Pastor Brian's Blog

From this Sunday

2009-11-09T18:31:00.000-08:00

Hey!! So we're in the middle of a great series called Icon. We're exploring how we can reflect God's glory through our human relationships and right now we are focusing on the marriage relationship. On Sunday, I called all married couples to start doing "communication dates" with one another. The concept of the communication date comes from a former pastor of mine, George Kenworthy. He's even written it into a book that he authored about saving marriages on the brink of divorce (yeah, I can't remember the name though). But, credit where it's due...right??

Anyhoo, here are the basics for a communication date:

COMMUNICATION DATE

I. Feelings of Love

A. Hubby shares with his wife the specific way or ways that he felt her love for him in the past week. Examples: the back rub you gave me, taking time to talk with me, helping me with the recycling, etc.

B. Wife shares with her husband the specific ways she felt his love for her in the past week.

II. Life Change

A. Hubby shares how he has experienced God changing his life the past week. This can be hard to get a handle on. Did God speak to you through a verse, prayer or a conversation with someone? Did you experience victory over a situation, a mood or a problem? What has been going on in your soul?

B. Hubby shares area(s) in his life that God has convicted him need to change. Examples: my prayer life is weak, I’m struggling with an attitude towards a person, etc. RULE: You may not identify your spouse as an area of struggle or a problem that you are having.

C. Wife shares how she has experienced God changing her life in the past week. See examples in II. A. above.

D. Wife shares area(s) in her life that God has convicted her need to change. See examples and rule in II. B. above.

III. Prayer Together

A. Praise God and Thank Him for how you have been able to express love towards each other in the previous week. Also praise Him for feeling loved by your spouse.

B. Praise God for the way He has changed your lives in the past week.

C. Pray for the areas that you have identified that need to be changed (actions that need to be taken, attitudes to work on, etc.).

D. Pray for one another and for God to work in each other’s lives.

Guidelines for a Successful
Communication Date

1. Schedule it!! Same time each week, if at all possible. If you don’t do this, you will not do your date. Guard that appointment dearly and don’t let little stuff get in the way!!

2. In the course of the communication date, you are NOT allowed to use the pronoun “you” if you are associating it with anything negative whatsoever. You can’t identify your spouse as a problem area in your life. You can’t say “pray for me because you upset me so often…” or “I’m trying to develop patience because of you…”

3. Aim to have your communication date last 15-30 minutes. If it’s shorter, it’s because you aren’t opening up enough. If it’s longer, one of you will get impatient because of other stuff you need to get done and that will possibly cause conflict.

4. As you get used to this ‘mini-date,’ you may very well find yourself doing mini-communication dates spontaneously. This is a good thing. You might also want to add more communication dates, doing them twice weekly, etc. Do whatever feels natural!!

I encourage all of you to start to develop this kind of sharing with one another. As you do it, you will be building a foundation for strong, healthy communication into the future. Some of you, after years of unhealthy or non-existent communication, may have given up on the idea that you can experience deep and meaningful conversations with your spouse. I say this: forget the past and build into the future. Years of failure in this area can be undone through the use of a tool like this. Set aside your fear as well. Dig in and enjoy creating a new means to achieve powerful connectedness with your spouse.

Eggs anyone??

2009-09-17T11:40:00.000-07:00

So, as if 13 cats are insufficient, we got 11 chickens for the chicken coop on Sunday. As of today, 3 have gone missing (weasel? owl? fox?). Not really sure how these birds can crank out 2-3 eggs a day, but that's what they supposedly do. The shock of the move will cause a bird to stop laying temporarily. We should have eggs coming out our ears in 3 weeks or so. Unless the predators arrive.

The Feline Microcosm and Self-Loathing

2009-09-08T09:14:00.000-07:00

Intro: For 45 years, I have hated cats. All cats.

The rest: My daughter Abigail has begged for 3 years for a kitten. She's sweet, adorable and virtually irresistable. 3 years is an incredible amount of time to ward off her pleadings.

At family camp at Trout Lake this summer, I gave in and allowed her to pick out a kitten. Tom was 10-12 weeks old and was raised in the horse stable at camp. He has a motor that never stops--literally uninterrupted purring 24 hours a day. I gotta google why cats purr.

On the way home from camp, Andrea called me (we had 2 cars up there). She said that Tom needs company and that her friend Char had 5 barn cats she was looking to find homes for. Growing more reluctant, I agreed to have another 2 cats brought over. Amongst the rules: no cats inside any part of our house, and I don't participate in care for the animals since I am allergic.

Muffin and Oreo came that next day. Friday, 1 cat; Saturday, 3 cats. They all seemed to be OK as cats go. Nothing special in my book (did I mention that I pretty much am a card-carrying member of the "I hate all cats" nation??). No cat is special, of course.

On Sunday, we head off to The Journey for church. We had an after-church picnic/potluck for the July 4th weekend. Good fun. We then went home for some family chores and stuff around the house. When we got home, the kids ran into the DETACHED garage (technically not part of the "house"). About 30 seconds later, Nate yelled "Hey, there's another kitten here!!" Fearing that they had befriended some stray runt, I went to check it out.

There, sitting in a kennel was a wet little rat-like thing. It had been born just 5 minutes before. Muffin was delivering kittens. AARGH. The evening was magical, to watch Muffin deliver kittens, lick them off, nurse them, eat placentas and do all the things that God had hard-wired into her puny brain. The kids watched in awe (mostly...a little shock too). But, I was starting to ooze frustration. I don't want ONE cat, let alone THREE. Oh, wait, make that EIGHT cats. When the heck did I agree to this??

Of course, the kids all said that they should each get a kitten...5 kittens, 5 kids. Makes sense, right? NO!!!! After weeks of tense negotiations, I have seen to it that 3 of the kittens will be given away. In fact, one is already gone.

As the time went on, I realized that I'm not allergic to short-haired cats. Only 1 of the 8 is long-haired. So, I could play with the kittens, Tom and Muffin. Then Muffin gets all affectionate and jumps on my lap when I'm on the front porch sitting enjoying a nice evening. I give her a saucer of milk and she flipping starts to cuddle with me. Tom plays all the time and comes running up everytime I inch outside the door. The kittens are ridiculously cute. Andrea and I were in the garage the other day and I said: "I loathe myself for liking cats." I feel like a traitor to all I have held dear...

Oh, yeah, as if going from 1 to 8 cats wasn't enough, Oreo showed signs of pregnancy within a week of arriving. So, she proceeded to deliver another 5 kittens in late August. 13 cats. Shoot me now. Except they are cute and fun. Keep them all. Get rid of them all.

As I look back on this whole cat thing...it's a microcosm of life, especially as I live life. I love to sign up for new things and to pursue new things, not always sure of the implications of it all. Every once in a while, something seemingly innocuous comes in to view...and I pursue it...and BAM!!--it explodes into something I never anticipated.

Kinda makes life fun. Usually.

Yippeeee!!!!!!

2009-09-08T09:13:00.000-07:00

Kids all back at school. No one forgot a lunch. No calls about a kid who barfed or has a headache. What a lovely day.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

2009-09-03T11:32:00.000-07:00

The twins are safely ensconced at college. The others start school on Tuesday. Andrea, it appears, will be employed by next week. Life is calming down.........

Aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I could use a few uneventful months.

Wow.

2009-09-01T07:09:00.000-07:00

So, this is my first time back "in the office" since Sunday. Yesterday was a "day off" for me. And I did take some time to re-charge the batteries.

Over the weekend, I ran a wedding rehearsal on Friday night, and the wedding on Saturday afternoon. It was, uh, different. I was concerned that I'd have to ask a groomsman to stay out of the wedding because of being sorta kinda buzzed. Also, the best man lost one of the rings 40 minutes before the ceremony. He and the rest of the wedding party were all scrambling to find the thing (of course it was the bride's ring...couldn't be the groom's ring...that would be far easier, so that just couldn't happen). The groom eventually had to go and tell his bride that they'd use a "plan B" ring and look for the other later.

Sunday was spectacular. We had worship in the park at Fish Lake Park in Maple Grove. About 75 there, a full band which totally rocked, and the morning clouds yielded to a gorgeous afternoon. The highlight of the day was getting to baptize Justin, Jeromy, Beth and Perry. It's always poignant to hear how God is a work in others' lives. We then hung around and ate some awesome food.

I went home and had a Skype conference call with Pastor Vasily and Boris, a translator. It was great to catch up with him. We have spoken a few times with out a translator, which means it's a mishmash of "Hallo. How arrrrr you? Gude. I pray for you and your family..."

Monday morning brought a new outreach for The Journey. We saved the treats from Sunday morning and took them, and all the bread, over to Weaver Lake Elementary. It was their first day of work for the staff. We blessed them with a huge spread of bagels, pastries, cookies, coffee, tea, juice, plus all the bread they wanted to take. They were blown away, and many of the 60 people were served asked about the church. The principal is a believer and she's totally open to allowing us to do some relationship building with the staff there. We're going to see if we can make this a monthly event.

That was 4 hours well-spent.

For the rest of my day off, I watched about 5 episodes of Lost, Season 2. I promised the kids we'd get through Season 2 before school starts. We are halfway through it...maybe Season 3 as well?????

Did he just say that???

2009-08-13T06:18:00.000-07:00

So, I was in a local fast food eating establishment the other day...and I heard a conversation like this:

"Here's your food, amigo," said the friendly Latina counter worker to a retiree who frequents the establishment.

Said the man, "Thank you!! And that word--amigo--that has to be the nicest word in the English language. Thanks for saying that!"

Hmmmmmm....wonder what she thought at that point. Now, he was a cute old dude and was expressing his fondness for his frequent server. And a few minutes later, when he got a refill of coffee, the same conversation took place with one change: he had practiced and got it right the second time. His response was this: "Thanks! Amigo is the nicest word there is, however it is said in any language." Nice recovery, I think.

Just really funny to overhear stuff like that. Put a smile on my face for the day...

Abby Stevens and the Mammoth Moth

2009-07-20T12:24:00.000-07:00

Saturday night was a great evening and we decided to go out as a family for dinner. When we got to the restaurant (Famous Dave's), we had a 60 minute wait. To kill time, we went over to Best Buy to try an find a couple things I need. We got back to the restaurant in plenty of time...meaning that we still had about 20 minutes to wait.

I ducked outside to take a call and when I was pacing around there talking on the phone, I saw a huge moth sitting on the side of the restaurant. I looked at him for a bit and he really was a stinking huge bug. I finished up on the phone and ran back in and got Abby. She's fascinated with animals...I think she's going to be a vet someday. She followed me out and when she saw the bug, she promptly picked it up and got him walking around on her arms. This girl will pick up and gently play with any animal around.

For the record, I think moths are gross and wouldn't pick one up if I could humanly avoid it. So, this girl is one of my heros for being able to confidently pick up that bug. Here's a couple pics...

Mac

2009-07-16T13:40:00.000-07:00

I made the switch back to Mac 6 days ago. My PC has totally crashed for the 3d time in 5 months. By "totally crashed" I mean that a tech has to reformat the hard drive, re-install Windows plus about 15 different programs that I use. The first two crashes cost me about $500 in parts and labor, plus 25 hours or more in reinstalling Word, BlackBerry, MediaShout, WordSearch, etc. I wasn't going to do it again!! Two strong attempts to sustain the life of that PC was enough. (we might try to resuscitate it later...)

Anyway, got a MacBook Pro last Friday and I'm feeling quite good about it. iPhoto is amazing. iMovie is amazing. Safari seems excellent. iTunes is, well, iTunes. Numbers, I'm confident, is great...although I try to avoid such software in general. Pages is great. And Keynote has me intrigued. I'm looking forward to delving into it and using it some.

I have partitioned the disc and have Windows loaded on the Mac. Using Boot Camp, I messed around with Windows this afternoon--with MediaShout, our worship presentation software. It's far more responsive and stable on a Mac-using-Vista than on a PC!!!

It's nice to be home again...

Shifty Died...Who Knew???

2009-07-16T12:59:00.000-07:00

As a post-Seminary graduation treat, I took the time needed to watch the entire "Band of Brothers" series (thanks Jeromy and Beth for loaning or lending, whichever is grammatically correct).

What an amazing series that is. Ordinary men, placed in extraordinary circumstances, accomplished remarkable things.

Shifty Powers was one of those men. He grew up in humble settings and enlisted when the war started. He took 6 practice jumps in training and was part of the 101st Airborne, which was being formed to try a new form of combat with gritty, semi-sane soldiers called "paratroopers." Shifty and Co. were dropped inland on June 6th, 1944 (D-Day). He fought in every battle that Easy Company faced for the rest of the war. He was considered the best shot in the entire company. During the Battle at Bastogne, he placed a shot between the eyes of a German sniper who had concealed himself extremely well and who had shot a number of US troops. All he could see of the sniper was a faint whisp of breath (it was bitterly cold).

Having survived the fighting, he was desperate to go home. He didn't have enough "points" to be discharged. But, HQ had authorized each company to hold a raffle to send a man home early--sort of a morale lifter. The rest of Easy Company--by now made up mostly of replacement soldiers--conspired to rig the raffle so that Shifty could go home. Sadly, Shifty didn't get home for months--his jeep had an accident on the way to the airport and he was seriously injured. All the other GI's rotated out of the service before he could even leave the hospital in Europe.

Shifty lived a full life following that. He worked for a coal company and had a family. He never talked to his family about his involvements and experiences in the war. He and his company were true-to-life war heroes. Not run of the mill soldiers, but the stuff of legend. Once Ambrose wrote the Band of Brothers book...and Spielberg and Tom Hanks made the series...all of a sudden his family saw their dad, grandpa, uncle in a radically new light.

You can see interviews of Shifty in the series itself--each episode starts with some 50-year-later interviews of the real veterans of Easy Company.

Now...Here's the deal. Shifty died on June 17th. So did Michael Jackson. Shifty's death has been completely obscured by the death of Jackson and the circus attendant thereto. Shifty saved more lives, risked far more, and all without agents or handlers. His death was totally swallowed up by Jackson's.

I'm FAR more grateful for Shifty and millions of other patriots who served this country over the years. And when I die, I hope and pray that there can be some shred of heroism from my life that my family and friends can savor.

Infection

2009-06-18T13:10:00.000-07:00

I had lunch today with a great set of friends. All are or are going to be church planters. These guys walk on the edge. They give themselves to ministry and, with God's guidance and help, they pull off impossible things. People come to faith weekly on account of these guys who endure significant loneliness, pain and loss to do ministry in their places. These guys are my heroes.

Once a month, we get together for lunch. We share stories of victories and the hurts of setbacks. We encourage, we cry, we pray, we laugh. It's always a tremendous time together.

One of the fun phenomena of lunch with these guys is catching bits of conversations from all around our 20-seated table. I love to listen in as various guys connect and share. Today, one guy shared that he's really not cut out to minister in the place where he is ministering. He thinks he'd be much better suited to a different sized church, city, demographic, whatever. In any event, he ended his conversation by simply stating: "Jesus has infected me with His love for [my current place]. That's all that really matters."

Cool.

Fast forward 2 hours. I overhear someone else who said: "I just found out that my sister is infected with swine flu. How weird is that?"

Two types of infections. For one there's no vaccine. For the other, we can be vaccined by by our own desires, our goals, our plans. We can be innoculated against the infection of Jesus by this world and what it has to offer. Sadly, lots and lots of "Christians" would love to live life without being infected by either of these things.

I've got no vaccine for either...the swine flu or the infection of Jesus's love for others. How about you?

I could do this all day

2009-06-16T15:30:00.000-07:00

I had 2 great opportunities to speak directly into the souls of a couple people yesterday. One is spiritually seeking, the other is quite far from God. For the one who is seeking, I spent an hour or so listening and interacting with her thoughts and questions. As we talked, I was able to share with her a different perspective on God than she's been struggling with. Her world was rocked a bit as she learned more of the one true God, revealed in the Bible.

Later in the day, I was able to speak into a hurting heart at a time of pretty significant turmoil. She had done a couple things that were pretty daring and harsh, and she had upset others in her family. I truthfully told her that her spirit reminds me of Christ. That kind of shocked her, since she's a professing atheist. She let me pray for her twice before our time together was finished. Very cool!!!

I could do this all day. Literally.

Almost killed myself and my wife tonight...

2009-06-12T19:23:00.000-07:00

So, we got a new toy last fall. We're using it to clear brush, mow the lawn, grade the driveway, mow what is basically a hay field, move, dig, level, pull, push, and, in the winter, handle all the snow removal.

Tonight, we took out an old sandbox. I used the bucket to lift up the wooden frame of the sandbox, and it lifted out completely intact. Andrea will use it for a raised garden bed next spring. Cool!!

Then I set about to scoop out all the old sand. Moving it down to the fire pit. And the fire pit will be moved about 15 feet to the west and south (if you've been there, you can probably imagine this).

So, I scooped up a big load of sand and started to drive down towards the fire pit. As I was making a turn, the tractor started to tip due to the weight in front. Not having weights in the back to stabilize the load, I grabbed some help. Josh and Andrea jumped on the back hitch. That stabilized the tractor some.

I swung the turn and started going down a hill that runs for about 120' and drops about 15'. It's a decent grade. As I was heading down, I made a tragic and rookie error: I raised the bucket, fearing that it was going to hit the ground. Not a good idea. The weight shifted up and away from the tractor. We started tipping over towards the front of the tractor. The bucket pulled the tractor up on its front wheels.

Josh, my oldest son, bailed off the back once we started to fly forward. My poor bride was unsure where to go or what to do. She hung on for dear life. I am reasonably coordinated. I was able to brace myself by placing my feet up and onto the hydraulic arms from the bucket.

The tractor was fully perpendicular to the level land. It was then that I felt and saw my wife tumble from behind me (i.e., above me) and fall down to the ground. She thankfully fell clear of the bucket. But, her fall was probably 8 feet, and after hitting, she tumbled a bit more down the hill.

With my rear facing the heavens, I hung suspended, keeping myself in place only with my legs bench-pressing me there. Andrea thankfully could move, and she cleared away. I slowly lowered the bucket, which basically lowered me and the tractor. I got to terra firma, dumped the load of sand, and then let my heart recover.

Andrea's on the couch, with a sore left knee and bumped up left arm. She's got some ice going and kicked back 800mg of ibuprofen. I'm in now, having moved all the sand. My back is locking up. Ibuprofen's on my agenda too.

