Gen 26

Optishokz Revvez Review

2019-07-22T15:14:00.001-07:00

Optishokz Revvez

(It should be noted, I have never reviewed a tech product before, but there are almost no quality reviews for these glasses, so I thought that I would put my two cents out there.)

I took my daughter to a friend's birthday party about two years ago, and between unicorn themed games I struck up a conversation with a fellow dad. He's the manager of the running shoe section of a local athletic store and he had a pair Aftershokz Bone Conductive headphones around his neck. For those new to the bone conductive sound idea, they are headphones that sit on your temple, instead of in your ears. You can hear the music, while also maintaining an awareness of sound around you. He talked them up relentlessly and I finally gave them a listen. The sound was...fine. "Fine" was surprising though, after all there was nothing in my ears. While I filed the idea away, I stuck with my Powerbeats, maintaining a cursory awareness of the technology.

Earlier this year, I started getting advertisements the Optishokz Revvez, an Indiegogo project from Aftershokz. The Optishokz are a sunglasses with the same bone conductive technology. The more serious I have taken my running, the more I have reveled in shedding excess gear (my favorite part of my Apple Watch is that I was able to ditch running with a phone). The Optishokz felt like the perfect product, and for the $100 backer price, I was in.

I have had them now for about three weeks. I have logged a half marathon, several trail runs, about 5-6 bike rides. Here are my impressions.

Pros:

Greater awareness of surroundings
Above-average sports sunglasses
Lightweight
Rock solid connection
Surprisingly good sound quality
Convenient for outdoor exercise

Cons:

Maximum volume is too quiet to be heard in heavy traffic or speeding downhill
Transducers sitting behind ears takes some adjustment; comfort may vary
Not "one size fits all"

In the Box

In the box, you'll receive the Revvez, a very nice hard shell case, a cloth case, a USB cable, a buff (basically a multi-purpose bandanna) and a surprisingly important alternative nose piece. Everything looks professional and well made. Good packaging tends to lend confidence with the company.

Fit

I have a big head. Notoriously, this can be an issue for both glasses and headphones. I often try on glasses that don't reach behind my ears. Headphones end up crushing my head. I was pleasantly surprised that the Revvez fit comfortably right out of the box. Great for me, less great for others. Forums have revealed that for many the Revvez's are comically large and more importantly, the transducers don't create a tight enough seal on their ears for quality sound. The alternate nose piece is important here, as it can raise the glasses up on the nose a bit, helping the transducers settle in behind the ear.

Which leads to the other important note on fit: the transducers. The transducers need to sit behind your ear with solid contact. There is noting inherently uncomfortable about this (it is certainly more comfortable than a tight-fitting pair of over the ear cans), but there is never a point where they just disappear. You will always know you are wearing them. Also, crank the volume up and you will feel vibrations. I don't mind the vibrations, but others find it disconcerting.

Battery

They say 6 hours, but since you are going to be listening close to max volume, be ready to charge about 4-5 hours.

Style

They look like workout shades. I am more into Wayfarer style glasses personally, but I can wear these without feeling like I am advertising my tech nerdiness to the world.

Connectivity

The Revvez's have always stayed connected for me. One issue though, while they support multi-pairing (up to two devices), my phone and watch often fight over connecting to them. I have to unpair and re-pair them often. I am currently blaming Apple, not Optishokz.

Sound

The sound is the most complicated part of the Revvez package. They have exceeded my modest expectations for sound quality, while falling sadly short in terms of volume.

First, the positive. You will be shocked how good bone conductive music can sound. On a smaller scale, these sound a bit like a pair of open-back headphones. There is some decent sound stage. The impact while running or hiking is interesting...imagine running on a treadmill in a coffee shop while a band is performing. That is a bit what running with Revvez's is like. It is profoundly different from jamming a pair of bassy workout headphones in your ear. Both have their place. Overall, I have found the Revvez's a delightful change of pace...

...as long as I am not listening to podcasts or books. Switch from music to spoken word and now it is like trying to listen to a soft-spoken friend in the that same coffee shop; during the busiest part of the day. And coffee is being ground. And the Pandora station is playing too loud. And someone is yelling over you from an adjacent table. You get the idea.

The max volume is just not very loud. While biking this is particularly bad. Good luck following the thread of an idea if you are biking in traffic. Every truck will drown out the sound completely. Even on a trail adjacent to the road, it will be tough to hear just about anything. The nosepiece needs to be mentioned again. I would estimate that the alternate nosepiece increased my volume by about 25%.

Inconsistency is the story of the day with Revvez. Music? Breezy and fun. Podcasts? Muffled and hard to hear. Trail running/biking? No problem listening at 3/4 volume. City adventures? Crank them to 100% and don't bother with any spoken word. Gym? If you are confident enough to workout inside with $30 clear lenses (when they become available), you are less vain than me. It is challenging to fully enjoy a product that's usefulness is so variable.

Who Are These For Anyway?

I have let dozens of people try on my Revvez's. They have an undeniable "neat" factor. Everyone is surprised by the sound and is amazed that these things exist. I was struck this weekend when my friend tried them on though; he was the first person to say: "I am buying these".

For the vast majority of people, I think the Revvez's are going to be an interesting curiosity, but they will be happy with their current headphones and sunglasses. I don't think I have a compelling argument to make with those people. I suppose the safety argument is the one that Aftershokz would like me to make, and I think it's a good one. It just isn't compelling for most people I talk to.

But I think about friend who instantly loved them. He's a cyclist. He's trail rider. He's a nerd. For him, the glasses just make sense. I think they do for me too. I have considered bailing on the Revvez several times this month, but I keep grabbing them when I go for a run.

In the running community there used to be a divide between purists arguing against headphones and younger runners, who couldn't imagine pounding the pavement without music. I have firmly been on the side of those who loathe the idea of running without sound. The Revvez is kinda the best of both worlds: the music joins you in nature, rather than drowning it out. I never knew I wanted awareness, until I got it. My trusty Powerbeats feel like they would take something away from my run, rather than add to it.

Obviously though, this isn't necessarily a case for the Revvez. At the $100 backer price, they are cheaper than top of the line Aftershokz Air's and a pair of $25 Goodr sunglasses. But, if Revvez go to retail at $200...everything becomes more complicated. Aftershokz seem to have higher volume...is the novelty of an all-in-one solution worth the premium?

Sadly, I think the answer is "no". I will hold on tightly to my backer pair (albeit, with a ear plug in for bike rides to help with sound), but $200 is simply too much for a device that requires this many compromises.

6/10

Hello, Goodbye

2017-04-17T10:07:00.001-07:00

It was sadness and anticipation that I am announcing that this is my final school year with InterVasity. I have accepted the Director of Family Ministry position at Moscow First Presbyterian Church, beginning June 1^st and will be continuing my seminary education with Fuller Theological Seminary. Donan has accepted my current Area Director position and will also begin June 1^st.

At a later time, I will post more about my new job and future hopes. I am very excited to work with families and have experienced multiple points of confirmation concerning this calling. For the time being though I would like to look back on the past 13 years (17, including my student involvement). InterVarsity has been my primary community and I am deeply grateful for every student, supporter, and staff partnership I have had. I hope these memories drip with the gratitude I feel to God and to my friends.

A Christian Community. I had no interest in Christian community entering college. Four years of Christian High School left me burned out on faith and skeptical that grouping Christians together was ever a wise proposition. Dan, Monica, Shamieko and Scott became the foundation of a community that challenged my assumptions. I accepted the invitation to a “Co-Ed Naked Bible Study”, along with a cold cup of lemonade on a hot day (I should note there was a footnote on the flier indicating that we would indeed remain clothed). These new friends flipped much of what I assumed about faith. They swore. They laughed. They confessed sins vulnerably. They cried. They prayed for each other. I slowly came to the realization that I was becoming one with them. By Thanksgiving I began to use the dreaded term “Christian” to describe myself.

Bible Boot Camp. After completing my freshmen year, I attended “Frosh Project” in the Tacoma Hilltop neighborhood. Frosh Project was described to me as “Bible Bootcamp”, an unfortunate name for what was essentially my Christian Confirmation course. As a community we worked (I worked for a low-income housing project), we cooked together simple meals (sorry for not soaking the lasagna noodles), we slept on hard church floors together and we cannonballed into the Sermon on the Mount. It was this bible study that messed me up. The somewhat ambiguous high call of Jesus came into stark clarity. To have life, I would need to lose it. I wasn’t sure I wanted that. I became so convinced that I didn’t that I packed all my stuff in the dark of night to leave. As I prayed in my stuffed car I heard Jesus invite me to stay. The next day I shared this story with friends. Annie began to cry. I was sure she was angry with me for thinking about leaving. She choked out: “I am just so happy that Jeremy chose Jesus”.

Me? A Leader? Shockingly, InterVarsity asked me to be a leader. For the next three years I would lead and live in different dorms throughout WSU. I collaborated with Megan, Terri, Becky, Julie, Zac and Jon. For three years I wandered halls knocking on doors, inviting myself to parties and gathering people bible study. I led weeks where no body showed up. I led weeks where 20 people showed up (the “Bible with Balls” was quite the hit in Waller). I clumsily attempted to disciple younger students. I saw friends become Christians! I saw friends leave angrily. I loved people well and authentically. I led people poorly and manipulatively. I tearfully prayed for some people. I avoided others. I was led by Shawna, Steve, Alex and Mae, who each in their own way shaped my leadership. I spent hours with Mike, Chris and Justin in discipleship, attempting to sort out what following Jesus should look like. And how to date girls without being a-holes. Quite a bit of time on that second one.

China. I spent six weeks in central China. Yes it was on this project that I met a beautiful, thoughtful, feisty Whitman woman that I quickly decided I wanted to spend as much time as possible with. But since we had a “no falling in love in China” rule, I will gloss over meeting my wife. What I won’t gloss over was how transformative it was to see my Chinese roommate begin to weep while singing “At the Cross”, or that amazement I felt when he wanted to pray to Jesus. In America, it is almost impossible be with someone when they first grasp the idea of God dying so that they can live. I also remember praying deep (and I mean DEEP) into the night with Eli. I should also mention Jen and Shamieko. These two women of giant faith were my friends throughout all of college. We traveled the world together and prayed together. I fought with both them and was sharpened by their wisdom. Jen challenged me to be more of the person God called me to be. Both her and Mike (they would later marry) never allowed me to get by on charm. They demanded substance of me. It was (is) an amazing gift. Shamieko chose to be an honest black woman in predominately white chapter that was attempting to open its eyes to injustice and race. Shamieko rarely lost patience with me and challenged me to see WSU not as a white dude, but to experience the campus from the margins (and such see my faith from the same perspective). Shamieko gifted me with honesty and modeled perseverance. These two women were “there” for every major college story I have.

Idahome. In 2003, Donan and I accepted an invitation to intern with InterVarsity at the University of Idaho. It would be impossible in overview form to write enough about Amy and Eli Awtrey, so I will keep it short: Donan and I based our marriage and ministry work on what we saw and learned from them. They demonstrated faith lived well. Sometimes we loved them for it. Occasionally we hated them for it. But we were always watching and learning. The student leaders when we arrived at Idaho were John, Adam and Audrey. They are my friends to this day. The believed in something that didn’t yet exist. I am always inspired by students who can do that. Now time to bullet point my favorite Idaho memories:

Worship at Fall Conference 2003. I started that conference more interested in catching up with my WSU friends. By Saturday night I was weeping watching my UI students singing to Jesus.
Eli teaching me to throw a better forehand (frisbee throw)
Feasts at Merv (the trailer)
Playing Tiger Woods golf with Amy and Eli
Shalom Conferences. Idaho students engaging in multiethnic worship and sitting under the feet of teaching they could have never expected
Urbana 03
Working graveyard to pay the bills
Singing the Idaho and WSU fight songs at my wedding reception
Sarah coming to intern
Breaking my leg playing frisbee
John coming on staff
Jesustherevolution and a month straight of 24/7 prayer in my basement
Tutoring in the CAMP program with Erik

Return to WSU. In 2009 I was really, really going to leave. But “they” (Scott and Kim) pulled me back by inviting me to staff with WSU chapter. Within my first week I met Andrew and Taylor (who would be the foundation of the next generation of leaders), walking around campus wearing nothing by short shorts and a pizza box, talked with 60 freshmen about sex and the bible and began to see the beginning of a chapter. I am so thankful for being able to partner with John (again), Donan, Erin, Tyler, Annie, Amy and Jessica. Pullman Presbyterian Church and specifically Matt and Amy McNelly have been foundational friends and partners. Simply put…an incredible chapter of my life.

