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Dr. David Powlison — author of the "Sane Faith" series on Boundless (part 1, part 2 and part 3) — appreciates the comments you've written on a blog post I wrote yesterday. This morning he sent me an e-mail responding to some of them.
Among other things, he writes that "faith actually changes how you perceive [someone] and respond to [them]." Later he adds, "How you're relating to God and how you're relating to [others] are not controlled by your body, but by your heart."
I find his clarifications helpful as I wrestle with the principles laid out in "Sane Faith."
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I so appreciate the honesty of blog responders. Life is not easy street, but a hard road. Contrary to the glib self-confidence and easy answers that define our culture's style, the Bible respects that our lives are fundamentally fragile, vulnerable to coming unglued. The psalms are the voice of honest strugglers, which is why Psalm 23 (and the anti-psalm) play such a key role in the lead article I wrote.
I want to make sure that the purpose of those articles is not lost. Ted Slater's blog comments are right in saying that these articles are not about medications at all. They are about affirming our humanness. They seek to shine a light on our common bond in the human struggles. We're all in this together, and God comes to take us in hand. I'd hate to have the main point obscured by the discussion getting swallowed up in the medication issue. That is an important issue in its own right. Here are some thoughts to put in the mix in thinking about medications. But I hope that readers will also go back and ponder my original articles further.
About 10 years ago I watched a PBS special on the state of psychiatry in America. The head of the National Institutes for Mental Health (NIMH) was interviewed. He can fairly be called America's "top psychiatrist." He sits at the top of the pyramid that funds medication research, sets standards for care, and so forth. He knows his field. His comments were insightful and fascinating.
He said that society has given psychiatrists an impossible job. They are charged with trying to help people solve all their woes and struggles. Then he said that psychiatric medications can sometimes take the edge off symptoms, but they can't give people what they really need. People need meaning and relationships. Psychiatry can't give that. Medication can't give that.
You might want to reread that last paragraph. It contains a philosophy of medication that is sane and realistic, as well as knowledgeable. It's so different from what our culture tells us.
This psychiatrist was also seeing something about people that I believe can only be truly addressed by Christian faith. People need to find personal meaning and meaningful relationships. My articles are about what people really need.
I fully agree with the head of NIMH that medications can "sometimes take the edge off symptoms." He credits medication with possibly doing some modest good, not all the time, but sometimes. Modest good does not mean no good, or all bad, or useless. Nor does it mean the best good. People most need meaning and relationships. And "sometimes" does not mean always, or without the possibility of negative side effects. It means what it says, sometimes.
Most people who've tried medications would say that their experience mirrors what the head of the NIMH said. He knows the literature. He knows people. He knows that people might be helped a bit, but that they need more help and deeper help. In my 30 years of counseling, I've seen the same thing countless times. I've also seen that when people find more help and deeper help they often drop the meds and don't go back. They don't need the symptomatic relief, because they've found more significant change. (That's not always, but in my counseling experience it's more often than not.)
More help and deeper help is what my articles are about.
Here's an analogy you might find helpful. Let's say you go to visit your mother for lunch. The relationship can be a bit strained. She can be "difficult." When you are with her, and things take a wrong turn, you get tense. You feel a bit edgy, anxious, and irritable. You can get sarcastic. Later you might vent to your friends, "She's impossible!"
Let's say you've also learned that your relationship with God makes a huge difference. You love this promise and response: He himself has said, "I will never leave you or forsake you." So we can confidently say, "The Lord is my helper. I will not fear. What can man do to me?" (Hebrews 13:5-6)
When you remember that, live it, take it to heart, you're calmer. You don't take your mom so personally. You're more constructive. You're able to forgive her. You pray for her rather than vent negative gossip. You're able to get on with the rest of your day in a positive frame of mind. You say to your friends, "I've got to say, it's hard to relate to my mom. But I'm very thankful to God for helping me not to return evil for evil." That passage of Scripture speaks sweet promises to you, in God's own voice: He himself says it! It also portrays how your faith comes to life: I can confidently say. Your thinking changes. What you say changes. How you feel changes. It doesn't mean your mom changes. But your faith actually changes how you perceive her and respond to her.
Now here's where our little analogy get interesting. Let's also say that when you drink three cups of coffee on an empty stomach and don't eat a good breakfast, you go into your day feeling tense. You get a bit edgy, anxious, and irritable. (Sound familiar?) Eating a good breakfast and laying off the caffeine makes you feel better. Similarly you find that healthy exercise and a good nights sleep also make you feel better, less prone to that tense frame of mind.
Here's the million dollar question. Will eating a healthy breakfast, taking a brisk walk and being well rested make your relationship with your mother tension-free and happy?
No, it won't. It might help you go into that lunch visit a bit less keyed up. It might help you not cancel because you can't face her. Maybe you won't be quite so reactive. But your relationship with your mother is a matter of "meaning and relationships." How you're relating to God and how you're relating to her are not controlled by your body, but by your heart.
Jesus puts all this in His usual pithy way. "Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God." Bread means bodily sustenance: breakfast, exercise, sleep. But bread alone can't bring energy and light, hope and love, to the meaning of your life and to your relationships. Whenever we make the connection, life makes much more sense. It's a connection to make every day, like eating a healthy breakfast.
The same sort of thing is true with medications. When they help, they tweak your body to feel and function better. But they can't touch your need for the things that Hebrew 13:5-6 touches. Perhaps this paraphrase catches the right sense of proportion: "Man does not live by meds alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God."