Two important life lessons from this crazy physics experiment:

1. When you're carrying a heavy load, don't try to carry it at arm's length. You will be far more stable if you don't try to shove your burden away from you. Keep it close, take it to where you can safely drop it, and then do so. This is true for tractor buckets filled with hundreds of pounds of sand...and it's true for people who are struggling with fractured relationships, broken careers and the crises that life brings us. Too many of us try to prematurely jettison our burdens. We need to navigate through them, getting to the proper and healthy place for us to unload.

2. You need to turn into the tip. On the tractor, when it starts to tip, the human reaction to avoid pain and danger takes over. If your back left wheel is tipping, you want to steer right to get away from the tipping. Doing this will typically worsen the tip. The correct response is to turn into the side that is tipping up. That's kind of against our nature. I'd rather get away, but the safe solution is to head straight into the perceived danger. When we lean into the problems, we have a far greater chance to survive without any harm.

Now, ibuprofen...and CraigsList to see if there are used tractor weights I can pick up for cheap.

Spring

2009-06-07T19:13:00.000-07:00

I love spring. It rocks. Snow is gone, grass grows.

One of my favorite choral works I've ever sung is called "Spring." It's set to a work of Lizst, and the words come from a Norwegian poem called "The Last Spring." It's a poem by an older person who wonders if this spring is the last spring he/she will experience. It's mournful and joyful in one turn. The Lizst tune is haunting, beautiful and celebratory. The poet ends on the thought that the beauty of spring passes, but summer--with its sumptuous beauty is coming.

Here's the lyrics:

Yet once again I could see winter leave,
and springtime advancing,
Buds soon appeared on hedge and tree,
and flow'rs were dancing.

Life in its beauty once again I see,
but must from it sever;
Sad then of heart I wonder if this be
the last spring forever.

Green was the grass, and the flow'rs now shown forth, in brilliant array
Once more I hear the joyous song of spring and summer.

I haven't figured out how to add an mp3 here. I will check into it...then you could have a listen.

Enjoy spring!!!

Stopping in the Swirl--Part 2 (more interesting)

2009-04-04T09:35:00.000-07:00

Stopping in the Swirl is an appropriate metaphor for me right now. I haven't blogged forever, so I tossed up that last post to update you all on how I and my family are.

Now, I want to tell you an awesome story...it happened this Tuesday as I was in the midst of my swirl...

She passed me as I was going to get more ice and Coke. I topped my cup off as the fizz settled and I headed back to my booth. After all, my other Egg McMuffin was waiting. I settled back into the booth and grabbed the morning paper. Oddly, she had seated herself at the next booth over, but not facing away from me. She was seated facing towards me...always awkward (servers in restaurants always seat single persons so that they aren't facing one another to avoid that odd feeling).

You all know that I study people. I noticed a sweatshirt emblazoned with "Osseo High School" on it, the orange familiar from the twins' days there. Not a ton of Osseo sweatshirts in the McDonald's in Dinkytown. Must be a U of M student who graduated from OSH. Maybe she knows the twins.

I kept reading, not wanting to be some obnoxious talking dude...uh...hold on...not wanting to be more of an obnoxious talking dude. Yeah. She fiddled with her phone. She wasn't eating, but was carrying a beat up box of Cocoa Puffs. Definitely sad about something.

10 minutes later, I asked if she went to OSH. Nope, her friend did. Doesn't know the twins. Talked a bit more and was able to tell that she was pretty upset. Borrow my phone? Sure. I then overhear her talking to her "grandma" about conflicts that she's having with a boy.

After the call, we chatted for another 10 minutes. From Maple Grove, not in school. Just kicked out of a school. Told her about Lisa being in treatment. She's been in treatment too--both for bipolar and addictions. Ouch. Addictions at this age?? I was guessing 20, but it's 17. She talked about her experiences in treatment.

Did you eat? No, but I'm OK. Let me get you something. Here's $10, get whatever you want, gotta get this call. She eats and we talk more. I feel weird, like a predator chatting up a pretty young thing. But, my motives are pure. I sensed tremendous pain in her and so I pushed deeper.

Are you with your family? No, couldn't live with my dad. Now with friends of the family. Really risky question: Did your dad abuse you a lot?? Not "did he abuse you" but "how often". Yikes, can I really ask that? She's lost and wanting to talk. Yeah, I'll ask. Yikes again: he abused me 2-3 times per week for over 40 months. No wonder you're chemically dependent and your psyche has been fractured.

I talk with her about legal aspects of what's going on in her life (no case worker assigned to her, sleeping at "grandma's house" but really not related to them, just expelled from school because she cut class once too often). Also she's about to be kicked out of the grandma's house and has nowhere to go. She's too scared to talk with the school or the grandma. She has no idea what to do next.

I also talk with her about God. I apologized for all the abuse she's been through.

How can I help? What if I go to the school with you to help you talk to them?? They'll talk to me, because I'll tell them that I'm your pastor. :-)

35 minutes after meeting her, I learned her name (let's call her Ann, not the real name). Ann and I went to her school (a sober high school) and went into the counseling office. We were there for 45 minutes or so. A plan was put together for her to get into a school again (possibly not this one). We all called the grandma on speakerphone and the conflict with her was resolved. She's got a place to live still, a plan for getting back to classes, and a bit of stability is restored.

Ann and I picked up Lisa from the appointment she had been at. We dropped Ann at "grandma's" in Maple Grove just after noon. Of all the things that she told me that morning, the most profound was this: "It's amazing that you bumped into me today? What are the odds??" I smiled and said...yeah, it is amazing.

Ann's got my number and vice versa. She's not been to church but she's wanting to come to The Journey.

So...in my swirl, I could have finished the newspaper, read for school, worked on a sermon or other church stuff, caught up on emails, made some phone calls...or could have been a friend and voice to someone who desperately needed to have some hope interjected into her life.

God's put at least one Ann in you life. Sitting across two booths, close enough to talk with. Yeah, I felt like others would think I was a lecher. Yeah, it took guts to drill into her pain. But it made a huge difference in her life. God touched her, through me.

Don't succumb to your swirl.

Stopping in the Swirl

2009-04-04T09:26:00.002-07:00

So, haven't blogged a whole lot lately. Here's a quick shot of what's going on in my life, with the fam, with The Journey...

1. Lisa is out of the hospital for over a month now. She's stable, but not back to where she was. She's been through a tremendous amount of stuff and recovery will take more months. Thankfully, she can drive, is starting to look for work and is doing pretty well.

2. Josh has a girlfriend. She's a sweetheart, which makes it a good thing. Very fun to watch him as he navigates this stuff.

3. Andrea is still out of work. :-( Almost 4 months now. This hurts bad, but what can we do???

4. The Journey plugs along. I had a ton of fun teaching the Leviticus series in Jan/Feb and then the Spiritual Warfare series Feb/March. If you haven't listened to them all, grab some mp3s--link through www.thejourneymn.com and you can find it easily. We have severe financial issues right now, which affects morale. God's nowhere near done using us...we just have to push through the economic crisis and remind ourselves of how God has called us to a special mission in the northwest suburbs.

5. I am finishing school soon!!! I graduate in 8 weeks!!! In the meantime, I'm a fulltime student with 3 classes. Thankfully, I like all 3. I won't be able to study as thoroughly as I usually do, because I'm bound and determined to neither let the Journey sit idle while I'm in classes, nor ignore my wife and kids for this chunk of time.

Mark your calendars for May 31st...party at my place....

What if.....

2009-04-04T09:26:00.001-07:00

..the hokey pokey is really what it's all about??

Hmmmmm......

2 Decades

2009-03-06T12:07:00.000-08:00

I'm approaching the 20th anniversary of landing my bride. It's been a huge adventure and we're tremendously blessed.

In the day-in, day-out rush of life, we're like lots of couples. We get stressed, we miscommunicate, we put each other in boxes, we argue. During a recent argument--with my stubbornness drifting in--I was melted by watching her sew a button on a sweater of Abby's. I've never seen her sewing buttons or anything else. It took me seeing Andrea doing something simple but different to get me to see her all over again. So, as we approach April 22nd, I wrote her a quick poem to express my love. Here it is, for all to share:

The Button Girl

She measures, she cuts, then ties the thread,
eyes it up with a cock of her head.
She pulls twice through, then three and four,
sticking her tongue out (which I always adore).

Her fingers are sure and the job's quickly done--
this sweater of Abby's can now be put on.
The impatient girl's smile dissolves all her sorrow
as the filly pronounces, "I'll wear it tomorrow!!"

When she was as young, she sewed many'a pocket--
not a seam or a blouse or a dress made her docket.
Grown now, branched out, she'll sew a button or a glove,
but what she's really doing is sewing her love.

And I watch my bride as she finishes the sweater...
I'm reminded again I could never do better
Than the bride of my youth who has captured my heart--
the tomboy with leashed toad, she's a true work of art.

She's beauty embodied, both outside and in
with strength and a sense of adventure within;
I've been blessed with her for 2 decades before
and I'm glad to look forward to 5 decades more.

To help with context, Andrea was known as a young girl to only sew pockets. No other sewing projects were considered or executed. She just loved sewing 2 pieces of fabric together along 3 sides to form a pocket, quite unattached from anything. Unmoored pockets...someone could make a million bucks I bet. She was also known for catching toads and taking them for walks on leashes...she was terribly allergic to all traditional pets.

With love to my rough and tumble girl...

Which one???

2009-02-02T18:05:00.000-08:00

So when I'm totally stressed out, I sometimes go and have a massage. I don't do it often--only when I feel like I've been carrying more baggage than a momma's boy on his first day of school. Today was that day. Family stuff, church stuff, seminary stuff...it's all weighing.

I went in and had a great massage. Felt 5 years younger afterwards. The huge knot in my left shoulder has been broken into about a dozen smaller knots that are more manageable. As I'm taking off from there, I saw a woman walking towards the car next to mine. She was coming out of the tanning place.

Made me think...I just spent a chunk of time seeking relief from pretty heavy duty stress and the bodily aches that go with it. I invested in feeling better and functioning better. I then saw this woman coming out, nicely tanned. She had invested in externals...how she looked. Now, maybe she's in perfect health and functions at a completely optimal level in all areas in her life. Or maybe she's getting ready to head south for a spring trip somewhere sunny and needs a base level tan. I'm not judging her personally.

It just got me thinking that I'd rather invest in navigating life better than in looking better. I could use help in both doing life better and looking better. I think I'll work on the first. If any of you see me worrying about how I look more than how I can navigate life better, slap me. I'd rather be a great husband, dad and pastor than anything else.

How about you? Where are you investing these days??

Old Gym Shorts

2009-01-29T09:31:00.000-08:00

Is life a box of chocolates? Yeah, Forrest, a little bit.

Today, I see life more like a pair of old gym shorts. I like clothes that are 'broken in.' They're more comfortable and feel familiar. With gym shorts, t-shirts, sweatshirts and the like, I have a great habit (my wife calls it obnoxious) of wearing that garment until it virtually falls apart.

I find that gym shorts will be trashed before a good t-shirt or sweatshirt. You see, there's elastic in the waistband. Elastic is meant to stretch and return to its original, unstretched state. If you use the shorts right, that elastic will work a long time. Staying the same size is important for the lifespan of elastic.

Lately, life has stretched me tremendously. When that happens, I need to remember that I'm elastic--designed to stretch a lot, but also needing to return to an unstretched place. I'm trying to make sure that I take time during these swirling days to read something that I want to read (like Grisham's newest book) or listen to music I like while I drive instead of returning those 4 phone calls. I take time to try to connect with Andrea, since that's the biggest thing she needs from me. She feels loved and appreciated when I take time to just chat.

Many of you are stretched these days as well. Economic stuff looms large and brings uncertainty. Others may be struggling through some other season in their lives which are relationally, emotionally or physically hard. My prayer for all of you is that you'll slow down enough to let your elastic start to snap back.

Broken elastic means that the gym shorts become a rag for washing a car. We face the same danger: we are God's workmanship, created for good works prepared for us to do...and if we allow our elastic to be over-stretched, we can ruin ourselves for the pruposes for which God created us. That's not good!!

If you're in the middle of a storm...slow down...create space...breathe...talk about nothing...play. You'll never regret it.

Awesome Staff

2009-01-26T10:14:00.001-08:00

The Journey is blessed to have a great pastoral staff, in my humble opinion. I'm not talking about myself here.

I thought it would fun to take a few minutes to brag on Kate and Ryan, 2 of the most gifted and humble servants of Christ that I have worked with in my almost 6 years in ministry.

Kate is a woman who is motivated by a powerful calling on her life. She gave up a comfortable, secure job in elementary education to pursue a calling to minister to youth. She had a stable income and left that behind to live, at age 30, like most college sophomores. She scrapes by and does it joyfully, knowing that she's in the center of God's will for her.

Not only that, but she loves people. She's got a huge gift of compassion and empathy, which flows out of her and drives her ministry. She has shared with me how much love she has for the youth in her care, but also for so many others at The Journey.

In the past few weeks, she's stepped up to help with Hero stuff when we've had some vacancies. I didn't have to seek her; she called to volunteer.

Kate, you are a treasure and we're blessed to have you here.

Now for Ryan...

Ryan is laid back, if you didn't notice. Yet, he never misses a deadline. He is incredibly faithful to his tech and worship teams in keeping his promises, getting song sets out, stuff like that. His dependability should inspire us all.

I don't know if you've seen this...but Ryan leads worship in bare feet almost every Sunday. To me, it's not an issue (although he's been reprimanded for it in other churches). He was sharing about those other church experiences once. When the topic was being discussed, I sort of told, sort of asked him this: "You take your shoes off when you lead worship as an act of worship--like Moses being on holy ground--right??" And he just smiled and said "Yeah." He would never tell others why he does that, but that why he does it. (I love that I figured it out, and I think he liked being understood...) Bottom line--he is serious about worship and leading others into the presence of God.

I just talked with someone yesterday who, for the first time, spent time talking with Ryan. He told me that Ryan's got a great heart...he was very impressed as he and Ryan interacted. He specifically said that he can see Ryan's servant heart as he chats with him...

Yeah, Ryan also brings Laura, who is awesome as well.

I don't know if you've done it lately, but you really ought to pray for Kate and Ryan. You should also find tangible ways to support them, appreciate them and love on them. They both have strategic roles in The Journey, perform at a very high level of competence, and they are stretched thin by the demands of ministry and the rest of their lives.

Ryan and Kate, you are both amazing.

Fun, fun fun.

2009-01-21T14:32:00.000-08:00

Sometimes when I'm in a series, it gets old for me. Maybe I'm excited about the next series as I start to prep for that. Or maybe I don't feel like Journeyers are connecting to the series as I had hoped.

Right now, in Leviticus, I'm having a ball. The imagery is profound. The foreshadowing of huge New Testament truths is fascinating. I was working hard to convince you all that Leviticus has important things for us to learn. I was already convinced of it myself. But, as I've worked up each week's teaching, I become more and more amazed at the richness of the book.

I love spending time in the Word as I prepare for teaching each Sunday. But, when the Word becomes so vividly alive, it's just a gas for me.

Thanks, God, for your Word!!

44

2009-01-20T13:18:00.000-08:00

We have a new president today. History was made as Obama was sworn in.

I've reflected on political things for many years. My involvement in politics varies, depending on other life circumstances. I once aspired to a career in politics, very nearly running for the MN House of Representatives about 12 years ago. While I have strong political preferences and beliefs, they always are secondary to who I am in Christ and my firm belief that God is sovereign.

I didn't vote for Obama. I would have preferred McCain.

But, Obama is now my president. I'm gonna give him a chance. The nation needs strong leadership on numerous fronts right now. I pray that he can provide that.

If you are a conservative and a believer, I want to remind you what Paul writes:

"Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God...He is God's servant...therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities...if you owe taxes, pay taxes, if revenue, then revenue, if respect, then respect, if honor, then honor." (Romans 13:1-7)

Moreover, leaders in the church are reminded that we should "remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient and to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one..." (Titus 3:1-2).

It's unbecoming and unGodly for us to perpetuate a critical spirit and a slanderous mindset towards our president. It's a horrid witness to others if we spite the man or his policies.

Let's pray for this, the 44th person in the last 220 years to hold the highest office in the land. Every president faces an essentially impossible task. Followers of Christ should be the last persons to impede his ability to lead or to add to the poison of divisiveness that permeates our society.

No matter your politics, God clearly calls you to respect, honor, support and pray for this man. Remember, President Obama professes faith in Christ. As his fellow brothers and sisters, we ought to be praying that he clearly hears God's voice and has the courage to follow.

Pondering the Whys...

2009-01-08T10:30:00.000-08:00

I was giving a relative of mine an update on Lisa, our 20 year old daughter who is currently hospitalized for a psychotic breakdown due to bi-polar disorder. Lisa was just diagnosed; her twin sister was about 2 months ago. We've watched these 2 precious girls succumb to psychoses which are tormenting them and are painful for the rest of us to see.

As I updated my relative, she said, "Mental illness is the one thing I can't fiugre out. Why would God allow that to happen to people?" I didn't offer any answers primarily because it's a huge issue--more than just a 2 minute conversation certainly--and because I believe we all have to process through those questions at our own pace. The existence of evil, suffering, random tragedies--all of these raise questions about God and mankind that we all have to plow through and we usually have to do it more than a few times during our lives.

She got me thinking about some of those issues. As I pondered the twins and their newly discovered disorders, I also thought of a dear friend who suffered a miscarriage a couple weeks ago. Another pastor friend just officiated at a funeral last week of a 53 year old saint who was fine one day and had a death sentence from cancer the next. Someone I know has a friend who is cutting herself and believes that all of her options in life are bad--she'll very likely be contemplating suicide if she keeps thinking along these lines.

Where is God in all of this??

I don't claim to have the answers. But I've got some of my own thoughts about this itsy-bitsy topic. Here's what's been rolling around in my mind for the last week or so.

1. All of us suffer multiple effects from the Fall. We all have been born with original sin infecting us. We have all been born into a world that is fallen. Creation itself has been marred by the Fall. Prior to the Fall, man and woman were immortal. Death wasn't a certainty (nor taxes, for that matter). In fact, it wasn't possible. Illness didn't exist. No cancer, no bi-polar, no astigmatism or gout or tumors or toothaches. No dentists!! (sorry, KG, you are the best dentist ever, but you would be in a different occupation if the Fall hadn't happened!!)

When the Fall happened, all of creation fell. Disease and death and relational fracture were foisted upon not only humankind, but on all created things.

