CaveOfTheHeart

2011-11-18T00:58:00.002-05:00

How empty.

2011-09-28T18:12:00.001-04:00

2009-07-26T16:37:00.002-04:00

NO MORE CUSTODI-GLENN...
As of yesterday, I handed over the reigns to Andy, the new hire for Faith Lutheran Church's custodial position.

I had this job since July 2002 and it was a God-send; I had just come off of a two year support from my denomination and a prior, one-month stint delivering newspapers up here for the Cincinnati Enquirer was like prison. The custodial position came along and was super flexible and a great place and church to work for and allowed me to do what I needed to do with Veritas.

Since working for IWU from last September, there isn't sufficient time to give what I once did now that my summers are full.......so, I had to give it up. I thought I could hang on to it, but Cathy was right.....just 'twasn't to be.

Though it's kind of hard to believe it's been this long, it has been truly good in every sense of the word. And so, I set up another marker in this journey and continue to say that I am thankful.

2009-07-04T14:12:00.001-04:00

Does anyone really blog anymore and not get paid for it?

2009-03-29T23:56:00.002-04:00

My temple is built on wood and of stone
Each space is filled with the things that I own
Idols and gods that call me to bow
I try to be free but there's no freedom now...No freedom now

The ones I hold dear--Those most precious to me
Some days I set them afloat on an indifferent sea
And these things in first place--They're worth nothing at all
At night in my dreams graven images call

And my gods won't let me sleep
And what a man sows that he will reap
I toss and turn at night
I've got places to go, got battles to fight
And my gods won't let me sleep...tonight

Ambitions once good--Once noble and pure
Now rule with a rod and I cannot endure
Those bonds I have forged with two will hands
They're not easily torn by the strength of a man

No other gods before you--No other holy shrines
Oh, I want to sleep in peace when I lie down
All other voices calling
All of the hands that pull me
Call and demand allegiance to their crown
-Wayne Watson, No Other Gods

2009-02-19T23:48:00.003-05:00

A year ago today, I took my hands- hands that gave a lot of life to a creature I'd dreamed of having since I was a child- and signed a paper that would legally end it. Yes- it was a euthanatic decision made countless times by many nobler than myself. But illness found my dog's head in my hands and lap one last time, my voice and face in hers, soothing...comforting...as she slipped wide-eyed from consciousness to somewhere from which she'll never come to me....no matter how loud I call. I know mercy's side of the argument and the necessity of a dignified passage, but there's a preciousness of life that bludgeons me....that the giving and the taking away can both be love-acts.

Here's a post I made to this blog about a month and a half after Vega died, on April 2nd, 2008:

I'm still grieving over the loss of Vega. I can't help it. Now that I'm working morning shifts (6am-130pm), I am the first one home to wallow in an empty house that had this creature for the previous 12 years....every day, she was there to greet someone....whoever it was...to come through these doors.

I've had three dreams about her and I'll wake up crying (or think I am). I am taken aback at the kind of introspection the grief has offered me and I've been surprised at all the other similar grieving circumstances I've had that get lassoed into the situation. But I parse these feelings and contexts to their rightful place and I still find I need to be grieving sometimes. Over this dog, nonetheless.

And, yes, I've lost close people in my life. But the affinity afforded me with the care of this creature, over whom I was graced with the "alpha" status, has set me into an emotional process much different in many ways and threaded with varying degrees of theological complexity, offering a simultaneous fix of comfort and cold.

I guess a picture tells most of that to which I cannot adequately speak. This picture was the very last time Vega would enter our house from the backyard, where we would let her go to relieve herself. The meager deck stairs in her stage of dysplasia were phenomenal hurdles in that time. There was a fresh snow the day before and her paw prints were left right up against the bottom stair leading to the deck. The night following her death, there was a light snow. I remembered on my bus route that day that I could still find her paw print if I'd search carefully enough, in spite of the snow. I began to be angry that it HAD snowed, because, when you grieve, you search for tendrils of physical connections to the one you loved in such close proximity to their passing. So I got home, went to my knees outside to where I thought the prints were and gently dusted away the top layer of snow in hopes of finding the last remaining physical proof of her final journey into the home she dearly loved.

2009-02-13T23:32:00.002-05:00

Well, went to the chiropractor today for an adjustment. Somewhere, unbeknownst to me and for no discernible reason, said back decides about a week ago to start "catching" and bombarding my hypothalmus with a healthy shot of faint, electrical signals my body likes to translate as pain. I don't remember any particular recent over-exertion or injury, though I've had these kinds of things off and on since 1991. I just started my training for the Cap City Half in C-bus in May and I'm not too enthused that I'm a bit lame. Especially now, since I just got back on the road.

My wife thinks I'm a nuttmunky for having gone out this past Tuesday to log in my 4-miler for which I was scheduled. I thought it was pretty heroic, trudging out in the midst of a high wind warning, with 49 mph gusts. I would be remiss if I didn't say it was the most grueling 4 miles ever. (But my back was already hurting, so there). Dodging (thankfully) twigs and trying to catch breaths that would whisk away in the gusts before I could snatch them took as much effort as running this usually fairly easy course.

At one point during a stretch where I was in a headwind, I was literally stopped from running to complete and sudden stillness, nailed in my tracks and subsequently, running in place. I felt like Jim Cantore on the Gulf shores reporting hours before a landfalling hurricane. Then I realized how ridiculously slow and lumbersome I must have appeared. My course took me through campus and even the Miami kids weren't out on their usual jogs and runs. It was just me.

I love times like these.

2009-01-14T23:27:00.003-05:00

Well, I had a minor surgical procedure done Monday...nothing too involved, though I do have six stitches and it is causing me to walk with a nutty gait. I am pretty much sidelined I think until January 24th when the stitches get to come out.

This is causing me considerable consternation, being this sessile. This will be the longest period of time that I have gone without running since I began running on November 30th, 2007. It's going to be a rough ride till that day comes when I can run again. Wanna know how sick I am? I was driving home tonight in the blowing snow, winds gusting and snow falling.....and all I could think about was being out there running in it.

I still don't know what race I'm going to do yet. I have decided that I'm at least going to begin training OFFICIALLY when I come back on the 24th. I've gone through my training log over the last year and I am enthralled that I had the sensibility to keep one from the beginning. I can definitely see my growth and progress over time. Having proof keeps you going. The log also serves as a marker for those days for which I am terribly fond. So much self-learning and so much life happened. And having someone to share it with was great too. I'm going to miss that for sure.

So what shall I do....another half? I'm worried about the time commitment for a full right now. Where do I race? Anyone want to run with me? You know, I'll run alone for sure. But I do love having someone to share the rigors of the training with me too. I enjoy that kind of accountability. These few weeks will pass, I'll have to decide and soon enough, I'll be into it yet once again. I can't wait.

2009-01-11T16:40:00.001-05:00

Rags make paper, paper makes money, money makes banks, banks make loans, loans make beggars, beggars make rags.
-English Proverb

2009-01-05T00:14:00.005-05:00

Well, looky here......I am a blogger once again. I've been around the block quite a few times in the last little bit during this latest hiatus. I'm trying to parse through what's noteworthy and what's not. I'm just not sure yet. I have a lot to say about a lot of things, but I'm not sure about the format yet. The last year of my life has left me reeling for many reasons. I am almost at a loss to explain it in some ways, but hopefully, in due time, I will do so.

Right now, the best I can say is that I feel a bit "lost".....not like I don't know where I am spiritually per se, but it just feels like I've left myself back somewhere tucked in the earlier part of this year and all of a sudden I find myself right here.....wherever "here" is. There have been some really good things happen and some rather perplexing things to boot. Strangely enough, it seems that the only connection I feel I have to who I was before, say, February of this year, is running. When I run, I am transported to times/places that were familiar (but by no means "easy"). I guess I mean familiar by the connection I feel I had to myself as opposed to the current time. Running has been that bridge to transport me and offer me solitude and solace over these last few months. It had also been a vital lifeline to other people who are close to me who shared the endeavor with me.

Well, in some ways, it looks like I may be the only one intent upon doing a race this spring. That's okay though. Although I do miss looking forward to sharing the training with someone, inevitably, people have to be intrinsically motivated enough to do it outside of them (or me) just wanting to have a running partner(s). I know I have to run. That's never been a question, regardless of who will do it with me. Running's like that friend who's always there....it won't waver or skimp or waffle and I never question it's purpose (even when it's physically a drag). But I know that not everyone has to see it that way either. So I do it for myself. And I do it to connect with God in some remarkable ways that don't happen outside of running. While it would be nice to have someone who has the same desire to run as I do, the lack of such won't deter me.

I'm thinking that an option this spring would be to try and run the Knoxville Half Marathon in Knoxville, TN. During the Xmas break, I reconnected with a buddy of mine that I've known longer than any other friend in my life and he suggested that I come down and do that one with him. Knoxville is where I was born and I'd get to finish at the 50 yard line at Neyland Stadium. So, while I'm not set for certain yet, I'm definitely considering this race in light of the fact that it doesn't look like there's any solid desire(currently) for others up here to run a race this spring.

It's not quite what I was hoping for, but, I (for one) am still trying to become a runner......hence, I'll keep running no matter what.

2008-11-01T11:10:00.004-04:00

AN INTERESTING DREAM

I don't typically get revelatory dreams like this, if this is what it is. Most of my dreams are usually some kind of spiritually dark "invasions" when I sense there are significant spiritual implications to the dreams.

I'm running along a variety of trails and paths with some "creatures," the type of which I wasn't initially sure. I couldn't tell if we were running FROM or TO something, but it became apparent we were running together. At some point, we were running up rocky crags and through precarious cliffs. I noticed along the way that I was running with sheep.

Suddenly we came across a fence corner, where two fence lines came together. Being the human, I knew I was going to have to climb the fence to keep going, but I wondered about the sheep; how were they going to get across?

I climbed and landed on the other side and found myself on the ground. As soon as I did, a blanket of thick and total and complete darkness fell. The darkeness was absolute, like what I'd done before for caving groups in the deepest recesses of a cave when we'd all turn out our lights and plunge into total darkness. Only, in the dream, it was a darkness that had a weight.....or, for lack of a better word- intention.

The darkness was so instantaneous and so thick, that I mused in my dream that I couldn't believe this had just happened. So, I was able to "rewind" in my dream to see if it would happen again. And it did.

It was Halloween (yesterday) when I dreamed this. This is significant not because of the date, but because the Aidan readings (Celtic Daily Prayer) for October 31st, especially the one from Psalm 119:169-176:

169 May my cry come before you, O LORD;
give me understanding according to your word.

170 May my supplication come before you;
deliver me according to your promise.

171 May my lips overflow with praise,
for you teach me your decrees.

172 May my tongue sing of your word,
for all your commands are righteous.

173 May your hand be ready to help me,
for I have chosen your precepts.

174 I long for your salvation, O LORD,
and your law is my delight.

175 Let me live that I may praise you,
and may your laws sustain me.

176 I have strayed like a lost sheep.
Seek your servant,
for I have not forgotten your commands.

I am, like the hymn writer of old, prone to wander. I am not above that, if I am to discern how much of this is for me and how much of it pertains to those for whom God has entrusted to me. Naturally, I'll incorporate 100% of this into my being and own it's encouragement for my own edification. That has to happen before this means anything to anyone outside of myself. And it may never.

In the reading, a prayer by Peter Marshall has now become one of my own in this season of my life:

Father, I know now, if I never knew it before, that only in You can my restless human heart find any peace. For I began life without knowledge but full of needs. And the turmoil of my mind, the dissatisfaction of my life all stem from trying to met those needs with wrong things and in the wrong places.

God remains at the edges and boundaries of my waywardness, seeking me, staying me, finding me and loving me and feeding me deeply. Oh, to stay in that...to rest in that, devoid of the illusions of my own strength that impale the works of the Spirit.

2008-09-21T22:44:00.002-04:00

GOOD STUFFS GOIN' ON...

Well, it is sufficient to say that there's a lot going on that I'll need to update you on. Coming off the heels of a wacky week of wind-induced power outages that have given each of us a new perspective on our lives, it has culminated with a great Sunday of baptisms from one of our house churches and a Veritasian book-burning of occult paraphernalia by one of our own, in whom the Lord is effecting great things at present and bringing into His light and freedom. It was good.....ALL good. Pics to come, of course.

2008-09-13T11:57:00.003-04:00

THE PRACTICE OF THANKSGIVING AND CONTENTMENT

If there is any better point of time in my life in which I need to be intentionally grounded in these things, I can't think of one.

I'm very easily thankful to have been given the job I now have at IWU. For example, many people don't have jobs with the kind of benefits available to me with this...well, some people don't even have jobs. In this kind of economy, that is a blessing for sure. But it isn't for the economics of it that

I'm excited for the potential this job has for me to delve into a level of ability and giftedness I haven't been able to express in a while...at least in this kind of professional format. I'm not going to always bank on how I feel to be the impetus for my sustainability and I know that novelty and attending excitement may wane. That's where the discipline of thanksgiving and contentment grant a productive and healthful perspective.

Driving a bus has been neither glamorous nor a line of work that carries much prestige. It's often tiring and monotonous and emotionally challenging in ways non-professional drivers may never know. The company has changed ownership twice in the last two years so that now we are owned by the largest mass transit company in the world. Job security (perceived or real) and familiarity is tenous at best- I'm acquainted with that much.

I also have been able realize that in all situations I get to choose my response to my circumstances and subsequently my attitude. I've had ample opportunity to learn this, rest assured.

Thankfulness and contentment are not necessarily results of various circumstances more than they are realms in which to enter in spite of circumstances. This applies across the board. For all God's intents and purposes, I currently have a plethora of opportunities in which to experience this.

Case in point: I am currently in the final throes of training for my next half-marathon coming September 28th. My running partner now appears to not be running with me. I am also nursing a nagging ilio-tibial band syndrome in my left leg. I may not run as fast as I'm wanting and may not run with whom I wanted, but that is not ultimately why I run. I could drop out, but I won't.
It's going to be ridiculously painful at times to even run, but I'm going to go for it nonetheless.

I just simply get to choose. There is blessing in that somewhere I know. And knowing that, therein lies contentment. And if I can be content in all things, in spite of my circumstances, I can know thankfulness as well.

2008-09-06T00:54:00.004-04:00

A BITTERSWEET FAREWELL
After close to 6 years as a full-time bus driver for the Miami Metro, I have submitted my two-week notice of resignation.

This is because on September 22, I will officially begin my new job at Indiana Wesleyan University as a Regional Student Services Advisor, having received the call from Human Resources today. After my shift, I went into my boss' office to tell her. It's really weird...I knew the bus job wasn't forever, but I have been happy there and have known many joys in my time with my mass transit colleagues. I know I'm going from a relatively predictable and low-stress job to one of significantly more in those regards, but the move is a timely one and welcome one and will benefit us quite well.

I'll opine even more over the next few weeks as I mentally and emotionally terminate from a work and a people of which and whom I have grown quite fond.

2008-08-17T01:25:00.005-04:00

A LIL' VIDEO UPDATE ON THE JUNE 3 OXFORD TORNADO

It appears at least one person got the storm on video at the time when there may have been a tornado on the ground. The National Weather Service confirmed an EF 0 (75mph winds) touchdown on a farm near King Road about 3 miles SW of Oxford and about a mile from our house.

This video is from Kehr Road, about a mile east of the storm. It's the only video I know of concerning the event in Oxford.

This is another segment from the same videographer. At about 1:17 through 1:38, look at the bottom right of the sky near the horizon as he zooms in. It could be scud cloud associated with a rotating feature or a difference in contrast between two cloud features at different distances from the videographer's perspective, but it does really favor a the behavior of a quick funnel cloud, at least in this shot. The resolution isn't good enough to tell, but I'm willing to bet that it's a two different areas of the storm- one receiving more light than the other. The motion of the features relative to each other give the visual impression of a funnel, at least in the shot I'm focusing upon. Great, great video, nonetheless. I was wondering if anyone in Oxford had caught it on film.

2008-07-31T14:34:00.003-04:00

HEADING FOR THE HILLS THAT HOCK
Going to take ye olde laydee to Hocking Hills for a night to stay at a B&B for a little bit of R&R.

I'm always stoked to go to where there are interesting geological features and always eager to be in/around the Appalachians, even if it is the lil' foothills in Ohio.

2008-07-29T17:39:00.000-04:00

THIS HAPPENS TO BE WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT....
As you know, I am adjunct faculty at IWU. I get to teach about the Kingdom of God under various classes such as New Testament, Marriage and Family, Old Testament, Themes in Biblical Literature and Defending the Christian Faith.

