The Rice Paddy Two

I'd like to teach the world…

2011-10-20T10:53:00.001-05:00

There are different kinds of people in the world.

There are Coke people. These are cool people, up on all the latest fashion, beloved by friends and enemies alike, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. These are people you want to marry your daughter, be your boss, and watch on "Jeopardy." These are happy people.

There are Pepsi people. These are insecure people, people who prefer imitation leather instead of the real thing, and are constantly challenging Coke people to a taste test. These are people you want to cut off on the freeway, live next door to your evil boss, and see tackled on "COPS". These are unhappy people.

Then there are Dr. Pepper people. These are weird people, people who talk to themselves in the grocery store, believe Kennedy was killed by aliens from Area 54, and talk about Dublin, Texas as if it were the birthplace of the leprechauns. These are people you want to sit next to your boss on a long flight, see pulled over on the freeway, and watch on "Survivor." These are crazy people.

The thing about Dr. Pepper is that you can only get it in about .00031% of the developed world. In other words, most of the time, the Dr. is not in the house.

Which brings us to Cambodia. (Doesn't everything these days?) The Dr. isn't in the house here, either. Imagine you made a list of the healthcare available to you? What would you include on it, right off the top of your head?

Would you include the ability to brush and clean your teeth? In our trips to the brick factories this week, we're taking each family a bag of rice (from 121), and a hygiene and medical bag (from our fellow servants Bridgeway). Before we hand out anything, we demonstrate how to use everything in the medical/hygiene bags.

We first demonstrate brushing your teeth, using some kids in the audience as guinea pigs, challenging them to see who can brush the longest. Yesterday, two girls lasted about five seconds before they had to spit out the toothpaste, not because it wasn't Crest, but because they had never tasted it before. They were 15 (ish, it's hard to tell here).

Would you include having soap and water? Our second demonstration is how and when to wash your hands and why. For this we pull in some of the men in the crowd. On Tuesday, the men dipped their finger tips in the bowl; immersing their hands and using soap was a foreign concept to them.

Would you include (isopropyl) alcohol and band-aids? Again, we demonstrate how and when to use these, and again, it is a foreign concept. (So much so that our partners repeat the demonstration every time they take in the kits.)

This is not ignorance. It is abject poverty. It is poverty as foreign to us in the U.S. as the toothbrush is to them. It is poverty generated by spending half of their meager income on their lean-to houses owned by the brick factory owner, and not earning anything when no bricks are made during the entire rainy season. It is poverty that makes even the barest of essentials (to us) completely unknown to them.

What can you do with this information? Pray. Ask the Lord how you personally can be a part of fighting all kinds of injustice, including abject poverty. Ask Him how you can be generous. He told us that of whom much is given, much is expected. Compared to these, we have been given the moon, so expectations from the Lord are sky high. Are we, are you, living up to those expectations?

And when you have the answer (and you will have the answer, He's just waiting on you to ask the question), be doers of the word, not hearers only.

Oh, and have a Coke. It will make you happy. And maybe sing in perfect harmony.

What an awful church!

2011-10-17T09:57:00.001-05:00

I went to an awful church today.

They didn't have Starbucks coffee. They didn't have any coffee. Good grief, they didn't have any snacks at all. It's like they didn't even care to satisfy our morning cravings.
They didn't have a sign on their building; it didn't seem to be important that people know where they are. Come to think of it, they really didn't even have a building, just a room in what looked like a strip center. No decorations, no cross, no baptistry, nothing.

And no chairs, so we had to sit on the floor. On the floor! Are you kidding me? Did they think we were fourth-graders? Not only were we on the floor, but we were actually touching each other, we were so close. Have these people never heard of personal space?

They didn't have a band. They didn't have drums. They didn't have bass. They didn't have any brass instruments. They had a single guitar (played by a women, mind you, don't get me started). I've heard better music around a campfire on the beach. And get this — they didn't have any screens! They had an overhead (hey, the 70's called and they want their projector back!) pointing to a sheet. A sheet! Like from a bed!

And children? Not only did they not have a children's program — no kids church, no dramas, no bible stories — one of the member's child was distracting during the entire service, making noises, walking around amongst the people (on the floor; did I mention we were on the floor?). It was absolutely unacceptable.

And the pastor? Where to begin: he didn't wear shoes, much less a coat and tie; he clearly had never been to seminary, much less graduated; he didn't speak our language and made no efforts to accommodate our particular needs (sure, some of the congregation jumped in to translate, but really, would it hurt him to learn another language?). What kind of a leader can you be if you can't even be bothered to put on shoes in the morning?

And when he was finished with his sermon, he just opened up the floor to anyone and everyone to give their testimony. Honestly, as if we care about some stranger's "religious experience" — they sounded like a bunch of holy rollers, and from what I heard, the pastor's lack of religious training clearly showed in his congregation's testimonies. Talk about simple — all they had to say was how someone had shared Jesus with them and their life had been changed. Nothing about their quiet times, nothing about any insights they'd gotten from BSF, nothing about anything that would be of practical use.

One room, barely 25 people crammed together sitting on the floor, singing to words projected onto a sheet, listening to an untrained pastor preach a sermon, and unsophisticated people drone on about how Jesus had changed their lives. What an awful church!

I wonder if we can go back next week?

A Perfect Day

2011-10-15T20:17:00.000-05:00

What is a perfect day? It is different things for different people, I suspect.

For some, it's playing a round at Augusta. With Tiger. (If I played golf, it would be Jack for me, which tells you I'm not as young as I look.)

For others, it would be watching Josh Hamilton hit a walk-off grand slam in the seventh game of the World Series at the Ballpark in Arlington. (They have to get past the Tigers, first.)

For still others, it would be… well, maybe something like yesterday.

The day began early — we were all awake by five, although some didn't actually make it out of bed for another hour-and-a-half. (No, it wasn't me, I was up at 5:15a. And, yes, I realize the irony of that being mentioned in the same sentence as "perfect day" when I am involved.) Showers, breakfasts, and a morning devotional later, we were on the way to our mission partner's restoration house for girls rescued from sex trafficking.

The party began with the girls performing a program for us. There was group singing, individual singing, a group dance by some of the younger girls, a traditional cocoanut dance (with some of the girls decked out as guys, which was great fun), and another traditional dance. They were all spectacularly good (not that we're biased). Jennifer leaned over during this time and said, "Would anyone mind if we take them home with us?"

We ate lunch and had humongous portions of a humongous cake, at which time we were warned that it was a tradition to rub icing on the visitor's faces. "Really? How exactly did that become a tradition?" "I don't really know," says the guy who started the restoration center, not sounding at all convincing. Sure enough, we were soon wearing at least as much icing as we'd eaten.

Next was crafts. Erica, Jen, and Katherine showed the girls how to make bracelets with strips of cloth, but the girls were way ahead of them, and were soon making headbands, anklets, and all in all doing a better job in ten minutes than we did in all of our of practicing leading up to the trip. But we're perfectly fine with that. Mostly.

While the girls were running artistic circles around everyone, Mike and I were blowing up water balloons. A lot of water balloons. (At one point, one of the Khmer staff that was helping us looked at the stack we already had and said, "How many do you need?" with that tone of voice that said, "Crazy Americans, you already have plenty!") When you play water balloon volleyball (four girls on a towel, throw it to another towel held by four girls), you need roughly six water balloons per towel per minute. We had eight towels. The math is left as an exercise for the reader.

The actual "volleyball" portion of water balloon volleyball only lasted, I don't know, maybe 45 seconds, and then it was just a water balloon fight. With fifty girls, another twenty or so staff, and us. It was hardly any fun at all. I hope we don't have to do that again. At least, not until today. Today would be a good day to do that again.

After that we lined the girls up into five lines and did a series of sack races. They had a blast, or at least appeared to, but as much fun as they had racing, I think they enjoyed the last race most of all — five of the staff lined up in the sacks and took off. The girls went nuts, yelling and laughing and screaming for their favorite to win. Yes, today, today would be a good day to do that again. Seriously, can we do that again today?

Was it a perfect day? Well, I've married the woman of my (and may others) dreams, I've heard a judge say, "Ashley, you are now officially a Rice," and I've been in the hospital room when they brought in the WCG (World's Cutest Grandbaby). So, no, I don't think it was a perfect day.

But it's in the Top Five.

Ten Years After

2011-03-05T19:50:00.003-06:00

She did not discover until she was an adult that her father had won the battle over how to spell her name; she had been spelling it wrong her entire life. (Actually, he supposedly had lost the battle, but since he was the one that filled out the birth certificate…)

Her nickname, although common today, was given to her accidentally by a grandchild who couldn't pronounce "Grammy."

She only ever cared for one man, whom she met at 15, married at 18 on the day they both graduated from high school, and was hopelessly in love with until he passed away the year after their 50th anniversary. In the years following, she still got testy if it was suggested that she ought to find herself a man. (It was never seriously suggested.)

The reason they both graduated on the same day was because he intentionally failed a class his senior year so he would have to repeat. His first senior year happened to be her junior year. "Hopelessly in love" went both ways.

They used code in the notes they would pass to each other in class. Fifty years later, he still used the same code when he sent her flowers — __ __ __ __ __ __ __ (I luv you). If he was feeling especially covert, he would just sign it "7" (i.e. seven letters). Did I mention "hopelessly in love?"

She lived through the Dust Bowl years in the panhandle of Oklahoma (her oldest child was born in the middle of one of the storms). Fifty years later, when she talked about the dust seeping into every corner of the house, even past the wet towels that were put under the door and window sills, you almost believed it was a living thing.

She and her husband lived the Grapes of Wrath. They grew up in a no-stop light town in the Oklahoma Panhandle, caught trains out to California when work disappeared, lived there for a year or two, and then made their way back to Oklahoma.

Although she moved to Texas when she was in her mid-40's, she didn't get her drivers license until she was sixty. She named the little Toyota her husband bought her "Libby," for "Liberation." After she passed away, her oldest great-grandchild bought her latest car, a 16-year old Dodge. It had 18,000 miles on it.

When a grandchild persistently tried (unsuccessfully) one day to get her attention from the backseat of the car, she finally turned around and said, forcefully, "Not, now, we're driving!" She was in the passenger seat.

She once told her daughter about some "little old ladies" who had come from church to visit her. Her daughter found her description amusing. "How old were they, Mother?" "I don't know, probably in their sixties." "How old are you, Mother?" "Sixty-five, why?"

She loved soap operas for much of her life. She passed it on to her daughter and her daughter's oldest; they watched As The World Turns and Guiding Light together for years. For the time the grandchild worked a few miles from her, lunch was the last half of As The World Turns and first half of Guiding Light. A sandwich was always waiting.

When the same grandchild took another job in a distant city (Dallas!), she wrote daily summaries of Guiding Light for years, interjected with running commentary on her thoughts on the events of the episode. Her comments were always far more entertaining than the episode.

She quit smoking at 81. After 66 years of smoking.

Her default language was laughter. She never met a stranger, would talk to anyone about anything at anytime, and had five anecdotes for every occasion. Her house was a mystical, magical place, not because of TV (almost never on after she quit the soaps) or game consoles (she never had one) or toys (none of those, either), but because she was there. She was universally loved. That has been said of others, but she is the only person I've ever personally known it to be true of.

Her name was Fae Elizabeth "Mimi" Wilkinson, and she passed away just after midnight on February 9, 2001, leaving behind a legacy of love, laughter, and legendary stories.

I was born pretty late in the Boomer cycle, so I only got the tail end of the first-run Beatles. I was too young to know I wasn't supposed to like Ringo; I was fifteen-and-a-half when Ringo's version of "Sweet Sixteen" hit Number One. But it was the song he released the year before that has always been my favorite of his, and it is those words that speak most to how I feel about my precious Mimi, raconteur nonpareil and grandmother extraordinaire.

Every time I see your face
It reminds me of the places we used to go
But all I've got is a photograph
And I realize you're not coming back anymore

I can't get used to living here
While my heart is broke, my tears I cry for you
…
I want you here to have and hold
…
Now you're expecting me to live without you
But that's not something that I'm looking forward to

Photograph

Hi, I'm Batman!