We all suffer an amazing amount due to the fall. All of our elementary playground wounds from taunting or bullies--because of the fall. All fractured marriages and the trauma they visit on adults and kids--because of the fall. All disease--because of the fall. All self-centered people who harm anyone else in their narcissism--because of the fall. Mental illness--because of the fall. Sexual abuse, rape and addiction--because of the fall. Depression--because of the fall. Greed, murder, envy, strife, lying, cheating, pride, hypocrisy, emotional abuse, you name it--because of the fall.

We hurt ourselves and others because of the fall. Others hurt themselves and us because of the fall.

Our lives are filled with a never-ending stream of hurt that flows out of Genesis 3.

2. None of the effects of the Fall are God's plan or idea.

God didn't create us to suffer divorce, abuse, emotional pain, physical pain, disease, illness, death, addiction, relational dysfunction or anything like that. Tragedies weren't His intent. Childlessness, fatherlessness, motherlessness, loneliness, pain from the evil acts of others weren't His idea.

We sometimes look at God as if He chose cancer for us. Or divorce. Or mental illness.

In reality, the effects of the Fall resound in all humanity minute by minute. God knows that we'll all suffer devastatingly from the effects of the Fall. But He doesn't prevent those effects.

I could be angry at God for allowing the twins to have bi-polar. I could just as reasonably be angry at God for allowing someone in my son's class to tease him, hurting his sense of self-worth. After all, both of those things are effects of the Fall. It helps me to know that--whether the particular pain is big or small--it all traces back to the Fall and it's not God who brings those effects upon us.

3. None of the Effects of the Fall are Fair.

Pretty simple concept here...it's not fair that death entered the world. It's not fair that cancer happens. Or mental illness. Or whatever. NONE of the effects of the Fall are fun, pleasant, just or fair. 6+ billion people are feeling the effects of sin due to the choice of Adam and Eve.

When the effects of the Fall hurt me, it's not fair. BUT, when I'm acting selfishly or with pride or I choose to lie, cheat, steal, hurt, whatever...it's not fair to the person or people who I hurt. You see, every sin that we can possibly commit damages some relationship that we are in. If I lie to my wife, our mariage relationship is weakened by that lie. If I fail to keep a promise to my kids, my relationship with them is hurt. If I gossip, I'm hurting the subject of the gossip. None of this nasty business is fair in any way whatsoever. Whether it's a huge injustice or a small injustice, it's never fair.

4. The Little Effects are Quite Huge.

We often focus on the big tragedies and injustices in our lives. I went through a broken engagement and was quite focused on the hurt that was visited upon me in that whole deal. People with cancer or going through a divorce or who have been sexually abused may understandably be strongly focused on those big traumas and how they have hurt and been unfair and so forth. Totally understandable.

From a big picture standpoint, though, I'd like to suggest that the small effects of the Fall are more devestating to us than those major traumas.

After all, we learn from an early age that people are mean, that it really hurts when someone says something nasty about us, that we really don't like to be alone. By the time that we're graduating from high school, it's highly likely that we've all been betrayed by friends (many times over), that our parents have failed us in many ways, that romance has crushed our spirits as we've tasted rejection or we've never even been asked out. We learn that people cheat and the system doesn't catch them. We are taught that there is no universal, absolute truth. Truth-telling, we learn, is quite optional. Hurting others is at best something that we have to do to make our lives more convenient; at worst, hurting others is something that seems funny to do. Oh, of course, we all learn too that we can't be certain that God exists since we can't tangibly inspect God with our 5 senses. Therefore, faith is stupid. I could go on.

Growing up and tasting the effects of the Fall has a numbing effect on us. When a 3 year old feels hurt by a playmate who takes a dumptruck in the sandbox, we tell them to share (which of course is impossible for them). We also tell them that some kids are just like that. Some kids will hurt you. Some kids are jerks. And the 3 year old grows up and starts to realize that the Fall is real, and that life isn't fair and that everyone will fail him at some point.

To me, the crushing and cumulative effects of the Fall that we all experience as we grow up combine to virtually destroy the real person that God designed us to be. Our spirits are crushed, we grow cynical, we hurt from all those little things, and to protect ourselves, we hurt others pre-emptively. Relationships of all sorts are discarded if they cause hurt. We grow up to become pain-avoidant and our hearts ache for something real.

I believe that this combination of thousands of little insults and injuries is more hurtful and unfair than mental illness. Or cancer. Or many of the other "big traumas" that we can face in life. (I know, easy for me to say, since I don't have cancer or a mental illness or have been raped).

I know that the "big traumas" are indeed huge. I'm not taking anything away from that. All I offer is the simple thought that the deluge of little stuff we all experience growing up has a cumulative effect that warps us tremendously, probably far more than any of us realize.

5. Separation from God is the Pinnacle Effect of the Fall.

As a follower of Christ, I have been adopted as a child of God. Before that, I was separated from God due to my sinfulness.

As we struggle with cancer, mental illness, abuse, divorce, dysfunction, pain and all the other putrid effects of the Fall, all of us who name the name of Christ must always remember that nothing here on earth compares with the hurt of eternal separation from God.

Cancer sucks. Fibromyalgia brings chronic pain that can be exquisite. Divorce is painful to everyone involved. Addiction is horrid. Mental illness brings anguish and heartache. But NONE OF THESE even comes close to the greatest effect of the Fall: being separated from God.

I believe most people wander this earth with a significant amount of pain simply because they are separated from the God with whom they were created to have a relationship. And, if they are never reconciled with that God, through faith in Christ, they will spend eternity in the worst pain imaginable...knowing that they can never have a relationship with their Creator. Eternal separation from God--being in hell--is the absolute worst thing in the world.

We know that when we step into eternity, all of the hurts and traumas will be gone, never to return. But think of those who face not only the hurts and traumas of this fallen world, but who will also experience the unspeakable horror of being fully separated from God for all eternity.

6. Final thoughts.

As we all struggle with our various hurts and pains and traumas and injustices, we have a choice. We could (a) be mad at God due to the pain/trauma/hurt; (b) engage in self-pity and isolate ourselves relationally and emotionally; (c) run towards God with our hurts and our questions; (d) seek wisdom from God as we walk through various traumas and hurts; (e) embrace community with others who will support us as we walk through various traumas and hurts; and/or (f) allow our painful and traumatizing experiences to remind us to reach out to non-believers, since we know that they are facing far more pain--unimaginable pain and hurt--if they never meet Christ.

Choices (a) and (b) are what many of us do in hard, traumatic times.

I believe God calls us to the last 4 options, though.

He yearns for us to run to Him with our hurts and questions. He longs for us to surrender our pain and doubt and anger to Him. He seeks to fill us with His wisdom--in fact, He implores us to chase after wisdom as the most precious gem we could find. He's programmed us to do life in community--to share our pain and trauma with others who can cry with us and rejoice with us.

But what about option (f)? Could we possibly allow God to speak to us from inside our painful times? Could He possibly use that pain to remind us of the lost around us? I think He does. You see, when I visit the unit where my daughter is, I am reminded that those in the psych ward aren't really very different from me...or you. They have the same hurts and traumas that we do. Their minds just aren't processing things for some reason. I'm struck by how normal many of those folks are.

As I look at them, I see their need for God. As I spoke with a young woman named Karen in The Studio (my favorite coffee place) on Tuesday, I saw her need for God. She is a sharp, intelligent young woman--not mentally ill. But the reality is that she will face the unspeakable trauma of hell for eternity if she doesn't meet Jesus.

My daughters' bi-polar disorder just doesn't seem as tragic, random, pointless or unfair in comparison to what Karen may face.

Maybe, just maybe, we all need to unpack ourselves from our hurts enough to let God shout to us about the certain pain and hurt that non-believers will face in eternity. Maybe God can use your hurt to push you closer to Him and close to others who need Him.

Yeah, I want you all to pray for Alicia and Lisa. But we need to be praying for the Karens of the world. Our pain and hurt and trauma are NOTHING compared to what they will one day face.

Let's us all run to Jesus, and bring others with.

Stuff at our house.....Is this really what a new year is supposed to bring???

2009-01-03T14:07:00.000-08:00

Hi folks. We're hoping you've all had a great holiday season. Many of you have heard already some of the things that have hit us in the past few days. I wanted to give you updates on stuff and ask for your prayers.

Lisa is hospitalized at this point. She was admitted to a mental health care unit on Wednesday after we observed a number of behaviors that are highly reminiscient of Alicia's behaviors as she was falling ill in October. We have known that Lisa has a pretty high probability of having bi-polar disorder, since it is a strongly genetic illness. Pray for her, please. She's in great hands, but it seems that she's still slipping into more delusional thinking; in other words, she's gotten worse in the past couple days. Pray that she'll take her meds (she's been refusing), that her mind will be brought back to reality, and that she'll cooperate in her healing process. Pray also that she'll feel the peace from her Prince of Peace, as her mind is in torment right now.

Pray for all the other the kids, who are shaken up by the auto accident of Thursday. They are all fine it seems, thank God. Steel and glass can be fixed, so we're not sweating the damage to the vehicle. It's great that they weren't more injured than bumps and bruises and a trip for 1 to the ER for some xrays and such.

Pray also for Alicia, Josh, Nate and Abby as they process what is going on with Lisa. It's unnerving for them to watch and experience this. Alicia especially needs our prayers as she is witnessing essentially what she went through, seeing it from the other side and realizing how seriously ill she was. It's scary for her.

Pray for Andrea and me as we try to get Alicia back to Bethel and situated, the kids back to school, find a new job for Andrea, and maintain a peaceful and supportive atmosphere at home in the midst of the swirl of life right now.

Juicy Peach Moments

2008-11-17T09:45:00.000-08:00

Every once in a while, your kids do something that is incredibly delightful. As parents, Andrea and I savor those moments, where we see fun, creative personalities emerging more and more. It's like grabbing a perfectly ripe peach and biting into it, expecting wonderful taste and texture...but every once in a while you get an extra juicy peach and on the first bite you find yourself grabbing for a napkin before the juice dribbles down onto your shirt. Kids can be that unexpected juiciness in life that leaves you begging for more...

Here's two juicy peach moments of late...

1. Abby lost a tooth a few weeks back. Now, she's plenty old (almost 10) and knows the facts of this world (Jesus is honest to goodness real, but Santa, the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny and whomever else folks may want to dream up are NOT real). But, we still play the Tooth Fairy game--after all, she wants her buck per tooth. She told me about the tooth as I was leaving for a church leadership meeting. By the time I got home, it was 10 pm, she was long asleep and I had totally forgotten about the tooth itself.

Abby got up in the morning, checked under the pillow and saw that I had failed in my task. She came to me and said, "Daaaaaaaad, the tooth fairy forgot to come!!!!" She had a twinkle in her eye because she was busting me. I told her that she needed to get breakfast soon and maybe the tooth fairy would come while she was eating breakfast.

I went downstairs and found a buck, while she finished dressing and then went down to eat. She sat down, I got up. I went up and found the tooth container, took the tooth and shoved a buck in there. I came back down and she popped up from the table and ran upstairs. 2 minutes later she came walking back to the dining room giggling her head off, holding our family's camcorder. This girl totally punk'd me--hid the camera to catch me planting the goods. We all sat at the table and watched the footage. I laughed for 20 minutes straight. What an amazing, creative character she is. I can't figure out where she'd get this kind of sneakiness. Certainly not from my side of the family. ;-)

2. Nate is all boy. He eats a ton, plays his heart out, still loves hugs and cuddles from his mom. He's the truly sneaky one of the lot--quick as lightning to make a joke, always looking to play a trick of some sort on someone.

About 5 years ago, I taught the boys the, um, uh, well, I sort of taught them how to pee outside. Since then, they have peed in the stream right by the Corcoran park (kind of a rite of spring--always the first time we go in March or April) and they've also peed in the headwaters of the Mississippi up in wherever that is by Bemidji. From what I've known of them, they only pee on very symbolic occasions. Did I mention this drives my wife nuts???

2 weeks ago, Abby came walking up the driveway from the school bus. I didn't see Nate anywhere behind her. I asked her about his whereabouts, fearing that he fell asleep on the bus or missed it at school. She flippantly said "He's at his pee tree." I, of course, started to giggle a little because I saw what was coming. "What's a pee tree Abby?" Well, Dad, she said, "It's the tree he ducks behind everyday walking down the driveway so he can pee."

Again, Andrea and many other women (perhaps some men too) will find this completely rude, crude and socially unacceptable. I'm not saying public urination is a habit worth getting into, but I almost fell over laughing with joy when I heard that this crazy little man had developed his own secluded little spot to take a whiz. That is a definite boy thing.

If you are a parent, what are your most recent juicy peach moments with your kids???

Life

2008-11-17T09:41:00.000-08:00

...it's sometimes rough.

I shared with the Journey leadership last night about recent struggles I've had with depression, ADD and sleeplessness. It's a long story, but for nearly 2 months or so, I was a dead leader running. I've turned a big corner and have energy like I haven't had in a few months. My thoughts are focused and I have a clarity of purpose and mission that's been missing. Thank God for good docs and counselors and so forth.

To any of you who I've seemingly ignored in the past couple months, I apologize. None of this is intentional and I wish that it wouldn't hit me like it does every few years.

Watch future posts for a couple really fun things......

...it depends on the definition of "reckless."

2008-09-22T16:44:00.000-07:00

So, 7 of us are 4 days into our RV trip. It's August 1st and we're heading west on Highway 12 in Wyoming, headed towards Montana and Little Big Horn. Hwy is the same Hwy 212 that runs through western Minnesota, through SD, and keeps on going.

He was standing in the ditch on Hwy 12. I had seen a few other hitchhikers earlier in the trip, but hadn't thought of picking any up. Without really thinking much of it, I slowed down and pulled over.

He was older--probably 58--and was clearly Native American. Howard showed the signs of a rough life. He is now sober, but once wasn't. He's not a hockey player, although the missing teeth might lead one to think otherwise. His glasses were missing one of the arms that rest on his ear. His right hand was missing 3 fingers from industrial accidents. His whole appearance spoke of toil and trouble.

He climbed in and he and I spoke quietly for over an hour. The kids were quiet and on best behavior (I think the boys even brushed their teeth at the thought of meeting someone new...quite a feat for boys on vacation).

5 minutes into the ride, he admitted that he was hungry (after I asked him 3 times). Without a word, my wife and 2 kids were busy making a few sandwiches, digging up some granola bars and apples, and finding the right soda for him. I love it when they instinctively practice hospitality.

As we spoke, Howard shared of a lost job and the need to get to Washington, where his family is. His brother has a job for him. I asked about his culture, his tribe, his people. He was happy to share with me. He asked about us. I explained the whole lawyer-to-pastor thing.

Our route was taking us across two different reservations. I asked if he would mind sharing some about himself and his culture with my kids. Again, he was pleased to do so. I called the 5 kids up and they gathered around him. He showed us different points of interest on the 2 reservations, he taught about Native American history--pointing out some pretty nasty stuff our forefathers did (for instance, those 2 reservations were right next to each other...and the 2 tribes were mortal enemies...the goal of the US government was to get the two tribes to kill each other off. Argh.). We talked a lot about Indian spiritual beliefs--praying to ancestors, venerating the great spirit, being one with the physical world. He spoke of sweat lodges, annual prayer festivals, sweet grass, and lots of other stuff that I can't remember.

As we left Howard about 200 miles later, we had made a connection. He was a gentle soul, having grown up enough to forgive the world for the way the deck was stacked against him. He is an eclectic person spiritually--he follows the ancient Indian practices, but also claims to follow Christ. He has studied Chinese folk religion (intriguing to the twins, of course!).

That 3 hours encounter was amazing. My kids ministered to him. I ministered to him. He shared a great deal. He left us with a braid of sweet grass, which is instrumental in his prayer rituals.

I later called to share the experience with my folks. Their first reaction was along the lines of this: "You have our grandchildren there....what are you thinking, picking up a stranger??" In other words--Son, don't be reckless!! Hey, they're my parents and I love them. They should caution me. If my kids start to pick up hitchhikers, I'll get on their case. After all, it is pretty reckless to do that. He could have been stoned, drunk, dangerous, on the run from the law...who knows?

But, I heard the Spirit. He told me to pull over. I rarely pick up hitchhikers. Each time I do, it's when I have the "inexplicable" urge to pull over. When that happens, I think it's rather reckless to not pick up the guy. We have instances all the time where we hear that inner nudge, from the Spirit, to help someone. I also believe that if we don't obey, the Spirit become less and less likely to nudge us. He'll go on to someone else who will willingly lay aside their agenda to take on the task and the risk of loving someone else.

Here's to nudges. I pray I'll never grow reckless with the call of God. I pray you won't either.

A Loving Death

2008-09-17T07:46:00.000-07:00

Something I've been gnawing on...

Christ came to die. It was out of love for a dying humanity that he came to die. Just before he was taken by the authorities, Christ told his disciples that they must love one another. A simple command in John 15. "This is my command: Love each other." This was part of the "I am the vine, you are the branches" teaching. In that passage, Christ teaches that we are to remain in him, grafted into him, and that we are to bear fruit with love. He says this in vv. 12-13: "My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one [man, person] than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." He goes on to explain that the disciples are his friends.

Christ was modeling the height of human love: to sacrifice oneself for someone else.

We're in a parenting series at The Journey right now. We're talking about prayer, discipline, our fears, stuff like that. I have often imagined that I wouldn't hesitate to lay down my life for my kids. Jump in front of a car and push them out of the way. Run into a burning house to pull them to safety, even if I'm completely charred and die from the burns. As parents, God has infused a willingness to protect and preserve our kids.

But Christ takes this to a higher level. Sure, we'd lay down our lives for our kids. But...our friends?? That's taking it up a notch, isn't it??

Notice that Christ said this: no greater love has no one or man or person than this...that he'd lay down his life for a friend.

That's the measure of the love a human being might aspire to. To sacrifice one's self for others. That's the greatest love a man or woman could show.

But, what about God? After all, He's not human. He's infinitely more loving than we can imagine.

Check out the heights of God's love: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son...

The ultimate in human love: to die for your friends.

The ultimate in God's love: to send your son to die for ones who are completely estranged from you.

As I've been working on this series, the thought of sacrificing myself for my kids swirls about. Maybe once a decade I ponder whether I'd sacrifice myself for friends. But, the thought of purposefully sacrificing--not myself, but one of my kids--and for people who aren't even my friends...that thought is virtually abhorrent to me.

