From Dr. David Timms, In Hope, Volume 7.36:

Modern nativity scenes violate the significance of that first Christmas.

Mary sits smiling -- no evidence of labor; no strain etched on her face; serene, not exhausted. And Joseph stands humbly by as wise men present gifts to a silent and well-behaved baby.
Even the animals could audition for Charlotte’s Web -- all attentive to the wondrous moment.

The entire scene is sanitized and orderly … and false.

The original manger scene would shock our sensibilities. Mangers were messy. Barns (or caves) couldn’t be kept clean, let alone sterile. Animals do what animals do. And human birth is hardly a ticket to the ballet.

God chose this delivery room for His Son?

What does it say about a God who can’t – or won’t – organize something more secure, more classy, more splendid? His Son deserved the best. This birth began a quest. Could it not have started in a warm, safe place with family and friends to support and celebrate? Why would we choose such a hazardous entrance into the world?

The manger provides the greatest object lesson before the Cross. It speaks softly but decisively to any of us with ears to hear.

Jesus continues to be born in the manger of our hearts, without reservation. The Savior does not look for the safe, the sanitary, the sheltered, or the secure. He does not avoid the putrid, the decadent, or the distasteful. Our mess -- our “stuff” -- cannot hinder His coming.

Good news! No condition whatsoever can hamper the coming of Christ, if we’ll but make the space available to Him. While we may want to dust and scrub, shovel and deodorize, wash and freshen up the manger of our hearts, He needs only the nod to come.

What does that first manger -- rough and raw as it was -- say about God? Everything we need to know. He comes to the hurt and the helpless, the harrowed and the homeless, the disheveled and downtrodden. Nothing can stop Him coming.

This Christmas, may the sweet nativities prompt us to rejoice in the Christ of “our manger” and may He come again to you. O come, O come, Emmanuel!

From Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun:

"She (his mother) had a marker in the Bible and she opened it now to the place that was marked and began to read again. She read the story of the Christ-child of the baby Jesus and how he was born in a manger...All the people were going to Bethlehem because it was tax time and they had to appear at the court house and register and pay up...Joseph had to do a lot of chores before he could start out and Mary his wife was pregnant and couldn't help him so they were late...As soon as they got into town Joseph began making the rounds of cheap rooming houses. He wasn't much of a success at making money and they only had enough to pay taxes and one night's rent...Then Joseph began to talk very seriously to the hotel manager. See here he said I've come a long way and I've got my wife with me and she's going to have a baby. Look at her out there on the donkey, you see she's just a kid and she's scared...(Hotel manager talking)It'll be an awful mess if she has a baby on the premises, people who can't afford them shouldn't have babies anyway but what are you going to do about it...I don't mind telling you I hope very much she doesn't have the baby here tonight because it'll upset my guests if she screams and they're all very high class people including three Roman congressmen...Oh I almost forgot, don't light any fires out there in the barn because in my insurance it says they're forbidden...Back in the manger Joseph lighted a lantern and fixed up a nice bed on the hay and Mary lay down on the bed and had her baby...

From the annals of "I'm so glad my tax dollars are going to good use":

The WSJ reports today that the head of the World Bank's anticorruption unit is coming under fire from "anonymous" co-workers for exposing corruption in the bank. Her crimes include bringing to light the tens of millions of dollars lost to corruption in a "Reproductive and Child Health" project in India and the fact that many whistleblowers are being killed in a $630 million roads project in the Phillipines. You'd think she would be heralded for her work, when in fact she may lose her job.

Also reported today was a failed vote in the Senate that would have capped the incomes of eligible recipients of farm subsidies to farmers with incomes greater than $750,000 per year. As the following quote points out, they sure need it: "Farmers will reap around $20 billion this year in federal handouts - despite strong crop prices and rising land values - and two-thirds will go to the wealthiest 10% of farms." Nice.

One of the most disgusting human bodily behaviors is throwing up in ones mouth? It happened to me on Sunday as I flipped through the channels and stopped at a local church service broadcast.

I had nothing against this church, other than that I felt they unfairly and wrongfully dismissed a friend of mine a few years ago and that they seemed too seeker-friendly to me and a list of other things, but other than that I thought they were all right. But I tipped on them after watching 30 seconds of the service. As I turned it on, some crazy lady was up on the stage in one of the most annoying voices (along with a very annoying face) going off how blessed they were and how faithful the Lord was for putting them in their new building.

I always find that funny, measuring the faithfulness of the Lord by a building we meet in on Sundays, for one since I find that nowhere in the New Testament (and we all claim to want to be NT churches) and for two outside of the Western and Roman Catholic world believers meet anywhere they can, anywhere they are safe. Can you imagine Chinese or North Korean Christians or those in the Sudan praising God for giving them a new building? I think not, I think in those cases it's more like "thank God that we are allowed to gather together in the Name of the Lord in safety without the army or janjaweed coming in to blast us into heaven" or something like that.

So, as a warning, the next time I hear some crazy lady on TV or in person thank God for being so faithful by giving them a new building, I may not be able to control my rage.

From the US Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report via ITeams:

Each year, an estimated 600,000 to 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders (some international organizations place the number higher), and the trade is growing.

Of the people trafficked across international borders, 70% are female and 50% are children. The majority of these victims are forced into the commercial sex trade.

I noticed in today's paper that Warren Jeffs was convicted and sentenced to two terms of 5 to life for his rape of teenage cousins a few years ago. Anyone who doubts the severity of this issue in the Mormon church must read Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven, your views will be changed.

How ironic is it that if you look at my archives on the bottom right you noticed that I have had the exact same number of entries in the years 2006 and 2005. I have a long way to go, however, to catch up for this year. You don't want to hear that much from me!

Earlier this week my friend Christina sent me an emailing saying that the best song in the whole wide world right now was "When the Saints" by Sarah Groves and that I had to download it RIGHT NOW! Yeah, Yeah, settle down Christina, I'll get to it when I have time...well I had time on Thursday night and I haven't been the same since. This song is doing crazy things to me! Check out some of the lyrics:

Lord I have a heavy burden of all I've seen and know
It's more than I can handle
But your word is burning like a fire shut up in my bonesand
I can’t let it go

I think of Paul and Silas in the prison yard
I hear their song of freedom rising to the stars

I see the shepherd Moses in the Pharaohs court
I hear his call for freedom for the people of the Lord

I see the long quiet walk along the Underground Railroad
I see the slave awakening to the value of her soul

I see the young missionary at the angry spear
I see his family returning with no trace of fear

I see the long hard shadows of Calcutta nights
I see the sisters standing by the dying mans side

I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor
I see the man with a passion come and kicking down that door

I see the man of sorrow and his long troubled road
I see the world on his shoulders and my easy load

And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them

Fling wide you heavenly gates
Prepare the way of the risen Lord
- "Did You Feel the Mountains Tremble
Delirious

Lift up your heads, O you gates;
be lifted up, you ancient doors,
that the King of glory may come in.

Who is this King of glory?
The LORD strong and mighty,
the LORD mighty in battle.

Lift up your heads, O you gates;
lift them up, you ancient doors,
that the King of glory may come in.

Who is he, this King of glory?
The LORD Almighty—
he is the King of glory.
- Psalm 24:7-9

(DISCLAIMER: I've been working on this post for about a week, and it's still not what I want, but I have chosen to publish it anyway. I plan to work on it further and hope to submit it to the Ooze for publication...your editing and revision suggestions are more than welcome.)

I just finished reading a book called Sold by Patricia McCormick, one that some of my students are reading independently. It's a fascinating book about a young girl from Nepal who is trafficked into the sex slavery business in India after she and her family were promised she would go to the city to work as a maid for a rich family. It's a fictional story but as is usual, the author followed in the footsteps of hundreds, thousands of young girls like Lakshmi, and based this book on their stories. (She adds that this story is too true for over 12,000 girls from Nepal each year.)

One part in particular stood out and reminded me of the story of the Prodigal Son. One of the ladies in the brothel, Monica, finally works her way out of debt and is free to go. She returns to her village, where supposedly she has a daughter, only to be met there by the elders and relatives and is soundly beaten and told never to come back. Her daughter has been told that she is dead. She shamefully returns to the brothel, the only place that will accept her. (I can only imagine how Lakshmi will be welcomed back to the family that sold her off.)