In my last class (Defending the Faith), I developed a relationship with a student in the midst of terrible financial/personal/familial times. Here is a letter he sent me after the class was done. It's a simple pointer as to why I really do this to begin with:

Glenn,

Thanks for helping me on my spiritual journey - I've
really enjoyed the last 5 weeks with you despite all
my personal difficulties. Thank you for listening to
me on Thursday and I definitely will reach out in the
future. By the way, I actually ended up buying my
copy of Contact from Blockbuster :) May God continue
to bless you and your ministry.
Sincerely....

2008-07-28T17:35:00.000-04:00

ANOTHER BLAST FROM THE PAST...

Hester Road House Church, ca., November 2003.

This is our house church back in the day. Only four remain of this group today. Others graduated, stopped coming or moved away and Vega passed away, of course.

2008-07-27T17:31:00.000-04:00

BLAST FROM THE PAST....
Taste of Oxford, ca., 2002.

Yes, I have bleached hair(s), a stained black goatee and the idiotic delusion that I was kewl.

2008-07-26T17:22:00.000-04:00

Just had a dinner with J&A the other night. Talked about Kingdom stuff and how it makes a difference in our homes, lives and neighborhoods. We're about to take some deeper steps into some good stuff to come.

We're all being grown in a variety of ways that is going to be significant for what God wants to do here in Oxford. And not just through Veritas.

2008-07-25T17:07:00.003-04:00

Got Some New Kicks....
New Balance 757's....more of a neutral support for my chikkin' stix. My 858's did the job, but was pushing my feet to roll on the outer edge and I think was causing me some knee pain.

Much more cushy, too. I had about 350 miles on the last pair, so I was right on the verge of being ready for some new ones. I got prime attention from the folks at the Glendale Running Spot.

They took video of my running on a treadmill, assessed from my gait the shoe I'd need. They were even gonna spot me the cost of my last pair because they thought I had been fitted for the wrong pair. But I just couldn't part with my first pair of running shoes after all we'd been through together. There was no way. Maybe a stoopid decision in this economy, but I just couldn't do it. These should do the trick in carrying me to through the State To State.

2008-07-14T03:39:00.000-04:00

By golly, we gonna do it again. The State to State Half Marathon is coming up and training begins July 14th (officially) for the Jaylord, Ratt C and I. It'll begin a 12-week regimen running four days a week with an endurance run on Saturdays. I am planning on tayloring my diet to hopefully cut 5-10 more pounds by race time. I'd like to see what it's like even lighter and without a dastardly allergy.

I am SOOO looking forward to tightening up for this race. There was something that "got" me about those months I spent prepping for the Flying Pig...so much I learned about myself and those around me that I could have never known without the experience of trying to pretend to be a runner. I want to try to improve upon my time of course and to bond deeper with any buds and budettes who'll run with me. So to kick off my training, this weekend, I've pumped away one monster milkshake and had a massive cookout with CMarsh, Paulos The Apostle and the two Nicky/i's.

2008-07-12T03:32:00.002-04:00

My deck outside is a pretty good metaphor for my life right now. I built some new stairs for it. Went well there. I determined we needed a power washer to remove the old paint from the deck. Got that. I took the most powerful nozzle to the deck.

Don't do that.

....but only a few boards did I really mangle.

So then, the day I repaint it, it rains. And rains.....and then it rains some more. So now, four days later, I have a beautifully shiny deck with nothing on it. Not even a human. You can't, you see, because it's still sticky. I learned that when I stepped out the door a night or two ago and lifted at least one layer of the paint off with my foot. We're going on four days now.

Any of you Bob Vilaboys (or girls) got any tricks as to how I can ready my deck without a gut-rending overhaul again, I'd like to hear it. I'd really like to use my deck before winter.

2008-06-27T22:01:00.012-04:00

THE WEATHER KISSED ME ON THE CHEEK
And I Shall Never Wash My Face Again

Ever since April 4th, 1974, when I experienced the Super Outbreak, I have been smitten by the weather. That was the largest outbreak of tornadoes in recorded history- 148 tornadoes in 13 states in 48 hours. One went close by our house and did some minor damage.

I had determined to become a meteorologist early on in my life. I made weather stations in grade school and got ridiculed for it. I had even interviewed with an Air Force recruiter in high school to check in on their program for meteorology. I was in the process of planning to go to Florida State to get my undergrad in meteorology and then go out to the plains and study severe thunderstorms and perhaps find a career in forecasting. But I think God had other plans for me. Okay. I I know he did.

The best I have ever been able to do is to make it a hobby and become an advanced storm spotter with the National Weather Service office out of Wilmington, Ohio. I have, on occasion, chased storms whilst in Louisville and since we've moved up here. But all the weather has almost always seemed to have either happened where I left to go chase or just plain not happened at all. I was on the verge of developing a slight mental imbalance in my conclusion that the weather machine was deliberately keeping me from the sweet stuff.

Then came June 3rd, 2008.

It was near 8:30 pm, Tuesday, the usual night Chad Moore and I meet together. We were in Uptown Oxford, sitting outside Kofenya coffee shop when an employee came outside, hurriedly gathering up the furniture. She stated that we might have to take cover shortly because of the "tornado in Cottage Grove" (just across the border in Indiana).

I was incredulous, though we had severe weather and even a tornado watch earlier in the day. Thunder was rolling occasionally now. I checked my Treo for the National Weather Service site and sure enough- there was a tornado warning for Franklin County, Indiana. I looked at Chad and said, "let's go!" All he needed to do was grab his camera, which was a good one, given the fact he was a photojournalist in Mississippi before moving to Ohio. If "it" was going to happen, we'd get good pictures.

We took off north about a mile from our original location on Hwy 27 toward Indiana and pulled off at a gas station under the canopy and took several pictures. The tornado warning was extended to our county now and the sirens were blaring. The storm was exhibiting very obvious signs of strengthening. This picture is one from this location looking southeast at the anvil overspreading our location.

A store clerk came out to inform us a tornado was on the ground five miles from where we were. We got in the car to drive a little bit closer to the storm to get a better vantage point. We headed north on Hwy 27 for less than half a mile when I noted the precipitation core was getting really close to us. We didn't know if there actually was a tornado with the storm but if it was, it could be rain-wrapped so I didn't want to get any closer with no way to spot it visually.

We pulled off under an abandoned gas station canopy with marble-sized hail falling now. Just adjacent to our location was a trailer park with a police car driving through, warning the inhabitants of the storm and issuing evacuation orders through his loudspeaker. All the while, the town warning sirens were still wailing. There was an inflow tail cloud forming in this picture with low level warm air being drawn into the storm (the slightly inclined cloud deck just above the trees is flowing from left to right into the main part of the storm):
By this point, this storm meant business. You can actually see my blurred hand at the lower left pointing to what structures of the storm for Chad to shoot.

The precip core was almost ready to overtake us and we determined that we needed to get south of the area. We jumped back in the car and by this time, there was no traffic coming in or out of 27, which is usually very busy. I had intended on taking up another position conveniently at my house, just a mile away. We only got so far as Kroger when we realized we needed to take cover.

We parked and ran into the store and ran into the store manager and a few other employees gazing into the sky, asking if "there was going to be a tornado." It was hard to hear them over the warning siren and the rain was beginning to blow horizontally now. I began to see that people weren't really sure of the gravity of the situation so I loudly alerted everyone to to get to the center of the store and get as many walls between us and the outside as possible. I didn't know for sure if this storm had a tornado with it or not. Better to be safe than sorry.

A college student, completely oblivious to the conditions, tried to forge out the door into the storm with her groceries. We all looked at her rather befuddled and I told her she needed to get inside. About 30 of us now were all gathered in the center of Kroger. I had my phone out, all my friends who knew me were calling to see if this was the real deal. I was trying to get radar updates and warning updates from the NWS site as well as telling Cathy and Mom to get in the basement. It was about all my phone could handle. The manager and employees were huddling around me, asking me questions about how long this would last, were we going to be okay, etc. I became severe weather hero guy for a brief moment when a lady asked me if I was a storm chaser. I could have died and gone to that storm spotter class in the sky, prepared for me by God's own angelic host. It couldn't get any more dreamy for me.

In a few moments, the storm abated and me, Chad and the manager, followed by a few employees, went to the front of the store and then to the parking lot. This was where I figured we'd see something if this storm was going to produce.

Immediately to our west was a rotating wall cloud. There is an area just to the left that is brighter...that is perhaps and indication of a slight rear flank downdraft- an area of tornadic storms where air rushed downward. It is thought that the RFD plays a key role in spinning up tornadoes. The filamentous clouds to the left were rapidly forming and shooting straight up into the rotation.

After about a minute, the wall cloud was on top of us and it produce this small, short-lived funnel cloud, just visible to the left of center. This area is broadly rotating
and the white/bright area to the left is a meager RFD (rear flank downdraft).

Of course, I am not believing what I am seeing or that I'm actually getting to witness this. The whole thing is coming to us instead of us trying to chase it down. It would figure, I suppose.

About another minute later, the area of rotation moved just NW of our location. The cloud's appearance was changing and a very narrow wall cloud with observable rotation extended very close to the ground now.

This is looking NW from our location toward Hueston Woods State Park. There were unconfirmed reports of a touchdown just west of this area also. There was very clear rotation evident with this feature.

Shortly thereafter, it produced another short-lived funnel cloud, just above the two spikes in the lower right of this photograph. The funnel has smoother edges to it, compared to the ragged scud just below it. This funnel's duration of 5-10 seconds as well.

This is some damage being surveyed by a city officer in NW Oxford in the area where the wall cloud was observed after being directly overhead. The damage here was from straight line winds, which can accompany the features we witnessed.

Here I am helping to move said branch (I am the goon to the far right). In just a second, I'm going to go beside the officer pictured and we both will lose our footing while trying to move the branch. This action will succeed in crashing our skulls together. That's the first (and hopefully) last time I head-butt an officer of the law.

The next day, we are bombarded yet again by a line of severe thunderstorms that move through, once in the morning (which dropped a weak EF0 tornado in Newtown, near Cincinnati). That evening, a line moved in yet again and caused widespread straightline wind damage across the Tri-State. At one point, well over 200,000 Duke customers were without power. We lost ours for about 12 hours and the whole next day saw rolling brown-outs. Large trees were down across the area.

All told, there were 5-6 severe weather episodes from June 3rd-June 4th, 2008. The National Weather Service out of Wilmington would confirm a weak EF0 tornado touchdown just less than a mile SW of my house! That completely rocks. We were actually photographing the weakening storm that dropped that tornado.

I sent these photos to the NWS in Wilmington and they are posted in their "Photos" section, currently under "Recent Events." This whole event is broken down here.
What's sweet is that the lead forecaster emailed me, thanking me for the pics, stating that this was just what they were looking for and might even use them in their spotter training courses. That's pretty luscious stuff right there if you ask me. Since you probably didn't ask me, I told you anyway, so there.

2008-06-14T18:57:00.002-04:00

Just updating here.....we are in Tenny, baking our nuggetts here in the 90 degree weather and really doing not much of anything. We had a rousing good time in the Nantahala with the Spengineer, camping and getting dumped on a class III rapid on the Nantahala River, with which, the Spinny-Doc found entertaining. And by "we" I do mean thee laydee of oldness. There are pics of the event as well. Yes, you will see them in due time.

We are looking forward to the return to Oxford shortly, ready to resume life there, at our home....with most of you who read this section of the cybersphere.

Shortly, I will post about the lusciousness of our severe weather event on June 3-4, 2008. I have pics too, courtesy of the Rev. Chadwick H. Moore. You've been warned.

Now, off to ingest a Mandarin Orange Chicken Salad so's I can have energy to post next time.

2008-05-26T14:58:00.002-04:00

HENNESSEY FLYING PIG

Place: Hennessey, OK
Dateline: May 24, 2008
Participants: 6 Adults, 8000+ Swine
Human Casualties: 0
Human Injuries: 6 minor
Swine Casualties: 4

...pretty amazing, considering the direct hit the farm took.

I won't be running in the Hennessey Flying Pig anytime soon.

2008-05-20T23:55:00.012-04:00

MOM FORCED TO LIVE IN CAR WITH DOGS
link to CNN.com article

Barking At The Empire....

Get over it if you think this is a democratic versus a Republican issue. To the extent that we get lost in the Hegelian dialectic supremacy holding sway over our current political machine, we shall never free ourselves into sustainable living. Well, on second thought, forget sustainable....how about survivable? Let's talk about survivability before sustainability. Sustainable living (whatever that really means) for a growing number of people can seem luxurious in this shifting economy and society.

Sustainability in the Empire today requires not only an intellectual assent and equity in its agenda and direction, but a greased slide down a slope of compromise in the end. We're told to swallow the bitter pill of the impact of this emerging global economy; that it's only part of the destructive reconstructionism of the capitalists to forge us necessarily into the global market. We should shoulder the socio-economic casualties as we would the physical in any ongoing, (not to mention, unending), military campaign. But who benefits? Who ultimately stands to gain the most?

Not the people in the above article (linked in the title). We wade our way through these stories (if we stop long enough to absorb them) in a subtle relief of "I'm-glad-it's-them-and-not-us" in the back of our minds. And who can be blamed for that? Yet, who can be far from that peril? Are the economic policies of the ______________ (you name the administration) presidency going to do anything legitimately curative (and not mere flattery-gimmicks like an economic "stimulus" package huckstered by this current administration) as long as they remain beholden to the corporate conglomerations that bank-rolled their campaigns? This, even as they bail out failed, gargantuan investment banks like Bear Stearns and as we funnel billions overseas in the shadow of our own poor.

For the most part, even our elected, Congressional barnacles often prey on the same goodwill of the populace (and constituents), adhering outwardly to a form of care and reform, but only managing to resort to the business-as-usual mode of self-preservation while dropping crumbs to the dogs. And many seem to enter the game well-intentioned; but progression in the Empire (equitable to the acquisition of wealth, power, prestige and office) requires the submissive kiss of the ring of their would-be handlers. That is enough to weed out true reformers. True reform will not ever come through the current system; it's corruption is so thorough, so complete and so entrenched as to warrant a revolution from without. This is one not to be wrought with violence and arms; but one following the clarion call from beyond the veil of the kingdoms of this world (1 John 5:19).

Sometimes it may take life lived in a car after the "palaces" that used to stud the former landscape of the American Scream crumble along with the edifices of our false hopes. There's nothing like the perspective on one's own identity and existence that such an experience can offer.

I might have been someone who, in the past, may have only glanced at such a story in disdain.

Nevermore.

This is now the story of another mother; one I know. This is now the story of my own mother, but without the conveniences of having the safe parking lots in which to sleep (albeit in a car) and without any form of gainful employment to be found. This is not in the over-priced and diminished housing opportunities like the West Coast cities such as Santa Barbara and others; we're talking small-city Tennessee. From a good job, condominium, car..... to nothing but a borrowed car, a dog and a cat and not much hope. And within a little over a week of having learned of her situation, this is now OUR story, as we've joyfully taken my mother into our home and our lives so that she doesn't have to worry about shelter, food or safety.

I am taking in a courageous and enormously gracious and thoughtful woman in my mother, and, I am relishing this reunion even in light of the circumstances. There is a presence of the Suffering Servant in taking my mother and her dog and cat into our home. I am finding joy in honoring her in this way. There also abides a warm and awe-inspiring sense of divine timing in how things came to be (or not, in some cases) that enabled us to be this receptive at this stage in our lives.

In all that we are doing, we are finding the Man of Sorrows show up in grocery store aisles, in conversations with people who complain about their jobs and in the plans we can make with the help of the people of God who are aligning themselves to journey with us through this. God is all over this, because, to me, this smells of the revolution and redemption of the Kingdom, even if only thinly approximated as through that veil to which we so often refer. Even then, God provides wonderfully, and in this season, I don't even know where this is going to take all of us. I know the One in Whom I've placed my trust and as my life and outlook is morphed by this experience, it is to the glory of God. And not just for me.

These must be the seeds of sustainability...

2008-05-11T00:12:00.005-04:00

The Flying Pig Has Flown

Yep....that's me in the yellow shirt, somewhere between mile 0 and 13.1.

Six months ago, on a whim, I decided to do something that radically altered my life for the better; I decided to run the Flying Pig Half Marathon with Jason. At the end of November in 2007, it was quite hard to know whether we could stick to such a thing. I'd never run a marathon, much less any kind of race since 8th grade track. I never would have considered myself a "runner" nor have I at any time in my life. I had tried running back in my last pastorate, but that was for only a few miles at a time, a few times a week and for only a few weeks it seemed.