Forcing Andrew to walk around campus with me in a pizza box
Inviting to Summit by smashing a piggie bank
Preaching on Woman at the Well by smashing a jar
Our community becoming “4^th circle” Christians
First Summit with WSU
Coffee/Settlers every week with Abigail and Kelati
Spending the night on Andrew’s dorm floor
Every time Alex came to Andrew’s bible study
A year of study and discipleship with Jesse and Brandon
LaFe!
Inn Dinner!
5 weeks of Summit leading with Donan (and infant Moira)
Amanda’s Summit mohawk
Taylor, Amanda, and Rebecca’s apartment. For two years, these women of God used their hospitality to make God’s love known to dozens of students. Amazing faith and sacrifice.
Rachael, who literally did everything to serve students at IV. One story would not be enough.
Everything about Summit with Tyler, Brandi and John. All stories have been sealed to protect the innocent.

The Best Co-Workers I will Ever Have. This is getting long. Really long. 13 (or 17 years) is pretty long. I am going to mention some people I have worked with. This is not exhaustive.

Shawna: you taught me to pray and how to love. You saw me in mighty armor…and saw that I was actually using it to hide, not to battle. You invited me out into the world instead. Thank you.
John: you’ve been my student, my intern, my landlord, and my colleague. Mostly though, my friend. You are my go-to for crazy hypotheticals for over a decade. You are probably the kindest of all of us.
Sarah: wisdom. You are wise.
Erin: You’ve been “shooting your shot” long before it was a thing.
Dale: You gave a year to help me get well. Thank you.
Nick: I have missed your enthusiastic passion
Tyler: I have missed your tireless desire to learn
Annie: I wish that I could be a student in a small group you lead
Amy L: I boldly predict that in your lifetime you are going to open a restaurant and plant a church. I would gladly go to both.
Jessica: Been a fan since Summit.
Vince: You are my soccer Yoda and my big, bleeding heart conscious.
SL: I want to keep praying with you.
Daniel: You have taught me to begin to see the world as artist
May: You decided to trust me. That is one of the great honors of my life.
Adri: You are one of the most trustworthy people I know
Angela: You showed me that it is possible to melt cynicism with love, not just smash it with logic.
Marshae: Leading intercession with you was a privilege.
Adam B: If the measure a person is saying “yes” to God no matter the cost, then you are one of the most complete people I know
Tim: I glad California gave you to us.
Scott: I am sorry for the late PCard Report. Your humility and willingness to keep learning helps remind me that there is always hope for the church.
Brandi and Benita: Leading Summit with you was one of the great privileges of my staff career. I hope you know that you “led up” and taught me so much.
Alex: Not sure if you remember leading evangelism training at Fall Conference together, but to this day it is most in sync I have ever felt with another staff. Thanks for the Sports Illustrated’s.
Christian: I respect your courage and the fight you gave to see your vision come to reality.
Joel: You’re in a lot of staff pictures with me. I am glad we have been on the same track. I am also glad that you always take my call, even though you have no idea what level of emotion is coming from the other end.
Debbie: Thanks for letting me teach your students and believing that I had something to bring. You're a great friend.
Ellen: I don’t know anyone who couldn’t benefit from you as a life coach.
Kim and Pauline: Thanks for believing in me.

An Interdependent Life. Finally, I would like to thank my supporters, both in prayer and finances. As I give you into Donan’s care, I am grateful for 13 years of dependency on God’s provision through you. Despite all the names listed above, staff can be very lonely. You have supported and encouraged me. You risked on God’s work in the Inland NW. You have sacrificed. I know that most of you give not out of abundance, but out of sacrifice. I have felt an obligation to live a life worthy of God’s call and your sacrifice for 13 years. Thank you.

Post Sabbatical Changes: Photography

2016-11-23T12:35:00.001-08:00

My sabbatical ended last friday. I will miss so much about that rich time. I miss the profound moments of clarity, but I also miss space. The space to walk, rather than drive. The space to sit and drink coffee, rather than throw it in the tumbler. The space for a long bike ride.

The most tangible fruit of space has been a developing love of photography. I recently sold much of my childhood toy collection to purchase my first DSLR camera. Below are some of my favorite shots. Most tell a story.

The majority of shots are from my deck. I have grown in love of my home over sabbatical. My view is spectacular. Specifically, the shots of Isaac playing on the deck and the sunrise that looks like fire are from the morning after the election. I woke that morning scared for my marginalized friends and wondering about my call to study to be a church pastor. My son playing and God's fire spoke to me. I wish I could tell you what they said...I can't. It wasn't peace. It wasn't anger. The closest word I could use would...resolve. A resolve to be the church in some consistent way. The Lord woke me early to show me His fire and my own son. I came in from that chilly morning sure I want to be a pastor. I can't totally say why.

Other shots are of Moira exploring. She is at the science center. She is climbing a tree. She is throwing leaves. Watching Moira attack life has become one of the great joys of my life. My daughter is ferocious. Her ferocity can at times be exhausting, but it also reminds me that no day is normal. There is more to discover and more to see.

Hodgins Drug and the Corner Club are Moscow institutions. They are part of my weird, divided, eclectic North Idaho home. I like the shots, but I enjoy the city that birthed them more.

If you think that Luke Cage is too black...

2016-10-06T15:38:00.001-07:00

Tony Stark:

Inherited a large sum of money from his rich family
Was educated in the best schools
Grew into a successful capitalist, making most of his money developing weapons for the United States
Attends wild parties and sleeps with mostly white women
While his best friend is black, the rest of his inner-circle is white
Gleefully thumbs his nose at United States government authority. Is celebrated as a hero by most.
Hangs out with his super cool friends. They are all white for the first movie and 7/8 (no, Nick Fury is not an Avenger)

I love Tony Stark. You probably love Tony Stark. Tony Stark is white male wish fulfillment.

(Don't even get me started on Steve Rogers...)

How to be a Big Vegan (who eats fish)

2016-08-03T16:54:00.001-07:00

I love food. And not in a foodie way. My friend Joel loves food. He will brave dark alleys to find shady food carts that will someday become Michelin starred. I will only do that to catch an Abra.

No I love grocery store food. Hot Tamales. Cool Ranch Chips. Deschutes Brewery Seasonals. Even some Top Ramen (but only with some Sriracha and hoisin sauce. I'm no savage). Basically, I love carbs and sugar. And your probably do to.

However, for as long as I remember I have had some...um...gastrointestinal issues. Sometimes minor, sometimes "stay home from work and sit in the fetal position begging for a fart". Sub-optimal.

I've tried stuff. I have (mostly) bailed on dairy. I was Paleo for a bit. I was gluten free for awhile. Intentional eating usually helps, but not really. My standard stomach's issues always seem to return. This leads to a pattern of trying something new, getting pretty militant about it, then encountered old fashioned pain and back-sliding into normal eating. After all, if an expensive Annie's Natural diet isn't going to help, store brand sugar is better-tasting and cheaper. No-brainer.

About a year ago I went to Seattle for a Sounders game and some time with friends. I ate HARD. Hot Dogs outside of C-Link? How about two. Beer? Did I mention it was a Sounders game? Pizza? Every Friday night with Bremerton family (all-meat, fire oven). As I drove back on Sunday with the familiar bowling ball in stomach I wondered if I should keep looking for something better, cause driving through Eastern Washington needing to birth a pizza-stadium dog-dark beer-baby is only about 132% as bad as it sounds.

Around Vantage I had the insane fever dream idea to try being a Vegan. Vegan? Why not? I already was usually off diary (the pizza baby was an exception. I swear). Being a vegan was going to only require not eating meat.

Meat.

Asada. Crispy Chicken Sandwiches. Buffalo Chicken. Pepperoni.

Okay, maybe this was going to be really, really hard.

But I militantly did it for about 4 months. Super clean. No bacon with the hash browns. Fajitas without chicken. I ate something called bulger. Not burger...bulger. I still don't know what that is. But I cooked it. Excellently.

And I felt great. So good. Even after the honeymoon period. Tried some meat (it was a brat at a BBQ) and I felt like a gained 15 pounds (the baby was back). So I didn't do that again. Donan suggested fish. Felt great! Tried again...felt terrible. Someone reminded me about eggs in tarter sauce. Tried fish again...and it was all good!

So I think I am a "Pesca-Vegan", but I cannot call myself that I like who I am. Technically, most days I don't meat, cheese, eggs or diary. But sometimes I eat fish and chips. And sometimes I go someones house and they wave cookies in my face and I eat a few. Or a dozen.

This is a quick guide for being a profoundly unhealthy eater who eats a niche diet. I weigh 220 pounds. Most vegan's don't. At least most vegan's who blog about don't. So here is what I have learned.

Reasons to be a Vegan:

Ethically-Opposed to Eating Animals: I am not one of you, but I see you. Fight the good fight. Eat your conscious. Know this though...I feel so inadequate around you. If there was a pill that would allow me to eat a double bacon cheeseburger with pepper jack cheese, deep fried jalapenos on a pretzel bun that had been lathered in butter I would sell my car for it. Can we still be cool?
Social Justice Reasons: I respect you even more than number 1.
Trying to lose weight. Stop it. Meat doesn't make you fat. If I could swap some beef jerky into my diet I could cut some noodle weight easily. Stop eating ice cream, keep eating meat.
Your Doctor told you too: Living is better than the above mentioned cheeseburger.
Save Money: Unless you eat meat 12 meals a week and ear gourmet ice cream every evening being vegan isn't going to save you money.

How to be Vegan:

Don't eat meat: Relatively easy. Meat doesn't hide in things. Meat isn't a character actor who you missed in a movie. It Robert Downey Jr chewing up every scene. It is no one's co-star.
Don't eat dairy: Hard. My parents were cleaning their garage and found black mold hiding in one of the walls. Probably been there 10 years. In the walls where no one can see it. Growing. Destroying stuff. Maybe making them sick. Butter is black mold. It is hiding in everything. If you want to be a "good vegan" you will never eat a pastry you don't cook. The good news is that no one is actually keeping score.
Don't eat eggs: You know how comics need to create metals like adamantium and vibranium because real metals aren't hard enough to withstand a punch from the Hulk? That is how hard it is to give up eggs. Remember what I said about butter? Same with eggs. But add every batter you love. Or just go out to breakfast. Find something you can eat. Then find something you WANT to eat. Not eating eggs sucks. When the mythical pill is released, I am going to scramble a dozen eggs and slice some bacon up and eat every square inch.

How to exist as a Vegan:

Sauces: Sriracha and BBQ sauce will save your life. They have two special powers: first, they mask new and unfamiliar flavors (like bulger!) and secondly, they taste like things you used to eat. If you are going to go from a drive-thru habit to vegan, bland food will derail you in a week. Make NO bland food. Turn the flavor UP.
Learn to cook Tofu: without protein you will sleepwalk to winco and wake up next two four empty beef jerky packages. You probably eat way more protein than you need right now. That is going to be an adjustment. Peanut butter will help, but your probably don't want to gain 10 pounds your first week off of meat. Tofu tastes like nothing. You get to make it taste good. Corn meal with help. Fry it in some oil. Or cook it in some soy sauce and sriracha. Learn to cook it.
Take it easy: unless you think meat is murder or you have some allergies that will immediately kill you, don't be afraid to let some contraband sneak past the goalie. Did that cookie have some egg and butter in it? Probably. Did that curry get cooked in chicken broth. Maybe...but is it good? Are you in the middle of a 300 mile drive and you need some chicken nuggets? I am not one to judge.
Order off the appetizer menu: your friends and family want to eat at restaurants. Foodies will take you places where the vegan options are phenomenal. Fresh veggies that are seasoned and prepared perfectly. Fresh, hot, pipping bread. Did I mention curry? You miss NOTHING with veggie curry. But if you aren't eating with Joel, you are going to end up at Applebee's. Your options are going to be green salad or green salad. Or....you can order a couple of appetizers. Onion Rings (yes, the batter has eggs. Get over it.) or chips and salsa, or pretzel sticks, or something else that is deep fried and amazing.
Noodles, frozen veggies and sauce: trade off between marinara or soy sauce. If you go with red sauce, throw in some fresh garlic and basil. You feeling soy? Great, add some peanut butter, lime juice and hot sauce. This is called "lunch" and it costs about the same as a turkey sandwhich and chips.
Pick your cheats: my favorite food is Pho'. I will endure Pho' without meat, but I am not going to eat vegetable broth. And you shouldn't either. I eat some fish now. Hot Tamales may or may not have gelatin, which may or may not be made from horse hooves. I sleep fine at night.