Over the past few months I've read a few books that detailed the practices of different cultures, books such as Infidel, The Places In-Between, and OnThe Road to Kandahar, just to name a few (I'd highly recommend the first and last, The Places In-Between was not that good). I was reminded of the backward way of living that still permeates these cultures, the patriarchal methods entrenched in the lives of the people and the atrocious treatment of women that is common, even expected, even by the women. And this paradigm has invaded not just Somalia, not just Afghanistan, not just India and Nepal, but most of the non-Western world. I go to visit my friend in Kenya and notice that the women are treated as slaves. When I confront someone on this, I am told it is "the culture." When I hear about a young girl being raped by her uncle or a neighbor and then banished from her family and village, forced to a life of beggary on the streets, I am told that this is cultural. This is not good enough for me.

Of course, I mean not to be caucocentric. We in the West are not immune to this issue. The very people Jesus dined with, the very people that He came to save are no longer welcome in our churches. “Go and clean yourself up,” they are told, “And then maybe we’ll let you in…conditionally.” We say we are protecting the flock, that we are protecting the Name and the house of the Lord…I don’t buy it, it’s not good enough for me!

Have we forgotten how the Kingdom of God works?

It’s been years since I’ve read Crime and Punishment and though I’ve reflected on the text quite a bit since that time, I’ve never quite understood or agreed with Dostoevsky’s message about the Lord, but he emits a great deal of truth about the Kingdom of God:

…but He will pity us Who has had pity on all men, Who has understood all men and all things…He will come in that day and He will ask…Where is the daughter who had pity upon the filthy drunkard, her earthly father, undismayed by his beastliness? And he will say, “Come to me! I have already forgiven thee once…I have forgiven thee once…Thy sins which are many are forgiven thee for thou hast loved much”…And when He has done with all of them, then He will summon us. “You too come forth,” He will say, “Come ye children of shame!” And we shall come forth, without shame and shall stand before him…” And He will hold out His hands to us and we shall fall down before him…and we shall weep…and we shall understand all things! Then we shall understand all!…and all will understand…”

Philip Yancey wrote a modern Prodigal story in his book What's So Amazing About Grace, I'll summarize:

A young girl grows up on a cherry orchard just above Traverse City, Michigan. Her parents, a bit old- fashioned, tend to overreact to her nose ring, the music she listens to, and the length of her skirts. They ground her a few times, and she seethes inside. "I hate you!" she screams at her father when he knocks on the door of her room after an argument, and that night she acts on a plan she has mentally rehearsed scores of times. She runs away...

Her second day there she meets a man who drives the biggest car she's ever seen. He offers her a ride, buys her lunch, arranges a place for her to stay. He gives her some pills that make her feel better than she's ever felt before. She was right all along, she decides: her parents were keeping her from all the fun...

After a year the first shallow signs of illness appear, and it amazes her how fast the boss turns mean. "These days, we can't mess around," he growls, and before she knows it she's out on the street without a penny to her name. When winter blows in she finds herself sleeping on metal grates outside the big department stores. "Sleeping" is the wrong word--a teenage girl at night in down town Detroit can never relax her guard. Dark bands circle her eyes. Her cough worsens.God, why did I leave, she says to herself, and pain stabs at her heart. My dog back home eats better than I do now. She's sobbing, and she knows in a flash that more than anything else in the world she wants to go home...

Three straight phone calls, three straight connections with the answering machine. She hangs up without leaving a message the first two times, but the third time she says, "Dad, Mom, it's me. I was wondering about maybe coming home. I'm catching a bus up your way, and it'll get there about midnight tomorrow. If you're not there, well, I guess I'll just stay on the bus until it hits Canada."...

When the bus finally rolls into the station, its air brakes hissing in protest, the driver announces in a crackly voice over the microphone, "Fifteen minutes, folks. That's all we have here." Fifteen minutes to decide her life. She checks herself in a compact mirror, smoothes her hair, and licks the lipstick off her teeth. She looks at the tobacco stains on her fingertips, and wonders if her parents will notice. If they're there...

She walks into the terminal not knowing what to expect. Not one of the thousand scenes that have played out in her mind prepare her for what she sees. There, in the concrete-walls-and-plastic-chairs bus terminal in Traverse City, Michigan, stands a group of forty brothers and sisters and great-aunts and uncles and cousins and a grandmother and great-grandmother to boot. They're all wearing goofy party hats and blowing noise-makers, and taped across the entire wall of the terminal is a computer-generated banner that reads "Welcome home!"

Out of the crowd of well-wishers breaks her dad. She stares out through the tears quivering in her eyes like hot mercury and begins the memorized speech, "Dad, I'm sorry. I know..."

He interrupts her. "Hush, child. We've got no time for that. No time for apologies. You'll be late for the party. A banquet's waiting for you at home."

Have we in our fallen world forgotten the characteristics of the Kingdom of God? Have we forgotten the story of the Prodigal Son? In Luke 15 the story is told of a younger son who sought to get away from it all, asking for and receiving his father's inheritance. He journeyed to the city for a life of debauchery, intemperance, licentiousness, etc. Like the young girl in Yancey's story, like Monica, as the young girls like Lashmi, he desired to return home, uncertain of the reception he would receive. He was ready for anything, what he obtained was far from what he ever could have imagined.

At the outset, these stories do not seem to be connected, but here is my point. God provides for us a model of how His Kingdom works, and we told to work the same. So many of our cultures today, Western included, are directly antithetical to the Kingdom of God, and somehow we miss that. We accept these as cultural differences and in the name of cultural sensitivity, we allow it to go on without questioning how this fits into our Kingdom theology. We can do that no longer. As followers of the Way, we need to stand up and be counted, to live as ambassadors for Christ, in this world but not of it. We need to act as my friend who as I write is spending a month in India teaching pastors how to lead the flock and is spending a great deal of time changing the pattern of how men treat women in that society. He understands this Kingdom theology and is challenging them to change their culture. Another colleague of mine, a brother from Nigeria who came to the US, went to college and felt a burden for refugees in Eastern Kenya. Right now he is raising up a new generation of Somalis who will understand the proper way to treat women, the proper way to settle disputes, the proper way to live as a member of the Kingdom of God. There are countless others…but the paradigm is the same, the focus is spreading the message of the Kingdom and acting as its citizens.

I just this week finished Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson's book Blinded by Might. Solid book, nothing extraordinary and nothing new or enlightening, but they put good information forth, and to me it carried more weight as they had been a part of the Moral Majority and Christian Coalition in its heyday. In their chapter entitled "Better Weapons," however, they hit a home run when they quote Lewis' Screwtape Letters:

Let him begin by treating patriotism...as a part of his religion. Then let him, under the influence of partisan spirit, come to regard it as the most important part. Then quietly and gradually nurse him on to the stage at which religion becomes merely a part of the "cause," in which Christianity is valued chiefly becaues of the excellent arguments it can produce...once you have made the world an end, and faith a means, you have almost won your man, and it makes very little difference what kind of worldly end his is pursuing.

Of course, they are using this quote to point a finger at the religious right for their wrongful ways over the past twenty five years. And they are right. But the religious left has learned that faith can put you in office and they have begun to put their faith forward and are succeeding, with their main argument focusing on the social justice movement. As I've said before, I'm all about helping the poor and needy, in many ways I've dedicated my life to it and wish I could do more, but I also understand that we do live in a fallen world and true, cosmic justice will only come with the reign of Christ. I interpret Lewis' statment, "the world an end, and faith a means" as what the religious left is engaging in now, and it sickens me as much as the binding of religion and politics used by the right. This world is not the end, and faith is not a means, God's Kingdom is among us, the Father is at work, and the faithful are humbly pressing into the work of God in their lives and in this world. Nothing more, nothing less.

I've got two problems with the Economist's recent report on faith and politics:

The first is obvious:

Rick Warren, American's favourite preacher, likens his "purpose-driven formula" to an Intel operating chip that can be inserted into the motherboard of any church; there are now more than 100,000 "purpose-driven" churches in 160 countries.

Forgive me, I just threw up in my mouth.

The second is not much better:

Second, the latest form of modernity-globalisation-has propelled religion forward. For traditionalists, faith has acted as a barrier against change. For properous suburbanites, faith has become something of a lifestyle coach...

Both provide perfect examples with the problems of faith, I want neither of these!

According to a recent email I received:

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee this week sent a "please explain" to six major televangelist organizations, questioning whether they really are non-profits in light of the extravagant and lavish lifestyles of some of the leaders who use private jets and Rolls Royce motorcars.

This is too unbelievable not to be true!

When I ask this question, I'm not being sarcastic, it's not loaded...

