bell, Do Hard Things by Alex & Brett Harris, Everything Must Change by Brian McLaren, Be the Change by Zach Hunter, The Irresistible Revolution and Jesus for President by Shane Claiborne. I have many others I want to read, but instead of listing them here and tie myself down to them, I'll leave it open to be decided later. I probably ought to include at least some secular stuff, too. I will probably post a few reviews as the year goes along.

2. Come up with some ways to attract more non-churched kids to our youth ministry. I like to set goals for my ministry at the beginning of a new year, and I feel like this is an area that God wants me to focus on. At my last church, we were able to draw several students who weren't the typical "church kids" and came even when they didn't have a family that encouraged them to attend. Here we have a solid base, but our influence outside our church is pretty minimal. I think a great test of the health of a ministry is how welcome outsiders (especially those without much previous church experience) feel when they come and get involved. I think this will also help us continue to see several youth baptized this year.

3. Completely finish converting all the slides. As you can see in previous posts, I've taken on the task of scanning all my parents' and grandmother's old 35mm slides and converting them into digital images. At a rate of approximately an hour and a half per carousel so far, it's hard to explain how much time I expect this to consume... I'll just say that my parents bought a terabyte external hard drive to hold them all, and I hope they fit :)

4. Find an alternative to my soft drink consumption (at least partially). Both to reduce my intake of caffeine and calories, I'm looking for something to replace at least some of the coke that I drink per day. Let me just say that I drink plenty of milk already, don't like tea or coffee (not that they would reduce the caffeine), and can't stand the taste of diet drinks. I have a hard time drinking much water and get burnt out on juices, so I'm still working on this one. Let me know if you have any good suggestions. (Oh, and I'm a pastor so alcohol won't work either... not that I could stand the taste or afford it anyway.)

5. Write more. I'm not going to say too much about this one, but I think one of my better forms of communication is the written word. I'm not always a great speaker, but I like being able to rework my thoughts and express myself more clearly through writing. So...

6. Be a better father and husband. There's a lot of areas in my life where I can afford to fail. It's okay if I don't read 12 books this year, drink less Coke, convert slide photographs... or honestly even reach more unchurched youth. But one area I cannot afford to fail in is my family. I am the only father and husband my family's got, so they're depending on me. I admit that when I look back over 2008 some of my biggest regrets are that I didn't spend more time with my wife and kids. I'm happy to be able to impact the lives of teenagers, but I have to find ways to balance all of that over against the needs of the four most important people in my life. I hope that 2009 will be full of "No's" to the busyness and selfishness in my life and many more "Yes's" to Amy, Ben, Will and Kate.

Top 10 Highlights of 2008

2008-12-31T12:10:00.000-05:00

In honor of the new year, I thought I would do a top 10 list of my highlights from 2008. Enjoy.

1. Kate & China
The biggest highlight of the year, of course, is the adoption of our daughter, Kate. We were finally matched with our daughter this summer on July 11th. After getting our LOA and TA, we traveled to China for two weeks in October, and on October 13th, 2008 we met her for the very first time. While we were in China, we went through Beijing and saw the Great Wall and the Forbidden City, traveled to Nanjing and Suzhou and walked around the beautiful canals and the Ming mausoleum, and finished up in Guangzhou with some final shopping and the oath ceremony at the US Consulate. After an extremely long flight, we returned home on her 2nd birthday, October 23rd. She has been a constant joy, even as our new family struggles through the newness and strangeness of it all. She has gone from wanting me non-stop for the first two weeks, to not wanting me at all (only Mommy), and now--especially in the last little bit-- she seems to be comfortable with us both (though sometimes she still just wants Mommy). We have worked through a lot of communication issues already: we picked up some Chinese, she seems to understand a lot of English now, and we've all been learning sign language. She loves her brothers, and the boys absolutely adore her. I can't tell you how thankful to God I am that we are now together at last.

2. the Boys
The boys are great kids. I'm so proud to be their dad. This has been a wonderful year with them. Ben and I have always been close, but now that Kate has come along, I think Will is becoming a little less of a Mama's boy and has been closer to me. This summer they both took swim lessons, and they're starting an indoor soccer program next month. In the Fall, Will started preschool two days a week and Ben started half-day Kindergarten five days a week. They are so smart and are great at teaching Kate new things. In 2008 Ben started reading, and I'm so amazed with his ability to read so well (he reads anything and everything he can get his hands on). And Will is very creative and athletic. The work he brings home from school and church are very imaginative, and he's becoming quite coordinated as we play ball together. I'm so excited to watch how they continue to grow!

3. 10-year anniversary
This August, Amy and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary, and we took a long weekend trip together to Myrtle Beach (via Chimney Rock, NC). If you know my wife, you know how lucky I am. She is beautiful and sweet and smart and witty. She loves God and her family and supports me and my ministry in a hundred different ways. I love that she "gets it" (i.e. she cares about the things that you're supposed to care about), and she's so great at listening to me go on and on about whatever I need to talk about. She's my favorite.

4. Baptisms
This year, three students from our youth ministry were baptized: Buckley, Sarah and Stefanie. I was also privileged to perform the baptisms for Stefanie, her step-dad Dean, and a new friend, Aaron. It is a huge honor to be a part of such a special moment in their spiritual journey.

5. Toronto
I think the highlight of our youth ministry in 2008 for me was probably our mission trip to Toronto, Canada. It was awesome to be a part of a group of 10 youth and 3 adults from our church to serve in the urban center of Toronto this summer. We had a great time, and I got to witness God using our teenagers to go outside their comfort zone and serve others. I'm continuing to see ripples from this week of ministry all throughout our youth group.

6. Fusion, Summer Internship, and Student Leadership
In my second year of youth ministry here, I'm proud of three new developments. One is our youth ministry network called Fusion. In January, I began contacting and pulling together youth ministers from churches all over town and setting up opportunities for us to get together. In the Fall, we pulled off our first joint venture-- Fusion: United-- community service projects and joint worship service. I've enjoyed getting to know these awesome leaders and look forward to what we'll do together in the future.

Second, we started a summer youth internship program. Blair, a junior at the college next door, worked with the youth this summer and did a fantastic job. She was full of great ideas, was great relating to the youth, and was fun to work with. I've enjoyed hanging out with Blair and am glad that she's continued working with our girls high school small group.

Finally, there were a few students who were ready to take the next step in their relationship with God and their role within the youth ministry. So, we've begun a student leadership program with four students who have committed to being contributors instead of just consumers. We're meeting to talk about what it will take to be the kind of leaders within the student ministry that God wants them to be. It's so exciting seeing their enthusiasm.

7. Jacob & Hawaii
Back in January of this year, Amy's mom took the family to Hawaii for two weeks. It was our Christmas present and basically a last chance to spend family time with Amy's brother, Jacob, and his wife, Alison. Later in 2008 they would leave for the mission field. It will probably be quite some time before we get to spend much time together again, so the trip to Hawaii was such a significant two weeks. It was so nice to escape the cold January winter for the warmth of the Hawaiian beaches. But more than that, it was great for us and the boys to spend some time with some of our favorite people. We saw the sights, ate good food, drank Jamba Juice, visited friends (Kele and Kaala & their kids), sat on the beach, and played together. Especially since Ben and Will miss them so much now, I'm glad we got these two short weeks together.

8. Presidential election
In 2008, we saw the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States of America. I'm still in shock that it happened, but I'm very excited for this new time for America. I saw him in person at the campaign rally for the Democratic nomination in Louisville on May 12th and followed the general election on the news pretty regularly. I'm proud to be a part of this historical moment in our country's history, and I look forward with great anticipation the work that he'll do when he begins his term in office.