How to Behave as a Vegan:

Bring your own Food: No friend, family member or camp should ever have to cook for you. Bring stuff. Be happy if someone actually cooked for you.
Assume most people don't care that you are a vegan: because they don't.
Make meat for people when they come over to your house: don't host a bbq and serve people tofu. Or your "special cookies". Your taste buds change over time. Be nice to people you claim to like.

No I will leave. And by leave I mean eat homemade curry, coconut rice and drink a citrus IPA. Never cheat on flavor and you will be fine.

Durant

2016-07-07T15:46:00.000-07:00

Quick note: I want to write a post about the recent killings of black men by police, but I don't have words yet. Yes, I believe the system is rigged against black men. No, Alton Sterling and Philando Castile did nothing to deserve their death sentences. Black lives matter. Black bodies are not criminal. These men were deprived of their right to due process. People of color in America have to follow so many spoken and unspoken rules that I will never understand.

I lack answers or even suggestions. I am collecting thoughts. I am using Twitter as a place to listen and learn from my brothers and sisters. I suggest that everyone do the same.

Kevin Durant was my last favorite Sonic. I bought his jersey in 2008. The Sonics had a 9% chance to obtain the second overall pick (where Durant was drafted). While the 2007-8 was miserable for Seattle, the future was bright; Durant was clearly a generational talent. For the first time since Gary Payton was traded to Milwaukee, the Sonics had a future.

But of course they didn't.

In 2006, Howard Schultz sold the Seattle SuperSonics to a group of Oklahoma businessmen led by Clay Bennett. While this ownership publicly promised to look for a way to keep the team in Seattle, private emails pointed to a deep desire to move the team to OKC. Then NBA commissioner David Stern also appeared to be in favor of a move and was key to setting up the sale (likely as a "thank you" to OKC for hosting the New Orleans Hornets during the aftermath of Katrina). Finally in 2008, the Seattle City Council released the Sonics from their Key Arena lease and just like that they were gone.

I was devastated.

The Sonics were the first team to ever make me cry. The 1990's Kemp-Payton Sonics teams taught me to love sports. Shawn Kemp was a pre-teen boy's dream basketball player. Huge dunks, crotch grabs and screaming intensity. As I got older and grew with the team, Payton became the guy. Exquisite passing, the best low-post point guard I have ever seen and a PHD in smack talk. Even when the Mariners had their run between 1995-97, the Sonics were Seattle. 1996 was the first time I ever rooted for a team that made it to the championship series. To this day I wonder how that series turns out if Payton guards Jordan from the beginning. The city loved that team. I loved that team. They were going to be in Seattle forever.

The Mariners wanted to leave for Florida. The Seahawks actually had trucks fueled and ready to take them to LA. Those two franchises felt precarious. But the Sonics? No way. They were our only champions. They had two the 15 best players in the NBA. They would never leave.

The Sonics left Seattle in the franchise's 40th season. I was 27 at the time. They felt as permanent as the Space Needle.

It stung. But losing Durant stung even more.

Sure, Kemp and Payton both left. But you knew even as a 19-year old rookie that Durant was going to be better than either of them. Kemp and Payton were top-15 players in 1996; Durant might be a top-15 player of all time. He had more in common with Ken Griffey Jr. Nothing felt impossible with him wearing the Green and Gold. In 2008 the Sonics were awful, but because Durant was on the team they felt closer to a championship than the Mariners or the Seahawks (you know how crazy that is? The Hawks had been in the Super Bowl just three years prior). In basketball you need a star. The Sonics had him. He was 6' 9" and growing. The shot looked good, even if his percentage was low. He looked like he could rebound, even if PJ Carlesimo tried to make him a shooting guard. He could lead us to championships, but more importantly I believed he could save the team. That 9% chance that led to us drafting Durant felt like it meant something. How could the team beat the odds like that and lose the franchise? Impossible. The Sonics staying in Seattle felt pre-ordained. Durant would save the team.

But he didn't. The Sonics moved. Kevin Durant became a superstar in OKC.

It's asinine to ever get angry at a player for leaving as a free agent, it really is. In professional sports young men (and women; I see you WNBA) are drafted. Which is really a fancy word for "told where they have to spend the next three years of their lives". In the NBA, once their rookie deal expires they become a restricted free agent. Under that system they can sign somewhere else, but if their team still wants them they can match the offer and force them to stay. But of course, this rarely happens because the home team can offer more money and years to the player. About year 8 or 9, a first round draft pick is finally able to choose where they work. Even then, the system is designed for the player to stay. Their current team can still offer them more money and years during their unrestricted free agency.

And if they have the gall to leave? People burn their jerseys and call them a traitor.

(Future blog post fun: about 440 players and 30 owners split revenue close to 50-50. Raise your hand if you pay to go to an NBA game to watch Steve Balmer give uncoordinated high fives or to check out what t-shirt Mark Cuban is wearing.)

I am not going to get into why Durant chose to play in the Bay Area over OKC because when I said "Bay Area" and "OKC" I already articulated why most people would have made the same decision. Beyond that, Durant doesn't need to justify his choice. He got to decide where to play basketball for the first time since he enrolled at the University of Texas as an 18 year old. Good for him. Oh, and lest we forget, the team that did draft Durant moved him after one season. As a 20-year old Durant learned that the NBA is a business.

This post isn't about Durant's decision, it's about closure. I am a bigger fan of Kevin Durant than I am of any NBA team. He and Nick Collison are the last Sonics in the NBA. And they have been stuck on the team that was taken from my city. I could root for their personal success, but not the team. Does that make me bitter? Probably. But...sports.

And you know what? I am not bitter anymore. The Thunder are meaningless to me now. I will take no joy in their fall off, nor would an eventual ascension bother me. My favorite player was held hostage for 8 years, but now he is free. Honestly, that team is of no consequence to me anymore. OKC is now Charlotte, or New Orleans. They are a team somewhere else with players I may or may not enjoy (and let me tell you, I LOVE Stephen Adams). Their wins and loses are meaningless to me. They are no longer winning with Durant, so they no longer matter. At all.

Clay Bennett, David Stern and Howard Schultz still suck though.

Commencement talk

2016-06-20T13:51:00.001-07:00

I am giving a commencement talk at Spokane Falls Community College Pullman Campus tonight. Here are my words! Enjoy!

Thank you for inviting me here tonight. About two months ago I was honored to spend an afternoon with the student government here at Spokane Falls Community College Pullman Extension. What I discovered was a group of students who loved their campus, longed for deep purpose and were working extremely hard towards their goals. I have been asked today to speak on “Success is not a Destination, but a Road to be Traveled”.

Naturally, brings me back to my college graduation. I was the first member of my family to attend college, much less finish. It wasn’t easy. I didn’t know the “rules” of the campus. I was homesick. I struggled to see how much of what I was studying related to my future. As I sat at my graduation, I was both relieved that I had finished, but I also realized that I had no vision for anything past graduating! I had been fixated on the graduating, getting over that mountain for so long, I suddenly was panicked about where this all was going!

At my graduation party afterwards, I was still spooked by the “what’s next” when my dad found me. I wasn’t sure what my dad was thinking. He has been very successful without a lick of college. He wanted me to go, but the whole experience was very foreign to him. He put his hand on my shoulder and said “I’m so proud of you”.

I never thought then, nor do I often now, that I measured up to my dad. To hear him acknowledge with pride my accomplishment changed me. It brought me peace.

So today I would like to offer you two things: a series of thoughts, but perhaps more importantly my whole hearted congratulations. What you have accomplished is now small thing. I am not your dad, but you have my respect and my pride.

In that vein I would like to offer five thoughts:

Thought one: Everyone feels like a failure

Frauds. All of us are frauds. We all work hard to mask it and to hide it. Some wear aggressive masks. Some arrogant. Some self-deprecating. Some self-defeating. But we do so for a simple reason: deep down most of us feel fraudulent. Sometimes the successful are the worst. As money, titles and properties stack up, the creeping feeling of being “found out” becomes omnipresent. You are entering a workforce, or further educational endeavors that littered with fraudulent people.

If you feel overwhelmed, it is because life is overwhelming. Expectations are overwhelming. The business of adulthood, education and vocation breeds doubt in all of us. And that is good news! You are not alone! You are not entering a world of confident, competent, emotionally balanced adults. You are actually entering of world of people like you.

Thought two: Choose curiosity, as opposed to false competency

Be curious. Now that you see how fraudulent we all are, don’t cover it up! Be young! Be a learner. Ask all the questions. Leave none unasked. Don’t waste other’s hard-earned experience. It’s there waiting for you. Ask.

When faced with our own fraudulence, we are tempted to “fake it till we make it”. Or more simply, we pretend. But curiosity is key. Curiosity is the courageous choice. This is one thing I love about my wife, she is fearlessly and ego-lessly curious. And you know what is crazy: my daughter is now the exact same way! Curiosity is contagious.

Curiosity is also hard. It is an actual skill that requires development. When ignored, it atrophies. Thinking of questions becomes work. Asking becomes exhausting. You cannot afford to let that happen. All that you need is NOT within you. It isn’t. You don’t know stuff. Other people know the stuff you don’t know. You need them. You need your questions. They are your lifeline for navigating the world. Is everyone eager to help? Certainly not. But you cannot afford to let those people discourage you! I have found so many helpful people. Jim is teaching me how a car works. Rich taught me how to handle adult pressures. Ellen teaches me how to really listen to people. Ask. Never, ever stop asking.

Thought three: Success is a team endeavor

You are not an island. Your success will not be your own. We are in this together. Life is a group project, not an individual exam. As noted earlier, ask questions and be someone who is there to answer others questions.

But isn’t a “dog eat dog world”? At times, yes. I wish it wasn’t so, but it too often is. But I truly believe that collaborators change the world. When at work you find yourself pitted against others, work together instead. Put your fraudulent brains and experience together. Do better together. This is something I saw in my afternoon with the student government; a community that knew each other, rooted for each other and worked together.

Stephen Covey in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People calls this the “Win-Win” habit. The workplace is an interdependent environment. The more we work together, and seek results where everyone wins, the more successful the “whole” is.

Everywhere you go, your success is going to be predicated on the success of your team. You will rarely be a conquering hero and vanquishing competitors usually leads to only short-term success. Invest in “us” and you will be fine.

Thought four: Your definition of success will change

Have goals. Have a vision. Have a plan. But know that it will change. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that you are going to hold 12-14 jobs in your career. Some will relate to your major, but many will not. You’re going to be the new face several times in your working life. For some of you, that is exciting. For others, terrifying! Let’s add some more variables:

Most of you will get married. Many of your will have children. You are going to weather financial crises, wars and unforeseeable personal challenges. Your joys will change you. Your sorrows will blindside you. Your priorities are going to change. As will your passions. Your successes will make you rethink your ceiling. Your failures are going to open you to doubt. You’re going to miss things; weddings, funerals, family events. Each one will challenge you to re-evaluate.

Your present definition of success will not be able to survive the onslaught of life. And again, this is good news. The “you” you are now is ill-equipped for the reality of “you” later. As you evolve, so will your definition of success. So will your priorities. Your career may consume all of your passion, vision and purpose. The vocational “you” just might change the world. Or, it could be volunteering at a soup kitchen that leads you to throw away every goal to serve the marginalized. Or joyfully caring for your family could consume decades. Hey, you might even still become a professional soccer player. The point is, you don’t know.

Set your course. Work hard. Make plans. Pursue goals. But know that they will change! Humbly accept that life if far too large and multi-faceted to be controlled by the likes of you. And enjoy the ride.

Thought five: Success cannot be simply vocational

Your career cannot be the only way you define success. That feels strange to say at a college graduation. After all, almost all that you have been learning about has pertained to your upcoming career. I am guessing that none have you have taken courses with titles like: “How to be a good person”, “balancing family and work”, or “the unexpected fulfillment of volunteering”. That is not a critique of college or education. It is an acknowledgement of their limitations.

Spiritual idioms like: “What good does it profit a man to gain the world and lose his soul”, or contemporary ones like: “She who dies with the most toys, still dies” remind us that winning in work is only one measure of success and purpose. There has to be more that fills up a successful life than a career.

That is not to say that hard work and killing it in your vocation are without value. A recent Princeton study noted the “$75,000 happiness benchmark”. Essentially happiness increases all the way up to a $75,000 annual income, the stagnates afterwards. Financial success and the stability that brings does in fact, impact happiness. But only to a degree. It is that degree that I encourage you to note as you go forward. Anything that you do for over 40 hours a week is hugely important and impacts you deeply. Arriving at this graduation today shows that you have been working towards the right goals. But if you believe those vocational goals are the “one thing” that will bring you joy, you may find yourself disappointed before you know it.