Sojourners writes a review today of Michael Gerson's new book Heroic Conservatism, and of course, since he is a disgruntled former member of the Bush regime, they love him to death.

But they also cite and quote from an article he wrote today in the Washington Post. I'll pick up their lead in to his quote:

He says there are two competing belief systems in the Republican Party – libertarianism and Catholic social teaching - and writes,

The difference between these visions is considerable. Various forms of libertarianism and anti-government conservatism share a belief that justice is defined by the imposition of impartial rules - free markets and the rule of law. If everyone is treated fairly and equally, the state has done its job. But Catholic social thought takes a large step beyond that view. While it affirms the principle of limited government - asserting the existence of a world of families, congregations and community institutions where government should rarely tread - it also asserts that the justice of society is measured by its treatment of the helpless and poor. And this creates a positive obligation to order society in a way that protects and benefits the powerless and suffering.

Of course, I agre with the first view. But the second is what leads to my question. He cites this as "Catholic social thought," but it goes beyond that as it is very common in the evangelical church today. But was that truly the message of Christ? Yes, he did mention that "whatever you did to the least of these you did to me," but wasn't that more of a personal message? Was that to society as a whole? My initial and superficial exegesis notes that he was talking to the disciples, which leads me to the latter interpretation, but this is something that I am seriously in conflict with.

On one hand I no-doubt see the social ramifications of this behavior and message (and if they politicians are claiming to be Christians then they need to follow) but on the other hand I know that we live in a fallen world and the world is not just. We can of course do our part, but there will always be poor among us and while it is important to share what we have, the most important thing is that we and they enter into the Kingdom of God, where true justice will one day be served.

To conclude, I enjoy a lot of the new ideas out there now on the Kingdom of God and Its Presence here on earth. I totally buy into that. How it plays out in the goverment is another question entirely, I need some more thought and reading and teaching and prayer on that.

I know that I haven't blogged in forever, but I couldn't resist a response to this article as I perused the web this morning.

A little background before I comment. If you followed this blog over the past two years or so, you will remember that last August I attended the International Aids Conference in Toronto and came away amazed at what I listened to. In a nutshell, I found the presenters and attenders radically petitioning for two things: more money (from government and big business) to go to prevention techniques (such as microbicides, as mentioned in the article) and to distribute clean needles and condoms around the world, particularly in Russia and China, where this disease is going to spread.

Having said that, if you skim the article you can see the irony in it and my cynicism as the time with these policies. A few comments:

1) This fall, pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. halted study of one of the most promising possibilities, a genetically engineered vaccine being tested on four continents, because it simply did not work. Can you believe they allowed this to be published? I'd love to see the response from the International AIDS Society (I wish I had time to look at their site for any response or to see how they could spin this).

2) The news has been nearly as bad for other technological solutions, including vaginal microbicides, one-a-day prevention pills and diaphragms. You could not even imagine the radical rhetoric that permeated the conference, I actually left at one point, I couldn't take it any more. The theme seemed to be, "We are going to continue with the behaviors that led to us getting this disease (drug injections and unsafe sexual practices), so you find a prevention measure (drug) or a cure, and then distribute it to use for free with taxpayer dollars." Makes sense to me.

3) Who would have thought those crazy Christians may actually have been right in the first place? They favor devoting more of the world's $10 billion annual AIDS spending to proven, lower-tech strategies against HIV, such as circumcising men, promoting sexual monogamy and making birth control more easily available to infected women.

4) I like and agree with the final quote: "If we're defeated in one area, we pull our troops back and attack somewhere else. That's what we're failing to do," he said. "We need a military response, and we have a bureaucratic response."

It's a good article, take a look and let me know what you think.

This morning during our teacher collaboration time, a group of us were doing item analysis on a standardized test that is given every year to our tenth graders. While discussing one of the questions and questioning why so many students got it wrong, a fellow teacher remarked, "sometimes we get so stuck on asking what the text means to us that we forget the author's intent..."


What struck me when the comment was made is that it is the same with God's Word. I have no problem discussing how a Scripture touches us or what God speaks to us through His Word, but we can't forget that there was an original meanting or intent for the Scripture, God did place it there for a purpose and it had meaning to the author of the text. That message definitely has gotten lost in "Bible" studies in the Western Church.

I've been thinking a lot about the latest buzzwords of community transformation and the call for the church to get out in the community and be an agent of change. I have a few thoughts on this that I want to get down for discussion:

1) Obviously, if we are just going out and raking leaves and serving food and painting walls without connecting it to Jesus, no change will happen, we will do no good for the Kingdom.

2) It seems like this is the "in" thing to do so everyone is jumping on board. But sometimes churches need to worry about feeding their own sheep before going out and recruiting some more, otherwise we've got more confused sheep wandering around than we had in the first place.

3) I'm all for community development, love what John Perkins is all about and what he is doing/did in Mississippi and Pasadena, so don't let my cynicism cloud the fact that I am agreement with this issue.

4) Community development must flow from a heart to love and serve God's people, it must be nurtured and prayed over and result from a clear call from the Lord, not just something we think is the right thing to do or everyone else is doing is.

Those are just a few thoughts for now that will help me frame some discussions I want to have in the near future with a few people.

I received this about a week ago from a former pro and enjoyed it, began a little correspondence with him, and included his response below.

The Discipline of Secrecy

Religious living often deteriorates into false piety. Our best intentions to read Scripture, serve well, give generously, and pray faithfully can quickly degenerate into exercises of self-promotion and self-glorification.

Jesus, however, warns us that anything we do to draw attention to ourselves -- whatever we do to be noticed by others (Matthew 6:1) -- negates any reward from our Father in heaven. But if we act quietly and non-publicly “Your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” (Matthew 6:4)

As we ponder spiritual disciplines, have we considered the discipline of secrecy?
When Jon Bon Jovi appeared on Oprah Winfrey’s popular daytime television program in the first week of 2006, he presented a check for $1 million towards Hurricane Relief. That generous act thrilled the audience. But, at the same time, Bon Jovi was promoting his musical albums. Did the check come from his marketing budget or from his heart? The public generosity made it very hard to tell.

We must delineate between sin-empowering secrecy and this spiritual discipline of secrecy.
Sin thrives on secrecy. When NBC Dateline set a sting for online sexual predators and then filmed men coming to the home of an underage girl, it became very apparent that those men, for the most part, lived horrifying double-lives. Rabbis, pastors, lawyers, doctors, tradesmen, and others all fell into the net. It cost many of them their marriages and did irreparable harm to their families. That kind of secrecy steals, kills, and destroys everything that the Father intends for us. (John 10:10)

On the other hand, Jesus advocates secrecy over acts that lead us not into shame but potentially into pride. His teaching, however, has few advocates in our self-honoring society.
Our culture teaches us to build a resume, and we do the same with our faith.We drop hints about our spiritual efforts. We mention our sacrificial service and leadership honors. We assist the poor and find ways to let others know about it. We tell stories of our spiritual achievements, victories and good deeds. But a fine line exists between sharing our life stories to encourage others and sharing the stories to enhance our own reputation.

The discipline of secrecy prohibits the building of any spiritual resume. It restrains us when we want to compare ourselves with the next person. It restricts our attempts to advance our own standing in the eyes of the world.

Any of us who would pray “Your Kingdom come” must consider this discipline with utmost seriousness. The coming of His Kingdom means the lessening of our kingdom, and godly secrecy guides us in that direction.

The discipline of secrecy may be one of the least practiced spiritual disciplines of our day – yet one of the most rewarding!

My response to him was that I agree with his premise, but said that in the world we live in, this is almost impossible, great idea, but very impractical. I found that out in my interview process with Life Promotions. His responded:

Perhaps the "spiritual resume" might be better replaced by "spiritual references" -- i.e. refusing to speak for ourselves but only receive what others might say about us. And if they say nothing? So be it. Might selling ourselves may be the ultimate expression of spiritual insecurity?

Very cool! How about going into a job interview and simply giving a list of references instead of having to sell outselves, let others say what we are about, they'll probably be more truthful anyway. I like that!

Another good one from that same article:

Running back Steven Jackson says that for months he has been getting issues of several handgun magazines that were mistakenly mailed to him instead of Stephen Jackson of the Golden State Warriors.

In fact, just read the whole article, I guarantee a few laugh out louds!

In case you are not familiar with Najeh Davenport, other than being an NFL running back he became famous a few years ago for this.