9. New Guitar
In March, with some of the money my grandmother left me, I purchased a new guitar. It's a Takamine EG543SC Acoustic Electric, and it's beautiful. It's got a great sound, and I love playing it. I think Grandma would be happy that I'm enjoying it so much :)

10. Cubs, Browns, UK basketball disappoint, but football Cats make 3rd straight bowl game

As you would expect from the Browns and the Cubs, I was very disappointed this year. Both had high expectations-- the Cubs even led the NL in wins-- but both failed miserably. The Cubs got swept in the first round of the playoffs to the Dodgers. The Browns barely even made it out of the gate before finishing the season miserably with two injured QBs, no offensive TDs since early November, and firing the head coach. Pitiful.

The Cats struggled in their first year with new head coach, Billy Gillispie. Had it not been for the emergence of Patrick Patterson it would have been very ugly. And even barely squeaking into the NCAA tournament, we made an early first round exit to Marquette. I don't even remember the last time we were ranked in the top 25. As we head into the SEC part of the schedule in 2009, I'm starting to have some hope for the Cats yet.

On the positive side, congratulations to the underestimated/ overachieving UK football team. Even though no one expected them to have much of a year, they crawled their way across the six and six line into their third-straight bowl game appearance (and hopefully third-straight bowl win). I'll be heading to Memphis tomorrow with great hope that they'll pull another one out, this year against the Conference-USA champions, the East Carolina Pirates.

converting slides

2008-12-30T08:45:00.010-05:00

My Christmas present from my parents this year was a little different. I told them if they got me a scanner that converted slides into digital images, I would take on the project of transferring all of my parents' and grandmother's years and years and thousands and thousands of slides into jpg images. So, Merry Christmas to me???

Anyway, I think it will be for me like jigsaw puzzles are for my mom. (By the way, my mom is what you might call a "jigsaw puzzle junkie.") Slow and time consuming. Addictive. Painstakingly detailed. Small victories in completed sections. And something to really be proud of when I'm finished. Unlike her though, I have the benefit of not having to undo all the work I spent so much time on when I'm finished.

I also have the opportunity to show off a few of the treasures I have come across along the way (Wasn't I a cute little kid?):

2009 theme

2008-12-10T13:45:00.006-05:00

If you read my last post, you know that I've been working on a 2009 theme for our youth group. I want to invite you to respond with your thoughts by participating in this little poll. (By the way, because I'm not creative, I freely admit that I've stolen all these ideas from other people.) Also, if you have thoughts for images, Scripture passages, or songs that would compliment these themes, please leave those in the comment section! I'm not promising to use the winner, but I'd love to get some honest feedback. Thanks :)

t-shirt time

2008-12-05T10:16:00.005-05:00

2008-- "Love Wins"

"We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us." 1 John 3:16

2007--"Becoming"

"Don't worry about your youth. Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity." 1 Timothy 4:12

It's that time of year again. Time to come up with a youth group theme, Scripture and t-shirt design for the new year.

Shortly after I came to the church in 2006, I promoted t-shirts for the youth group to begin in some small way the process of developing cohesiveness. I think maybe (at least subconsciously) it helps teenagers feel like they belong, that they know the direction/ theme of the group, and that it helps them have a way to let their friends know that their church is important to them.

I've really liked the first two years we've done this (see above), but I'm still praying and searching for a direction for this year. I've already had some good input from some of the teenagers about what they'd like to see.

I think it's also nice for the youth to have something like a t-shirt to help reminisce about some great times or to remember some awesome things God did in their lives. That's the way it is for me, at least. I have to admit I love my old t-shirts. For the longest time, I held on to old t-shirts from high school and youth group until they were falling apart. I still occasionally sport a Kentucky BSU shirt or a FCA ultimate frisbee shirt. Sometimes when I look at an old t-shirt, I think of some of the best times of my life.

p.s. I'm grateful to Hands On Originals t-shirt company for some great help putting together some fun t-shirts and designs over the years.

update on Kate

2008-11-25T20:45:00.001-05:00

I should apologize. If you were faithfully reading this blog, I've let you down. I've not been posting much lately, and I'm sorry. (Hopefully you've used this time to go back and re-read all the wonderful and insightful things I've written in the past... haha.)

In addition to other distractions, I think I've not posted very much because I'm not sure what to say or quite how to articulate my thoughts about the changes in our family.

If you've been around our family recently, you probably know that Kate isn't the daddy's girl she used to be. Since we've been back in the country, she has become attached at the hip with Amy. I don't blame her. Since I have to leave every morning (and often in the evenings and weekends), I'd probably pout, too. Sometimes she just looks at me like she's mad at me and is planning on holding a grudge for a while. The things she used to do that indicated good attachment-- look to me for comfort, hold eye contact, willing to show affection-- she doesn't do nearly as much. So, it makes me feel sad (because I feel like I've lost a little bit of her already) and guilty (because it's my fault that I have to leave her behind all the time).

Don't get me wrong. She's a great little girl and we are so blessed that she is adjusting so well. But I attribute that to two things: One, she has two wonderful brothers that think she hung the moon. She gives Ben the biggest hugs, and Will is constantly making up songs and singing over her! Two, it's because her mommy is so great (and because she's now figured that out!). She really is thriving. And really I can't complain too much... Kate still let's me hold her (at least for a while), take afternoon naps with her, take her to the store, give her baths, feed her, brush teeth, change diapers and clothes, and most other essential things (especially when I get her brothers involved). But it's not what it once was between me and her.

A while back, in order to better facilitate Kate's attachment with her, Amy took over the bedtime ritual (see her recent post). It worked well... maybe too well. Because when I went to put her to bed last week to give Mommy a break, she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me. She cried, kicked and signed "mommy" non-stop for about an hour (all without ever looking at me)... I think we underestimated each others' stubbornness. The decibel level only grew whenever I said that Daddy loved her or that Mommy was not coming. She would not settle down no matter what I tried. In fact, she worked herself into such a fit and got choked on so much snot and mucus that she threw up twice. After changing clothes and bed sheets... and tactics and positions... she finally wore herself out and settled down in her bed with me laying next to her. Exhausted she fell asleep. Since then, Amy and I have been doing bedtime together more often... at least when I'm home in time. I hope this helps Kate attach with both of us.

So pray for us... that we'll know what to do. That we'll know how to build trust and acceptance. That we'll know when to hold on and when to back off. That she'll know that we are her Mommy and Daddy and love her more deeply than we can say.

And let there be no doubt, even in the midst of what will likely be a temporary struggle, truly God is good and we have much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving season!

Is God Really Enough?

2008-11-13T15:34:00.003-05:00

In the last couple days I've been priviledged to participate in an interesting theological discussion on facebook with several folks from NKU and their campus minister, Brian (an old college friend of mine). It started out with Brian's post, "Is God Really Enough?":

Question get your attention? :) No, I am not questioning God as the creator and provider of all things. :) I spoke at our worship service last night and this was one of the questions I posed to spark some discussion in hopes of further developing our Christian Community within the NKU BCM as well as on the campus of NKU. Will you go with me for a minute...
Look at Genesis 1 & 2...God has just created man (Adam). In Chapter 1, as he created each day, He ended the day by saying it was Good. After He created man (Adam & Eve), he said it was Very Good. There is something special about humans that God created... Now, in Chapter 2...after everything had just been declared "Good" and "Very Good", God says in Verse 18, "It is not good for man to be alone..." Amongst all the good, God declares something that was not good. This has been interesting for me to ponder. Why was it not good? Maybe because it was incomplete? Not accomplishing what God wanted accomplished?
I often hear comments from people that as long as I have my relationship with God, that is all that really matters...God is enough. I find it interesting that this is exactly the situation Adam is in in Genesis 2 and yet, it seems that God deemed that that was not enough...something was missing. This led me to another question...Is there a void in our life that God will not fill? Note that I did not say that He could not fill it. He is perfectly capable of doing so. But, in this instance in Genesis 2, it seems that He has left a void in Adam's life that God did not fill. (Also note, that the fall had not occurred yet...) Verse 18 concludes with, "...I will make a helper suitable for him." Scripture goes on to describe the process that ultimately resulted in a suitable helper/companion being created...Eve...another human.
Could it be that from the beginning God created us (humans) to experience community much like the community/relationship experienced among the Trinity? Could it be that we are missing part of the point when we do not emphasize that God really is enough in the context of Christian community? Could it be that one reason the Church is not getting much traction with the Gospel in the world is that we are missing a large part if ourselves?
These are some thoughts I am working through...there are likely holes of reason and understanding. Will you help me explore these questions by engaging this discussion with me? I think the process of exploration in these areas trusting that God, through His Holy Spirit will guide us to His answers, will be a way to spur one another on to futher growth in our relationship with God and each other. Hope to hear from you!

