The Good Ship Horvath

There's something about Mary...

2010-12-14T15:52:00.000-08:00

*This is a talk repost from last year in honor of Advent :)
The Never-Ending Story

*Play Never-Ending Story Movie Clip*

Bastian:
What's that book about?

Coreander:
Oh, this is something special.

Bastian:
(Bastian moves in closer.) Well, what is it ?

Coreander:
Look. Your books are safe. While you're reading them you get to become Tarzan or Robinson Crusoe.

Bastian:
But that's what I like about them.

Coreander:
Yes, but afterwards you get to be a little boy again.

Bastian:
What do you mean?

Coreander:
Listen (he motions for him to come nearer.)

Coreander:
Have you ever been Captain Nemo, trapped inside your submarine while the giant squid was attacking you ?

Bastian:
Yes.

Coreander:
Weren't you afraid you couldn't escape ?

Bastian:
But it's only a story.

Coreander:
That's what I'm talking about. The ones you read are safe.

Bastian:
And that one isn't ?

Coreander:
Don't worry about it.

Bastian:
But, but you just said it was.... (the phone rings and Coreander puts the book under a newspaper to try and hide it.)

Coreander:
Forget about it. This book is not for you. (he gets up and gets the phone.)

Bastian watches him. As he talks on the phone Bastian uncovers the book. The title on the book reads, The Neverending Story. above these words is a symbol on the cover. The symbol is two snakes intertwined with each other and biting each other's tail. As the old man hangs up the phone, Bastian grabs the book and runs out.

ANGLE: Coreanders desk

On his desk in place of the book is a note pad barely legible writing on it, it reads:

"Don't worry, I'll return your book."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Those of you who know me know I have been working on something, something big. And this weekend, I finished it.

That’s right – this weekend, I finally finished watching all the seasons of Lost. I watched all the seasons over a span of about two months. I have to say that’s pretty impressive of me considering each season is about 24 episodes long. That means, since I watched the first season three times, that I have dedicated 168 hours to watching Lost over the past two months - the equivalent of having an additional half-time job. And it was so worth it. So worth it.

I’d reschedule things, flake on things, let my house go to shambles, just to watch another episode on my computer. Alone. In the dark.

I think that kind of dedication deserves a round of applause. Thank you. Thank you.

The sad thing is that this isn’t the first time I’ve done this. I’ve watched every season of 24 multiple times. I’ve been through all the seasons of Arrested Development over and over. And before that, it was Alias.

And it’s not just TV. I do the same thing with books. I consumed Twilight. Those of you who know me know I tend to get a little obsessed with Twilight. And before that, it was Harry Potter.

I love me a good story.

I think I love a story because a story, if it’s a really good story, pulls me out of myself and into the action. I can picture the characters’ faces in my mind, hear their voices, feel their feelings, and suddenly, and it happens every time, I’m one of them, at the drawbridge, yielding my sword, fighting the dragon myself.

My favorite babysitter when I was little was Liz. Liz would tell me bedtime stories every night, and guess who the main character was? Me. I was. And I was always a princess riding on a winged horse, clop clop clopping around on marble floors in my palace.

I loved marble floors. I thought marble floors were floors with actual marbles all over them. And since I loved marbles, marble floors sounded simply magical.

I like a story that can sweep me off my feet and transport me to another world, into something bigger, grander, more important than myself.

What makes a story a good story?

In Donald Miller’s latest book, he talks about the elements necessary to have a good story.

You have to have a good character. Then something has to happen to that character; a good story has action, conflict. And then the character has to be transformed. And the more unbelievable, unattainable, or challenging the conflict is, the greater the transformation and the better the story.

Miller says that “in nearly every story, the protagonist is transformed. He’s a jerk at the beginning and nice at the end, or a coward at the beginning and brave at the end. If the character doesn’t change, the story hasn’t happened yet.”

When I was a little girl, I figured I should write down my own story. We went to a lot of museums and I observed that we know about history because the people who lived the stories of history wrote them down. So I figured that since the future would probably want to know my history, I had better write it down.

So I began. I wrote about the chicken and rice I had for dinner. And the game of Jenga we played after dinner. And then my opinion on whether or not my brother should have skipped his guitar lesson.

And after awhile, I realized that my story wasn’t all that interesting. All I had was a character. But nothing was really happening.

So I started to embellish a little bit on the conflict.

And then a lot. And soon, I was a princess whose jewel-encrusted harp had been stolen by an evil troll. And I had to enlist the help of Esmeralda, the tree hollow fairy, Katie, my lady-in-waiting, and my talking orange cat, Marmalade.

I even illustrated it.

I embellished on the conflict because my real story wasn’t a very good story. It didn't have all the elements.

I’m realizing more and more that I’m not living a very good story. My story has no real action, no conflict, and therefore, no transformation. There’s no epic struggle, no Cruella DeVille, no giant whale. My story has been, so far, pretty easy. And because it’s easy, there’s no reason for me to transform. My story is pretty safe.

You know, like, when you’re watching movie trailers, the narrator comes on and says something dramatic like, “One fantastic fox. One fantastic fox’s fantastic wife, Mrs. Fox….And one swashbuckling adventure they’ll never forget!!”

My movie trailer might sound something like, “One girl. Wakes up. Walks to work. Goes home….And eats chicken and rice for dinner.” Really dramatic, right?

Yours might sound a little more exciting: “One guy. Five finals. And only one week…to take them.”

We tend to be like Bastian in the Never-Ending Story. We can read and imagine and join in the fun, but we can always close the book or flip off the television, and go back to the way things were. Our stories tend to stay pretty safe. We like it that way.

But what if that’s not the end of the story?

Let’s see what Bastian’s up to. Since our last clip, Bastian has stolen the book from Coreander’s bookstore. He’s skipped school to hide in the attic and read all day. Sounds pretty exciting, doesn’t it? And the book is fascinating; it’s all he hoped it would be. He reads about a faraway land called Fantasia. And Fantasia is being taken over by an invisible, evil force called The Nothing. The characters in the story are desperately trying to save their world to no avail. And then there’s a twist Bastian doesn’t expect. Watch what happens as he reads their conversation in the book:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Childlike Empress:
He has suffered with you. He went through everything you went through. And now, he has come here with you. He's very close listening to every word that we say.

Atreyu looks around, as does she.

Bastian:
What ?!

Two fragments of Fantasia collide and explode shaking the Tower Violently.

Atreyu:
Where is he ? If he's so close, why doesn't he arrive ?!

Childlike Empress:
He doesn't realize that he's already a part of the Neverending Story.

Atreyu:
The Neverending Story, what's that ?

Childlike Empress:
Just as he is sharing all your adventures, others are sharing his. They were with him when he hid from the boys in the bookstore.

Bastian:
But that's impossible!

Childlike Empress:
They were with him when he took the book with the Auryn symbol on the cover, in which he's reading his own story right now.

Bastian:
I can't believe it, they can't be talking about me.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The characters on the page start speaking to Bastian, and suddenly, the story isn’t just a story. Now it’s his story. And he has a role to play in it.

You see, it’s one thing to get caught up in a story as Tarzan or Robinson Crusoe or Captain Nemo, if in the end, you can close the book and go back to your life, without any wear or tear. It’s another thing altogether when the characters start speaking to you, telling you that you have an important role to play.

If you think about the nature of the Bible, God uses story after story after story to tell us what He’s up to in the world. The Bible even has stories within stories. And they have all the elements. They have good characters and conflict and transformation. The plots don’t always get resolved. The twists happen when we least expect them. There’s death and sword-fighting and giants and true love and they don’t always make it off the island.