Going back to Covey and the 7 Habits, we need to be “principle-centered”. Centering around career, or family, or pleasure leaves us vulnerable to huge gaps. We risk missing out on what matters most deeply to us in the name of success. Know who you are, set long-term goals and plans that are rooted in what matters most to you. Keep that at the center.

Community. Purpose. Charity. Fitness. Family. Success has many facets, some measurable and some not. Success will take much effort on your part in many different directions. Keep an eye towards all that matters to you.

Conclusion

At this point, I assume you are quite done with this speech and ready to get on with your big day. Far be it from me to hold you up any longer. So from one fraud to another, here is my final word: celebrate. Celebrate this day, because you have accomplished something worthy of celebration. Celebrate promotions, new jobs, 10k’s, first steps, new moves and new adventures. Our culture knows how to party, but not how to celebrate. We are very capable of turning up music, turning down lights and tapping kegs. But so few of us really mark the moments of our lives that matter. Celebration keeps us focused. It invites others into our lives. It makes us grateful. Acknowledge the moments of your life. Make celebration a rhythm of your life. And start tonight!

It was fun writing this. I particularly enjoyed thinking about values and purpose in a way that I could give in a setting that is not inherently Christian.

I don't have much to say

2016-06-16T13:58:00.001-07:00

It has been almost a month since sabbatical began.

1/6 of the way done.

About 17% of the way through.

Time flies. But I am not sure growth and healing move at the same speed time does. A month in I don't really feel "better".

Better is probably a strange term. Is the point of sabbatical to get better? What does better look like? In many ways I think the first month has been as much about what I have lost. Creativity. Hope. A sense grace. Self-control in the face of temptation and addictions. Permission to live more slowly has revealed how tired I actually am.

In The Face of the Deep Paul Pastor asks: "Are we crooked things ready to be made straight? It sounds so good until the hand of God is on on our limbs and we know that to set the break our very bones must be snapped and rehealed."

Snapped and rehealed.

Donan and I started Sabbatical on Lopez Island celebrating the wedding of friends. It was perfect. We had time to read, walk, laugh, watch movies and take pictures. We spent time with our close friends. Sabbatical felt like vacation. But recently...

Snap.

Snap.

The snapping isn't fun. But you know what also isn't fun? Incorrectly healed bones. Limps. Arthritis. Absent of time to heal, the real pain of the past 12 years has too often healed on its own. I have not always gone to the Great Physician.

The shooting at our church.

Dearly loved students disappearing into sin and addiction.

Two buried grandparents.

Countless student stories of abuse.

Under-funding and deep fears about money.

My brother's struggles with employment.

Student converts sliding off of my radar into...somewhere.

Snap.

Snap.

I have coped. But God has so much more than coping. He has healing. Restoration. Newness.

So. A month in and not much to report. Heaven hasn't opened. I don't yet have a five-year plan. Sin hasn't yet vanished. But I believe that I am under the care of the Great Physician. And that is enough.

Some new pics:

"Lord, help me to see"

2016-05-31T13:46:00.005-07:00

On May 19th, Donan and I began a six-month sabbatical. I have struggled with words to describe why sabbatical is good or more specifically what I hope for sabbatical. I am not taking a class, writing a book or have any great medical need. Simply, InterVarsity offers a six-month sabbatical for any full-time employee after seven years of service. This is year twelve and it felt like the right time.

The last week or so before sabbatical began several friends prayed for me. The theme in these prayers was clear: God wants me to remember who I am.

As I received this prayer time and again from different people I received two truths: firstly, I am deeply loved that God would care enough to want that for me and secondly, I have lost something of who I am.

The second truth provides both clarity and confusion, as word from the Spirit often do. Something has felt odd. When it began, I couldn't tell you. I have been sadder. Angrier. Anxious. Even blessings are coated with a sense of inevitable disappointment. As I reflect on a lifetime of being the optimistic ying in so many relationships I have to acknowledge that now I am the one desperately seeking others to see silver lining that I am incapable of seeing on my own. Something feels lost.

Which is of course the worst part of sabbatical; despite the lack of emails and meetings, I am still stuck with me! Not the me that I ought to be, but the me that I am. It is one thing to hear that God wants you to remember who you are, it is another thing to remember. It's like a name you can't recall, or watching a movie you have seen, but barely remember. You know that it is there somewhere, but extracting the information remains outside of your grasp.

I am slowly reading The Face of the Deep: Exploring the Mysterious Person of the Holy Spirit by Paul Pastor. The first two chapters of focused on the creative person of Holy Spirit. He was the Spirit of God who stirred the waters of creation in Genesis. He is the creative expression of God. We are surrounded by not by evidence of God, but by the creative reality of Holy Spirit every moment. The second chapter focuses more on Spirit's creative work in humanity. We participate in creation. Our creative practices exist on the canvases of artists, but also in home construction and in baristas making coffee. Meaningful labor and activity are part of Spirit's work today.

Curiosity is a friend that I have long neglected. I wonder if part of who I have lost is a sense of awe surrounding God's presence in our world and my role within it. After all, what is ministry work if it is devoid of awe? What is a manageable ministry job? The more tired I have become, the more interested I become in explanations rather than questions.

For now, I am exploring Spirit's creation through a camera lens. I am not a photographer. My dad has generously given me a camera and I am trying to teach myself to look at the world in new ways. To see beauty, questions and intentionality in what I generally pass by. It's been fun! The world looks different. It looks magical.

I have taken Moira with me on two photographing jaunts. She is looking for magical places. She wants to find magic hidden among the mundane. What I am realizing is that she doesn't really see anything as mundane. When she stops and looks at a tree, or a mail box, or a rock those objects are always something more than they appear. Those she often takes blurry photos with her finger in front of the lens, she is a better photographer than I am.

Alethea

2015-11-17T14:38:00.001-08:00

My name is Alethea Dumas and I am a senior at Washington State University. I have three majors which are in Critical Culture, Gender, and Race Studies, Women’s Studies, and Social Science. Also I have two minors in Human Development, and Popular culture. I am a student mentor through the multicultural student services at Washington State University, where I mentor 1^st generation, minority freshman and transfer students throughout their college academic career. Currently I am leading a Black campus ministry Bible study every Monday at Washington State University. I am passionate about helping and serving others, especially other college students and youth in general.

Urbana is something I would be overjoyed to attend simply because I love Jesus and I desire more and more of him every single day! Even though I grew up in the church, my relationship with God didn’t really start until I got to college. For so many years growing up, Christianity felt like a chore to me, just a list of rules I have to follow in order to not go to hell. Thankfully God gave me clarity on my identity in Christ and how in him I am free. I truly understand that Jesus is strong in my weaknesses, and that I am not defined by my sins but by what Jesus did on the cross for me. Through Intervarsity God has called me to be uncomfortable and tie myself with people from all cultures, ethnicities, and walks of life to further the kingdom of God and grow as a disciple of Christ. I want to continue to grow in Christ and freely worship with thousands of believers at Urbana.

Terlona

2015-11-13T22:41:00.000-08:00

My name is Terlona Knife and I am a freshman at Washington State University. I am majoring in Psychology and getting a minor in music. I would like to be a holistic music therapist that is very culturally aware. I really love the community that I have been surrounded by at Washington State University. I am involved in God’s Harmony, a gospel choir on campus, and setting up and tearing down Resonate church services. Additionally, I helped start the first Black Campus Ministry with my co-leader Alethea Dumas this year.

I gave my life to Jesus the summer before eight grade at a Christian summer camp. Since then God has carried me through foster care, depression, being separated from my younger brother, and my mother’s diagnosis of Huntington’s disease. Through all of that I have learned that God’s purpose for my life is greater than my pain. In those circumstances I learned to trust in God and understand his love for me better. I have been on 2 mission trips in the past and loved living my life on mission while volunteering my time to further God’s kingdom. I hope that Urbana will help me understand other cultures and learn what God’s plan is for my life regarding mission work. I want to go to Urbana, because I know that God has a work that he wants to speak to me and push me outside of my faith and become a better lover of people, and leader of my sphere of influence.

Uriel

2015-11-12T12:06:00.001-08:00

Hello fellow brothers and sisters,

My name is Uriel, I am a first generation college student seeking to achieve many things while in college. I am a transfer student from Spokane Falls Community College and currently attending Washington State University. I plan on pursuing a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice with a Minor in Psychology. Throughout stressful moments in college I turn to God and take some time to pray. I realize there is something wrong with the last sentence. I have been turning to God when I need him and not every morning and night. I would like to change this and believe Urbana 2015 can help me do this. I would like to have a closer connection with God and experience more than just prayer. Urbana as I have heard is a life changing conference. I hope to go and find God in so many ways. Urbana is a conference where I will not only connect with people with the same spiritual goals as me but also help myself understand who I am and how it is that God wants me to be a good Christian. I am planning to go to El Salvador this Spring Break with twelve other people as part of the Presbyterian Church. We are going to build a well for people who don’t have clean drinking water. The purpose for this trip will not only be to help build a well but also have bible studies where we have the opportunity to spread the word of God. This trip will be perfect after a trip to Urbana where I know I will gain a closer connection with God.

Thank you for your time and help along with prayers for this trip.

God Bless,

Uriel

Brittney

2015-11-10T15:00:00.001-08:00

Send Brittney to Urbana!

My name is Brittney Richards and I am from Tacoma, WA. As a first generation college student God has opened up so many doors for me. During this college experience I am blessed to have an outlet like the gospel choir, God's Harmony to keep me humble. With my time as a college student coming to a close I am praying God will show me my next steps in life. I know Jesus wants me to share his love with others. This is why I need to go to Urbana. These last couple months InterVarsity has continued to show me God's joy and I truly believe Urbana can teach me so many more things about Jesus.

Legacy of Calling

2015-11-09T16:39:00.000-08:00

Over the next couple days, I am going to be highlighting different students that need help attending Urbana. My unabashed hope is that you will fall in love with these students, and in turn donate money or frequent flier miles to help them attend.

Wait, you don't know what Urbana is yet?

(I am a terrible staff worker)

You should go to the website.

Then you should DEFINITELY watch this video (warning, Billy Graham will give you goosebumps on your goosebumps).

I love Urbana. I answered the call to come on staff at Urbana. I learned how much the American Church needed the Global Church at Urbana.

God is doing something. Every week, another student who just met us asks me if we have money to help. One student, nicknamed "T" asked me if I could help her. Her dad won't let her drive (she lives in Akron, Ohio). She said to me "if I could get my flight paid for, I can go. He won't help. Is there anything we can do?"

Who is T? She is a new leader of our first Black Student Bible Study. She is a member of God's Harmony (the WSU Gospel Choir). She is smart. Funny. Missional. She is a FRESHMAN. She wants to go to Urbana and lead with IV for the next 3 1/2 years.

So yes, I want your money. But I want to re-invest in the Kingdom of God. I want to re-invest in the Inland NW. I want re-invest it in global missions.

If you want to give, give here.

And keep coming back here! I am going to start uploading pictures and stories of students who need help. I want you to love students like T with me! They are great. They inspire me. I hope they can inspire you too,

Pain

2015-10-19T17:45:00.001-07:00

Physical therapy.

I hate the idea of doing (more) physical therapy. I skipped it for the torn meniscus, but it looks like my recent back pain is going to take me back. Well then.

If you can permit me a moment to list my injuries:

Simple arm break x5
Compound arm fracture x1
Ankle spiral fracture (requiring surgery) x1
Tibial Plateau Fracture (including a dislocated kneecap) x1
Torn ligaments in shoulder x1
Torn ligaments in knee x1
Torn meniscus x1

Now, this post is not about you feeling sorry for me (though if you want to for a minute, I'll take it), but to reflect on pain. I joke with my friends that I have a tremendous pain tolerance, but a low discomfort tolerance. For example, when I broke my ankle I drove myself to the hospital. I thought I had a sprain! I thought a break would hurt more. I ended up having surgery at the earliest possible moment. Does that make me sound tough? Well anyone who has ever endured me taking 3 bathroom breaks during an hour long meeting will attest that I am not nearly as tough when it comes to discomfort.

Why is this? I think that it comes down to mindset. When I am injured, I slip into a different mode. I anticipate pain and I am able to push through. I make jokes. I focus on everything but the pain. I am sure anyone who has ever been injured does the same thing. Pain destroys normalcy. The pain is all that matters, thus it can be dealt with. Life stops for pain.