2010-11-15T09:03:00.000-06:00

(This post was written in Cambodia, but for a variety of reasons it's taken a while to get it posted.)

A couple of friends of mine have had a mostly civil back-and-forth for several years about which is the greater superhero, Batman or Superman. (I have geek friends, this surprises you?) I am firmly in the Batman camp, having grown up during the 60’s TV show (speaking of camp). I also find it more impressive that a normal human can turn himself into a superhero rather than being born with superpowers – I mean, really, how hard is it to be a superhero when you’re born being able to stop bullets?

I met a real live superhero today, of the made, not born, variety. We'll call him… Cambodia Man.

Cambodia Man was a young man when the Khmer Rouge took over. Soon, his entire family was rounded up and taken away to the killing fields. They left him alive because he could catch fish and thus feed them. He did this for a while, but eventually made his escape.

He headed for Thailand, and along the way joined with others until there were approximately thirty people in the group. When they got to the border, in order to make it across, they had to go through a minefield. By the time they got across, only seven of them were left alive, including Cambodia Man.

Once across, they were immediately arrested by the Thai military, and thrown into jail because they didn't have documentation. For Cambodia Man, it was a relief to be in jail, because he at least had food and shelter and he was reasonably sure they wouldn't kill him.

While in jail, someone shared Jesus with him, and gave him a Bible. He had completely abandoned God in any form by this time, but, after reading a bit in the Bible, told God that if he really existed, to get him out of jail.

A few weeks later, the Red Cross visited the jail, heard their story, and began the proceedings to get them out of jail. Ultimately, because of God answering his prayer, Cambodia Man gave his life to Jesus.

They were given the opportunity for education. Cambodia Man chose to be trained as a dentist. After his training (which took 2-3 years), he was told he could go anywhere he wanted to practice, even the United States. He said, "I want to go back to Cambodia and help my people." They told him he was crazy (the Khmer Rouge had fallen by this time, but the civil war with Vietnam had just begun). He insisted. And so he found himself back in Cambodia, helping his countrymen (and women) with their teeth.

Many years passed, and one day in church, a man came to talk about needing help fighting sex trafficking. Cambodia Man knew that this scourge was almost as bad as the Khmer Rouge, and so volunteered. Today, he's working with an organization dedicated to eliminating sex trafficking in Cambodia.

I know there are other superheroes out there. But I met this one, and now I have this song running through my head.

P.S. — I ran across this tuk-tuk later in the day. Apropos, no?

Day 9 in Three Acts

2010-10-27T18:28:00.002-05:00

If you're also a reader of the 121CC Mission blog, you might feel like you have déjà vu…

Act 1 — Angkor
The day begins as three tuk-tuks roll down the road in the dead of night. Well, 4:30am, which is pretty much the same thing. Several of us were headed to Angkor Wat for sunrise pictures. Angkor is the largest of the temples in a huge complex built in the twelfth century. It was originally a Hindu temple, but is now Buddhist, and is considered the largest single religious monument in the world. It is also the main tourist draw of Cambodia, if not Southeast Asia (over one million visitors a year come to see it).

Once there, we watched the sun come up over the main temple with 2000 or more of our closest friends. Mostly. The sky was full of clouds, so it got lighter and lighter, but the sun never made an appearance. Many pictures were taken, a few monuments were climbed, much sweat was, well, sweated.

Act 2 — Church

After getting back to the hotel, taking a quick shower, and picking up the rest of the team, we all headed out to church. We went to the church of one of Agape International Mission's church planters. We met Pastor Sakona and his worship pastor during last year's Cambodia trip, so we were very excited at the opportunity to attend his church. He came to the hotel on his moto so we could follow him to the church. It's a good thing he did — we drove for a long time, off onto one dirt road, and then onto a smaller dirt road, and then onto an even rougher dirt road. We passed a sign on the way — "Middle of Nowhere" — with a big X and "You are here" next to it.

We eventually pulled up to a small one-room building. As we entered, we saw two empty rows of plastic chairs at the front, reserved for us. The rest of the chairs, probably twenty people total, were at the back, filled with smiling Khmer, mostly teenagers. The worship pastor, who also served as Pastor Sakona's English translator, asked us to introduce ourselves, and then they introduced their staff to us. The worship pastor led us in several songs, including "How Great Thou Art" and "Amazing Grace" (we sang English, they sang Khmer), drumming the beat with his hands on the metal table he used as a podium.

I gave a message of introduction and encouragement, and then sat down in anticipation of the Pastor Sakona message. After a short discussion in Khmer between the worship pastor and Pastor Sakona, the worship pastor came over and said, "Pastor would like for you to preach the message, since they have the opportunity to hear him every week." Which brings us full circle.

After the (short) message, we did a little more singing and more praying. In Cambodia, everyone prays out loud at once (they're not big on singling people out), which is actually very freeing, especially for those that are self-conscious about what they're praying. And then the service was over.

It was a truly amazing and encouraging thing to be worshiping on the other side of the world with a small village church that loves the same Jesus, spreads the gospel of the same Jesus, and serves the same Jesus. The audio of us singing together, English and Khmer, some of the great songs of the faith, brings chills as we re-listen to them. We have a group shot with them, but it's stuck in Cambodia on someone else's camera.

Intermission
The afternoon was fun time/down time; a few took the opportunity to go four-wheeling in Cambodia, others shopped, the rest just relaxed at the hotel.

Act 3 — World Hope
We then had dinner with a staff member from World Hope's Siem Reap office. World Hope is the assessment center where IJM places most of the under-age girls they rescue. World Hope performs a 6-12 week assessment on each girl's mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual condition, and the girl's family (did they know the girl was trafficked, did they traffic the girl themselves, etc.), to determine the best course of action for the girl. The staff member we met with is from Sarajevo, her family went to Sweden as a refugee, and she's spent the last several years working as a social worker all over the world. It was clear from our conversation that God chose well.

One of the interesting things she shared is that, in addition to the healing of the girls' in their care, the Khmer staff, and indeed much of the nation, is also in need of healing. The horrors of the Khmer Rouge are in the distant past, but while almost every person in the country was directly affected (losing spouses, children, parents, grandparents), almost none of them have ever talked about it or dealt with the pain and the loss.

The day was another picture of the light (Angkor) and darkness (aftermath of Khmer Rouge) that live side-by-side in this amazing country.

Days 4–7 — High Contrast

2010-10-24T03:21:00.000-05:00

In photography, "high contrast" is, loosely speaking, when there is a marked difference between darkness and light in the image. This has been a high-contrast week.

Did any of this happen to you this week?

You walked along the neighborhood with a friend and passed three women, and when you got around the corner the person you were walking with said, "Those three women are all traffickers," i.e. they sell girls in the neighborhood to brothels for sex.
You got to the location where you were doing a VBS, and the pastor's son came out and stuck up his hand so you'd take it and walk with him, exactly like your grandson.
You walked in a different part of the neighborhood with that same friend and passed a little elementary-age girl, and when you get far enough away, he turns and says, "That was the girl I was telling you about yesterday, the one who was raped every day for over a year, but now the mom has now stopped selling her."
You taught Excel to a teenager who has never seen it before, and in thirty minutes he's understanding COUNTA's and COUNTIF's.
You looked out on a sea of children and began to notice the tell-tale signs of cronic sexual abuse in several of them where before you had not noticed anything because you were oblivious.
You had those same children, as they came by to get a snack after VBS, smile huge smiles and tell you "Thank you!".
You walked around the really poor part of town, where they live in quiet dignity in tin huts with maybe a chair or two, and do everything in the space of 150 square feet.
You ate lunch with a group of teenagers who got up at 6:00 in the morning to study the bible with their pastor for over an hour.
Those same teenagers circled around you on your last day with them, walked around you and sang blessings to you for ten minutes.

We have had all of that happen and more.

Satan is on the prowl, looking whom he might devour.
The eyes of YHWH move over the earth to strongly support those whose heart is completely His.

Never were both truths so evident in one place, at the same time.

It is definitely high contrast, and therefore a great picture of another verse: The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overpower it.

Update Light

2010-10-22T05:57:00.001-05:00

Yeah, yeah, I know, I haven't written anything in two days (so now is the time to catch up if you've been a slacker). We've been very busy, and tonight I have to prepare for speaking at the retreat tomorrow morning, so it might turn into three days. So, here is some of the lighter side of the last few days…

Apparently going to the other side of the world causes your body clock to go to the other side of the day, because so far I'm a morning person. Wednesday, 4:30a, Thursday, 4:00a, today 5:30a. We are not amused.

I went into the computer room yesterday morning, and one of the Cambodian disciples (the youth who help with kids club, teach in the computer area, etc.) was on Skype. When I went in he asked me where I was from; I said "America. Texas." He talked for another second and then asked, "Do you want to talk to someone from Bayside?" (one of the other teams that had been here several months before). So, I put the headphones on and said: "Hello! Who is this?"
"Vince."
"Really, that's a weird God thing, because this is Vince."
"Your name is Vincent?"
"No, just Vince."
"That is weird."
"Yes, that is weird."
So, Vince in the U.S. from a previous team talked to Vince in Cambodia from the current team. I'm pretty sure I felt a disturbance in the force…

We want to the Tarantula Place last night (no one on the team knows the real name of the restaurant). Everyone got their picture taken (well, everyone except Kelly and our IJM staffer, who refused to touch it), and Alf, Amy, and Allen partook (we went in alphabetical order, and ran out of spiders before we got to the 'B's). I did get some of the red ant and beef dinner, which was actually quite tasty (and, as Mr. Barry says, I'm not making any of this up).

This afternoon we went to Bloom Cafe and had cupcakes that were a third of the size of a regular cupcake and approximately 28 times the calories. They were unbelievable. They had sample cakes all over the cafe, including a complete Noah's Ark, all made by hand, all edible (cake or sugar decorations). I would show you a picture, but, no photos. I would have snuck a picture with my phone, but I was occupied eating another cupcake…

There's been lots of heavier stuff, but I'll save that for the blog. Just know that Satan is alive and well. But, greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world. You don't often get to go from black to white and back to black in the space of three seconds, but you do here. Most of us have whiplash.

Keep praying! The IJM retreat is tomorrow (Saturday) morning, which is Friday night for America. Pray that their spirits will be encouraged by our time together.

More later!

Days 3 and 4 — Before and After

2010-10-20T01:24:00.002-05:00

This is the tale of a city. This city is a small immigrant village outside the capital city of Cambodia. It is a very poor village, with dusty streets and corrugated tin huts. Though humble in appearance, it was once known all over the world, if you ran in certain circles. If you got into a cab in Phnom Penh and told the driver you wanted to sleep with an 8-year old girl, he brought you here.

Brothels lined the streets, with girls outside actively engaging cars as they drove by. It wasn't a secret, it wasn't hidden, and it wasn't bashful. Overage, borderline age, underage, children, you could have anything you liked. It was the appearance of a five-year old girl in an undercover video that helped spur action from an organization created to bring justice to unjust places. And that in turn ultimately led another organization to start a church to bring the light of Jesus to a very dark place. And in turn Jesus has begun the process of transforming the village.

There is still much work to be done. Many of the children are still trafficked or sexually abused at home or put into labor at the local brick factories. There are still brothels. Svay Pak is still a small immigrant village. It is still a very poor village. It is still humble in appearance.

But, brothels no longer line the streets; there are not as many, and they are not as open. Girls no longer surround cars on the boulevards. The community is being educated that sex trafficking is an evil, not a normal way of life. Agape International Mission has brought Jesus to Svay Pak, and it will never be the same.

This is the tale of a building. This building was going to be one of those brothels that lined the streets. But it was going to be far more than that — it was going to be the biggest brothel in town. A three-story brick monstrosity of a brothel in a town where a 150 square foot house was living in luxury. A building that would allow dozens of girls to be raped, abused, and prostituted on a nightly basis. A building that would be not only the talk of the town, but of the country and the world.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the forum. When I first saw the building, it had its outer brick shell, the roof, and parts of the interior, and that was it. The inside was a bunch of brick and trash. This crown jewel of brothels had been abandoned by its owners soon after the first justice raid in the city. They quickly determined that the winds were shifting, and the opportunity for profit out in the open, conspicuously out in the open, had past.

