Agosto 2005 Archives

I wrote on Monday about the kids willingness to hurt each other over rocks!

Well, they settled it all out and build their rock houses. Today the houses weathered the downpours caused by whatever remains of Katrina, and the toy anlmals refused the evacuation orders. When a late afternoon rescue mission ensued, I snapped some photos.

Antonio's House:

Notice the TV antenna on top, and the big brass door knocker. We found two dinousaurs contentedly asleep in their oyster shells (which convert to couches).

Elena's House:

This house had some lovely painted rocks, some black shell foodstores (stored in the ziplock bag) and a nice television. When we took off the roof, we found the resident black gorilla sound asleep under the green leaf.

When we put the roof back on for the night the house looked like this:

With the heartache from the fighting restored, creativity has filled the neighborhood with elegant places to live. I might just want to move in with the Gorilla.

I had a vision yesterday afternoon of the darkness of my own heart.

We were working in the yard, clearing out a new garden bed, and getting ready for fall planting. Elena and Antonio wanted to make rock houses for some toy animals. We suggested they build down in the back yard and off they went. I wasn't really paying attention to their progress until I heard the unmistakable escalation of a fight. By the time I made it down to the back yard, I saw them tussling over something that Antonio had - obviously a rock. As the noise continued to escalate, Elena grabbed Antonio's hand and almost wrenched his arm out of his shoulder and then Antonio hurled the rock at her - hitting her in the leg.

By this time of course I was louder than they were. "Stop it right now! Get up here!"

I don't know if it was their pain or the tone of my voice - but they started boo-hooing and climbed out of the back yard up to where I was. Both of them were disconsolate. I marched them up to where I was working and sat them down it the grass.

"Do you realize what you are doing? You're willing to hurt each other over A ROCK!"

They looked down and kept crying. I don't know if it was the anger on my face, or the recognition of what they had been doing, but they settled down. I made sure Antonio's arm and Elena's leg were all right, and let them sit in their sorrow for a minute before hugging them and letting them get back to thier afternoon.

Now you may ask.. my dark heart? Their tussle got me thinking about the way I as so prone to act just the way they did. I might not get in a cat fight like my kids - but I'm sure prone to hurt those I love over what are really dirty cheap rocks. I might disguise my intentions and pretend that my needs are somehow more noble and important. But often, they are just that - cheap rocks that I have given innnapropriate value, cheap rocks that I'm willing to hurt others in order to retain.

Lord help me.

P.S. Getting back to the kids. They did go back and finish the construction and made little houses for toy animals. Elena proudly showed off her house - complete with table, kitchen, easy chair, television and remote. Antonio is still working on his.

So - I'm so dreaming of one of these:

but the finances just won't permit the luxury. I give my wife grief about spending all the money - and then think about a $1000 bike, a $300 ipod, camera, guitar, computer ... She might spend more money, but what I want comes in bigger chunks.

So with gas at $2.50 a gallon - I'm trying to build a case for the new bike. My trip is about 5 miles, and when I drive - I usually come home for lunch. So that is about 20 miles a day. My old truck is pretty efficient, so we'll call that one gallon.

Why the long face...

That means I'll have to ride to work 400 days to save the gas money to buy the new bike. At most I can ride 4 times a week. So that means 2 years!

Well its a project.

Last night I got several fixes. Best of high school top 40, Greatful Dead Improvisation, and musical mastery all in one. Bruce Honsby played the Tivoli in Chattanooga. It was fun to take in the show with Jim Ward and his brother Dick.

I have this great memory of the first time I heard his break through album. We were on our senior trip in Ecuador - riding the bus back from Salinas (on the Pacific coast) through the city of Guayaquil up the mountains to Quito. We started the trip just as the sun was setting, and were 100 miles from the start of the mountains, in the midst of a sultry tropical haze. But the setting sun caught Chimborazo - the tallest mountain in Ecuador - and the snow cap lit up like a fire hanging in the middle of the sky. "That's just the way it is"... and that great piano solo.... will always bring that image to my mind.

Hornsby also reminds me of Dave McNamara - my college buddy / housemate - who was a big deadhead. (who else do you know who would give up the dead for lent?) Hearing all that improvization and extended combination of songs that the dead were famous for has really affected what I appreciate in live music. As Horsby said last night when taking requests, "If you want it just like the record, you can leave now." Hornsby and the band did some wonderful combinations, extensions and reinterpretations - adding interest to his book. Creativity in the moment, improvisation and curious combinations - that is what makes live music great for me.

There was also some great musical mastery - even showboating - going on. Which is always what the live setting is mostly about anyway. Good times.....

At dinner tonight we were watching a rainstorm when Elena asked me:

"Papi, I've got a question: If God is all powerful, how come he couldn't stop Adam and Eve from eating the fruit in the garden of Eden?"

Then Antonio follows right along:

"I've got another question: If God knows everything, why did he put that tree in the first place?"

Those are important questions. And mine is the long pause and the careful explanation. How much it helped - I don't know.