Discomfort is a different animal. Discomfort is not easily ignored. It doesn't destroy normalcy, it joins in with normalcy. It occupies your mind and space, along with work and family. It demands your focus, even though it isn't severe enough to be granted your full attention.

That is what may back feels like. It is there. It is always there. Every moment I spend with my wife. Or kids. Or students. Or Jesus, is accompanied by a degree of pain or discomfort. Every chair feels wrong. Every standing position feels just off. It feels like wearing a pair of underwear that is two sizes too small. Except twice and hour the underwear electrocutes you. Or something.

The problem is, when do you deal with that kind of discomfort? It is never the most important thing for you to do. I'll confess, my back has hurt for months, but without a spasm last week, I wouldn't have seen a doctor.

I bet you can guess where I am going, but let's go there. How does this apply to life? How much soul discomfort do we tolerate because it doesn't feel painful enough to stop everything for?

In the course of life, there are moments of extreme pain that stop everything and demand full attention. Death. Divorce. Legal troubles. These stop everything. And I have noticed that most of us actually do WELL in these moments. We buckle down and get stuff done. We are strong for everyone else. We step up.

But what about the steady, gnawing issues? The addictions that don't seem to be causing problems. The doubt. The fear. The persistent feeling of inadequacy. Do we stop and deal with these, or do we wait for the crisis?

I have been reflecting for the past year or so on Jesus' command to not worry (Matthew 6:25-34). I have noticed how little worry I tend to have in major moments. I am not worried leading inner city projects. I just believe in God's protection. I don't worry about my staff overseas. I rarely struggle with existential questions when faced with death. But daily? I worry all the time. ALL. THE. TIME. I worry about money. I worry about my kids. My health. My wife's life satisfaction. My standing with people I respect. My standing with people I don't respect. My standing with God. Okay, so I worry about how other perceive me.

I find it interesting in Jesus' instruction not to worry that he focuses on what you will eat, drink, wear and tomorrow. I don't perceive that Jesus is talking about major crises of the day, but I think he talking about very, very basics. The day to day stuff. I think that is much, much harder to respond to normalcy with faith than it is crisis moments.

I have begun to think that faith in "big" moments is easy. It is confidence in Jesus in regular moments that is hard. Jesus' invitation to learn a worry-less existence from him is radical because he wants to invade our normal.

I would rather have a broken leg than a bad back. I know how to deal with pain. It's the gnawing that I can't stand. However, my life (spiritual, emotional) is so much more acquainted with the gnawing. I am sensing an invitation to notice. Notice my back (as if I could ignore it!). But also to notice my feelings. My fears. My worries. My compulsions. Notice the gnawing. I know how to give Jesus the big. Now I think he wants the small. At eighteen I came to realize that my life was too much for me to carry. Now I am learning just how little of it I can actually bear. Is a less productive me and less loved me? Scripture says "no". My mind often says "of course!". Such is the burdens I am invited to lay down.

I think learning to live free of worry starts with noticing all of the gnawing and entrusting those things to Jesus. Facing the gnawing is tough. It is like noticing how bad you have to pee. No one wants to highlight that which makes them uncomfortable. But I am coming to believe that is the way to knowing Jesus in the small. I need to know Jesus in the small.

Now if you excuse me, I need to use the bathroom.

Why I have been posting about Mike Brown, Eric Garner and Tamir Rice

2014-12-10T09:52:00.001-08:00

I remember in August, watching the first round of protests in Ferguson. Watching is a strong word, I don't have cable and even if I did, the major news networks had no cameras in Ferguson. I "watched" via Twitter. I began following protest leaders and journalists who have been talking about race and police violence for years. I will never scrub from my mind images of tanks rolling through an American city. Never.

Getting my initial news from protesters was a strange experience. I am used to hearing from professional journalists first. Not from the streets, not from the fray.

I think that has shaped much of my interpretation. Prior to that night (which humorously, involved me watching Muppets Most Wanted with my family while constantly refreshing Twitter), I had used terms like "systemic injustice", but I had no knowledge of the number of police killings of black men. I would have assumed it was higher than whites, but I had no understanding of how skewed the ratio is. According to the Centers for Disease Controlled and Prevention, blacks are killed by police at twice their rate of the general population. Are more simply, African-Americans make up 13 percent of the population, but are victims of 26 percent of all police shootings.

And very few people from outside of the black community knew, or cared until people started protesting and tweeting about what happened between Mike Brown and Darren Wilson.

I have heard from friends who believe this is a media creation. It isn't. The media had no interest in Mike Brown (or Trayvon Martin before him). Protesters and social media started the story.

Absent of my friendship with a black friend who was tweeting and posting of facebook like crazy, my first exposure to the story would have been CNN, or another national news source. I am indebted to my friendship with someone more personally impacted for gaining a grassroots perspective.

But this is all background data. I want to talk about why I personally care, post stories, host prayer vigils and unabashedly feel like there is a major problem with race, power and policing in America. I realize many who I consider good friends disagree with me. That's fine. I don't expect universal agreement. But recently I spoke with a friend who misinterpreted a comment I made on facebook over a year ago and came to some pretty inaccurate conclusions about my beliefs. I would rather explain in long form and hopefully further dialogue.

For simplicity, I am going to say what I believe and don't believe about these issue. I will start with the negative, frankly because it seems like where most anger and misinterpretation exist.

What I don't believe:

I don't believe that Mike Brown was necessarily "innocent". I use innocent in quotations here because of all the charges that have been levied at Mike Brown. So yes, I concede that Mike Brown probably hit Darren Wilson and generally acted aggressively in a mutually aggressive situation. He also probably enjoyed weed and was a jaywalker. All of these crimes probably earned him an arrest and potential jail time. So no, Mike Brown was not innocent of the crimes that have been lobbied against him in death.
I don't believe Darren Wilson consciously chose to kill Mike Brown because he was black. While I believe racism is alive and well, don't think that Darren Wilson likely is a proud racist killing black people out of a personal agenda. This is also likely true for the police in Staten Island and Cleveland.
I don't believe that Darren Wilson would have been found guilty in a trail. As much as I wanted an indictment and spent hours raging and praying about their not being one, I don't think that Wilson would have been convicted. In America today, if an officer "feels" in danger, they are authorized to use lethal force. I think that is asinine, but people are not convicted by the laws we want, but the ones we have.
I don't believe that Mike Brown was a super human demon. I have honestly not been more horrified by any aspect of this case than I was listening to every white member of a panel on NPR agree that Darren Wilson made for a compelling witness. I read the testimony. He assigned mythical powers to Mike Brown. The ability to run through bullets, the possession of super-human strength, the power throw a death punch. I don't necessarily think that Wilson is a liar, but I think that his recollections are impacted by other factors.

What I believe:

I believe the justice system is skewed to protect police. I will not attempt to quote this whole article, so just read it: http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/ferguson-michael-brown-indictment-darren-wilson/. Basic gist, if a case to goes to a grand jury, there will be an inditement. Unless you're a cop. That is wrong. When you combine this reality with the increased likelihood of blacks being shot by police officers, you end up with a system that blocks the pursuit of justice.
I believe that the police are given too much leeway in how they enforce laws. From Randly Balko of the Washington Post:

Sen. Rand Paul took some heat this week for pointing out that Eric Garner was essentially executed for selling untaxed cigarettes. I’m not sure why this is a controversial thing to say (especially since Paul also explicitly said the video itself was “horrifying”). Every law, no matter how seemingly innocuous, is enforced with the threat of violence: If you fail to follow it, the state is saying it reserves the right to use violence to force you to comply and/or force you to submit to a penalty for violating the law. Every law passed also creates more opportunities for interaction with police officers, the people entrusted to use the violence necessary to enforce the laws. How a proposed law will be enforced, and potentially abused, ought to be considered in addition to the content of the law itself.

For example, primary seat belt laws give cops another way to racially profile black motorists. It’s another excuse for a pretext stop. Earlier this year, I put up a post about the harrowing video showing South Carolina state trooper Sean Groubert firing a barrage of bullets at motorist Lavar Jones as Jones reached for his driver’s license. Groubert had pulled Jones over because Jones wasn’t wearing his seat belt. It isn’t the first time a seat belt stop has escalated to violence. In September, an Indiana family filed a lawsuit stemming from a seat belt stop that resulted in police smashing a car window and tasering one of the occupants. A Georgia family has filed a lawsuit after a traffic stop last January that ended with a teen being pulled from the car and handcuffed at gunpoint. He was cited only for not waring a seat belt. A seat belt stop in Florida last year led to an officer inadvertently running over and killing 38-year-old Marlon Brown.

Now, I doubt that New York city council anticipated that failure to comply with this particular law would result in a man’s death, any more than legislators in Indiana, Georgia, South Carolina, or Florida anticipated that seat belt enforcement could end in tasings, shootings, or arrests. But you enforce the laws with the police institutions you have, not the police institutions you want. Low-level offenses are a tool police sometimes use to do sweeps for outstanding warrants, or as part of a “broken windows”strategy of law enforcement. These are tactics overwhelmingly deployed on low-income and minority communities.

I realize that some Balko's ideas sound a little Libertarian, but I feel like his large points are worth looking at. If police are practicing "broken windows" law enforcement (basically treat petty crimes with great seriousness and it will clean up larger crimes before they occur), then they should be obligated to practice the same policy on themselves. Treat even small infractions concerning abuse with absolute seriousness. Self-police more harshly than you police others. Isn't that the heart of Jesus' teaching about removing splinters with a log jammed in your own eye? Furthermore, as long as police have carte blanche on how they enforce the law, we may have a moral obligation to only have laws that are deemed worthy of intensely physical enforcement.

I believe that people operate with personal prejudice and that police are people. From Constance Rice, a Civil Rights lawyer who works with LAPD to build trust between white cops and black communities:

Cops can get into a state of mind where they're scared to death. When they're in that really, really frightened place they panic and they act out on that panic. I have known cops who haven't had a racist bone in their bodies and in fact had adopted black children, they went to black churches on the weekend; and these are white cops. They really weren't overtly racist. They weren't consciously racist. But you know what they had in their minds that made them act out and beat a black suspect unwarrantedly? They had fear. They were afraid of black men. I know a lot of white cops who have told me. And I interviewed over 900 police officers in 18 months and they started talking to me, it was almost like a therapy session for them I didn't realize that they needed an outlet to talk.

They would say things like, "Ms. Rice I'm scared of black men. Black men terrify me. I'm really scared of them. Ms. Rice, you know black men who come out of prison, they've got great hulk strength and I'm afraid they're going to kill me. Ms. Rice, can you teach me how not to be afraid of black men." I mean this is cops who are 6'4". You know, the cop in Ferguson was 6'4" talking about he was terrified. But when cops are scared, they kill and they do things that don't make sense to you and me.

This makes so much sense to me. In spite of my personal experiences with black men (good friends, spiritual leaders, never one violent or threatening situation), I still find myself nervous on city streets and at night. This is in part to still being part of mostly white communities (InterVarsity, Moscow Idaho, WSU, my church) and in part because I have been told over and over again by news and television programs to fear black men (especially "thugs", whatever that actually means).

But, as long as our laws only require that police "feel" scared, then they are going to be more inclined to act more violently towards those they perceive to be scary.

I believe this is a spiritual issue. I believe that world has a real spiritual enemy. I believe that he wants to kill and destroy. I believe that unity is antithetical to his purposes. Racism; deep embedded fear of the "other" increases his purposes and takes us further from the dream of Revelation 7:9, of every "tribe, tongue and nation" praising God together. (Right now, do you feel like white and black church are closer than they were 6 months ago?) If irrational (and generally unnoticed and unexamined) fear is combined with institutional power, it bombs unity and costs lives. Both serve to benefit the kingdom of the devil and weaken the witness of the Kingdom of Heaven. This is as old as Eden. This is why Jesus went to Samaria, drove merchants away from the Gentile gate and commanded Peter to not call anything that he made unclean. Jesus' ministry of reconciliation wasn't PC, it was Kingdom building. Over half of the New Testament is written by Paul; and Jewish, Roman Citizen. He left positions of comfort and safety to boldly cross lines of division. This is the work of the Kingdom. I believe with all my soul that these long term, long standing places of injustice and prejudice and violence are being exposed by the Holy Spirit Himself (yes, I think God can use Twitter).

The uncomfortable reality that we in the white church need to embrace is that the perspective of the New Testament is the perspective of persecution and occupation. The early church was so harshly persecuted, that to call anything that the white Christians are encountering now persecution is borderline insulting (yes, including IVCF's campus access issues). The challenge that faces most of us is how to translate these early church writings into a post-Christendom context. I worry that we are used to empire-defending, because we are used to being the empire. When events happen like are happening in Ferguson, Cleveland and Staten Island they rupture our sense of injustice and re-calibrate our sense of victim hood. It is simply easier to look away, or to blame the source of that rupturing.