About two years ago, I had tried running with Spen around what would later become my 2.1 mile loop (I can still remember the thought of how daunting even that distance seemed late last year). On mine and Spen's run, I nearly collapsed from fatigue and nutty pains radiating up my right leg. I couldn't even muster one mile without stopping. In fact, Jason, my future running partner, caught me as I was hunched over in pain. Spen had long left me as he was having no such difficulty. That was my ticket to not even think about running again. Ever. Never mind that I didn't hate running, I just wasn't liking how this had turned out. The thought of doing this again was resolutely expelled from my mind.

Now I can't forget how bewilderingly joyous and high I'd felt after deciding on that cold December night in 2007 to go ahead and run that 2.1 miler in which I'd so miserably failed. I couldn't get past the image of my sad sack of bones hunkered over in pain. But with each step, that haunting memory faded and finally, into oblivion, when I burst through the front door that night, feeling that runner's high and greeted Vega and Cathy with a barely containable elation. I wasn't going to look back.

Our plan was to try and run in December and January and then, by January 30th, the first registration cutoff for the Flying Pig, decide whether or not we were going to do the marathon. I knew in early December after that 2.1 run that I was sold on it. So, I read all the magazines, books and online material I could and Jason and I came up with a graded running plan. We just had to get our bodies used to running and our goal became to train without getting hurt and realize that the real winning mark was making it to the starting line some six months later. I began to alter my eating habits and began dropping weight as my miles increased. I got all the reasonable gadgets I could get to help me keep track of my training and I kept a dedicated training log online so I could monitor my body and my training habits. I began to be able to monitor my heart and keep up with how my body was doing on my runs over time. That intimacy with my body was a new thing for me. Learning how to listen to my aches and pains and knowing how to take care of it across the board was eye-opening. To date, I have been rewarded with a greater overall health and well-being and a loss of 26 pounds of weight that I didn't need.

I am truly not the same person now as I was 6 months ago. I was becoming mildly sedentary, but not completely out of shape. But it wouldn't have taken long to get there. I still relish those cold, 11-degree nights running alone on the roads under the crystal clear night sky and a full moon lighting my way. Not once in all those runs did I ever feel cold. It was hard to see as often as the ice would coalesce on my lashes, but cold, I was not. There was, too, an intense communion with God, myself and the spaces in between my thoughts and my music. There is a joy in just being and just putting one monotonous step in front of the other. And there is a subtle discipline therein that runners know, not to mention numerous life-analogies that can be extrapolated from this whole experience.

For me, my training is divided by Vega's passing back in February. Somehow, in some semi-subconscious way, the training and the race became a last, major connection I had left to Vega, if for no other simple reason than the fact that I had begun this endeavor when she was still alive. It was just an easy emotional conduit for my longing for continuity with her. Training for this particular race was implicitly a connection to her....I could bear my own body's pain, fatigue and exhaustion when I compared it to what she must have felt as she laid her head on my lap one last time as her body succumbed to the euthanatic drugs coursing through her veins. I'll always know it was the right thing to do with her but it's hard to divide myself from the guilt I feel over seeing my signature on the release form authorizing the administration of the act. Some days I simply ran to escape that memory. You see I've never had a heart to kill anything. Ask anyone who knows me. Just tonight, I stopped my cleaning duties at the church to secure a cup and napkin to contain the giant wolf spider that was loose in the fellowship hall. That's what I do.....it's what I've always done. I've never hesitated to go out of my way for some creature, gangly, spindly, hairy, bipedal.....whatever. I just feel the joy of life coursing purposefully enough through my own veins that it offers me an empathic insight into the "other" and their desire to have/need life.

Curiously enough, all those raw places came welling back up as the Finish Line came into sight. First, I saw Cathy and Andrea's Tennessee flag waving high (so's we could see them along the course). Crossing it meant crossing another place in how I am to maneuver through Vega's death, especially as it has called up some other painful emotional memories that I am only beginning to connect with.

That finish line was an accomplishment for Jason and I. It accomplished a shared goal that we did together. We struggled through quite a bit to get there. And the way we got there is not to be traded for anything. As usual, I had to hit the restroom at about mile 4. Jason didn't have to, but he waited with me. He didn't have to take the hit on his own personal time record in his first half marathon, but he waited with me and for me, just like he was with me and for me all during our training. You may think I'm reading too much into a piss, but, under the circumstances, that is a monument to our friendship that I shall lean to for all time. Suffice it to say, there was a lot of life that happened leading up to the 2 hours and 25 minutes it took my lumbering butt across the Finish Swine. And there is much, much more ahead.

2008-04-24T23:38:00.002-04:00

SAVED BY THE SECOND-TIER REJECTS: Why The Marginalized, The Minimized and the Screw-Ups May Save Us Yet

And if I may jump in.....(here is Alan's encapsulation of the everyone's input into the conversation thus far...)

Recession? You think so? Is anyone saying the great "D" word yet? Is that so far out of the question? Although it's apparently a flash-in-the-pan, "panic" response, the global quandary this week over food shortage, hoarding and escalating prices absolutely and unequivocally ought to call the Church even closer to a better-embodied life of sustainability. One which, as Jason Evans points out, must finally scuttle beyond theologizing and stop whiffing on the fumes of what could/should be and establish ourselves in even greater practical realities. And some are a heckuva lot further down the road than we are on this, I should say. But there's a move afoot, nonetheless.

I think what ultimately must be at stake here in the shadows between our evolving, theological vantage points is whether or not we are erecting calamity-proof structures which will allow the people and mission of God to thrive over-and-against the prevailing economic delusions of not only King George, but HIS predecessors, successors and their ilk the world over. Here, we may as well dispense with the faux, duplicitous notion of the two-party system, neither of which offer real ways out....only enslaving diversions and false solutions found deeper down the rabbit-hole. The kingdoms of this world are on the decline, in spite of the ascension of the ultra-elite to their fleeting states of power and wealth. We do believe another Kingdom is breaking in, do we not?

I have been mentoring a young church planter here in Oxford for well over a year now. Every week in our local independent coffee shop, we at least sit down for a few hours, sharing life and conversation- looking at each other down our containers of Church Planter Ambrosia (large caramel latte with whipped cream, in my case). As you might imagine, we cover a few bases on a lot of developmental/leadership kinds of things he encounters in his journey as lead planter in a college church. They hold two large-group weekly worship gatherings as well as weekly community groups and have been exploring a communal living situation of their leaders for the last year with some interesting results and seem to be doing well in this context.

The planting paradigm he finds himself in was one I was entrenched in nine years ago. The equation is roughly similar: trained church planter+convention/state/local association agreement/funding+lots of promising talk= successful church plant that can be modeled back up the rungs through the local association, the state and, finally, the national convention levels...the great butter-up, lick-and-chew-you-up-then-spit-you-out syndrome (though not necessarily intentional).

Get it up and going, garner the attentions of the denominational supers and for the two-year time-period in which you're promised a salary of sorts from the denominational coffers, things can be titillating. Until churches promising support bail out on you. Until the association you were called through misplaces your housing support money and ultimately says you can go to another local association because "we can't afford" you. And now they find themselves- mainstreamed and moved-out- here in the land where intellectualism, Budweiser and bloated real estate are the triune gods of this section of Butler County. As more or less vagabonds and misfits staring down the opportunity toward these more organic structures but still unsure of how much to unhand the fading church paradigm, maybe their hands will be forced; maybe ours will be too.

Stripped of opulence, influence, prestige and status- the Church that flourishes has a certain destitution as its fuel. And this- toward unheard-of realms of the transformative power of God across the board. For if this is indeed the end-game we are mooring upon, then the coming darkness looms less forbidding, shouldered by the misfits on the margins.

2008-04-20T01:26:00.006-04:00

A Different Kind of Resurrection Dream

I still keep dreaming of Vega. I had my fourth dream about her and it was the most interactive, with a bit of a theological twist.

I'm sitting cross-legged on the ground with some other people I know, but I can't recall them now. It is dim and misty and Vega is around me/us....I can see her as well as sense her in my dream. At times, she comes by me to play and she's off again to absorb attention from someone else. I am conversing with who's there about why she's with us. You see, we all knew she had passed away, but between the joy of having her back and the mild surprise that she was alive again, I had an explanation.

As she came by me again to lay on her side and offer up a paw in my direction like she would do when I'd scruff her chest with my hand, I began to explain that she had been resurrected. Somehow, we had all been a part of it, I suppose in some instrumental way- either bringing it on or simply witnessing it. There was a stabbing comfort coming from this dream but, as such, it is confined to my subconscious, not easily summoned (if at all) and dulled by any theological reality of the spiritual life (if any) of the domesticated canine.

And so, amidst the damning awareness that such grief pales in the comparative perspective of those who've lost, say, a husband or a wife or a brother or sister or daughter, I grovel in this diffuse perplexity of the existential destinies of "intelligent" animals created by and related to by their Creator. Why is the Scriptural witness so silent on this matter? Why are we allowed to bond so deeply with another creature for the end result to be existentially null and void? Why can't we know if the creatures for which we've been assigned a certain stewardship over will fall into our arms again in the celebrated newness of the New Heaven and New Earth? Couldn't they partake as well? If God can remember the way our atoms bonded, could he not remember the animals? Is there no return to that Garden in which all creatures cohabitated in pefection?

The density of the human plight in this loss is that we can "know" of our eventual reuniting on the other side of the veil. I will see my Granny again. Papaw will be there, and so on. My love was no less of a love and my stewardship no less faithful in the care I gave Vega. Yet I cannot rest on the assurances of well-wishers who stretch the contextual foundations of the Scriptures that seem to allude to the "salvation" of the animals (in that they partake in the resurrection or the New Heaven and the New Earth). And I cannot stomach the disheartening naysayers who won't fathom of the possibility to begin with. And I am finally discontent with just not knowing.

2008-04-19T01:25:00.005-04:00

Cathy nudged me this morning...as usual....and about the time we're both about to rouse from our sleep. But I had been jostled awake, peering at the clock through bleary eyes when I determined to snooze some more. It was 5:36 a.m. But Cathy was speaking through my ear plugs.

"Did you feel that?!? The dresser with the TV on it was rattling!"

I tried to dismiss it, having not "heard" it, but aware now that I wasn't sleeping well up to that point it seemed. She had mentioned that either we needed T.A.P.S. to do an investigation or something else had happened. I opted to go downstairs to the USGS site and confirm what I excitedly suspected- we had indeed gone through an earthquake originating from near West Salem, Illinois that measured 5.2 on the Richter scale.

We are 289 miles from the epicenter and my report submitted to the USGS was the first from Oxford. There were 32 reports submitted in all from our zip code (as of midnight, 4-19-08). So HAH! In all, Oxfordians felt an average intensity of about III on a maximum of VII for this event. There were at least 4 more aftershocks during the day today. One was over 4 on the Richter scale.

All I can say is that was doggone-freekin-biskit-kind-of-luscious.

2008-04-04T22:29:00.003-04:00

Trudging Ahead....

Had a superb conversation with the Jaylord last night for about 3 hours over pizza. In addition to a swell running partner, I have an even sweller feller to journey with in this life up here. We connected on some important issues regarding the present and future of Veritas. Just judging by our conversation, I am wholly heartened by what's ahead. And especially the opportunity for those foolish enough to remain and help facilitate some more Kingdom things together.

I'm fully enthralled with who is still with us. I know (and am coming to know) their giftings, abilities. We've journeyed this far together, we have a history and His name and authority and that's fuel enough for me.

Who knows what it'll look like....the thing is, we (our community) know in the most fundamental sense what it is that grounds us (disiciplined simplicity, organicity, an embedded, authentic presence of Christ before our neighbors). That much will be our foundation. There will be a move toward more embodiment in addition to verbalizing what this will look like. Just talking about it isn't enough. We are still about the need to meet together, to strengthen each other but we need to be more about empowering one another to serve to where we go back and have the bulk of our lives.

I know some in our community are wondering about what's ahead. Some have bailed out on us. Some have misinterpreted a perceived inaction, silence (or whatever) as wishy-washiness, a vacuum in leadership, laxity...I don't know what. Some may have seen it as a chance to jump ship. In any case, some perspectives may be currently misconstrued. Suffice it to say where that is the case, things are not as they appear. They are potentially better than they appear. The question is who wants to persevere, in light of the hits we've been taking (not to mention those we've invited). But more on that later.

I just know- for my part- I'm ready to put out my ecclesial bat signal. God knows it's been cloudy enough of late, so it should have something to visibly reflect off of.........at least to those half-willing to look up again with us.

2008-04-02T23:20:00.006-04:00

I am supposing that I need to say something of import, something that might enthrall or ensure readership. I don't mind speaking to things that impart life, if what I speak of does just that. Admittedly, much of what I have to say right now centers heavily on loss, some large, some small and some sliding on both sides of the greasy continuum. Collectively, the weight is intrusive.

Yet another person has sought communal pastures other than the one into which we've invested ourselves. While not so totally unexpected, I simply don't agree with it for several reasons that are sensible I suppose mainly in my own context and perspective. I do feel slighted, but I must ultimately attend to that on my own. I bear no ill will or sour feelings toward anyone. I'm just not that way. It's just when I'm at a loss for a reasonable understanding for relational withdrawals, I mull over the bits and pieces, mostly the scraps found in hand when the dust settles. Moving on now...

I'm still grieving over the loss of Vega. I can't help it. Now that I'm working morning shifts (6am-130pm), I am the first one home to wallow in an empty house that had this creature for the previous 12 years....every day, she was there to greet someone....whoever it was...to come through these doors.

I've had three dreams about her and I'll wake up crying (or think I am). I am taken aback at the kind of introspection the grief has offered me and I've been surprised at all the other similar grieving circumstances I've had that get lassoed into the situation. But I parse these feelings and contexts to their rightful place and I still find I need to be grieving sometimes. Over this dog, nonetheless.

And, yes, I've lost close people in my life. But the affinity afforded me with the care of this creature, over whom I was graced with the "alpha" status, has set me into an emotional process much different in many ways and threaded with varying degrees of theological complexity, offering a simultaneous fix of comfort and cold.

I guess a picture tells most of that to which I cannot adequately speak. This picture was the very last time Vega would enter our house from the backyard, where we would let her go to relieve herself. The meager deck stairs in her stage of dysplasia were phenomenal hurdles in that time. There was a fresh snow the day before and her paw prints were left right up against the bottom stair leading to the deck. The night following her death, there was a light snow. I remembered on my bus route that day that I could still find her paw print if I'd search carefully enough, in spite of the snow. I began to be angry that it HAD snowed, because, when you grieve, you search for tendrils of physical connections to the one you loved in such close proximity to their passing. So I got home, went to my knees outside to where I thought the prints were and gently dusted away the top layer of snow in hopes of finding the last remaining physical proof of her final journey into the home she dearly loved.

2008-03-30T12:13:00.006-04:00

...So What Now?

I know it's nothing central to this particular blog, but there is within me a sense that a return to writing is a return to life of sorts. The key task is now ascertaining just what kind of life. I've had some time to think.

I/we retreated from a lot in September of 2007. I had to. I didn't feel like it was an abdication or a shirking of the things for which I was responsible, but now, judging from some of the relational repercussions and the current "lay of the land," I feel presented with as much opportunity as I am befuddled by the looming losses. I never intended this to be a drill bit into our foundation followed by an explosive charge, but I don't know if some have taken it to mean this. This may take some time for me to unpack too (even if my 2.7 readers have been shooed away by my absence).

I needed to breathe out instead of inwardly (like I had been for some time, mainly while trying to ferret out the direction of our community and the changing relational dynamics of people coming and going). Part of that included discovering foundations of living life with a people with God in a certain way that had been congealing in my mind over the years all the while wondering with whom I had to journey. Part of this ongoing, neglected equation has to do with the deconstruction of who I am in all of this, and, wondering how much deconstruction is too much. I didn't really expect that this exhalation process would last for over six months, but I didn't really do anything to stop the train either. See? There's still, arguably, a bit of intention in that.