Which caused me to do some thinking... and give input into the discussion, too:

Just a thought... Was the Trinity not enough for God? Isn't that why he created humans? Maybe the bigger picture is that community-in-and-of-itself isn't what is missing... maybe an ever-growing, more-inclusive community is what God is pointing to here. (A community which constantly adds more to it, e.g. the Trinity adding Adam, Adam adding Eve, the first family adding children, etc.) Yet another aspect to the Abrahamic covenant: You are blessed to be a blessing... bring more people into the "family," if you will.
Personally, this has been more real to me through our adoption of Kate. I'm not enough... Me and Amy aren't enough... Me, Amy and my 2 sons aren't enough... We felt it deep in our souls to love another and open up our family to this amazing little girl. As in the case of the Trinity, even good can become better. Or, maybe put another way, good can become "not good" if it never grows beyond itself.

And this, too (after further discussion):

Yes, thanks James for the word of caution. I really don't mean to imply that God was not self-sustaining, but nevertheless I don't want to miss the way that God builds something of himself into his human creation, a.k.a. "created in his image."
Brian, great job explaining what I was trying to say... I should let you speak for me more often :) Like you, I guess I might use the word "satisfied." When you look at the creative and redeeming nature of God, it reveals an unwillingness to be satisfied with things as they are. (Also, maybe that's why ours is a God of linear history instead of recurring cycles and reincarnation?) I mean, really, isn't the problem with many churches that they're often satisfied NOT reaching out beyond themselves? Why does this annoy God? Because the people who call themselves by his name are acting in a way that is inconsistent with his character! I believe it is part of who God is that he is always seeking, inviting, welcoming, opening doors, breaking down barriers, growing, renewing, recapturing, redeeming...
So is God enough for God? Does God need more than God? "Need"? I wouldn't go that far. "Desire"? I truly think so. Forgive me if I overstate the point, but I feel that God's love moves him to be dissatisfied.
I'm interested... does this make sense? What does everyone else think?

live blogging from the KBYMA

2008-11-10T16:36:00.004-05:00

Our state's Baptist Youth Ministry Association is meeting during the annual convention. Right now about 25 youth pastors are sitting around discussing what can we do about the trend for older high school students and college students to drop out of church. What needs to change? How can we operate within the structures that values keeping things the same? Why do our churches sometimes value only "good kids"? How can we keep teens connected through these transitions (driver's license, college, etc.)? How does a youth pastor's longevity factor into this? Is it simply that we're not offering anything good enough to compete with all the options that are now available to them? Is our message deficient... leaving out what's necessary to create deeper commitment? How do we measure things... what are some ways to tell "when it sticks"? Good questions that demand thoughtful and creative solutions.

Our jump off point were some quotes taken from the recent Catalyst conference...
“To reach people no one else is reaching, we must do things no one else is doing.”
“Become preoccupied with those you haven’t reached as opposed to those you are trying to keep.”
“The next generation product almost never comes from the previous generation.”
“Be a student, not a critic.”
“If we got kicked out and the board brought in a new CEO, what would he do? Why shouldn’t we walk out the door, come back in, and do it ourselves?”
“We fall in love with the way we do ministry so we keep it around.”
“What do I believe is impossible to do in my field… but if it could be done would fundamentally change my business?”
“Pay attention to the people who are breaking the rules. Rule breakers are often problem-solvers.”
“When your memories exceed your dreams, the end is near.”
“Don’t let success overshadow your vision.”

new creation

2008-11-06T09:13:00.000-05:00

New Creation from Pace Hartfield on Vimeo.

the political campaign model

2008-11-04T00:03:00.000-05:00

In honor of "Super Tuesday," I thought I would post some thoughts (Yes, I know... it's dangerous to stray too far from pictures and stories about my daughter, especially into politics!).

A friend of mine posted on his blog asking what the church could learn from political campaigns. The following was my reply:

"I'm afraid it has been a lesson in what-not-to-do, as it relates to faith and the kingdom of God...
1. Campaigns exist to promote the leader. In the church, God's design is for leaders to promote the people (though we see it modeled the other way all the time).
2. In campaigns, it's all about the event. You get people to make a "decision" the will determine their (sic!) future. Though this is how a lot of people talk about Christianity, I think Jesus models a faith that is intended to be more of a journey that has several key points of commitments and evidences of maturity all along the way. Our faith is intended to move us toward the image of Jesus reflected in us, not simply praying a prayer, a.k.a. marking the right box on a ballot.
3. In campaigns the ultimate commodity is image. You can't afford to be really authentic-- it's too risky. On the other hand, the church should be a community of real people who live authentic and vulnerable lives, modeled by its leaders.
4. Campaigns often don't seem to differentiate in priority of issues. On a scale of 1 to 10, everything is a 10: health care, social security, the economy, national security, civil liberties, judgment, education, etc. In the church, not everything is a 10. The death and resurrection of Jesus is a 10. What translation of the Bible you prefer is probably a 1. (However, as we all know, there are many churches that treat 1's like 10's.)
5. In campaigns, the most utilized way of influencing people is through well-placed rhetoric (either inspiring or fear-based). Commercials, billboards, debates, yard signs. "America first." "Change you can believe it." I think the leadership example of Jesus says influence comes through relationships, serving one another, and tangible expressions of love. "They will know you are my disciples if you love one another."

I guess that's enough for now. There's a lot to learn from the political campaigns, but I'm afraid it mostly helps me see how the ways of God are fundamentally different from the ways of the rest of the world!"

What do you think?

since we've been home...

2008-10-30T11:26:00.006-04:00

Well, we're back home from China, and everyone is doing great! It's much colder here than it was in Guangzhou.

I want to say "thank you" for all the support and encouragement that so many of you have given to us while we traveled to bring home our daughter.

Mostly because our last moments in China and flights back to the States were relatively uneventful (with some exceptions), I won't rehash any of that. You can check out Amy's blog for some of those updates.

But since we have been back, we have been very busy. We got in on Thursday, grabbed some dinner and pretty much went straight to bed. So last Friday, with a full night's rest, I got up and went to work that morning to get some things done... and took Kate with me. As you have probably read, she's a bit of a daddy's girl so I thought I'd try to ease her into my absence by taking her with me that morning and letting everyone else get some more sleep. It was fine because I always love showing her off, and Kate amazes me with how she handles new things so well. So that afternoon I had a meeting, so I left her at the house with Amy and kids and again she handled that very well, too. Kate has the boys-- who she absolutely adores!-- around most of the time (Ben has school only until 11:00am and Will only goes twice a week). So I think my going back to work has actually helped her and Amy's bonding experience. We finished up the day with some visits from friends and a good homecooked meal (Amy's meatloaf, mashed potatoes and peas = yum!), and judging from the amount Kate ate, she must have really liked it :)

(she loves those gloves)

Each night we've been trying to adjust our sleep to the new time zones and slowly it's getting better and better. So Saturday morning we laid around the house (the boys watched Qubo). And that afternoon I was leading a church event most of the day, so Amy carted the kids off to lunch with the girls in Lexington. I ended the night by finishing some prep for church and catching up on a little college football.

Sunday we went to church. That was fun. Kate went to big church with us and had a great time. She didn't seem to be at all overwhelmed... maybe a little nervous at times when strangers got too close. But she did great. She loved the music--she wouldn't sit still, clapping and wiggling around to the music! And I loved showing off my beautiful daughter. Later, Grammy and Boopa stopped by to meet their newest grandchild, went out to eat and came back for a little belated birthday cake and ice cream. Though Will sang "Happy Birthday" to her over and over on her actual birthday on Thursday and with the "party" on Sunday, I'm not sure she understands this whole birthday thing yet.