We’re going to take a look at a story in the Bible today, one that most of us are pretty familiar with. It’s a story we don’t always think of as having all that much action, but that’s because we treat it like it’s the beginning of a story instead of right smack dab in the middle of a story that’s far from being finished. And when we read it in its entirety, we see that it’s not a safe story. It’s so much bigger, so much grander, so much more important than we can ever imagine.

Today, we’re going to talk about Mary. And Mary’s story has all the elements. Turn with me to Luke chapter 1.

26In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary.

So we have a character: Mary. We don’t know a lot about Mary, but there are a few things we can safely assume.

We know Mary was pretty young. In her time, women were married between the ages of 12 and 15. Mary was probably about your age.

She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph. And engagements during this time didn’t look like our engagements. They were as legally binding back then as marriage is today. Your parents would choose your spouse for you. Gifts would be exchanged. And a legally binding document would be drawn up, signed, sealed, and delivered.

They didn’t engage in sex until they were officially married, but the engagement itself was so binding that if a couple had to break the engagement for any reason, it would have looked like our equivalent of divorce.

So we know Mary was young. She was engaged to Joseph. She was a virgin.

Mary was also what they called an anawim, which is a very poor person. Mary was from Nazareth, a town so poor, that later in the Bible, someone says, “What good can come from Nazareth?” Nazareth was the ghetto.

So we know Mary was young. She was engaged. She was a virgin. She was poor.

And she was Jewish. And in Jewish culture, story is very important. Stories are how the Jews share their history, pass on their faith, teach life lessons. Good Jewish children would know all the stories, most of them by heart.

Mary knew all the stories. She probably loved them, had them memorized. But for Mary, the stories were safe.

So here’s Mary - a young, engaged, poor, good Jewish girl. She’s minding her own business, doing what she’s supposed to do, and suddenly, there’s a twist she doesn’t expect.

28The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." 29Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30But the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. 31You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David,33and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."

Um…what?

The characters in the story, speaking to her? Now, we have conflict.

Mary thought the story was safe. She thought the characters would remain in the submarine, fighting the squid, until she opened the book again. But suddenly here they are, telling her she’s a character in the greatest story ever told.

Suddenly, the story isn’t just a story. Now it’s her story. And she has an important role to play in it.

34"How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?"

That’s impossible. They can’t be talking about me. I’ve never been with a man. How could I be pregnant?

35The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called[c] the Son of God. 36Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. 37For nothing is impossible with God."

That’s impossible. They can’t be talking about me. And Gabriel responds, “Nothing is impossible with God.”

Mary could have just said no. She knew the story was no longer safe. She knew that there was considerable risk in joining the story.

Joseph would know the baby couldn’t be his and it would appear that Mary had been unfaithful. And unfaithful women at that time were doomed. Joseph would have every right to divorce her. And divorced women at this time didn’t have options. She would have nowhere to go, nowhere to earn money unless she were willing to do things good Jewish girls didn’t do.

But it gets worse.

Legally, Joseph would have every right to stone her publicly. She could be killed for this. Her life would inevitably change and she knew it probably wasn’t going to change for the better.

Mary could have just said no to the conflict.

But think of what she would have missed.

She would have missed incredible transformation. Mary transformed from a young, engaged, poor, good Jewish girl to being one of the most important women in the history of the world.

38"I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said." Then the angel left her.

For Mary, it was no longer just a story. It was her story. And she had an important role to play in it.

Are you at all like Mary? Are you minding your own business, doing things just the right way? Do you know all the stories? Are they safe for you?

It’s so easy for us to leave the stories on the page, on the flannel board, in the nativity scene. But what if the characters in The Story started speaking to you, beckoning to you, telling you that you have a role to play?

How would you feel?

Would you feel excited? Honored?

Confused? That’s impossible. They can’t be talking about me.

Would you feel, perhaps, as Mary felt, afraid? Knowing full well that things would change forever?

Three words of caution when you accept the invitation to join The Story:

The first is that The Story is not about you. The story wasn’t about Mary. It was never about Mary. It was always about that baby in her womb, the baby who would grow up to do so many amazing things that the Gospel of John says that if we were to try to write them all down, the whole world wouldn’t have room enough for all the books that would be written.

The Story is not about you.

The second word of caution is that you can’t be in this Story and also participate in another story. For some of you, that in and of itself, will be your conflict. Sometimes, other people, even well-meaning people, will try to write our stories for us. There are expectations about what our stories will look like. Maybe you simply have other things to do. You have finals to take and chicken and rice to eat and laundry to do.

Those aren’t bad things. Those aren’t bad things unless…

Unless you are living a story you know hasn’t been written by God.

Unless your story is already too full for you to play the role God wants you to play.

Unless you are you so busy you don’t have time to hear your Gabriel, whispering, sometimes shouting, “Greetings, favored one. The Lord is with you.”

The third word of caution is that you’re going to be transformed. And transformation is hard. Sometimes we assume that when we start following Jesus, our lives will become easier and in some ways, they will. But most of the time, when we start following Jesus, we are transformed. And transformation is hard. You’ll have to pray for your enemies and feed the hungry and sacrifice some of your wants to meet other people's needs. But it will be worth it, because the one beckoning you to The Story is Christ himself.

When I was in college, I had a friend named Grace. I knew Grace a long time before she told me her story and her story had a lot of conflict. Grace grew up in war-torn Uganda. When she was a very little girl, a rebel army started kidnapping and brainwashing children to kill each other, to kill families who resisted their rising power.

When Grace was 9 years old, she was kidnapped and her story became a horror story. She was brainwashed to kill other children. When she was 15, she was sold to a 40-year-old man who forced her to marry him. She was able to escape during an attack; she survived for three days on dirt in the woods before she was discovered by some nuns who took her in. Eventually, she made it to the United States to go to college, but she knew she had left behind millions of other children just like her.

To escape being part of a story like Grace’s, Ugandan children would walk for miles every day to go to places – hospitals, vacant schools - where they could be guarded by the government in the night. This meant that they spent much of their days walking to safety, only to sleep in very tight, dirty, cold quarters, surrounded by men with machine guns, not knowing if their families were safe at home.

Grace started to tell her story around our campus and 200 students from Gordon agreed to walk with us to Boston, to “take a stand by lying down.” We joined a movement of 80,000 people in cities all over the country to spend the night in our city centers like the children in Uganda did. We wanted to raise awareness of the way these "Invisible Children" were forced to live. For one night, we became Invisible Children ourselves.

Within a year of this night commute, most of the children in Uganda found safety in their own beds again and the need for commuting to safety was severely lessened.

Grace’s story was no longer just a story. It was our story. And we had a role to play in it.

The thing is, we still took our finals that semester. We still ate dinner and did our laundry. But that wasn’t the point for us anymore. We had been transformed. We had been invited into a better story.

So many of us are just like Mary. We’re minding our own business. We know all the stories. But the stories are safe for us. And then Jesus comes off the page and into our world and says, “You. I choose you. Come into my story.”

And suddenly it’s no longer just a story. It’s your story. And you have an important role to play in it.

How will this be, you ask? You have to stop and listen. Listen to Gabriel, listen to Jesus, telling you where you are called to serve God in this great story, because you and I each have unique roles to play and if you're not playing your role, no one else will. When we do, when we accept Christ's invitation, nothing, nothing will be impossible for us.

Welcome to The Story.

If and Yet

2010-02-19T18:03:00.000-08:00

*I wrote this for a friend yesterday but it was a message I needed to hear, too.

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.

During the fourth watch of the night Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. "It's a ghost," they said, and cried out in fear.