I believe that is time to listen. I have been accused of making many of these problems worse by using terms like "white" church and "black" church (as well as Latino, Asian, etc). My response is simple: look at Sunday mornings in America. Our churches, for the most part are segregated. And as such, our theology is shaped by our cultural experiences. This is why during a time of civil unrest around race, white Christians need to lend their ears to black Christian leaders. We are one body. We can't now (especially now) ignore part of our body. Paul (who was a cross-cultural missionary, who bridged the gap between race, power and politics) says:

15 Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. 19 If they were all one part, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many parts, but one body. 21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” 22 On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, 24 while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, 25 so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. 26 If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.-- 1 Corinthians 12:15-26, NIV

It is imperative that we listen right now. We have to have "equal concern for each other" right now. Here is a great place to start: http://jonathanmerritt.religionnews.com/2014/12/05/eric-garner-black-christians-react-anger/

Final Thoughts: I don't expect total agreement. I don't expect Christian Democrats to start voting Republican, or vice versa. I don't expect to see masses of white Christians join protests who are not inclined to do so already. But I do hope and pray for respect. I do hope for listening ears. I do hope to see issues like these discussed in churches. I have had several white Christian friends say to me: "people don't realize how much better it is now than during the 60's. People are ungrateful". Try hearing that. Try hearing someone say to you: "I realize that it is bad and that black people are more targeted and villianized than white people, but it's about as good as it can be expected to be". That is not solidarity. That is not mourning with those who mourn. We get to disagree with the "how's" and even the "why's" for the inequality that is being painfully exposed right now. But I don't believe that we get to ignore it or call coverage of it inconvenient. Our body is wounded. We need all of our limbs.

"God is Not Dead" and the Danger of Provoking Christians

2014-05-15T12:53:00.001-07:00

I have been asked several times if I have seen the film God is Not Dead. I mostly laugh off the question by telling people that I have limited time and money budget for films and Winter Soldier took up all the allotted funds.

That answer is partially true. I would rather see the Captain America movie than watch Hercules as an evil Philosophy professor. Generally, Christian movies don't have a great reputation for being well made or nuanced (yes, I realize that I just implied that a Marvel comic movie has more nuance than Christian films. I defy anyone to prove me wrong). Winter Soldier on the other hand, flipped the entire Marvel film universe upside down! Seriously, see this film.

As I understand the premise, God is Not Dead is about a college student who is bullied into acknowledging that God doesn't exist by zealously Atheist philosophy professor. The student is threatened with a failing grade if he chooses to acknowledge God's existence without proving it to a degree that is satisfying for the professor. I can see why people would want me to see this film. I am a missionary to the University world and I have Philosophy degree. From the outside looking in, I may seem like the target audience for a film like this. In actuality, I have gone from not caring about the movie, to being disturbed by its existence (which yes, will lead me to actually seeing it).

I went to a Christian high school and public University. I have spent significant time in both the Christian and secular education worlds. While I was in high school, scores of recruiters from Christian colleges visited our school. They emphasized not only their educational standards, but their mission to raise Christians who could combat secularism and fight the good intellectual fight for the faith. To listen to these recruiters, there was an army of professors who saw it as their life mission to torpedo the faith of thousands of incoming freshmen every year. Going to these Christian schools would not only protect your faith, but would make you an agent for good that could beat back these influencers.

If you know my story, you know that I not only went to Washington State University, but had a profound re-introduction to Jesus. The faith decisions that I made at my secular college continues to influence my life, both personally and vocationally. In my studies, I was never asked to abandon my faith or ridiculed for having it. As a philosophy major, I wrote about Jesus and his influence in almost every paper I wrote. If I saw an opportunity to juxtapose Jesus and Kant, I took it. As long as I made good and thoughtful arguments, I was never punished for my views. My grades were fine and the higher level my classes were in my major, the more my own thoughts and opinions were welcomed. As far as I know, none of my professors shared my beliefs, but that didn't cause them to deride them. While I was a middle of the road student, the two most accomplished students in my class were also professing Christians.

Somewhere between 50-75% of incoming Christian freshman college students will leave the faith by the time they are 30 (according the Pew Research Group and Barna). That is a sobering fact. No one seems to totally understand how to stem the tide. Concerned parents, pastors and church-goers want to understand why. It seems like in humanity, we prefer simple answers that make intuitive sense, rather than complicated answers that draw from a variety of sources. Universities become the villains in the narrative that surrounds this exodus. Sometimes it is simpler to narrow that villainy to the professors. I also can imagine that there are enough stories of particularly militant professors out there to create a confirmation bias ("my best friends cousin's nephew was told that only science can be fact"). Truth be told, I have looked for simple solutions to a complex problem in my desire to be more effective on campus.

InterVarsity's (my employer) vision is to see "Students and Faculty Transformed, Campuses Renewed and World Changers Developed". I will be the first to admit that "Campuses Renewed" feels like the most daunting task. Campus renewal is a huge call, that requires not only a desire to see the campus be more Christ-centered, but a deep and authentic love for the University. That is my actual issue with God is Not Dead. I love the universities. I see the ones in my Area as my home. I love the environment of learning. I agree John Ortberg's statement that "ignorance is the devil's tool, that God is the God of truth". As long as Universities serve as the mustache twirling villains in the Christian imagination, they are not places to be renewed, but to be torn down.

I am deeply grateful for my college education. My philosophy degree serves me every day. I learned how to think and how to reason. I learned how to form effective arguments. I learned that I don't get to take my ball and go home when I don't like what someone else is saying (I also am aware that in most of my classes, I would have been docked for that cliche).

I also can freely acknowledge that WSU was and is not perfect. In fact it was pretty screwed up. In my 14 years in the Palouse, we rarely go a year without an ugly racial or sexually motivated hate crime emanating from my Alma Mater. Drinking is a real issue, and it leads to death, sexual coping and wasted years that do not result in degrees. Pervasive loneliness drives hundreds of students into video game addictions that remove people from real community and relationships.

And yes, while there are about a dozen Christian groups active, only about 10% of the campus is engaged in Christian community. The exodus is alive and well at WSU.

Dallas Willard commented that general attitude towards God at universities is not hostility, but irrelevance. Students are not told that their faith is a matter of the lack of intelligence, but it is actually minimized to being a insignificant part of who they are. Students are told by pastors and parents that they are supposed to "put God first", yet they spend almost all of their time working on majors that seem to them to be completely disconnected to their faith. On the campuses that I work, God is not dead, he is "cute". How is a weekly one-hour Bible study, or worse, a twice a year trip to a home church supposed to compete with such a pervasive message?

I think that we need to help students see that their majors and their studies are important parts of their own faith lives and of God's purposes in the world. God IS a God of truth. God loves knowledge and is the author of all knowledge. Their faith belongs in the classroom, because without God their is no classroom.

Jesus was more than a teacher, but he was still a teacher. Jesus educated people. He called his followers to follow him with their hearts, strength and minds. The message that the university needs is not that God exists, but that he matters. He matters in engineering, biology, sociology, politics and yes, in philosophy.

Too many students come into college with the message; "find a nice Christian group, hunker down and don't lose your faith". What would it look to invite our students to engage the campus, learn all you can learn, find God's fingerprints in your major and point them out until others can also see?

I think that if everyone could see the campus that I see fear would be replaced by compassion and excitement about what could happen. Millions of students every year are exposed to teachings that can change their lives and their communities. Now we have to learn how to get better at helping that experience be part of their faith development. We need to lay down our fear, and ask God for new eyes to see. We need to repent of any fear of knowledge that we have and instead ask for God to be revealed. We can only learn what God already knows. Jesus, as God in the flesh, was the smartest person to ever walk the earth, and he was called "teacher". Let us walk in the footsteps of our creator, savior and teacher.

Nicodemus

2014-04-18T21:06:00.003-07:00

I was recently asked to write and act out a biblical character's response to Jesus' resurrection for an Easter sunrise service. I chose Nicodemus.

If his name isn't familiar to you, he is a Pharisee who shows up three times in John's gospel. Once, he investigates who Jesus is at the beginning of Jesus' ministry (John 3). Another time, he tries to convince fellow Pharisees to seek more information about Jesus before arresting him (John 7). Finally in John 19, he along with a "secret disciple" name Joseph, claim Jesus' body and lay it in a tomb.

Nicodemus' first interaction with Jesus is his most famous. In this interaction, we find Jesus talking about the need to be "born again" and the famous John 3:16 passage occurs ("For God so loved the world that he gave is only begotten son, so that however believes in him will not perish, but will have eternal life."). Nicodemus' other occurrences are rarely mentioned.

I went into this project unsure whether I was going to portray Nicodemus as convert, or as a curious person who was reluctant to make a final decision about Jesus. It is difficult to accurately portray someone's response to the resurrection when their entire story is left so open ended.

But it was the open-endedness of Nicodemus that intrigued me so much. In his first interaction he approaches Jesus under the cover of night, and with pretentious flattery. By the end of the conversation he is dumbfounded and silent. This is not uncommon for Pharisees in the gospels. What is unusual about Nicodemus is that he comes back. He advocates for Jesus (if ever so slightly) in front of his peers and he steps out of the night to ask for Jesus' body. Remember, the night of Jesus' crucifixion, every disciple except for John bailed on Jesus. Nicodemus was there.

I think that Nicodemus should be the model of the gradual conversion. He let Jesus and his words haunt him. When Jesus humbled Nicodemus, he let himself become affected at a deep level. Nicodemus had a ton to lose, and some church lore says he indeed lost it all, eventually becoming a church martyr in the 1st Century.

I admire disciples who immediately follow Jesus. Levi, James, John, Peter...these guys had the guts to drop everything to follow Jesus. Maybe Nicodemus doesn't measure up to them. But the good news of the gospel and of Easter is that it is not about measuring up. I know so many more Nicodemus' than Peter's. I know many who are on the Nicodemus road right now; trying to decide if Jesus is trustworthy and worth the risk.

Below is the rough draft on my monologue. Seems appropriate to post it here, since everything I write here is a rough draft. Please take a look at it. And if you are so moved, pray for a Nicodemus in your life. You never know where people really go when the step back into the night.

There are two things in my life that I have really wanted; to be a Pharisee and to see the Messiah. I fear that it has been revealed in my actions which was more important to me.

I should go back to the beginning. My name is Nicodemus. I first met Jesus a few years ago, during Passover. I came to see at night, after he had made a scene at the Temple. I came at night because it had been a long day.

No.

I came at night because I was afraid. Even then, Jesus was not well-liked by my companions. The spoken reasons were varied; he wasn’t educated, he was a rabble-rouser, he was irreverent. I think at that point though, we were angry that he didn’t need us. He held sway over the people; our people, and we weren’t part of his world. The council asked me to go and talk to him.

I was nervous. I had heard about his healings and was transfixed by his boldness in the temple. I think it was my nervousness that caused me to blurt out how we knew he was from God. I tried to endorse him. I would learn that evening that Jesus never wanted, or needed endorsement. I have never met a man who was less concerned about other people’s opinions of him. I thought that he was stonewalling me after that. I thought that our conversation was all about him keeping me at arm’s length. I thought that I blew it.

It wasn’t until much later that I realized that he was actually inviting me to be “born again”. He longed for me…FOR ME, to be born of the Spirit of God. He talked about freedom; being like wind. No one knew how trapped I felt; no one but Him. By the time he spoke about the “Son of Man being lifted up”, my head was spinning. I forgot that the snake in the desert was for the healing of the people. I stumbled back into the night. Exhilarated and confused.

You know, I thought that just maybe this was all going to work. It seems so naive now. I thought that if my brothers could meet him, he would exhilarate them too. But as you know, it never happened. First it was Sabbath healings. Then his claims of being God’s son. But throughout it all, it was his indifference towards us. They were so angry that he would heal on the Sabbath, but they were so much angrier that he never wanted to debate us about it. He didn’t care about proper channels. He wounded their theology, sure. But he more so wounded their pride.

In my self-deception, I still thought the relationship could be saved. Jesus was clearly from God, we were teachers of the Torah…there had to be hope right? I believed that right up to the next Passover. Jesus again appeared in the courts, now declaring Himself the living water. You should have seen the faces of my brothers, they were furious. They sent guards to arrest him. When the guards came back empty handed, only with their own amazement about Jesus’ teachings, my brothers exploded in anger. I mustered up the last bit of my courage and reminded them that our investigation of his claims were still incomplete, but stopped short of saying what my heart was screaming, “he may be the one!”