Monday Ben started back to school, and we're working hard to get back to "normal." It was my day off, so we just hung around the house. Amy did some grocery and clothes shopping. The boys watched some movies they got in China (Bugs Bunny and VeggieTales "Pirates Who Don't Do Anything"). Later, "we" carved the pumpkin... "we" means that I gutted it myself, carved it myself, and got to clean it up myself... they told me what shapes to make the eyes, nose and mouth :) Later, when Amy bathed the kids, I cleaned up the kitchen and baked pumpkin seeds. This was the first time I had ever tried baking pumpkin seeds myself, but I remember when I was a kid my mom doing this all the time. So I called my mom to ask what to do. Funny thing is that she said my brother, Brian, tried the same thing this year, too. It turns out Kate likes the pumpkin seeds, too.

Tuesday was pretty uneventful, I guess. I took the kids to school and went to work. We had spaghetti for dinner, and Kate loved it. We're glad she likes so many things, though she still doesn't seem to care for peanut butter, pizza, oranges or milk. I gave the kids their baths, but I had a hard time putting Kate to bed. I guess I forgot how tricky bedtime can sometimes be with two-year olds. Amy was great and was eventually able to get her in bed.

Wednesday was a big day. The church had their "Trunk-or-Treat" event where the adults decorate the trunks of their vehicles and pass out candy to the kids dressed in their Halloween costumes. It's a lot of fun. The boys dressed as Transformers--Ben as Bumblebee and Will as Optimus Prime. Kate became the third of our kids to wear the hand-me-down puppy dog costume, but she was very cute. It turned out to be an appropriate costume, too. I had told the youth on Sunday morning about my daughter and her middle name, Xuna, which was part of the name she was given at the orphanage. The "Xu" part of the name represents the year in which she was born, according to the Chinese zodiac. She was born in the year of the dog, and when each dog year roles around on the calendar it is paired with an elemental attribute. 2006 is fire dog. So many of the youth of my church are going around calling my daughter "Fire Dog." So anyway, it was a great time... lots of candy, tired kids and frozen toes :)

This morning our son Will got to show his preschool class pictures from his trip to China. We helped him show pictures of him with his sister, pictures from on the Great Wall, Tian An Men Square, the stone animal road at the Ming Mausoleum, and on trains, boats and playgrounds in China. I think he was proud to show off a little.

We have been unbelievably blessed with Kate's progress so far. She is such a joy to our family, and praise to God for bringing her so far so quickly! It is so amazing how in love I am with this little girl. And if you've not met her yet, I can't wait for you to see her.

* I apologize for not having more pictures here, but the battery on our home computer completely died so we can't access almost all of the pictures we've taken since we've been home. Hopefully soon.

guangzhou

2008-10-21T08:01:00.004-04:00

Here is some video from Suzhou... It's fun to see our family interact. I think Kate must think all we ever do is eat (which seems to be okay by her!).

We are now in Guangzhou. We flew in early yesterday (Monday morning) from Nanjing. Here's a picture from the flight, not long before she spilled that cup of water (pictured on the right) all over my shirt and lap. Nice.

Once we arrived and checked into the White Swan hotel, we had a fairly Americanized lunch at Lucy's down the street. More expensive but worth it. We then took Kate to her visa picture and medical examination for the paperwork for the American consulate. Not fun, but I'm glad she's so healthy. That evening, Amy worked diligently preparing all the paperwork to be filed this morning. (Great job, honey!) Because that took a while, we ate a late dinner at an Italian restaurant a little walk from the hotel. Not bad. I think everyone enjoyed it pretty well.

This morning we really didn't have anything scheduled. Just be available in our rooms from 9:00am to 10:30am while our guide filed our paperwork with the US consulate so she could contact us if there were any complications. Along with the other families from our agency, we dressed up all the kids in traditional Chinese clothing for pictures. Isn't our daughter beautiful? Then a little trip to go shopping and pick up some pizza for dinner. Because there were no naps, we just sent everyone to bed early tonight!

Tomorrow is our last full day in China. I guess we'll take part in the oath ceremony at the US consulate and try to get everything packed up. This may be my last post until we're back, but, for all you who twitter, I'll probably update once we arrive in Detroit.

24 things I've learned about my daughter

2008-10-19T04:04:00.007-04:00

Since tomorrow morning it will have been a week since "gotcha day," I thought I would post a few of the things I have learned about Kate since we met...

1. She is absolutely perfect.
2. She loves to be carried by her Baba.
3. She could eat bananas and shrimp (which she needs me to peel and de-head) non-stop.
4. She has a fascination for electronics... constantly playing with the phone, the cameras, the tv remote, and any other buttons and knobs she can get her hands on.
5. She likes to carry things around, either her toothbrush or comb (though she doesn't actually like to use them) or she puts things in bags and carries them around.
6. Speaking of toothbrushes, she doesn't like anyone messing with her lip or her mouth (which makes it hard to brush teeth).
7. She likes the color pink and looks adorable in tights.
8. She needs a nap in the afternoon and wakes up in a good mood.
9. She feels the need to hold the water bottle lids, and occasionally comes along and grabs open containers and dumps them out.
10. She loves peek-a-boo, kissing noises, is ticklish, and has a hilarious low-toned belly laugh when she gets going.
11. She slaps her head after she has bumped it on something.
12. She's got these long, slender fingers and toes (and, when I put her in bed, she likes it when I kiss her feet).
13. She poops in twos.
14. She usually calms down when she is sung to.
15. She uses her head to block food she doesn't want to eat (it looks like she's bowing).
16. She cries all throughout bath time.
17. She thinks her Mommy is hilarious and thinks it's funny when she makes kissing noises.
18. She loves attention from Dai Ge Ben and Er Ge Will.
19. She seems to think sunglasses are great for leaving fingerprints.
20. She is hot-natured and sweaty.
21. Though we think she might have an ear ache now, she is generally healthy and has been well-taken care of (and takes medicine pretty well).
22. She doesn't drink from a bottle, straw or cup, only with a spoon (because of the cleft in her palate).
23. She has learned to appreciate chocolate ice cream.
24. She is more wonderful than I deserve!!!

what I appreciate

2008-10-18T09:17:00.009-04:00

First, some pictures... This is how I spend most of my time (carrying Kate in my arms)... oh, my poor back! Ben has been dealing with a bit of homesickness the last couple days. I don't think I'm homesick, but there are some things I suppose I miss about home. From my traveling these past several days in China, I have learned to appreciate (or re-appreciate) a number of things...

1. 110 voltage: With all the things we brought that need charging, one power converter barely covers it.

2. US tap water and milk: We cannot drink water in China, except bottled water... which includes no brushing teeth with it, eating fruit or vegetables washed in tap water, open mouths in the shower, ice in our drinks, etc. And because of the recent problems with people getting sick from milk in China, we're avoiding milk... and the boys love milk. Not that they don't love getting to drink Sprite all the time, but we all miss a nice cold glass of milk these days.

3. Laundry facilities: With the 44-pound weight restriction on baggage and the limit to one checked bag on flights in China, we only packed for one week and are now on week two of our trip. This means we have been doing laundry, some of it Amy has been doing in the tub and others were done by a laundry service. I put on some of the "professionally" laundered clothes today and they smelled less than fresh. On top of that, after several hours, my skin started breaking out in a rash! Apparently I'm allergic to the detergent the laundry service used (thankfully, my underwear was washed in-house!).

4. Traffic rules: I experienced this quite a bit on my previous visit to China, but there's no way to explain the driving here. Traffic rules here are, at best, traffic "suggestions." Pass on a double-yellow line? No problem (even with oncoming traffic headed right at you). Honking is not rude or angry; it's merely necessary to let other drivers know you are close. The confluence of cars, vans, bicycles and motor bikes is amazing, indeed. (However, train travel--like in Europe--is so nice... I really wish we utilized this more in the States.)