But man, isn't it soon to be asking that sort of questions?

Yesterday, we were all moping around the house. The kids just wanted to play computer games, I just wanted to sleep or read, Marialice was working on school stuff - so finally in the early evening I went out to work on the garden. Pretty soon everyone came out and the kids jumped in the pool. The setting sun, the water's splash, and some good looking kids... I had to drop the shovel and grab the camera!

I've been challenged this week. I realize that one of the constant reccuring thoughts in my day is "what can I blog" and one of the thoughts that is NOT constantly recurring in my day is "what I can tell my wife" or "who can I call on the phone to talk to" etc. A few weeks ago, I wrote about the blog being a great community building tool - and I still believe that. But it cannot be a substitute for direct communication and that is what I fear I am prone to do.

I'm sure there are those who blog because their circumstances offer them no community. I see others blogging as a way of continuing / exapanding / deepening the interaction their community involvement offers them. That is all good, good for them... My challenge is to ensure that community is built - or rather intimacy - is built first and then, in the second moment, post to the blog.

I have a suspicion that the attraction of thinking first of the blank page before building community is a broader phenomenon. I've been watching with some curiosity (and horror) the quality of several debates that have emerged recently in the church; the Reformed challenge to the New Perspective on Paul and the broader Evangelical challege to those in the Emerging church. In both these cases the method of debate seems to be the written page - rather than the discussed forum. And when the topics are both so wide reaching and so emotionally connecting the propensity to argue against straw men, react in emotion, and publish sinfully angry material has become the dominant method rather than the exception. This is frustrating.

We need to build a church culture of dialogue - where the conversation and the two way interaction of debate comes first, and the written word, the argument carried on the blank page comes second.

I need to build that culture in my own life.

He might be the center of considerable controversy these days, but I always find Brian McLaren to be a good challenge to my thinking about church, spirituality, culture, etc. This quote from a presentation he gave at the Emergent convention is of great challenge to me.

worship as (spiritual formation) [disciple-making] {community formation} there has been a lot of talk about worship in recent years…. traditional contemporary blended postmodern (yucch) such labels can be useful and they can be problematic. Do we need more “market segmentation?” let’s consider all of these as transitional, and on a deeper level. Let’s consider ourselves to be moving to a “postprotestant” era in worship where forms of worship are not biblically mandated and where elements of worship are not denominationally proprietary where liturgy is acknowledged as universal, a dynamic tension of form and freedom, identity and innovation, and where “evolution” is seen as normative, and where one of the essential functions of worship is Spiritual formation: The development of people who “be,” think, feel, work, relate, and play … in the way of Jesus.

transformation
…teach them to do all I have commanded you. (Matthew 28)

transformation
I have give you an example… love one another as I have loved you. (John 13-15)

transformation
to be conformed to the image of God’s Son (Romans 8)

transformation
… be transformed by the renewing of your minds. (Romans 8)

transformation
…until Christ is formed in you. (Galatians 4:19)

In one sense, everything is spiritual formation: Listening to Rush Limbaugh, watching Fox News or South Park or The Cosmetic Surgery Channel, using pornography or drugs, choosing one neighborhood over another, engaging in office gossip, making charitable donations, etc. In another sense, spiritual formation involves intentional spiritual practices (or disciplines): Actions within our power which we do to train ourselves to do things currently beyond our power, and to become people we are currently incapable of being.
- Running a marathon
-Playing the violin
-Building a bridge
For example, fasting:
- Feeling and acknowledging our weakness in the face of impulses from our bodies.
- Practicing impulse control.
- Asserting to ourselves the importance of things other than impulse gratification.
- Accepting weakness and “poverty” in faith that greater strength and satisfaction can come to us.
- What benefits could come from this practice?

Then again - and I can't find the quote - he asks "do we make up for a lack of transformation by simply making sure our members are busy, busy, busy..."

Finally he gives 10 Spiritual Practices for Public Worship

1. Ritual: Doing things I may or may not feel like doing to bond to the meaning they represent.
2. Inconvenience: Going to a place I didn’t choose at a time I didn’t choose for a purpose I do choose.
3. Association: Associating with some people I like and others I don’t like for a purpose I believe in.
4. Speed: Altering my pace to see what I’ve missed and to feel a different rhythm. (Weekly Seasonal Annual Lifespan)
5. Hospitality: Using my presence and our space to help “the other” feel welcome in my presence, and in the presence of our community.
6. Attentiveness: Waiting for what I may receive only by waiting receptively.
7.Generosity: Taking greater pleasure in being productive (fruitful) than consumptive.
8. Modeling: Exposing apprentices to masters In prayer, teaching, artistry, faithfulness, service, hospitality, etc. Contemplative and charismatic models …
9. Justice & Mercy: Preaching justice Singing justice Praying justice Signifying justice Announcing justice
10. Catholicity: Quoting others Affirming others Praying for others Inviting others

Good reminder eh?