Our society attaches such inordinate hopes to medication. Pharmaceutical advertising makes such grandiose promises (not just about psychoactive drugs, but about many classes of meds). We want to say, things that help your body are good: healthy diet, exercise, and sleep, always; medications, sometimes. But they aren't the best. See these things for what they are and aren't, and you'll keep your life struggles in proper perspective.
The human touch that the articles seek to elicit and portray is always the most important. Those articles are about the YOU on the inside of who you are. They are about the YOU in your relationships.
I'd encourage readers to go back and read the lead articles again. As Ted Slater mentioned, Boundless and I have been working on this project for a year. In a culture of online information, people are not used to reading something more than once. But anything worth thinking about carefully is worth reading a second time. Print it out. Take it slowly. Underline. Write in the margins. Ponder what it means. Take it to heart.
I'd describe medication questions as a riff off from those articles — an important question in its own right, but a sidelight, even a distraction. You've probably seen how easily that happens in blogs. A riff carries the discussion far afield from the original topic.
I hope that what really sticks in your mind is Psalm 23. Verse 4 brings a true perspective on all our woes, including a body that gets out of sync and mothers who can sometimes be difficult.
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P.S. Here are some further thoughts, and something for further study for those so minded. Joseph Glenmullen, a research psychiatrist at Harvard, summarized hundreds of studies on the effects of psychiatric medications for anxiety and depression (Prozac Backlash, Simon & Schuster, 2000). He takes a balanced view, similar to the director of NIMH. He simply gives the research data. Research shows that most of the positive effect comes from placebo effect, not psychoactive ingredients. Perhaps two-thirds of those who take medications feel better because they expect the medication to make them feel better. In other words, even with a pill, the issue of one's faith plays a significant part.
How can you know whether you're getting a psychoactive bump in mood or a placebo bump? You can't. That's part of why paying primary attention to meaning and relationships puts medications in their proper place as second-tier items. A person getting a placebo bump will continue to feel better when off medications because the meaning and relationships in his or her life improve.
Glenmullen also gives details on the negative side effects that frequently arise and the frequency of drug ineffectiveness. People in these categories need not despair. Fruitful dealing with meaning and relationship issues always makes a difference in a person's life, even if they must live with lifelong tendencies towards depression and anxiety — which many wise and godly people in history have done. Even if there's no medication to make the tense-and-anxious reaction in your body go away, if the tense-and-anxious reactions in your relationships improve, then your life improves.
I went to the Colorado State Fair! I go every year. As we open this week's show, I rhapsodize about why state fairs are so fantastic. When I'm at the fair, I live on the edge: I get an airbrushed tattoo. I have my handwriting analyzed. I ride the Freak Out. I stick my hand into the "What Am I?" boxes at the Natural Resources building. I pet a goat, then eat a funnel cake without applying hand sanitizer.
That's dangerous stuff, folks. But there's something incredibly satisfying about being a suburban girl indulging in a bit of ghetto craziness. It's a concession prize for never being in 4H. It's a reprieve from dressing up every day, doing sensible work and eating protein and salads as if I actually enjoy them. At the State Fair, I can be a different Lisa. And no one judges me. Or if they do, I don't care; I just stomp off to the small animal barn and pet the bunnies.
Tommy Boy's Getting Married -- 6:16
I'm not sure if he copes by petting bunnies, but Tommy McBride knows what it's like to be judged, too. An actor in the upcoming film Fireproof, Tommy is 20 years old and engaged. He's had people tell him (many times) that he's too young to get married. Is he? He shares his story in this week's roundtable as we unpack the pros and cons of marrying young. Do the naysayers have a point, or are they just naysayers? Steve Watters shares some principles for deciding if and when it's time to tie the knot.
Fireproof Countdown -- 18:19
Kirk Cameron almost didn't make it. Scheduled to fly to Colorado Springs for interviews with The Boundless Show plus a little radio program called Focus on the Family, Kirk's plane had to make a crash landing shortly after takeoff. He escaped unscathed, and was gracious enough to join us by phone to talk about Fireproof. Also in studio for this segment is the film's creator, Alex Kendrick (remember him from Facing the Giants?), and Tommy McBride. We talk about the important themes behind Fireproof, and anticipate the impact it will have on marriages and families worldwide.
Walking in Memphis -- 40:07
When you stand in front of Graceland, many things can happen. You may start humming "Fools Rush In." You may get a craving for a peanut butter and banana sandwich. Or you may realize that all the money and fame in the world can't buy happiness, satisfaction or true significance. In this week's installment of "The Hungry Years," Steve shares more about his dad while reflecting on this theme.
Get Smart! -- 45:20
She loves him, but isn't sure he's smart enough for her. He doesn't like to read, isn't up on current events, and isn't a card-carrying member of the "I Have A Degree and Am Not Afraid to Use It" club. Is this a bona fide red flag, or is this listener shallower than the lyrics of an *NSYNC song? Maybe there's a deeper problem here? Candice does her best to get at the root of this "Brains vs. Brawn" dilemma.
Whew. All this typing has made me hungry for a foot long corn dog, cheese curds and strawberry lemonade. But I'm back in the real world, so I'll go home and grill a chicken breast and toss a salad. Bleh.
Despite Suzanne's evidence to the contrary, the children in my neighborhood are constantly outside and always riding their bikes in the streets and my driveway. I'm praying that I make it through the summer without hitting any of them.
Speaking of children, I don't have any. This, I noticed last night, does not stop me from yelling at my TV during "Supernanny." There are a lot of wild children who refuse to go to bed unless their moms sleep with them. So the moms do. There are also kids who think it is a good idea to hit their dads. So the dads let them. Some children like to decorate the walls of their house with crayons and markers. The moms don't like this but, hey, what can they do about it? This is why I had to yell at my TV.