5. The 112 miles between our house and Mimi's: I love my mother-in-law and am so glad to have her help with the boys on the trip. She does a great job with Ben and Will, and I think it's so great that they've gotten to experience this. But after so much non-stop time together, I think Mimi and I will both be happy for a little distance when we get back home.

6. Variety in food: I think I've done a good job of eating. If you know me, you know I can be a picky eater, but I haven't complained about the food. We've had breakfast buffets at our hotels, which always have bread or toast, eggs, OJ, and some other things I like (plus, I'm not much of a breakfast eater anyway). For other meals, we've tried a number of places. We ate at a hot pot place a couple days ago (very spicy); we were served lunch when we visited the orphanage; we ate at a noodle place tonight; and a couple other "local" places along our tours. We are certainly getting our fill of rice. There are a few other options, too... McDonalds, Burger King, KFC and we found a Papa John's, too. All in all, I'm getting burnt out on these limited options though. I could really go for some good home cooking right about now (or at least a Cracker Barrel).

7. Media: This goes both ways. I appreciate the distance from the media because it gives me a break from the political circus (commercials, coverage, phone calls, polls, etc.). It also helps me deal with my heartbreak over the Cubs not being in the NLCS or World Series (at least I don't have to watch the horrible Phillies play the games the Cubs should have been playing). But I miss my cell phone and text messaging, college and NFL football, ESPN sports radio and updated podcasts, and the new episodes of Heroes and CSI.

8. Self-sufficient children: Now that Ben and Will are old enough to take care of themselves so much, I didn't realize how hard it was going to be to go back to taking care of every need of a toddler. On top of that, since I'm the only one Kate has totally bonded with, it's left to me to feed her (which is sometimes tricky, especially liquids), bath her, diaper her, cloth her, rock her, tuck her in, supervise her playtime, give her medicine, brush her teeth, sit with her in the van, carry her on the tours, and be there at any moment she wants something. It makes it harder that she can't tell me what she wants but still gets mad at me when I don't get it right. I love Kate so much and have totally enjoyed being her beloved Daddy, but now after six days, I'm ready for some help :) I hope she bonds with Amy soon!

These (along with soft beds, air-conditioning, and non-tonal languages) are just some of the things I've grown to appreciate more over the last 10 days.

what you come here for

2008-10-15T20:47:00.003-04:00

I don't doubt that the reason most of you come to visit my blog is for the videos I've been posting, so here you go. This is from the Humble Administrator's Garden we visited yesterday. We attracted quite a crowd. Enjoy.

Daddy's Little Girl

2008-10-13T23:47:00.002-04:00

(Brushing our teeth!)

A quick update. (I don't have much time... I distracted her with Cheerios, but she won't let me be away from her too long!)

Everything has been going very well. We went to the Civil Affairs office this morning to sign all the paperwork to make Kate officially ours (at least as far as the Chinese government is concerned)! We had to take Kate with us back to the place where we picked her up yesterday. She seemed to handle it pretty well. Actually, when some of the orphanage workers who brought her to us yesterday tried to get her to come to them, she refused to leave my side! Wow. However, she was not especially patient of the time it took to complete the paperwork... many times she got upset with me that when she grabbed my hand I wouldn't follow her outside.

Also, a highlight of my night yesterday: She got upset and started crying just before bedtime, so it was left to me to try to soothe her. I picked her up and took her to the bedroom. I bounced her for a moment, which soon led to dancing in circles, which soon led to me singing to her. For some reason, James Taylor's "You Are My Only One" came to my head. She loved it. She hugged my neck a little tighter, took some deep breaths, and totally gave it up. I have no words to describe what this feels like to have this strong connection already with this precious little girl. Like I said before, she's the other woman of my dreams!

I'm the luckiest dad in the world

2008-10-13T11:04:00.008-04:00

My daughter is amazing. I can't believe we are finally together! I am even more amazed that she has bonded with me so well already! Oh, how my heart is ready to burst :)

(my new favorite picture, I think)

Well, since I'm nice and all, I let Amy get on-line first after we put Kate to bed tonight (that, and it's taking me a long time to convert all the video to the computer). So, go visit her blog soon.

Amy is quite amazing, too. What you don't know is that, because I knew it was common for the adopted child to have a preference for one parent over the other, I was afraid I would be the one rejected. What would have devestated me, Amy is handling wonderfully. She has been great, finding opportunities to bond little by little, helping me out all the time, and encouraging me and giving me confidence that I'm doing a good job.

Video of our first moments with Kate...

Some time well spent at Haagen Dazs...

Some more updates

2008-10-12T09:30:00.001-04:00

This morning we visited Tian An Men Square. It was pretty amazing... a strange mix of leftover Olympic and Para-Olympic decorations with a strong communist nationalism (exemplified in the very, very long line of people waiting to walk past the body of Chairman Mao).

Close by was the Forbidden City. What an interesting clash in political ideology. Next to Tian An Men, the symbol of socialism and economic equality, was the Forbidden City, the sprawling palace that was once reserved strictly for the emperor and his family (now crammed with masses of people ironically enough). It certainly provides a visual reminder (propaganda?) of the extreme excesses of this kind of empire over against the teachings of communism.

We arrived in Nanjing tonight and are hoping for a good nights sleep. It's funny... driving through Nanjiing (and walking around the hotel a little), it reminds me much more of the China I experienced 11 years ago (looks and smells). I noticed several roadside vendors selling meat on a stick, people coming up to you to try to sell you stuff (a la "Hello Banana Lady"), and I even had myself a Magnum bar for good measure. Shawn is probably the only one who'll read this and know what in the world I'm talking about :)

By the way, don't forget you can see our travel itinerary (with links for more info) here.

Well, just a reminder... tomorrow is the big day! In about 13 hours (Sunday night for you), we will meet our daughter. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers. We hope to post some great pictures and videos soon!

China in review (so far)

2008-10-11T09:17:00.004-04:00

If you're wondering what our travel to China has been like so far, you can read some notes on Amy's blog. But here's a video recap of the trip over from Ben and Will's perspective :)

This was video is from this morning on the Great Wall of China. Will and I had found a spot to rest and wait for Amy and Ben to catch up with us. (Be sure to notice Ben in background yelling, "We'll see you in a minute!") The scenery was magnificent.

And it's true. Ben, and especially Will, are quite popular. It's hard to tell how many times we were stopped by people asking to take a picture with them. (I might need to google "picture with a cute white kid with freckles and dimples on the Great Wall of China" to see how many of those pictures have been posted to the web!) Even in a shopping center where we ate lunch today, Will was being stalked around every corner by two clerks trying to get him to give them hugs (see picture below). I'm afraid they'll start thinking they're celebrities.

(Also a quick shout out to Dad for the power converter that is making all these updates possible--keeping our camera, computer, video camera and all other technology charged! Thanks!)

here we go!

2008-10-08T22:52:00.004-04:00

A lot of people have been asking me if I'm excited about leaving tomorrow for China. Honestly, I don't know how to answer them. Of course I'm excited! I mean, we're flying half way around the world with my whole family (including my mother-in-law). We're getting ready to add a little girl to our family full of boys. And this little girl, who's almost two years old, doesn't know us... doesn't know English... we don't know Chinese... and we are going to take her from everything she's ever known to live with us back here. Exciting? Terrifying and wonderful and sad and beautiful and traumatic and a dream come true and, yes, exciting, too.

This morning I woke up with butterflies in my stomach. (My stomach is always the first physical indicator that something's going on.) I guess it's kicking in that I'm about to leave on a journey that will forever change my life... to meet the other woman of my dreams :) Amy told me earlier that she has to tell herself to breathe. My prayer has long been that I would be a really good father. Ben and Will have been relatively easy so far, but a girl--will I know what to do? Talk about heartache! I know this little girl will have the capacity to either make my heart soar or break it to pieces. With all my heart, I hope I can be everything she needs.

I love you, Kate. I can't wait!

8 days to go

2008-10-01T22:39:00.004-04:00

How is it that time is moving so slowly? (Although I still can't seem to get everything accomplished I've got on my to-do list!) I can't wait to get my arms around this little girl!