Which is why the following quote from DJ Gallo on EPSN.com is so funny:

New head coach Mike Tomlin has punished players who show up late to meetings or practices by making them share a laundry basket with running back Najeh Davenport.

I LOVE this article by Gregg Easterbrook! You have to read it in its entirety (it's not nearly as long as his TMQ's). I particularly enjoy the following quote:


Some commentators argue that Vick must be dealt with severely to "send a message" about athlete's behavior. No: Vick must be dealt with fairly, to send a message about justice.


He goes on to say how Vick shouldn't be sent a message to right the wrong that happened years ago in the Ray Lewis situation, namely that he wasn't punished harsh enough.


I couldn't agree more. I've never been a fan of making an example out of someone (though I did watch a Dateline a few weeks ago about an abusive husband who was made an example out of the by the judge, but though it was stated in those terms, I actually believe the sentence fit the crime).

I've fought this as a coach and teacher, too often I hear that a student or player must be "made an example of." I disagree, let the punishment fit the crime, if the player is engaged in conduct detrimental to the team, she should be removed, not to send a message to the other players but rather for the best of the team and their goals.

I was actually startled to realized this, but according to UNHCR (Jan. 2007), "The flow of Somali refugees into Kenya has reached more than 1,000 per day." WOW!

I was just humbled as I was going through some old mail and looked at a recent International Teams newsletter with the following quote from a Refugee Ministry Leader.

It was great to pray with believers from all over the world. I saw a Filipino serving in Japan praying over a Nigerian who is a US citizen and married to a Filipina with whom he serves Somali refugees in Kenya. I started praying with my eyes open after I realized what was happening.

The Nigerian US citizen is my good friend and brother Akindotun Modupe, the Filipina is his wife Ami who I am blessed to know. They are dear friends and faithful ministers of the Gospel! They just went through some tragic times and could use any extra prayers that would be offered up to our Father.

Interesting stuff from the latest Koinonia House newsletter:

A large number of young people are leaving the Church after high school, according to a survey of 1,023 Protestants age 18 to 30. While 35 percent of those who leave generally resume regular church attendance by age 30, and another 30 percent attend sporadically, significant numbers of Christian youth are leaving and never coming back.

"Too many youth groups are holding tanks with pizza. There's no life transformation taking place," said Ed Stetzer, director of Nashville-based LifeWay Research, which did the survey in April and May 2007. "People are looking for a faith that can change them and to be a part of changing the world."

Over half of church dropouts cited problems with the pastor or people at church, with over 40 percent saying they saw church members as hypocritical or insincere. Fifty-two percent of those surveyed said they had philosophical, religious, or political reasons for leaving.

What do we do to keep young adults engaged in Christianity?

Former atheist-turned-Christ-apologist Anthony Horvath argues that one of the biggest issues is that Christian youth are not being taught to defend their faith. Kids have major questions;
-Why is there evil and suffering in the world if God is good? -What is the evidence for God's existence?-What makes the Bible different from any other religious holy book?-Are the events of the Bible historical?

Horvath argues that kids do not simply need to be taught what the Bible says, they need to know how to defend their faith, as 1 Peter 3:15 says:

"But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:"

Older Christians and Christian parents need to research and do their homework so that they can be ready to answer the questions of their young people. Churches should make sure that their youth groups do more than hang out, sing, and eat pizza. While youth ministries should be a lot of fun, they need to be places where kids are trained in the knowledge of God, not simply entertained.

Just as important, both Christian youth and Christian adults need to shun hypocrisy. The teen years can be the hardest years of a person's life. They are often years of insecurity, filled with longings to be loved and accepted. If the Church fails to embrace these young people and demonstrate the true love and nurturing character of Christ, kids can be deeply hurt. It's tragic when people feel safer and freer to be themselves in a tavern than they do in a body of believers.

Only by being filled with the Spirit and in touch with the true heart of God can we be the models of Christ that we need to be to the next lost and dying generation. Only by building up our young people to be warriors of the faith can they be prepared to battle the world's philosophies as they grow into adults.

I really like the balance he lays out when he says that youth groups should be a lot of fun but should also be places where kids are trained in the knowledge and ways of our Lord.

Another great quote was the need to shun hypocrisy, which is so evident in the church that it makes me puke! Why can't we just be honest and admit that we are all sinners who are freely redeemed by our Lord Jesus Christ. Is it that hard? Why do we need to play the game?

Any arguments?

Yesterday I received an email from a person who will remain unnamed that she had changed her email address. Today I received the following email from the administrator at a church that will remain unnamed:

Thanks -----. I’ll be sure ---’s database is updated. Coming soon!!!...you’ll be able to change your own general information in ---'s database from the web!!!!

WOW! How great. What did we do in the past when we couldn't change our own general info from the web...what a great selling point for any church, I'll have to sign up San Damiano.

Wallis seems to want to praise Gordon Brown for the following speech made at the US last week. I find it to be great, but empty rhetoric. How about something specific to address these needs:


And so my argument is simple: The greatest of evils that touches the deepest places of conscience demands the greatest of endeavor. The greatest of challenges now demands the boldest of initiatives. To address the worst of poverty we urgently need to summon up the best efforts of humanity.I want to summon into existence the greatest coalition of conscience in pursuit of the greatest of causes. And I firmly believe that if we can discover common purpose there is no failing in today's world that cannot be addressed by mobilizing our strengths, no individual struggle that drags people down that cannot benefit from a renewed public purpose that can lift people up.

To find that common purpose, he said:

Our objectives cannot be achieved by governments alone, however well-intentioned; or private sector alone, however generous; or NGOs or faith groups alone, however well-meaning or determined—it can only be achieved in a genuine partnership together.

After addressing governments and businesses, the prime minister went on:

Let me say to faith groups and NGOs—your moral outrage at avoidable poverty has led you to work for the greatest of causes, the highest of ideals, and become the leaders of the campaign to make poverty history. Imagine what more you can accomplish if the energy to oppose and expose harnessed to the energy to propose and inspire is given more support by the rest of us—businesses, citizens, and governments.

Oh-oh - TMQ is back a few weeks earlier than I thought, that's spelles TROUBLE for me:

But before Tuesday Morning Quarterback rises to a full defense of the NFLPA, let me just say: I'm back and I'm bad! Well, at least I'm back. TMQ has returned and will appear in this space through the Super Bowl. Start blocking off 1-3 hours of downtime every Tuesday to read the column!

Great example from Peter J0nes of what our world is coming to. Was I the only one who missed this?

The trouble is, "both/and" gets a lot of people befuddled. Moral confusion is everywhere. Who is right? The school bus driver who kicked two girls off his bus for kissing, or the transit agency chief who apologized? How should the people of Cambridge, England relate to the new transgendered "lesbian" mayoral couple? Both Jennifer the mayor and Jennifer the mayoress (her wife) began life as men. Are you confused? Sexuality is not the only realm where confusion reigns. Religious confusion is everywhere. A woman Episcopal priest claims to be both a Christian and a Muslim. On Fridays, she wears a black headscarf and heads to the local mosque. On Sundays, she wears the white collar of a priest and leads the church in Christian worship.

I've always had a great deal of respect for Randy Alcorn, his latest email/prayer request hit the nail right on the head:

I need to guard my schedule to carve out more time for reading, reflection and writing. I would appreciate your prayers for me that I would be both refreshed and productive, that the reservoir of my life would be filled, as Mary’s was while sitting at the feet of Jesus. I love what Jesus said: “Only one thing is necessary—Mary has chosen the better portion.” We all have many things to do, but it all starts with one thing: being and living in the presence of Jesus.

Great article at Worldview Weekend entitled "Ten Ways to Grow a Church Without God." I'll be using this at I discuss the future of our church with my pastor.

Interesting article from the Daily Mail via Drudge written by a former radical Islamist shedding some light into the background on these home-grown terrorists in Britain.

I also find this quote interesting from the recent edition of TIME:

The Democratic Party nominated a slew of New Yorkers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries when Tammany Hall was the powerhouse of the state's big-city ethnic base. But the Republicans tapped New Yorkers too --Theodore Roosevelt, Charles Evans Hughes, Thomas Dewey--as did significant third parties: former President Millard Fillmore headed the anti-immigrant American Party ticket in 1856. Some New York candidates went straight from the campaign trail to the footnotes--Horatio Seymour, anyone?--but four New Yorkers managed to win eight presidential elections: Martin Van Buren (1836), Grover Cleveland (1884, 1892), Theodore Roosevelt (1904) and Franklin Roosevelt (1932, 1936, 1940, 1944).