I have been captivated by several movements in my life, both imposed and invited. Each have been deep and incisive and warrant further reflection because the impact hasn't been fully realized:

Saying Goodbye to Vega: We had to put our German Shepherd, Vega, down this past February 19th, 2008, after several culminating days/weeks/months of deteriorating health stemming from her treatment of debilitating and severe hip dysplasia. Of course, if you know us, you know that Cathy and I don't have children but after 12 years of sharing our home with this creature with whom we were given the opportunity and chose to enter into a deep bond, I have frankly been blindsided by a grief nearly equal in depth.
Absence of Close Friends: Some have moved on to work in other states as part of new directions in their lives, which, although difficult, is something I celebrate with them because I am still in contact with them. There was notice of their change of venue; they included me in the process. Others have simply dropped off my radar for reasons unknown. Even as I emitted distress signals, their acknowledgment was nowhere to be detected when I needed them most. There was no intention communicated for their going MIA. And, given our history of having at least achieved an intimacy deserving of ongoing connection, I am at a loss.
Teaching: Like the Marsh of Cee, (and in some large part because of him), I am now adjunct faculty at Indiana Wesleyan University in their College of Adult and Professional Studies. I teach biblical electives, a sociology and a history course. This has been radically fulfilling being that I get to infuse the tenets of the Kingdom very blatantly into the material. When non-believing students connect with what you're saying regarding said Kingdom, that's quite the stab of joy.
Training For A Half-Marathon: Or, as my father said I should say it, "I'm half-running a marathon." It just sounds more substantial than to say "I'm running a half-marathon." Jason came home after Thanksgiving break with this absurdity flowing from his lips: "Let's run the Flying Pig Marathon." Well, we decided to give it a try starting at the end of November, 2007 and run until the first cut-off date for the registration at the end of January. I was enthralled because I was somewhat sedentary and had never run a half-marathon before. It would involve a rigorous detail of some life changes that I didn't know if I could incorporate. But I went all out, bought shoes, etc., and begun the regimen and have been going since with the race in about a month. I have lost 15 pounds, run over 20 miles per week and feel great about my chances for completing the 13.1 miles in May. Prior to starting in November, I couldn't even run over one mile. This has been a great discipline for me and is still paying dividends even this far out from the race. One great plus has been having Jason to train with. Our friendship has deepened considerably and it is hard to know how it would have been without him as a partner in it.
The Changing Face of Veritas: We have firmly attached ourselves to some foundational principles regarding the kind of community we ought to be. But much is yet to be birthed. Much is on the horizon and it offers some tantalizing possibilities. With Jason's graduation this May, it will be the first time we don't have a current Miami student in our midst. Much more on this later.

I'm just simply saying here and now that, for the purposes of this blog, (which is an ever-present outsource of my heart and plea for accountable personal and communal progress), I am back, even if I am reduced to the yipping of an annoying lap-dog in the outer darkness.

2007-09-19T01:48:00.000-04:00

Breaking Away

I guess everyone else has had their go at "it"..."it" being their chance to wig away for some rest and recuperation from the toils of life, love and ministry.

So it's my turn now I 'spose. Cathy and I are taking a mini-sabbatical of sorts starting in October. I am cutting out some things by necessity and staying put on others that I don't feel like God has released me from yet. We've been on "go" from day one here in Oxford and that was 7 years ago. Actually, rewind to 1998, and we've been in "church planter" mode since then without a real break. And I don't mean the occasional vacation, but a break from the mind running full speed ahead, always processing, always analyzing, always on "available" mode. A paring away of the regular routines of doing things.

In the presence of frustration (there's always that), futility, joy (even), weariness and smidgens of hope, we have decided that we have neglected some things about ourselves that need attention. That includes our marriage. We are solidly in love, devoted to each other and to ministry together.....we just need some time together and alone to find more of what we're to be and where our service to Christ and to our community will take us. We are solidly committed to being here in Oxford too....so we aren't going anywhere but to within, to God and to each other.

This has been a while in coming...about a year and a half actually. I just haven't had the courage to admit it much I don't guess. I tried a mini retreat for a few days in March and that was great, but I knew it was not enough. I just know that I can't remain in some of the places from which I am operating...and that mostly out of my own strength. I don't want that much anymore.

This means:

Terminating our suburban community (we have had two other people living with us in intentional community)....we just need the space that is our home to be able to go to where we need to go
Ceasing our house church community meeting at our house (other community members are planning on an alternate location)....we also will not be attending our community during this time
Laying aside some visible and mostly invisible pastoral duties....I will still be observant and it isn't as if I'm leaving a vacuum...I am going to return in due time
Entering into some deliberate personal and corporate accountability during the interim for reflection, healing and wholeness
Getting away with my wife so as to just focus on ourselves a few times
Getting away personally...each of us....so we can gain a greater clarity of our place in our togetherness

We will be back. We are not sloshing around for an undetermined period of time. I will return to this blog. We will return to our community refreshed, reinvigorated, revitalized and- hopefully and prayerfully- with something of import to say. And an even greater, more empowered platform from which to spring. Yeah, it's scary, it's a risk but and some may not even understand, but everything in our bones tells us it's the right thing.

I won't be back the same as I was upon stepping away. Thanks for holding out for me/us.....keep posted.

2007-09-01T00:57:00.000-04:00

The Cathedral Spires in the Black Hills, SD- from our trip out west this summer. Could really stand to be there right now.

Everytime I see this pic, the cirrocumulus cloud deck above the spires there look like they're moving from right to left.

2007-08-30T01:34:00.000-04:00

Figured I'd post since I've been reticent for the last 21 days. I guess I can surmise enough has been going on to direct my attention elsewhere, as such seems to be the case with blogging buds who've slipped the surly bonds of the blogosphere into other ethereal freedoms. But it doesn't mean I don't want to write.

So much seems to be happening around these parts and I'm really trying to grasp something I can recognize. I'm changing, Veritas is changing, people around me are changing. Not all of it is healthy change. And not all of it is within my influence, though it doesn't mean I haven't tried. And that doesn't mean that it should be controlled by me at all. People just float along not really seemingly aware of how the decisions that they make and the things they say, do (or don't do) impact those around them.

Some things bode well for the future. I have been mentoring a church planter here in Oxford for the last several months who I've just simply come to adore (along with the whole planting team). His heart is solidly in the right place, he has a love for this community, for the students and for his planting team and God is doing some neat things in them even as new as they are. In just a week and a half of school, 10 students have become Christ followers. Some crazy God-stories are already happening too (including one of the pastors getting run over by a car and living to tell about it).

We are gearing up in plugging a young lady into the mobile home park as part of what we are praying is the center of some God-activity happening there. She has bought a mobile home at the entrance of the park, is stoking some things dream-wise and Veritas is going to come along-side her because we believe she is only going to be the first of several who will be part of an intentional community to anchor that section of town. She knows she's called, we've affirmed that (things are happening relationally there too) and we're just waiting for God to give some more specifics.

Cathy has just begun a prayer group at her school, where she and some other teachers are going to gather once a week before school in one of the rooms and just pray. Such stuff is the nectar of weary church-planter guy (like me), looking to suckle some sweetness wherever he can find it.

2007-08-09T01:49:00.000-04:00

HOT HOT HOT
Hottest I've seen it since I can remember.....hit 99 today at my weather station at 1361 Dana here in Oxford. Hit 104 according to the thermometer in the car (which was the temperature near the pavement). Excessive heat warning, severe thunderstorms today (not here of course) and even a 'nado in NYC. Good weather day all around I'd say.

2007-08-08T02:33:00.000-04:00

Testing...Can You Help Me Out?
Okay. I need someone...ANYONE to just leave a comment on my blog to let me know people CAN comment. You don't have to interact.....just say something. I don't know if things are working right, although I can comment.

2007-07-31T00:25:00.000-04:00

Can We Do This? Are We Allowed?
Here's the deal. Kim and Kara are two young Veritasian ladies who've been tracking with us quite a while. They are finding themselves in a transitional time in their lives calling into the fore issues of vocation, calling, economy, ministry, location and the Kingdom of God. They've waded through the decision to remain in Oxford- here in our community- foregoing other options and opportunities to go elsewhere and be and do other things. That says quite a bit there.

This is coinciding with a phase in the life of Veritas that many of us are encountering on many different levels. We have people who are staying put and taking root here. Jobs are being secured here. We're buying houses in the same neighborhood and really only beginning to ask what that means. We know it's significant.

The major point is that we are revisiting what our community is all about. Why are we here? What are we to do? Who are we to be? We're feeling the need to solidify our community around some vows pertinent to our place and people. And yes, we've been influenced by many friends and communities in what could defined as the new monasticism but not because we read a book or two. Perhaps that's a dog to chase a bit later.

For the Dana house, we are embracing the fact that in many ways we are a training house and a "retreat" for leaders in training. And we're also just a simple, warm and inviting cabin in the woods for some wayfarers. Our calling is to be navigators in this terrain we've been given. We've toyed with that, but it's time for us to go full force into that placement. And God is giving us people with whom to verify this calling.

We've always had people living with us since we've been in Oxford. Well....not ALWAYS as in 24/7/365...but many people have been with us, living under this roof, for multitudes of reasons. There is definitely a "thing" of hospitality that we are seeing God enact by just opening our home. God just does things with this. We're only just now seeing how being intentional with it makes Kingdom possibilities become realities. We've done "intentional" things with people in the past (such as community leadership internships), but this is an occasion of not only exploring this dimension of community and what it means for us as a church, but also in the creation of another intentional community.

Suffice it to say, God is making a move of some sort that seems rather pointed and concerted amongst more than a few of his people here in Oxford in our own little abandoned place of Empire....the Oxford trailer park. In some pretty supernatural ways, he's laying this area of town (I call the College Corner Corridor, or C3.....I know, I know) on our hearts and we're discovering a common vision for the C3.

So Kim and Kara are finding an inner urgency to "be" there...in the trailer park, as residents- even buying a trailer and essentially becoming one with the people in the neighborhood, serving them and doing their part to love them into the Kingdom. Nobody, especially not I, had ever suggested to them to do such a thing to my knowledge. And from what I am gathering, they are not loners "out there." There are pioneers who've laid a path. And if it is that Kim and Kara are to go there, there will be others to follow if they are faithful. They won't be the only ones.

Still yet, there are quite a few unknowns and uncertainties in making this move, if it indeed happens. And having lived together the last year and just recently coming to the end of their lease, Kim and Kara are finding that the decision to move is forced upon them. But this time, in ascertaining where to go, they are submitting it to the scrutiny of what this particular move can mean in context with what God is doing in us and them. A move with this kind of Kingdom-minded intentionality is somewhat of a precedent for our faith community.

So this is what the Dana house is offering and has indeed morphed into.......we have invited Kim and Kara in to live with us in a structured, intentional community as we delve into and decipher just what it is that God is doing in them as well as in us. There are no real preconceived notions and token naivetes in the formation of this community here at 1361. We are laying a bed of disciplined routines and a structure to our common life together for as long as we are together (until God says to move). Through common prayer, meals, conversations and routines borrowed from the rich history of the Church, the new monastic ideals evident in other local communities and through careful support of the wisdom of brothers and sisters in Christ, we are basically seeking out a way of life that is indeed sustainable and reproducible and faithful to the (hopefully) prophetic witness of the KOG here in the intellectual capital of Butler County, Ohio.

Sure, it may be prototypical and exploratory, but what we have formed is real. We are even in a suburb, but not the kind of suburb you might think if you've never been here. We are one of a few single family residences on our street where the rest are duplexes, some mainly run down. People are in and out of these places like the seasons, and most of these people are in lower income situations, or at least, transitional income circumstances, if you will.

But here we are, and we're going for it- or something, whatever "it" will be. We know that we are fashioning a disciplined bed where the seeds of the possibilities of God are going to be nurtured and grasped in due time. For a split second, I've thought, "can we do this in this kind of neighborhood?" Does the place we are in "guarantee" a legitimacy or not? Are we trying to be "new monastics" and therefore up our stock on the hip guage? No, not really. This kind of life we are choosing at 1361 Dana just makes the most sense. And mainly, we need discipline and depth because we think we are on the cusp of some pretty inspiring things here in Oxford and we need depth if we're to be an incubator for what God wants to entrust to us.

2007-07-29T12:16:00.000-04:00

If you were a child of the 80's you may really appreciate this.

Brings me back to times on our cardboard in our friend's carports....breakin' in East Tennessee for sure.

Days do indeed go by.

2007-07-25T00:57:00.000-04:00

Bellythink: Stability's Arch Enemy

Currently, there is only one Veritasian who's still a university student and will be graduating in December. Quite frankly, the fact that there aren't any students (or won't be in the near future) means a several things: one, our community is coming of age; two, our outreach into the student population has waned a bit; and, three, it reflects a bit of the direction our community has taken.

Part of this coming of age is begging a few questions as well. Who are we? How are we to grow? What are we supposed to be doing? We are asking questions that even challenge many of the ways I've conceptualized about what it means to be the Church.

We are nonetheless primarily a church of young adults. Many of these have graduated and some have moved on to other parts of the country and world. Some of these still track with us.

Now some are staying in the area and getting jobs and buying houses. This has been a long time coming when you are intending on sustaining a church plant amongst primarily students, as we had purposed when we arrived in 2000.

For us, there are some Kingdom issues that are taking on new light. It is heartening to see us starting careers here in the area and buying houses and thinking about staying here and serving God in our "hereness." This is a phase I think that bodes well for us as a church because I believe God is faithful when we embed ourselves for the long haul.

This is why stability is becoming more of a meaty issue for us...one that can truly be embodied in tangible ways that reflect back into the community at large. This means we are at a place of seeing how such a vow can impact really what is already taking place in our lives.

Stability embodied in the presence of such cantankerous consumerism as can be found on a campus such as Miami (which is only a microcosm of our culture) may seem ridiculous to townie and student alike. Why would a student want to remain in Oxford, which offers next-to-nothing in terms of the kind of life and income "promised" to the Miami graduate (if not by virtue of its reputation alone)? Jon Stock, in his chapter on stability in Inhabiting the Church notes that we, from an early age, are taught to think "with our belly." He is essentially saying that our appetites virtually drive us into a frenzy of purposeless mobility and restlessness. Our culture dictates that not attending to our desires is to impose disaster to our sense of fulfillment and actualization.

What does it mean to stay together in a city where dispensing/dispatching people is economically and systemically necessary? How does THAT bode for the Church in our context, especially when we devalue attractional modes of being and "doing" church? We shall try and find out.

2007-07-22T23:54:00.000-04:00

A Quick Pictorial Update on Veritasian Happenings

Chris' baptism back in June at Hueston Woods State Park.

Baptismal feast in embryo; waiting for the coal of char to heat up.

Celtic Daily Tatanka Brownie.

Swell times at the Dana gathering.

2007-07-20T02:29:00.000-04:00

Yellerstoned
Although it seems like an eon ago since we were there, the total impact upon my soul from our journey out west is still reverberating within. People who've been to Yellowstone inevitably say to people who haven't: "It's so hard to describe. You just gotta go!"

I agree with that conclusion. Comprehending the massive bombardment to the senses there and what that portends was staggering for me, sort of an existential paring of my soul on a level for which I was unprepared.

It was no difficult task to be utterly reminded of the grandeur of God's creative supremacy while you are out there. You might be driving for hours in the color-washed reds, pinks, browns, tans and whites of the countryside spanning visibly for miles ahead and suddenly you are taken in by a wash of emotion and humility in the Creator who seems to say, "Look what I did."

The contrasting ironies are at once preposterous as they are invigorating. It is unnerving and freeing to have gone from suburban "civilization" to tremendous landscapes resulting from great and terrible forces that could, in a moment, end your life.

I was simply not prepared to process the enormity of the experience that is Tatanka. I must say, having surfed the channels one week before our trip, I happened across Dances With Wolves at the part where Costner's character is getting pummeled while trying to show the Native Americans that the bison were on the move. The only word he knows that they understand is "tatanka," which he indicates with two pointed index fingers attached to his temples. They got it and so did I.

So I issued an edict to Cathy, decreeing that we shall not refer to the bison as such, but they would be called "tatanka" and we had persmission to correct one another whenever we strayed.

These dudes were everywhere. They were wandering in our campground through the tents. That's about 1500-2000 lbs. of them, doing what they wanted. Approaching six feet tall at their shoulder, they are visual markers of bygone days of graceful innocence and rugged strength and power. To me they became icons of God, pointers to his grace and affirmation.

White man nearly decimated the creatures not so long ago. After coming to within 10 feet of one for the first time in my life, (in addition to seeing them in their natural places that I had never seen before), I began wondering: what is God's experience of these animals? does he take pleasure in them? are they "aware" of his pleasure in them? what is their "experience" of their Creator? It became nauseating to me that these animals could not have an existence outside of a park created for them. Is our current subduction of the globe as it is the kind of stewardship God intended, having traded the earliest Garden for ones wraught with concrete and steel, mostly at the expense of the creatures with which we are to coexist? Certainly, this begs the fullest expanse of the questions of consumption and sustainability.

It became amazing to me, that- in spite of our history with the tatanka- they tarried with us...in their home, almost seamlessly weaving us into their ways, our unnatural
interruptions with our cars, tents and selves, gawking with mouths agape. They jam our roadways and lumber onward in their tantanka-ness, with a slow toll and pace that invites onlookers to relish the same. Irony...in their behemoth heads rhythmically flowing up and down as they reveal a grace from time immemorial. Irony.....in such docility while knowing that they can run about 30 miles per hour and with one thrust of their horn...well, you get the picture.