These pictures are now six months old, but we just got them last week in a file we were sent from our agency. What a wonderful surprise! (Click here for more recent pictures.)

One week from tomorrow we get on the plane to China, and in 11 days from right now (given the time change) we should be meeting our daughter! I can't believe how amazing this is.

We're hoping to have good internet access on our trip so that we can post regular updates to our blogs-- this one and Amy's (see "Raising Tomatoes" on the right-hand side of the page). We look forward to reading your comments as we post from China.

thoughts on "stress"

2008-09-23T08:50:00.001-04:00

I love it when, even in the midst of leading a Bible study, God puts some pieces together in a whole new way.

This past Sunday morning during our normal youth Bible study, we were talking about dealing with stress and the things that cause stress. I had already planned and prepared, but in the midst of sharing some Scripture, God showed me a really cool connection that has really stuck with me.

1 Peter 5:7 says, "Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you." There are some things that I care about that others don't care about like I do (e.g. my wife doesn't care about my baseball card collection, some old books I've held onto, or my large collection of baseball caps). It's okay, but knowing her love of yard sales, I don't trust her with these things. In this verse, God assures us that he is trustworthy... he truly cares about us and the things we care about (the things that cause us stress). Because he cares about our cares like we do, we can feel confident to trust him with them, to "cast our anxiety on him."

Add that to this verse: Matthew 6:33, "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." It seems that God is also saying that he wants to change our focus. He wants to make sure that our priority is him and his kingdom, and, as a result, the other things we care about will be taken care of, too. He wants us to replace our worry with another activity--pursuing him. It seems that he is saying, "I want you to care most about the things I care most about."

Which I think leads to this muddled, but insightful, principle related to the stress in our lives: God cares about what I care about, but he also wants me to care about what he cares about. This is the heart of deep relationships--interconnectedness. Shared priorities. Mutual concerns. Loving one another.

(By the way, Amy really does care about the things I care the most about... I just like giving her a hard time about how much she likes getting rid of things in yard sales.)

I thought this looked fun...

2008-09-18T15:09:00.002-04:00

China Travel Itinerary

2008-09-16T14:09:00.005-04:00

I don't know what you're going to do with your October, but here's most of mine...

October
9th-- leave home at 11:15am, through Detriot and Tokyo
10th-- arrive in Beijing at 9:35pm (Beijing Traders Hotel)
11th-- visit Summer Palace and Great Wall (Juyongguan section)
12th-- visit Tian An Men Square and the Forbidden City, fly to Nanjing (Manderin Garden Hotel)
13th-- meet our daughter, Kate!!!
14th-- civil affairs office for registration
15th-- train to Suzhou (Kate's birthplace), visit Humble Administrator's Garden and Panmen Scenic Area (Holiday Inn Youlian Suzhou)
16th-- visit Tong Li Town, the water county and Suzhou Embroidery Institute
17th-- visit Suzhou Children's Welfare Institute (SWI) and Lingering Garden, back to Nanjing (Manderin Garden Hotel)
18th-- visit Ming Dynasty Emporers' Tombs
19th-- visit Qin Huai River
20th-- fly to Guangzhou (White Swan Hotel), medical check-up, fill out forms for US consulate, get Kate's passport
21st-- guide helps complete consulate documents
22nd-- oath ceremony
23rd-- leave Guangzhou at 8:20am, through Tokyo and Detroit, arrive home at 4:25PM

"Grab a Corner"

2008-09-10T17:20:00.007-04:00

If you've been following my blog for a while, you know I changed the web address. It used to include my last name, so for a little extra anonymity out in cyberspace, I recently changed it to http://www.grabacorner.blogspot.com/. I suppose it's about time I give a little explanation of the new title.

Early on in my dating relationship with Amy, I remember actually uttering the phrase, "I don't need anyone." I knew I liked being around people, and it wasn't much fun if you didn't have friends or family. But I thought that a sign of my inner strength and fortitude was that I felt that my fulfillment as a human being was not dependant on any other person. (Surprisingly, she didn't dump me immediately for my naive foolishness.) What I grew to realize was, instead of it being an indication of weakness, the need for other people is a fundamental part of the way God created me to be human. In interdependency, there is strength.

Let me see if I can explain. Check out this list. These are but a few of the things I feel that God has called me to do in life:

Be a faithful husband, loving Amy sacrificially ("as Christ loved the church," Eph. 5:25)
Raise all three of my children to love God and nurture in them a desire to have a relationship with Him
Adopt and care for our precious daughter... provide her with a loving family.
Be fully engaged in God's Word and let it live within me
Have a meaningful prayer life that connects my heart with the heart of God
Lead youth, their families, and our church to join God in the mission of reclaiming the world for Himself
Come alongside teenagers to lead them on the journey of becoming fully-developed disciples of Jesus
Actively worship God in a way that brings him honor and joy
Serve the people of my community and my world in meaningful and restorative ways
Share the story of my Savior with other people
"Act justly, love mercy and to walk humbly with my God," Micah 6:8

Now, looking at this list, how many of these things do you think I can actually accomplish by myself? None. I can try, but I will be much more successful in being all that God has intended for me to be as I depend on other people helping me. Case in point: since God did not speak to me from the sky or drop a Bible in my lap, if it were not for other people, I would not be a follower of Jesus today. I needed others to point me to God, and I still need them today.

That's why I love the story in Mark 2 of the paralytic man and his friends. Here's this man, paralyzed, who is unable to help himself. Maybe if he could get to Jesus to heal him, but he could never get there unaided. So I can imagine in my mind the scene, this man's friends saying to one another, "We can do something about our friend's disability. We can carry him to Jesus." Not only was this man unable to help himself, but none of his friends by themselves could get him to Jesus either. So by the time they rounded up four of them, I can hear the first call out to the other three, "Hey, grab a corner. We'll get him to Jesus." The rest of the story goes on to tell about them being undeterred by the crowd and lowering the paralyzed man down in front of Jesus through the ceiling by pulling aside the roofing of the house Jesus was at. It says in verse five, "When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.'" Then it says Jesus healed him and the paralytic man got up from his mat and could walk.

There's a lot that God wants me to do, but I need help. So I guess that's what I want my blog to be about. In the variety of things I write about-- adoption, youth ministry, changing the world--I want to invite you to jump on with me. Go ahead. Let's go. Grab a corner.

highlight videos

2008-09-06T00:33:00.005-04:00

A couple highlight videos from youth trips this summer...

a different kind of trip

2008-09-01T14:35:00.009-04:00

We found out last weekend that we got our official Travel Approval to go to China, and a couple days later got back our passports with their Chinese visas (above, on left). But we were disappointed to learn that the US Consulate did not have any available openings until October 21st to schedule us for the finalization of the adoption on the American side of things. I guess this is what should be expected when you are working with bureaucracies from two different countries!

So we will be traveling to China on October 9th. But this isn't my first trip to China.

I first traveled to China in the summer of 1997 (see visa at top, right side) when, along with five other college students (Shawn, Sharon, Qny, Momi and Angie), I spent five weeks in Yangshuo, Guangxi (near Guilin). We traveled through Hong Kong and southern China by boat, train, airplane, bus, taxi, bicycle and foot. We saw breathtaking landscapes filled with limestone mountains and terraced rice fields, picturesque towns with pagodas and ancestral shrines, and amazing cities with skyscrapers that climb to the sky. We spent our time with a school full of kids (mostly around 13 and 14 years old). We learned Chinese and taught English. We played basketball and ping pong and learned tai chi and mahjong. We snacked on "sheep-on-a-stick" at roadside vendors, dined on some odd-looking pizza at "americanized" cafes while they showed movies (like an "edited" version of Braveheart), and accepted invitations to traditional Chinese meals (where I was first introduced to beer... "Gan Bei"!). We tubed down the Li Jiang and bicycled to Moon Hill. We haggled in the marketplaces and took lots of pictures. We danced and laughed at birthday celebrations and wept, hugged and set off firecrackers at good-byes. The most amazing part for me was answering the girl who asked, "Teach me how to pray," and hearing my closest friend, Cook (pictured below), tell me that he believed. It was an awesome trip, and I can't imagine what my life would have been without it.