This is a Story about Fear. And I know fear today – it is the emotion that woke me up in the middle of the night last night, the emotion that drives the tap of my foot on the floor and the flicker of my fingers on the keyboard as I write this right now. My body is shaking with fear. And yours, I’d imagine, is shaking with pain and fear ten thousand times more than I can even imagine. Still I know that Jesus, in the midst of our fear, is walking toward us on the water. Even when we can’t recognize Him for the wind and the waves, it's Him. It’s Him.

And it's at this point, at the height of fear, that Jesus says something important to His disciples, to me, to you:

"Take courage! I am. Don't be afraid."

Amidst all the hundreds and some-odd commandments in the Bible, this one comes up by far the most: “Do. Not. Fear.”

He knows we will. We will fear. The whole world makes us afraid, the waiting room makes us afraid, the verdict, the answer, the diagnosis, the wind and the waves, they all make us afraid. And He knows it.

So He reassures us. Take courage. Don’t be afraid. Because, He says, I Am.

What he says is ego eimi , the same name God revealed to Moses at the burning bush. Take courage, friend, because I am God. Ssshhh. Calm down. I am.

"Lord, if it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the water."

There’s an important word in Peter’s response: If. If it’s you…And that word, if, is dripping with fear and doubt.

It’s as if Peter is saying, “Never mind that just yesterday, you fed 5,000 people with just a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish. Never mind that you’re walking on water. If you’re God, make me do it, too. If you’re God, prove it.”

If is used this way several other times in Matthew – the first few occur when Satan is tempting Jesus in the desert. The last, when Jesus is hanging on the cross. If you are the son of God, come down. If you’re God, prove it.

And Jesus responds.

"Come."

Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, "Lord, save me!"

Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. "You of little faith," he said, "why did you doubt?"

It takes courage to walk toward Jesus in the midst of fear, in what seems like an impossible situation, when maybe you’re not even sure if it’s really Him. But Peter steps out of the boat onto the water.

And sinks.

And Jesus catches him.

Yet Peter fears again. He denies Jesus three times because he’s afraid of the consequences of being identified with Him. Faith doesn't always banish our fear. But it does teach us whose hand will catch us when we’re falling.

When I was a little girl, I was afraid of being sucked down the toilet. And I thought that, perhaps, a snake might come out of the electrical outlet (teeth through the little holes). Also, I feared spidies. As I got older, my fears changed. I feared being abandoned, being rejected, losing people I loved. Today I am afraid of change.

Faith doesn't always banish our fear. But it does teach us whose hand will catch us when we’re falling.

This Story is Our Story. Because if we’re really honest with ourselves, so much of our fear comes from the if. We fear that His promises won't stand on water.

Lord, if it’s you, tell me to come to you.

And He says Come.

Because it’s Him. It really is Him.

We can rest assured that though we fear and will fear again, there is one whose hand will catch us when we’re falling.

When we take that hand, then our fear takes on a different form. Because if He is indeed who He says He is, if He really is the Great I Am, we will fear Him. And our fear becomes worship.

There’s a passage about fear of the Lord in Deuteronomy 10:

To the LORD your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it. Yet the LORD set his affection on your forefathers and loved them, and he chose you…

For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome… He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing… Fear the LORD your God and serve him.

To the Lord our God belong the heavens. And not just the normal heavens, but the highest ones, too. He is indeed the God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome. And I am none of those things.

The thought of this great and glorious one who can control the wind and the water, who is in fact sitting in my booth with me right now, that thought is terrifying to me.

But there’s a yet in this passage. And I adore the yet. The yet reminds me that however powerful and wonderful He is, He remembers me.

To the LORD your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it...

Yet…

the LORD chose you...

This is a Story about You. Everywhere in Scripture, we see this big and powerful God who loves the small things, all the little things. He loves everything every day that “brightens your eyes, the “Ah-Ha!” moments you have while washing your hair, the case of the giggles you get for no particular reason, the sunsets you take pictures of while stuck in traffic.” And in the midst of the big things, the scary things, the wind and the waves, and all the what ifs, the Lord chose you…

Deuteronomy says to fear Him and fear Him we should. He is the God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome…

Yet…

He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing.

He is a God clothed in splendor and wrapped in unapproachable light...

Yet…

He heals the sick by the hem of His garment.

He is the Great I Am. He is eternal and all-powerful and everywhere all the time...

Yet…

He calls you His beloved one.

He can control the wind and waves...

Yet…

He’ll reach out His hand when you’re scared and sinking, saying, “Ssshhhhh, calm down. Don’t be afraid. I Am.”

And He is. He is. Even when we don't recognize Him over the wind and the waves, when we don’t know if His promises will stand on the water, He is.

Faith doesn't always banish our fear. But it does tell us whose hand will catch us when we’re falling.

Don't be afraid, my friend. Take courage. He is.

-------------------------------
*The citations didn't really show up right on the blog, but here they are anyway.
Matthew 14:22-26
Matthew 14:27
Scott Hoezee, Walking on Water, Pulling on Oars: Http://www.calvincrc.org/sermons/2002/matthew14.html
Matthew 14:28
Scott Hoezee, Walking on Water, Pulling on Oars: Http://www.calvincrc.org/sermons/2002/matthew14.html
Matthew 14:29-31
Deuteronomy 10:14-15, 17-18, 20
Scudder, Katie, “The Little Things” (paraphrased).
Psalm 104:1
1 Timothy 6:16

Now I’m Found: An Interview with the Lost Boys of Sudan

2009-12-06T12:34:00.000-08:00

“For you have delivered me from death and my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before God in the light of life…” Psalm 56: 13

In 1987, extremist Islamic government forces from the north displaced nearly 17,000 boys from the southern part of Sudan. These boys, all under the age of fifteen, fled on foot to escape slavery and death, grieving for lost parents, brothers, and sisters. Many walked over 1,000 miles barefoot through desert and jungle. They finally made it to Ethiopia, only to be forced out at gunpoint when the Ethiopian government became unstable four years later. Over 2,000 boys drowned trying to cross the Gilo River out of Ethiopia and about 5,000 perished from wild animals, disease, hunger, thirst, or gunfire.
In 1992, survivors finally arrived at the Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, where they lived for 9 years on one cup of maize and flour a day. Some of their sisters made it to refugee camps but very few. Most young girls were raped, killed, or sold into slavery in the north. In the midst of all of these hardships, survivor Jacob Puka never lost faith that “God was the only One guiding us through the wilderness. We were lost to our families but we were never lost to God.”
James Ariath, John Gak, David Mand, and Santino Wach are among the survivors who were brought to the United States by the United Nations in 2001. James reminded us that this interview records only a part of the history. If we try to write the whole thing down, he said, we will write until tomorrow.

BH: Thank you for meeting with us and sharing your stories. Will you tell us a little bit what happened to you after the war broke out?

James: The complete history is too long to tell. Some people thought that God forgot us. This is not something we planned but sometimes I think God planned it.

BH: You were all very little when the war started. Do you know how old you were?

Santino: I don’t know exactly my age. I was probably about 5 years old.

At that time, the Khartoum government attacked our village. I woke up and then I ran to go and hide because the sound of the bombing and the planes really terrified me. They were trying to get me but they did not get me.

John: We left the country. It wasn’t a choice. When we left, we felt like we would come back in the evening. Then two days down the road, we knew we had left the country.

Since we had no choice, we just walked by day until we happened to be in Ethiopia, but we didn’t know we were in that country at first. We went slowly by night until we could hear people speaking a different dialect so we knew we were in a different place. It took me a month, personally, to walk to Ethiopia.

BH: John, do you know how old you were at this point?

John: I was seven.