And yet, that's exactly what the Father did. Didn't sacrifice himself. Sent his Son to die. For people far from him. Done by a love that is completely counter-intuitive to the human capacity to love.

And I still wonder sometimes if God loves me?? Duh. Or I try to earn his love by being good, reading the Bible, doing other things?? Stupid. When will I ever learn to just live in that love with a child-like acceptance?

Set those 2 verses side by side and it's an amazing picture of God's divine love for us.

....2 months later

2008-09-15T18:30:00.001-07:00

So, vacation was awesome. And the twins are off at Bethel, starting their freshman year. The other 3 have settled into their new schools and are doing pretty well.

Here's something I've been processing for a week or so. On the day of the Journey Walk-a-thon, the twins got almost a dozen Bethel women to come and take part in the walk. I played chauffeur for them, picking up a bunch and then driving them home.

As we were returning to Bethel, the women were talking in the back, sharing stories of their hometowns, their majors and the like. Soon, they were talking ink. Some had tats, others didn't. One woman shared that a tattoo would be completely looked down upon in her family, "...not that there's anything wrong with that, of course."

She then proceeded to show her right forearm, where she had branded herself. She read up on how to properly sizzle human skin. She watched videos on YouTube. Then, she did it. At home. She heated up some kind of metallic cross and branded it into her arm. It was over 500 degrees in order to achieve the required depth of burning.

Over the course of the next year or so, she carefully debrided the wound. She had to completely tear off the scabbing twice in order to follow the "burn yourself at home" regimen that she had so carefully followed.

Now, nearly 2 years later, she's got a wicked scar on her arm. The cross is barely recognizable. It looks more like a fat addition sign. It looks more like she had a nasty bike accident of some kind.

At least she didn't get a tattoo, though. You know...that wouldn't be acceptable in her family.

Now, here's what I've been gnawing on. This young woman did something that I think is a form of self-mutilation. BUT, she wanted to find a way to proclaim very publicly and pretty permanently her allegiance to Christ Jesus. In the US, baptism isn't usually a public profession of faith, nor is it inconvenient typically. Branding oneself in order to state unequivocally that one is part of the Kingdom certainly is far more public, lasting and suggests a permanence of faith. Faith that won't be moved.

I loved this young woman's heart. I'd personally search for a different way to express this kind of devotion. Youthful exuberance is great. I hope that she's just as sold out to Jesus when she's my age and just as fanatical about it. We need more Christ followers who aren't ashamed, who are in it for the long haul, and who want everyone to know about it.

How do the rest of us convey our faith? Are we as up front? Something to think about...

Vacation approaching

2008-07-21T22:43:00.000-07:00

Can't tell you how excited I am to go on vacation next week. We'll be rolling out right after church on Sunday the 27th. Believe it or not, we're almost completely packed and ready for this trip. The RV is ready, food is loaded on, water, gas and propane are topped off. Just got to get the fresh fruits and milk and such on there on Saturday, pack the clothes on and the bedding and stuff. Games and sports stuff are already ready. This rocks!!!

You askin me??

2008-07-11T09:20:00.000-07:00

I read on of my favorite blogs from another pastor this morning and found this to be a great, thought post. Here it is in its entirety:

Had a great meeting with a sharp church planter yesterday and he asked me a question that still has me thinking. He said towards the end of our meeting, "What's the question I should be asking you but haven't yet?" Wow!

I've been thinking about that and asking God, "What's the question I should be asking YOU but haven't yet?"

What's the prayer I should be praying but haven't yet?

What's the dream I should be dreaming but haven't yet?

Questions are how we grow. A friend told me when I was graduating from college, "You don't have all the answers now. You just have the ability to ask better questions."

We get the right answers when we ask the right questions. So what's the question you should be asking that you haven't asked yet?

Great stuff. I think I'll incubate on that for a while.

July!!

2008-07-11T09:04:00.000-07:00

Wow. If I don't blog religiously, time rushes by and suddenly I'm a month between posts. Lots of stuff going on at The Journey and within my family. Here's what I've been working towards, mulling over, thinking and doing.

Starting a series on money this week. Hard stuff to talk about because some people may take offense (which means they are being hit head on). Harder to talk about because I am not a particularly fabulous steward when push comes to shove. I'll be preaching a lot to myself and will have my own list of stuff to do as a result of this series.
Big leadership gatherings happen the next 2 Sunday nights. I love getting our leaders together. I'm praying that these will be a great time of refreshment, unity, envisioning, discussion, and prayer.
Getting really excited for the Walk-a-thon in September. We've been talking to Maple Grove folks and people from the women's shelter--Home Free--and I think this is going to be huge!!
Getting ready for a family vacation. We leave on July 27th (Sunday) right after church is done. I am excited to be with the fam for 2 whole weeks. We're heading out through the Black Hills. We're going to hit the Bad Lands National Park, Mt. Rushmore National Monument, Devils Tower National Park, Yosemite National Park, Grand Tetons National Park, Little Bighorn National Monument, and Teddy Roosevelt National Park. See a pattern?? The kids will love this!!
As we're getting ready, I've divided the kids up into teams for vacation prep. There's a "nutrition team" charged with getting food prepared. There's a "hydration team" in charge of water, pop and gatorade stuff. There's a maintenance team, getting the RV ready. The teams are meeting and getting their stuff put together. We're even giving each team a budget. Pretty cool. It adds more work for me and Andrea, but it's teaching the kids some great stuff.
Golfed this week for the first time in over a year. That was fun.
The weekend of the 4th was great. We got some great work done around the house and yard, plus carved out a lot of time for family and relaxation.
Josh and Nate were at basketball camp at Bethel this week. Abby is at Trout Lake. It's been crazy quiet around the house as a result.
The twins are leaving for Bethel in 6 short weeks. That will be a huge adjustment too!!

There's a short snapshot of what's going on.

Hmm....it's June

2008-06-16T05:47:00.000-07:00

So, no blogging for 2 weeks or so. It's been a crazy busy season at the Stevens home. 5 kids ended their school years in the past 3 weeks. 2 graduated high school. We had 3 year end concerts, 4 year end programs/honors programs, 2 scholarship presentations, a partridge in a pear tree, a high school graduation, 2 sets of relatives in town over 2 different weekends, a graduation open house that we hosted, about 5 other open houses to go to...yeah, not much going on.

The twins are all graduated, the relatives gone, and life is getting back to "normal."

So, here's what's rattling around in my brain.

--One Prayer is really great. Perry Noble was fabulous last week. I preached this Sunday and really enjoyed it. I think a lot of people connected with the lion chasing theme.
--We had a family pow-wow last week and planned out our family vacation. Gas is really pricey, but we haven't had an all-family vacation for 2 years. So, we're gonna pack into the RV and head out for 2 weeks. Heading to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. It's gonna be a great time. Every time we go on a vacation, it gets to be more and more fun. The kids are old enough to involve in our planning process and the anticipation is sweeter. They are stoked.
--Father's Day was great. My wife got me a new phone. No more Q!! I didn't like that thing. I can't remember the model, but it's got the qwerty keypad that you flip open...as we were doing the phone thing, they gave my wife a deal and she got the same model for free, gave her a free USB deal for unlimited data access for wireless internet, and gave us a 20% reduction on our bill because of where my wife works. We came out with 2 great new phones, wireless internet, a huge deduction on our bill. Had to lay out $100 total for everything. Sweet.
--Kids took me to Fuddruckers for a burger, then I got to lay around and watch the US Open and the Celtics. Over to my folks later for dessert. The twins gave me a DVD with a couple videos and some slideshows on it. Should be pretty cool.
--Great baby dedication yesterday. I love doing those. Fun to do it on father's day too.

Smoke on the Water

2008-05-29T08:13:00.000-07:00

So, we have a variety of musical instruments around the house...and various kids are taking various lessons from time to time.

Unfortunately, they've all learned the first line of that guitar lick from "Smoke on the Water." In a recent 24 hour period, I heard that lick on acoustic guitar, electric guitar, piano, cello, trombone, and on a recorder (you know, the little flute kind of thing that kids in elementary school play).

I'm all smoked out...

Oh, yeah, they're working on "Another One Bites the Dust"--just that one line--and nailing that down as well. Yippee.

What???!!!??

2008-05-27T12:07:00.000-07:00

So, it's the last week of class at Bethel Seminary. I've got a big old paper to do...and I'm down at Sem library working away. I took a break to wander off in search of caffeine. Went to the vending machines (since the snack bar is closed for the day). The pop machine is EMPTY!! What???!!!??

That's insane!!!

I am officially forming a new fraternity. Needa Cappa Chino.

Wake me when the week is over.

RETRACTION

2008-05-15T19:09:00.000-07:00

Ok, so just this morning I told you that the Journey softball team wasn't all that good...

We played two games tonight. The first was miserable....16-0, forced to end after the 4th inning...

Then there was the second game. We spotted them 5 runs in the first couple innings. Then, in the bottom of the 3rd, we came alive. A string of hits got us a few runs. I came up with 2 on and no outs. For the first time in 9 years, I felt the magic of a fresh, hard softball jump off the sweet spot of my bat and watched it sail over the left field fence. What a freaking rush!!!!

Our guys poured it on and we touched the plate 9 times in that inning. 9 to 5 didn't hold, though. They scored 2 runs in the 6th and then 2 in the 7th (the last inning in softball).

We were home team, and our lead off guy got a single, followed by a fielder's choice. The 3rd batter got a single--guys at 1st and 2nd with 1 out. The next batter walked. Bases juiced, with just 1 out. The next guys up drove a single into the outfield and that was the game!!

Honorable mention to Beto Bautista who had a key walk and his very first ever base hit playing softball!! His single kept our big inning going (and he ended up scoring).

So, we have a little game, I guess. Maybe we'll win a few more!!

Some of that, some of this...

2008-05-14T13:49:00.000-07:00

So, I didn't get the regular Monday stuff out...this is basically a Wednesday Mind Dump...

My mom's still in the rehab place...hopes to be set loose on Saturday or early next week. Spent some time with her on Sunday for Mom's day. She's in good spirits.
Identity Theft, our current series at The Journey, has been powerful. Lots of people getting pushed on by the enemy as we are working to unmask his lies and come against them in our lives. Remember, "a lie, if believed to be the truth, will have the same effect as if it were true."
I'm excited to launch into some summer projects around the house. Made a list and me and the missus are trying to prioritize them and figure out which ones we can realistically tackle. The list I compiled didn't include a couple major projects that I want to work towards in the coming year.
The Journey softball team started this last Thursday. It was....well, uh....hmm. Basically, we suck. But, we're out there giving it our best. Most of the guys have man-boobs (myself included) and we somehow got put into a league with young bucks who can hit the cover off the ball. Yeah....20 years ago, I was there baby!! I specified in my contract that I would reach below my shins for any ground ball or low throw to me at first base. Some things are just not possible at my age. But, in spite of ourselves, we will find a way to have fun and enjoy ourselves!! I'm sure we'll win at least one game this year...some team has to forfeit at some point. ;)
We've got a great gathering after worship this Sunday. It's our annual Journey body meeting. We'll do it at a local pizza place. They're fixing up a pizza buffet for us, and we'll have their side room. It's gonna be great as we talk about what God has done in the past year and where we believe he'll be taking us next year. Perry Stuns is going to share his faith story--particularly how The Journey has been a place where he reconnected with God in a big way. I'm stoked for this time together!!!
A good friend of mine lost his sister to breast cancer yesterday. She was in her 40's. She leaves a husband and 3 kids. It's a tough time for them all, but they know that she's with Jesus. She was a wonderful Christ follower. In her last conversation with her husband, she sat up in bed and said "Something very wonderful is about to happen to me." She laid back down and never regained consciousness. Pray for the husband and kids. Also pray for this woman's younger sister, who was diagnosed with breast cancer this past week. That must be incredibly tough, unnerving news right now.
I'm really excited to be heading to CA next week for a conference at Saddleback, where Rick Warren is the lead pastor. It promises to be a great time, together with 2000 of my closest friends... ;-)

Monday Stuff

2008-05-05T08:47:00.000-07:00

last week was crazy...Mom had surgery, spent time with her and dad, had leadership council Tuesday night, had some other out-of-the-ordinary things going on that were pretty heavy things to be involved in. I was in serious need of sleep last night and got a good night sleep.
had a great time Friday night with the Jonasons, out for dinner together. They are dear friends and it was wonderful just to kick back, talk for a long time, and enjoy a great dinner.
the Journey cookbooks are fabulous...lots of fun to get it done (giant thanks to Kelly J for doing a ton of work to pull it together and get it printed and such) and I'm glad that I got some of Sheila's recipes...and Sue's...and Kelly's...and the rest of you.
the twins are going to prom...that's pretty cool.
my mom is doing very well. She's in a rehab place and will be there for 2-3 weeks (already there for half a week). I'm going to see if we can get her a pass to come to The Journey next Sunday.
The Journey was great yesterday. We had a whole slew of Journeyers who were gone, but we had a dozen guests there. I love how Journeyers are warm and welcoming. I saw a bunch of people chatting with the guests, making connections, inviting them back...that's just excellent.
Seth was our worship leader yesterday...he's a Bethel Sem student who will be graduating in a few weeks. After that, he's going on to work towards a PhD. What a great worship set yesterday!! It was acoutstic, but he rocked. Beto was totally into the djembe too. Great job, gents!! Props to you both.
Identity Theft Week 4 was fun. I had a ton of content to cover--probably too much to explore in one teaching time, but I took a run at it anyway. I think lots of folks have been connecting with this series in a great way.
I'm excited for the Twins game on Saturday night. We have a group of about 25 coming. It's gonna be great.

Feeling Freakishly Old

2008-04-28T03:33:00.001-07:00

So on Saturday, Andrea and I went with Alicia and Lisa to Bethel to an orientation day. Lots of parents and kids all wandering around, getting info, filling out forms, dropping cash left and right for all kinds of stuff.

We were pretty easily some of the youngest parents there--most parents were late 40's and into their 50's.

It was really exciting to see the twins as they were starting to really sense the reality that they are going to college. At a great place, too. They couldn't stop smiling all day.

In the last session, Andrea poked me and said "Think about 3 years from now. Where will our kids be?" I had to work it out, but this is where we will be in 3 years: 2 in college, as juniors, 1 in high school as a sophomore, 1 in junior high, in 8th grade, and one in elementary, in grade 6. That's freakish. Now if we could just adopt an infant, we'd have one in preschool too. (I shouldn't joke, God just might take us up on that...)

Oops

2008-04-21T08:22:00.000-07:00

So, I wore a green shirt when I preached yesterday. April 20th. 4/20. Hmmm...

I wasn't making any type of statement by my choice of wardrobe.

Others who wore green yesterday may have been making a statement by their clothing.

Here's why... 420 is a slang term meaning marijuana. Snopes deals with the origin of the term, which is unclear. But, the term is popular within certain segments of the population. The Star Trib did a story a couple years back about rural street signs ("420th Street South" or "NE 420th Ave") being stolen left and right by kids. The ones with 421 or 419 are all left intact.

And, apparently at 4:20 pm on 4/20, one is supposed to light up and toke in a symbol of unity with cannabis users worldwide. And, of course, users all are to wear green on 4/20 to also symbolize their love for weed.

I guess I need to make a note of that for next year.

Who knew??

Bird Poop

2008-04-21T07:31:00.001-07:00

So, we've not had to worry much about bird poop in the past 5 months or so while the birds were laying low and trying to survive the winter...or gone south to survive the winter.

Last Friday, I came out of the house and saw that a bird had left his/her mark prominently on the windshield of my little Hyundai. Used about half a gallon of windshield spray to finally get it off the windshield.

Saturday, I came out and started laughing because a bird had dive-bombed our Honda Pilot and just barely missed the driver's door handle. I imagined the twins or Andrea using that car and grabbing a handful of poop when they went to open the door. It was just not a direct hit, but close enough for them to be weirded out by it.

Yesterday, I went out to run an errand and there were 3 distinct globs of bird crap on my windshield. More washer fluid...argh.

This morning, I came out to run the kids to school...grabbed the handle of my Hyundai and felt something strangely squishy on the door handle. Yep. Sure, they miss the Honda door handle, but they manage to drop a prodigious load square on the drivers door handle of MY car. What the heck???!!!!!??

These birds have some kind of agenda. A vendetta of sorts. Perhaps we have to fill the bird feeder (empty for about 3 months now) as an act of contrition, thereby seeking an end to the senseless scat strafings.

If you visit us, you are now warned. Your car will be a target of these beasts.

Monday!!

2008-04-21T07:12:00.000-07:00

Mind dump time...

--didn't do this last week because I played hooky with one of my kids who needed dad time. We did Mall of America and had a ball. Great to connect for a whole day. But taking Monday off just scrambled my screen for the whole week. I never got into a groove with work until Friday. It totally threw me off my game and I forgot stuff, didn't know what day it was, and just put out fires the whole week.
--lots of great meetings last week. Leadership Council, a couple great lunch meetings, a coffee here or there.
--I love our Leadership Council. These guys are great and I appreciate them a ton.
--The Journey has rocked for the last couple Sundays. I'm enjoying the "Identity Theft" series. I think lots of Journeyers are connecting with the teaching and are challenged by it all...
--I'm excited...I think we'll have a new worship leader on board in a few weeks.
--I have a 2 week break in my class, which is welcome. It's a great class, but the time demands are pretty strong. I'm gonna work ahead so that May will be manageable.
--I grilled ribs on Saturday afternoon. WOW. Those things are fabulous when I can manage to not burn them...
--I saw "Expelled" on Friday. If you haven't heard of it, it's a Michael Moore type documentary done by Ben Stein, and it deals with Evolution vs. Intelligent Design. Stein interviews a number of professors, researchers and writers who have been fired or denied tenure because they believe in both evolution as a scientific fact and an intelligent designer. There are some great points in the movie. My favorite part was to see famed athiest, philosopher and author Richard Dawkins interviewed by Stein. Dawkins claims that the most likely explanation for the origin of life (which is the unanswered question left by Darwin--he deals with the origin of species, but fails to explanify how life itself started) is that intelligent life from elsewhere in the universe came to earth to seed the earth with life. Yet Dawkins claims to reject Intelligent Design. Fascinating. See it if you have a chance.
--Saw 88 Minutes with Al Pacino last night. OK, I actually saw it with my dad, but it starred Al Pacino. Missed the first 10 minutes or so, but the plot is easy to pick up on and it kept me guessing. I usually figure out who the bad guy is, but I didn't until the very end on this one.

