that’s what she said.

“The function of muscle is to pull and not to push, except in the case of the genitals and the tongue.”

– Leonardo da Vinci

sick day.

today i was sick. not so good, yet so good.

on the one hand i don’t like the feeling of being sick. today in particular was a very soar throat, loads of flem (sorry), cough etc.

on the other hand, i can’t explain how great it felt to sleep in until 11:00am and then spend the entire day just resting. i ate. played a bit of poker online. watched the 2nd half of the real madrid vs. roma champions league game. watched “bully husband” on dr. phil (the husband was a real douche by the way). i even did some work for a missions trip we’re planning for the youth this summer. on top of all of that, i got a chance to read. i finished off simply christian as the previous post alludes to, and i’ve just begun the great giveaway, by david fitch. i’m pretty pumped to read this book, here’s the thesis:

the thesis of this book is that evangelicalism has “given away” being the church in north america. simply put, evangelical churches have forfeited the practices that constitute being the church either (a) by portioning them off to various concerns exterior to the church or (b) by compromising them so badly that they are no longer recognizable as being functions of the church.

here is another excerpt, this time about ditching the values and practices of modernity:

but could one still be an evangelical and dump modernity? in other words, could i still minister wthin evangelical churches yet unload the scientific manipulations to defend the Bible, the overstated attempts to make Christianity intellectually attractive to the society at large, the obsession with decisions for Christ and megachurches, the vigorous rationalizations conducted in the name of individualist objectivity, that evangelicals seem so attached to? to me, evangelicals were spending a lot of effort making Christian faith intellectually defensible on modernist terms that were fading in their usefullness. even worse, these efforts smelled of an evangelical agenda, which of course in modernity is a bad thing. because, as any good modernist knows, we were supposed to be objective in the pursuit of truth. evangelicalism then came off as disingenuous. furthermore, evangelical salvation seemed cheap when it was made into a formula for modernist evangelism. and evangelical individualist morality seemed legalistic and impotent against the sensuality of the day. there was little connection to the cosmic work of Christ’s victory over evil, sin, and death as manifested in his chosen people. could i leave the modernist things behind yet remain an evangelical?

wow. this is going to be great.

to sum up my evening, i think i’ll finish off the introduction to fitch’s book and then settle down with some food and a tall-boy to watch the raptors take on orlando (moon over howard fo-sho!).

peace.

the challenge of ‘simply christian’

i just finished reading ‘simply christian’ by tom wright. it was a very good read and i strongly recommend it to anyone. here is how the book ended:

“made for spirituality, we wallow in introspection. made for joy, we settle for pleasure. made for justice, we clamor for vengeance. made for relationship, we insist on our own way. made for beauty, we are satisfied with sentiment. but new creation has already begun. the sun has begun to rise. Christians are called to leave behind, in the tomb of Jesus Christ, all that belongs to the brokenness and incompleteness of the present world. it is time, in the power of the Spirit, to take up our proper role, our fully human role, as agents, heralds, and stewards of the new day that is dawning. that, quite simply, is what it means to be Christian: to follow Jesus Christ into the new world, God’s new world, which he has thrown open before us.”

wow. that’s good.

go read it.

peace.

video editing

i’ve always been interested in video editing. i think my fascination began back when i was a kid and we spent entire summers skateboarding around town with an old video camera.

anyways, check out this new commercial for wesc headphones

trippy.

what not to do to make friends.

on how God and the World are NOT related (and how maybe they are).

i was first turned on to Tom Wright in my first year of university (leading edge to be precise). we read a book called “the challenge of Jesus” by Wright and it began to shift the way i thought (this book is a must-read for Christians, IMHO). after leading edge i took numerous new testament courses taught by one steven thompson (read: stevie t) who further cranked-my-chain in regards to Wright.

anywho, i’ve just finished reading “simply christian” and you ought to do the same. here is sample on the relationship between God and the world:

“Option Two was to see God and the world as a long way apart from one another. Many today, faced with the question of Christian ethics, assume this model, taking it for granted that if this distant God wanted humans to behave in particular ways he would give them instructions. The idea of an overarching moral law, common to all humankind, written perhaps within human consciences but also needing to be thought out, argued through, and taught, has been extremely common in Western society for the last two hundred years at least. Indeed, many people have supposed that when St. Paul was talking about “the law,” he was referring to that sort of overarching moral system. Christian ethics then becomes a matter of struggling to obey a somewhat arbitrary code of law promulgated by a distant deity. Within that struggle, “sin” is seen in terms of breaking laws conceived in that fashion; and “salvation” is the rescue of human beings from the punishment that this deity would otherwise inflict on those who disobey his decrees,” (Wright, N.T. Simply Christian, 220).

i think we all, at one point or another had boiled Christianity down to “following the rules.” this was, of course, until we heard Jesus’ (through james) incredibly liberating words, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” than-you Lord for forever fulling (how’s that for alliteration?) the law on our behalf.

so, what is this Christian way of life about then?

“Rather, it is the new way of being human, the Jesus- shaped way of being human, the cross-and-resurrection way of life, the Spirit-led pathway. It is the way which anticipates, in the present, the full, rich, glad human existence which will one day be ours when God makes all things new,” (Wright, N.T. Simply Christian, 222).

if that doesn’t get you excited, then check your pulse sir/ma’m.

peace.

i think chris, nathan and daryl need to hook up Tom for the next epiphaneia conference.

on actually living.

hi.

the other day i read an article about people in my generation that are purposely working less. rather than working all sorts of rediculous hours like their parents did, they are working less and, thereby, spending more time doing other things. walking their dogs. loving their wives. reading. enjoying music. essentially, living. the 40 hour work week has been replaced by a 30 hour work week (some of you ought to remind your bosses that this is so).

i like this.

the past year i worked under an interim pastor who prided (real word?) himself on the fact that he was a “workaholic”. wierd. why is this something to be proud of?

my goal is to purposely not be a workaholic. however, this proves somewhat difficult when your “work” is predominantly relational, i.e. pastoring. i happen to love my “job”. however, my job isn’t one that can be measured in the same way you would measure a blacksmith or a store clerk or a manger of some sort. in fact, if i sat behind a desk for 40 hours a week i could be, and rightfully so, accused of not doing my job. the reason for this is because my job is highly relational. in other words, i need to be “out there” with real-life people to be at all effective in what i do.

i love this.

however, at the same time, i’m trying to learn balance. i’m trying to learn to say ‘no’ sometimes. because, i have no desire to lead a busy life. i have no desire to constantly be doing something. and the reason for this is not because i am lazy. quite the opposite. the reason for this is because i want to live my life and enjoy it and that is a hard thing to do if you’re always preoccupied with actually doing something.

life is simple.

live simply.

mother teresa said something once, well she said loads of things actually. but one thing that she said stands out to me as particularily brilliant.

“In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.“

do small things, and do them with great love.

peace.