James: I walked 1,000 miles to Ethiopia, following the eldest boys who were in charge. The oldest boys were in charge of the younger ones.

BH: What did it feel like to walk for so long?

Santino: It was very hard. My leg was swollen and I was not able to walk. It was a very bad situation.

BH: Every day, for a month, you would just wake up and walk in a line?

Santino: Yes. Sometimes, we couldn’t lie down to sleep. We would just sleepwalk.

John: In the midst of hunger, longing, and diseases, a lot of the boys fell sick and died. We would take them out and bury them but it wasn’t a fancy burial. We didn’t have any tools to use to make a deep grave and we were all very little. So animals would come in the night and cast their bodies out.

James: In that Savannah land, the tall grass grows. We had to leave dead bodies in the grass all the way to Ethiopia. Some of the boys died in the river or by crocodiles.

Santino: Whenever you are born in the war zone, it is a tough situation. People die a lot. There are a lot of people suffering over there, disabled.

BH: Do you know how many boys were walking with you?

John: There were so many of us and we came from different villages. We couldn’t walk together – we were everywhere. Nobody knows how many we were.

BH: What did you eat?

Santino: Sometimes I couldn’t find food. Sometimes I saw people eating along the way and they shared with me. Sometimes I just ate wild fruit to stay alive.

James: God is good because our land has a lot of fruits that can’t poison you.

John: We fed on everything that we could find whether we knew what it was or not – we didn’t have a choice. We ate whatever we could find that would keep us alive.

BH: What do you think sustained you when you were running? What kept you going?

John: Well, after I left the country, I had no one to rely on, no parents. But I had God and friends. So I would say God sustained me.

BH: Who introduced you to Christ?

John: Before we left Sudan, there were people going village to village proclaiming the word of God. I was busy, taking care of my parents’ house. But I heard the songs and I would always sing them. I would sneak over to the church and listen to them sing. But I wasn’t into it until I started going to church in Ethiopia to dance. They had organized groups to dance. That’s how I came to know God.

James: There were some people who knew the will of God and started preaching under the tree. They told us what the Bible said and how to sing and pray to Jesus. And they sent some priests and baptized a lot of the boys and we were able to get our Christian names. In our culture, every name has a meaning. When you choose a name, you have to know the meaning. At this time, the priests chose Christian names for us.

BH: What else happened when you were in Ethiopia?

John: Most of us made it to Ethiopia safely and we settled in the border, close to Sudan but not in Sudan. All of the lost boys settled there and lived in groups. We didn’t have anything but once in awhile, a group of five of us would be given a cup of corn for a day. If you ate it in an hour, then you spent the rest of the day without anything to eat.

Then the United Nations brought some convoys with food. Our lives changed a little bit and we started going to school. We didn’t have classrooms. We would sit under a tree and the teacher would pick up rocks and say, “Ok, this is one rock. Here are two rocks.” Soon they gave us a book to study math and we got a blackboard.

BH: Who was teaching you?

John: Boys who knew English, those who went to school back in Sudan. If you had been in first grade, you would teach first grade.

BH: So the boys would teach each other?

John: Yes. Eventually, we had Ethiopians teaching us.

In 1991, when I was in first grade, the government of Ethiopia became unstable and so our allies were no longer in office. We were forced to run out of the country. We were never in a secure area; there was a lot of bombing during this time.

This time, the United Nations were with us. So anything we needed - food, medicines, and even refugee camps - they prepared for us. They brought us to a camp called Pachala. But we knew every day the Sudanese government would come to find us so we had to leave that camp.

Two days after we left, they captured Pachala.

From there we went to Kenya with the International Committee of the Red Cross. We walked. I don’t know how many days we walked. Down the road, they sent us some trucks to go to another town that brought us to Kenya. We stayed there awhile. Then, we went to a town in Sudan, an hour away from where we settled. Soon that town was captured. Whenever they heard that we were in a new town, they went to capture that town as soon as possible.

BH: That must have been terrifying. Why do you think they were targeting you? You were just a bunch of little boys.

John: In the United States, women can go to war. But in African countries, only men fight so they wanted to kill us before we grew up and joined the rebel army. Before we left, all of the young men left the country. The fighting started in different towns because the government wanted to find soldiers in these towns. That’s why they began burning villages down.

Now that all the men had left, the boys became the men. No one over 15 years was in the country. So even though we were young, we became men.

BH: That’s a lot of responsibility.

John: Yes, but we stepped into that responsibility. In our culture, men are in charge of the family and whatever comes, they will be the first to die. It wasn’t a plan to leave. We just left when it was time. We had to run.

In Kenya, the U.N. brought food and set up water facilities to a town called Lokichiogio. But they knew that the Sudanese government had access to where we were, so they brought us to another town called Kakuma, a refugee camp. We settled here.

We began going to school at different levels and we finished High School. James and I were in the same class. I knew him back at Kakuma. He was my school captain.

Now we were at rest. There wasn’t any running and we didn’t hear bombing. But the United Nations knew that we were still not settled. So they connected with the United States to get us to a place where we could settle. At the end of 2000, the first group went to the United States. The second wave was in 2001.

BH: Is that when you came, John?

John: Yes. I was on one of the last flights.

BH: Did you want to come to the United States?

John: Even though we were told that we were going to the United States, we didn’t believe it until we set foot in the country. We thought, “Who would take care of all these people?” So when the process started, we thought we’d go for it since it didn’t cost us anything. We didn’t apply for it. It was the United Nations that decided it so we said we’d go.

BH: Did you have any choice in where you were sent in the United States?

John: No, we didn’t have any choice. We just asked to be in groups of three to five boys so we could stay with friends. I first came to live in Ohio. I stayed there for two months but because of the weather, I moved to California.

During that process, I felt that God was working. All along the way, we had people helping us until we came to the United States where we could now be at home, work, and go to school. If it wasn’t for their hearts to help God, I don’t think we could have made it up until this point.

BH: So He was watching over you the whole time?

John: That’s what I felt.

BH: Can you tell me a little bit about your experience in this country?

John: The first group that came over sent us pictures and a video saying it was like second heaven in this country. But their pictures were taken against a brick wall and we laughed because we didn’t know there were bricks in heaven!

The lifestyle here is very different and the food is different. There are so many cars here. Where we grew up, there wasn’t so much technology. The cities weren’t that much different from here, but living in a refugee camp, you can imagine how little technology we had.

BH: Did anything else surprise you coming to the United States?

John: We had read about homosexuality but it wasn’t something we knew much about. That was a surprise. It is not part of our culture. At home in Sudan, guys would put their hands around other guys or hold hands. When we first came here, people would stare at us when we did that. Later on, we found out it wasn’t something we should do.

James: I hear my classmates in America talking about how hard life is. I always tell them that they haven’t seen the hard life. They have freedom. I say, “You can go to the movies, go to class, watch TV all day, eat and drink 24 hours a day.”

I asked my professor to compare life in America today with early America and he said that this generation is wasting time and taking everything for granted. I believe that. Most of the kids going to school in America don’t go to work. Many drop out of school. I wish I were here in 1995. I should have graduated already. I think if I were born here, I would be a professor already. But it is a different life. And we are trying very hard to get enough education to bring back to our people.

BH: In general, have you been treated pretty well by Americans?

John: Generally, yes. When we first came, volunteers would take us out shopping, show us where the markets are, take us to the movies. We didn’t have jobs so we would stay in all day. But the volunteers would come and take us out. They bought us all brand new bicycles.

BH: Do you ever want to move back to the Sudan?