There's what's going on in my world...

--

Monday, Monday

2008-04-07T07:17:00.000-07:00

Got lots of thoughts swirling around, just in time for the Monday Mind Dump...

--The Journey was great yesterday. Big crowd, including a dozen or more first time guests. I love that.
--We've finished Colossians and today is spent in working on the next series. I'm pretty sure the direction I'm going to go, but it isn't a done deal yet. You will hear about it in the Travel Guide for sure. I'm looking at 2 options and am excited about both.
--Luke and Jillian tied the knot!! What a great ceremony and wonderful reception. I haven't been to a wedding and reception for quite some time. I've married 4 other couples in the past few years, but didn't always stay for the reception and such. But, for Luke and Jillian's...I wouldn't miss it. I love those guys and it's been great getting to know them through the pre-marital counseling and in our life group.
--I hope and pray they get on the plane this morning for Cancun. The person who made travel arrangements made the reservations in Jillian's married name. Of course, she had no ID or passport in that name. So, we scrambled around last night to get copies of the Marriage Certificate, Marriage License and affidavits signed by me and notarized attesting to the fact that Jillian Coalwell is Jillian Alexander...
--Someone's messing with me (practical jokes). They will be sorry. My creativity knows few limits or bounds, and practical jokes get my competitive juices flowing.
--On Thursday, we took part in an extraordinary spring ritual. For 3 years now, the official start of spring is some late afternoon when I go and yank off the cover from our RV, pile all of us in for a 10 miles drive to Wagner's Drive In in Brooklyn Park. This place is an old-fashioned drive in restaurant, with car hops and the whole deal. We open the windows, feel the spring breeze and get greasy burgers and fries. We diversified this year and added a couple chili cheese hot dogs. Sweet times. When the kids saw me taking the winter tarp thing off the RV, they started yelling and going crazy. They will remember these nights forever.
--I turn 44 this week. Don't feel anywhere near that old.
--Another spring ritual: first serious grilling session of the year on Saturday afternoon. That was a thing of beauty.
--Thanks Kelly J for the brownies. We went to their home late on Friday evening for dessert and it was brownies.
--We have 2nd interviews with 2 worship leader candidates this Saturday. Also have 3 others in the initial stages of consideration. Pray for us as we proceed.
--I'm at office hours and Gary Odle just strolled in, so I am going to go.

Peanuts

2008-04-03T04:17:00.000-07:00

Had peanut butter toast for breakfast this morning. Yeah, you all should intuitively know this--Extra Crunchy. But I digress. I've been to T-Wolves and Twins games in the past 2 weeks. Incredibly sweet seats for the Wolves game (7th row, under a basket). But I digress yet again.

At these games, I had peanuts for the first time in a good decade or so. Real, live...uh, real, dead in the shell peanuts. Why haven't I been eating these things for the last 10 years? There's something incredibly fun about crushing your snack before you pop it into your mouth, not to mention getting to throw the spent shells all over the floor. I purposely ground the empty shells into the Dome's floor during the 7th inning stretch. There's something magically childlike in tossing those shells everywhere.

From now on, peanuts are gonna be my snack of choice--the snack I'm too cheap to buy at the stadium, but will smuggle in in a jacket or cargo shorts pocket. Move over licorice, peanuts have arrived. Yeah, that feels good.

On the lighter side...

2008-04-02T08:03:00.000-07:00

Abby took out a kids' pool--really for toddlers--and shoveled herself a spot on the driveway yesterday afternoon. She then ran a hose from our utility room and filled the pool with hot water. She crawled in with a t shirt and shorts and "swam" for about 30 minutes. She had to keep re-filling it with hot water because (1) She displaced so much water from the pool itself, and (2) it was cooling down quickly. She's a nut. A creative, full of life nut. Just one of the reasons I love her.

I spent 4 hours yesterday cranking out some work in a Dunn Brothers. Got Luke and Jillian's wedding stuff all pulled together. Made a bunch of calls, plus a zillion emails. To pay rent, I bought a Naked Juice. Of course, I told the guy, when he asked what I'd like, I said "I wanna get Naked..........................................................................juice." I never bothered to drink the stuff because I had just come from a breakfast meeting and had plenty to slake my thirst then. I got home and decided to give it to Nate. He's been escpecially helpful around the house and he LOVES Naked Juice. Squeals of delight are awesome!! You'd think I just gave him a million bucks.

April Fools was good at our home. I got Andrea at 3 am, with a tried-but-true 'my back is killing me and I need some painkillers' kind of thing. Then I wrapped a little pony tail elastic thingie on to the sprayer of the kitchen sink. One of the twins got nicely dampened before they left for school. 2 of the younger kids were had easily. Josh is proving elusive at this whole thing, so I have to gun for him next year. The rest of the family tried to get me on several occasions, but I didn't fall for anything, except for Josh who got me with a 'I haven't done any of my homework' thing. That's the true beauty of April Fools Jokes--the more credible they are (and not doing his homework is a very credible notion, unfortunately), the more easily they are carried off. I wrapped up the evening with re-doing the kitchen sprayer with scotch tape. Got someone else, but I wasn't home to witness it. I also got a Journeyer who will remain anonymous, althought he's the cross-smashing prophetc bass player on most Sundays.

Obnoxity? Obnoxiousness? Hmm...Stuff that's bugging me

2008-04-02T07:57:00.000-07:00

Snow.

Mosquitos. Yes, already killed 2.

Holes in trampolines.

Piles of laundry.

That's it for now.

Monday Mind Dumpage...

2008-03-31T15:06:00.000-07:00

First things first: I hate winter. This snow is ridiculous. Why, God, why????

Now, on to the whole mind dump thing:

--The Journey rocked yesterday. The worship was fabulous--the band was kicking, the crowd got in to it, new faces were there. It was marvelous.
--I thought I stunk up the joint, but lots of comments afterwards told me that God still uses what we give irrespective of how we may have perceived it...
--A couple new families there yesterday. One of them gave me great feedback after getting our welcome email. They loved it and will be back.
--Big week ahead. Luke and Jillian are tying the knot, with my help, on Saturday. That means a rehearsal and dinner on Friday and a wedding and reception on Saturday. Class on Thursday, after chaperoning a 3rd grade field trip to hear the MN Orchestra. Preach on Sunday. Search and Rescue on Saturday morning and early afternoon. I'll have a totally nuts 4 days from Thursday through Sunday. So, it's prep time before then.
--Trying to find Rika Caldo de Pollo online. It's Panamanian chicken powder. If you have eaten at our home during grilling season (February through New Years Eve), you may have had Panamanian chicken. It's fabulous, and it's just a powder that the twins introduced us to. Many of you have even asked for some. Maybe I can deal chicken powder on the side. Pretty sure it's legal and all.
--Going to the Twins tomorrow night...2nd game of the season. It's Luke's bachelor party. Also going to help them clean their new home tonight with our small group, followed by helping them move in on Tuesday.
--Finishing Colossians this coming Sunday. I think it's been my favorite book to preach through in the last 5 years.
--Andrea is supposed to get a job offer today...looks like it didn't happen yet. Maybe tomorrow. We're kind of on pins and needles.
--The twins are filling out a trillion scholarship apps. They've both gotten some money so far--a few thousand here, $2500 there. It's exciting to see when they get an award notification. We're praying like crazy that Bethel can put together a decent package.
--Pancakes for dinner. Real fancy.
--Finished "The Faithful Spy" this morning. It's by an up and coming Vince Flynn type author. Not a bad read.

Just so you all know....

2008-03-26T08:56:00.000-07:00

I'm updating my blog subscriptions today. Found a few great church planters with great blogs. And, as you know, most church planters are a bit, uh, over the edge. Here's something from a Florida planter. I took the test and can wup up on 25 kids if need be. See if you can beat that.
25

Brain Drain Time

2008-03-17T07:43:00.000-07:00

I turn around and it's a month later. Wow, I take a week off blogging and it turns into a month. Argh. Life is like that!!

So, here's what is rolling around in my brain.

--I really don't like snow.
--We've been making our way through "Lost", season 1. We will sometimes watch on a Saturday evening and do 2 or 3 episodes. It's awesome watching them without commercials. It's an interesting show.
--Had a great evening last night. Went to Springsteen at the Xcel. He's a great rocker. Almost 60 years old and he rocks like a 25 year old. I don't like everything he stands for, but they guy kicks it and shows a fabulous passion for music. He's actaully really varied in style--folk, blues, rock...even ended the night with an Irish song about moving to America--2 accordians, a violin, and acoustic guitar rocked this as an early St. Patty's Day send up. Great concert.
--It's felt flat at church lately. Mostly because we haven't had new families settling in at The Journey lately...we've had a lot of families show up who come once a month or so. Several couples who are looking for churches and hopping everywhere different, two couples who have Sunday work that gets in the way of coming, another couple where the guy is gone for 2 months at a time on the road...We've been getting guests showing up, but it hasn't translated to growth and that can be frustrating. Every once in a while, the mix and match of guest traffic makes it feel flat and stagnating. But, honestly, we have had decent traffic of new guests. They are all interested in the Journey, but all have weird circumstances going on... So, don't despair. We'll grow and we'll see more guests.
--Sounds like the youth group had a great retreat. 7 kids and 2 leaders went. Very cool.
--Spent most of Saturday writing a big paper for a class at Bethel. It was on Malachi for my OT Prophets class. Now I just have to write part of the final exam (I already did the first half of the exam online--now comes the essay part).
--I have just 4 classes left at Bethel. Will be walking in Spring '09. I'm looking forward to finishing up. I take Christian Social Ethics starting in a couple weeks.
--I'm really excited to get back to my life group!! I've missed a lot in the past couple months due to basketball stuff with the kids. We had nights where 3 kids had games at different times and places and were supposed to be at life group too. I miss my group and am looking forward to getting back there.
--We'll finish Colossians in the 2 weeks after Easter.

Have a great week!! I'll be back on here in a couple days.

Karaoke on Ice

2008-02-13T06:31:00.000-08:00

We had one of those magical, serendipitous afternoons this past Sunday. Church was great (even with the bitter cold!!) and I was in the mood for an adventure afterwards.

Now, if you know me, you know that I have a great weakness for going out for meals. Especially on Sundays. After service is done, good-byes are said and the trailer is locked up for the week, I really enjoy heading out with the whole family to relax, eat and be together.

This Sunday, I gave my wife the "please, can we go out" look and she relented. We piled into our Honda and headed out. As we were going to a nearby place, I remembered a Chinese Buffet that we had eaten at a year ago down in St. Louis Park. I made an audible and we drove down there for our dinner. It was a nice time--good food, good conversation, even a few Ukrainians near our table that I chatted with.

As we were driving home on 169, I remembered that there are Art Shanties out on Medicine Lake. This is the 3d year that artists have been putting a small art festival on the ice in the middle of the winter. A shack may have a jewelry artist, a musician, a painter, whatever. It's a celebrative, funky assortment of artsy types who are out there on the weekends.

I pulled off 169 and drove up to the lake. To the great consternation of my wife and kids, I drove out on to the ice. Amidst the shouts of alarm, I started to explain about the Art Shanties. 100 yards later, when death hadn't swallowed us all, the nerves gave way to excitement at the sight of a 30' tall robot structure. We parked and hopped out. The 5 kids squirreled their way around on the ice, first a bit nervous, then excited to explore.

We spent 10 minutes checking out a couple shanties. A tarot card reader in one shanty told us which shacks to check out. So we did. The music shack was packed with some kind of brass band. Several were closed due to the intense cold. As we were about to leave, we dropped in one last shack: the Karaoke Shack.

Now, that was fun. We spent almost 45 minutes serenading ourselves and others and having others serenade us. We had to endure someone singing "Dirty Deeds, Done Dirt Cheap" while we paged through the catalogs to find songs that we might sing. I finally settled on a great song..."Love Shack" by the B52's. Andrea and I teamed up for that, and the kids sang along on the chorus. The kids sang something from High School Musical. I ended our time with a fair rendition of "Hooked on a Feeling"--some kind of a pre-Valentine's serenade for my bride (no, there's weren't any "Oooga chucka, ooga chuckas..."--it was the BJ Thomas version).

About 20 minutes into our little karaoke adventure, the kids had all forgotten about being out on ice and in sub-zero temperatures.

Our little diversion was incredibly fun. It was one of those unexpected adventures that the kids will remember for decades. What a sweet gift from God to us as a family.

Monday....uh, Tuesday Morning Mind Dump

2008-01-29T07:56:00.001-08:00

Adjusting back to normalcy after the New Orleans trip!! I'm glad to be back, but wished the weather from down there was up here with us!! So, here's some stuff kicking around in my head...

Here's a great video about New Orleans and the recovery. It's by a guy named Detroit Brooks, who happens to be a close friend of the construction supervisor that we worked with. He swung by our job site a couple times to drop lunch off for her, but we somehow never managed to meet the guy. Maybe next year. But, the video is great.
I'm reading in the minor prophets this week for my prophecy class. Read through Daniel and Ezekiel last week.
This Sunday's teaching was rough. The passage I preached on could be the subject of a 500 page book pretty easily. It's a very heavy passage from a theological standpoint. I always struggle with those thicker passages because I want them not just to be revealing of God, but I want to explore what we need to do in response. How do we react? Is God calling us to change our mind, our lifestyle or our attitudes in response? Theology is fabulous, but we also need to know what to do with it all. I hope that came through for you on Sunday!!
Still have sick kids at home. In the past week, 4 of the 5 have been home sick. Yuck. I get to work from home today as a result.
We are working to start a Leader's Gathering at The Journey. Paul Jonason, David Clark and I have been working on this concept for some time. Watch for further announcements about this. We're hoping to have this started in February!!
It was great to have Brett playing keys this Sunday. That's his primary instrument...bass guitar is a secondary instrument for him. So, a day on keys is kind of a treat for him and all of us too. One could say he's a prophetic keyboardist (ok, that's an inside joke).
Just had the mother board on my laptop replaced. Thank God I bought that extended warranty.
Our life group was together last night after a long break. The holidays took us apart for a couple weeks. Then Andrea and I have missed a few weeks due to kids' basketball schedules. We had a 'bye' week last night. It was great to be back with them all. Of 10 people in the group, 9 were there. I miss them when we aren't together weekly. If you aren't in a Life Group, you are missing what really is the biggest and best opportunity to grow your faith and experience community as God designed it.

Well, it's back into the prophets for me. Unless my kid decides to barf again. I'll take the prophets any day.

Where is Him?

2008-01-29T07:44:00.001-08:00

I was missing my kids when I was down in New Orleans. Was thinking about them a lot one afternoon and I just started chuckling. I thought of a painting that Abby did one morning in an art class at The Studio. It was a jungle picture with a big old parrot, some palm trees and bushes. In the foreground of the picture, she included a bullfrog, just sitting waiting for flies to buzz his way. In the body of the frog, she put the frog's name: Him.

The crazy part is that Him, the frog, is a girl. She was explaining that to me one afternoon. That just cracks me up. In her 8 year old mind, she envisioned this conversation: "Hey, Abby, have you seen Him?" "Yeah, Dad, I've seen Him; she's over there." What a stitch.

That kind of creativity, humor and spark just shows that there's a Great Creator who has given us all tremendous gifts. Cool.

Thursday

2008-01-24T16:49:00.001-08:00

Just a quick update for you all. We've made great progress on Ken and Lynette's home. Such sweet people--they are a joy to work with.

As the week has unfolded, it's become clear to me why God urged me to come down this year. I have had a great chance to minister to a person who once was close to God and who has walked away from her faith. She's endured significant abuse--horrific abuse--at the hands of 3 "Christian" men--2 pastors and an elder. She has panic attacks if she is in a church building. Her hurts are real and very deep. She has opened up to me more and more as the week has progressed. Oh yeah--she's a pastor's kid and one of her abusers was her dad. AAAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHH. She has trusted me enough to open up about her past. After a good 20 minute talk yesterday, I asked her if I could pray for her and her continuing healing. She let me pray for her. After I chatted with God about her, the tears were flowing. She's a precious child of God who is trying to figure out if she's willing to risk herself in God's gracious hands ever again. What a privilege to be part of her journey!!

Please pray for this gal. I'm not gonna use her name right now, but I am hoping that I can stay in contact with her and encourage her more.

One other really cool thing...the rest of the team knew that I had a great opening into her heart. They let me run supply errands with her. They let me ride in her car to the job site. They let me operate out of my strengths as a counselor/pastor. It would have been fun for any of them to be able to run those errands, but they knew that ministry was happening, so they let me move in that direction. They even sat inside the house doing nothing for 5 minutes after we pulled up with a load of tiles. They knew that we needed room for that ministry to happen. They have all loved on this woman and found ways to befriend and encourage her. This team makes me so very proud!!

We leave about 2 pm tomorrow. Pray for a good trip home!!

Big Easy, Tuesday...

2008-01-22T18:43:00.001-08:00

Hi folks!! I've been thoroughly upbraided by Mr. Odle, a proper Southern gentleman, who has taken me to task for not using the more proper "y'all" when addressing a group of you all. So, y'all, we're having a fabulous time so far.

Got a bit sunburn today. Just not used to the sun and 68 degrees. Hehehe. It's a beautiful week so far. So, here's the scoop...

Arrived on Sunday late afternoon after a very nice drive down. Our two cars left at separate times--one carload stopped for an overnight in Arkansas, the other drove straight through. But, we met up in Jackson, MS, and made the last 3 hour drive together.

Monday, MLK day, was a day off for the contractors who are overseeing the rebuilding efforts that we are part of. So, we had the day off unexpectedly as well. We arranged for the church where we sleep to leave us a list of chores to do. And that was our Monday--cleaning gutters, doing landscaping, sweeping and cleaning. It was needed work, and was a way to thank the church for their hospitality. After a full morning's work, we toured parts of the 9th Ward and located the 2 homes that our Journey team from last year worked on. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the homeowners. One of the homes looks like it's been almost completely rehabbed. The other, well, not so much. The owner hasn't worked to rebuild. That was bittersweet for the team from last year as they saw that home in about the same condition.