It's amazing when the nanny comes in and makes these kids behave. Even though her disciplinary techniques are quite simple and tame, they work as long as the parents are consistent. These kids want some order and control even though they don't realize it. It is a win/win -- the parents get more sleep and fewer ulcers once their children start to behave.
Watching "Supernanny" last night reminded me of why Dr. Dobson felt the need to start Focus on the Family in the first place. He saw that American families were falling apart, and he had a good handle on what children needed. He encouraged parents to Dare to Discipline and he helped them deal with their Strong-Willed Child. These techniques are simple and effective, and I know that they've helped families for many years. I'm sure they will be useful to me when my future children start writing on the walls of my house.
While a variety of disorders may best be treated medically, a good number may be best treated in less "therapeutic" ways.
So says Dr. David Powlison, counselor and editor of the Journal of Biblical Counseling, in a series published this week on Boundless: Sane Faith (part 1, part 2 and part 3).
In his three articles, Powlison challenges a tendency to label our disorders with pseudo-scientific terms, which have the effect of releasing us from any possible responsibility for those disorders.
We say we have "obsessive-compulsive disorder" (OCD), when instead we may be stubbornly striving for the unattainable, oblivious to the Lord's mercies toward us. We say we suffer from "intermittent explosive disorder" and have an "addictive personality," when in fact we may simply be losing our temper and acting narcissistically, disregarding the Lord's call to patience and humility.
A problem with false diagnoses is that they place the blame on something or someone else, and responsibility for the cure on us. The benefit of a right diagnosis is that we come to see the root of the problem for what it is, and are able to turn to the Savior for healing.
Again, nobody is saying that there's no place for medication, or for professional counseling. There clearly is. But in some cases, perhaps many cases, we're poorly served by false diagnoses and the pseudo-scientific labels attached to them, and the consequential misguided treatments.
This series has been over a year in the making. Each word has been closely reviewed by several pairs of eyes, including our own Counseling department. These concepts have challenged me to consider my own role in my personal pathologies, and the relevance of the Savior in treating them. May they serve you similarly.
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Focus on the Family has a staff of more than 20 licensed Christian counselors available to talk with you. If you would like to talk with one of them, please call (719) 531-3400 Monday-Friday 9-4:30 (Mountain time), and ask for the Counseling department at extension 7700. One of the counselors' assistants will arrange for a counselor to call you back at no charge to you.
I was reading an interview with Rob Bell in Relevant Magazine earlier this year in which he made this statement: "We refer to ourselves [at Mars Hill] as aggressively nonpartisan."
This statement was literally a half a page removed from this one: "We are fighting a war right now for oil. American soldiers and Iraqi civilians are getting killed today because they have a resource that Americans are addicted to."
And though it's possible to be both liberal and nonpartisan, that last line could have been taken straight out of the Democratic talking points. Can't you just hear Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) say something like that right after he proclaimed "the war is lost"?
I thought of this as I read a transcript of Donald Miller's prayer to open the Democratic National Convention this past Monday. It would have been just fine had he left out some of the more partisan prayer requests for universal heath care, raising the minimum wage, government paid college tuitions, and increasing the national education budget.
Now I must say, I find affinity with many of the things these men say and do. But I think it's time to call a spade a spade. Rob Bell and Donald Miller are blue-bloods, lefties, liberals, doves, whatever you want call them. Just please don't call them "aggressively nonpartisan." I mean, you could. But please, don't ... unless you're going to afford Focus on the Family the same courtesy.
I've read many comments here lamenting Focus on the Family's supposed conspiracy with the Republican Party. I'm sure they're the same folks who praise Bell and Miller for their "holistic" approach to politics. You know, the "we shouldn't just be about the sanctity of life and marriage" approach. Which really means, "I care more about carbon footprints than unborn baby footprints."
And I'm fine that Bell and Miller are liberal. Really, I am. What irks me is their pretension of unbiasedness. I believe they use it to lead people leftward, away from more conservative views. And that, my friends, is called a political agenda.
Apparently, for Emergent types, nonpartisan simply means touting liberal beliefs to balance out all those conservative evangelicals.
Ted's recent post about a fatal car wreck brought to mind a similar experience.
My friend Andre and I were blasting down a dirt road in the Florida backwoods in his dad's brand new 1975 Delta 88, a car so big that only a few minor modifications would be needed to turn it into a combat vehicle. We were approaching 60 mph when the road suddenly took a 90-degree turn. Andre slammed on the brakes and yanked the steering wheel, but speed, gravel, and sudden turns are a recipe for disaster. We skidded sideways off the road, rolled several times down a small embankment and landed at the edge of the swamp.
As the dust settled, I saw the stump of a 3-inch pine protruding through the firewall. The rest of the tree was on the hood and the now crumpled roof. How we missed a giant live oak is still a mystery. It certainly wouldn't have snapped in two.
The car behind us came to a halt, and a panicky man ran down to see what he thought would be certain carnage. Seeing us stunned but still alive, he started to yell at me. My first thought: Why are you yelling at me? I then realized that I was now behind the steering wheel and Andre was in the passenger seat. (Seatbelts? What are they?) The man was calling me a dumb so-and-so, relieved that we weren't hurt and angry that we'd been so stupid. The doors wouldn't open, so I crawled out the now much compressed window, trying to explain that I hadn't been the driver. To this day I still have vivid, slow-motion memories of the wreck, the oh-no feeling as we flew off the curve, the tumbling around the interior as the car rolled over and over.