But there we were...us and them. We didn't deserve to be there. Not after our atrocity perpetrated upon them. By virtue of just being out there, it was no stretch to see the consumerism that almost eradicated them for their fur never really abated. But there, for me, amongst our tents and beside our cars and with no legitimate reason to allow us, was an image of God. Packaged in this furry beast was rolled up welcome, affirmation and grace. God, we are told, "pitched his tent" amongst us. And this in spite of how we try to "do" him in and eradicate any semblance of him. Perhaps I may be unsupported in these tenets, but I was still moved by them.

But their heads are so freekin' awesomely huge! Beyond the fact they use them to plow through the snow to reach the warmer springs and steam vents for grass, I am still trying to decipher the theological significance of that.

2007-07-19T01:55:00.000-04:00

I am back from my summit in Greensboro, NC. Wonderful people there.....quite hungry and eager for God to break into their midst and use individuals in a simple and powerful way. That seemed really evident to me.

Driving down there was luscious....saw a house fire, a tanker fire and a car on fire within about 3 hours. God even gave me a lil' bit of fire while I was down there too. That's always a delicious thing.

God to see Dave-O at the elsewhere collaborative in Greensboro...a 3-story storefront with some cool artists and splendid art installations. Somewhat in my honor (I'll go ahead and think), one of Dave's works there includes a "weather station" that allows a person visual and auditory (as well as tactile) stimulation of weather from the INSIDE. Nifty stuff.

Tomorrow, the Dana house is hosting Chad Moore and his planting team for a cookout. They are planting a church here in Oxford. Chad and I have been meeting together weekly for the past few months and the guy is pretty sharp and some God things are happening with him that I'll hopefully elaborate on later. I'm looking forward to meeting his team, but, of course, tomorrow will probably be the day we'll get severe weather.

2007-07-15T02:00:00.000-04:00

I'm just tinkering with my blog appearance and it's getting a bit ridiculous now. But I needed something new but I can't stop myself with the reinvention, at least with the small leeway I have in knowledge and options with Blogger. I don't know....I suppose the digital flux here represents the same in my life.

I'll be leaving for Greensboro tomorrow for yet another summit with some local pastors/leaders there to talk about non-traditional church planting stuff. It's kind of funny that Dave, a Veritasian, is in the midst of an art residency as part of a collective there in Greensboro and I get called for this trip there with the North American Mission Board. We'll get to connect so that's off the cool-meter.

2007-07-13T17:38:00.001-04:00

Okay...experimenting here. What you see is not what you'll get. Bear with me. If you're with me.

2007-07-13T08:46:00.001-04:00

Shortly, after a conference call regarding my next summit in Greensboro, NC, I shall haul a busload of chitrens and yoots from Clubhouse down to the Cincy Museum Center at Union Terminal.

My goal this year- in addition to arriving at our destination safely- is to keep the umbrellas on board while on I-75.

2007-07-11T03:36:00.000-04:00

The New 'Scape of Things?

Ever found yourself peering out over the horizon, thinking you're ascertaining the lay of the land- but instead of a state-of-the-art, handheld, GPS device- you see that you've really been clamoring over a 6-foot sextant more appropriate for Johannes Hevelius? And to top it off, you don't really know how to work it.

So what does that say about how you "got" to where you are now? Where are the objects that have been guiding you? Are they as fixed in their positions as you thought?

Secretly, I think I tend to hold my perception of my own relationships as constants for navigation. I don't think there currently is a judgment for or against this at this point either. This has been solidly the case for me in these last few years of ministry....I guess I can say it's been that.

There was a time in those years (and I don't think that "time" has abated) wherein my journey seemed like a span from the Arctic Circle to the calm of the tropics. It was lonely and icy but there were others being found on that journey and it seemed we were all headed in the same direction. Finding each other was warmth enough.

Across the board, some destinations were made, some are still in progress and some- like poor, ol' Jack Dawson in Titanic.- sunk into the cold depths off the raft.

I'm looking around in wonderment at how much things have changed in such a short span. It's not all negative change. People's lives take root; new footholds are gained. Any one vantage point, perspective or conclusion at any given time isn't hard and fast. We all know that- but that's a risky emotional reality in which to dwell. But again, not necessarily negative.

For instance, and at the risk of sounding something like a drama-queen, I look at my blogroll and about half either barely or do not blog at all. In their histories, there were cathartic moments for them when actively writing and images flowed through their fingertips to the screen handily and I was profoundly moved by their virtual introspection into their lives. Somewhere, the light went off, the writing was burdensome or had lost it's novelty or was laid aside for authentically noble reasons. For whatever reason, just like the move toward blogging signaled a life change, the move away from it arguably signals something like that too, I would say.

The pressure to generate content and the quasi-convincing humiliation that you have no readers can be a blog-killer, especially when nothing is to be gained financially from the endeavor. Did the online phenomena dictate the direction of the discipline to "pen" thoughts to the cybersphere or did our conversation? Does the code, signal and digitized images give life or do our words? It's curious that those who have much to speak with unique profundity find that they cannot say as much online anymore. And in every way, I can respect that. The entry into disciplined silence is noteworthy, if that's the case. If not, what's happening?

So, we seem to quit writing when we become disillusioned or part of our dream dies.The fact remains that we identify a life stage and assign a behavior to that stage as a marker (such as the novelty of blogging). We move out of that stage, and blogging is dispensible (again, for some good reasons). I've found, and maybe others have at times, that blogging is writing and writing for me has been prayer. Since I'm not altogether that good of a pray-er, I've not been that good of a blogger. But, I'm not a blogger, really. Just a writer of sorts. And that connects me to my soul and to souls. Every so often, it connects me to the Creator of Souls.

2007-07-04T03:27:00.000-04:00

WELL, HERE I IS...
I really have MUCH to update you on...Veritasian ministerial leanings/directions/developments; having just driven over 5000 miles in the last 3 weeks; realizing I've seen fully one-third of the states in the continental US since October....goofy stuff like that.

It's 330am- my usual haunting hour- my ladee of oldness and the dawg are sleeping in the community room and I'm listening to Hammock's Raising Your Voice...Trying to Stop an Echo and I'm quite fond of it at present. You should dive into it if you have a hankering for some ambient, shoegazer, dream-pop tracks that are altogether melancholic and hopeful and starkly emotionally riveting. Their musical intuitions hearken me back to my rural Tennessee roots, rife with mountain scenes and the pungent and sweet odor of valley cornfields tucked between mountains.

So this duo, from the south and living in Tennessee (you'll see good stuff DOES come from there), produced Raising Your Voice... after one of the duo lost a friend to suicide. Much of the tracks cover a theme of loss, despair and questioning and a hint of faith....not unlike what you and I have been through in the recent past.

I feel like I haven't surfaced for air in months, but my wanderings have been rich and formative. All of this brings me down to the longing to nurture my roots here in O-town for a while.

2007-06-06T23:54:00.000-04:00

MY (WIFE'S) CELEBRITY LOOK ALIKES

Thanks to the Creecher, I just had to....

While I'm too embarrassed to do mine yet, I had to do my wife's, which was just plain entertaining. Mine....well....was quite shameful. But maybe later.

2007-06-02T21:55:00.000-04:00

MYSTERY GIRL UPDATE

For the untold myriads of you desiring further knowledge on the subject ("myriads"=nicki mcg!), I queried my next-door neighbor about her.

Essentially, she is perhaps a girl that deals with autism or something similar. There is some history with my next door neighbor and the girl and her family as well where she exhibited some behaviors indicative of the aforementioned condition.

Sounds like there are some extenuating family issues for her too that are a bit heartbreaking, maybe having to do with some control issues with her. Hopefully, she'll keep showing up and we can make some sore of contact with her. Don't know what we'll do next.

2007-05-29T23:24:00.000-04:00

Whaddya Do With This?

For several weeks and on a few occasions, I have been observing a little girl in our neighborhood who has seen to make herself available to our front yard and, well....just help herself.

She's not doing anything that I can see that's destructive or suspicious, insofar as a fourth or fifth-grader can do. She's just.....hanging out. She doesn't say anything or engage in any other kind of behavior other than really loiter, I guess.

Jason saw her sitting in our driveway while we were away one time recently. She was drawing with that outdoor concrete chalk. The next time I noticed her, Jason and I were in the front yard, observing my mulberry tree. We both looked and saw her sitting in the yard, kind of straddling the curb and scooping back into the road piles of my freshly mown grass that I taken care to take OFF of the road. She was completely oblivious to us until she got up and started nonchalantly walking down the road. I thought for sure she glanced back at us and cut a wry smile as she strolled down the road as if her job was done.

So today, I am coming home from the weight room and I notice her walking on the sidewalk past my driveway as I am pulling in. I park in the drive and she proceeds to walk into our yard and plant herself under our plum tree as if on an leisurely stroll in the park. She did not even look at me as if to "ask" if it were normal comportment to just hang out in a stranger's yard. I made it a point to look at her to see if I could make eye contact, but no go.

I didn't sense any imminent threat so I went on in. She sat there for about the next ten minutes, just long enough for Jason and Andrea to walk by. Jason knew who she was and they tried to say "hello." All she could muster was a bland stare at them, devoid of any vocalizations. I figured as much.

I did get this picture of her just to make sure she wasn't a ghost. Well, not really for that reason, but this little mystery girl has piqued my interest here and, although, such behavior might be the norm in more urban environments, it's not so much in suburbia. And I don't know what it is about our place that keeps drawing her here, but I have not ever seen her doing this in anyone else's yard. Just ours.

I'll keep you posted to see if I make contact with her.

2007-05-27T00:50:00.000-04:00

Jen Leonard is blessing our presence here at 1361 Dana in O-town for the next day or so. That's totally some pretty sweet awesomeness.

2007-05-26T02:23:00.000-04:00

WELL, I'M BACK

Back here in good ol' oihO. And it is a treat to be home. Every time I am away, I invigorated into newer, fresher places of heart for our work here.

Well, to get this out of the way, the flights were fun. A one-hour, ten-minute ground stoppage on the runway in Dayton on my 737 was luscious. Of course I was monitoring the Chicago radar every fifteen minutes, but stopped short of offering my fellow passengers weather updates for fear of not being able to stop myself.

When we did finally get up and make our approach into O'Hare, the pilot was doing some pretty cool maneuvers that I wasn't sure I wanted to see a 737 make, like dips, dives and pull-ups over convective towers, like in the pic I snapped below.

I didn't know at the time, but one of our team members was in Detroit on his plane ready for departure when they discovered a mechanical problem with the fuel line or something. They performed a repair and did a taxi down the runway. I suppose as they were doing so, there was an even greater malfunction and fuel was being sprayed all over the plane. Yikes. No, make that a double yikes. Obviously that flight was canceled and,unfortunately, he didn't get to join us.

Coming back I got to fly in a Fairchild 328, which is Midwest's regional jet. I was scheduled for a United flight from Milwaukee to O'Hare then to Dayton on a 737. But guess who had a ground stoppage when I got to the airport in Milwaukee? They offered me a non-stop on Midwest to Dayton, which I took. You know that when you go up in gate letters and numbers you are getting a rinky-dinkier aircraft. So I got to gate D-52 and out the window there were nothing but turbo-propped "crop dusters" which I knew they weren't about to fly to Dayton, but I had to make sure. And I did. For the next 1.5 hours, I saw one Fairchild after the other land, deplane and take off again. These little boogers looked like mini-cargo planes and I immediately began to wonder how it would handle the turbulence we were about to get into.

It got a bit bumpy going up because the winds were gusting up to 30mph that day. But coming into Dayton felt like a riding with a drunk on a Rock-O-Plane at a gypsy carnival. I suppose a larger craft could have absorbed some of the bumps better but even as buffetted as we were, the crew did a good job landing.

The trip to Wisconsin was quite fruitful. We(our task force) have been compiling our findings from the past several months into some presentable material for our churches and their leaders. We have been receiving feedback from both groups and incorporating it into our material.

We started out with at least a premise that people in North America are largely unreached for Jesus and we aren't doing a very good job at ameliorating the problem. Intially, we were going to identify the barriers in our churches that kept non-professional ministers, (i.e., "lay" persons...regular church folk) from doing the Kingdom work they can and should be about, but have been kept back because of leader insecurity and just plain ignorance.

That is built upon the idea that soley relying on professional, trained church planters- the deployment of which are ridiculously resouce heavy- hasn't cut it. In that vein, we thought we were going to identify ways we could empower "lay" persons (we even have difficulties with the baggage associated with that word) to see that they could engage in planting in ways that- perhaps by perception- were reserved only for professional minister-types.

Well, now we are reasonably sure that the true spirit of what we think God is about in this is not to get people to "start" churches, per se, as much as it is about people being relationally available, persistent and connected to what God wants them to do in their own neighborhoods. When that happens, churches are often born in many kinds of forms that please God. That SBaptists have always taken the Commissioning in Matthew 28: 19, 20 to heart is not novel. More revolutionary in SBC life is that the goal necessarily isn't to pump out churches, but to create simple, redemptive communities where the spread of God's Kingdom is possible. This implies a radically new approach to disciple-making for some, if not many.

Not revolutionary for most of you, I know, but there is a groundswell amongst the everyday Christ follower in SBC churches that we are finding are longing to be released to do this and be free from programmatic/unnatural/inorganic approaches to impacting our neighbors for Christ. To be sure, there are deep pockets of control that factor into this being a bona fide release and empowerment.

But I think when people are free enough to realize their place and identity, God may move amongst us like we've not seen in ages, and in a way that isn't solely to save denominational face or feather the beds of our deep-seeded control issues. It will be something in which God alone can truly be glorified.

This much we knew from our first gathering in Orlando last October, when opening our journey together in a time of prayer, we were pretty literally driven to our knees- our little hotel conference room being filled with God's presence in a powerfully humbling way. It seemed God was telling us that if we were serious about what we were setting out to do, he would be the one to be glorified. I'll not forget that visitation of the Spirit upon us that day. We have a chance here. I know.

I hope.

2007-05-19T22:32:00.000-04:00

Stuff You Just Hafta Blog About

God still loves the 'burbs. I love it when he uses the whole creation to show us.

I'm at the Lutheran church tonight at about dusk cleaning windows. It is beginning to get dark enough just to make out the crescent disk of the moon and Venus which happen to be in conjunction tonight. I had known that, but forgot.

I wasn't done with the windows, but there was an inner urgency to get home and get my scope out. And not just get it out, mind you, but something told me I had to get out on my sidewalk just in case I would encounter anyone. Ordinarily, it ain't no big thing that I yank out my scope, but just as I was ready to dismiss the idea and wonder what I would do instead when I got home, I could find the only other thing I was leaning toward was walking up and down Dana Drive and maybe praying. I think God was telling me sumpin'.

I get home, set up and begin viewing the moon and Venus with Cathy, which were both visible in my 25mm eyepiece. That doesn't happen a whole lot. Just then, a lady on her bike with dog in tow, slowed to a stop at my drive. I had seen her before, but had never talked with her.

She asked if there were an "event" going on. I told her about the conjunction and asked her if she'd like to look. She was all for that. I proceeded to take her on a tour of Venus, the moon, and Saturn. She was ecstatic and almost got her shy roomie to come out.

Turns out, Maria's a recent grad of Miami and a botanist who's been working with plant experiments with the shuttle, which includes prep studies for future Mars missions. She had also thought about being an astronaut (and was maybe being "tapped" to become one) because of her small frame, but the one-in-ten fatality ratio of the job made her think otherwise. How freekin' cool is that? She's currently a research assistant at the University of Cincinnati. But, lo and behold, she loves Oxford and wants to stay here (and mentioned she's willing to drive the hour just to stay here). That in and of itself is an anomaly.

She asked what we did, and I told her I was (gulp) a pastor with a lil' house church. She proceeded to share that she had become a Christian while living in the Northeast. And ever since she had been in Oxford, she had never connected to any community of faith.

Big open door here. Yeah, we took it, because this was a divine set-up.

We traded numbers and she said she'd be here Sunday for our gathering. I hate I have to be gone, but she's in great hands. And what a cool person. We can't wait to get to know her more.

Pray that God helps us to meet a need and possibly embody the kind of community she's looking for.

You see how God ties up things together for his purposes? If God can take our second planet from the Sun and our only satellite, combine it with my nerdy love of the cosmos with a thread of thinking on Kingdom stuff, he can do the same in your life if you're open. And I know, this is old hat for a lot of you out there and is pretty simple, but still cool nonetheless.

If anything, we have a new friend and know how to pray for her. So yeah, another reason why we are here on Dana.

2007-05-19T19:45:00.000-04:00

Off To Madison, WI...

Hitting the skies yet again for what is going to be the last leg of my stint with the North American Mission Board's Task Force on Lay Church Planting, which began last October. Altogether, I think my total flights since then have racked up to about 14 or 15, which, if you know me, is 14 or 15 more than I like.