I'm back in the building again this week. Where once there were piles of bricks and trash, there are now beautiful classrooms with hand-painted walls, and a huge space where a kids club meets during the week and a church of almost 400 meets on the weekend. There is a large space for lunch for a host of kids, a bi-weekly medical clinic, and a discipleship program to turn Cambodian youth into Cambodian adults that will help change their country. AIM has brought Jesus to Rahab's House II, and it will never be the same.

This is the tale of a man. This man was a husband, a father, and a drunk. When he was drunk, he would often try to rape the in-house older daughters from his wife's first marriage. He persisted enough that his wife was forced to send her daughters to live in another city with a former neighbor. He refused to go to church, because, as a Vietnamese, he was convinced he would not understand the Khmer spoken by the church pastor.

I met the man today, and his wife, and the two kids they have together. I saw the pictures of Jesus and rainbows on the wall of their house that their two kids had colored at the AIM kids club. I heard the story of how the man had finally come to church one week, and understood everything the pastor said, and how he had come back every week since. I saw he and his wife both smiling huge toothy smiles, and saw their beautiful son and daughter laughing and showing us the pictures they'd drawn. I heard his pastor say that the man was not where he needed to be, but he was better than he was. At that moment, I realized anew that grace's net casts far wider than I understand. AIM has brought Jesus to this man, and he and his family will never be the same.

This is a tale of a woman. This woman is very attractive, speaks six languages, dresses very fashionably, and is well-known throughout the village. She is also a professional trafficker. She sells girls of all ages into brothels, and is smart enough that she has not yet been caught, even though everyone knows who she is and what she is doing. She is nondescript enough that you would not notice her if you passed her on the street (we didn't).

AIM has not yet successfully brought Jesus to this woman. But they're working on it.

Day 2 — Kong of Majesty

2010-10-17T09:44:00.004-05:00

Guys, you won't break any fences sitting on the bed with Amy in front of 9 other people — spoken by Pam at the morning's team meeting. In order to get 11 people in a Cambodia hotel room, multiple people have to sit on the bed. Amy was already on it, but none of the late-arriving guys seemed to want to join her.
Fix your gaze — spoken by Alf during the morning devotional. From Acts 3, where Peter and John perform the eponymous act on the lame beggar; Alf's question was do we "fix our gaze" on people, or merely look at them? Do we believe Jesus can make the lame walk, and raise the dead, or have we been "enlightened"?
King of majesty, I have one desire, just to be with You — this blog entry's title phrase, sung in church this morning; apparently "Kong" is in the iPhone's dictionary, so it didn't autocorrect. I had to bite my tongue really hard to keep from laughing when I saw what I'd really written. It's an amazing thing to be literally "on the other side of the world" (thanks Rich!) and worship the same risen Jesus that we worship at 121CC. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.
Are we determined to be in the presence of God? — I don't actually remember who said this one, I think it was the worship pastor at New Life. Self-explanatory — are we determined to be in God's presence, or do we just hope it happens and move on if we don't "feel" it in the first five minutes? (Not about music, by the way.)
Found love beyond all reason; caught in the mercy fallout —Also sung in church this morning. I suspect I listen better to what I'm singing when it's being sung in Khmer and I'm reading the English translation under the Khmer words on the screen. "Love beyond all reason" — it is "beyond all reason," which is why post-Enlightenment people have such a hard time with it. We should stop trying to reason it out and start trying to live it out.
The time has come to stand for all we believe in — Also sung in church this morning. This isn't a new thought, but it takes on a different meaning when you've been in the belly of the beast the night before. As my pastor and others have said, what we do is what we believe, everything is just talk. Are you standing (and by "standing" read "living") for all you believe? Am I? I often don't like my answer.
Today, today, it's all or nothing — Also sung in church this morning (I know, I was very reflective during the music portion of the service, apparently). One of the most interesting things about being here is how many U.S. ex-pats there are who came here, saw a need, and moved their families here as a result. For them, it was really all or nothing. They chose "all."
Be active and know that I am God — one of those mind lurches I take so often. A speaker at church quoted Psalm 46:10 (Be still and know that I am God). My mind took a hard left; I usually know He is God when I'm still. The problem is remembering He is God when I'm active, when I'm engaged in a task, when I'm driving to work, when I'm doing whatever. I need to be better at always knowing He is God, not just when I'm still.
Everything's a lesson, nothing's done just to do it — spoken by an IJM staff member about the approach New Life's pastor takes to raising nationals as leaders. I thought we should all live life that way. I seem to do a lot of things just to do them.
Because I'm old; if you want to ever be old, you'll hush up — spoken by Vince, telling an Agape staff member what she should have said to the soccer-playing kid who came indoors where Bridget was one day and asked her why she was sweating, since she didn't play soccer.

1 Thessalonians 5 says we should "pray without ceasing." We forget sometimes that prayer is a conversation, not a soliloquy. That means we need to be listening without ceasing, too.

What has God said to you today? Were you listening?

Travel Day — Good News/Bad News

2010-10-16T11:32:00.004-05:00

The good news is the flight wasn't until 9:40a.
The bad news is that we had to be there two hours earlier, which meant getting up at hour-and-a-half before that. If God had meant for people to be up that early, He would have put it later in the day.

The good news is the first flight was only 3½ hours.
The bad news is the next flight was 12½ hours.
The worse news is there was still another 5½ hour flight after that one.

The bad news is that there's not much your brain can do after sitting in a chair for ten hours straight.
The good news is that one of them is watch The Sting, which was on the "Classics" movie channel.

The bad news is that there was crazy turbulence much of the entire second leg.
The good news is that no one on the team threw up. That I know of.

The bad news is that the second leg's flight landed twenty-five minutes late.
The worse news is that we only had a forty-five minute layover in the first place.
The good news is that the airline put us in 1st the last twenty-minutes of the flight (with our luggage) so we could get off the plane first.

The good news is that we made it to the final leg's plane on time.
The bad news is that we had to do a six-minute mile in order to do so (again, with our luggage).

The bad news is that there's nothing your brain can do after sitting in a chair for 16 hours straight.The good(?) news is that there was nothing to do on the final leg. Doing nothing for 5½ hours is not as much fun as you might think. And, in case you're wondering, sleeping is something.

The bad news is that my camera bag took a dive while we were getting on the plane for the last leg.
The good news is that's not why there are no pictures. There are no pictures because, everyone all-together, there's not much your brain can do…

The good news is that one of the people meeting us was waiting on us when we got there.
The bad news is that the other one wasn't due in for forty-five minutes .
The worse news is that the Dairy Queen(!) in the airport was already closed.

The bad news is that the humidity is still at 172%, same as last year (and presumably the year before that…).
The good news is that we (mostly) don't care. OK, we care, but we know we're not here for comfortable weather.
The better news is that we're here to share the Good News.
The best news is that there is Good News to share.

Well Done

2010-09-30T08:29:00.000-05:00

Thirteen years ago this month, I lost a dear friend. Although seldom a week goes by that I don't think of him, I haven't written anything about him since he died. I woke up this morning thinking it was time to change that.

He challenged me in so many areas of my life, it's difficult to think of them all.

He challenged me theologically, but in very subtle ways. He was very well-read, but did not beat you over the head with what he'd learned, but instead weaved it into his conversations so adroitly that you sometimes didn't realize the depth of what he said until days or weeks later. He understood better than most that theology is meant to tell us how to live, not how to think.

He challenged me relationally. He was truthful in his dealings, sometimes painfully so. But the pain was almost always on his side, not ours. When the truth was for us, he did not harm when he shared it, but instead couched it in such a way that you welcomed it. When the truth was about him, he did not shy away from things that hurt him, or things that did not paint him in the best light. He was an example of how to live life authentically.

He challenged me financially. He was very successful at what he did in many ways, including money-wise, but he never saw money as the end, but merely the means. He understood that to whom much is given, much is expected, and he used his money accordingly. He lived on far less than he made, and gave the rest to those that needed it more than he did.

He challenged me judicially (this one could also fit under theologically). He understood God's justice, and how we are called to live that out on a daily basis. He devoted the last years of his life to indigenous people in his native country, living among them, teach them, loving them. His heart was broken by the things of this world that breaks God's heart — injustice, ignoring the poor, taking advantage of those over whom you hold an advantage.

He challenged me eschatologically (I'm pretty sure that's not a real word, but we can't break the -ly streak). "Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die" is generally true, but not about him. He yearned for heaven. He didn't care as much about the means, but he was intently focused on the result — he wanted to be with Jesus.

The word is overused today, but he was a truly extraordinary man. He had faults — he struggled with pride, he could be very stubborn, sometimes his honesty was painful to those on the receiving end — but at the end of the day, it was the above qualities that you remembered. The sum of the whole made for a man you could not forget. And I haven't.

His name was Rich Mullins, and I never met him.

smto dvciideta agme vere

2010-08-26T12:22:00.001-05:00

Everyone knows by now that the iPhone is misnamed — of all the things it is, a phone is the least of them. It's a calculator, it's a camera, it's a level, it's a photo album, it's a DVD player (via Netflix), it's a floor wax AND a desert topping! (That's right, there once was a time when SNL was funny.)

It's also a portable game player, enough so that Sony has started attacking it in it's PSP ads. I never have been much of a game player myself, much to my son-in-law's chagrin, but last year at Christmas my sister showed me Word Warp, and I was immediately sucked into the Black Hole from Hades.

Word Warp is a "Lays" game — no one can play just one. Heck, no one can just play twenty. If the current game frustrates you (and the odds are huge it will), then you want to play another one to show yourself you can do better. If you do well at the current game, you want to play another one to show it wasn't a fluke (it was).

The game play revolves around a jumbled up bunch of six letters. Your mission is to form as many words of three or more letters as you can from them, including at least one word using all six. WW gives you a small hint by showing you slots for how many words of each length there are, e.g. eight slots of three letters, ten slots of four letters, three slots of five letters, one slot of six letters. Each word is worth a certain number of points, based on its length. Every game, i.e. every group of six letters, is guaranteed to form a six-letter word. If you get that word, you "win," and your score continues to mount. If you don't get that word, your score starts over at zero for the next game.

So, the primary goal is to get the six-letter word. You want to do that as quickly as you can, to ensure you don't run out of time and have to start your score over. But, getting the smaller words can sometimes help you visualize what the big word is. It's amazing how many six letter words there are in English, and how difficult some of them can be to discern when the letters are askew, and how hard it is to concentrate on those letters with the pressure of a ticking clock.

The game's most redeeming quality is that it only takes two minutes (or three minutes, or five minutes; you can choose the length of a single game), which means you can play it almost anytime, anywhere. Waiting on the rest of the people to show up at the meeting? Word Warp. Waiting for the car to fill-up while you're pumping gas? Word Warp. Have to make a trip down the hall? Word Warp.

Of course, the problem is the meeting is half over before you look up and realize you've been playing WW for thirty minutes. And you're standing in enough gasoline to fill-up an H2, twice, before you realize you're on your fifth game. And … well, never mind, you get the idea.

Anyway, I was playing the game the other day, and got

D N S E I I

Now, you WW fans out there will probably instantly recognize the six-letter word. And you'll get some of the other words as well. But, if you're like me anyway, you won't get all of them. At least in the allotted time.

So, when the time was up, WW did it's thing and showed me the words I missed, in red. And one of the words I missed was

S I N

…

The rest of this blog entry kind of writes itself, doesn't it?

The Smaller Picture

2010-08-24T17:07:00.000-05:00

A few years ago, my wife and I went to an actual movie theater to see a movie (radical, I know). The movie, based on a short-lived sci-fi TV series from a few years prior, had received rave reviews, so, although we had never seen any of the series, we thought we'd check it out. Coming out of the theater, our collective opinion of the movie was an unqualified…

…meh!