John: I’m not sure right now. I wonder where it would be safe for me to stay. I don’t see any stability in the country. I won’t go to stay until I see some stability. I’m okay right now, going to school and working here. I’m not thinking of going back to stay right now but I love going back to see family and friends. I went back in 2004 and again in 2006, but just to visit.

BH: Do you know where your parents are, or your brothers and sisters?

John: My elder brother left ahead of me since he was a young man. In 1991, he was killed in the fight. He was the eldest of my mother’s children. My dad had 15 children by 5 wives. Having many kids is part of the tradition and heritage in the Sudan. In Sudan, the more kids you have, the less you have to work when you are old. They are like your retirement fund. Many of my brothers have the same name as me. I haven’t met them all.

BH: So have you seen any of your brothers and sisters since 1983?

John: I saw some of them when I went back in 2004. That was the first time I had seen my mom since 1987.

BH: Do you get to talk with your mom while you are here in the United States?

John: I used to when she was in Kenya. Now that she has gone back to Sudan, it will take a while for me to talk to her. They don’t have phones in the village. The only thing that I can do is to ask my brother in Kenya to call her and see how she is doing. Or I can call my cousins in the refugee camp because they can contact the other villages with radios.

BH: What about your dad?

John: My dad passed away in 1992 in the north.

Santino: I don’t know where my parents are right now. If possible, I would like to go back and find out where they are. The last time I saw them was 1987 and I have not seen them again. That’s a long time.

Also, when we were walking, I had my brother with me but he got shot on the way and died.

BH: Do you know who shot him?

Santino: No, I did not see the person. It was nighttime.

James: My dad was killed in 1999 and my mom passed away on February 26, 2006. I hadn’t seen them since 1987 but she said she wanted to see me before she died. I sent her a letter and a picture but she didn’t believe it was me, that I was still alive. And so she asked me the name that they used to call me before, when I was little. I told her and then she was convinced that I was alive. She thought I was dead already but God had taken care of me. And I’m happy I’m still alive to tell this story.

BH: How did you keep your faith in the midst of so many difficult things?

John: I knew it was only through God. I learned this from the Bible. In Genesis, God said, “I’m your God. I’m the first, the last, the left and the right.” So I knew that wherever I was going, God was in front of me, to my right and to my left. God was my only way. I know that we call Him the God of Israel, God of Abraham, God of Jacob. All the promises that God made to them were real. I knew God delivered Israel and He would deliver me.

BH: Do you feel like you survived for a reason?

John: God has the potential of keeping you alive for His work. So I believe God kept me alive, not for my goodness, but for His work, that I would show God to others. Now I can say, “God helped me and He will help you like He helped me.”

I didn’t do anything to be alive. It’s only God’s plan. And those who died didn’t do anything to die, but it was their time. God knows my time. I felt like I would die; I was stressed and depressed and thought I wouldn’t wake tomorrow, but God knew when I would die.

David: God brought us a lot of friends to walk with us and allowed us to go to school. We’ve learned to pray and trust God. When He says come, we come. We are hoping the kingdom of God will come and when it does, we will see what we have been living for.

James: Only God empowered people to think of us suffering over in the refugee camps and bring us to the United States. That’s why we are here.

Many ask us what we are looking for. God inspired people to bring us here and maybe He wants to change the Sudan. We are the people who can bring peace to Darfur and to the whole Sudan. But there has been a lack of education. That’s why we are here working full time and still going to school. Even if we aren’t sleeping more than two or three hours a day, that’s okay.

When I was four years old, I went to school for one year. In 1983, the war broke out, so I didn’t exactly get to see the sweetness of education. Our country doesn’t have a good system of education outside of cows and farming.

That’s why I think God brought us here, to get an education and bring His word back to the people of Sudan. Sometimes, I think that this time was punishment, but God is great. Whatever His plan, we are trying to accomplish it.

BH: If you could say anything to the people who forced you out of your home, what would you say?

John: Love your neighbor as you love yourself. And at the same time, love your enemy. I know a little bit about the Koran. We interpret God’s word differently, but we can draw from what they know. I cannot slap back. I can only tell them to love their neighbors as they love themselves.

BH: What else do you think our readers should know from your experience?

John: Life is in God’s hands. How do you know you will be alive after this time? Anytime something bad happens, I may have so many questions. I might curse, wonder if I am being punished for something my dad did or my great grandparents. But I know that God has a plan and He does what is right. Because of God’s work, I am alive.

We need to believe in the things we don’t see. That’s faith. The tsunami happened, cancer happens, people are distressed, but God has a plan. Our hearts will strengthen our bodies. It is never going to be daytime all the time but we can trust that tomorrow will not be dark.

When I look back on all the things I went through, I can’t imagine how I survived them. I had a miserable time and I thought that was the end. I didn’t think there would be a better day for me. But now I know that you can have bad days and good days but in faith, your bad days can turn into better days.

Wunderbar It Is

2009-11-26T09:23:00.000-08:00

Not long after we were expelled from Eden, everyone in the world had one common language and speech. One tribe in particular gathered together all of its members and considered, “Why is it that God reserves the best part of the world for himself – the upper part – and forces us to stay down here in the lower part? Let us work together and build a city, one with a tower that climbs to the heavens so that we may be equal with God.” And together they made bricks and mortar and built a tower, a great high tower so as to be equal with God.

And God looked down from the heavens and saw the budding tip of their minaret. He saw their efforts to succeed Him, that their common language had made them proud. He saw that they could do great things for themselves, yea, great but godless too. And He saw that once they could accomplish these things they would no longer try to know Him for they would believe that the earth was their own.

So God confounded their language and separated them by tongue, tribe, and nation, and they could no longer understand each other or hope to reach heaven before eternity was theirs. And it was called Babel in that place for there was much confusion.

Au Revoir, all my brothers and sisters. Auf Wiedersehen, friends. Goodbye.

Many cultures share this story with the Jews, but as expected, everyone seems to have their own perspective. Central Americans, for instance, believe that Xelhua, one of the world’s seven giants tried to build a pyramid in order to reach heaven, but the gods destroyed it and the builders could no longer speak to one another. Herodotus places the story not in Babel but in Marduk, where there are known remnants of a once great ziggurat. The Qur’an lays the scene in the Egypt of Moses.

They are the same story, spoken through different tongues: pride always goeth before a fall and no matter how great we think we are, we will always be leveled in favor of a greater glory. We build our tawdry towers and time and time again, we watch them tumble down while we are left alone, wide-eyed and tongue-tied, to remember that we are dust.

Then the Lord stoops down and makes us great.

Many years after the Tower of Babel, the followers of Jesus stood awed, side by side in Jerusalem, watching a man who had risen from the dead ascend to heaven on a cloud. Jesus’ disciples recalled His words and finally believed them, that they will “receive power when the Holy Spirit comes…and…be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Yes, they prayed; let it be so. Help us to speak and teach us what to say. Come, Lord Jesus, come.

As they were praying, a great holy wind came and shook that place, and “tongues of fire” alighted upon each one of them. And those who knew Jesus were filled with His Spirit and glorified Him in languages that they could not before. And all were amazed for everyone there, from any tongue, tribe or nation, could understand the power of the Gospel in their own languages. Hallelujah!

In this redemptive Pentecost, the punishment of Babel is reversed; the diversity of languages is now a palimpsest of re-written history, a gift for the good of proclamation. Through Jesus, the updated manna from heaven, communication is re-opened. The Hebrews can tell the Gentiles of Jesus and His mighty deeds; the Romans and Greeks, the Pygmies and Eskimos, the French and the Welsh, all are offered the same message in different tongues.

Now we can do great things for each other, yea great, and Godly, too.