For some reason I wasn't killed that day. Not so much as a scratch, in fact. Same for Andre. (Not sure what happened after his dad found out he'd wrecked his pride and joy, though.) I wasn't a Christian at the time, and I'm pretty sure Andre wasn't either. Yet God spared us, even in our extreme foolishness. Why?
These questions are haunting. Why, when disaster strikes, do some people live and some die? I don't know. But I do know I need to be careful about how I talk about it.
How many times do we see people attributing their survival to God? Just last February a tornado struck Jackson, Tenn., demolishing buildings at Union University, a Southern Baptist institution. Many students attributed their survival to God's providence: God was present before, during, and in the aftermath of the events of 2.5.08. I know it's hard to think about because so much damage was caused. … With collapsing buildings, it is a shock that no one was killed. That was God and if you can't recognize it, then you need to put on some glasses and open your eyes.
A book about the storm promises that "remarkable eye-of-the-storm accounts from 20 survivors will show you both God's power in nature and his gentle hand of grace."
But people were killed from that storm system. Twenty-three, in fact. Why did God not deliver them? There's a pretty good chance that some of them were Christians, too. Did they not have enough faith? Did God's "gentle hand of grace" not extend to them?
I know a retired general who speaks of praying with his soldiers before a major operation. Even though the mission was eventually aborted in disaster, none of his soldiers was killed. He credits God and prayer. But in fact eight men in the aircrews did die -- horrible, fiery deaths as two aircraft collided during refueling. Why? Did the general's prayer not cover them? They were, after all, not in his unit. How can you credit God for "saving" everyone's life when in fact not every life was saved?
My point is that we can sound very callous and parochial when we credit God for saving us or those close to us when in the same circumstances others died. It comes across as smug and insensitive. It's not so much letting the devil take the hindmost; it’s that the hindmost don't seem to figure into our calculations. So long as we and our loved ones are safe, death and disaster elsewhere don't seem to matter.
Imagine how an unbelieving world hears this. The truth is that sometimes God spares fools and not believers. It's an enduring mystery of His sovereignty. He "causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous." He says, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." It is not dependent on us. Truly, His ways are not our ways, nor His thoughts our thoughts.
I lived an extremely foolhardy youth while still an active enemy of God, and I have survived some extremely dangerous situations since. Yet He reached down to save me, and I stand today, alive and more or less in one piece, as testament to God's mysterious sovereignty. So when disaster strikes I praise God for those spared, and with the same breath I mourn those who are lost. I don't dare to presume His reasoning in the process.
Remember the days when we rode our bikes through the neighborhood, explored the woods with our friends and set up lemonade stands unsupervised? Sadly, as Rosa Brooks explains in her in her LA Times column, unstructured childhood play "has gone the way of the dodo, the typewriter and the eight-track tape." Reader, if you're much over 30, you probably remember what it used to be like for the typical American kid. Remember how there used to be this thing called "going out to play"?
For younger readers, I'll explain this archaic concept. It worked like this: The child or children in the house -- as long as they were over age 4 or so -- went to the door, opened it, and ... went outside. They braved the neighborhood pedophile just waiting to pounce, the rusty nails just waiting to be stepped on, the trees just waiting to be fallen out of, and they "played."
"Play," incidentally, is a mysterious activity children engage in when not compelled to spend every hour under adult supervision, taking soccer or piano lessons or practicing vocabulary words with computerized flashcards.
Brooks goes on to lament that between 1981 to 1997, children 8 and under lost from 228 to 501 minutes of unstructured playtime (this from University of Michigan time-use studies). She writes: Increasingly, American children are in a lose-lose situation. They're forced, prematurely, to do all the un-fun kinds of things adults do (Be over-scheduled! Have no downtime! Study! Work!). But they don't get any of the privileges of adult life: autonomy, the ability to make their own choices, use their own judgment, maybe even get interestingly lost now and then.
I remember seeing a commercial for a stationary bike for kids that you could hook up to a TV for a simulated outdoor riding experience. Despite the coolness of the technology, the fact that we need something like that made me sad. I find it frustrating that my kids won't get to roam freely outdoors like I did. Parents must find alternative ways to let their children play. It may require that Moms and Dads accompany their children outdoors. Come to think of it, that wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.
HT: Tim Challies
Let's just start by saying I meant to pay it on time. I really did.
But, I had to return a couple of things -- so I didn't want to pay the full balance and then end up with credit on the account. You see, they'd offered me 30 percent off my purchases just for using their store credit card. So I bought first and asked questioned and tried on later. Then I needed to return something else -- so I delayed paying the bill a little longer.
Then it was the first day of school. And then Ted gave me a deadline (yeah, okay, technically I had had the deadline for two months). And it wasn't in my routine of bill paying, since I don't normally use store credit cards. So, the bill did not get paid.
Then, last night it hit me in all its fierce fury: it was the last day to pay the credit card bill. Frantically, I got on the web site to pay the bill. They wanted my bank account number. Um, no. Not gonna happen. So, I turned off the computer with an increasingly nauseous feeling in my stomach. Yep, I was gonna pay interest. Me, who rails against credit card debt. Me, who writes to encourage good stewardship. I felt like a total sap.
That's why at 8:05 a.m. this morning, if you happened to be sitting in the parking lot of my local department store, you saw a wild-eyed blond screeching into the parking lot, hustling out of her SUV and half carrying/half dragging her poor, dazed, four-year-old straight to the credit counter. There, I paid the bill in full and inquired carefully how much the interest charge was going to be.
"I'm not sure," the very helpful lady told me. "But you will have a $25 late fee automatically."