I've really been impressed with the the passion and depth of the people I have served with on this team. It has totally reminded me why being connected to a larger family of believers is so important. Seeing that God is faithful to building his Kingdom no matter where it is we go and to whomever we talk, I'm just glad to be journeying with these people on a larger basis and for all my pipples in the 'Nati and the Oxford area.

Talk back at you Wednesday...

2007-05-17T01:24:00.000-04:00

GETTING UP IN A FEW HOURS....

We are going to open our house for prayer on Thursday mornings now from 6-8am for our community and anyone else who'll come. We are figuring prayer is a good thing to do together.

You know if something is requiring my presence this early in the morning, it has to be God. For the LOVE OF GOD!!!!

Literally.

2007-05-13T20:16:00.000-04:00

Veritas 2007 Spring
Retreat...

Pic By The Kimminator

....is history. Much thanks to the Convent at Vineyard Central for their tremendous hospitality. It simply gave us the room and space to go to some places we were needing to go as a church.

For some time, I've felt --(and now see many others do as well)-- that we've been at a threshold of sorts for our community. We came together for an overnight retreat to pray, worship, evaluate and dream for things to come. It had indeed been awhile since we had done so.

We had eight of us there and I was frankly amazed at what was already on everyone's heart. It was the kind of situation where you open your mouth to share what's been stoking your heart and what it is you're dreaming of and people say stuff like: "That's what I've been thinking about too!!" There was a bunch of that happening in our short time together. I just didn't really realize how pregnant this "thing" was, though there's still some gestation to occur.

There seemed to be quite a consensus on a couple of things.

We're getting pretty serious about the next phase for Veritas, which stands to be rather enduring.
...serious enough to enter into a concerted season of prayer not quite like anything we're used to
It is definitely going to involve some intentional, missional communities.

These communities will be missional because we're stumped by the immense need and darkness surrounding us. And because we ain't got nowhere else to go except to Jesus and He just loves on us and then turns us back out and sends hurting people our way.

We are now convicted of this: the kind of work that we feel like we're being called to can really only flow from and be sustained by disciplined, embedded communities. We'd eventually love to see them on several fronts here in Oxford and the surrounding area.

Coming back into Oxford this evening, I felt a renewed sense of calling to this place and to these people and overjoyed that I get to be with the people who are around me who are looking to see similar things. That is stupendously overjoying.

We are really in the beginning stages of conversation about this and some other things, which I'll go into a bit later. There's no timing on anything, just words and possibilities to fit a passion and a longing. We talked of things to come with fervor and with tears and I can't tell you how much I've needed to see this.

We're having to let go of some things, some for clear reasons and others for-- well, I couldn't even begin to tell you why. It's just part of the sacrifice I suppose.

The invigorating thing is we've turned the corner for sure because it doesn't feel like we're still high-banking in preparation like we have been. There's the issue of timing, but when that's borne and he gives the green light, it's mostly just pedal to the metal from there.

2007-05-08T03:48:00.000-04:00

Since It's Severe Weather Season....

Lightning is a main killer in storms, and this guy is pretty doggone lucky he wasn't part of the main channel that made the connection from the ground to the stepped leader from the cloud base.

Note the plasma discharge from the metal on his bike where his hand is placed.....the charge obviously worked it's way up his kickstand, deployed beneath him on the other side of the bike. You can also hear what appears to be a door alarm tripped possibly by the strike.
WARNING: Some rough language.....but hey, tha dude bout got 30,000 AMPS and 300,000,000 volts.

2007-04-30T23:10:00.000-04:00

It's Lionel Richie's annoyingly bad "All Night Long" meets every bad episode of Kung Fu Theater you've ever seen. It's actually Hiroshima-San Say, straight from 1983. And it's the only ninja music video I know of. But that's not saying a lot. I would have embedded it, but yootoob wouldn't let me.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Yq7D-NfDxtY

2007-04-17T02:25:00.000-04:00

SUSTAINABLE LIVING?

There is a gnawing impetus to unplug myself from the implacable videodrome. To stop taking more than what I need in the form of hand-me-downs from the falsely-flattering industrial complex. To live more justly, concretely simpler. How do I ameliorate the sneaky need to acquire a rural Idaho compound versus remaining in the "abandoned places?" How do you do it? How do you excise the consumption beast when his salivating fangs are polished and chiseled by your own hands?

2007-04-13T02:47:00.000-04:00

Been here in the house minus my wife this week. She's been in Tennessee seeing after her mother in her convalescence during her spring break. I'm not too used to her being away...I'm usually the one gone if one of us has to be.....or we're usually together. I think the last time she went off and left me fending for my bad self was perhaps the mid-nineties.

I've learnt a few things this week. My dog definitely prefers Cathy. She truly just tolerated me while she pined away faithfully on the landing at the bottom of the stairs, waiting for her return, scattering a whimper here, a whine there from out of nowhere. I tried to take her several times on walks this week, with me on roller blades and her tagging along....all for her, to get her "out" and get exercise. It was akin to dragging the beast to the vet. I think once we got going, it felt like she was doing it for my benefit. She comes around me only for sustenance and evacuation of her bowels. I feel like I'm being used.

I guess she sees it better than I.....I'm just not my best without m'ladee.

2007-04-05T02:37:00.000-04:00

HOODATHUNK IT?

Another Veritasian has done a big ol' can-opener in the bloggin' pool........and it be Jenny-licious.

2007-04-04T00:10:00.000-04:00

PROUD OF MY LIL' TOWN

The April 2007, Men's Journal has listed Oxford as one of the 50 Best Places to Live in the US, under the Best Commuter Towns section.

I'll take it.

2007-03-31T01:41:00.000-04:00

The Dry Heave
The confounding thing is that there are so many conflicting desires and distractions to dissuade me in my quest for God. Mostly, I can barely even call it a "quest" because I can be so radically aloof in regards to a requisite Kingdom-mindedness. Dryness, emptiness, weariness, unworthiness may flood in and push us away from discipline and ultimately from community. But I don't think they are the enemies:

It will happen again and again that the person who is charged with
offering the prayer for the fellowship will not feel at all in the spiritual mood to do so, and will much prefer to turn over his task to another for this day. Such a shift is not advisable, however. Otherwise, the prayer of the fellowship will too easily be governed by moods which have nothing to do with spiritual life. It is precisely when a person,who is borne down by inner emptiness and weariness or a sense of personal unworthiness, feels that he would like to withdraw from his task, that he should learn what it means to have a duty to perforn in the fellowship, and the
brethren should support him in his weakness, in his inability to pray. Perhaps it is right here that one will realize the profound truth in Paul's words: "We know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered." (Rom. 8:26).
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, LIFE TOGETHER, p. 64-65.

At least they don't have to be.

2007-03-26T02:03:00.000-04:00

ReTREAT

I am back in O-Town after a refreshing weekend at the Convent for a mini-retreat. It certainly was all I could have hoped for. No agenda but to relax, focus on God and engage in some scintillating conversation with the crew down there. The place just oozes hospitality. I mean, what a phenomenal set-up. There can be no doubt that God is all over the situation there in Norwood.

Some realizations:

I hadn't realized how much I had "flipped" this past year in response to the loss of Chad and Palmer and watching my friends and colleagues stagger and grieve. I confronted my own mortality and misplaced my trust and looked for validity in other people when I should have sought sustenance from God. I had to repent of that.
"Shimmering" Verses: Psalm 51:17 "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." I don't even know sacrifice yet. My Christianity has been relatively "easy" and safe thus far.
God, the Sneak: Something's creeping in on me from behind....from the horizon....from around the bend.....the sneaky feeling that God delights in me, despite my being prone to great treachery as a Kingdom vagabond and often traitor. Fleeting moments emerge, promising the hope of transformation and stepping into something greater. I sensed this driving down in the fog, rain and dusk, and, although the surroundings were appropriate to where I've been the last bit in my life, that stab of joy seemed simultaneously mine and yet not mine.
Dave Nixon, the Omeletteer: When Dave says, "I'll get up and make everyone some omelletes..." one does well to fashion one's schedule around that.
Dave Nixon, the Squirrelinator: Beset with this rhodentious invader, I would learn of it when Jody came down after breakfast in a hustle, crying out: "I saw it....it's running around." Heidi tells me the "it" is a hapless squirrell on its last legs that was trapped in the building for the last five days after having finally chewed its way through the wall. Well the beast would not extricate itself and Dave made haste to the third floor. Soon after, I made my way out the door and no sooner had I closed it when I hear a "THUD" and, turning, I beheld a deceased squirrell bouncing off the ground about 15 feet in front of me. I knew instantly. That had to have been one of the most awesome things I've witnessed in a while.
What I Need More Of: A deeper, more sustaining hunger and thirst for God. A truly Spirit-empowered life, inwardly and outwardly.
Pray without ceasing: Still as haunting as it is inviting.
I like the ways God just lets me know that he's glad I'm here.
I was greatly heartened by the time the Dave gave to me and Matt Saturday night at the Speckled Bird. He didn't have to, but he made time. And thanks to Jody for that time as well.
A few days is not enough for a real retreat. I was indeed just starting to unwind.

So now, the tests of routine, complacency and contemptuous familiarity come to try me. Thanks be to God, it "smells" a bit different this time.

2007-03-22T01:24:00.000-04:00

Trying Not To Resist The Irresistable Revolution

Some of you may have already read it, but I am working through Shane Claiborne's The Irresistable Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical, thanks to Beanerosity of the Beanius.

A pretty compelling story, especially from a fellow Tennessee boy....who's done quite well I might add (for a Tennessee boy).

Chew on this for a minute:

.....we have seen the beauty of diverse vocations and the multidimensionality of Christian discipleship. One of the best things communities like ours do is carve out a space for people to discern and redefine our vocations.
(p. 138)

In our context, with young adults struggling with what it means to marry authentic Kindgom living and issues of vocation, I find it evermore imperative to be such a community as well. It hasn't struck my heart with as much fervor as it has done so this weekend as a result of Thinspace. I don't know that we're doing this faithfully enough; we have some really struggling with losing themselves in their vocational ideations/pursuits that Kingdom vitality is being snuffed out right before my eyes. Sometimes I feel powerless to even speak into/against the current of that kind of worldview, especially when it is from those you love and who've previously desired greater things.

I long to know what I need to do to be able to carve out that approachable space for people to discern and redefine their vocations in light of the Kingdom of God. I do know you cannot prematurely impose your Kingdom-mindedness nor your vocational worldview. But there is risk when you spout out things that you think were inspired; you AND your words can ultimately be rejected.

Then again, there is also the risk that someone might be listening in the Spirit.

2007-03-20T12:11:00.000-04:00

I did mention Thinspace in my last post. Shortly, I shall delve a bit deeper into some of the particulars of our experience this weekend as things shake out. I've discovered over a Chinese buffet dinner last night some interesting things God is doing in both mine and Cathy's lives...God nurturing, confirming, directing. I think we'll incubate it a short while (some part I've already shared with my Veritasian community) till we can speak of it with more clarity and grounding.

2007-03-19T00:19:00.000-04:00

Bizziness abounds....posting suffers.

AHEAD:

Prepping for my weekend retreat at the Convent this weekend. Got the support of my community and that is exceptional. Looking forward to it mostly. But I am really quite rusty at this.
Probably traveling somewhere on the last leg of my lay church planting task force with NAMB, which will be in mid April. And by somewhere, I mean either Salt Lake City or.....somewhere else in the US. Our task force facilitator is going to be sending me perhaps to another location to facilitate a gathering along with some others in the group at additional locations.
Camping with some buds at the end of April. Requisite time for sure.
Veritas retreat. More later.

Thinspace was definitely a needed time for me, Veritas (yeah even those who didn't go will be affected) and our network of people we run with. Our breakout session went well and we were greatly impacted by the speakers, the worship and the people overall. I hate I missed the usual subsequent hang-out time with my friends at the B-house....many of whom I see only occasionally or once a year.

My shout-out to Cmarsh who composed us all into a workable whole. It wasn't an easy task and I am grateful he is my friend.

2007-03-02T23:22:00.000-05:00

WHAT IT'S LIKE TO JUST GET BY...

By now, everyone must have heard about the devastation in Enterprise, Alabama, and other surrounding areas on the March 1, 2007 tornado outbreak. 8 people were killed inside the high school as the tornado-- rated EF 3 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale-- ripped through.

I scouted out this video of some roommates emerging from their home near Ft. Rucker...

What seemed to be the random and fickle nature of a tornado (why the videographer's house was spared and his neighbor's twenty feet away wasn't) is due to a complex set of conditions inside the tornado circulation. Some of the pictures and videos I've seen of the Enterprise tornado seem to show a multiple vortex funnel, where smaller, more intense suction vortices form, circulate around the main center and dissipate. These account for why a house will be destroyed and why the one next to it won't.

2007-03-01T23:24:00.000-05:00

You know how long it's been since I took an intentional, spiritual retreat for myself? You know....the kind of one where I just focus and listen to God and see where I fit in?

You know how long I've been talking about doing this?

Come March 23rd-25th, I will head down to the Convent at Vineyard Central for such a time. The space down there has some deeply resonating Kingdom connections for me here on this earth. It has been there and around the relationships formed there that God physically came through on his promise that I/we are not alone in this journey. And to realize that was all coalescing almost five years ago is astounding. The Nixon's, the Rains's and others in a collective testimony to God's radical faithfulness and perseverence adds up to an altogether safe place to retreat back toward God. And that is what I need.

The deal is this.....I need a new-found brokenness of heart, mind, passion and spirit. I need to recapture a simple center again. I need to discover the heart of God in my context and others who'll step forward to see me to that end. I have baggage to drop by the wayside too...stuff that doesn't belong to me.

Whatever is off kilter is because of me. I'm to blame. I accept that. But now I have nowhere to hide...I've brought others in on it. I've committed myself to this weekend and to others. This deal is set. To be sure, I'm not really looking forward to it. On the one hand I am eager and I know it is the "right" thing for me to do. In truth, I will to go to this place. The intrepidation I have I think comes from what God might require of me, namely, the sectors and spaces I have taken away from God back for myself.

Also, I am as unnerved of the possibility of nothing happening as much as I am of something happening. But that is beyond me. Nothing can mean something too.

I apologize if any (who remain with this blog) have looked here for something of more pertinent worth in the last bit. It has been rather flat lately, here in the blog and in certain places in the heart too.

AND, if you're so inclined, prayerfully infuse me with any insights or observations as I near this time, because, ultimately, this HAS to become more than just being about me. What should I do to prepare? How should I spend my time? What books should I take? How should I journal? How should I pray? How should I listen?

Blessings to you.

2007-02-27T02:47:00.000-05:00

I'm looking at my hands right now. There are wrinkly places where there didn't used to be. I gazed at the bends of my inner elbows and the skin is wrinkly there too. Certain hair folicles have lost their ability to retain pigment as they used to. Shucks...certain hair folicles have seen a cessation of existence. Productive ones that is.

I just tried growing out my hair for about the last two months. Let me tell you....that was a stinking exercise in futility. I had a receding hairline since it all started back in college. I thought I was set and was just going to have to deal with it as that. Now the receding areas not only are meeting from left to right and vice-versa, but the emerging hair island on front and center sports a newly balding streak in and of itself. So I thought I'd dye it, as in the olden days. It turned orange. Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Bald is beautiful again.

I am trying to rectify my own bodily changes with those around me, with my own sense of my place in the Kingdom work. I am trying to figure if I am just a wrinkle in the face of its ever-present, ever-breaking newness. I fear those with whom I have invested myself in deeply see my spiritual wrinkles, tire/bore of them and long for thicker, more vibrant colors. In such were vestiges of promise; times now bear a different, stranger fruit, promising neither certainty nor total abdication....I change; people change. Am I still wanted? Does God still want me? Do I still want myself?

And yet, I want to go for it all. I want to lay aside encumbrances and thrust into a faith unknown. But I won't go it alone. Things got scary a year ago when it became clear that this kind of life in the Kingdom ACTUALLY COSTS US OUR LIVES! I shared that vulnerability with people I love and I think I shooed some away. Maybe I layed too much on the line. Maybe I opened up too widely and prematurely projected expectations belonging only to myself and no one else. That's kind of why I feel like the chubby kid in dodgeball who gets pelted first and stands alone in the "out" line.

You can't manipulate people to journey with you. Neither can you settle for tag-a-longism to count for diligent Kingdom work, the kind you can share with a confidante and the kind who will enter into the deep and the mystery. And hanging on the wispy triumphs of yesterday will sink you as well.

It's amazing how the cares of the old world and spectres of the defunct easily trail us all off the path. How cruel it is that we can't ascend the lofty ideations we held in faith when the things of God were new while the devils sit victoriously reticent. And from those shadows bellow even greater temptations to further cement what we said we'd never become.