I am not sure why I was surprised when they shot me down. But I did, finally know then that it was over.

I have told myself since then that I didn’t leave because I still had hope. Maybe I could do more from the inside than I could from the outside. But in reality I didn’t leave because I was a coward. When I stumbled out from my meeting with Jesus into the night…I never really left. More and more, I wanted to be born again. I was tired. I was tired of my life and my politics, but I also felt increasingly stuck in them. Not to mention that being a Jesus follower went from being crazy to dangerous.

During the trial, I just watched. Horrified, I just watched. Whatever nerve I had to speak up was lost. I was silenced. Silenced by the darkness.

It wasn’t until he was up on the cross that something happened. For years I had been living in a fog, but when I looked up at him, I remembered his words; “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,^[f] ¹⁵that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.” He told me three years prior that it would come to this. He knew. He knew me, he knew us, he knew the people. We were dying, he was the cure.

I didn’t know how to respond, but I knew Joseph was going to ask Pilate for His body. I went with him. I spent a fortune on aloes and spices. I know…too little, too late, but I had to do something! Have you been in that position; when everything becomes clear and you have to respond; even if that response seems woefully inadequate?

When I heard that he rose from the dead, my response surprised me. I believed, even when I expected to be cynical. I tried to be objective, but I knew…no, I KNOW that it is true. For the first time in…I don’t know how long, it feels like daytime. Three years ago, Jesus created a deep discontent inside of me. Now, I have no position other than being a disciple of someone the world thinks of as a failure and crackpot. My family thinks I am crazy, and many of my new brothers doubt my worthiness. In many ways I agree with both my family and fellow disciples. I think I am crazy, and I cannot say why anyone should count me worthy. But I can’t go back. I can’t go back to the darkness. I bought a tomb, and ended up more alive than I have ever been before. I will not go back.

Would Jesus Eat Frybread?

2014-01-13T21:28:00.001-08:00

Hello all.

November 8-11 I was privileged to take a University of Idaho student to InterVarsity's national Native American Student Conference entitled "Would Jesus Eat Frybread?". WJEF (as I will now call it for short), was hosted in the Yakama Nation. I have been thinking about how to process my experience into words for awhile. This is in part as a result of a busy fall, and in part because my experience was so multi-layered. As a result, forgive me for choosing to reflect on my disjointed thoughts with bullet points.

Why have a Native student conference? Because it is extremely necessary. Less than 1% of students on campus are Native. Many come from reservation life, which I am learning, is very different than any other culture in America. Many students who came to WJEF are the only Native students in their IV chapter (this is the case for the student I took from Idaho). The questions that they are asking cannot be adequately addressed by a Christian who does not have experience on the Res, no matter how well meaning that person may be.
What happens at Native student conference? Here is where I need to make a confession, WJEF was the most cross cultural experience of my life. More so than being in China for six weeks and more so than living in a Latino neighborhood in the southside of Chicago. I first noticed that there was no powerpoint! Not even one slide! If you have been to a Christian conference before, you know how strange this is. Worship was led by an amazing women of God (Cheryl Bear. Google her and buy her music.). She led not only through music, but through stories. She told personal stories, she told the story of God and she exhorted students to follow God. She spoke directly (and sarcastically!) about how to reconcile ancestor worship and the "great cloud of witnesses" in Hebrews. In China I spent most of time in a classroom and in Chicago my church resembled churches I had grown up in (albeit in Spanish rather than English). WJEF, on the other hand, had very few of the trappings and rhythms that this "professional Christian" was used to. I had no idea how much I have began to assume that I will be an expert and Christian events. Lord have mercy.
What am I taking away? More than I think I know. First of all, I have precious friend in this Idaho student. I am so honored that I was able to share the weekend with her. I am also challenged in how I see God. My prayer life is often rich in requests, questions and friendly familiarity (all important components of a relationship with Jesus). At WJEF though, I saw a prayer world that was filled with awe and gratitude; awe that God was powerful enough to create all that we can see and interact with and gratitude that we have a land and creation to occupy. For both our hosts from the Yakama Nation and from leadership from the outside was a constant reminder of the blessing of the land. Even though these were the First Nation Peoples of the land, no one seemed to treat the land with entitlement. This posture convicts me about my own entitlement and how that alters the way that I approach God and His blessings.
What's next? God has opened an amazing door at Heritage College, which located in the Yakama Nation. Two students have decided that they would like to plant a Bible study and would like InterVarsity to come along side them with training and support. I will be traveling to Heritage on January 26 and I would invite anyone who is reading this to pray! I am honored that I will once again be a guest in the Yakama Nation. I am hoping to continue to learn, pray and serve in any capacity that I can going forward!

Please don't read this blog and think that you know what God is doing among Native students. I am so young in this process. Please visit http://mem.intervarsity.org/nm/about-native-ministries for more information about IV's work with Native students. Also, go to http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/CherylBear to buy some Cheryl Bear music.

And of course, a picture:

sometimes you just need to yell at God during a thunderstorm

2013-08-26T00:58:00.001-07:00

Prayer is really weird.

Best I can tell, if God doesn't exist I am going to have spent thousands of years of my life talking to:

my hands
the inside of my eyelids
car windshields
hot coffee/tea
walls
my bible

...and tonight a thunderstorm.

If God is real though, I will have spent such a small portion of my life talking to and listening to the only one who matters.

Either way (talking to inanimate objects or the author of everything ever) it seems dumb how sanitized my prayers are. If I am usually praying to a windshield, I doubt that the windshield cares much about my diction or whether or not I use some salty language. I cannot fathom that my coffee cup cares if my laments make sense, or if they are petty.

I also cannot really see how God would care either.

Don't get me wrong, I am quite sure that God cares that I pray and the content of my prayers. I am just not sure that God is easily offended or turned off by the content of the prayers. If God really is the author, he is in the heads of his characters. I am already known. "Thou's", "oughts" aren't going to fool him. Neither are worthless and meaningless platitudes like, "but I know you care". I am sure he does, but when I am uttering that line, I rarely believe he does. Who wants a God who is so easily buttered up?

This week, my small group is supposed to be working on prayer. I doubted that I would find this week so difficult. In my head it seems easy to be honest and even vulgar with one who knows my inner vulgarity. Yet when I close my eyes (or bow my head, or whatever) I find myself often incapable of actual honesty. All the formality and hypocrisy that so appalled me in my early Christian days takes over in me. Rather than honesty, I become tongue-tied.

But, when faced with a thunderstorm tonight, it seemed easier. Something about the violence of the scene before me made it easier to pray the violent, angry prayers in my own heart. They came out of me like vomit. All of my internal anger found external expression. Somehow, I was able to believe that the God of the lightning I could see and the thunder I could hear would appreciate those prayers. I worry that if I am unfiltered that I am going to hurt people and break relationships. For once, I wasn't worried about breaking relationship with God.

Maybe part of prayer is to daily affirm that God can handle our crap. That he is not unaffected by us. He hears the cry of his people, even if the rest of the world wouldn't find those cries to be very important.

I am not feeling thankful for as much as I ought today. Gratefulness is not my strongest virtue. But today I am thankful for this; I am thankful for the God who hears.

writing stuff

2013-08-15T08:53:00.002-07:00

For as long as I can remember, I have thought of myself as a decent writer, who could become a good writer if I tried. Of course, I have never really tried.

There is power in this way of thinking. I could be good at something, if I tried to be good at something. If you don't try, you don't have to fail. If you never fail, you always could have succeeded. It is a vicious cycle, but one that I unfortunately know too well.

When I was a freshman in college, I watched the movie, then devoured the book High Fidelity. The book centers around a thirtysomething man who owns a record shop. He is a sharp musical critic, who analyzes everything in his life through his harsh critical lens. He is also profoundly unhappy. This book was actually essential in my journey towards following Jesus. It helped me see that most of what was keeping me from Jesus was my harsh criticism of other people, people who were trying, but often failing at living virtuously. Like in High Fidelity, I had to come to the point of recognizing that those who tried, failed and kept trying were significantly ahead of me; the critic who shielded himself in self perceived untapped potential.

Back to writing. Here are the excuses I make not to write:

"I don't have time". False. I have time. I work out. I watch sports. I play Words with Friends. I have time. I don't make time. But that is an entirely different issue.
"I have nothing to say." Listen, everyone gets blocked. Our ideas get blocked, ambition gets blocked, even bowels get blocked. The reality is though that creativity spurs creativity. I used to be able to run 7-10 miles. I now can run 2. However, if I ran 2 miles everyday this week, I could probably run 3 next week, and so on.
"The world doesn't need another Christian no-it-all book/blog/tumblr/etc". Here is where it really is.

I think of writing externally, not internally. Before I sit down to write, I think about the audience first. I try to imagine what no one else has said. I (rightly) conclude that everything has already been said.

But here is the rub, I think that I still need to say it. I have thought about writing or being a writer since I was 10 years old. That is 22 years! My writing dream can order a drink. By comparison, I have known my wife for 12 years. I graduated from college 10 years ago. I have followed Jesus for 14 years. My thought of being a writer is older than all but one of my friendships.

I don't think it would be healthy to allow another 20 years to pass or critiquing others or wondering if I could actually do that thing.

So I will try to be here more. I will try to extract more thoughts from my head and see if I can get any better at the process. If you enjoy it, let me know. If you see things I can improve on, also let me know, but nicely. I'm in a vulnerable state with all of this. If there is a dream delayed for you and you want to give it a shot, let me know...it's fun to embark on the journey together!

poor in spirit

2013-05-11T16:12:00.001-07:00

"I am just not happy right now. I haven't been for awhile"

I couldn't believe I was saying those words out loud. Even as I said them to Donan, I felt like I needed to stop. Those are bad words. Those are not the words that she wants to hear. Not the words that I want to hear. Not how I am supposed to feel. Being unhappy is not allowed for me.

I have spent a good chunk of my life not happy. My junior high years were very rough. My shyness was so crippling that I had very few friends. I strongly disliked myself, mostly my body. Like most kids that age, I always felt like everyone else around me got the joke and I was lagging behind. My general funk got so crippling that my grades became dangerously low. My parents became worried enough that they asked me if I wanted to go to a smaller private school.

High school had been where the fog began to lift. I took high school as an opportunity to reinvent myself (or would "re-brand" be a more relevant term?). The process was clumsy. I still rarely felt like I was in step with those around me, but I was closer. I was listening to the right music and wearing the right clothes. I also learned how to cynically dismiss endeavors that I was not gifted at (sports teams, mostly). I was able to build a community of friends and even upgrade occasionally to more socially acceptable friends. But was I happy? More so than before. I was still haunted by comparison with more socially able and athletically gifted friends, but like most teens, it was amazing to have even a few people to sort through life with.

Going into college, I had no grand plan to re-brand myself. Quite the opposite actually, I strived to hold on tightly to the friendships that I had established in high school. I would room with a high school friend, keep my high school girlfriend and in no way risk falling back into the junior high abyss of loneliness. If you know me, then you know where this story is heading. My high school friend left first semester (though he would return, graduate and is now quite successful) and my relationship wouldn't make it until Christmas. I did however, make the most significant life change imaginable, I decided to follow Jesus.

To this point, my view of happiness was usually dictated by my relational networks. The more alone I was, the more unhappy I was. Relationships were my lifeline. I drowned without them. Deciding to follow Jesus changed the script. Rather than external relationships, I was compelled to seek out the promise of internal change and a focus seeing God's Kingdom in the world. In short, I was seeking purpose more than relationships. So...did it make me happy? Actually, yes! Like many converts I got my share of "what happened to you?" comments(I am pretty sure that most were meant in a positive manner). I passionately began leading bible studies and participating in mission. Now I had my fair share of angst, but I can say without hesitation that following Jesus in college was a more vibrant and alive period of my life than any time that preceded it. As an added bonus, I gained (and maintained) many relationships in the midst of it all. I had more peace internally (Jesus!), more purpose externally (the Kingdom) and more people to walk through life with than ever before (community). The mix seemed perfect. I now work with college students, hoping that they will experience the same transformation with Jesus, His Kingdom and community that I did. It's been 10 years since I graduated. My whole life has been shaped by a little Bible study in Stephenson North in the fall of 1999. No regrets. I love my job. This transformation in my passion.