It wasn't a bad movie, but we certainly didn't think it was deserving of the praise being heaped upon it. It was just… well, "meh" is the best word I can think of.

Fast forward to a week or so ago, when, through the wonders of Netflix, we decided to watch the TV series upon which the movie was based. It only took a few nights (the series was really short-lived), and when we were finished, we decided to re-watch the movie (my wife didn't remember any of it, anyway, she just remembered the "meh"). This time, our collective opinion of the movie was an unqualified…

…hey, that was pretty good!

Same movie, same movie-watchers. What was the difference?

We now "understood" the characters. We knew their history, the way they interacted with each other, the reasons (some of the reasons) why they were the way they were. A throwaway line by one of them was now pretty funny as opposed to just mildly amusing, because we knew the tension between the characters that had built up over time. In short, we had "walked" with these people for a long enough period that the short time we spent with them in the movie now had far more meaning. Was the movie a better movie than the first time we saw it? No. It was just a better movie to us.

I could not help thinking how often the same thing occurs out in the real world, how often we watch a movie and make judgments without taking the time to watch the series first. I was reminded of an op-ed piece I read a few weeks ago written by someone who sat next to a woman and her small child on a flight. The child wasn't as well-behaved as the writer would have liked, and she (the writer) was admittedly brusque with the mother, right up until the mother said, "I still don't know how to make it without him," referring to her now deceased husband.

The writer had only watched the movie and decided what she thought, without first checking out the series. After having "watched the series" by talking with the mother the rest of the flight, the writer could only say "I wish I had been nicer to her at the beginning. I wish I had smiled more."

The same thing happens, on both sides, when someone takes a trip to a lesser advantaged country (aka the movie-maker). The trip-taker comes home from a life-changing experience, having lived the series for a week or two, shares a film short with friends (the movie-watchers), and wonders why they don't fall all over themselves praising the movie.

For the movie-watchers, they don't understand the fascination with the film short. It's nice and all, but still… it's just a movie, and not that compelling a one at that. What's the big deal? Which of course hurts the feelings of the movie-maker, who has a series full of experiences that resulted in the making of that film short.

The solution is for both sides to recognize that the film short is not the point.

For the movie-maker, the goal of the film short is not to get great reviews from the movie-watchers, or even to change their lives. The point of the film short is to paint a compelling enough picture that the movie-watchers want to go make their own series. However, it's necessary for the you to recognize that not everyone wants to watch your movie, much less make their own series. That needs to be OK.

For the movie-watchers, someone showing you a film short has a whole series they really want to share, but they know they can't do that with everyone (or hopefully they know they can't). Make some time to allow them to show you an episode or two. You might find you want to go film one of your own.

(Thus ends the world's longest metaphor. Note that, although people often make real films from their adventures, the movies and series above are being used metaphorically, not literally.)

(Let the record show (and Troy note, who himself hasn't written anything since May) that I have three blog posts in August. This might actually turn into a real blog if I'm not careful.)

Speed Trap

2010-08-10T06:09:00.000-05:00

I recently attended The Summit, and it was, as always, excellent (more on that later). However, I was almost completely distracted during one of the sessions on the second day by a Music Speed Trap.

You know speed traps on the highway? Those places, almost always outside of small towns who have very small revenue streams, where a speed limit sign is put where you can't see it (or can't see it in time), and the police sit just on the other side waiting to catch you going too fast? Well, this is the like that, only with music.

There are two kinds of MST's. The first is the Metronome trap. This is the one that assumes the slower the beat, the more spiritual the music. This is the one I encountered at the Summit last week. The worship leaders (who are normally uniformly excellent) led us in a song, I don't remember which one (I've tried to put it out of my mind), during the beginning of a session. If the metronome is normally on 100, they sang it on 75. We sang so slow, I took naps between words.

This trap isn't dependent on the style of music or the instruments used — we had plenty of guitar, drums, etc. on this day, and it was a contemporary song. It was just t o o d a n g s l o w. What's really fun when you run into this speed trap is listening to the people in the crowd who know what the beat is supposed to be try to keep … down … with the leaders. Have you ever seen a Corvette in a school zone, trying to go 20 mph, but occasionally gunning the engine and getting up to 25 or so, then hitting the brakes to get back down to 20, going in this jerky speed up, slow down, motion all the way through the zone?

It's kind of like that.

The second kind of MST is the "slow songs go last" trap. Even for leaders who keep the beat up on the individual songs (the songs that are supposed to be at 125 are at 125, the songs that are supposed to be at 75 are at 75, etc.) fall into this one. No matter how rocking they get during the service, they always end with at least two slow songs. Again, the theory seems to be that the slower the music, the more spiritual the music, thus if we want to get spiritual leading into preaching, we need to get s-l-o-w.

I spent some time going to concerts in my youth (back when bands had normal one-word names, Heart, Eagles, Nugent, Lynyrdskynyrd, not weird esoteric phrases like Death Cab for Cutie. But I digress). There are just two rules of a concert set: 1) Start off with a bang, and 2) End with a bigger bang. This is because when someone's talking about a concert later, they'll go on and on about how it started and how it ended, but they won't remembers what happens in the middle. Nobody remembers what happens in the middle If your first two songs and last two songs blow the doors off, then you could sing "Mary Had A Little Lamp" for forty-five minutes in the middle, and no one would care.

In the worship world, however, it's like they only got half of the message. Even contemporary worship leaders whose bands could give the one word Lynyrdskynyrd a run for their money, fall into this trap. If the normal music session looks like a U (big start, big finish, slow in the middle), the normal worship session looks like a \ (backslash; big finish, slower and slower all the way to the end). I wonder if perhaps the lethargy in the pews (or seats, if you're non-denominational) is caused by the worship leaders putting the people to sleep before the preacher gets up to speak?

What if the worship leaders WOKE UP the people for the pastor? Maybe we need to get the crowd's adrenaline going, so when the pastor gives them a word from God, their hearts are pumping and they're in "let's get after it" mode. It might even wake the pastors up, some of whom preach as if they just took a Vicodin. (I'm sooooooooooo mellow…)

Have you been caught in a MST lately?

Two pollices down

2010-08-02T22:18:00.000-05:00

Being a critic of anything is a thankless job (that's critic in the formal sense, not in the Internet age "I'm brilliant because I have a computer" sense). The word "critic" comes from a Greek word (doesn't everything?) that means "able to discern," and that's what the best critics do — they are discerning about what they're watching (TV/movies) or eating (food) or listening to (classical music), and then they express what they discerned in a reasoned, hopefully entertaining, way.

But, as mentioned, in the Internet age, everyone's a critic, because everyone has an opinion, and most think that an opinion is all it takes to be a critic. However, it takes much more to be a critic, and certainly to be a good one — it takes, well, discernment, it takes education (not necessarily formal) to be able to express yourself well, it takes experience in the chosen medium to be able to compare what you've experienced to other experiences your audience will be familiar with.

Roger Ebert is a critic in the best sense of the word. He is certainly a good critic. In some circles (including my own), he is considered an excellent critic. He makes me want to see movies I know I won't like; he makes me want to re-watch movies I like to see them with more discerning eyes. His reviews border on brilliant most of the time; even when I disagree with him, he makes a much more reasoned (and certainly entertaining) argument for his position than I can make for my own. Even his one-star reviews are legendary (check out his thoughts on Deuce Bigalo: European Gigilo); however bad the movie is, it was worth being made if it elicits a column from the Man with the Golden Thumbs.

But, even the best have an off day. As part of my ongoing education about the sex trafficking industry (our church is partnering with IJM and another organization on this issue), I watched the movie Trade tonight. It is a movie based on a Peter Landesman article in the NY Times, and it is a mostly unflinching portrait of what happens with girls (and boys) who are kidnapped from their homes and sold as sex slaves. The movie doesn't take place in Southeast Asia or India, however — the girl who is the focal point of the movie is kidnapped from Mexico, but her destination is New Jersey. The movie, and the article, point out that trafficking is just as much a U.S. problem as an international problem.

As I often do, I checked out IMDB after watching the movie, to see the names of some of the actors/actresses, and while I was there, I clicked on the link to Ebert's review because… well, see above. And there I read the two most vacuous statements I've ever seen come out of Ebert's typewriter. The last two sentences of the review state:

Anything that holds our interest can be entertaining, in a way, but the movie seems to have an unwholesome determination to show us the victims being terrified and threatened. When I left the screening, I just didn't feel right.

Are you kidding me? It has an unwholesome determination to show the victims being terrified? You "didn't feel right"? If you "didn't feel right" after watching that movie, then it bloody well did its job. And not only did it not have an "unwholesome determination" to show the victims being terrified, it, if anything, turned away at a couple of junctures that it probably should have kept in view, as even a half-hearted reading of Landesman's article would make clear.

This is a brutal business, and it's brutal to a younger population every year; where once a 15-year old gave a pedophile a thrill, now it takes a 12-year old. Or a 10-year old. Or a 5-year old. This isn't Pretty Woman (a movie I refuse to watch because of its glorification of prostitution), this is pre-teens being brutally raped multiple times a day and/or night, for months and years on end.

So, yes, the victims are terrified and threatened, and if ever we walk away from reading or seeing or hearing about this issue and we don't "not feel right," then either we weren't listening or we don't care or we're numb. But if we don't "feel right," then something got through, and perhaps we can be moved to action, to be part of the solution instead part of the apathetic mass that is a huge part of the problem.

Watch, and read, at your own risk. And pray that you "don't feel right" at the end.

Unexpected Sounds

2010-07-11T00:43:00.001-05:00

"Hello win column — the Texas Rangers have won the World Series!"

"And the winner for Best Actor or Actress in a Leading Role is… Megan Fox."

"When asked about the situation, Jerry Jones only reply was, 'No comment.'"

Unexpected sounds. Words you're not expecting. Phrases that are out of sync with the present circumstances.

Twenty-three years ago this month, I was working as a consultant at a client site when the phone rang. The voice on the other end said someone named Sharon was on hold for me. This was odd for a couple of reasons — one, she had no idea where I was working, and two, she'd told me several months before she didn't want to see me, "for a while." Her voice that afternoon was completely out of the blue, as was her invitation to dinner with some friends. As was the "I do" that came four months later.

A few years later, Sharon and I we were watching a movie with the same friends. The movie was Yours, Mine, and Ours, an oldie but goody in which Lucille Ball and Henry Fonda play single parents with six kids apiece who get married and form a football team, er, I mean, form a family. One of the story lines in the movie involves one of Ball's sons, who, after the wedding, wanted to go by Fonda's last name. The school bureaucracy wouldn't allow it because "it's not his name," and so the two parents decide to adopt each other's kids so that it would be his name. After the movie was over, Sharon's daughter said, "I want to be a Rice!" A short time later, she was.

Seven years ago (give or take), I clicked the "Play" button on the answering machine one evening to hear, "Well, I'm taking your mother to the hospital. It looks like she's had a heart attack." No panic, no emotional outburst, just the matter of fact words of my dad, who could have been calling to say he was going to the store, based on the tone of his voice. That calmness transferred to me as I went to the hospital. A stent and a stint in the hospital later, Mother was fine.

Today delivered another unexpected sound. Our family gathers together once a month to celebrate the month's birthdays, and today was the day for July. We have exactly one person with a birthday in July, and that one happens to be my dad, so we all went to his and Mom's house for pizza and cake. (And graham crackers with icing in the middle, but I digress.)

I had parked behind his truck, so I took Dad to pick up the pizza. When we get back and herded everyone into the kitchen to eat (no small feat with eight adults and two boys and one toddler), we gathered around in a circle to say grace. Usually whoever's house we're in has the honors. Except when we're at Mom and Dad's, when Dad asks me to do it. Every time. For as long as I've been an adult.

Today, he hesitated, and I thought he was going to ask my brother-in-law, or my son-in-law. But instead, I heard an unexpected sound. A sound I haven't heard in recent, or even non-recent, memory. It was the sound of my dad saying grace. It was the sound of my dad praying.