I always think of the current immigration battle as new, but forget it's been going on for almost as long as the US has existed. It's just that the immigrants are changing. Fillmore probably didn't like those Irish bastards (of which I claim partial heritage) coming onto American soil back then, not it's the Hispanics who are "threatening our way of life." Who will it be next?

I love this quote from John Hollinger on ESPN.com. I used to be a HUGE Knicks fan, until Isaiah tok over, that is...

It continues a tried and true formula in the NBA -- find the biggest sucker at the table, and take all their chips. Getting Isiah on the phone has been a key part of the rebuilding process for the Suns, Bulls, Raptors and Magic, and it appears the Blazers are the latest to take the plunge.

I came across a very interesting article called "Free Love: Was there a price to pay?" Check it out...

Since I've been so apathetic on the blogging side lately I debated whether I should post this or not, I decided to since I felt it was so true and well written:

According to a recent Gallup poll, approximately 66 percent of Americans think the UN is doing a poor job. This most recent assessment of the United Nations' shoddy job performance is the lowest ever since Gallop first began keeping track in 1953. This news is not surprising. What is astonishing is that, despite the United Nations' terrible track record, most Americans think the inept organization should still play a major role in international affairs.

What most people don't realize is that the United Nations has become a safe haven for thugs, war-mongers, and tyrannical dictators. The truth of the matter is that only 89 of the 192 UN member nations have truly free governments. In other words, the majority of the UN is made up of 103 nations that do not give their citizens the same political rights and civil liberties that you and I take for granted. That is according to Freedom House, which has published a report on what it calls "the world's most repressive societies." With the sole exception of North Korea, all of the 17 nations that made the list are current members of the United Nations. Perhaps most alarming is that some of the "worst of the worst" human rights violators have actually been appointed to the UN Human Rights Council.

The United Nations was created to maintain international peace and help solve the world's economic and humanitarian troubles, but the UN has failed time and time again to achieve its main objectives. The UN is plagued by scandal, widespread corruption, favoritism, and financial mismanagement. Furthermore, through its misconduct, negligence, and complacency the UN has aided terrorism worldwide.

In April of 2006 Iran was elected to a vice-chair position on the UN Disarmament Commission, which is tasked with preventing the spread of nuclear weapons. The following day Iran announced that it had successfully enriched uranium. Appointing Iran to a position where it can establish disarmament rules to protect its own clandestine nuclear program is either a colossal lapse in judgment or a deliberate attempt by the non-democratic majority to protect one of their own from scrutiny. It doesn't make any sense, unless of course you think like one of 103 nations that control the vote in the UN General Assembly.

One must only examine the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Sudan to understand why the UN has failed to fulfill the primary purpose for which it was created - to promote peace and protect humanity. Hundreds of thousands of people in Darfur have been slaughtered and millions have been forced to flee their homes. The Islamic government that controls Sudan is guilty of genocide, but the United Nations has yet to take decisive action to stop the bloodshed. For the past four years they have done nothing but deliberate, procrastinate, and make empty threats. Why? The UN has failed to act because the status quo serves its interests, because powerful nations like China benefit from Sudan's oil wealth, and because the very leaders who control the vote are profiting from the sale of bullets and bombs.

I have to laugh at those who still sing the praises of the UN and see them as the savior of the world through which peach will come. Look for further than the tragedies happening around the world for a good wake-up call my friends!

Reason number 3, 459 why I do not believe in the good of humanity:

As reported in The Economist on the strife in the Central African Republic from 2002-2003:

The sexual violence was particularly brutal. For the first time the court is investigating a situation where the number of rape victims exceeds the number of murders (JN note: not necessarily something to boast about)...He has detailed accounts from at least 600 rape victims, including children, old women, and men. Many were gang-raped, often in public.

I like this quote taken from the latest Peter Jones NewCWIPP on Esoteric Spirituality:

A classic text from the Christian scriptures said this with surprising clarity two thousand years ago. This is no secret! There are only two kinds of religious people, those who worship and serve creation and those who worship and serve the Creator (Romans 1:25). These two kinds of spirituality describe the only two religious worldviews. They both require faith and service. They are mutually exclusive, and everyone must choose between them—but you would not know that from reading The Secret.

The age-old esoteric option, presented with such brilliant marketing skill in The Secret offers power, money, human “divinity,” the elimination of all things distasteful and the promise of a humanly-realized earthly utopia. However, it fails to take seriously huge issues that we ignore at our peril—human evil, physical death and the reality of God as separate from us, demanding our allegiance.

The exoteric option, found in the Bible, faces squarely the present reality of evil and the ugliness of death while finding final hope only in the Creator as the loving Redeemer.

Key here for me is the failure of the esoteric option not to address the problem of evil. That seems to be one of the key questions I hear most often from searchers or skeptics of the faith, and one that is easily answerable with a proper biblical worldview.

As the few of you who read this probably already know, I hate the following argument put forth by Georgetown Forward Jeff Green:

School is only going to be here four years," Green told the newspaper. "The NBA will be there forever. You can't just give up that. That's a big thought in this process.

No Jeff, school will be there forever, and you can afford any college you want after you make your NBA money. While I don't disagree with his pending decision to return to school, improve his skills, and try his luck next year in a weaker draft, his reasoning is all wrong. Colleges will always be there, one only has a limited time to make their money in professional sports.

I did something today that I haven't done in a long time, abandoned a book. So long Theroux, I loved "Dark Star Safari" but just couldn't get into "The Happy Isles of Oceania," maybe I'll pick it up at a later date with more time on my hands to read about something I don't have a lot of interest in.

Welcome "Velvet Elvis," although the intro didn't catch me, this quote on the back did, "Just because I'm a Christian and I'm trying to articulate a Christian worldview doesn't mean I've got it nailed. I'm contributing to the discussion. God has spoken, and the rest is commentary, right?"

Peter Beinart wrote a solid article in Time an issue or two ago regarding the falling of freedom around the world. He makes a solid point about the price of oil and level of personal freedom:

Then there's oil. As Thomas Friedman has noted, the price of crude and the tide of freedom tend to move in opposite directions. Before 9/11, the price per bbl. fluctuated between $20 and $30. Now it hovers between $50 and $65. And that's not likely to change anytime soon, given rising demand from China and India. That gives oil-producing autocracies such as Russia, Iran, Venezuela, Sudan and now Nigeria more money to crush or buy off internal dissent. And it makes it easier for them to win friends and influence people around the world. A decade ago, authoritarian governments were largely on the defensive. Today Venezuela's Hugo Chávez is cloning himself in Bolivia and Ecuador. And Iran is on the verge of dominating the Middle East.

Easterly made a similar point in "White Man's Burden":

A natural resource oligarchy is particularly inimical to democracy. Oil is infamious for undermining or preventing democracy. Oil revenues are very easy to redistribute, so wealthy and well-connected insiders who benefit from oil controlled by dictatorship have a lot to lose from a democracy that would surely result in redistribution (as I noted in a post last year). Hense, we get oil societies desperate to prevent democracy, ranging from the oil-rich Middle East to Africa. NYU politics professor Leonard Wantchekon documented systemactically the association of resource wealth with autocracy in Africa, as others did using worldwide patterns. Wantchenkon shows that new democracies have succeeded in Africa mainly in resource-poor places such as Benin, Madagascar, and Mali, while oil-rich states such as Algeria, Cameroon, Gabon, and Libya still have dictators. Worldwise, oil producers were on average in the worst fourth of the world's countries in democracy in 2004, as democracy was measured by three World Bank researchers. (125-126)

Just today, the Wall Street Journal reported on the state takeover of the one of the last independent news sources in Venezuela, and the impending distaster awaiting that country. Their quote, "Having built his claim to legitimacy on the spurious assertion that he presides over a democracy, you can bet that Mr. Chávez would not have gone after RCTV unless he deemed control of TV news vital to his survival. It may indeed be. The reason is because the economy has been so mismanaged that a crisis now appears unavoidable. How it will end, in rationing and hunger or hyperinflationary madness, is hard to say. But when the whole thing comes a cropper, the last thing the president will want is TV images of popular protests that could be contagious." Seems to fit the studies presented above.