This year, we're working for a sweet guy named Ken, and his wife Lynette (I think that's her name...it was a long day!!). They lost everything in the hurricane and we're working on rehabbing. They are about 2 months away from moving back in. They've been gone for almost 2.5 years and are anxious to get back. Ken is mid-60's and is disabled--he has kidney disease and is on the transplant list. He goes for dialysis thrice weekly. He'll be getting a kidney in the next 6 months if all goes well...he first has to have 2 wisdom teeth extracted so that there won't be a possibility of infection settling in to his system through these teeth which have created problems for him in the past. Ken is a sweetheart. Very fun and full of life. He's helping with some of the chores as we work around his home, as did his wife. Their grown daughters will both return to N.O. next fall to teach school. Teachers are getting paid pretty decent bonuses to come and teach in N.O.

This morning, we met about 140 other Minnesotans and Iowans. We are working through a local Presbyterian church and their district has put together a large, district wide relief program now. All groups are funneled together and there is more oversight and guidance for the teams. We were the only non-Presbyterians, and they accepted us gladly. It was cool to meet a bunch of other Minnesotans who were down here!! In the "small world" category, I met Kate O'Brien's pastor from her home church in Bettendorf, IA. He has a team of 7 down here and when he introduced his team this morning, I figured odds were great that he knew Kate, who grew up in a Presbyterian church in Bettendorf!!

Our day today was spent tiling the main floor of Ken's home. Many folks down here want ceramic tile. After the flooding, the smell of rotting, wet carpet was overwhelming for tens of thousands of folks, many of whom don't want to have to smell it ever again. So, ceramic is selling big time down here.

We worked hard and then headed back to the church. The Presbyterians catered a big old banquet for all the teams and we were invited. Great food, followed by a big old church business meeting that we got to skip out on!!

Tomorrow, more tiling, and then some trim carpentry--doors and window frames. We'll hit the French Quarter tomorrow night. We'll be sure to stroll in shirtsleeves along the River Walk and down Bourbon Street, thinking of y'all in the hinterland the whole time.

Talk to you later!!!

Big Easy

2008-01-18T18:21:00.000-08:00

Well, it's 8:30 or so on Friday night. Time to pack for New Orleans. I'm very excited about this trip. Get to spend 7 days with a great group of folks (Paul, Scott, Perry, Sue, Anthony and a guy named Jeromy). We get to do some great work--rebuilding someone's home. And we get out of this aching cold spell!!!

Anyway, we will be blogging on here as frequently as possible. Check in for updates.

Your prayers are coveted as we have 2 cars driving down tomorrow and Sunday. Have a great week and I'll blog at you later!!

WARMTH!!!!

2008-01-15T17:32:00.000-08:00

Great news....at least for those in the Stevens' home in Corcoran. My lawyers tell me I need to retract everything bad I said about CenterPointe ServicePlus. They were able to completely fix all our furnace woes. So, hats off to them. Or at least hats off because of them...

Coldness

2008-01-15T06:54:00.001-08:00

It's the coldest morning of the new year. I usually don't mind such things. I've developed a great degree of imperviousishness....uh, imperviarity...I mean the cold usually doesn't bug me.

When it's outside.

Woke up this morning to a house in the mid-50's. Our furnace is OUT. Not like "out" on a date or something like that. "Out" like dead. Kaput. Stick-a-fork-in-it-done kind of out.

Yeah, so the repairman is supposed to come today. And I'm sure he'll have the exact part needed (NOT) for the 23 year old furnace. And I'm sure it will come priority delivery (NOT) tomorrow. And then they will be out in the timeframe promised (NOT) to put it in.

Mom, Dad?? Is the bed in your guest bedroom made?? I have this sinking feeling that we're gonna be sleeping elsewhere tonight.

Yippee....the forecast calls for dropping temps. This 5 below junk last night just isn't sufficiently cold, I guess.

Argh.

Sloughing the Grey Matter (i.e., Brain Dump)

2008-01-14T07:39:00.000-08:00

It's the week before the Katrina trip (5 days away, in fact!!), and I'm getting pumped. Here's what's rolling about in my cranium this a.m.:

Brandy Boyer is joining me shortly at The Studio for some chats and coffee. Should be fun. He's got a good heart.
It's always a weird week when I'm not preaching. Takes me out of the rhythm of lie to some degree. Since I'll be in Mississippi or Louisianna next Sunday morning, I won't be preaching!
I missed my life group last week. Basketball started for our 2 youngest kids and they play every Monday night...the same night as our life group. Argh. That's a hard choice. I don't want to take myself out of group for 8 weeks. But I don't want to miss kids' games. 30 years from now, I can still be in a life group, but the days of my kids playing 3rd and 5th grade hoops will be long gone. So, I'm hitting the games. I am gonna try to get creative with carpooling and such and see if I can make it some nights or make it for part of group after games are done.

I've met for coffee with 2 people in the past week who are really seeking after God. Lots of questions. What an amazing thing to be able to share with people who are hungry after the things of God.
If you didn't hear yesterday's teaching, download it. It's worth taking the first 5 minutes to hear about the chaos we had at our home on Saturday night. What a riot that was!!! I love to be able to tell real life stories that are so incredibly full of the stuff of life. Here's a link It should be up there in a few hours.
I'm reading Jeremiah and Lamentations this week.
We leave for New Orleans in just 5 days. I am getting incredibly stoked for that. Perry Stuns is excited about "having 7 days to harass the preacher." He scares me most of the time.
Life sometimes drops unexpected stuff in our laps. Stuff that we'd rather not have to deal with--like being out of work for 2+ months (like my wife) and all the associated stuff with that. But then I get an email from my friend who has lung cancer. My problems aren't really all that big.
I keep JAcKing anonymous people at The Studio--just paying for their coffee and having the barista hand them a card. I need to start JAcKing people directly, not through another person. I need to also JAcK some people that I know. This whole Get JAcKed deal is sweet. We did get our first person who emailed in their story, and I'm looking forward to having hundreds of stories in the next year.

I'm a Bus Nerd

2008-01-11T07:07:00.000-08:00

I try to make time at least once a year to help chaperone a field trip for each of my kids. Recently, Abby has been hounding me to come on one of her trips. I yielded and signed up for the mid-winter outdoor nature exploration hike that they do at the Eastman Nature Center. Yippee, looking at animal scat. Who could resist that??

Anyhoo, I showed up at school, got my little ID tag and get ready. I got to Abby's class, got my list of kids to supervise and got to work. Coats, hats, snow pants, gloves, scarves, boots--all had to be tossed on those 11 kids. 26 minutes later, we were off to the bus.

That's when the nerd showed up. Yep, my daughter dissed me. No sitting by dad on the bus for this girl. Had to sit with her friends, way in the back. Wouldn't even look at me on the bus. So, there I was...43 and the loser who no one would sit by.

Of course, I kept the kids around me in relative peace. Made the boys give back all the hats they were stealing from the girls. Made the boys stop sitting on top of each other. Made the boys stop pretending to be thrown from their seats and across the aisle on top of the girls whenever the driver made a left hand turn. But, through it all, I was alone. That felt weird. At my age, I certainly didn't let it ruin my day, and I laughed about it--but I allowed myself to feel the feeling of loneliness.

I just kept thinking the whole time that I hope that guests at our church don't feel the same alone-ness that I felt. It's gotta be awkward to walk into a place where everyone else knows each other, where everyone else is accustomed to the place. We need to be mindful of folks like this in our midst and do everything we can to make them feel welcome. Maybe even sit by them.

Oh yeah--on the way back to school--I wasn't alone. One of Abby's friends apparently felt sorry for me and sat by me. That's funny!!!

Monday Mind Dump

2008-01-07T13:42:00.000-08:00

Here's what's swirling in my brain these days:

My winter class at Bethel started officially today. Did a 'webinar' with the class from 1 - 2 pm. The prof forgot and thought it was supposed to start at 2...he showed up at 1:15 when someone called him. D'oh!!! That somehow made me feel a lot better about the occasional time that I'm late.
The class is Old Testaments Prophecy. Lots of work, but it's good material.
Yesterday was a crazy fun day at The Journey. Tons of people there--in fact, the highest attendance we've ever had at The Journey with the exception of our launch Sunday.
Lots of guests there because we did a baby dedication. 4 babies in all (Elisa, McKayla, Erin and Addison). Always a fun Sunday for that.
Started into Colossians, which is a rockin good book. I felt horrid when I was preaching--had a borderline migraine--but it went well in spite of all that.
I JAcKed someone at the Studio this morning. She told the cashier that she's had to take a second job because money's been so tight, so an unexpected gift of free coffee really meant something to her.
Basketball season is in full swing at The Stevens home. 3 kids have 3 games tonight...at 3 different locations. Isn't that fun....and of course, it's the night of our Life Group!! I'm going to Abby's game--it's her first basketball game ever, so I gotta get to that...
Was IM-ing Beto Bautista this morning. He flies back to the states tomorrow and will be at The Journey Sunday--so we should have a full band!! I have missed the full sound lately.
Saw August Rush yesterday with the family. It's a good movie, particularly for anyone who loves music and/or anyone who has adopted or been adopted. I cried like a baby at the end. It's probably nearing the end of its theatrical run, so run out and see it soon.

Apologizing for Another

2008-01-02T19:54:00.001-08:00

There's a card game I really enjoy...some call it 'Baptist Bridge.' Not a lot of people know of this 101 year old game. Rook. Lots of fun. Kind of like Spades, there's trump and tricks and bidding and partners. But it's a points-based game. You don't bid tricks, you bid points.

Anyway, I play Rook online occasionally (no, it's not a betting game in any way, shape or form). I played a bit on New Year's Day. During one game, the other team was smoking me and my partner. I typed in a comment that they were pretty lucky with the hands they were getting. One of my opponents said words to the effect that 'I'm a Christian and we don't believe in luck...I'm just blessed.' I almost fell out of my chair. To suggest that God even gives a rip about his rook game is a horrible bit of theology at best and downright disgustingly prideful at worst.

The dude essentially told me and my partner that God likes him better and that's why he was winning. Oy vey. As if our job to attract lost people to Jesus isn't hard enough, this dude makes it all the harder.

A hand later, after I lost my bid and put us in a deeper hole, I told the guy that God must not like me because I didn't get a good hand. HE AGREED with me. AAAAAAAAARRRGGGHHH. That's when I decided to let him know that I'm a Christ follower too. Why wouldn't God want me to win as well? Why wouldn't God bless me too? He had no answer. I finally broke down and told him the whole truth...that I'm a pastor. Instead of wanting to talk about his crazy statement, he wanted to hear all about our church and our denomination and what not.

After they won and they left, I apologized to my partner on behalf of God. I told my partner that true Christ followers don't trivialize God by claiming that He is worried about a game of Rook. I hope that she isn't forever turned off to Christ by this guy's prideful, arrogant attitude.

And I pray that we all are always conscious of how we treat people around us. When do I make similar ridiculous statements that I might not even be aware of? How often have I carelessly spoken about God and made someone decide that they want nothing to do with my God?

What powerful things words are. Let's work hard to make sure we don't have to apologize for our own statements, or--worse yet--have someone else have to step in an apologize for us because we're too blind to even know the harm we've wrought with careless words.

Monday Morning Brain Dump

2007-12-31T06:36:00.000-08:00

Leaving in a few minutes for breakfast with me wife and Gary and Lauren Odle. They are a great couple and I love having them at The Journey. Gary will be teaching while I'm in New Orleans, btw. We're eating at Emily's, a great greasy spoon just south of Brookdale Mall about a mile. They're only open for breakfast and lunch, a sure sign of a great breakfast place.
Will be meeting with a missionary couple to Israel later today. I love God's chosen and am looking forward to hearing what God is doing with and through these 2 special people.
Our life group is still meeting tonight, the holiday doesn't stop us!! We're just gonna have some great food and spend time talking about new years reolutions.
I JAcKed someone today already. I was at a coffee shop and I paid for the next person in line. Left the "JAcKed" card for the 'jackee'. The barista was blown away by the idea and asked "what church is doing this??" So I whipped out a Journey card and invited her. Even though she didn't get JAcKed herself, she was witness to it and got just as big a kick out of it as the person who got free coffee. I'm stoked for this whole JAcKed thing!!
Picked up a book on the Korean War on Saturday. Excited about reading that.
Spent 8 hours shooting raw video footage and trying to edit it. It was gonna be a JAcKed video, but we couldn't get the video onto the laptop. Wrong cables, no firewire card, didn't have the camera driver software. Totally aggravating day on Saturday as I spent 6 hours or more on technology problems. AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHH!!
Got a great day lined up tomorrow...an old friend has invited our whole family over. They have horses, a sleigh, a big bonfire pit, and snowmobiles, along with land to enjoy them all. None of the kids know it yet--it's gonna be a fun surprise--but we'll have a great old time in the snow, riding horses, sleighs and snowmobiles...
We head into Colossians this coming Sunday. Excited for that.

Katrina is Coming!!

2007-12-30T20:33:00.000-08:00

I met with the Journey team who is preparing to go to K'ville (New Orleans) in just a couple weeks. I'm really stoked about this whole thing. We've got a great team put together--Scott Olson, Perry and Sue Stuns, Paul "Tall Paul" Jonason, Anthony Kasper, myself and a guy who is from outside the Journey.

Scott led us through all the stuff that we need to pack. We talked cars and routes to go down. We talked about what kind of work we'll be doing (construction stuff...the tear out work even in the 9th Ward has been completed).

I've been planning on this trip for 4 months or so. Now it's actually gonna come to pass. So, I'm getting excited about it all. New Orleans is an amazing mix of pagan and pious, rich and poor, black and white. It's a beautiful city and a city in shambles all at once. Kinda like all of mankind, when you think about it.

I'll be blogging on the trip when we go, so watch for updates.

The Studio

2007-12-30T14:53:00.001-08:00

I hang out a lot at a local coffee shop called The Studio. It's a great place--coffee, the typical smattering of mixed fruit smoothies and mocha creations. But, it's also a fully functioning art studio. People come in and throw pots, slough glass and do other artsy stuff. Me, I drink bottled water, hot chocolate and cider. Not a coffee guy.

Anyway, I was gone from there for about 3 months. Just didn't hang there. I had been really busy with some school work and other stuff at church. It wasn't that I didn't want to come, I just couldn't come. When I started back, there was a warm welcome. They were glad I was there. No questions about where I'd been.

Do we do that at church? Lots of people drift in, then out, then back again. If you're like me, you start to think they are flaky, non-committal types. You wonder if they are really 'solid' in their faith. Lots of times people (I believe) disappear because they hurt and don't think they can trust fellow believers with their hurts. That's a tragedy. And that tragedy is compounded when we judge them from afar and act skeptical or offended when they return.

Something to chew on...

You got JAcKed!!

2007-12-28T21:53:00.000-08:00

I'm pretty jazzed about the coming year, for one major reason. We're gonna be doing a crazy fun thing at church all year long called "You got JAcKed!!" It stands for Joyful Acts of Kindness. Kind of a random acts of kindness thing, a la "Pay it Forward."

We have a fun twist, though. We'll be giving cards out to everyone at The Journey...and when they "jack" someone, they give them a card saying, of course, "You got JAcKed!!" The card will invite them to a website we're designing. We're gonna gather up stories of people who've been JAcKed, explain why we are doing this, and invite folks to The Journey.

People who get JAcKed can use the card and perpetrate their own Joyful Acts of Kindness on others. We're hoping that this will start a fun, creative and meaningful chain reaction of people finding unique and practical ways to share Christ's love with others.

I'm hoping we'll get stories from all over the place. I'm hoping that people come to faith because of this. It's cool stuff and I can't wait to see what God does with this all.

Year End Mind Dump

2007-12-26T14:25:00.000-08:00

A few blogging buddies of mine do a weekly mind dump. It's kinda fun. I'm doing a year end mind-dump and I'm gonna start a weekly mind dump as part of my New Year's Rezzies (Resolutions).

So, here's what's swirling in my mind about 2007, and looking into 2008.

The vision team did an awesome job from February to July. They were totally faithful, creative, energetic and passionate about that work. It shows in the final product. I'm just dang proud of the entire vision team.
The vision process was long and tiring at times, but has been well-worth it. Our ministry leaders have a good understanding of what we are hoping to do in the next 3 years and we're working together towards that.
We need more vision updates.
There's about a dozen or more people at The Journey who have come to faith this year or come back to faith in a significant way this year. That rocks.
Our first annual leadership retreat was lots of fun. Looking forward to the '08 retreat, which is already on the calendar.
I need to spend more time with my wife.
I need to lose weight and exercise.
If I do those 2 things, I will be a much better pastor.
I took 3 classes at seminary this year, just 5 more to go until I graduate--Spring '09.
I think Kate "Stripey" O'Brien has amazing instincts and passion for youth ministry and I'm excited to see her grow into that role.
Josh has been a great leader on Sunday mornings, and it's always great to have Emily singing too. It's been a long year for Josh and Em as they are looking for a good fulltime science position for her, as she finished school and graduated, and as they navigated their first year of marriage. I'm glad you are here, guys!! Looking forward to the coming year.
Ken Adams always is impressing me with his passion for involvement in whatever ministry he can get into. He's doing a great job with life groups, as a webmaster, on our search and rescue team, and as a tech guru. Life groups are vital to the Journey and he's doing a bang-up job there.
Kids ministry has great momentum, with Theresa, Andrea, SJ and Kelly R all helping drive it. The kids' Christmas deal on Sunday was fun. Have to admit that I wasn't excited about "rockin around the Christmas tree", but it was darn cute.
Gonna watch seasons 1 and 2 of Lost--got that for Christmas from my wife. I hear that kids can watch--that it's OK for kids the ages of ours. Maybe this will be a January family thing.
We've saved over $17,000 as a church to help birth other churches. I'm getting more excited about the prospect of us joining forces with several other churches to help plant one or more churches in '08 or '09.
Ukraine was fabulous this summer and I am looking forward to going back. Josh Stevens wants to go back too--for the food mostly.
We've gotten killed financially lately at The Journey. We are almost 4 months behind in rent!! Got a year end gift from a dear friend of the Journey (doesn't go to The Journey) and it will pay roughly 3 months of our rent. Thanks to God!!!
I'm thankful for Paul and Brett, the guys on Leadership Council with me. They are off the chart in terms of wisdom and they are very supportive of me on a personal level. I love both these guys as great friends. Beyond that, they provide a huge ministry to The Journey itself.
The Admin team (hey, that needs a new name!!) rocks. They do tons of behind-the-scenes work, and often do so without thanks. Kelly J heads it up. I'm so thankful for these intrepid, faithful volunteers.
The Journey has a well-earned reputation for being very friendly. I love that. People remark on it over and over again. That makes me so proud!!!
Hero team. What can I say...they are incredible. Scott Olson, hats off to you. Uh, you can keep your hat on, though...I don't want to go blind.
Search and Rescue....this team is gonna rock The Journey this coming year. They are high-energy, crazy cool creative, and they're gonna lead the way as we reach out to Maple Grove in exciting and meaningful ways. Just watch and be amazed. Then join in.
Look for a new leadership gathering starting up at The Journey in January. This is one of our 2008 strategic goals and I'm excited about this.
Our other strategic goals for 2008 are life group/discovery classes as well as the search and rescue team. Those are running strong!! So, before the year even starts, we have made huge strides towards achieving our 2008 goals.
My new years rezzies--in addition to the weight loss/exercise and more time with Andrea--more time in prayer, a silent retreat in the spring, more reading for personal enjoyment (fiction, Civil War, other history). Also regular blogging. Don't ask me to define 'regular' right now.
Hoping to get our Christmas letters/cards out soon!!! We always run late on those.
My folks are in NY visiting my oldest bro and his family. The Journey is blessed to have them here. They have an important ministry here.