That definitely qualified as an unexpected sound. A prayed-for sound, but an unexpected sound, nonetheless. I know, we're supposed to pray expectantly. After a while, though, do we really expect it? I mean, really, deep down to the bottom of our toes expect it? And if we do, do we expect it now, or in some distant future we can't quite imagine.

I also realize it was "only" grace over a meal. But, as Bill Murray would say, baby steps, baby steps.

And perhaps the next time it won't be so… unexpected.

Everybody must get …

2010-04-09T22:23:00.001-05:00

I heard a story tonight I've heard before. This isn't the first time this has happened — my grandmother had favorites she told over and over, and we laughed with gusto every time we heard them, because she told them in a way that made them fresh every time. It won't be the last time it happens — as I get older, I hear myself telling stories I've told before and wonder whether I've told it to the current audience, and pray I haven't, because I do not have Mimi's gift for storytelling. Unfortunately, the yawns usually tell me I have …

This particular story involved two young girls and an evil man (I don't throw that word around lightly, as you will see). The man in question was a American pedophile who left the U.S. for Southeast Asia, which seems to draw pedophiles like a flame draws moths. He was a serial abuser; he would typically bring in a couple of girls, abuse them for a month or six, then pass them on to another pedophile. "Abuse" in this case means not only sexual abuse, but also on-going physical torture (I said I did not throw the word around lightly).

Through the efforts of IJM and the country's national police, the two girls (and others) were rescued, and the pedophile was arrested, extradited, and eventually brought to trial in the U.S. Unfortunately, the abuse of the girls was not yet over, although this time the abuse took the form of a badly screwed-up justice system, that, although among the best in the world, still has its moments of mind-boggling injustice. The two girls were flown to the U.S. to testify in court against the pedophile. Among the indignities they were allowed to be subjected to by the defense lawyer, they were shown pictures of several men's genitals and told to pick the one of their alleged abuser.

In spite of all this, however, the girls stood strong. They were poised, they were confident, and they were courage personified. Why? After all that had happened to them, while facing the kinds of questions they faced in the trial, why did they not fall apart?

There are obviously many, many things that went into it: the care shown them by IJM and the aftercare center they were sent to, the many people pouring into them and praying for them, etc. But we're just going to focus on one for the moment.

As the couple that ran the aftercare center prepared the girls for the trip to the U.S. and the trial, they told them the story of David and Goliath. They told the girls that all it took to bring down the giant was God, one small stone, and an obedient teenager. They told them that in this case, the evil man was Goliath, and all it would take to bring him down was God, the truth, and two obedient (early) teenagers. To reinforce this, and to help them remember, the couple gave each of the girls a small stone, with the word "Truth" written on it. And, as in the Biblical story, the stone hit its mark.

In one of those "coincidences" that are neither "mere" nor "chance," we sang "Come Thy Fount" tonight. The worship leader said he'd never used the song before, and that he chose it before hearing anything about the evening's itinerary. As you may or may not know, depending on your age, the second verse of the song says, "Now I lift mine Ebenezer." For those of us who love Dickens, that brings up images of raising Ebenezer Scrooge by the head — an amusing, but altogether incorrect picture of what the song is trying to convey.

The reference is from 1 Samuel 7. Earlier in Samuel, the Israelites foolishly took the ark into combat, thinking it was a talisman that would protect them from defeat. God was angered that their confidence was in the ark, not in Him (and that they didn't bother to ask Him before moving the ark), and so the Philistines not only defeated the Israelites, but captured the ark as well.

However, as the saying goes, that did not end well, and the Philistines ended up sending the ark on its way tied to the back of a cow. In the first few verses of 1 Samuel 7, the prophet Samuel calls Israel to repentance, to turn away from their false gods, so they could be rescued by God. They did, and He did, and as part of the celebration, Samuel took a large stone and placed it between the two towns where the Philistines had been defeated, and, verse 7 says, he called it "Ebenezer," because "Thus far the LORD has helped us."

Thus, the statement reflects on the name. "Ebenezer" is the transliteration of the Hebrew "Eben Haezor," which, literally, means "Stone of Help." Thus, Samuel raised a "Stone of Help" to remind Israel how God had helped them "this far," i.e. at every step along the way until the current time.

As I have become more familiar over the last couple of years with the importance God places on justice, as I have seen how much of His word is spent telling us to impart justice, to take action against the unjust, to actively be a part of enforcing justice in His world, I have come to understand that we should all be someone's "stone of help." When someone asks, "But what can I do?", I believe that is the answer — be someone's Ebenezer. Be the person someone would think of if ever they sang that song.

It was not the physical stone in their pocket that enabled those brave young girls to get through their testimony. It was the couple who gave them that stone who were their "stone of help". For the last several years, that couple, who left a comfortable life to work on the other side of the world, has been Ebenezer to countless other young girls in this same country.

So, you might not be able to bust down doors and rescue teenagers from a fate, literally, worse than death. You might not be able to single-handedly figure how to change a justice system to treat victims with the respect due them. You might not have any idea of what to do against unspeakable evil. But you can do this thing, you can be someone's "stone of help."

Who is calling you their "Ebenezer" today? Who will be tomorrow?

Nicholas Monikers

2010-01-31T16:43:00.000-06:00

Names are interesting things. We are given them for a lifetime, yet have no say in what they are. That could be a good thing (Brian, Ashley) or a very bad thing (Moon Unit, Apple). We all know people who don't like their names (any boy named Leslie), people whose parents couldn't spell (Graclyn), and people whose names we wish we had (Rhianna, Powers Booth).

Names can make for interesting stories. My mother's name is Blanche, which as you might guess is a relatively unusual name. When she was in high school, a guy trying to "chat her up" (sorry, too many British comedies on PBS) asked her her name. When she replied, he said, "Really, that's my mother's name!" Now, that line might work when your name is Susan or Melissa, but not so much when your name is Blanche. Except that it turned out his mother's name really was Blanche. Small world.

Then there are our married (to each other) friends Ken and Barbie. Really. Not only are those their names, but they look like Ken and Barbie. They're both blond and beautiful, drive a Jammin' Jeep, and live in a 3-story dream townhouse. OK, I made those last two up, but they really do look like you would expect Ken and Barbie to look if they were real people. And, if your name is Barbie, can you really marry anyone except someone named Ken? Of course not, it would be a violation of the laws of the universe.

Today, we don't pay much attention to name's meanings when we're handing them out to our kids. In Old Testament times, names meant something, so when your parent named you, they were putting words to your (future) character, for good or for bad (Jacob [Yaakov] means "deceiver"). If your character changed significantly enough when you were older, you were given a new name (Jacob's name was changed to Israel [He who Strives with God] after his wrestling match in Genesis 32).

We handle things a little differently now. Instead of giving someone a new name, we give them a an additional name, a nickname (from a mis-pronunciation of Old English "an ekename," which meant, literally, "second name"). Nicknames are similar to our given names in that we usually don't have any input, but they're dissimilar in that they usually reflect something about us: our character, our abilities, or simply an affectionate name someone has for us. (I'm speaking of true nicknames, not stage names and not the phrases we used in seventh grade to belittle someone we didn't understand.)

Nicknames can be cool ("The King"), intimidating ("The Rock"), or endearing ("Lady Bird"). They can speak to our abilities ("Sultan of Swat"), our actions ("Elvis the Pelvis"), or a random phrase applied to us that sticks ("Babe" Ruth). They can become so much a part of us that our given name is forgotten — do you know Billy the Kid's real name? Wild Bill Hickock's? Lady Bird Johnson's?

I came across a great nickname this week. I'm reading through the Bible chronologically, so I'm in the middle of Genesis (this plan has Job following Gen 12). As I was reading about Jacob's confrontation with his father-in-law in Gen 31, I ran across this phrase in verse 42 (it's still amazing to me how often we can read something in the Bible and still see something new every time):

The God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac … (emphasis mine)

A few verses later (v. 53), it says that Jacob swore by "the fear of his father Isaac." In both places, in most modern translations, Fear is capitalized, making it clear that the phrase isn't referring to Jacob's emotions, but to the same one alluded to in the phrase "God of Abraham." In other words, "The Fear" is one of Jacob's nicknames for God (these two verses are the only places in the Bible the phrase appears).

Is that a great nickname or what? "The Fear." That makes "The Rock" look like "The Paper Mâché." What's really interesting is that, unlike our nicknames, this one doesn't refer to part of God's character or nature or abilities, but to how we should feel when we're in His presence. The word translated "fear" here is most often translated "dread" or "terror" elsewhere in Scripture.

When we think of God, and His son Jesus, I think we should remember two things. We should remember that God spoke to Moses "as a man speaks to his friend," that one of the last things Jesus told the disciples was that He once called them servants but now He called them "friends." We should remember that God is our Father, He loves us, He loves to visit with us, He calls us His "friends" as well as His children.

And we should remember "The Fear."

Everything I Need to Know I Learned From Classic Rock

2009-12-05T14:38:00.003-06:00

Having established my fogie credentials last time, let's turn our attention to the greatest decade in rock 'n roll, 1967-1976. These days, I spend most of my radio time listening to KVRK, the local Christian rock station, but when they're playing something I don't like, I'll sometimes wander off to the classic rock station for a bit. Occasionally I'll think, "that's a good line, I need to start writing those down." I've been thinking that for probably ten years. Now I finally have. With apologies to Robert Fulgham, here's classic rock with you all you need to know.

Education
When I think about all the crap I learned in high school, it's a wonder I can think at all.

Kodachrome, Paul Simon

Contentment
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes, you just might find
You get what you need.

You Can't Always Get What You Want, Rolling Stones

Introspection
I can never see what's right and what is wrong.

Amie, Pure Prairie League

Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned?
I know it sounds absurd, but please tell me who I am.

The Logical Song, Supertramp

You can travel 10,000 miles and still stay where you are.

Sequel, Harry Chapin

Everyone's looking for something.

Sweet Dreams, Eurythmics

What'll you do when you get lonely, and nobody's waiting by your side?

Layla, Eric Clapton

All I want is to have my peace of mind.

Peace of Mind, Boston

It's so easy to blow up your problems.

Moving in Stereo, The Cars

I want to know what love is.

I Want to Know (What Love Is), Foreigner

I was a prisoner of doubt.

Straight On, Heart

And so you finally ask yourself just how big you are?

Thick as a Brick, Jethro Tull

Though my eyes could see I still was a blind man.

Carry On, Wayward Son, Kansas

I have become comfortably numb.

Comfortably Numb, Pink Floyd

Been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely time.

Rock and Roll, Led Zeppelin

So often times it happens, that you live your life in chains
And you never even know you have the key.

Already Gone, Eagles

Money
Money so they say is the root of all evil today.

Money, Pink Floyd

Helping Others
If I shiver please give me a blanket, keep me warm, let me wear your coat.

Baba O'Reilly, The Who

Feed the babies who don't have enough to eat.

Fly Like An Eagle, Steve Miller

Life
I found the simple life ain't so simple.

Runnin' with the Devil, Van Halen

Don't you know that you are a shooting star?

Shooting Star, Bad Company

Life is just a dream here.

Welcome to My Nightmare, Alice Cooper

Maybe tomorrow the Good Lord will take you away.

Dream On, Aerosmith

Save my life, I'm going down for the last time.

Never Been Any Reason, Head East

Be a simple kind of man.

Simple Man, Lynyrd Skynyrd

Talk is cheap.

Promises in the Dark, Pat Benatar

Relationship with People
Every girl's crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man.

Sharp Dressed Man, ZZ Top

You better find somebody to love.

Somebody to Love, Jefferson Airplane

You can't hide your lying eyes.

Lyin' Eyes, Eagles

I want you to want me, I need you to need me, I'd love you to love me.

I Want You to Want Me, Cheap Trick

These cuts I have, they need love to help them heal.

Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me, Elton John

I get by with a little help from my friends.