Now 11 years later, I will be going on my second trip to China. Like before, I expect to see a lot of amazing sights and experience meaningful moments. But this trip will be a very different kind of trip. Two weeks instead of five. Through Beijing instead of Hong Kong. Probably pretty comfortable accommodations throughout. Again, I will be there with five others with me... but they'll be my family members Amy, Ben, Will, Mimi (my mother-in-law) and Kate. But the purpose of this trip is to adopt my daughter! We will arrive in Beijing, meet our agency workers, adjust to the new time zone and then meet our daughter in her home province of Jiangsu. We have to spend a week together with her there according to the Chinese guidelines of international adoption. Then we will go to Guangzhuo to the US Consulate to swear on oath that we will take care of her and raise her well. We are so excited to finally be with this little girl that we have planned for and prayed for for so many years.

I can't wait to return to such a beautiful and wonderful country that I have grown to love dearly. Though this is an extremely different kind of trip, I'm not sure this journey would have happened if it weren't for the impact of my first trip to China.

Loyalties

2008-08-28T15:37:00.008-04:00

Ok. Let's go ahead and put it out there so there's no confusion.

I'm a little worried about something. I'm afraid I'm about to be labeled a "fairweather fan" as I continue to root for the Chicago Cubs. Now that they sit atop the Central Division--and in fact the entire National League-- going into the final stretch (29 games) of the regular season, I'm balancing a nervous excitement about the possibility of making the World Series with a deep dread that something bad is going to happen. We, Cubs fans, hold our breath at the very notion of success. But please don't think that just because they are doing well this year that I'm jumping on with the bandwagon. Here's the history. Just about all my friends who are my age are either Atlanta Braves fans or Cubs fans (and consequently hate the other team). It's a result of limited TV programming in Kentucky in the 1980's really. Either you watched TBS and the Braves or WGN and the Cubs. The Reds weren't on TV so not many people rooted for them. In 1992, I talked my parents into taking our summer vacation to Chicago so that I could "look at potential colleges." Yeah, right-- Wrigley Field, baby! So I'm a fan of the Cubs and greats such as Ryne Sandberg, Mark Grace, Harry Caray, Andre Dawson, Sammy Sosa, and Moises Alou (despite the 2003 Bartman foul ball situation). I still can't forgive Greg Maddux for going to the Braves in 1993 (even though he eventually came back to the Cubs in '04). And I'm proud of the team we have put together with Zambrano, Soriano, Woods, Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez, and Edmonds. Strong. I have loved and angonized with the Cubs for many years now. I'm looking forward to an exciting/ heartbreaking October!

And just so it's known and out there...
1. College basketball: University of Kentucky (1998 alumni) 2. Amercian League baseball: Cleveland Indians (born in and family from northern Ohio) 3. NFL football: Cleveland Browns 4. NBA: Cleveland Cavaliers (old school logo!) 5. College Football: THE Ohio State Buckeyes (and also Kentucky)

a picture paints a thousand words...

2008-08-25T00:31:00.007-04:00

but in case you need them, here's a few words to get you started...

A couple days ago, Will was mad because when he went to the potty, he got a little on his favorite Transformers t-shirt. So, he decided that instead of changing shirts, he would put on a few more over top of it. "How many?" you ask. Ten. Yep. He sneaked quietly upstairs and preceded to layer nine more shirts on top of the one with pee on it... all of them "super" shirts. (He calls them "super" because they either have superheros on them, look like shirts that his favorite superheros wear in the cartoons... or even that he somehow thinks what's on them vaguely reminds him of a superhero.) This is not the first time he's put on several layers of shirts. I think his logic is "the more super shirts you are wearing, the more super you are." So he comes down the steps with his ten shirts (shattering his previous record), barely able to move his arms, and shows off his "answer" to his pee/shirt problem.

Way to think outside the box, Will!

10 years

2008-08-23T22:50:00.003-04:00

Yesterday--August 22nd--was mine and Amy's 10 year wedding anniversary!

On that day ten years ago, I made a series of promises--
"Tim, will you take Amy to be your wedded wife to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse; for richer, for poorer; in sickness and in health; to love, honor and cherish 'til death do you part?" "I will."

"I, Tim, take you, Amy, to be my wife to live together according to God's ordinance in the holy estate of matrimony. I promise to love you as Christ loves the Church, knowing that Christ gave His life for the Church unconditionally. This is the love I share with you."

"Amy, this ring is a symbol of my love for you. With this ring I give you my faithfulness and devotion, and I will love you forever for my love is of Christ, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."

8/22/98

8/22/08 Amy, over ten years, in whatever ways I have succeeded in these vows, may God help me be even better. And in the many ways I have failed to live up to these promises, please forgive me and may God give me the grace to change. You are an amazing wife, and every moment of these past ten years I have loved being your husband. I love you... forever. You're my favorite.

*****************

Oh, and as an anniversary present, our adoption agency emailed us to tell us we received our TA ("Travel Approval"). We've now applied with the US Consulate to ask for an appointment with them on Sept. 22, 23, 24 or 25 (which would have us leaving on the 11th)... they have five business days to give us an answer. If we don't get one of these dates, we won't travel until the 18th.

Will and Preschool

2008-08-19T14:45:00.006-04:00

Today Will went to his third day of preschool. He actually started a week ago, August 12th, (Tuesdays and Thursdays only). I guess with everything else going on around here, I'm just now getting around to posting about it.

It's time for Will to discover independence. On the exterior, he looks like quite a natural go-getter and extrovert. But that's not quite right. Truth is he has always had Mama or Brother or someone he was comfortable with all his life right there with him. He held Ben's hand during swim lessons or new classes at church. He clings to me whenever someone he doesn't recognize tries to talk to him. And don't get me started on his mother... His favorite phrases include "sweet Mama," "cuddle, Mommy," or sometimes "I want Mommy!" But I'm hoping some of this will change now that he's started preschool.

So far Will has taken very well to preschool. He talks like he doesn't want to go, but when it's time, he goes willingly. The first day of preschool--the same day as his birthday-- Daddy, Ben and Will loaded up in the car for school. I dropped off Ben at Kindergarten, and Will and Daddy went to McDonalds for our "first day of school celebration breakfast." After that we drove to the preschool where he quickly found a familiar face from church (I'm so thankful for Ethan!). He went right in and started playing. His teacher, Miss Ginger, said that he did very well and was the "social butterfly" after he warmed up to the group. I'm excited about what is in store for Will in this new chapter of his life.

*************

Here are a few pictures I wanted to share that Ben and Will took with the camera the other day... future professional photographers, I'd say :)

New Pictures of Kate!!

2008-08-15T11:41:00.004-04:00

Enjoy!!

Adoption Update

2008-08-11T15:57:00.007-04:00

Everything still seems to be on track for traveling around the second week of September. So today we sent off our China visa applications, passport and some more fees. Basically, we're asking them to kindly let us into their country. I'm a little nervous putting my passport in the mail, but it should come back with this cool looking stamp on the inside of it saying that we are officially invited to come in. We also got most our vaccination shots... I still have to go back for my tetanus shot in a few weeks (they were out because of all the kids starting back to school).

Our next priority is to get our official changes made from the USCIS on our home study document (changing it to match with an older child with special needs)... which we're already expecting to come in the mail any time. They don't always expedite these changes, so we will have to stay on top of it.

Also, we want to get Kate's care package in the mail quickly. We are sending a blanket that we've been sleeping with for a couple weeks, a disposable camera, a picture album of her new family with Chinese written on it (check out my profile picture or other examples on Amy's post: http://raisingtomatoes.blogspot.com/2008/07/taras-rockstar.html), and a journal with questions written in Chinese that we are hoping one of her care workers will fill out for us with additional information about her last 21 months. You never know if the care packages are going to make it to their intended destinations, but it's certainly worth a shot.