That's a lot. Probably forgot some stuff, but that's OK...

Ukraine Stories and Such

2007-07-31T11:03:00.000-07:00

My son Joshua and I just returned from an 11 day trip to Ukraine. We were the official "Journey Team" to Ukraine this year. While only 2 from The Journey went on this trip, we joined 123 other Minnesotans who were traveling to their own sister churches for similar kids camps, youth camps and other short term missions. So, we never felt insignificant in terms of numbers. In fact, the average group from even churches 4 - 10 times the size of The Journey was 4 or 5. Anyway, I want to ramble for a bit about the trip...

Basic timeline:

We left on Thursday, July 19th. This was Josh's first trip out of the country (not counting Niagara Falls!!), so he was a bit apprehensive. The flights over went fine--all connections went swimmingly--and we arrived in Kiev on the afternoon of the 20th. We went to the Hotel Rus and had a few hours to sleep and shower, then headed out to a local pizza place for dinner with the whole team that was there (we were part of a group of about 35 total who flew out and back on the same dates). The evening was given to food, fellowship with new friends, and then an early bed time to catch up on sleep.

On Saturday the 21st, we traveled by bus to the village of Buzifka. This is where Pastor Vasily, Alla, his wife, and their 2 daughters live. It was a wonderful reunion for me to see them. After 18 months, we were all excited to be together once again. Alla baked her famed chocolate cake which has been a treat for dozens of Minnesotans over the past decade. Of course, we had borscht as an appetizer and then something else yummy for the main meal. Following that, we headed to Zyubrikha, a 10 minute drive, to our sister church, for a get-together with the folks from the church. It was a time to welcome us and to make re-acquaintances with so many who I met last time. That meeting didn't start until 9 pm--many villagers have to milk cows and such and can't come to a meeting until later in the evening. The picutre below is Pastor Vasily, Alla, Luda (7) and Alena (3).

Sunday was great. I preached in the church in Buzifka at 9, then home for lunch and then preached in Zyubrikha at 2 pm. Last time, we had 5 services to cover between Saturday night and Sunday night, so this was a bit easier. In the evening, arrangements were made for Josh to try his hand at fishing in Ukraine. Alla's father is part owner of a fish farm, so we headed there and ventured out in a boat that scared both Josh and I a good bit. Josh caught a nice 5 - 7 lb. carp. Now, carp is usually pretty nasty to eat, but this is grain-fed, farm raised carp. So, we braved it and found it to not be very bad at all. Probably not my first choice for fish entrees, but it makes for a great story. Personally, I came up empty at fishing in the fish farm pond. Should have been just like shooting fish in a barrel, but I was blanked!!

Monday was the start of the Day Camp at the Zyubrikha House of Prayer. At 9:30, about a dozen kids showed up. Josh and I looked at each other with a bit of disappointment, wondering if we came this far to work with so few kids. By 9:40 another 50 or so kids arrived and we found the benches crammed with about 60 kids total. The day camp days were incredibly fun--very much like an American Vacation Bible School (scripture memory, Bible lesson, songs, games, crafts, snacks, opening and closing gatherings, skits, etc). Josh and I were the sports/games people. We taught the kids some games they had never played. Apparently they really liked "Steal the Bacon" because we had to play it every day with the girls. The boys preferred Sharks and Fish, which allowed them to run off a lot of energy. Day camp lasted 3-4 hours each day and we held camp from Monday through Thursday.

Afternoons were filled with preparations and errands for the events of that evening or for the coming day. We cleaned the church most days, came home for lunch, took a quick nap (30 minutes or so) and then worked during the afternoon in planning and prep for other events.

The evenings during the week were filled with other ministry events. That Monday night, Pastor Vasily had planned a couples' event at the church. He led a Ukrainian version of the Newlywed game. I taught for about 30 minutes on how to have a great fight...that drew laughter when my translator translated the title of the lesson for them. But, as we got into it, I could see these dozens of people--both believers and non-believers--taking lots of notes and being impacted by what I was teaching. Vasily later told me that most of these people have had very little exposure to such life skills.

Tuesday evening was a church service in another village. Pastor Vasily and Pastor Dima (also from Buzifka) are coordinating a new church start in another nearby village. They hold church meetings on Tuesday and Friday nights in this town. So far, 5 women have come to faith, and about 20-25 villagers are attending. One man walks twice a week from his distant village to come to this meeting--his walk in over 5 miles each way!!! There is spiritual hunger in this village, and I ask you all to pray for this new work. The village is called Stipivka. I invited people to come to faith that evening. Although I saw no one make a first time faith commitment, I saw several young persons who were impacted strongly by the service and teaching that evening.
Wednesday evening was a mix of business and pleasure. Josh and I were taken to Uman, a city about 30 minutes away. This is a large city--250,000 souls--which has an amazing park. Built over 200 years ago as a birthday present from some rich dude to his wife, this park boasts a number of lakes and rivers--all interconnected--plus fountains that rely on nothing but gravity to work. The maze of paths, boulders to climb on, statues and lakes make this a great place to visit and unwind. Following the park and a pizza dinner, we went to the Ukranian version of WalMart and bought enough ingredients for a huge spaghetti dinner. I unknowingly volunteered myself to make spaghetti for the entire village of Zyubrikha when I asked about a rumor I had heard that many American teams cook for the Ukranians on their final night in the village. While simply inquiring about the rumor, I was taken to be a willing volunteer and was told that I am more than welcome to cook for everyone!!!! Translation can be a very hard thing!!!

Anyway, we bought 30 jars of spaghetti sauce (their largest jar is the size of the smallest jar you'd find here in the US), 30 packages of spaghetti, lots of spices (the sauce is known to taste sweeter than ketchup and needs a lot of doctoring!!), garlic cloves, meat (bologna was the best I could do, also adding to the sweetness of the overall taste), mushrooms and onions. They thought I was crazy buying as much as I bought, but then vastly underestimated the number of folks coming to the Thursday evening program!!After day camp on Thursday, we went home, had lunch, and then it was time to get ready for the big evening. I make sauce for the next 3 hours. I spent about an hour of the time teaching Vasily and Alla about some theological concepts that I have been mulling over for the past year or so. They were amazed that I could chop onions, garlic and saute sauce, while simultaneously deliver a theological teaching to them! Anyway, we got the sauce all ready and let it simmer from 3-5 pm. After a light dinner, we headed over to Zyubrikha. I met with the church leadership team to discuss their vision, finances and other ministry issues that they wanted some input on.

Following that important meeting, there was a 2 hour sports festival for the whole village. There were games for the kids, big time soccer matches (2 villages sent their teams to play against Zyubrikha's best footballers), and a few volleyball games. I played with the Zyubrikha men's volleyball team...although we lost, I managed to make a few good plays. I did well for a guy who hasn't played in 20 years....

At about 9 pm, we had an end-of-day-camp meeting. Volunteers were thanked, Josh and I were recognized, we presented gifts to the church from The Journey, and there was special music.

Once all that was done, the spaghetti feed was on. We started this "dinner" at about 10:15 pm!! Thankfully, my 'over zealous' buying was pretty accurate. We had less than a pint of spaghetti sauce left over after about 125 people ate dinner. The sauce wasn't up to my standards by any means, but people liked it. They've never really had true Italian cuisine there. Thankfully, everyone got plenty of food and they all seemed to be happily ready to trundle off to bed. After many hugs and kisses goodbye (the babushkas are always ready to kiss anyone), we left for home at nearly midnight. We were tired, but the evening was a great success. Many folks came to the church for the sports night and the other events who ordinarily never come to church. That's excellent!!

On Friday, we had time for packing, breakfast, and a very brief time of prayer. Our bus showed up 30 minutes EARLY which is unheard of in Ukraine. So, we had to leave sooner than we expected. Leaving Vasily and Alla was difficult. We have grown close to one another through our two visits and it's not fun to leave people you care deeply for.

The rest of Friday and part of Saturday was time in Kiev. We have the afternoon and evening to ourselves. I met with a friend who is in YWAM Kiev and the 3 of us went out for a long walking tour of Kiev. Saturday afternoon, we had a short flight to Vienna, where we had to lay over for the night. We dropped our bags at the hotel and then 13 of us went into downtown Vienna for dinner, walking tours and their world famous ice cream. It was a great night.

Sunday was the long travel day, flying from Vienna to Chicago and then to Minneapolis. We got home 7 minutes early, all jet lagged, but happy to be home.

So, that's a basic timeline of our trip. I'd like to share with you some of the significant and impactful aspects of the trip as well...

--the kids at the camp were wonderful. These kids steal your heart. They have maybe 2 outfits that they wear for the summer. They walk perhaps a mile to get to the day camp. They may or may not have had breakfast. Yet they are all very happy and excited about day camp. They love the songs and sing whole-heartedly--even the older kids. I had one young boy who stuck by me all the time. After he won some candy for knowing his Bible verse, he gave me half of it as a friendship gift. This kid wore the same clothes each day--he's got very little to his name. Yet he wanted to share with me. Stuff like that happened again and again. You can't go to Ukraine without your heart being stabbed by the love these kids show others. It breaks your heart at the same time that it makes you want to shout out to God in praise for the youthful beauty and innocence all around.

--my time with Vasily was amazing. We had some great talks, pastor to pastor, filled with encouragement, prayer and openness. Our translator told me that she'd never translated between 2 pastors who were being as open and vulnerable with one another as we were. Our friendship has gone to very deep levels. Vasily has great vision for his ministry in Zyubrikha and in the surrounding area and I am excited to continue our partnership with him precisely because of his vision.

--being able to bless Vasily and his family was a significant goal of our visit. We were able to bring him a brand new laptop to facilitate his ministry there. We also purchased a CD/mp3 player for use in the church. On a personal level, Josh and I bought Vasily and Alla's daughters bikes. They have never had the money to buy bikes in the past. Luda, who is 7, has been praying for a bike for 2 years. All her friends have bikes, but she didn't. Now she does.
She went down to the corner market about 5 minutes after she got the bike--that's a daily chore for her and she used to have to walk. Now, she rides and puts whatever she buys in the basket that came with her bike. What a joy for her.

--another amazing part of the trip was spending so much time with Josh. He's getting to the age soon where he'll want to do stuff with friends instead of parents. What a blessing to spend 10 days with him. We were only apart from one another about 3 times for a total of maybe 8 hours during this time. We shared lots and lots of little conversations about life, God, ministry, culture, language, customs, manners and everything else that you'd expect on a missions trip. We prayed together, laughed, worked hard on our juggling skills, slept in the same room, ate a lot of new stuff together, and we had an awesome time together. It's stuff that I will cherish for the rest of my life. I was unspeakably proud of him and his adventuring spirit during the trip. Josh even became a daily feature at the camp for his basketball spinning skills, juggling, and other silly stuff that the kids just loved.

All around, this was an amazing opportunity for both Josh and me. We had a great time. Josh wants to go again next year. How about you?? Vasily and I have ideas for next year and I believe we can build on what we started this year. I encourage all of you to prayerfully consider joining us in 2008. A trip to Ukraine will change your life. Thanks for reading!! On a final note, I ask you all to pray regularly for Vasily and his family, the church in Zyubrikha and the newer churches being started in Stipivka, Konela-Popevka, Kupiavata, and other nearby villages. Vasily, Dima and other local pastors are working vigorously to advance the kingdom. Pray for their work. Pray for new ways to connect with the lost. And pray for the outpouring of the Spirit on these villages!!

Prayer

2007-07-07T09:09:00.000-07:00

So, we've been waiting for my son's passport for the last month. All the chaos in the passport agencies due to the new western hemisphere travel regulations has made it utterly crazy to try to get a passport.

We applied plenty early and have watched and prayed ever since.

On Thursday, we were 2 weeks from our scheduled departure date. The passport agency won't even talk to you unless your date of departure is 2 weeks away or less. So, Thursday was the magic day that I could actually DO something about the passport.

I called one of our senators, a congressman, and the passport agency. I emailed the passport agency. I read some news articles to see if I was missing any other angles that I could work.

Oh, and of course, I did the very proper thing. I prayed. Like maybe once. And then I worried and started rehearsing in my mind what I'd tell my son if he couldn't go to Ukraine. I asked my small group to pray. It's likely that they prayed more than I did. I was in problem solving and worry mode.

So, the doorbell rings this morning. FedEx. On a Saturday morning. With the passport.

It's an answer to someone's prayers. I was too busy worrying and trying to do it myself.

Lesson learned again...

Van Morrison wrote a great song a couple decades back...here's the lyrics:

The sun was setting over Avalon
The last time we stood in the West.
Suffering long-time angels enraptured like Blake,
Burn off the dross, innocence captured again.
Standing on the beach at sunset,
And all the boats keep moving slow.
In the glory of the flashing lights,
In the evening's glow.

When will I ever learn to live in God,
When will I ever learn.
Cause He gives me everything I need and more,
When will I ever learn.

You brought it to my attention,
That everything was made in God.
Down through centuries
Of great writings and paintings,
Everything was in God.
Seen through architecture of great cathedrals,
Down through the history of time.
Is and was in the beginning
And evermore shall ever be.

When will I ever learn to live in God,
When will I ever learn.
Cause He gives me everything I need and more,
When will I ever learn.

Whatever it takes to fulfill His mission,
That is the way we must go.
But you've got to do it in your own way.
Tear down the old and bring up the new.

Up on the hillside it's quiet
Where the shepherd is tending his sheep.
And over the mountains and the valleys,
And the countryside is so green.
Standing on the highest hill
With a sense of wonder,
You can see everything is made in God.
Head back down the roadside
And give thanks for it all.

When will I ever learn to live in God,
When will I ever learn.
Cause He gives me everything I need and more,
When will I ever learn.

Great lyrics, but more than that, a pertinent question. When will I ever learn?? Why do these kind of lessons take so much repetition??

Thanks, God. My son and I are now looking forward to an amazing, memory making time together. Oh, if you could guide us, protect us and use us, that would be most excellent.

Been a long year!!!

2007-07-04T20:18:00.000-07:00

So, it's been over a year--actually about 16 months--since I blogged last. The year has been long. In some ways, it's been an incredibly long and tough road over the past year or so. And in some ways, it's been lightning fast and full of amazing bits of grace and light.

We've got 5 kids--the twins have been with us over a year now. Alicia and Lisa have been a challenge, but are a wonderful part of our family. They are 18, just got their driver's licenses and are looking to take the world by storm. They will graduate school in another year and are looking at a bunch of different schools for '09.

The original set of kids, Josh, Nate and Abby, are amazing. They've blossomed in wonderful ways this year, and they love their new, older sisters. There's just too much to say about each, so I'll just keep it short right now. Maybe more stuff will drift in in the coming weeks.

My wife continues to work, now at Ameriprise Financial downtown. That, plus 5 kids, keeps her busy all the time.

I'm going to start blogging again. While I started with some personal stuff, I'm going to spend a fair bit of time blogging about stuff going on at The Journey, the church I pastor. I'm gonna be inviting folks from The Journey to drop by off and on to get a peek at what's going on in my mind and to see how we are doing in pursuing the vision God has called us to. I'll mix in personal news, devotional thoughts and a good dose of what's going on at The Journey. So, stop back in from time to time. I'll make it worth you while...

Big House Made Me Cry

2006-02-13T12:31:00.000-08:00

OK, not everyone in the world knows about this, but now you all will. Andrea and I are very seriously considering adopting a set of 17 year old twin girls. We have been looking at this for nearly two weeks, thinking and praying about it, having many conversations with many people.

Here's how it all happened. I opened the mail two weeks ago and received a letter asking if anyone in our church might be interested in adopting/hosting 3 kids who are juniors at Osseo High School. All 3 are siblings and are Panamanian Chinese kids. They moved to the US one year ago and live with their 22 year old brother. Their mother is deceased and their father has essentially nothing to do with them. The older brother can not afford to support the whole family, so thy are looking to find a host home for the other 3.

Back up to before we even got this letter: we have thought about adopting for at least a decade. In fact, we have given our name and phone number several times to youth pastors who work with at-risk youth, telling them to call us if they happen to be working with teen girls who are pregnant and who are considering adopting their baby out. Adoption is a frequent topic of conversation for me and Andrea and we have again and again committed to one another and to God that we'd adopt kids if God brought it to us. Andrea even has told me several times that she believes that God will call us to adopt multiple kids, not just one.

So, we were immediately excited about these girls. To this basic excitement, add these things...First, the girls are from Panama, and their primary language is Spanish, which Andrea has been busily studying for about 4 years. Second, we realized that these girls are related to several people at the Oriental Grill in Maple Grove, which is a restaurant we frequent (they are all Chinese Panamanians and we speak Spanish to them!!). Third, we realized that we've already met these girls--at a wedding last summer, the restaurant catered the reception and Andrea met the girls, who were working as catering servers. Last, we also realized that these girls live in the apartment building where our worship pastor lives...and they have met the girls several times. So, the world is an incredibly small place!!

We have met with someone from the Chinese Christian Church, where the girls have been going. They made first time faith commitments a month ago and are growing in their new faith. After meeting with them and learning a lot about the twins, we set up dinner last Friday night. Oh, the people from the church have advised us to take the girls only--the 18 year old boy can and will stay for now with the 22 year old brother.

The girls, the 18 year old brother and someone from the church came over. We had a great time...it was very fun, and our kids really liked the girls. These girls are intelligent, sweet and full of laughter. We ate pizza, showed one another card tricks, toured our home, and talked a lot about school, hobbies, music, church.