With A Little Help From My Friends, The Beatles

I've been searching for the daughter of the devil himself
I've been searchin' for an angel in white;
I been waitin' for a woman who's a little of both
And I can feel her but she's nowhere in sight.

One of These Nights, Eagles

This thing called love, I just can't handle it.

Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Queen

Hold on loosely, but don't let go.
When you squeeze too hard, you're gonna lose control.

Hold On Loosely, 38 Special

Teach your children well.

Teach Your Children, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

Relationship with God
I never did believe in miracles, but I've a feeling it's time to try.

You Make Lovin' Fun, Fleetwood Mac

We were liberated from the fall that's all.

Won't Get Fooled Again, The Who

Jesus is just all right with me.

Jesus is Just All Right, Doobie Brothers

I got a friend in Jesus.

Spirit in the Sky, Norman Greenbaum

A new road's waiting, you touched my life.

Feeling That Way, Journey

When the final light is over, and it's certain that the curtain's gonna fall
I can hide inside your sweet sweet love, For ever more.

The Story in Your Eyes, Moody Blues

You are like a hurricane.

Like A Hurricane, Neil Young

Your love has set my soul on fire.

Heartbreaker, Pat Banatar

I know I'm worth nothing without you.

Bargain, The Who

Writing lessons from two Dan's

2009-12-01T15:38:00.004-06:00

(For those reading this on FB, I don't know if the links will make it, if not you might want to read it on the blog.)

In the early days of the 80's, Dan Fogelberg released a song titled Same Old Lang Syne. It was a straightforward "story" song, along the lines of Taxi or You're So Vain. (No, there haven't been any decent story songs in the last 30 years and yes, I'm an old fogie. Now get off my lawn.)

The song told the story of the singer running into a former flame in the grocery store on Christmas Eve. It is a bittersweet reunion, as they sit in their car and reminisce (they "couldn't find an open bar"), and think about what was and realize that it is still "was" and will never be "is". The last line is one of the most memorable, bittersweet lines in American music.

As I turned to make my way back home, the snow … turned into rain

The symbolism is unmistakable, but more than that, those last five words evoke a mood, paint a picture in our minds that is so clear, so descriptive, we might as well have been there. You can see this played out on the Web, as you read story after story of people who heard the song and immediately thought of a lost love of their own.

Five words, and we have the complete visual in our head. That is masterful writing, as evocative as a John le Carré sentence that communicates more about the subject than any three pages from another author. If it weren't for "the reckless raging fury they call the love of God", it would be my favorite line ever (and if you know me, you know the highest praise I can give is to put it second to Rich).

I thought of that song this morning as I was reading another Dan. Dan-i-el is a popular book for children's Sunday School classes, because it has some great, kid-friendly, stories in its first half. However, no one reads the last half of Daniel, or admits to it, because it is, to say the least, confusing. (Google "Daniel" and "seventy weeks" sometime, it's very entertaining.)

In Daniel 10, Daniel has been praying intently for the nation of Israel, and as a result is visited by the archangel Gabriel. As almost always happens in Scripture when an angel shows up, everyone is petrified, so much so that Daniel's companions run for cover. Of himself, Daniel says, "No strength was left in me." And then he says this (from the ESV footnote):

My splendor was changed to ruin.

What a wonderful phrase! By this time, Daniel has been the servant to four kings (Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Darius, and Cyrus) and two kingdoms (Babylon and Media-Persia). He has been the third highest person in the kingdom. He has, to use Rich's words again, "seen the best that ever was." This Dan knew splendor. But in the face of a mere messenger of God, all of that splendor faded to nothing.

This is what Isaiah meant when he said, "all of our righteous acts are like filthy rags" (do a word study on that "filthy" — it's a lot filthier than you think). The best we have is worthless when we stand before God. Whatever we think we have or are in ourselves is exactly nada in God's economy.

I am too often impressed by my "splendor," too self-satisfied with what I've done, where I've been, how I've contributed. It only takes a second before God, if I'm really before God and not just going through the motions, for all of it to turn into the nothing it really is. And that's a good thing, because then I can reflect the splendor of Jesus, which is of course how it's supposed to be all the time.

How long has it been since your splendor turned to ruin?

Blind-sided

2009-11-28T14:42:00.002-06:00

In Sandra Bullock's new movie, The Blind Side, her character Leigh Anne Touhy has a scene where she has just fixed up the guest bedroom for Michael Oher, the 17-year old black young man her family has taken in off the street. There is just a hint of a look of self-satisfaction on her face — she's doing a "good deed." As Michael looks around the room, slack-jawed, he says, "I never had one before."

"A bedroom of your own?" Leigh Anne asks, expecting a "yes," thus confirming her good deed.

"A bed," Michael replies, and you see in her face that Leigh Anne's world has just been turned upside down. Living in her half-million dollar house, driving her $100K 7-series BMW, she knows there's a world out there that's not as privileged as hers. But she has parameters for that world, boundaries that define just how unprivileged "unprivileged" is. Michael shatters those boundaries, and she has to go to another room and sit down for a few minutes to collect herself.

Leigh Anne was blind-sided by a reality that was quite different than the reality she had constructed.

It happens to all of us eventually, in various degrees. For me, it's happened a few times as we've walked with our church as it's become involved in the issue of sex trafficking.

First, "sex trafficking" looks rather pedestrian on the page. We had identified it early on as one of the most "unjust" of the justice issues we looked at, but I know that for me at least it was a concept more than a reality, or said differently, it was an antiseptic reality that had little relation to the reality faced by the young (as young as five years old) girls who lived in it.

My first wake-up call happened when I read a book by a sex-trafficking survivor. She spoke of being raped seven to ten times a night and more (sometimes by groups of men), of watching a fellow victim shot in the head while she and other girls were forced to watch, of policemen being perpetrators instead of protectors. This reality wasn't pedestrian or antiseptic, it was real and raw and disturbing. I was blind-sided by the depths of the depravity.

My second happened in Cambodia a couple of months ago on a trip our church took to investigate how we can be involved on the ground. We were at a ministry that runs an after-school program for kids in the town. There was a roomful of kids that looked to be from first grade to middle school (in U.S. parlance). They were singing along with one of our group who was playing the guitar, and in general looked like a roomful of happy kids anywhere. As we watched, the director of the ministry running the program turned to one of our team and said, "Probably 80% of these girls are still being trafficked." We were blind-sided by the persistence of evil.

But in that same town, we visited families who had been healed, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, by the power of the Holy Spirit. We saw the local church active in its work of rescue, redemption, and reconciliation. We saw a community being changed by the power of Jesus in the face of obstacles that would cripple a church ten times its size in the United States. We were blind-sided by God's glory in a dark and dirty world.

What has blind-sided you today?

The Liquor District

2009-10-15T14:58:00.002-05:00

On a recent mission trip to Cambodia (more on that later), our LEADER, a former resident, was showing us around Phnom Penh. As we passed one area in the van, she said, "And over here we have the liquor district, where I spent many an hour…" and I thought "Reaaaaaly? That's … interesting."

And then she finished her sentence. "… shopping. They make great wicker furniture here, and there are a ton of shops just in that one area." One of the guys behind me exclaimed, "Oh, good, I thought you said liquor!" I said the same, and we all had a good laugh.

Sometimes it's the small things. One letter made a big difference in what we thought about that area of town (and our LEADER, for that matter). Left uncorrected, those small things can lead to large misunderstandings, or worse.

I thought of that again the next day at church. One of the songs they sang during the service was "Above All." Having abandoned KLTY (our local CCM radio station) long ago for a Christian rock station (go KVRK!), I hadn't heard that song in years. (The few Western-oriented churches in Cambodia are largely stuck in the late 80's/early 90's, music-wise. Ironically, I heard the song again this past Sunday on KLTY when I had no choice due to KVRK being temporarily off the air. It reminded me why I abandoned it in the first place. But I digress.) As we were singing, I was struck again by how large a difference a small phrase can make.

The ending of the chorus, speaking of Jesus on the cross, says, "And [He] thought of me, above all." There was a time I didn't think anything about that line, I just went along for the ride. (Yes, that means there was a time I listened to Michael W. Smith. I've repented.) It was a nice thought — ahhhh, Jesus, on the cross, thinking of me above everything else. Isn't that wonderful He thinks of me so much?

Except, of course, that it isn't true. If we know anything about Jesus from the Gospels, it's that His thoughts were always primarily on what His Father wanted of Him. If Jesus had any thoughts on the cross, I have no doubt they were directed towards His Father, not towards us. Because, above all, Jesus was obedient.

They are such a small thing, those six words. And yet they represent a very large, very dangerous, theological error. Jesus was not me-centered. He was God-centered. Jesus is not me-centered. He is God-centered. God is not me-centered, He is Himself-centered. Singing otherwise leads to thinking otherwise leads to acting otherwise leads to … trouble.

All of this does not mean, of course, that Jesus doesn't love us. Of course He does — He died for us. It just means that His primary motivation wasn't His love for us, His primary motivation was His love for, and obedience to, His Father. Just as our primary motivation should always be our love for, and obedience to, our Heavenly Father, not ourselves.

Have any "liquor districts" crept into your theology?

Unoriginal Screenplay

2009-01-22T23:51:00.002-06:00

My wife and I went to see Seven Pounds a couple of weeks ago. If you haven't seen it and plan to, stop reading now and go see it. No, seriously stop reading now. You need to go into this movie blind. (Frankly, you should never watch another trailer again as long as you live if you really want to enjoy movies, but this particular movie even more so.)

If you haven't seen it and don't plan to, stop reading now and go see it anyway. Forget the critics, IMDB and I never lie.

Most of the bad reviews the movie has received is due to it's being viewed as a Sixth Sense kind of movie, with a big "tell" at the end, except it isn't that big and so a few people with high expectations give it grief. The problem is that isn't a Sixth Sense kind of movie and it's not trying to be. In fact, the first scene tells you exactly what's going to happen, if you're paying attention, and from there it's not hard to figure out a large part of what occurs going forward.

It's the way the story and the relationships unfold that get you.

A short outline:

Prologue: Guy tells person he's talking to what's about to happen
Guy decides he wants to "drastically change" some people's circumstances, for the better
Guy looks for good people whose circumstances he can "drastically change"
Guy weeds out not-good people
Guy develops relationship with good people he's picked
Guy decides their life is more important than his own
Guy makes ultimate sacrifice for one he's fallen in love with
Two people whose circumstances were "drastically changed" come together

The reason the story grabs you is that it's one we've heard before. And the original is a doozie. You just have to substitute "God" for "Guy" in the above outline.

Prologue: God tells us what's about to happen (Genesis 12:1–3, Isaiah 7:14, etc.)
God decides He wants to "drastically change" some people's circumstances, for the better (Isaiah 9:6, John 10:10, etc.)
God develops relationship with people he's picked (Genesis 12-50, Matthew-John)
Jesus makes ultimate sacrifice for the ones He loves
People whose lives were "drastically changed" come together, as the church

Now that's a story. For all the similarities, notice the big (HUGE) difference. God didn't choose good people. God didn't weed out the not-good people. "While we were yet sinners, He died for us." (Romans 5:8) "For God so loved the world..."

If Emily and Ezra had rejected Ben's gift, it would have a tragic waste of a life, and not much of a story.

Let's make sure the original version of the story ends well.

Taking a Bite of the Apple

2008-12-31T15:25:00.003-06:00

Real life has reared its ugly head the last few months, and although I've written several posts in my head, I never found time to put them down in the ether. Sorry about that, I'm going to see if I can do better in '09.

Popular notion has it that the fruit Eve ate in the garden was an apple. We all know how that worked out for her (and Adam). I've swallowed my own Apple, and I'm not convinced yet the end is going to be any different.

A new MacBook Pro has been calling my name for some time now. Given the switch to Intel, the subsequent ability to run Windows in a VM on OS X (I have to use Windows for work), and the brain-dead decision by Lenovo to mess with the Thinkpad's keyboard, I decided to see how the other three percent live. So, after twelve years as a staunch ThinkPad user (I'm on my fourth; we recently found my first one in a closet somewhere -- it was almost three inches thick. Amazing.), I made the leap to the other side.