I possess a certain indigence of spirit at present that neither inspires nor witholds. It's not an achievement and there are no worthy holdings here. These words probably ring quite an advertisement for self-aggrandizement, but they help to shape the hollows and core out the marrow.

It's a threshold for sure...for life, for self, for church, for community and for all ideations about them. I just feel more alone sometimes now than ever before. And some who gave all before now float in a boat of whimsy where I may be concerned.

2007-02-21T12:20:00.000-05:00

I am back from North Dakota and the trip was quite fruitful. I ate my first buffalo burger with some initial intrepidation, but was pleasantly surprised. It tasted like a really good lean cheeseburger. The Bismarckians were also intent upon setting the world's record for the largest snow angel on the day I arrived. We drove by the capitol building to see the fun.

The convention folk were quite hospitable and engaged with what I had to share, which was very encouraging. They are good, solid people with a heart to see God reach people there. The people and the possibilities for the Kingdom of God there more than warrant my prayer for them.

2007-02-15T12:24:00.000-05:00

ON THE ROAD AGAIN...
I'll hop on a plane again Saturday at 7am, flit to Minny-Apple-Iss and jostle over to Bismarck, North Dakota to speak at a new church plant and make a presentation with some other planters at the Dakotas Baptist Convention. It's going to be really sweet.

Think of me, if you will, as I'll be in the air again.

2007-02-11T17:05:00.000-05:00

SOME MORE SNOWSLEETFREEZINGRAINRAIN

ALL IN ALL...THIS STORM IS GOING TO CREATE SIGNIFICANT PROBLEMSACRS THE FCST AREA. ANY SHIFT IN TRACK EVEN OVER A SHORT DISTANCEWILL LIKELY IMPACT PCPN TYPE AND DURATION AND RESULTANT SNOW/ICEACCUMS IN ANY ONE LOCATION ACRS FCST AREA. AND AS MENTIONEDABV...DO EXPECT SIGNIFICANT SNOW AND ICE ACCUMS. THIS SURE LOOKSLIKE A STORM THAT WE MAY END UP COMPARING WITH PRE XMAS STORM IN2004 AND THE VALENTINES WEEKEND STORM IN 2003.

That's the 438 PM EST SUN FEB 11 2007 Forecast Discussion out of the the Wilmington National Weather Service office. Here's the graphical cut of the latest watches/warnings:

Most people really don't appreciate the incredible difficulty in assessing and forecasting a winter storm. There are literally millions of parameters and myriads of scenarios that could happen that affect whether or not someone sees one kind of precipitation. Moisture fetch, air flow patterns, snow-to-liquid ratios, thermal profiles, isentropic lift and many other issues play into the prognostication.

Most people rely upon popular media outlets for their weather information at some point. Often, the information that comes from there is colored by the pressure to secure ratings. Add to that the anomaly of human perception and attention to the details of forecast products.....many of which are embellished by hearsay and pessimistic attitudes that detract from rapidly changing forecasts and conditions. By the time the event is underway, the expectations of some as to what should be occurring might be based on false perceptions and old forecasts. That's a big reason why weather forecasting gets such a bum rap. If you really want to know what's going on, log onto your local NWS forecasting office and read the forecast discussions. These offices are not competing for viewer ratings and are not prone to drama. And they do admit when they make mistakes.

All in all, the comparison to this upcoming storm is to the pre-Xmas 2004 storm and the Valentines Day weekend storm of 2003. That particular wording in a forecast discussion is significant, given the typical, laconic style of forecast discussion texts.

2007-02-06T23:24:00.000-05:00

WITH KILN RADAR INDCG IMPRESSIVE RETURNS 30+ DBZ ACRS
SWOHIO AND EXTENDING NW BACK INTO CNTRL
INDIANA...EXPECT HVY SNOWWILL CONTINUE FOR NEXT SVRL HOURS.
QUICK LOOK AT CROSS SECTIONS ALSO INDCG THATBEST LIFT COINCIDES WITH MAX DENDRITIC GROWTH ZONE OVER NEXT 3-5HOURS. THIS SHOULD ENABLE A CONTINUATION OF HVY SNOW WITH 1-2 INCHPER HOUR SNOWFALL RATE WITH SNOW TO LIQUID RATIOS AT 15/20-1 INTHESE AREAS INTO THE EVNG.

And with that excerpt from the 4:16 p.m. forecast discussion out of the National Weather Service office in Wilmington, I believe a man could sleep rather well, if not conquer many of the world's problems.

Officially at Dana Drive in Oxford, we registered 6.5 inches. If'n ya don't believe me, this pic will get all up in yer bizness. Because my camera stinketh, I'll have to tell you that the ruler is 8 inches long.

2007-02-06T01:51:00.000-05:00

Now that's what I'm talking about. As of 1:55 a.m., EST, we are under a Heavy Snow Warning with a potential of 3-5 inches through early Wednesday. Just about freekin' time.

Of course, since I am wanting it, it won't happen (I am currently working on a personal theodicy of weather). It is a balmy 0 degrees here in O-town, with a heat index of....well.....0. Just thought you'd want to know. You just didn't know you wanted to know.

2007-02-05T12:14:00.000-05:00

Back from DFW from a fruitful summit. I am learning much from some people/churches about what it means to be missional. Whatever the term "missional" means to whoever, granted, it's an easier thing to talk about than to do. Folks like Mission Arlington are doing it. And they are doing phenomenal things while keeping it simple.

I guess we be getting ready for The Feast of Saint Patty-boy in March. Should be pretty swell.

2007-01-27T05:15:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow, I'm off to Dallas for the second leg of NAMB's Lay Planting Summit. This experience with these leaders from around the country has been highly edifying for me in ways I've not imagined. Looking forward to being there, but that means I'll have to fly again. Sigh.

2007-01-15T02:31:00.000-05:00

Great. The whole freakin' state of Ohio is under a flash flood watch.

I love winter.

2006-12-30T04:11:00.000-05:00

Riding down the greasy slide toward the end of Christmas break. Haven't caved yet, but getting there; well into the yearly floor refinishing at the church; much recollecting about life and relationships and the richness I have within them all.

Family time at home was good, bad and just plain bonkers. Things change, but when you don't even know the how's, when's and why's of the changes that affect you and have no way to get to the bottom of them, then I surmise you're just plain out of luck. I don't know how to even be thankful at times for the impermanence of things in life I'd really like to be able to count on.

2006-12-19T01:36:00.000-05:00

'Twas quite the birthday this year for this ol' codger- especially being able to share it with my people, since it fell on our gathering day.

They hit me up right too....pecan pies, roasts, biskits, korn, mooshed taters and various other sundries and delights. The Birchfield boys and girl utterly SURPRISED me with a wetsuit, enabling me now to push the river entrance to Wells Cave in Kaintuckee. I am modeling for you (and the Dana Community) in all my XXL glory below.

The best part was the kind and encouraging words and stories each of them shared with me....ways that I had impacted them, things I had said, done or even not done that built into their lives. It was a truly rich time and fed some starving places in my soul, especially in light of the history with some of these people for about seven years now. They spoke of Kingdom things, the sort of stuff over which I have really had no control, except in terms of making myself available, both to God and to these people I love and serve.

2006-12-12T02:49:00.000-05:00

A big, fat mea culpa for the sedentary blog of late. There are bunches of things to do that are finding me not minding this discipline. My laziness, therein, is shameful, especially to those of you who had been checking in and out only to find the same collection of pixels. It would have been better if I had prefaced it with an "I'm-taking-a-break-from-blogging" caveat, but even in that, I'm not even sophisticated enough (which is still something maybe on the horizon). In fact, the more I think on it, the more I feel inclined to revamp this whole, whoa-whoah, sweet blog- o'mine, from the ground on up.

Trips a-plenty on the horizon too. After having been in Hotlanta (home of the Braves) and Orlando in October, I'll be in Dallas at the end of January; in the Dakotas to share with the Dakota Baptist Convention about our experiences in ministry amongst students here in Oxford in January or February and Salt Lake City in April to finish out our lay church planting task force gatherings.

So as things brew, and as I plod onward in search of a greater depth and discipline, I will continue on with things here.

2006-11-13T02:29:00.000-05:00

Of House Guests and Lawn Moles...

Jen Leonard was with us at Dana Drive this weekend. In March, I was blown away by her story when she arose to speak at Palmer's memorial service. Hers is one that prods me to think about what it is that I have really sacrificed on this journey in our corner of the Kingdom here. I am moved to the conclusion that the only satisfactory answer to that was/is, not much. Or, at least, not enough.

Her story and the questions she is currently posing in regards to this way of life are resonating with me and Cathy, especially the "all or nothing" issue. For us, I think our path to this point has been inconsistently puctuated with only fleeting instances being completely "sold out," or, being "all in" (choose your analogous phrase here).

But I think there is worth in the tension of "not knowing." The core values of the Kingdom are at once tenously thin as spider webs in my white-knuckled grip as they are urging me deeper with a contingent fervor from beyond that Veil. The Father can be found in the not knowing of what's next, what I'll look like, how I'll be and what I'll do. He is just as much the God of my dim, dullness as he is of my (scarce) moments of X-ray clarity, is he not?

Im tired of complaining about what isn't right with my commitment level and others' for that matter. I'm tired of being disgusted with things and not doing something about it. I'm tired of pettiness in myself and others. I'm tired of a lifestyle of laxity and coziness with the way things "are." But it is me that's the problem- I'm the limitation. I can't be preoccupied with my observational discontent when I'm too sessile of a Kingdom co-laborer. I've got to lead by stepping out and risking something greater, something bolder.

I stand firm with the knowledge that I want to be with the people I am journeying with and the foundational, common denominator is living and loving in simple communities. From that, there is no retreat. But noticeably absent is the level of missional-mindedness that we find ourselves in. You know- the kind infused with passion, dreaming and Kingdom-originated envisioning. On the other hand, it might not be that there's such an absence of that mind. The challenge of connecting it to heart and behavior is more appropriate.

And I don't think that I'm brandishing a legalistic hot-iron here and I'm certainly not about imposing my perspective on others either. It's been months (years) in the making, but this is just a slice in my current stage of life and if I am game for it, there are widespread and wholesale implications for life and ministry. I am tilling this garden of transformation as feverishly as I've been hunting that dreaded, little lawn mole that's expertly converting my back yard to a tunneled spongework. Just today I was reminded of how both excursions are messy, dirty, lead in circles and sometimes involve getting a little doo on your shoe when you aren't watching where you walk.

2006-11-08T02:12:00.000-05:00

I think I am on the verge of coughing up my gizzard.

I loathe colds.

2006-11-04T01:27:00.000-05:00

I'm home now, having returned from the first leg of the North American Mission Board's Task Force on Lay Church Planting, which I was invited to serve on. We're a combination of a group of 18 planters, practitioners and denominational equippers from all over North America with a passion to see millions of ordinary people begin to realize they can do simple, Kingdom-minded community-building and church starting. John Bailey, our former Director of Missions here and now a church planting enlistment director with NAMB, convened us together to pick our brains so that several months/meetings from now, there might be a book on the findings. There were representatives of all types of styles of church...traditional, multi-housing, house church, student house church, cell church...you name it.

I was eager to be a part of this, because being invited meant that it might have been possible that my denominational brothers would be open to hearing our story. I felt like I had something worthwhile to contribute too. But even more so, to learn.

Some of you know that there have been instances of painful ostracization from within my own Southern Baptist fold over the last 6.5 years here. Not everyone was closed off to us, but those who were provided enough to last. It cut me because I have been Southern Baptist from the get-go....it was a Southern Baptist church in Rogersville, Tennessee and who took me in and befriended me as a wayward, vagabond 15 year-old and they simply loved me as I was. They invested in me all the way, even when I sensed God urging me vocationally to something beyond my dreams- even at 15. They became the family I longed to have.

That's why it hurt to have experienced the rejection I have had. I knew back before I came to Oxford that it would come. I just didn't know how it would impact me. Though Christ has touched these painful places with healing, I wasn't sure what to expect this week. I had hopes nonetheless.

I was blown away. I hadn't quite expected to encounter God quite the way I did this week. I thought we were just going to be a task force, a think tank. I wasn't quite prepared to be overcome with the sense that God is laying upon us something potentially momentous and that he was going to unite us together like he had. I wasn't expecting (but I was hoping) to find such friendship and kinship and warmth and genuine open-heartedness in these men like I did. They heard my heart, my/our story, saw pictures of us feasting, laughing, baptizing, crying, worshiping and just living and doing church.

On the first day we convened and halfway through our morning session, we were dialoguing about barriers before us that we had to identify. One of the men just became weighted with a heart-heaviness, stating that whatever was going to become of our efforts it needed to be in line with God's heart. That's really when we hit our knees and faces and literally fell prostrate for the next half hour. I was almost sure that if I lifted my nose from the floor that I'd glimpse His face. There was just a rush of brokenness, humility and recognition of the Presence of Holiness in that hotel meeting room coupled with the sense that God wants to give us something fragile, something close to his heart, something other-worldly, imbued with immaculate and immense worth. I don't really know why or what all happened or what becomes of this.

I do know that afterward, it was my turn to do my presentation, which was me telling the story through pictures of God bringing us to Oxford, about Veritas and about what God's been doing. As I saw my fellow Veritasians, it stirred my heart to such fascination and love for the people with whom I journey (and have journeyed).

I shared my struggles and John shared with them some of the war stories from clashes with those in our own association who were in opposition to us and that's when the man above acknowledged the difficulty I had personally experienced and asked what they could do to come alongside me/us. They didn't even know, at that point, (and I said so) that just hearing my heart and our story and receiving me was more than they knew. Being there and hearing me was enough for that moment. You see, right before me, God had those men impart to me the affirmation the enemy had stolen from me early on. They all came around me- all but two were strangers before the previous day- and they laid their hands upon me, affirmed and encouraged me. It's not a question of deserving, because I didn't deserve that grace. But God saw fit, and that, six years later. I just wanted you to know how huge that was for me.

I hope to unpack some more of this a bit later.

2006-10-30T23:53:00.000-05:00

Heading out again.....to Orlando, Flarduh, for the first meeting of NAMB's Lay Church Planting Summit. This includes taking in the one day Simple Church Conference with Alex McManus. It's a freebie, too, so t'ain't no thang, and I am kinda interested.

The rest of the week will be story-telling among the practitioning summiteers and digesting some points from the conference no doubt. I'll keep ya posted.

2006-10-28T03:06:00.000-04:00

Going down today to Looseyville to my alma tamater to visit our young seminarians- Christi and Eric Osterday- already in their first semester.

I would have never thought, when I was there, that I would be back someday visiting a couple from a church we planted whom we would support in their edumacation.

That's a right bit warming to the heart.

2006-10-27T01:20:00.000-04:00

JUST SOME RANDOM SCARY STUFF I CAME ACROSS...

Me at 225 lbs of blubb, with my grandfather the last summer he was alive.....

....me, 4 months later and 45 lbs lighter, all circa 2001. Gadzooks!!!

2006-10-23T00:54:00.000-04:00

Andrew Jones quotes Roland Allen, a missionary circa 1930's, whose response to his sponsors requesting big stories from him was:

"I do not trust spectacular things. Give me the seed growing secretly every time."

There you have it.

2006-10-17T01:36:00.000-04:00

I'm just a wee bit frazzled. By the end of this month, I will have been gone every weekend and will have flown out of state twice. And that's not to mention a smattering of meetings/conferences in between almost weekly.

I am swelling in preparation of a heaving a great sigh of relief, but I may have to hold my breath for more of what's to come. Just kind of feels that way.

By the way, my one day conference in Atlanta with my good friend John Bailey (and Church Planting Enlistment director for the North American Mission Board) was a good one. He's in the process of writing a book on what it means to be a missional church and, last week, he collected together myself, another house church network planter from Texas, two church planting profs from two of our seminaries and another planter- an Atlantan- who's doing a large group/cell church model (and doing it really well). We sat through some presentations of some information on current trends in population and culture in America and compared that to the sobering fact of our failure to reach the unbelieving populace.

We were all from different backgrounds and contexts but were enveloped by the same passion....to grow into more of what it means to be biblically missional across the board. Each of these guys were profoundly sharp and plugged in. It was refreshing to hear some other stories on different fronts and I gleaned a lot from the discussion.

2006-10-09T01:12:00.000-04:00

"...we-don't-chat-in-a-line-out"

"...big-ol'-Jap-in-a-lighthouse"

"...bit-of-cheddar-rind-on"

"...big-ol'-shed-of -lino"

"...railroad-track-outta-'lignment"

"...Big-ol'-Jed-had-a-rhino"

"...Big-ole-jet-had-a-light-on.....don't carry me too far awa-ay....Who-oah"

Whatever Steve Miller sang in Jet Airliner, I'm getting on one later today and heading to Hotlanta to take part in a discussion on missional churches with theNorth American Mission Board of the SBC.