We got an email back from the girls the next day. They really liked us and want to come live with us.

So, we're moving forward with this. The girls will come for dinner some time this week and will come and stay the weekend this coming weekend. We'll maybe have one more week apart after that to think and pray about this. We're trying to process this well with our own kids, and we're still having a few necessary conversations with guidance counselors, family counselors, etc. And, we're still praying, making sure that we're doing what God has called us to.

Lisa and Alicia will be in church with us on Sunday, so any of you who are there will meet them.

This is an incredibly exciting thing. Today, I was roller skating with my kids at their school Valentine's skating party, and we were skating to contemporary Christian music. The song "Big House" came on...I usually just sing along with it and don't think much about the lyrics. Suddenly, I'm singing about coming to the father's house (a house with lots and lots of room, with lots and lots of room, a big yard where we can play football). I was suddenly choking back tears as I thought about Lisa and Alicia maybe coming home to a father's house for the first time. Ever. Our place is big enough, our table has plenty of food, and the yard's plenty big...and our hearts have room for these 2 girls. So, Audio Adrenaline's campy song from 15 years ago reduced me to tears while I was out skating with my kids. Adoption is a pretty powerful thing. Pray for us, our kids and the twins!! Thanks.

Big Easy Day 4

2006-01-26T20:53:00.000-08:00

Quick post because I'm wiped out.

Day 4 was terrific. We've been assigned 2 homes to gut...as you know if you read the earlier posts. And we are going to get done ahead of schedule. They weren't quite sure if we'd get both done or not...and we're going to finish home 2 around noon tomorrow. In other words, we've gelled well as a team and we've done a great job. They've seen lots of teams come and go--we're one in a long line of other groups--and we're proving to be really productive in terms of output. That's cool!!! I have to admit that I got about 4 calls this morning and I missed over an hour of work on the home while I did other things...so, if I'm bragging, it's more bragging in the others who make up our team.

Spiritual insight for the day...as we tear out rotten sheetrock, we have huge piles of crumbled junk--all shapes and sizes, lying there in a huge dusty jumble. We have to do that tear out and then we have to remove all the sheetrock into the debris pile. So, we do a contant cycle of tear out (a whole room at a time) and then removal. Shoveling crumbled sheetrock is incredibly hard. We have about a dozen different shovels, all of varying sizes. I've tried all of them. Most were basically useless, until I tried the old rusty one. It's a flat headed shovel, and the steel part is well rusted. The wood part is beaten badly. But, once I tried it, it worked beautifully. That shovel could not possibly shovel snow, nor be used to dig a hole in a garden. BUT, it's the only shovel that can reliably shovel sheetrock. Reminds me of our spiritual gifting--we might not be the newest or most sturdy shovel around, but God still wants us in his tool shed--and he's gonna use us for something that we're perfectly designed and equipped to do. Shoveling sheetrock isn't glamorous, but that shovel made the job incredibly easy and saved us lots of time and energy. That's how God's toolbox works.

One more day!!

Bleach and Beach

2006-01-25T18:56:00.000-08:00

Day 3 was great. Lots accomplished. We actually finished the house we started on Day 1, which is an impressive feat. Beatrice's house is now totally stripped to the studs, and I spent the last hour in the place spraying bleach on all the woodwork to kill off the remnants of any mold. Thank God for great masks. I didn't even smell a hint of bleach. People in the yard were complaining of the strong smell, but I didn't even get a whiff. Cool. The next teams to come along will insulate, re-wire and sheetrock the home. Flooring will follow, and she can move back in in a few weeks, maybe a month.

As we finished that home, we moved directly across the road and started on a new home. This is a home owned by a widow in her 70's. She and her husband worked hard--he was a concrete contractor--and they had a pretty nice place. Pool in the back, a couple boats--very upscale for this neighborhood. A large tree fell right on top of their pontoon boat, and the pool is full of black, fetid water.

Joyce, the widow, hasn't been in the home for more than 15 minutes or so since the storm. So, going in is a health risk with mold and mildew. The water line is over 5' tall. We got in and moved some furniture. After that, we were able to start some serious tear-out. We put out this afternoon, in a big way. That house is bigger than Beatrice's, probably twice the size, but we've gotten this almost 75% torn out. Joyce stopped by while we were there and she told us that she hasn't come over before because it was too overwhelming. Now, she could see trmendous progress and she was actually starting to get excited about maybe moving back home sometime.

On our way home, we took a 15 minute detour and went to Lake Pontchartrain, the large lake to our South and to the North of New Orleans. We could look across and see N.O. 25 miles in the distance. Pontchartrain is brackish water--mixed salt and fresh. Pretty amazing to see such a large body of water where the sea and Mississippi commingle.

Tomorrow and Friday will be more work on that home, and our goal is to leave it nicely bleached and fully torn apart when we leave.

NO Day 2

2006-01-24T18:49:00.000-08:00

Hi!!

I am officially an old, out of shape blob. I hurt on many varying parts of my body from just one day of work. We worked in Beatrice's home. Beatrice lives in Lacombe Bayou, a place that no one would confuse with Maple Grove or Edina. Beatrice is 81 and widowed. The church we're staying at arranged for us to finish up the tear out in her place. She lives a few miles down the road temporarily at her great niece's home.

We spent long hours raking and moving brush. Half the team was inside tearing out drywall and ripping up linoleum and tiling. Beatrice's home is a small 2 bedroom rambler (2 BR, a kitchen and a living room). But, those 4 rooms, plus the bathroom took a long, long time to strip down to 2x4's. Lots of dirty, dusty work.

I learned a few things as we did this. Here's a couple things that I noticed.

First, planning and preparation are very important things in leadership. Jon taught about this in PitStop the other night...and I have a great example of what happens when planning/prep aren't adequate...as we were breaking for lunch, our church contact person came out to check on our progress. He told us casually that we'd need to move what looked like a small pile of drywall to get it closer to the street. "You see, FEMA will come along and will scoop up whatever they can reach from the roadway with their trucks, and that pile isn't close enough." FEMA apparently uses a bunch of trucks with large claws that will swing out to the side and pick up debris. A group that did some tear out a while ago didn't know about the FEMA trucks. So, they moved tore out drywall, and moved it...but the job wasn't adequate. To make the situation worse, they dumped the drywall into a hole created by an uprooted tree. It looked like a 15 minute job. But, no...Scott Olson and I worked like dogs for an hour to rake/shovel/pitchfork that stuff out. It was a lot deeper than we thought and it had disintegrated even more in the last week or two once exposed to the elements. Lesson learned: when you're doing something, make sure yuo do it all the way...otherwise you end up possibly creating more work for you or someone else. Leadership moment for the day, I guess. If those other guys had simply gotten a full picture of what FEMA's needs are, then all that work would have been avoided.

OK, I also had a great spiritual insight, too. As I was trying to strip up tiles in Beatrice's kitchen, I was reminded of a great concept when it comes to evangelism. You see, some of the tiles came up real easy...the pry bar slid under nicely and that tile would pop out nice and clean, all in one piece. Other tiles wuold crack into 2 or 7 pieces when I pried them up. Still others would require a ton of work--scraping, pounding, whatever else. It always helped with the stubborn tiles to come at them from many different angles...then I'd get a little give here and maybe open up a different corner to slide that bar under. Reminded me of how we reach others around us. Some are ready to just pop off, with an easy slide of God's pry bar. Others require a ton of patience and we have to come at them from all angels with God's love and grace. Every tile was different. Every tile eventually came up. I believe that every person that we have around us can be won for God. It requires prayer, patience, and a determination to come at people with God's love from every concievable angle in their lives. And that pry bar...it's a tool. Just like us. We're God's tools that he uses to get at people, to get under them and to move them spiritually. Sometimes it's wonderfully easy, sometimes it takes a ton of time. And it's dirty work!!! In fact, I desperately need a shower right now!! But, it's worth it.

In the midst of a pile of debris, I saw a few flowers popping up. Great to see God's creation, resilient and new, determined to reflect the Creator's glory, even in the midst of ruination.

Oh yeah, we had a flat tire today. Nothing ever quite goes flawlessly, does it???

It was a great day, all in all.

New Orleans Day 1

2006-01-23T19:13:00.000-08:00

Flew in today and got here just fine. The rest of the team met me and we spent an hour driving around New Orleans looking at the levees and finding the spots where they were breached. Those levees are pretty huge, and it's amazing to see how tall they are. The force needed to breach them would have had to be almost incomprehensible.

As we drove around, we saw entire neighborhoods that are still abandoned. I never saw a kid playing in New Orleans. Taco Bell is offering a $1000 signing bonus to come and work there; Wendy's will pay and extra $125 per week to work there. The city is still half deserted. Amazing.

Almost every home had the spray painted signs on them. A large "x" is painted on the front of the home. On the left edge of the "x" goes the identification marking of the search crew who was there, on the right goes the date. Below is the number of dead found in the home. I never saw anything besides a zero on any of those homes, but there certainly were lots of homes that did bear numbers on them.

Tomorrow we will hit the bayou. I hear there's lots of gnats, no-see-ums and snakes. We'll see!!

Christmas present

2006-01-19T08:32:00.000-08:00

I went to a Phil Keaggy concert in December. Keaggy is one of the top 5 guitarists in the world. He does incredibly amazing things with his instrument. OK, I've been a lifelong fan of his, but I'm still somewhat objective. He's been in Guitar Player magazine a zillion times and is consistently rated as one of the very best by people who know. Enough said.

In the encore, I yelled out for him to sing a piece he wrote 29 years ago. It's a sonnet by CS Lewis, set to music. Lewis happens to be one of my favorite thinkers and writers, so it's kind of heavenly to have Keaggy playing and singing lyrics written by Brother Jack (Lewis).

I just wanted to share those lyrics with you...incredibly powerful words about our tendency to be so self-centered...

So, here goes:

As the Ruin Falls, by C.S. Lewis

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I've never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through;
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, reassurance, pleasure are the goals I seek.
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin--
I talk of love (A scholar's parrot may talk Greek!)
but, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me--but how late!!--my lack.
I see the chasm; and everything You are was making
my heart into a bridge by which I might get back
from exile and grown man; and now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you are the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

Wow.

New Year

2006-01-10T15:37:00.000-08:00

Hey, it's a new year...wow. I haven't blogged for a long time. It kinda helps to remember your password after 5 months of inactivity. I've tried to get back on but couldn't!!! Finally it all came back to me. So, I'll blog more in the coming weeks.

I'm going down to New Orleans in a couple weeks to do a week of work for Katrina relief. Looking forward to that!! I'm planning on blogging while down there...so, check it out.

up and down

2005-08-23T08:13:00.000-07:00

I am a new person in many ways right now. I am now sleeping very soundly at night, something I haven't experienced in years. I was diagnosed with sleep apnea a week ago...I got the Darth Vader mask deal and it has made an unbelievable difference in my life. I have energy now for like the first time in a decade or so...

A friend on my pastor's chat room has a tagline that says "Live vertically!!" I agree--we have to live our lives 24/7 living in the verticality of the kingdom of God. Happily, I can both live vertically and sleep horizontally now!!

the stinking airport

2005-08-13T04:29:00.000-07:00

I pretty much hate going to the airport. The cost of parking, the lines, the construction. Ah, the construction. That really drives me nuts. I have lived in the Twin Cities for 23 years now. I have flown in and out of that airport probably almost 100 times (that would be 50 trips, for those numerically challenged of you). I flew for business for a year or so and made about 10 trips during that stretch alone.

What I have noticed is that every time I go to the airport, they are remodeling it. The are never DONE. I've seen this airport grow from the Red, Green, Gold and Blue concourses to about 6 different concourses, they've added parking, a little train thingie, some kind of bus to bring people from long term parking, the underground tunnels to the parking ramps...there is no end to the remodeling they are doing.

I watch that and get ticked off. That's tax dollars at work!! That's also higher airline fees!!

And then I think about God. Here's the cool thing...He is willing to never stop pouring His resources into me as He keeps remodeling me. And He will keep remodeling me for the rest of my life. It's a never-ending process. That doesn't tick me off...I'm grateful for that. But, more awesome than that is the fact that God, in His awesome gracefulness, while He's pouring dollars into me and cementing things and carpeting things and adding parking, He looks at me and says "In my eyes, you're DONE. Because of what my son did. I see you as done and complete." Gnaw on that a bit. While He's carrying forward the work that's been started, He views us as complete because of what Christ did.

Enjoy your next trip to the airport...or down your local highway that is under major construction...or wherever you go that takes you into a hard hat area.

love letters

2005-07-26T16:09:00.000-07:00

Yeah, it's been a while. I know. We did family vacation, and then I've been trying to dig out from it all...

So, I saw a story about an old boyfriend of Jennifer Aniston who is selling her old love letters to him on e-Bay. Weird.

Love letters from a celebrity. I wonder how much that'll fetch on e-Bay. Hmm...maybe I could gin up some love letters from some celebrity and sell them. Just might pay my mortgage for a month or two.

Got to thinking after I heard that story. We have the world's most impressive love letter...the Bible. Sure, I read it and I want to know it. But how much do I value it?? What would I do if there was only one in the world?? I suspect I'd value it a bit more highly (actually a LOT more highly) if I felt that this was God's personal love letter to me or that it was an incredibly rare thing.

We get over-Bibled sometimes in church--we have easy listening Bibles for times when we want a comfy God vibe; jazzy Bibles for a more edgy feel; literal translation Bibles, parallel Bibles, study Bibles, chicken soup for the whatever Bibles, recovery Bibles, youth Bibles...it's pretty easy to start taking God's word for granted when we don't realize it's true worth. It's worth a lot more than a love letter from an ex-"Friend" with a trendy Rachel hairstyle...

sms

2005-06-30T07:57:00.000-07:00

SMS (OK, Ihave to admit I can't figure out what the acronym means) is a cool thing. I'm sitting watching bands in nowhere Pennsylvania and taking part of a running conversation with Brad on SMS. Weird and fun. Kinda cool to just shoot a message to someone when you think of them. All wireless and easy.

Supposedly I can blog by phone as well...I gotta figure that out.

vacation ramblings

2005-06-30T07:51:00.000-07:00

It's Thursday, that means we're in Pennsylvania. The trip has been great. Monday was Cedar Point in Ohio, the biggest coaster park in the world. The kids did awesome and were more and more daring...which means that I got to go on a handful of coasters.

Creation started last night...David Crowder Band, RelientK and Switchfoot. Excellent music. The best part is meeting people from all over the country, seeing the kids make friendships with kids from all over, and knowing that they're making lifelong memories. All 4 kids are doing great (Justin Clouse is with us). It's stinkin hot and humid, but fun nonetheless (thanking God for a generator and AC in the camper!!).

We're here until late Saturday or early Sunday. I'll check in later. Today, we'll see Tait, TobyMac (OK, those are the kid's favorites) and I think Casting Crowns. And a bunch more inbetween.

Crosswords

2005-06-22T20:44:00.000-07:00

Early Yucatan people: Inca.

Part of QED: erat.

I love crossword puzzles. Sometimes my wife gets bugged when I do them because they are supposedly a waste of time. And yet, we sometimes sit in bed and do the puzzle together.

Studies show that crosswords are powerful stimulants to certain parts of the human brain and can boost memory and cognitive vitality. Cool.

Do you know that the New York Times puzzle is easiest on Mondays, then a bit harder on Tuesdays, etc., and it hits its pinnacle on Sunday? The Sunday NYT...that's the granddaddy of them. Andrea and I did a whole Sunday one once. It took us until Friday that week...

Time to go do the puzzle.

in the weeds

2005-06-15T01:36:00.000-07:00

My son Josh and I just took a quick camping trip to SE Minnesota. What a great experience that was. We biked 37 miles on a state trail on Monday, and then fished that evening. We ended up taking home 10 rainbow trout (the state possession limit is 10--we could have brought home 20 because we were just pulling them out left and right).

Josh and I were fishing a stocked trout pond right in the middle of a little Minnesota town. A church chimed out a hymn every hour, on the hour. A bald eagle swooped in looking for dead fish a couple times. The fish were plentiful and the bugs scarce. It was idyllic; the best part for me was hearing Josh say (about 5 times): "Dad, this is the funnest day I've ever had."

As we fished, I kept trying to get Josh to move closer to me, away from the weeds that were bunched up at the south end of the pond. But he liked fishing there--it was where he pulled out the first trout of the day and of his life. So, he insisted on fishing there. Silly, it seemed. He spent as much time fishing as clearing weeds from his lure. Meantime, I fished the cleaner areas of the pond.

For as much as my way of fishing made sense to me, Josh ended up catching as many fish as me, possibly more. We quit counting after we had our limit. For the benefit of his burgeoning masculinity, he has been told that he aced his dad out by catching one more than me...

Then there were others fishing at the pond. A class of fly fisherpeople who were trying to do this for the first time ever. And they caught fish--they kept every single fish they caught, no matter the size. And a retired couple, sagged by the weight of the years, who sat patiently, using corn as bait. They took home a bunch of trout. Several families came and went, pulling out their share, too.

God calls us all to fish. We all use different bait, different styles. Some use flashy spinners, some good old fashioned corn. Some catch fish easily and naturally and others are trying hard to learn. Some of us have to spend a lot of time clearing weeds, but with patience, we'll get just as many as anyone else out there. I hope and pray that you are wetting a line every day, using what you can to catch who you can...God has stocked your pond, now it's time to fish. Fish as a family! Fish alone! Fish as a couple! Take a class on fishing! And keep every single fish you get--God wastes none.

touch

2005-06-11T16:08:00.000-07:00

I took Josh, my oldest son, out for a few errands this afternoon...we're going camping for a couple days and we needed a few things, including his very first pocketknife. We were driving and I put my hand on his knee and squeezed it some. He got a little hacked--"Dad, you know I don't like it when you tickle me like that..." I stopped tickling, but kept touching, wanting him to know that his dad loves him. I tell him daily, but I want him to remember rides in the car with a dad who is loving enough to touch his grubby, grass stained knee...

Later, I thought: "Do I reject God's hand when He reaches into my life and wants to play?"

enter here

2005-06-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

I'm new to this...and will be taking my time doing this. If you have found your way here, welcome. I'm gonna play with this a bit. You can look around, post a response or whatever. I will be sharing my thoughts from time to time, particularly about my ministry, my family and my church, The Journey at Rush Creek, in Maple Grove, MN. Enjoy. Don't stick around too long, or you'll start to think like me... ;-)