I'm sure the blood must have quite literally drained from my face because she gave me a concerned look. Yeah, there goes my savings from using the card at all.
"You know," she offered sweetly, "you can call the credit department from that phone over there. They can let you know."
A few short minutes later, I was heaping phone praise on my customer service helper lady for wiping out my $25 and the interest which they had back charged on my entire bill.
Yeesh. Never again, I swore.
It's getting practically epidemic, though. It seems almost every store I go to wants me to sign up for a credit card and promises me savings if I will. And, I have to say, it worked on me this time. It's just plain hard to turn down 30 percent off. All I have to do is sign up for your silly credit card? Okay, fine.
We think we'll pay it on time. Some of us do. But they're counting on the fact that we won't. After all, why would they offer us such an incentive if they didn't plan on making even more money off of us than we are saving off of them? According to an article over at Dave Ramsey's web site, 60 percent of us don't pay off our credit cards each month. Another article I read stated that a major chain store just made more than 15 percent of its annual profit off its credit cards alone.
And here's something else: Even when we pay off our credit cards each month, two separate studies have shown that we actually spend more using credit than cash. One of the studies showed that we spend 12-18 percent more on a purchase with credit than with cash. Another (cited by Randy Alcorn in his book Money, Possessions and Eternity) "calculated that a consumer using a credit card will buy 26 percent more than he would if he were carrying cash, even if he pays it all off without interest charges."
So, I'm saving 30 percent to spend 26 percent more? And then they're counting on the fact that I'll have returns or the first day of school or deadlines or life, and that they'll be getting some interest and late fees too?
Tricky. Suddenly, my "savings" aren't looking so smart.
"Who has had the greatest impact on your spiritual life?"
When Drew Dyck asked this question at a retreat, the answers surprised him: I expected to hear about best-selling authors and big-time preachers. Instead, most members of our team cited virtual unknowns: youth pastors and teachers, parents and siblings. We have a bookish team, which includes editors and authors, so thinkers such as Henri Nouwen and G.K. Chesterton were also mentioned. But for the most part, my colleagues talked about ordinary people that influenced them during critical phases of their lives: a youth leader who took a special interest in a student, a college roommate whose habit of Bible-reading made a lasting impression, a father who challenged his son to be serious about his faith.
Dyck cites as his greatest influence his father, "whose humility and example did the most to smooth the path of my spiritual journey." I can name many godly influences, including my parents, my choir director and a worship leader at the summer camp I attended during high school. Dyck explains a misconception he has had about ministry: I have to admit that, for me, the word "ministry" still conjures up images of what happens on a church platform. I picture preachers delivering sermons or worship leaders ushering congregants into the presence of God. Sure, I know that one-on-one ministry is essential, but often it’s easy to think that the most visible efforts made by the professionals are the ones that matter most.
And yet when he asked his colleagues the question, it was the "ordinary" people who had made the greatest impact. A big name or big ministry had nothing to do with it. So what about you? Who has impacted your spiritual life the most? Why?
Suddenly, I wake up. It's after midnight. I'm conscious enough to remember that my family and I are visiting friends in a nearby town, and I'm sleeping in a bedroom with my brother. He's unsettled. Sitting up, he whispers urgently, "Did you hear that?"
Tired and disoriented, I grumble and curl down into my sleeping bag. He gets up to leave and, not wanting to miss anything important, I reluctantly decide to join him. We go down the narrow staircase into the open air.
A cool night mist drizzles over the yard; the air tastes musty, sour. Glowing flares shimmer off the wet road like hazy moonlight reflections over a lake. I see the tread marks on the road, smell the burnt rubber, and walk past the flares to where a handful of people are huddled around the car as if at a grave site ceremony.
The Mustang is tangled around a tree, its left side heaved deep into wet bark. Cheerless spots of dew sparkle from weeds and tiny chunks of glass. A student from the local university (I later learn) hangs awkwardly from an open door, his friend resting his head on his shoulder, his blood soaking through his hair, smearing down into his shirt and onto his chest and belly.
Pieces of his brain and skull are tossed onto his friend's lap. Beer cans are scattered in the back seat.
I look up into the restless shadows. Perhaps the spirits of these two fragile men are swimming around up there in the branches, watching voicelessly. I wonder if perhaps they see me looking up into the leaves, up toward the wide night clouds.
I leave when the ambulance comes.
While I sleep, a cleansing rain drenches the ground near the tree. The men's blood soaks into the turf, being drawn into the tree by woody tentacles. Minutes, hours pass as the blood and water work their way back into the earth.
While I sleep big trucks haul away the wreck, leaving behind scattered splinters of bluish glass. A wide patch on the tree's trunk shows where soggy bark had been slammed off in sheets.
Night recedes into early-hour gray.
In the morning, my brother and I walk to the crash site. A fleshy pink blob glistens in the dewy grass. Later in the day one of the men's friends will have covered it, gently, respectfully, with soil.
The early morning drizzle continues. The water turns from red to pink to clear.
I was off to church the other night for a meeting when I said to my wife, "I'll probably go out with the guys afterward." She responded, "Great. Have fun." Though it meant her having to feed the kids and put them to bed by herself, she recognized that I needed some guy time.
So why do guys need guys? One reason is that men share things with other men that they just don't with women. It could be about work or sports or John Piper sermons or personal struggles ... especially personal struggles. I'm amazed at some of the things I've shared with my buddies. Sometimes I catch myself in the moment and think, Wait. Did I just say that?
It's true. Transparency happens when guys hang out with guys. I think it's partly because we internalize everything for fear of appearing vulnerable. And you tend to let your guard down when you're out with the guys. So the valve just sort of opens.