Also, we got an email from our agency saying that we will not be able to take a tour of Beijing due to the recent tragedy of the stabbing death of the American at a tourist site at the start of the Olympics. It's unfortunate for us, but it's obviously not the point of our trip. And who knows, it may change again before we actually arrive.

* I hope my new web address hasn't caused problems for any of you, but I hope you understand that I changed it in order to remove our last name and other identifiers from this public forum. Thanks for your patience :)

Ben's first day of elementary school

2008-08-08T14:31:00.008-04:00

This morning I dropped off Ben for his first day of Kindergarten. Yes, I knew it was coming, but I can't get over the feeling that our family has just crossed over into a whole new stage of life.

I'm not sure why this feels so big. I mean, after all, Ben's only going half a day. And he already had the experience of attending preschool last year three days a week... but that was just right next door to my office. And in comparison to the hugeness of the adoption, this seems like it should be tiny. But it's not. He started school!

Ben has got a real thirst for learning right now. Of course, he knows all the basic stuff. On top of that, his coloring, writing and addition are really coming along. But I'm completely amazed by his ability to read so well already. He is constantly taking on new books and more and more words. For example, he read the back of my Fall Break mission trip shirt last night: "I was in prison and you came to visit me... whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." And he's just starting Kindergarten!! Ben is ready; it's just me who's not.

So, this morning, we got up (while it was still dark) and got ready for school. Last year I took Ben out to breakfast before his first day, so we decided to keep the tradition alive. We headed over to McDonalds (which he asked on the way to school why McDonalds didn't have an "a" between the "m" and "c"... he's so smart!) and both ordered the cinnamon melts and an orange juice. There we enjoyed a breakfast, eye to eye and knee to knee.

Later as we walked into the elementary school, I couldn't stop thinking about how big he was and how proud I am of him. I don't know how I ever got so lucky as to have such a wonderful little boy... (*cough, cough*) I mean, young man.

Emailing my blog post

2008-08-06T16:05:00.003-04:00

I'm testing out this newest discovery on blogger.com. This is pretty cool if I can post to my blog through email messages.

More Than Meets the Eye

2008-08-03T22:42:00.018-04:00

Ben and Will's most recent obsession-- Transformers! Like most of their other favorite toys, they've had very limited first-hand experience with their tv shows (such as "Ben 10," "Planet Heroes," or "Spiderman"). Since we don't have cable, their viewing is limited to what they can find on Cartoon Network.com, YouTube and other websites. In fact, we have now worked through the first 14 episodes of the old (circa 1984) Transformer cartoons on YouTube (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Transformers_episodes and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ16d-qpBEE).

And personally I think it's brilliant. What's better for little boys than cars and airplanes? Cars and airplanes that turn into robots!! Add to that robots that turn into dinosaurs and insects and you have Dinobots and Insecticons!! I'm telling you, it's marketing genius.

And for Ben it's even better. "How?" you may ask. Not only does Ben absolutely love cars, robots and dinosaurs, he loves puzzles. The harder, more complex, the better. Ben will sit there and transform his Optimus Prime and Bumblebee back and forth between robot and automobile over and over and over. It's impressive.

And now the icing on the cake: it sparks conversation between me and my boys. I tell them about how I used to watch Transformers on tv when I was a kid, and that I actually used to play with my own transformers, including Gremlock (the T-Rex Dinobot), Megatron (that turned into a gun) and Soundwave (the boombox that had two cassettes that turned into a dog and a bird). The other night when Ben was getting ready for bed, he sat with eyes open wide in amazement listening and asking me questions about my favorite Autobots and Decepticons from when I was a kid. It was great. Male bonding at its finest, I tell you.

There's a special bond between fathers and sons... indeed, "more than meets the eye."

LOA

2008-08-01T21:34:00.009-04:00

Here she is! Our beautiful daughter, Kate (Xunuo). We got our LOA ("Letter of Acceptance") at the adoption agency yesterday and FedEx-ed to us at the house today! I'm so proud to be able to post (i.e. "show to the world") her picture now. We are amazed that it came so quickly-- only 10 days from our LOI ("Letter of Intent")! Isn't she the most absolutely amazing little girl you've ever seen?! Once we got the paperwork, we signed it and will get it back to our adoption agency right away. They will file everything by Tuesday, and they expect to get an appointment in about three weeks after that. Hopefully this means we will travel by mid-September. Wow! When we go, we will arrive in Bejing, travel to Suzhou (where she now lives) to get her, and then to Guanzhou to complete the American side of the adoption process.

What can we say? Everything is happening so fast. We have so much left to do. We have a change form pending with the USCIS (immigration office) to stay on top of, Parent Education credits to finish off (reading, videos, write-ups), a care package to send, payments to make, travel arrangments to apply for, vaccinations to update, room to get ready-- all the while celebrating a 4th birthday for Will and getting two little boys ready to start school next week! Such an exciting time :) Lord, thank you for your greatness in all of our joys!

*********

Meanwhile, the boys finished up swim lessons today. Over the last two weeks, Ben and Will have been taking lessons at the Pavilion. They have done so well and have learned so much. Even if we had to bribe them with swim goggles, it was worth it. I think they've come to enjoy the pool so much more now. Here's a few pictures of my little swimmers...

check Ben out...

matched!

2008-07-21T13:18:00.009-04:00

Wow! Now that we've shared the news with many of our family and friends, I can get away with blogging about it. My wife and I were matched with our daughter this past week!!!!

We have been in the process of adopting a daughter from China for a long time now. About this time three years ago, we first began filling out paperwork. January 2006 we sent our homestudy along with many documents, forms and pictures to China and received back a log-in date (LID) of March 7, 2006. So now after 28 months of waiting to be matched, we finally received the referral for our little girl. (See my blog entry puzzle pieces from 1/26/07... who knew that at the time I was writing my daughter would be three months old?)

My daughter, Kate, is so beautiful! There's a lot we can't post online until we receive our official Letter of Acceptance (LOA)-- including her picture-- but she is absolutely amazing. I am so in love with her already! After some more paperwork gets processed, probably in about two or three months, we will travel to China to get her.

Pray for us as we prepare ourselves, our family and our home to welcome our new daughter. Ask God to give us the wisdom it takes to respond to her special circumstances and needs as she goes through this huge change in her life. Thanks!

...just wanted to share the good news :) Oh, and check out the link to Amy's blog, "Raising Tomatoes."

a week at Grandma's house

2008-06-01T21:57:00.013-04:00

Last December my grandmother passed away... she would have been 91 in two weeks. She lived a very interesting and full life. A month ago we finally began what will be a very long process of cleaning out the house she left behind. My mom, my brother (and his family), and me and my family took a week off and met in Ohio to start cleaning.

This house is amazing. It has a total of 4 floors. A basement, first and second floor and a large attic. Because she was such a huge collector and because she had lived there since my mom was little, it is crammed-pack full of "things." I always remember it being full, but in the later years of her life, Grandma was less able to manage the clutter and had let all the stuff get out of hand. Just sifting through the layers is bound to uncover years and years of history (specifically since she was an only child and still has many previous generations' belongings in boxes around the house, she was a member of a ton of organizations, like Eastern Star, DAR, DAC, church committees, library board, museum curator, former teacher, etc., and she survived two husbands).

Here are some pictures to try to show what we are facing...
Stairs to the third floor (before & after): Grandma's room (before & after):

Hallway (before & after): Library (before & after): Den (before & after):

Attic:

In that week, we filled an industrial dumpster three times... mostly full of old food (some as old as 30 years), magazines, and bills and receipts that she had held onto over the years. We took four van-loads of clothes to Goodwill, including probably over 100 pairs of shoes. We sorted through stamp collections, coin collections, doll collections, Boyd's Bear collections, decorative plate collections, postcard collections, and so on. And the problem is that it seems like we barely scratched the surface.

I hard to imagine an end in sight, especially since it is so far away and difficult to carve out the time that it will take to make progress.