I spent the weekend at a retreat thinking about the failures and deficiencies of my intimacy with my God and with my wife. It was a very convicting and uplifting experience (all at the same time). I walked away with a bunch of great ideas and practices. Try this on for size in both relationships.

Every day:
1. Spend time in prayer together
2. Express two feelings to one another – both what you felt today and why, and when else you felt that way and why.
3. Express one thing you appreciate about the other.

These sort of practical disciplines are the meat and potatoes of both relationships. Yet they are futile if attempted outside a reality of repentance, of a heart dependent on God, of the same work of grace through faith that I found in salvation. This has been the Sonship message for us, this is the only way for the work of this weekend to be effective, to be transformational.

Much of my failure is because my heart has always been stuck in a box. Ever since I can remember, emotional depth and intimate honesty have been completely foreign concepts. I could manage so much, but no further. I could open so much, but no further. You can imagine the box Marialice has been trying to unlock, you can imagine how impossible it has been to know repentance, brokenness and renewal from my God.

I have always expected that some sort of insight or experience would fix everything. I was hoping for the key to the “AHA” moment, for some explosive energy to blast the box wide open in a moment's notice. Now I see that it won’t happen that way. God is asking me today: “If it takes a year of tapping around the edges, an hour at a time, with the hammer and chisel of repetitive disciplines? … will you do that to break that lid off?”

So today I confess and pray – in the way I know how: fairly intellectual and perfunctory. Today I work on the disciplines that are in front of me. This will become the regular focused work, the disciplines of drawing out the heart, opening the box. I commit to this in the trust and hope that God will work over time. I hope that confession and repentance will grow deeper, grow “all encompassing” – especially including the depth of my emotions. I trust that the resolution toward renewal – toward intimacy with God and with my wife - toward being what God wants me to be – would become all of me.

Jon Barlow wrote a great post celebrating the tenth anniversary of his marriage. I really like the post and the things he says about marriage and his wife. We celebrated our 10th during the spring weblog absence so I didn't get to make this sort of post. However, I'm not sure I would have even if I had been able. I see the balance he strikes between living his life on the blog and careful vagueness, but I'm thinking I'm a little more careful of disclosure. I struggle with this - how open should I be, how public should I be etc - and I have not come to any firm convictions yet. Caution certainly eliminates a great number of posts that ruminate in my head, or make into my journal, but that is what caution is about. But my life is becoming more and more focused on risk and opennes and the blog is just one more place where that should take place.

Anyhow ... enough about me... Thanks Jon for your sharing. Here's to your marriage - may it last decades longer.

You may not expect it, but I've been an elder at New City Fellowship for the past four years. There is a wide diversity in the men that serve, and in what they wear to church.

A few weeks ago, I was going to be working in the nursery during church, so wore an old pair of jeans and a wrinkled shirt. Nothing fancy or even hip - just easy to play with the kids in. Then during worship Randy asked us to come forward to greet new members. There's all the formal, suit wearing gang... and me! I really just wanted to hide behind all the others, but at 6'6" - that would have been hard to do.

So imagine my surprise when a few days ago Cindy Gaston said how much she appreciated seeing me up front - as an elder - wearing jeans. Maybe I should take on the mantle...

Two posts by men I really respect bear linking together.

Jeff Rogers of Faith/Works Global Gallery writes a response to the war on terror. He supports the idea, but not the implementation and links to a series of great resouces for those in the "coalition of the passionate" as he calls it. I would quote a great big section - but the whole post bears reading.

Then Byron Borger - the wiley bookseller of Hearts and Minds writes this month about "LIVE 8, Ron Sider, and the Travels of a T-shirt: Christian Perspectives on Social Justice and the Global Economy" His resources are books of course - but what great books. And his review and reminiscence is worth the price of a book.

I hope these guys know each other or at least about each other. What each one do, as colporteurs of a very wholistic christian world view through practical local businesses is a wonderful model. I know each has made sacrifices to live out their call, but I'm glad they have - they have made my life a richer one.

This past week we had Nicole Henning and her four kids staying with us. They spent much time with her parents, so we didn't always have 7 kids roaming the house. We very much loved having them here with us - and are agitating to get them moved to Chattanooga (to a house of their own of course) but a chord of Hennings is not easily broken. I'm sure the Chattanooga police force needs an excellent officer...

Yesterday for lunch we had Jim and Sarah Drexler (recently of St Louis) over. They were great friends of the Hennings and so it was good for them to recconnect. Sarah fell in love with Lilana and wanted to take her home.

So later in the evening, we were talking as a family and I told the kids "Be Careful, that lady - Mrs Sarah - wants to take Liliana home to live with her. You all have to watch out." The kids always take a minute to interpret my mock seriousness. Liliana sat with a stunned expression. I could just see the wheels of fear working in her little head. But then she brightened into a smile, and blurted out in dismissive derision... "But then I'd have to drive alone...." What??? We all fell out laughing. I'm not sure how that made sense of my mock seriousness, or even if it fit in her little head. But it made all of us laugh and laugh.