I had to laugh last night as I was perusing the channels and saw this interview being conducted on 60 Minutes. Truly, this is a terrible thing, anytime this amount of tax payers money is wasted, I want to cry. But where in the world does this Rep. get off taking the high and mighty route in scolding these private contractors for wasting the money of US tax payers? Is not the irony flowing from his lips? I read articles every day calling out the government for their wasteful programs and here is this guy trying to cover his butt by lashing out at these contractors. Sure, they may be wrong, but he needs to take care of his own house before messing around in someone else's.

A while back I had to go to this multi-cultural sensitivity panel for my job, it was actually a lot better than I had expected. Anyway, one of the guys, the Hmong representative, made a great analogy regarding schools. He said something to the tune of back in the day, schools (and teachers in particular) operated much like an ancient king or kingdom, "I am king, you come to me, you fear me!" But now that is changing, schools and teachers have to be more sensitive to the needs of students, especially in our ever-changing world. I love that analogy!


I also felt that it could be related to the Church over the last two thousand years. In the past, especially in your more orthodox churches, the priests or whomever was at the top acted much like the King, "I am king, you come to me, you fear me!" and they even presented God in this light. But more and more those layers are breaking down, in many circles this hierarchical leadership in the church is being outed for the mockery they have become. Furthermore, more and more literature is being published that is showing God for the loving, merciful, forgiving, just God that He is, not this big bad angry father up in the sky just waiting to get you. Thanks be to God for that!

I was having a great conversation with my main man John today and this Scripture came to mind:

For when there is a change of the priesthood, there must also be a change of the law.

WOW! That has been one of my favorite Scriptures for some time. We discussed how utterly incomprehensible it is to the human mind to understand what happened when Jesus died on the cross, when the veil was torn, when He took on our sin and then defeated it with the Resurrection three days later. An utterly astonishing event. I could go on, but since no words I write can even scratch the surface of the meaning behind this event, I'm going to stop.

A crazy, heart-wrenching, tear-jerking story as posted on the from the New York Times as posted on the Freakanomics blog.

Joseph Loconte wrote an article in Friday's WSJ titled "Christianity Without Salvation," a review of Walter Rauschenbusch's 1907 book titled "Christianity and the Social Crisis." Fortunately I was able to link to the entire article, you should be able to read it for free. GREAT ARTICLE! YOU HAVE TO READ IT! It's very short, let me know what you think.

Two paragraphs stood out as particularly true and poignant:

As such, Rauschenbusch's gospel had little need of a Savior. It merely displaced the problem of evil--the supreme tragedy of the human soul in rebellion against God--with the challenge of social iniquities. The Kingdom of Heaven would come soon enough, if only we put our hands to the plow...

This is exactly what I wrote about here a while back, I truly believe that the leaders of the emerging church are advocating a type of postmillenial thought, similar to Rauschenbusch above, where we need to perfect the earth and prepare the way for the Lord's Second return. It's interesting that the article quotes Wallis and Campolo, two of the leading emergent spokesmen of our day. Count me out!

The Christian confession of faith, by itself, offers no guarantee that either individuals or societies will be transformed. But, for believers, not even the smallest steps forward can be taken without it.

Again, take a look at the article and tell me what you think.

I am angry right now! Very angry! So angry about this situation that I find it difficult to speak or write coherently about it. I'm referring to the World Bank situation regarding Wolfowitz , his girlfriend, and those calling for his head.

Now, of course I don't know the entire situation, just what a few news outlets and magazines have written, each with their own side. Did he tell the powers that be that he was dating this girl before he took the job? Did they tell him to move her and give her the pay raise that was merited with such a move? Did he act favorably in accordance with their relationship? I don't know the answers to these or a myriad of other questions. What I do know is that the situation at the World Bank and the global development community is broken, and whether Wolfowitz is the man to fix it or not we are not sure, but it needs to be fixed or cease to exist. I'm sick of the 30% funding that is given to their poor countries ending up being siphoned off the top in bribes and another 40% being sent right back to foreign banks. I'm sick of the people who need the hand up the most received pennies on the dollar. I'm sick of the problems being exascerbated because we are not out to fix them, only prop up these evil regimes and keep the poor in control. I'm sick of it, I'm sick of it, I'm sick of it! This is not a political issue (though it's evolved into one), it's a people issue, and I've walked and talked with too many who need this hand up much more than the corrupt government offical needs a new Mercedes.

I remember thinking shortly after watching "The Titanic" back in college that I was not and would never be a fan of Leonardo DiCaprio. Of course, the first movie I remember noting post-Titanic was "The Beach" and just by the cover and trailer there was no way I was going to watch this chick flick (although as you will remember, I've since viewed this movie and LOVE IT!). But when "Gangs of New York" released in 2002 followed by "Catch Me If You Can" the same year, I was rethinking my stereotype of him. Then came "The Aviator" in 2004, which I loved, followed by "The Departed" which I felt was overrated and "Blood Diamond," which I loved. All in all, what I'm saying is that I've changed my mind, I'm a fan of DiCaprio, have the utmost respect for him, and echo what Scorsese wrote of him in the latest edition of Time.

I had not heard about this but an nevertheless moved:

On Wednesday morning, April 18, 2007, the three men left home to attend a Bible study. It was there that they were attacked, bound, tortured for three hours, and martyred. In a letter from the Protestant Church of Smyrna to Christians around the globe the men were described as "the first martyrs for Christ out of the Turkish Church."

Perhaps one of more surprising outcomes of this tragedy has been the reaction of the men’s widows. Their willingness to forgive their husband’s killers has captured the attention of a nation - something the attackers probably did not anticipate. Following is an excerpt of the letter from the church in Smyrna:

In an act that hit front pages in the largest newspapers in Turkey, Susanne Geske in a television interview expressed her forgiveness. She did not want revenge, she told reporters. "Oh God, forgive them for they know not what they do," she said, wholeheartedly agreeing with the words of Christ on Calvary (Luke 23:34).

In a country where blood-for-blood revenge is as normal as breathing, many many reports have come to the attention of the church of how this comment of Susanne Geske has changed lives. One columnist wrote of her comment, "She said in one sentence what 1000 missionaries in 1000 years could never do."

My friends, we have just witnessed the Kingdom of God at work!

Pretty good article on the economics of "the poor" taken from The Economist. I was particularly intrigued by the following information from the study:

A dollar a day would seem to leave little room for choice or discretion. Hunger is surely the most binding of constraints. And yet these pillages of privacy show that the poor do make choices. They also suggest they are not always the best ones.

The poor do not complain much, the two authors note. (Only 9% of people in their Udaipur survey say their life makes them generally unhappy.) But they have a lot to complain about. Beset by hunger and illness, many are scrawny (65% of adult men in Udaipur are underweight), over half are anaemic, and about a seventh suffer from impaired eyesight. Many had to go without food on at least one day in the previous year.

And yet they do not eat as much as they could. According to Mr Banerjee and Ms Duflo, the typical poor household in Udaipur could spend up to 30% more on food than it does, if only it stopped devoting money to alcohol, tobacco and festivals. That last item, which includes weddings, funerals and religious events, typically accounts for about a tenth of the household's budget. This spending might be motivated by escapism—the poor have a lot to escape—or perhaps by social emulation. Even those in absolute poverty care about their relative standing.

Are we to chide them for their foolishness in spending or stand by them in understanding that this is their method of escape? Read the article and let me know what you think.

This was somewhat a surprise for me, I had heard of the ban in NYC and had assumed that the evidence proved that aluminum bats were more dangerous, I should have known better, as pointed out by the Wall Street Journal:

Reasonable people can disagree on the relative merits of wood versus aluminum, but leave it to the New York City to conclude that government should decide this issue for everyone else.
The City Council recently outlawed all metal bats in the city's high school baseball games come September. Proponents of banning metal...claim that balls go faster when hit with metal bats. But this hasn't caused more serious accidents: Studies from the American Legion and Consumer Product Safety Commission found zero reason for alarm.

As for New Yorkers, the peril of getting beaned with a line drive is hardly the most pressing concern for city's kids. Little League Baseball leaves the choice of wood or metal up to its local chapters because it says "there are no facts-none at all-to support" the claim that aluminum bats are more dangerous. Even at the college level, where metal bats are common, baseball is among the safer sports, with serious injury rates roughly on par with women's volleyball.

The current campaign is headlined by a couple of sad accidents, but these cases were literally less than on in a million. Legislation by anecdote is a good way to end up with minimum sentencing guidelines for swimming after eating a sandwich...