This is our blessing and our curse, the fall of the Tower of Babel, another demonstration of God’s wrath intertwined with His mercy. Here we are to this very day, we assorted, eclectic, and sundry citizens of earth, scattered and curious at the base of our tower. It is true that we have been exiled from the great high city we tried to build, and more importantly from the name we tried to make on our own. It is true that our New York skyscrapers are no match for Mount Chimborazo, that our submarines fold in the depths of the seas. And once again we’ve nothing to do but blink at the Milky Way and exclaim at our limits: “Wonderful!” “Vidunderlig!” "美妙!" “Wunderbar!”

And wunderbar it is. We are born wearing fig leaves; we are swaddled in darkness. Yet we are offered understanding and light in abundance. We who tried to reach heaven by the work of our hands, are promised that in the last days, the God who taketh our tower will replace our dumbness with a “spirit of unity…so that with one heart and one mouth” we will glorify Him. And the heavenly city we longed for will be here.

Daylight Spendings

2009-11-01T18:43:00.000-08:00

"I bloom indoors in the winter like a forced forsythia; I come in to come out. At night I read and write, and things I have never understood become clear…outside, everything has opened up. Winter clear-cuts and reseeds the easy way. Everywhere paths unclog…the woods are acres of sticks; I could walk to the Gulf of Mexico in a straight line. When the leaves fall the striptease is over; things stand mute and revealed. Everywhere skies extend, vistas deepen, walls become windows, doors open." - Annie Dillard

I love Daylight Savings because it always comes right when it’s about time for a change.

Come Spring Forward, I’m ready. Round about Easter, I’m itching to cast off woolen sweaters and scarves and finally be free to flit about in sandals and sundresses, eating my strawberries, sugar, and cream.

Come Fall Back, it’s soup for me. Soup and cider. Dresses to the birds, it’s sweaters I want. Now and forever, amen.

I like the change of seasons because it always feels like it’s about time for a change. It’s about time for it to get cold again, dark again, about time for me to sip hot cocoa and eat butternut squash until kingdom come. Or until Spring come. Whichever come first.

I was visiting with Sharol and her mother last week. Sharol has just moved into a big, beautiful house overlooking Columbia Seminary. Her mom started noting all the trees that were changing color in front of the house and said, “Those trees are so beautiful and the leaves are about to fall. Think of the view you’ll have!”

Indeed, just think of the view. When seasons change, when leaves fall, our view changes. And a change of view can be a very good thing.

I need change. But it’s not always easy for me. When I was in second grade in Mrs. Gauntner’s class, I remember she’d change our seats around every three weeks. Just as I got comfortable, everything would get disrupted and I’d have to get used to a whole new set-up, a whole new group of second graders to sit with, a whole new way of doing things, and worst of all, a whole new view of the whiteboard.

A change of view can sometimes be a very hard thing.

Enter Abraham, an age-old Patriarch from days of yore, a man well familiar with change. When we meet Abraham, he’s 75 years old, very wisened and very wealthy, settled just fine in Southern Iraq. And God comes along and says, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.”

Well, that’s a little vague. The land you will show me? And you want me to change everything about my life for it? If I were Abraham, I wouldn’t be stoked to get that call. Take your life, everything you know, and move away from it. Change it. Go to the land I will show you. Leave what you know and move. Toward. Me.

For Abraham, though he didn’t know it, it was about time for a change. And for Abraham, a change of view was a very hard thing.

But a good thing, too, because Abraham’s call came with a promise: “And all people on earth will be blessed through you…”

We know that what comes from that promise, that willingness to move, to change, to follow God, is Jesus Christ Himself, born of Abraham’s line. Indeed, we have all been blessed through Abraham, a blessing that might not have come if Abraham had stayed in Southern Iraq with his sheep and his strawberries, sugar, and cream.

I don't know about you, but I treat the story of Abraham like I treat exercise. I spend a lot of time reading about exercise but not a lot of time exercising. I know all the stories. I want to know them because they tell me who I should be, but when it comes to actually being that, to moving, to shaking, well, I'd rather wrap myself in a blankie and read more stories. So I keep looking for the stories of people like me who stayed like me and still turned out ok. I find myself in Scripture alright, in the stories about the ones who gave 10% and not a lot more, about the ones who ignored the man on the side of the road, about the ones who pray faithfully, "Thank you God for not making me like that tax collector." I find people like me everywhere in Scripture, but not in the stories with happy endings. And if I'm honest with myself, I act like the command to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength" is giving me options, as if I can pick just one.

And I can't. It's all or nothing, baby, it's that simple. Transformation is required. When we are willing to move, to change, to take the next step, to enter a new season, God moves, too. With blessing. With Jesus Christ Himself. With every new season, God changes our view. With every new seat, we learn to see the whiteboard just a little differently.

Maybe you are in the middle of a season of change. Maybe your change is a good one, like college or marriage or a precious new baby. Maybe your change is a hard one. You’re going through a death or depression or you just lost your job.

Or maybe it’s about time for a change. Maybe your life doesn’t look like you want it to look and you know God has better things for you.

Either way, know that when He calls you away from what you know, it’s because He’s calling you towards Himself. And just think of the view.

On Why the Genealogy is More Interesting than NASCAR

2009-06-30T16:01:00.000-07:00

I was in a meeting today with my boss (Joe) and my colleague (Zack) discussing important church beeswax, when all of a sudden, something snapped and everyone but me wanted to show off his knowledge of NASCAR.

We live in the south where stock cars are king, and Joe and Zack have made it a spiritual discipline to know the name, car, sponsor, and number of every driver. So, seeing as the Daytona 500 is rapidly approaching, our meeting turned into a riveting round of the "Name a Number and I'll tell you the NASCAR Driver, Car, and Sponsor" game.

Joe answered a lot of trivia correctly after only a few squabbles with Zack (who has an i-Phone and therefore knows everything), so to speed things along, I finally just asked him how many drivers he knew altogether. A lot, he said. And how many people listed in the genealogy of Matthew did he know? I asked. Not as many. Why not? Not quite as interesting, Zack said.

I couldn't agree less. It’s not that I find NASCAR wholly uninteresting, but that I find the genealogy so interesting that I'd literally tattoo it on my back if I had any pain tolerance.

But I'm an anomaly. Why would anyone actually want to read the genealogy? It's boring, isn't it? On and on and on it goes. There aren't any red letters or commandments to attract us to it. No miracles in the genealogy, no parables, no "you've heard of the old way but I tell you a new way."

Not at first glance anyway.

So we stumble through the list if we have to and pay no attention really until we get to names we know. Even then, though our ears might perk up, those names, the ones we know, hold no significance because they are bookmarked in between Jehoshaphat and Zerubablahblahblah, names that no respectable preggo actually considers anymore (like Agnes and Enid) and by the time we get to Jacob or Joseph, we're just dying to get to the next of Matthew – the Christmas story – everyone's favorite. Who doesn't love the old yarn about the starry starry silent night, the friendly ox, the twinkly-eyed magi, the baby who would rock the world?

When you think about what's coming next in the story, well, it's hard to think of the genealogy as anything of vital importance or intrigue. Sure it's in there; it has to be in there. Always has been. But it seems a little archaic, don't you think? Let's skip to the next bit, okay? The bit about stockings and snowflakes and silver bells, silver bells…

But there's a catch, you see, when we skip to the next bit. The catch is that the end doesn't make much sense without the beginning. It's kind of like "Stairway to Heaven," the genealogy is. It's tedious and sounds like the same thing over and over again. And it goes on and on and on for four and then six and then eight minutes and you wish they would just get to the good part already. But if you fast-forward to the last minute and eighteen seconds of "Stairway to Heaven," which is when Robert Plant goes nuts, or read verse 1:16 only, when Matthew announces the whole reason for the long list of branches on Jesus' family tree, if you skip past it all and just listen to the good part, you don't ever really understand the good part, do you? You have to climb up Robert Plant's long, twisty story to dance around at the top for the best minute and eighteen seconds ever. You have to walk through Matthew's Hall of Records and Vital Documents to hear Jacob's name called, and then Joseph's, and then Mary's, and finally, that clincher, that reason for all of their being, to hear the name Jesus.