The Good

Startup was dead simple. Answer a couple of questions, and BAM!, you're in.
Network setup was equally easy. Leopard handles multiple locations out-of-the-box, so I set up one for home with my wireless, and one for Work for my client setup.
As soon as the network was setup, my other two home computers showed up on the Sidebar in Finder. Nice!
When I took it to work and plugged into their network and started to figure out how to add the printer (I figured it was going to be a big deal trying to get it to work with a Mac), the work printers showed up automatically. Pick one and you're done. Very nice!
When I plugged in my AT&T air card, it hummed for a couple of seconds and I was on the network. No installing software, no network preferences setup, no nothing. True plug-and-play. Nice again!
Installing a new application? Drag an icon to another icon. BAM! It's installed. Awesome!
Running Windows side-by-side with OS X turns out to be as easy as everything else on the Mac (but see "Bad" below).
Now we can Skype our friends in Italy. We haven't managed to get together after three weeks of having it, but we can!
The screen is brilliant. My brother-in-law refuses to buy one because they're only glossy screens, but I haven't had any problems with reflection, and next to it, my ThinkPad looks like it's dull as dishwater, even when it's on full brightness. In fact, the screen is so clear I took my default font down a point on my text editor.

The Bad

Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users. As just one example, getting keyboard access to a program's menu is a convoluted mess, requires three times as many keystrokes as Windows, and requires Full Keyboard Access to be turned on. The consistency between programs is non-existent; again, as just one example, Cmd-1 switches to the first tab in most programs, but opens the first bookmark on the toolbar in Safari (which is an Apple program).
No dedicated PgUp/PgDn/Home/End/Ins/Delete keys. This one is just stupid. Moronic, even. There is plenty of space to put the keys (IBM and now Lenovo has been doing it for 15 years). Having to learn, not only new keystrokes for the Mac, but new keystrokes for Windows, and having to use two hands to do it, has been the hardest part of using the machine. Again, Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users.
The trackpad, although nice for a trackpad, still can't beat a touchpoint. It's easier, it's faster, and it keeps your hands on home row (again, Apple needs to get a clue about keyboard users).
Parallels, the first to the VM party on the Mac, has been something of a disappointment. The latest version (4.0) has numerous keyboard issues (again with the keyboard theme) that makes it all but unusable for a touch typist. And, it had a problem with my Bible software (again keyboard related), which turned into the deal killer.
VMWare Fusion, the latecomer to the Mac party (but a longtime VM veteran and the name brand on the PC side of the house) doesn't have the keyboard issues that Parallels has, but my VPN won't stay connected more than 10 minutes or so at a time.

The Ugly

iCal is a joke. After migrating my emails and calendar from Outlook (using O2M, the suggested Apple genius bar way to do it), it invented an appointment out of thin air. But only on my iPhone (which has been happily syncing with Outlook for months). That is, after syncing with iCal, I had a recurring appointment on my iPhone which didn't exist on my iPhone before, and which did not exist in iCal. After a two-hour visit to the Genius Bar didn't fix it (he gave up and gave me a new phone, but the minute I synced with iCal the appointment showed back up). Further, deleting the appointment on the iPhone and choosing "all future events" doesn't work -- none of the appointments are deleted. Only by deleting them one at a time will they go away. Since it was a recurring appointment all the way to 12/2010, I had to delete 48 entries. I actually haven't synced the phone again, so I don't know if they will stay gone or not.
I've already lost a key. The Enter started wobbling after two weeks, and completely fell off yesterday. More on that story below.

The Key to Happiness
On the same Genius bar trip mentioned above, I asked them about the wobbling Enter key. He took in the back, and came back and said he'd let me know what they found. A half-hour later, he told me that the keyboard would have to be replaced. For one key? You gotta be kidding me. He ordered the keyboard, said it would be in in two or three days, and they'd call me.

The key completely fell off yesterday, so I went back to the Genius bar today, the guy took it back, came back out in a few minutes, and said the keyboard was in (where was my phone call?), but they had to send it in to get it swapped out, and it would take three days. Three days? This is a work computer, I can't do without it for three days. How about just giving me a new laptop, and swapping out the hard drive? Nope, the geniuses can't do that, I'll get my manager and see what he can do.

He says he can't swap it out either, but he can order a new computer and swap it out of that one. What about in the meantime -- I can't use it without an Enter key. He said he would give me a wireless keyboard to use with it.

So, although I think it's ridiculous that losing a single key requires the entire keyboard to be swapped out, it's ridiculous it takes shipping the machine somewhere else to replace the keyboard, and it's ridiculous that the keys are held on by two microscopic pieces of plastic that look like they could be broken by looking at them cross-eyed, Apple, in the form of the manager, did a good job of customer service and attempting to make things right. Kudos to them for that.

All in all, it's been a good, not great, experience so far. I have doubts about the longevity of the keys, which may turn out to be a big issue in the long run, but for now we're OK.

Happy New Year!

The Best Day of the Year

2008-08-07T22:09:00.002-05:00

Remember when you were a small child and your mom said you were going to get to go to Six Flags/Disneyland/whatever in a few days? Remember how you couldn't sleep and you kept asking "Is it today? Is it today?" and it never was, or at least seemed like it never was? Remember when the day finally got there you almost couldn't stay in your skin you were so excited?

I still get that way. Except, instead of Six Flags ($45 so I can go spend the day in 105 degrees and eat bad, expensive food? Ummm, let me think about it, NO), it's The Summit. The first day of the Summit is the best day of my year. This is my tenth year: all of them have been good, nine have been great, and four or five have been mind-blowingly un-stinking-believably awesome.

The first year was like the proverbial drinking from a firehose. I'd never seen or heard anything like it. The music was incredible (at the time, I was still in a traditional church with a traditional church service). The speakers were better (speakers as in persons speaking, not speakers as in things music comes out of, although they were pretty good at Lakepoint, too). I came home the first day and talked to my wife for an hour-and-a-half. Of all the droplets in the fire hose, one that has stuck with me was from John Maxwell: Choose who you lose.

In 2001, Bill Hybels interviewed Chuck Colson and asked him, "What is it that gets under your skin?" Colson thought for a second and replied, "People who have too small an idea of what God wants to do through them." I almost stood up and cheered. Someone had put words to my thoughts, to at least a portion of my calling -- to enlarge people's vision of what God had called them to do.

In 2003, Erwin McManus completely blew me away, not once, but twice. I could write a book just about those two sessions (and he wrote two), but one of funniest quotes was from a discussion about the names we have for groups of animals. He said a group of rhinoceroses (rhinoceri?) were called a crash, and they could run 60 mph but couldn't see 30 feet in front of them. He said, "That's what I want to be -- running 60 mph for Christ, but only seeing 30 feet in front of me, because that's all I need to see."

In 2005, Rick Warren talked about stewardship, a subject near and dear to my heart. He talked about not desiring either money or fame and being given both, and determining the influence he'd been given was to be used for those that didn't have any. He also talked about living on 10% of his income and giving 90% of it away, not taking a salary from Saddleback any more, and reimbursing Saddleback for every dollar they'd ever paid him.

Last year, Richard Curtis, a non-believing but searching film director, talked about living for the greater good, selling big red noses for a pound in England to raise money for poverty. His interview touched my pastor so much he came home and decided to raise money for a social injustice issue as part of the building campaign we were about to embark on.

We're only halfway through this year, and already it's been a great year.

Bill Hybels talked about axioms, and quoted Abraham Lincoln: "The best way to vanquish an enemy is to turn him into a friend." I needed that.

Gary Haugen of International Justice Mission (another subject near and dear to my heart these days) said if we want our leadership to matter, we need to lead in things that matter to God (i.e., are Jesus and I really interested in the same things?). He also pointed out that at the feeding of the 5000, the disciples focused on what was needed (which was overwhelming), while Jesus focused on what they had (which was little), and then turned it into enough.

Bill George said we were all born to manifest the glory of God in us, and therefore we should be asking whether we're fulfilling God's calling for our leadership. He also said that leaders who fail don't fail in leading others, they fail in leading themselves.

Wendy Kopp (Teach for America) had a host of miserable statistics about education of the poor in the U.S., but the most interesting thing she said was about a Gallup poll. When the polling group was presented with 20 choices about what was wrong with education, the top three answers given were 1) Lack of student motivation, 2) Lack of parental involvement, and 3) home life issues. However, when T4A interviews their alumni teachers after they've finished their 2-year commitment and asks them the same question, their answers are 1) Teacher quality, 2) Principle quality, and 3) Academic expectations of the students. Hmmmmm.

John Burke said people are like Rembrandts covered in mud: we see the mud and treat them like a muddy mess, but we should look past the mud and treat them like the masterpieces they are, because that's what Jesus does.

Efrem Smith had at least two hilarious rants ("No more grown men with 'Lil' in front of their name!"), but also painted a picture of the racial storm in America as being the high pressure of what God wants hitting the low pressure of what we're willing to settle for. Wow.

In short, it's been the best day of the year. At least until tomorrow (the second day of the Summit).

One Twelth of 12 Angry Men

2008-07-27T19:33:00.002-05:00

I just finished reading Escape, and I'm angry.

I'm angry Carolyn lived most of her adult years in fear.
I'm angry her eight children were not allowed physical contact (hugs, etc.) with their parents.
I'm angry that after all she'd documented, her first lawyer still allowed Jessop to have visitation rights to those kids.
I'm angry that Carolyn didn't even have the police to turn to when she escaped, because they were all in the FLDS as well.
I'm angry that we give this kind of barbarism protection under the guise of "religion".
I'm angry that, although Carolyn's escaped the physical clutches of the FLDS, her spiritual condition has not.
I'm angry that the state of Texas turned a blind eye when Jeffs' moved in to Eldorado.
I'm angry I didn't get angrier when I read Under the Banner of Heaven a few years ago.
I'm angry that I'm not sure I won't stop being angry before I've done something to help right this injustice.

Dos Muchachos and a Gringo

2008-04-28T22:42:00.004-05:00

I wrote this article about our second Guatemala trip for my church's missions newsletter, thought I'd share it here as well.

As I rode back from Antigua to Guatemala City by myself last year, I had many thoughts bouncing around in my head (mostly because there's so much empty space up there). As previously documented (August 2007), many of those thoughts revolved around Joselin, the girl at the orphanage who had so captivated me. But, there was also the "roller coaster" question — “Hey, that was awesome, can we do it again? Huh, huh, can we, can we, can we?”

As with the roller coaster, the answer was eventually “Yes,” and Easter morning this year found us in Guatemala City, in an intimate worship service with just our team, in preparation for a week with the girls at the orphanage. Easter afternoon, we drove to the orphanage and spent a couple of hours with the girls there. I love Easter sunrise services as much as the next guy who isn't fully awake until 10am, but if I've had a better Easter, I certainly can't recall it.

In many ways, this was a completely different trip than my first one. Then, I was more of an observer than anything; this time, our group leader allowed me the privilege of teaching the girls the Gospel (yes, our leader is crazy, see picture). Then, the trip was marked by the Unknown; this time, it was not only known, it was looked forward to with great anticipation. Then, the trip (for me, at least) was dominated by one girl; this time, there were dozens who smiled and hugged and laughed and hugged and cried their way into my heart. In the interest of space, however, this is the story of just two of them.

Joselin
It would be impossible for me to talk about Guatemala without talking about Joselin. For every word I've written or spoken about her, I've thought ten more. Our daughter and son-in-law wondered (seriously, I think) if Sharon and I would find a way to bring her back with us this time. There was only one problem — we didn't even know if she was still there. Carly Simon once sang, “We can never know about the days to come, but we think about them anyway.” Exactly.

On the drive to Antigua on Easter Sunday, Sharon and I learned from Berta, our lead interpreter, that Joselin was indeed still there. Our steps were therefore a little lighter as we entered the orphanage that afternoon. I was better prepared this time for the chaos that is the welcome, and greeted most of the girls in the “first wave.” As I scanned the crowd, it became apparent Joselin wasn't in the courtyard yet, so I made my way over to my “safe place,” and began meeting a few of the new (to us) girls. Suddenly, I heard a loud, “Beence!!” And then the world started spinning. Literally.