So why then, in 2013 do I feel more like the lonely junior higher than the wide-eyed college student? Honestly, I have no idea. Am I working too hard? (maybe, but hours have rarely bothered me) Do I need a vacation? (yeah) Do I have some undiagnosed medical malady (possible) Am I 9 months into a new job and not know what I am doing? (true and oddly specific) Trust me, since I finally admitted to being unhappy I have spent many hours trying to self-diagnose. Sometimes I feel like I am especially prone to spiritual hypochondria. As I have been digging into scripture though, I have begun to wonder if my fundamental question is actually wrong. I have been asking, "why am I not happy?". The reality is that is very close to an unanswerable question. I didn't decide to follow Jesus to become happy, I chose to follow Jesus because I became convinced that He was God and that He wanted me to follow Him. Did I have expectations on how that would effect me feelings? Sure, but when you feel like you are encountering the supernatural God it is difficult to dictate terms. I think the question that scripture has been pointing me towards is, "why do I think that I am not allowed to be unhappy?". When I think about my unhappiness, I don't generally ask "what's wrong?", but instead "what's wrong with me?". Being unhappy makes me feel like a hypocrite. Makes me feel like a fraud. My emotional state so vastly improved upon becoming a Christian, that unhappiness makes me feel like something is wrong with faith life. Somehow, somewhere inside of me saying "I am not happy", became akin to not believing in Jesus anymore. Can you see the danger in this? If following Jesus is synonymous with happiness, then it's just a short road to Christians needing to be the most put together people in the room. They need to be successful, their kids need to be clean and their attitude needs always remain upbeat and pure. In fact, as I look back on the last several months I can see how I attempted to control all of these areas of my life. If I couldn't be happy, I could at least look like a Christian should. In the face of this though, I come to the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). Even if you haven't studied or read these chapters, you kinda know them. Love your enemies? In there. Don't judge? Yup. Turn the other cheek? You betcha. This sermon is Jesus' introduction to the Kingdom and what Kingdom living looks like. It is beautiful, fierce and completely upside down. No one is excluded from the hope it offers or its fierce correction. And Jesus begins with a simple phrase: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven". I will not get into all the different definitions of "poor in spirit" and give then one that I find most accurate; the spiritually bankrupt. Now I don't think being spiritually bankrupt is a goal, but I do think that Jesus is saying that spiritually bankruptcy doesn't disappoint or scare off Jesus. In fact, I believe is saying that the Kingdom He is building is for people that are emptied out. I know that this is a cliche for many of us, but how many times have you gone to church empty, tired, doubting and just barely holding on and felt out of place among the smiling happy people? How is it that Jesus says church should be where you feel at home? As I take into account my present unhappiness, my unhealthy coping and scripture, I wonder how long I have been a false happy face making people just as spiritually bankrupt as me feel like they don't belong? It's one thing to complain that church (or InterVarsity chapters...) are fake, it's another to rebelliously be real. Especially when being honest feels exhausting and you are constantly wondering "what's wrong with me?". I have been amazed how much of a relief it has been to not try and be happy, and how freeing has been to see that attempts to rebuild happiness are often antithetical to Christian faithfulness. This is a long post. I think I will stop. I have more to say. I suppose that the point of blogging is that you don't have to say it all at once. I will try to remember to keep up blogging. If you read this all, thank you. I mean it.

Victimized vs Protected

2012-12-14T14:43:00.002-08:00

"I see myself as these girls protector. As a man, that makes me feel good."

My friend Troy said those words last week. Troy started an organization with the simple vision of providing young girls who are destined for forced marriage or brothel work a way to be educated instead. He works to trade brothel life for real life. I like that he does that and I was inspired by his work.

I was also struck by his perspective about how is gender is tied to his calling. He is not ignorant. He knows that these girls are being led into brothels in order to satiate the sinful desires of men. He also knows (and articulated) that there is not as large of a chasm between lustfully staring at video online and actually purchasing a real girl. The line that we pretend exists is not as fully formed as most of us would like to believe. Troy sees his work as actively rebelling against his own sin and the sin of ilk. I find that much more appealing than simply trying not to fail. I guess I like action.

I have been thinking about Troy today as I have been trying to sort through my emotions after the shootings in Oregon and now Connecticut. I realized that when I heard that the shooters were young men it barely registered. Of course they were young men. Just like the shooters at Columbine. And Timothy McVeigh. And most of the perpetrators and violent and sexual crime.

As a campus missionary, I spend quite a bit of time thinking about young guys. Young guys are increasingly absent from Christian community. Young guys are also increasingly absent to their families. Don't get me wrong, some young guys are awesome. My friend Andrew is leaving Pullman today as a new graduate. He is a man of God and a man of integrity. I know many guys like him at WSU and Whitman. But I also know droves of men who simply refuse to grow up. They don't know if they have what it takes, and seem disinterested in finding out. Video games trump real experiences and women exist for their pleasure.

My last year in college I led a men's bible study. Let me tell you, I knew what men on campus needed. I knew how they had fallen short. I was going to be the guy to call them out. Many good things came out of that study. People decided to follow Jesus and a critical mass of men came together each week. But as the year wore on, I noticed that my definition of masculinity was narrow. It was so narrow, that guys either found themselves unwelcome in the community, or subtly pushed into faking their own masculinity in order to belong. As a result, I have mostly put men's ministry on the back burner since. After all, if I don't have the answers, then what do I have to contribute?

Lately, I have been trying to repent of that attitude. Even before Troy spoke, I felt a stirring inside of me. What about men? If church is not reaching them, then what will? I feel this even more strongly today.

The reality is, for millions of people in the world, men are the perpetrators of violence towards them. Whether that person in a young girl in Bangladesh or a child survivor in Connecticut. Troy's role as protector is increasingly not how men are perceived. We are the depraved and absent ones, not the ones who fight to be a voice for the voiceless or protectors of the weak. This is sad.

I know that many of my female friends may exclaim, "I don't need to be protected!". And for many of them, this may be true. For some of my guy friends, they may feel insecure about their manhood or physical prowess. Guess what, me too! I believe that biblical masculinity is not synonymous with misogyny. I have been led by, as well as leading women. I wouldn't have it any other way.

I am certainly not arguing for violence. Jesus says, "Those who live by the sword, will die by the sword.". I happen to agree with him. I am talking about using worldly power for other people's gain. I am talking about being present to families and communities. I am talking about bringing up uncomfortable topics because it is the right thing to do. I am talking about praying with urgency because these are urgent times that require heart and soul engagement.

I know for some people, this is the last week for the whole world. For others, we are in a period of "rebirth". Personally, I try not to assign special meaning to numbers or dates (plus I happen to think that Jesus meant it when he said "no one will know the time or date"). But I do sense a quiet desperation in people who just feel hopeless. Job market sucks, apparently we are going over a fiscal cliff, the Middle East is increasingly violent and North Korea is launching rockets. It feels safer to remain disengaged, or to retreat into realities that you feel like you can do something in (see: games, video).

Troy went to law school and found some girls that needed help. What will I do? Who will I fight for?

Peter was a loud-mouthed coward, who became the "Rock" and could be counted on to lead a church.

Jacob was a slimy mama's boy, who became someone who could wrestle with God.

Moses was an ill-tempered rich kid, who became was able to lead people through harsh desert life for 40 years.

I want to know less about who I have been and more about the man I am becoming. And I want some guys to walk with me in the process.

Whose coming with?

2012-04-10T09:41:00.002-07:00

confronted with my own pettiness

On Saturday, I called the Verizon customer service line with a legitimate complaint. My voicemail had been on the fritz for a couple of days, leaving people unable to leave me messages. I also mentioned some issues that I had been having with my GPS. The GPS issue was secondary and I am not even sure why I mentioned it. Then something interesting happened, the operator mentioned that I may be eligible for a replacement phone if we couldn't get the GPS working.

A new phone? For me? Why thank you!

Suddenly I thought to myself, "what if they are out of my phone? Could I receive a better phone? More RAM? A front-facing camera?". My thoughts went from the legitimate, to a lustful wanting, almost immediately.

Then I was connected with an IT guy who immediately annoyed me. He wasn't rude, mean or dismissive. He was knowledgeable. He knew how to make my phone work better. He understood the issues and gave sound advice on how to get it running again. He knew how to ensure that I would not need a replacement device.

I tried to be gracious, but I was unhappy. This person was costing me something new and something shinny. I started asking questions. I asked why this didn't work or that didn't work. He answered all my questions and proved to be very helpful.

Then he asked about my voicemail. I realized I had almost forgotten why I called. So he tested my voicemail and heard: "Hello, you have reached Jeremiah with Intervarsity Christian Fellowship at Washington State University...". He asked me what I did for a living and what Intervarsity was. As I replied, his voice changed. He proceeded to tell me how necessary I was and how college students needed Christian mentors. He talked about how important Christian mentors were to him in college and how he is a member of his local church because of the Christian community he had in college.

In that moment I realized the extent to which my own greed and materialism had blind me to the human being on the other end of the phone. In my lust, I had de-humanized someone. My desire for something new was no different than looking at pornography; I had allowed someone else's humanness to diminish to fulfill one of my wants.

I felt small, but also grateful. God knows my needs and how and where to communicate with me. I can only hope, that I can learn from my father how to instruct and correct Moira as well and as patiently as my Divine Father leads me.

What my Daughter's Middle Name Means

2012-02-02T17:03:00.001-08:00

Moira Grace Nealon was born on January 22 at 8:02 pm. She has immediately changed my life...I quipped two days after she was born that her birth marked the death of my cynicism. Thankfully, this has continued to be true.

This post is about her middle name, "Grace". Like most parents, I hope that her name will mean something. In the Bible, often names prove to be descriptive. Jacob was born clutching Esau's heel, so he his name means "heel" (is there any wonder that he needed to be renamed by God?). Donan and I long that Grace will be more than a pretty middle name that rolls off the tongue. We hope that it will describe God's hand in her life.

Quick background, I have spent much of the past year exploring the idea of grace. While I have been a Christian for 12 years now, I felt like my understanding of grace was very limited. I was a Christian to make the world better, but was lacking in understanding in just what force God was using to change our world.

I believe that Grace is the most powerful force in the Universe. I believe Grace is the essence of God's plan for the restoration of everything that has ever been made. I believe that Grace gives weight and importance to every action that occurs on our planet. I believe that Grace is evidence of the existence of sin and the offer of real forgiveness. I believe that Grace can accomplish more than war ever can. I believe that Grace erodes what fear establishes. I believe that Grace undermines every scheme to enslave humanity in bitterness. I believe that without Grace, there is no such thing as hope.

I believe that Grace is done a disservice when it is applied to dance routines and beauty pageants. While my daughter is a beautiful girl, I do not believe that Grace is inherently feminine.

I believe that Grace is misunderstood. Too often we treat Grace like it is a tool that we can wield, choosing who to give it to and to hold it back from. In reality, Grace is a force that we either can resist or embrace. To embrace it, is to get lost it. Grace defines us, we never get to define Grace.

Grace is evidence that our lives matter to God. Our sins and failures mean so much that they need to be atoned. OUr inherent value to God is so high that He is willing to die to restore us. Grace doesn't mean that in the end nothing matters, it actually proves that everything matters.

I hope and I pray that my daughter will allow herself to be embraced by Grace. I want Grace to protect her from a merit-based view of the world. I long for her to never know the sting of unforgiveness or to be poisoned from the inside-out by a grudge. I hope that Grace enables her to treat every person with value and to know that her value is entirely derived by how God sees her.

From the time that Donan found out she was pregnant, in the womb I would tell Moira that she could not earn my love. Good grades and perfect behavior would never secure my love. In contrast, rebellion and sin would never cost her my love. I pledged to her that I would strive, to the best of my feeble ability, to demonstrate the Grace of her perfect Father.

So that is what Moira's middle name means. Her name is hope. I tell her that her middle name is the most powerful force in the universe...and I mean it. All I can do is pray that she will be defined not by the "un-grace" of the world, but the eternal wave of Grace unleashed by Jesus.

Gen 26

Optishokz Revvez Review

Optishokz Revvez

In the Box

Fit

Battery

Style

Connectivity

Sound

Who Are These For Anyway?

Hello, Goodbye

Post Sabbatical Changes: Photography

If you think that Luke Cage is too black...

How to be a Big Vegan (who eats fish)

Durant

Commencement talk

I don't have much to say

"Lord, help me to see"

Alethea

Terlona

Uriel

Brittney

Legacy of Calling

Pain

Why I have been posting about Mike Brown, Eric Garner and Tamir Rice

"God is Not Dead" and the Danger of Provoking Christians

Nicodemus

Would Jesus Eat Frybread?

sometimes you just need to yell at God during a thunderstorm

writing stuff

poor in spirit

Victimized vs Protected

What my Daughter&apos;s Middle Name Means

What my Daughter's Middle Name Means