Gotta love this from TMQ:

Note: Keyshawn Johnson did well for a novice sportscaster, but also garnered the best garbled comment of the weekend's coverage. As Green Bay's pick approached and all speculation was on Brady Quinn as Favre's successor, Keyshawn gushed, "Quinn could lead the Packers into the next millennium." Keyshawn, the next millennium starts in 994 years.

Below is an excerpt from a weekly e-article that I receive from a former professor of mine. I've posted occasional copies of his work in the past. What struck me about this writing is that it is exactly what I have been confronted with over the past few months. I am finding that the very things that bother me the most about other people are the things that convict me within my own life. I get frustrated with certain personality traits others possess but then notice how I hold those same traits. It's almost like the old quote I read a while back, something to the tune of, "The biggest penalty for a liar is that he can never believe anyone else." (I know I've butchered that quote but I can't place it, so I had to go with how I remembered it, you'll just have to take it in the spirit of the quote.) Take a look for yourself:

In November 2006, amidst great scandal, Ted Haggard the senior pastor of the 14,000-member New Life Church in Colorado and president of the National Association of Evangelicals resigned from his ministry. A loud and public critic of homosexuality, he confessed to inappropriate gay encounters of his own.

We might quickly cry "Hypocrisy!" but something deeper beckons our consideration.

Gordon MacDonald wrote in a pastoral note:
“When I see a leader who becomes stubborn and rigid ... less compassionate toward his adversaries [and] increasingly tyrannical ... I wonder if he is not generating all of this heat because he is trying so hard to say ‘no’ to something surging deep within his own soul. Are his words and deeds not so much directed against an enemy ‘out there’ as they are against a much more cunning enemy within his own soul? More than once I have visited with pastors who have spent hours immersed in pornography and then gone on to preach their most 'spirit-filled' sermons against immorality a day or two later.”

This phenomenon spans the centuries. Shakespeare had Queen Gertrude exclaim, “The lady doth protest too much” in a scene in which a conniving woman kept insisting on her loyalty to her husband (Hamlet , III, ii, 239).

Excessive protests and overly vigorous opposition sometimes indicates wounds or weaknesses within us . Indeed, our own pain and failure can give us deep conviction and passion. Consequently, it may help us to clarify if our fervor and stridency arises because we are sorrowful for the fallen or struggling with ourselves. A critical spirit may reveal more of our self-perception than how we view others...

Any suggestion that we have no sin will undermine our capacity to touch others ... family members, friends, co-workers, neighbors, or fellow-believers.

Before we crusade to tear down the strongholds in others, let's confront our own demons then speak truth out of lives of humility, obedience, and sincerity. Therein lies genuine freedom for all of us, including Ted.

Herein lies the only problem that I see, I believe we are still called to speak out against sin. But the difference is our attitude. In calling out that sin we are not to believe we are above it, that we have it all figured out. We must also confess that we too are sinners, that we struggle with many of these same issues. And together we must confess our sins to the Lord, thank Him for His grace, and together ask Him to shape us into followers or Him who take on the image of His Son. As my prof signs off, In Hope!

Anyone who knows me knows of my disdain and cynicism for large-scale international developmental aid as championed by the UN, USAID, World Bank, etc. William Easterly opened my eyes to this issue in "White Man's Burden" when he used the case study of Amaretch, the young Ethiopian girl who daily trekked from her village to Addis Ababa to sell a load of firewood for a few dollars. When interviewed, she said, "I don't want to have to carry firewood all my life. But at the moment I have no choice because we are so poor...I would prefer to be able to just go to school and not have to worry about getting money."

But therein lies the problem, in spite of the billions and billions of dollars poured into nations like Ethiopia over the years, the lives of children like Ameretch or their family have not improved one bit. If anything, their situations have grown more dire, as Paul Theroux, on his second tour through Africa, points out in "Dark Star Safari," noting how large-scale farming was on the secline, survival through subsistence farming was the focus of most families. What can be done to allow children like Ameretch to go to school?

I have always believed in private, grass-roots organizations as the solution to these problems. Of course, it will take literally hundreds, even thousands of organizations stepping forward and making connections around the world where they can make a difference, but it is happening. Just today there was a front-page article in the Wall Street Journal on a dam project in the Machakos District of Kenya, a place we travel when we journey to Kenya. I know from experience that the rains only come once or twice a year, and then only if the people are lucky. We see the remnants of where the rivers flow in the rainy season, but in July and August it is a parched land.

Fortunately for the people of this area, a group of farmers in Ohio stepped up to the plate. Selling cattle and holding fundraisers, this group of farmers donated money, around $70,000 to a project in the area that sought to build a dam on a local river to keep the water flowing year-round. In the past, the river would dry shortly after the rains, but now it runs almost around the clock, allowing farmers to expand the crops they plant and harvest two or even three crops per year. One farmer was able to raise his annual income rom $100 to $500 by selling his surplus vegetables at the local market. In the spirit of entrepreneurship, the farmers have also purchased tools and other materials to increase their irrigable land and profit from the extra water. In addition, since the farmers now have more time on their hands since they don't have to travel miles to find water, they have taken it upon themselves to fix the local roads, something the government of Kenya and Western nations have pledged millions for, to little success, probably being redirected to foreign banks in the accounts of the corrupt leaders.

How can we ensure that children like Ameretch are able to go to school instead of carrying firewood every day into the city? How can we help farmers increase their crop yields? How can we help the eight million people who die from starvation each year? How can we get bed neets to the thousands who die every day or malaria? The answers are not easy, but we've tried the large-school development which has not seemed to work, though private, grass-roots has its limits, it seems to be the best alternative to truly meeting the needs of the people.

Pretty cool quote in the recent issue of Atlantic Monthly:

Stalin Was Right

"A single death is a tragedy," Joseph Stalin said. "A million deaths is a statistic." Now a psychology professor at the University of Oregon has tried to figure out why, with a paper suggesting that an evolved behavioral response may mean that we don’t feel that genocide is real unless we can focus on a particular individual. People understand reality in two ways, he argues: one is intuitive and experiential, the other is analytical and rational. Making decisions based on intuition is usually easier and more efficient than forming a judgment after analysis, and although our rational processes are supposed to monitor our intuitive impressions, they’re often "rather lax." A case in point: When participants in a study were asked to donate money either to a starving girl in Mali or to a larger group of famine victims represented only by a number, they gave significantly greater amounts to the wide-eyed girl. Moreover, contributions to the starving girl actually dropped when statistical information about the number of people suffering from severe hunger accompanied the girl’s name and picture.

The full article is linked here. What hit me in the above text was the fact that this is so true of me. Tell me about the twenty million slaves around the world and I’ll cringe, but provide me with a first-hand account of a child sex-slave or a kidnapped domestic slaved trapped in hell on earth, and I’ll be spurred to action. Notify me of the forty million AIDS orphans around the world and my heart will go out to them, but chronicle me the story of a young girl who watched first her father and then her mother die of this dreaded disease and I’ll be moved provide for her education and the care of her siblings. Provide me the statistics of the Rwandan genocide and I’ll be the typical Westerner in “Hotel Rwanda” who saw the tragedy on TV and took a cup of coffee and said, “That’s too bad.” But travel to that country and interview survivors of the genocide, tell me their stories, how they survived, the loved ones they lost, and I’ll be burdened for their cause and hardships. This seems like a very accurate portrayal of how we respond to tragedies, how we make decisions, what spurs us to action.

I've ripped on Wallis in the past, but I really enjoy what he wrote this week about the Virginia Tech tragedy, although as much as I consider myself a conservationist, I'm not sure of his inclusion of elephants in the narrative:

We are sad today, and we will be sad for quite a while. We are not moving on, we are embracing our mourning. ... We do not understand this tragedy. We know we did nothing to deserve it, but neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS, neither do the invisible children walking the night away to avoid being captured by the rogue army, neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devastated for ivory, neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water, neither does the Appalachian infant killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized. No one deserves a tragedy.

Unfortunatly, these tragedies are a result of the fallen world that we live in, a world that is still under the control of the evil one. Thanks be to God for giving us a way out!

My high school had a hosted a pretty cool assembly this afternoon, it was called something like "Voices of Men" and dealt with different types of abuse, mostly directed at females, and how men need to take a stand on this issue. I thought it would be a man-hating feminist ordeal, but instead we were treated to a one-man play as he did celebrity impersonations and showed very moving video clips. I thoroughly enjoyed it. At the end he asked every man in the room who felt called to stand and take a pledge that they would treat women with respect and be a voice to those who didn't.