I have looked into the eyes of the most beautiful woman I know and said, “I do.”
I have heard a judge make my daughter officially my daughter -- “You are now Ashley Rice”.
I have said “Her mother and I do” as I handed that same daughter's hand to her about-to-be husband.
And after eight months apart, I have hugged Joselin as tight as I could and twirled her around a couple of times for good measure.
I have known true joy.

(Amazingly, that wasn't even the greatest joy of the week – we had fourteen girls give their lives to Jesus while we were there, and there's no greater joy than seeing the lost become found.)

The rest of the week was something of a blur — teaching the same thing four times in a row every day will do that to you. Most of the days we were there, we had a half-hour or so at the end of our time to just hang out with the girls. During those times, I got to watch Joselin jump rope and laugh and just be a fifteen-year-old girl. (I actually got to jump rope with her a couple of times, which fortunately none of you will ever see now that I've destroyed every known copy of the video.)

The coolest thing that happened was that on our last day, one of the workers (who didn't speak English) told one of the other workers there, Mary (who did speak English), to tell me something. Mary passed on that Joselin was on the list for Buckner's transition home, just waiting for a space to open up. (The transition home holds ten girls, so it's a much nicer environment for them, i.e. more personalized teaching, more private space, etc. It's a real privilege for the girls that are chosen to move there.)

The cool thing wasn't learning that Joselin was going — she had told us that on Tuesday (with great excitement). The cool thing was that someone saw she was important enough to me that I would want to know that. If a disinterested third party could see that, then I have good reason to believe that Joselin could see it, too. And that is extremely important to me — that she know what I wrote in the Spanish-English Bible we left her to be true: God loves her, Sharon and I love her, she is important, and she is special. Whether we see her again or not (and God’s going to have to send a talking donkey to prevent it), if she can know those four things, she will be well on her way to leaving her past behind her, and moving toward the future God has for her.

Bernadita
But there was also a very different girl there this time.

Bernardita was sharp — sharp in appearance, sharp in intelligence, sharp in street savvy. She was also trouble. You didn't have to know Spanish to know this girl had an attitude – she wore it on her carefully ironed sleeve. Her smile didn't make you melt when you saw it, it said, "I'm smarter than you and tougher than you and don't you forget it, because I won't.” (I’ve changed Bernardita’s name because … well, I’m not sure why, but I felt the Lord wanted me to. I chose an alias that means “bold as a bear,” because that says it all.)

Bernardita was in our second group of each day. The first couple of days, she more than once made fun of one or more of the other girls as they were talking. Again, you didn't have to know Spanish to tell what she was doing — her face communicated everything pretty clearly. Luz, the Puerto Rican firebrand on our team who brooked no nonsense from the girls, got onto her a couple of times. Bernardita was unfazed. We asked about her and found out she had already tried to start a gang among some of the girls. That did not come as a shock.

As we moved towards Thursday, the day we asked the girls to respond to the gospel presentation, I began to pray more and more for the girls, specifically that they would hear the Holy Spirit speak very clearly to them (in Spanish). As I got to Bernardita, my instinctive reaction was to pray for her not to be there – I didn't want her disrupting the time in a way that would prevent the other girls from hearing from God.

That only lasted a couple of seconds, as the Lord gently (OK, not so gently) pointed out what I already knew — Bernardita needed to hear more than perhaps anyone there. He also reminded me that, though sometimes people come through hard circumstances with the demeanor of a Joselin, it's much more common for them to react as Bernardita had — with anger. In other words, perhaps I could identify with Bernardita, as my own tendencies are not always towards appreciating the challenges life occasionally throws at me. Properly chastened, I prayed that Bernardita would be “seized by the power of a great affection,” in the words of Brennan Manning, and that if she was not, she would at least not be an obstacle to the other girls.
Bernardita was not there on Thursday. Not just in our group, but in any group. She stayed in the dorm, watching from a distance. “I'm smarter than you, I'm tougher than you, and I don't have to listen to anything you say if I don't want to.” I didn't see her Friday, either, until it was time to leave.

As I was making one last pass around the yard before we left, Bernardita appeared from out of the shadows of the dorm. She came up to me and gave me a hug. Not a casual, “yeah, great, you’re leaving” hug, a “don't let go” hug. As I held her, it took me a few seconds to figure out this was a God-given moment, then I told her she was very important, and that I loved her. (I was not a little shocked to find the latter to be true.) She held on to me, and let me hold onto her, for perhaps 45 seconds. (That may not sound like a long time, but try hugging someone today – after 5 seconds they'll be done.) After we left, I found out that she did the same thing to Sharon.

What was Bernardita looking for in those ninety seconds? She had shown no inclination the rest of the week towards needing anything from us (of the 75,000 pictures we took, she’s only in two I can find, and neither of them were at her request). I can guess, but I confess I don't really know, and I suspect she doesn't know herself. I do know this — I love Joselin, and would bring her home and give her a new name in a heartbeat. But it's Bernardita that's going to keep me up nights.

I said last year that everyone has a Joselin out there. As true as that is (and I believe it is), for every Joselin, I suspect there might be several Bernardita’s. They’re mad, they’re bad, they’re trouble with a capital T. And they need a hug.

Who’s keeping you up nights?

Blurred Vision

2008-04-01T16:24:00.002-05:00

Ten years ago we had the opportunity to go to England, and, since it was a potentially once-in-a-lifetime trip, I decided to buy a "real" camera. At the time, “real” was a medium-priced Canon film SLR and a couple of decent lenses. The trip was a lot of fun, I took a lot of pictures, and discovered that I liked photography. I wasn’t very good at it, but I liked it.

In the intervening years I’ve upgraded to a digital SLR and a long zoom digicam. I still like to take pictures, but I’m still not very good at it, mostly because I don’t take enough pictures. (Can’t get better at something unless you do it!) I’ll take the occasional good photograph, but there are a couple of hundred mediocre ones on either side of it.

With the advent of digital cameras, I’ve been able to stand in front of a scene and take it in with my eyes, then look at what was captured in the camera, and see immediately that the latter doesn’t do justice to the former. The same with people – pictures of my wife don’t begin to show the beauty that is seen in person. So it is with mediocre or bad pictures — they give us a false impression of what the real thing looks like.

This is the problem many of us have with God. We hear the words, “Heavenly Father,” and we immediately bring up the picture of our earthly father. If our picture is a good one, we’re good. If it is a mediocre one, or an absent one, or an abusive one, our thoughts about God are warped by that bad picture we have in our head.

So, instead of looking at our pictures, we should look at His. The Bible tells us that Jesus is the perfect picture of God — in fact, even better than a picture, He’s exactly the same (Colossians 2:9). So, look at Jesus in any of the Gospels, and you can see what God looks like. If the picture disagrees with the picture you have in your head, guess which one’s the blurred one?

Overweight Suitcases

2008-03-30T17:22:00.004-05:00

I don't travel much, but I travel enough to know that checking luggage is a bad thing. To paraphrase Darrell Royal, there are three things that happen when you check luggage, and two of them are bad. I've gone on a week-long trip many times with only a single carry-on suitcase (and my laptop), and I would do it every time. If I traveled alone.

But, of course, I don't always travel alone. I'm blessed to have a lovely wife to accompany me on vacations, the occasional business trip, mission trips, etc. When we travel together, checking luggage is a necessity. She has one carry-on just for her make-up (which she doesn't need because she's beautiful without it), and somehow one day of clothes takes up three times as much space in her suitcase as it does in mine. When we travel together, we have a lot of suitcases.

So it is with many of us — some of us only have a single suitcase, some of us have several, some of us carry around our own porter. Interestingly, it's not called "suitcase handling" at the airport, it's called "baggage-handling". And that leads us to the spiritual side of this conversation.

Just as we all physically travel with different amounts of suitcases, so we all spiritually travel with different amounts of baggage. Some of us don't have much, some of us have too much, and some of us can't seem to move at all because our accumulated baggage is so heavy.

For those of you in the last group, the Bible has good news (yes, it actually talks about baggage).

Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28

Jesus loves people who have too much baggage. He not only loves them, He invites them to a party. A "get rid of the baggage" party. Because He goes on to say

My yoke is easy and My burden is light. Matthew 11:30

If you're not yet a believer in Jesus, He has great news — you no longer have to carry that baggage around. He'll take care of it for you — you just have to bring it to Him. If you are a believer in Jesus, He has some possibly surprising news — that baggage you're carrying isn't His. His burden is light.

Have an unpacking party today. Throw away some suitcases. You won't be needing them any more.

Art Imitates Life

2007-09-30T23:09:00.000-05:00

The Dallas Summer Musicals had several shows this year my wife and I wanted to see, so we bought season tickets. Our daughter and son-in-law ended up going with us as well; we enjoyed Wicked, Chicago, and, of course, Spamalot among others, all at 8:00pm on Sunday evening.

This evening was Lion King, the spectacularly costumed musical version of the Disney movie. It also happened to be opening weekend of the Texas State Fair, so we arrived extra early, around an hour before showtime. Since we were so early, we decided to go and look at a few trucks and the new Honda's at the Auto Show pavilion. We strolled back over to the Music Hall around 7:40, with plenty of time to buy a t-shirt and get to our seats. Or so we thought. (That's called foreshadowing, used only by your professional bloggers. Don't try this at home.)

We thought it odd that no one was in the hallway, but figured it was because the doors had already opened and everyone had already headed for their seats. Except the doors weren't open. Realization slowly dawned as one of the ushers said, "You need to hurry, we're about to have a ten-minute blackout." It seemed tonight's show began at 7:00pm, not 8:00pm. We had forgotten to do a very simple thing — look at the starting time on the ticket. We got caught in that most human of predicaments, the assumption.

It isn't a new predicament. The prophet Nathan stumbled into it several thousand years ago. Nathan was a mighty prophet in Israel. It was he who uttered the infamous words, "You are that man!" to King David, after David's shameful escapades with Bathsheba and Uriah (2 Samuel 12:1-15). But a few years before that, in 2 Samuel 7, Nathan fell prey to the same trap we did tonight.

There was peace in the land, David had built himself a beautiful cedar house, but God still dwelt in a tent. David decided that wasn't a good thing, so he had the prophet, God's voice to the people, come over for the evening and told Nathan his thoughts. "Let's build a stupendous house for God," David told Nathan. "Great idea!" Nathan replied, "Do whatever you have on your mind." Because, of course, it was a great idea. What could be wrong with building God a great big house?

Well, nothing, except God hadn't asked for a great big house. And He wasn't interested in David building Him one. Which He told Nathan that night when Nathan got home. And told Nathan he had to go back and tell David to call off the building. Don't you know that was a pleasant conversation for Nathan? "Umm, King David, ummm, well, you see, ummm, you know that building idea you had that I said was a great idea? Well, ummm, I know I'm the prophet and everything, but, ummm... Gosh, this is hard."

Nathan assumed. He heard an idea, he decided it was a great idea, but just like we didn't bother to check the tickets (hey, they've all started at 8:00pm), Nathan didn't bother to check with God.

If it was only show times, I wouldn't worry much. But it's frightening to me that I might make an assumption far more serious. That when someone asks me what they should do about a problem in their marriage, or with their finances, or about changing jobs, or whatever else the question might be, that I would give them the "obvious" answer. The "obvious," and wrong, answer.

What are you assuming today? What might you assume tomorrow? Let's you and I remember to check with God on all our decisions, because His answers often aren't the obvious ones.

Be Very Afraid

2007-09-29T23:53:00.000-05:00

My dear friend William Attaway says I should do this, and since he's a pastor (albeit a baby-faced one), I guess Father knows best. (Yes, I know, pastors aren't Fathers, but work with me here.) It's midnight and I'm in the middle of a conversion for work, so I'm not going to write anything that I might be held accountable for later, but I thought I'd at least get this thing started.