Here we learn it's not just why we read the genealogy that's important, but who we read that's important. Every name in the genealogy was chosen to be part of that genealogy, chosen by one who knows every name ever, the one who could have excluded the poor and impoverished for the sake of the rich and royal. But didn't.

The names in the genealogy, like all Jewish names, are packed with meaning, stories of their own. And we have to read through the whole bloody mess of it, the parts where Abraham almost kills his only son and Jacob steals his brother's blessing, the part where Tamar seduces her father-in-law, where Rahab the prostitute saves the men of God, where David sleeps with Uriah's wife and kills him to cover it, the part where I do all these things in my heart every day, it all has to happen first, before the part where the unmarried teenager gives birth to the son of God makes any sense at all. Truly, we have to wander through a little desert to find the burning bush or the Promised Land. But it's so worth it.

There's a twist. The story we expect is not the story we get.

In the genealogy, we see a scurvy crew made into kings. We see Rahab adorned in royal ribbons. We see David, Uriah, Bathsheba, and Solomon sharing an umbrella on a rainy day. And here the unlikelies, the Jews and Gentiles, the saints and sinners, the shepherds and kings are adopted into the family of God.

And we too are invited, no matter how unlikely, unruly, unholy, unclean, to dine with Him at the table of tables. At this table, all nametags are welcome and together they’ll sit: the cowboys and Indians, the princes and paupers, the Capulets and Montegues. And we, too are offered water turned wine at the great round table.

We are Cornelius. We are ten lepers. The old way drove us to the edge of camp with the other untouchables. The new way invites us in, beaming, on the arm of the guest of honor, Himself an unlikely, God and man.

And we're not just on His arm. We are His arm, His foot, His finger, His very eyelashes. This family tree is not just a list of branches but a list of body parts. To forget about it is to forget our medical records on a trip to the doctor. When we look at this list, these stories, each other, we see nothing less than Emmanuel, God with us.

The genealogy is, every verse, red letter. It's a commandment, parable, and miracle, the curtain torn in two. It fulfills all the prophecies before we even get to the salad course, the first testament in a bread bowl. It's the genealogy that leads us from the old way to the new, the thesis statement that opens the Gospels, the character guide, the index, a family history for the God of the universe. The genealogy is, in so many words, so many unpronounceable Hebrew words, the "once upon a time" in the greatest story ever told.

Welcome, friends, to the Holiest of Holies. Christ, the Savior is born.

A List of Middle Eastern foods that will never play in the NBA

2009-02-22T12:16:00.001-08:00

1. Olives
2. A fig
3. Fal-awful players (hahaha. Good one, Brynn)
4. Benshawarmas

South Mouth

2009-02-13T21:11:00.000-08:00

Everywhere in the world, when you meet someone for the first time, you say, “Nice to meet you.” But in the south, you say, “Nice to see you.” It can be very confusing.

Ask any southerner and they’ll deny this is true. But they all do it.

Yesterday, I met a woman I was sure I’d met before. But I wasn’t that sure. Mostly sure. She looked really familiar but she acted like we hadn’t met before and introduced herself to me. So you know what I said? "Nice to see you." As if we’d been friends for years. What was I born in a barn?

I'm starting with the Brynn in the mirror

2009-02-11T14:38:00.000-08:00

So now I have a blog. Now I always have something to do and I'm prepared to be quite obnoxious about it. But in the past 15 minutes, I've checked my blog here seven times to see if anything new has been posted, as if some secret twin Brynn has been sitting here posting new entries to surprise me. No, Brynn. Nothing new's been posted.

Well, I guess now something has been. Happy reading, Future Brynn.

There's Treasure Everywhere

2009-02-11T12:08:00.000-08:00

A few months ago, as Aaron and I were setting up our house, we stumbled upon a treasure in an antique store that clearly didn't know what it had: a complete collection of the Great Books of the Western World. We are on a strict budget like most young marrieds, but we needed them. So we took the money we were saving for a couch and we bought the Great Books instead. We just had to read them on the floor for a little while.

The Great Books come with a 10-year reading plan, and since I hope to one day write a great book myself, I thought yesterday that maybe it was time to start cracking on them. Trouble is, they start you right off the bat with Plato's Apology - can't they ease you into it all with something lighter like Calvin and Hobbes?

Summertime and the Livin's Easy, Part Deux

2008-08-20T11:58:00.000-07:00

We hope y'all like your tea sweet and your chicken fried. Cuz you're about to get a fresh glass of iced Georgia goodness from our wraparound porch to yours.

To catch you up on our summer so far, I'll make like a true Southern Belle and talk about the weather. And my, oh my, the weather. Over the past two months, we've all but melted in the heat of the noonday sun and also the heat of the midnight moon. We've celebrated rainy days with indoor picnics, walked in the park (twice), and danced under the starlit sky.

We watched the new Batman thriller on a dark (k)night and finally lost interest in Lost (ok, just Brynn did that. Aaron has yet to find interest in it). We watched "High School Musical" One and Two (Extended Versions) over kettle corn and sour patch kids and other healthy snacks. Oh, and in case you wanted to know, I learned from my high school girls why "High School Musical" is so good. Cuz Zac Efron. Just in case you had wanted to know. That's why.

Our athleticism has been thriving: we got a TV and a couch just in time for the Olympics. Last week, we met the CEO of the Braves, either because we are so important to the world of baseball or because we were eating lunch at the same cafe as him one time. You decide.* More than once, Aaron has been called a "Yankee" by southerners and we have always responded with perfect clarity that though Aaron is from the North, he is NOT and will never be a Yankee. He is a Red Sox, if anything.

I spent a glorious week dodging chiggers and ticks at Hard Labor Creek State Park with our high school students, learning to line dance and talk country and jump into a boiling hot lake that gives you a nice coat of dirt just in case you were cold. Which you weren't. My favorite night of the week was game night. For goodness' sake, I have never seen so much chaos in all my years. Our kids were swinging from the rafters. Literally - we played a game called "Swing from the Rafters." To put it into perspective for you, the night was way more turbulent than my old youth group's bouts of "Guess the Font" ("American Typewriter Condensed!") and a little less turbulent than say, the perfect storm. But just a little.

We went white water rafting, visited White Water water park (don't go; it's dirty), did the laundry (one time), made new friends out of old ones, joined a book study and a Bible study, visited Six Flags (again), chose our life's verse (the Seven Woes), and traveled to the aquarium and back.

We invented the word Moolalah, which means (noun) "an impressive sum of money." Try and use it in a sentence today.

We took a group of ten-year-olds on a mission trip to downtown Atlanta. Aaron was invited to a "shromp bile" in N'awlins while I, I played Advanced Freeze Tag with 7-year-olds on Skid Row in Los Angeles. You might have played it**. It's the kind of Freeze Tag where 7-year-olds make up and change all the rules at any time, especially after they've just been tagged. LOVE that game…

We've eaten delicious hamburgers shaped like Texas, Texasburgers shaped like ham (I made that second one up), shrimp and grits, and all the Varsity onion rings we could carry (which was six). I've baked dainties for tea parties, gobbled several Krispy Kremes, and enjoyed the hottest hot wings this side of Ol' Mis. Or just pretended to. Either way. Fiery little suckers, those.