Did I say this is the first time I've flown since April 2000?

2006-09-26T00:18:00.000-04:00

Emerging church = deeper, more substantial, quality relationship?

I'm not so sure anymore right now. Despite a few holdouts, people are still people, no matter what tag you pin to thing....it's just the same ole donky sometimes.

We talk a great game relationally, but we inevitably get pulled elsewhere. By the time we are called to investigate how serious we were back when, are we finding we were really as serious as we thought we were? So much time is lost contemplating...wavering...we don't quite ascertain what we do to flounder our contingent faithful.

Are we being inwardly changed/transformed in all of this ourselves, or are we still flailing in our strength, pounding away on things, trying to issue a massive pump-knot on the noggin of our circumstances?

It starts off good and all....moving from one stage of loneliness and longing and finding others in comparable boats. And some of the vessels were welcome sights....appearing as mighty, tall-masted ships on the horizon bringing comrades-in-arms. So you tie off to one another and continue the voyage, floating to who really knows where, but it's okay, because you're all together, believing the Captain has formed the armada.

But the sea roils, boils and upends, testing our seaworthiness. Some are tragically inundated. Some of us have walked and are perched on planks of our own handiwork, daring the next swell to do its thing. Nicer ships entice to mutinous proportions as well. Some of have cut rope and drift along. Some have to have unbelieveably long tethers and can barely see the fleet.

All around me, my ministry peers that I treasure more than anything....the people I've journeyed with and for whom I'd die to bring up in this way of life....effort has tended to be less than half-and-half (myself included). But I KNOW....this is life. And I KNOW I can't see/know everything. And I KNOW I'm weak, wounded and need sharpened and this vainly skews my perspective. But maybe I just don't really know HOW yet.

The loss-to-gain ratio is puzzling because you can never get a grasp on how things currently "are" with ministry, with your leadership, your people, your friends. Most of the time the encumbrances are daunting and feel mightier than the advances, and the damnedest thing is that I might be the problem most of the time. If I were better than- more than- what I am now, how much more so would those around me be?

I am a relational mutt and I err in holding on too tightly because the pervasive feeling that I've lost so liberally. Early in my life, the security of relational boundaries were muddied profusely and often and when I came to the One Who'll never leave nor forsake, well, I tumbled headlong. So I thrive on the security apparent and possible (but not always manifested) within brothers and sisters in Christ when they say, "here am I." So I guess I just don't do well when these relationships are tenously unclear. It's risk, risk, risk...pure risk, and my weaknesses are not as safe as they once were.

Neither being the spokesman nor the paragon of healthy, consistent relational modeling, suffice it to say, this is why this is hard sometimes. For me at least.

2006-09-23T04:23:00.000-04:00

What Do You Do With This?

After a refreshing conversation with CMarsh Thursday at our usual haunt, Barnes and Noble, I received a phone call from my mother. It was one I could have never even dreamed up myself in a million years.

She informed me that my Aunt Pam (her sister) had been diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and has about 47% lung capacity at present. I just buried my Great Aunt Juanita back in July from this disease.

"The doctor said hopefully about 5-8 years left....."

My mother's voice trailed off in my head a bit. Then I heard the word, "Germany."

My cousin is a supply sergeant and had been in the Iraqi theater recently and isstationed in Germany. Mom said Aunt Pam was going to move there to be with her daughter. She didn't say so, but she's probably going there to live the rest of her life.

"Glenn.....I'm going too."

I'm still wondering what to feel about all of it. Frustration, futility in the face of age/demise/impending death, abandonment, bewildered.....calm and assurance. I sort of childishly and selfishly thought, ...for the first time in my life, I won't have physical access to my mother.... I just can't "up" and go see her. But even more, will I see my Aunt Pam again on this side? I just wasn't prepared for the dynamics of such an adjustment....and so quickly. My aunt is flying out next Thursday and my mother to follow not long after. I'm sure we'll try to unite before the move, and that I'm missing the finer points and all, but it sure is a gnarly situation to sift through.

I talked to my Aunt Pam last night. She's by no means on her deathbed and is full of much more life. We talked about now how she has the blessing of knowing that she can choose to really, REALLY live each day in its fulness. To me, that was somewhat of a blessing, in the truest sense of the word.

It seems to be the right thing to do, given the circumstances. In that way, I'm okay with it. They have each other now and they don't want to take anything for granted, to miss out on what they HAD taken for granted. None of their family remains in Knoxville anymore. Grandparents, parents, brothers, aunts, uncles...either passed away or moved. And that is a foreign thing to grasp because so much of my formative years were there.

So they should go. I bless it to be. I don't want it...with all of my heart I don't want any part of what this situation is all about. And I remember my own sense of abandonment I lugged around. But Jesus touched that a few years ago. He covered that part of me and that healing spreads over even now, so that I can say, "go...live....love" and know that it isn't about me. There's calm and peace there. Besides, I love my mother and Aunt Pam and my cousin too much.

I just long for the lost years sometimes.

2006-09-17T23:50:00.000-04:00

In the earlier days of my faith (ca., 1985-ish), I used to be offended by this bumper sticker ("Jesus Caves") sold by Bob&Bob, a caving equipment supplier.

Now, there is something different about it that registers amusing....with the high-falootin' font and all.

But it's true now. Jesus, in effect, does go caving with me. He is present with my brothers and sisters in Christ when we are underground. He is present in the beauty of his unique, physical handiwork there too.

So, yeah, kinda having a hankerin' for the underground right now.

GOOFY, KIDDISH THING TO BE THANKFUL FOR TODAY: Jesus made the earth the way it was so that caves were possible. He's made is so I can go in them too.

2006-09-08T01:07:00.000-04:00

CELLCHOSIS: The Oblivious Plight of the Typical Miami Student

I am a hero. Everyday, I rise to that status. Everyday.

Okay, in my heart, I'm a hero.

But everyday, I bring my bus to a stop somewhere just safely short of a completely oblivious student in the middle of the street, hanging onto some conversation being mediated through a cell phone on the other side of their head.

I watch them try and converse while just trying to get home or get to class or get across the street. Their attention retreats (you can see it in their eyes); their gait becomes slowed, if not cumbersome and zombie-like. They miss their stops on the bus because of the cell phone and they want to blame me for their having missed it.

-Sorry- I don't stop at every stop unless someone wants it.

-Well, you were on the phone when we passed it....

And so on....

Cell phone firmly placed to the ear, they forget the concept of right-of-way at a four way stop, yet I/we lurch to a stop to keep them from hitting us. They keep talking.

There is something a tidbit mind-altering when you are on the phone, engaged in conversation. There is a slight mesmerization and an affectation of the faculties necessary for survival in an urban environment. I call this induced state of mind, cellchosis. Cellchosis is the state of dulled perception and motor function enveloping the user while in the midst of a cell phone conversation. A person is said to be cellchotic when they are standing out in the middle of the street talking on the phone with a 40-foot long 36,000 lb bus only feet away from them- that after having screeched to a halt, preserving their lives and their conversations. Then they glare at you and complete their jaywalk. That is cellchotic.

It's a willful condition by virtue of the fact no one is being coerced to hold the device to their head. The prevalence of these devices are going to collude with some calamitous events one day, I'm afraid, resulting in something bad, like a pedestrian vs. a car, or a bus. We've had those, but I am flabbergasted that it hasn't happened more, or that more serious injury hasn't occurred.

We need to outfit collegiate cell phone consumers with GPS monitoring systems that communicate with a vehicle's speed, distance and approach rate so that it would trip a pre-recorded, deafening message to the phone holder to retreat in no uncertain terms. Perhaps, once cellular devices become seamlessly implanted into our tympanic membranes, I'll have my wish. I'll probably be out of a job by that point in our technological prowess though.

Till then, I'll just be a hero.

2006-09-07T00:51:00.000-04:00

SEPARATED AT BIRTH?

Installment 2
Not a novel idea, but I have my own visual sensibilities about the poor souls, who for some reason or another, were split asunder at birth. Perhaps their progenitors, beholding their monstronsities, couldn't fathom a world without my filial matchmaking acumen, which I am always on ready to do.

How about a Derren Brown caricature of quintessentially astute actor-for-the-ages Sir Anthony Hopkins......and, Gollum, quintessentially destitute sad sack of Lord of the Rings fame?

2006-08-20T22:56:00.000-04:00

A Rather Kairotic Weekend

Well, they be back. The stoodints, that is.

Upon our docile, little town they descended and took over like so many leaves upon an October lawn and I'm back to scooping them up on my forty-foot long, six-wheeled diesel-beastie. Nice thing is, we (my new transit employer, that is) secured 14 brand-new International buses, replete with AC, 200-watt Pioneer CD players, individual, bucket and clothed seats (to make it fun for them to puke on during drunk runs), and, best of all, new bus smell (which, incidentally, should be taken care of by the reference in the last parenthetical inclusion) .

After spending most every night this past week prepping for our biggest outreach project of the year, I attended yet another funeral of a pastor-friend of mine in our association this past Saturday. He was found dead in his backyard from a massive myocardial infarction. He was a basketball buddy and a supporter of Veritas in our association among a handful of pastors in a time when such were hard to come by.

This whole weekend was a set-up, and a divine one at that. Friday, we were on campus helping families move their freshman children into their dorms with our dollies and handing out water. I love to watch our people dig into some hot, rigorous manual labor for people they don't even know or won't see again and be filled with joy while doing it, knowing they aren't going to get anything out of it. That stokes me just right. And I love to see the confounding look when these families see that you're there to help them. Sjogren was right. God does show up in these times of simple hospitality.

And Saturday, we had obtained a booth Uptown for the Chamber of Commerce's Annual New Student Day, when all the merchants and organizations in the area get to set up booths and pimp their free stuff to the new students who are given meal vouchers for the Uptown restaurants as a starter. As usual, we had made some hemp necklaces, gave away more water and gum. But this year, Veritas' resident aromatherapist made some soap for us to give away, and that was a fantastic hit.

After that, Cathy and I headed down to LaRue County, Kaintukky for a 205th anniversary celebration at Rolling Fork Baptist Church, our very first pastorate in seminary and verifiably out in the middle of the sticks, so to speak. For three years there, we were loved by the most gracious and patient of people, especially to take on a newlywed pastor-wanna-be who thought he knew more than he actually did. They chucked us full of the most inconceiveably delectable meals and taught us the basics of godly hospitality, preparing us for the work we are currently in now here in Oxford. We just didn't know that at the time. But that was today- Sunday.

For Saturday night, we had planned on staying at the Jailer's Inn, a quaint little bed and breakfast in Bardstown. We found out that the Travel Channel had rated the place one of the 10 most haunted places in America. It used to be a jail and was built in 1819 and was in service until 1987. If you look closely, you can see Cathy haunting the lower right hand side of the picture.

At breakfast this morning, the Innkeeper pulls me aside, apparently knowing from a conversation with Cathy that I was a minister, and asks if I would say a blessing over the meal before 14 other people I didn't know. I knew I was back in Kentucky then. It wasn't that I didn't know them that made me a bit intrepid, but that I didn't know if these strangers wanted some dude in earrings praying to a God that some of them obviously didn't acknowledge. Part of the group were New-Agey ghost hunters, with electromagnetic wave sensors and stories of some kind of activity in their room last night. There were some other "normal" guests (sans meters and such) who had some experience last night, too, it seemed. I kept hearing foot steps upstairs go from one end of the ceiling to the other, but then a toilet would flush, so...

But when the Innkeeper pulled me aside to ask me to pray, she told me she had seated Cathy and I with a young couple. Sure enough, as we ambled to the courtyard, there were our seats with them. They seemed quite young (early twenties) and we immediately began some small talk and they briefly began talking about the fact they were newlyweds (one year) and that their log cabin they were building had just burned completely to the ground. After about a three minute intro into that, Cathy looked at the husband and interjected, "...so, what about your first born?"

This couple frowned and then looked at each other. The twenty year old lady said, "how did you know about that?". I looked at Cathy. I knew for a fact the guy said NOTHING about a first born. He didn't say anything that remotely rhymed with it in the conversation to this point.

Cathy said she thought she heard him say that.

The guy, looking into his bride's eyes with shared pain, said he didn't say anything resembling that. The young woman looked at Cathy and said, "We just lost our baby boy in January. He was born with a knot in his umbilical." Incredulous, I looked at Cathy thinking, how in the world did you hear that?? But I knew. God sat us there. He spoke that. I don't think they were Christ followers, but they immediately invited us onto their sacred ground.

From there on, this couple poured out their pain and their hearts to us, filling us with their stories of incredible loss. Their brand new house burned to the ground; the insurance company shorting them 100,000 bucks and the loss of a child. We were there to receive their hurt, for God's purposes I suppose, to side with them by divine proxy.

All through breakfast, I watched as my wife listened intently to the young lady, touching her occasionally on the arm in delicate, non-verbal reassurances that I'm sure carried the greater assurances of God's Spirit. It was an amazing thing to watch. I was just glad to be there. I am just ever more convinced that my wife has "it" infinitely more than I do.

Do you ever notice that when God lets people "unload" on you, you become a receptacle for their pain, bearing it in some way? What do you do with it? Well, we still had to drive thirty more minutes to get to the church for the anniversary celebration, which was full (well about 50 people full) of my former parishioners, county judges, state representatives and people I'd never seen before. And I learned that, even after a 10 year absence and after having moved on, you are still a pastor to people. One by one, I took in stories of death, sickness, new life, new hopes and new aspirations as if I had never left.

One couple we were particularly close to caught us on the way out and were distraught and broke down in tears on the front porch of the church sharing about their wayward son and other anxieties. For fifteen more minutes we were God's receivers of hurt. We slung it on our backs, ministered to and encouraged them and prayed with them while a long-winded southern gospel group carried on inside.

Yet, now I sit here staring at arranged pixels on a screen, and I am in touch with a pain that is not mine. God often calls us to take on pain in some supernatural way, I believe, as he imparts grace/healing/respite to those dishing it out. But it is not meant for us to keep. We've got to find a way to give it back to Jesus. The picture they showed us of their still-born infant boy is emblazoned in my mind. It was a picture that was simultaneously both a birth and death record of a life never lived on this earth. Those pictures are ones for which we'll have no need in the coming Kingdom.

I reckon that the pain I feel (though in no way equal to theirs) is sufficient enough to prod me into meaningful prayer for them. And after such a period of time as God sees fit, we'll submit a pain belonging to someone we'll probably never see again back to Jesus. I hope we were faithful today. I know I was blindsided.

Another interesting tidbit about my first pastorate...

"With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan - to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."

The above quote was from, arguably, one of the most quoted men in American history, Abraham Lincoln. His father, Thomas Lincoln, was a member at Rolling Fork. Makes you wonder if some of the godliness passed on to ole' Abe was instilled into his daddy there.

Good Country Folk

When this building was built in the 1850's, the men and women entered and sat in separate sides of the church, which is why there are two front doors.

My first mega-church, from afar.

Another way to tell you are in the sticks of good ol' Kentucke; the presence of gargantuan winged scavenger in the roadway.

And, for the Creecher, Extraordinaire...I bet you know where this is.

2006-08-12T00:25:00.000-04:00

I Mean, What Gives?

So I'm finishing up blowing leaves, grass clippings, etc., after I mowed the lawn today, as I usually do, and, as I have been for two years. I have a small pile blown together at the end of the driveway to be swept later. I am in the road blowing some more toward it when I notice the 75-80 year-old man from 3-4 houses down the street.

Next, I notice him standing straight as a pin, dressed up like old man, knickers on, Mr. Rogers sweater, old cabbie hat and staring me down. I look away.

But he keeps on. So I cut the blower, and asked if I could help him. I could tell it wasn't going to be good, but as to why, I could only wait.

All of a sudden, as I'm standing in the gutter on my side of the street in front of my house, this old guy comes over and lays into me about grass clippings and if I was going to clean them up. Befuddled as to why the sight of me CLEANING THEM UP wasn't good enough for him, I interject, "That's what I'm doing right now, sir."

His tirade continued.

"I SAID I'D CLEAN THEM UP!!!" That still wasn't good enough, so I raised my voice to him to ensure he got my drift. "IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE I CAN HELP YOU WITH SIR?" He snarled, swirled around in a tizzy and rolled his eyes while pointing and circling his finger to his temple doing a "cuckoo" to me.

I've never met the dude. I'll be the first to respect my elders, but sometimes you just can't win. Lord willing, if I make 80, I hope to be seeking other activities outside of the pasttime of Grass Nazi.