Interestingly, it's a release that can prove invaluable in marriage.
One night after I droned on and on to my wife about some disappointment in my life, she suggested that I call one of my buddies and go out for some wings. It surprised me a little. I mean, I thought part of a wife's job was to "be there" for her husband. It is. But I've learned that it's possible for a husband to overburden his wife with issues that could (and probably should) be discussed with another man.
It's now one of the ways I protect my wife. She carries enough burdens for the family. There are some that are better carried by myself, the Lord, and my buddies.
In the book of Judges, we find the phrase, "In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as he saw fit." I thought of that phrase while reading the latest survey from The Barna Group.
When Barna asked adults about eight behaviors "with moral overtones" that they had engaged in during the past week, they found that many have "redefined what it means to do the right thing in their own lives." Barna thought "one of the most stunning outcomes" was the moral attitudes among adults under 25: The younger generation was more than twice as likely as all other adults to engage in behaviors considered morally inappropriate by traditional standards. Their choices made even the Baby Boomers - never regarded as a paragon of traditional morality - look like moral pillars in comparison.
For instance, two-thirds of the under-25 segment (64%) had used profanity in public, compared to just one out of five Boomers (19%). The younger group - known as Mosaics - was nine times more likely than were Boomers to have engaged in sex outside of marriage (38% vs. 4%), six times more likely to have lied (37% vs. 6%), almost three times more likely to have gotten drunk (25% vs. 9%) and to have gossiped (26% vs. 10%), and twice as likely as Boomers to have observed pornography (33% vs. 16%) and to have engaged in acts of retaliation (12% vs. 5%).
George Barna, researcher and author of the study, believes we are witnessing "the development and acceptance of a new moral code in America." He goes on to say: Mosaics have had little exposure to traditional moral teaching and limited accountability for such behavior. The moral code began to disintegrate when the generation before them - the Baby Busters - pushed the limits that had been challenged by their parents - the Baby Boomers. The result is that without much fanfare or visible leadership, the U.S. has created a moral system based on convenience, feelings, and selfishness.
The consistent deterioration of the Bible as the source of moral truth has led to a nation where people have become independent judges of right and wrong, basing their choices on feelings and circumstances. It is not likely that America will return to a more traditional moral code until the nation experiences significant pain from its moral choices.
It's interesting that Barna sees the experience of "significant pain" as what would give Americans fresh eyes for a more traditional moral code. It's my sense that the primary lesson today's young adults have learned over the years in their role as "independent judges" is consequence management -- skirting or dulling the "pain" associated with immoral actions instead of simply doing the right thing out of obedience to a just God.
I finally had a chance to watch "The Dark Knight" yesterday afternoon, catching it at the local IMAX theater.
I didn't like it.
What was there to like? Did I "like" when the Joker tortured his victims, catching their terror on his shaky handheld videocamera? Did I "like" when the hospital blew up, or when the police station blew up, or when the other buildings that blew up blew up? Did I "like" when loved ones were murdered, or when loved ones were threatened with death? Did I enjoy watching the Joker so casually knife someone or shoot someone or manipulate the mentally handicapped or giggle at the corruption of others?"
No, I didn't enjoy this film.
My reaction as I walked out of the theater? I nearly wept. My heart was heavy, and to tell you the truth, I'm still not sure exactly why. I think it had to do with the pain, the hopelessness, the darkness, the chaos, the brokenness -- the evil that humans are capable of. That humans are capable of portraying, perhaps.
I don't know if this movie was good for me. (And, after all, isn't that the only reason to watch a movie?) On one hand it may be a difficult but helpful film for me, one that provokes me to think deeply about the twisted fringes of humanity and our Lord's response to it. About chaos and meaninglessness ... and about the bright purity of our Lord's order and the way He brings meaning to life.
Or it may simply provide a pleasurable opportunity to rub shoulders with evil from the safety of a comfy chair, to see how close I'm able to flirt with darkness without darkening my soul, to enable me to engage in a type of voyeurism that's not going to raise the suspicions of my neighbors.
Was this movie good medicine, horrible tasting yet good for the soul? Or was it a poison pill? Honestly, at this point I don't know.
I do think it's worth the effort to evaluate why this film moved me so much, and why I'm drawn to this and other psychological thrillers.
In his recent article "A Knight Too Dark?" Matt Kaufman concludes, "We can glimpse into the darkness from time to time, but we look too long at our peril. We need to spend most of our time looking into, and living, in the light."
How long is "too long"? Hm. Not sure. For me, "too long" might be one viewing.
Or not.
For any of you contemplating heading back to the gym this fall, you may want to consider the benefits of running. According to a study from the Stanford University School of Medicine, regular running slows the effects of aging. The study followed 500 older runners as they pounded the pavement for 20 years (not continuously). According to the report: Elderly runners have fewer disabilities, a longer span of active life and are half as likely as aging nonrunners to die early deaths.
Methods for gathering the information were pretty straightforward: Fries' team began tracking 538 runners over age 50, comparing them to a similar group of nonrunners. The subjects, now in their 70s and 80s, have answered yearly questionnaires about their ability to perform everyday activities such as walking, dressing and grooming, getting out of a chair and gripping objects. The researchers have used national death records to learn which participants died, and why. Nineteen years into the study, 34 percent of the nonrunners had died, compared to only 15 percent of the runners.
The effect of running on delaying death has also been more dramatic than the scientists expected. Not surprisingly, running has slowed cardiovascular deaths. However, it has also been associated with fewer early deaths from cancer, neurological disease, infections and other causes.