We've learned the Jonas brothers' favorite bubble gum flavors and promptly forgotten them. We've discovered that the oldest Jonas brother is twenty - which means, according to my gaggle of high school girls, that he's way too old to date. Way. And too famous and rich. I added those last two. Now here's the curiosity: Zac Efron - also twenty. BUT, according to the gaggle, not too old to date. It just doesn't make any sense. I guess the ancient Chinese proverb rings true:

可憐设法有道理在高中心臟的迷宮房間外面的傻瓜，特别是關於Zac Efron的那些事态的

or

"Pity the fool who tries to make sense out of the labyrinthine chambers of the high school heart, especially in those matters concerning Zac Efron."

If translated into English, then back into Chinese, then back into English again, the proverb reads: "Tries to make sense pitifully in outside the high school heart's labyrinth room fool, specially about Zac Efron these situations." I like the bit about "tries to make sense pitifully." It reminds me of something.

We saw Independence Day fireworks with millionaires and billionaires at Buckhead's ritzy Lenox Mall. We learned that the 6th best firework show in the country takes place in Atlanta. Buckhead is ranked #6A. We're guessing it's because of all that Buckhead Moolalah.

We've floated down the Chattahoochee in inner tubes – traveling at one mph for five blessed hours if it was one. We stopped saying the "T"s in Atlanta (now we just say "Alana"), got new cell phones and lost them (again, just Brynn), and became responsible adults by foregoing the adorable vintage heels I really really wanted in favor of toilet paper and light bulbs - SO excited about that. We were given a slab of raw venison as a gift, which is kind of like a gift a cat might give you and definitely the #6A best gift we have ever received.

Last week, we befriended our neighbors, which was easy because some of our friends just moved into the neighborhood. So I guess we actually beneighbored our friends.

We still have not eaten a peach.

Dinah, our flopsy topsky kittentail, has been busy too. She has tirelessly tried to establish contact with the fireflies through the window, all of whom seem rather indifferent to her efforts. Though unsuccessful with the fireflies, she was able to befriend the basil plant (who died soon thereafter), and made her peace with the new couches (which were TERRIFYING before she discovered that they are very soft to sleep on). Even so, she has tired of the old nap-eat-nap routine and has become a small-time pirate, single-handedly stealing all of our milk caps one by one. We don't know where she hides them and she'll never tell. Perhaps she's fashioning them into rudimentary eye patches.

Oh, Dinah. Indeed we will miss her when she finally departs for the high seas with her swashbuckling barge, a few choice fireflies, and all the milk caps.

And you. We miss you, too. As Zac Efron sings in "High School Musical" Two, you are the music in us. Na Na Na Na. We'd love to host you sometime here in Alana. Just hop over on a midnight train to Georgia. Or a noonday one – doesn't matter. It'll be hot either way.

Thank you, friends, for continuing to support and encourage us as we begin this exciting new chapter! And until we hear from you, we'll just keep singin' that old sweet song. We've got Georgia on our minds.

*It's the second one.
**With Aaron's cousin, Nikolai

Summertime and the Livin's Easy, Part One

2008-06-09T11:52:00.000-07:00

Welp, we've been in Atlanta for about a week and a half now. Oh, didn't you hear? We moved to Atlanta to work at Peachtree Presbyterian Church and let me tell you, it's been a whirlwind - almost like a tornado, you might say.

Since we southerners like to impress each other, we will now impress you with a list of everything we did during our first week in Georgia. So grab a rocking chair and a mint julep, y'all, and prepare to be blown away. I apologize that this will be a little long-winded but hey, life is slower (and stickier) down here. What's your rush?

We moved into our condo fresh off the plane last Thursday. Almost immediately, we unpacked a hundred and fifty boxes and painted a huge shelf country red. We still have quite a few boxes left and a lot more furniture to buy. We're using Craig's List like a treasure map but with or without it, we've already gotten lost in midtown.

In our first week, we sat at our shared desk for a total of thirty minutes. Between the two of us, we went to Six Flags, the zoo, and a Braves game (Atlanta lost). We learned to drive a minibus. We got in a water balloon fight, bounced in a bounce house, served sandwiches at a homeless shelter, and enjoyed a delicious pancake breakfast. We followed a Rod Stewart look-alike in worship, helped with Vacation Bible School, memorized the names of 300 kids (ok, I made that one up - but we've met almost as many), and brushed our teeth every morning and night. We drank lots of Caribou coffee, sweat off half our body weight while reading by the pool, joined the gym, and licked our chops at the local Pig n' Chik. We unintentionally used the word "y'all" in a sentence. We went to the movies with fifty students and were yelled at by an ornery bus driver with eight cats at home. We watched twelve episodes of Lost (ok, just Brynn did that. Don't judge me - we have to wait a whole 7 months for the next season of 24). And we finally found our coffee pot right when we were starting to form a search party.

We went out running on the street where Elton John, Ludacris, and the governor of Georgia live. Or driving. Or whatever. It's just a block up. We lost count of all the BMW's we've seen cruise past our place, the teenagers with i-Phones, and the beautiful moms who while away the hours under big magnolia blossoms, gossiping over sweet tea and sugar cookies.

We shared meals with new friends. We've made more than we can count with all ten fingers - which means we've already made at least nine more than last year.

Since we've been here, we've heard the word "milestone" rhyme with "gallstone" and "men" pronounced with two syllables. The "rebel flag" was mentioned to me casually last night. We saw a guy riding on the highway in the back of a pick-up and a few days ago, Aaron actually heard someone exclaim, "Why Thomas, you look hot as coffee!" We think Atlanta is a little like Moscow, a little like Oxford, and a lot more southern then we remembered.

We have not eaten a peach.

Dinah's been busy, too. If you haven't met our kitten yet, she is a firecracker, even if she is sometimes a sleepy, cuddly firecracker. Dinah's smattering of accomplishments includes attacking and building forts out of at least thirty moving boxes and rearranging all of the packing tissues around the floor. She has also eaten and uneaten one rubber band. Thankfully, she has finally learned to sleep with us without soiling herself (and our bed). We think she just doesn't want to be alone - in the dark - with the boxes. Dinah's all talk.

Next week, I'll be gone with the wind up to Camp Rutledge (held in nowheresville at Hard Labor Creek State Camp) with the High Schoolers, a camp I've been told by many a church-goer (always with a raised brow and a smile) is like no other. Apparently, it is Peachtree at its best and worst and I will be the hottest and happiest I've ever been. And afterwards, the tiredest.

Yesterday, Aaron drove up to Camp Ducktown in Tennessee with the Middle Schoolers - a much cooler camp with white water rafting and cell phone reception. And I'm staying here in our condo this week, unpacking books and goblets and pot holders, glad for Dinah's company because I'm kind of scared after watching all that Lost.

Next month, we're going on domestic mission trips to Los Angeles (go figure), N'awlins, and inner city Atlanta. Aaron will be helping to launch an adventure ministry in the next few months and I will be doing everything I can to write and play music and other things good for my soul.

See? I ain't just whistlin' Dixie when I say we've already experienced one of them famous Georgia tornadoes. But seriously - we get paid for all this!?

We were told that this is the "crunchest" (busiest) time of year for our ministry and life will get slower very quickly. However, if you contact us in the next month and a half and we're a little slow on the response, we're sorry. We might be on a mission trip, getting to know a student, unpacking, or taking a nap (probably that last one). But until we hear from you, we'll just be singin' that old sweet song. We've got Georgia on our minds.