What struck me during this play, though, was that I cannot think of one time in my life where I witnessed a man abusing a woman or child or where I felt a close friend or acquaintance or even someone I knew was being abused. And believe me I've racked my brain as I can't believe that I have never experienced this in my life, but I can't think of one instance. That is very rare. Not only am I extremely lucky that my father never laid a hand on my mother or one of us children, but the fact that I've never even been a part or heard of it outside of my family is unheard of. I thank God for that and as I mentioned in a previous post about sexual abuse, I pray to God that men stand up and be men and call other men to respect the women in their lives, praying also that God intervene when this does not happen and protect the women and children who face this abuse, giving them the peace and comfort that can only come from being in the hands of God.

While it could have just as easily come from The Onion, my main man William Easterly linked the following on his website:

De-velop_Mented is a sporadically-issued periodical produced by Zappalachian nomads on $150 laptops. Due to limitations on bandwidth and frequent aid-financed power outages, I have only been able to get the headlines to the stories, and even that only occasionally. Any stories that Zappalachian exiles wish to file can be send to William.Easterly@nyu.edu

Previous Headlines:
"UN announces new agency to combat excessive bureaucracy in foreign aid"

"Malawian mother adopts Britney Spears"

"Mammoth new global AIDS program vows to prevent one new infection for every 10,000 people receiving treatment"

"World Bank angrily denies charge it cares about people above $1 a day"

"UN campaign to reduce poverty headcount urges poor to refrain from
sex"

"G-8 trade ministers reach landmark agreement to remain on verge of
making progress on Doha round"

"UN Millennium Project announces that Madonna's Malawi baby has
attained Millennium Development Goals"

"IMF to distribute to poor Congolese 55,225,478 copies of Country
Report No. 04/224,'Democratic Republic of the Congo: Joint Staff
Assessment of the Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper Preparation
Status Report'"

"Destitute children demand royalties on photographs for aid publications"

"African leaders form commission advising Bono how to reform U2"

As I've written many times over the course of this blog, about three years ago in May I really felt the Lord gave me a clear heart and mandate for three particular peoples: widows and orphans, modern-day slaves, and unreached people groups. Shortly after that, I was introduced to Tumaini Int. Ministry and asked to become Vice-President, fulfilling my heart for widows and orphans, mainly orphans. Other than supporting missionaries, I had not much of a focus or window for working with slaves or unreached people groups. But lately, the Lord had laid a SEVERE burden on my heart for modern-day slaves and abused peoples, as He has on the heart of my brother Adam.

While on vacation last week, I was able to read two profound books, "Memoirs of a Boy Soldier" and "Enslaved," the first about a child soldier in Sierra Leone (the movie "Blood Diamonds" could have been based on this book) and the second seven or eight stories of the plights of modern-day slaves, how they got in and out of slavery.

"Memoirs..." was a good read and I'm glad I read it. But "Enslaved" was the one that touched me the hardest, in fact I've not been able to sleep much of late due to the nightmares associated with some of the parts of the book. What I've noticed that is gripping me the most is the tales of sexual abuse and sex slavery that I'm hearing, both from this book, first-hand acconts from my students, and other instances that make their way into my life. The common denominator that I'm finding is that when rape or sexual abuse is involved, I cringe. I can read a story about someone being abused physically to the point of death, and I pause and feel for them, but any story about the slightest bit of sexual abuse makes me literally sick, and I say literally as I got sick to my stomach while reading "Enslaved" and was shaking at one point in the narrative.

Doug Hermann, a national abstinence speaker, asks the audience to choose one of the following hypothetical situations:

Situation A: You are leaving a mall, a group of thugs come in a van, kidnap you, take you to a remote location, stab you repeatedly, take you back to the mall, throw you out, you are found and seriously hurt, but you will be all right.

Situation B: You are leaving a mall, a group of thugs come in a van, kidnap you, take you to a remote location, rape you repeatedly, take you back to the mall, throw you out, you are found and seriously hurt, but you will be all right.

He asks his audiences which situation they would prefer and without fail they choose situation A. (In fact one time a male student of mine thought he would be smart and choose situation B until a girl in the class turned around and said "how about being raped by another man?" He shut up pretty quickly.) Of course the point Hermann is trying to make is that sex is not only physical but emotional as well. And that is the point I am making as well, there is something to rape and other sexual abuse that I don't believe one recovers from, ever, and the mere thought of it turns my stomach upside down.

All of this to then say that I feel the Lord working in my heart, I am praying for that working to find an outcome, something I can commit to in order to assist those in need, those going through this right now or those who have gone through it in the past. What that is I don't know, for now every night before I go to bed I utter something to the following:

"Dear Lord, be with those who have been raped or abused in the past. Right now give them a peace, let them know you are God, let them know that this is not your plan, that you are there for them with the peace only you can give. Father, stop those men right now who are abusing, who are leaving the taverns with plans on raping and abusing wives and children this evening. Stop them with the only power that can stop them, you! I implore you God to act, give the children, give the wives, give the slaves one night of reprieve, let them rest in your peace this evening, touch them in an even greater and more overpowering way that only you can do. And tomorrow may both the abused and the abuser wake up to an overpowering extension of your grace and may they choose to follow you. Thank you God. AMEN"

This made its way into my inbox this afternoon:

Shortly before Christmas, Dave Talbot's mother lay dying in hospital. Barely conscious for much of the time, and clearly in the last few days of her earthly journey, she slipped further and further away from her grieving family. Then, with a sudden surge, her eyes shot open. She raised herself up a little and cried, "Heaven! Heaven! Heaven!" She slumped back into her bed and soon departed.

The undertaker who came for her body noted that, in 5000 deaths, he had seen only five people die with a smile on their face like hers. Her suffering became a revelation and affirmation to her family of an eternal reality.

Today Colin Harrison -- a 32-year-old losing his battle with melanoma -- prepares for that same journey "across the bar," as Tennyson once famously described it. His wife, Kasey, has suffered with him through this 12-month ordeal. His labored breathing, little speech, and drifting consciousness make this torture from a human perspective. He's transforming from mortality to immortality, and from perishable to imperishable (see 1 Corinthians 15:42, 53).
Yesterday, Kasey sent an e-mail in which she affirmed:

In acceptance there is peace.
Let thy heart be still.
Let thy restless worries cease
And accept His will.
Though this test be not thy choice
It is His, therefore rejoice.

Not everyone sees or senses the hand of God during suffering. But sometimes, by His grace, He uses suffering to draw back the veil for a moment, so that we can see things eternal. He comes to us and reveals Himself amidst our pain.

Very cool and appropriate article, check it out!

http://www.christianworldviewnetwork.com/article.php/1645/Jason_Carlson

I don't know much about Richard Daley, mayor or Chicago, or the political machine that makes up that city's governing system. But I did enjoy two quotes in Joseph Epstein's opinion column in today's WSJ centered around the Daley dynasty in Chicago:

In his novel "LIfe and Fate," the Russian writer Vasily Grossman notes: "Man never understands that the cities he has built are not an integral part of Nature. If he wants to defend his culture from wolves and snowstorms, if he wants to save it from bring strangled by weeks, he must keep his broom, spade, and rifle always at hand. If he goes to sleep, if he things about somethign else for a year or two, then everything's lost. The wolves come out of the forest, the thistles spread adn everything is buried under dust and snow."

The great administrators-and Richard Daley, I believe, qualifies here-are those men and women who have no desire to be elsewhere: The best academic deans do not dream of being president of Harvard, the best husbands do not dream of sleeping with Nicole Kidman, the best mayors do not dream of going on to the Senate and up the greasy pole from there. They are anchored, happy in their work, committed to the job at hand in perpetuity.

Out of commission!

That is the best way to describe my last few weeks. A few things have kept me from posting:

1) Basketball season wrapped up for me on Feb. 12 and the last two weeks were just a whirlwind. It is still going on but my team is done. 16-0, my first undefeated team ever.

2) Lisa's work schedule. Her boss and manager had a child at the end of January and Lisa has been picking up her hours to keep the store running. She has been working full and even overtime the past few weeks, and most shifts are 2-10pm, so we got days without seeing each other. It's taken it's toll on both of us, only four more weeks left!

3) The flu. I got the real deal starting last Saturday, influenza, and it took me right out of commission for the past week. I went to work for half a day on Monday, had to take Tuesday and Wednesday off, and then slugged through the day on Thursday and Friday. Today is the first day I feel half-way decent. WOW!

Look forward to getting back into things soon!