The greatest benefit to runners, the study found, was the ability to continue performing daily tasks later into their lives. The runners enjoy a higher quality of life for longer. Paul did say: "For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come" (1 Tim. 4:8).
I told you a little about my personal journey into running. I have enjoyed greater discipline, better health and increased self-esteem since I added training into my life. Whether running is your thing or you want to try out one of those crazy sports you just saw in the Olympics, exercise can make life better—and possibly longer.
The Boundless folks finally got my references back, and apparently have been sufficiently convinced that I am, in fact, a Christian. As a result, they're going to let me write the podcast post most weeks. What's more, they even included my bio and photo among the Boundless Line elite, so you can now read my whole life story in a paragraph. You will be blessed.
To celebrate, I sent some of you about 392 copies of Boundless flair on Facebook this week. Sorry about that. Something went awry, my system shut down, and several of you wrote to me saying, "Um, thanks for the outrageous amount of duplicate flair." Again, my apologies, but please find and post the flair on your boards and forward to friends. Please do this without a spirit of bitterness. And please send M&Ms to me here at Focus as a thank-you.
As we chatterboxes kick off this week's show, we wish those in college a "Happy Back to School." We reminisce a bit about our undergrad and graduate years: the stops and starts, laughter and tears -- and the Sponge Man.
The Art of Flirting -- 9:22
Eye contact, hair tossing, "sidewinder" hugs ... file all of these under "flirty behaviors." Join the Boundless team plus Schelau and Mark, two flirty singletons, as we unpack what's hot and what's not when it comes to flirting. Is flirting appropriate for Christian singles? Can you flirt with more than one person at once? Can you flirt while wearing a WWJD bracelet? We'll ask the questions and offer some helpful answers. Except Ted, who apparently started flirting with his wife by looking at her bookshelf. But she married him, so what can I say?
Social Justice -- 29:58
This week, Focus Sr. Vice President Tom Minnery is in the studio to unpack the topic of social justice. Tom, author of Why You Can't Stay Silent, takes on government assistance, tax hikes and the responsibility of the Church while offering a strong case for the continued fight for the unborn and the sanctity of marriage. As the Democratic National Convention kicks off in Denver, check out this segment for some issues-related insight. Tom will teach you a new Greek word in the process. Bonus!
The Heart of Rock and Roll -- 43:33
Steve's dad met Elvis. Yes he did. He was also a musician himself. But aside from the coolness (and you'll see this coolness in a couple samples of his music this week), he learned what it's like to use his gifts in some unexpected ways. So if you can roll your tongue, lick your elbow, walk on stilts or impersonate J-Lo, listen up: there may be a ministry waiting for you.
Relationship Rewind -- 50:14
Bruce and his wife are trying to mentor some dating couples in their church, but feel these couples have put the cart before the horse. Or maybe they can't even see the cart anymore. These couples are excluding others, getting physical, becoming emotionally involved and/or dependent on one another ... all without tackling some of the foundational issues necessary to ensure a solid relationship. What is Bruce to do? How can he and his wife get these couples to take a step (or eight) back in order to get some clarity in their relationships? Motte Brown draws from his own experience to offer guidance to those involved.
As for me, I'm off to practice my flirting skills (insert hair toss and eyelash flutter here).
I have been praying in recent months, "Lord, teach me to number my days, that I might have a heart of wisdom." During that time, I collapsed twice, once in public, turning mustard-colored and clocking a pulse of 34 beats per minute.
These words come from World on the Web writer Andrée Seu (also the author of Boundless' "On Writing.") Seu believes God has answered her prayer through ventricular trachycardia, a serious heart condition. Not exactly the "answer to prayer" most of us are hoping for. Seu writes: I believe there is a problem with our praying, which God drolly illustrates in the incident in which Mark's house church prays for Peter's release from prison and then doesn't believe he is at the door knocking (Acts 12).
Charles Finney tells of the days before his conversion: "On one occasion, when I was in one of the prayer meetings, some of the attendees asked if I wanted them to pray for me. I told them no, because I did not see that God answered their prayers." Ouch.
"On further reading of my Bible, it struck me that their prayers were not answered because they did not comply with the conditions upon which God had promised to answer prayer. They did not pray in faith, in the sense of expecting God to give them the thing for which they asked."
Seu provides the biblical contrast: Elijah on Mt. Carmel bowed in strenuous prayer for God to send rain, and kept sending his servant to check the sky at intervals for signs of clouds. This is the kind of "watchful" (Colossians 4:2) prayer God wants.
When I send out an important e-mail, I check my inbox a bazillion times looking for the answer. But how often do I have that same expectation when I petition my Heavenly Father? Many times I'm like the Christians who prayed for Peter's release. I hardly expect anything to happen. And when it does, I'm surprised. Sometimes I may not even recognize the answer. How greatly my faith would be increased if I began searching the sky for those clouds.
Do you have a hard time imagining your parents as young adults? When you think about your life and the kinds of highs and lows you encounter, is it difficult to imagine a day when your parents when in your shoes?
I remember one day when my grandpa was turning 70 him telling me that he still felt like a 17 year old inside. I'm starting to understand what he meant. Even as I take on more and more adult responsibilities, I still often feel like a kid inside and wonder if the "big people" can see right through my facade of maturity.
But it's amazing that I've gone through much of my life seeing my parents as altogether different. It's like I thought of them as born mature and instant adults -- even though they had to be young once.
This week on The Boundless Show, I tell the story of my dad recording at Sun Studio and then meeting Elvis at the age of 24. Hearing that story growing up I thought of this hyper-mature guy who knew his next chapter was going to be serving as a pastor and being a family man. But, even though he was pretty mature for his age, he was just this young guy trying to live a big life, pursue his dreams and make something of himself.
Yesterday, my dad would have been 61 if he hadn't died in 2003. I still enjoy hearing his old rock music (some of which appears in the podcast today) because it gives me a snapshot of his young adult years. But it also helps to see the full span of his life and to recognize just how pivotal the decisions dad was making in his twenties turned out to be.
Hope you enjoy the show this week.
"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things."
You may recognize that challenge from Philippians 4:8, something I've wrestled with ever since I first read it decades ago. How is that even possible this side of Heaven? How do I engage my culture, for example -- which is often polluted by lies, dishonor, injustice, impurity, ugliness and the like -- when Scripture seems to encourage a disengagement from such things?
Specifically, how do I engage with cultural artifacts such as movies, when so often they're tainted by perversity and vulgarity? And even more specifically, in light of this verse, what are the moral issues involved in watching -- or even deciding whether or not to watch -- the latest and darkest Batman flick, The Dark Knight?
Join Boundless author Matt Kaufman as he wrestles with this problem in today's featured article, "A Knight Too Dark?"
A few days ago, members of Vision Beyond Borders stayed at an airport in Kunming, China for 26 hours waiting to see if their 300 confiscated Bibles would be returned. They were not.
World Magazine reports on the incident: "We're very disappointed, for a country saying they're opening up and things are getting better, it sure doesn't seem like it," a representative of the group, Pat Klein, told the AP by telephone. The Sheridan, Wyoming-based group distributes Bibles and Christian teaching materials around the world.
The Bibles were printed in Chinese, he said, and were intended for Chinese Christians.
"The Chinese Christians have been asking us for Bibles, saying they are desperate for Bibles," he said.
Chinese officials said foreigners need permission ahead of time from religious affairs office if they're bringing in more than one religious book. But Chinese officials say a lot of things.
This sort of thing isn't shocking for China. So my mind went elsewhere. Like what sorts of things Christians here in America are desperate for, what I'm desperate for. Certainly not Bibles.
I have three of them I regularly use: a daily reading Bible, a travel Bible, and a Bible at work. My wife has two, a black leather ESV Reference Bible and a pretty green one I bought for her at the Focus on the Family bookstore. Our nine year old daughter has two and a half Bibles (one is a little New Testament signed by a late U.S. Senator from South Carolina). In addition to these, I'd say we have about six or seven more just laying around the house. That's more than a dozen.
As you can see, I'm not desperate for Bibles. What I am desperate for is silence. Because here in the land of the free, silence has a lot of competition. And the competition usually wins with me.
So I'm not battling some oppressive government trying to molest my quiet. I'm really battling myself. I'm just not sure which is easier to overcome, a dark regime or a dark heart.
I do know that the gospel is able to overcome both.
In today's Boundless article "Seeing God," David Barshinger provides a great overview of sanctification. If that word tempts you to tune out, hang with me for a minute. In the article, Barshinger makes a strong case for the connection between striving for holiness and "seeing God." To begin, he considers what this holiness looks like: Much of what defines holiness in the Christian life is quite plain from Scripture. A person controlled by the Holy Spirit should not be getting drunk on Friday nights, should not be having sex with her boyfriend, should not be lying about his hours worked on a timesheet, should not be bursting out in furious tirades — and the list goes on.
Yet a great deal of the Christian life is not as clear-cut as we might wish. Scripture spells out many moral questions and gives wise principles for living ethically, but it doesn't give five-step plans for solving every issue we face, and it even recognizes that, because of personal conscience, certain activities are acceptable for some Christians but not others (1 Corinthians 8). Talk about complex!
Here's the thing. Even the "non-negotiables" Barshinger lists in his first paragraph seem to be up for debate among Christians my age. A "do whatever you want under grace" reaction to legalism has cropped up. This makes the gray areas even murkier. Even the simplistic "What Would Jesus Do?" falls short as a recipe for pleasing God: The WWJD question doesn't take into consideration how different Jesus was from us; He had divine authority and ability to do things we can't or shouldn't do, which clouds the simplistic WWJD question even further. Instead, we need to ask the Father what we should do, cultivate the wisdom of Christ, and follow the Holy Spirit's guidance.
I think in our desire to part with legalism, we've become numb to holiness. We don't always care enough to weed the bad — or that which does not sanctify — out of our lives. It takes discipline and sacrifice for sure. But the rewards are great as our consciences and hearts are made tender to the purposes of God. Barshinger gives this advice for balancing holiness and grace: Instead of creating our own qualification lists for who's in and who's not, we need greater humility. We need to resist passing judgment too quickly, listening to the concerns others raise about particular activities, but also praying for wisdom to honor Christ in our decisions. Our aim is neither legalistic nor licentious living.
The importance of sanctification (there's that word again) is clear. Hebrews 12:14 says: "Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord." My desire is that my generation would be one that sees God clearly.
Our very own Candice Watters was featured in a CitizenLink article about how fewer women are having children. A lot fewer. According to new U.S. Census data, one on five women in their early 40s are childless. Just 30 years ago, it was one in 10.
Why is this happening? Candice explains, "There is the perception, perpetuated in large part by Hollywood, that you can wait until your late 30s or even your early 40s and have a baby without too much trouble," she said. But "it's really difficult for a woman over 40 to conceive."
And the culture isn't helping, Watters said.
"Women feel cultural pressure to get all of their schooling done, and much of their career-building done, before they even start to think about marriage," she said. "My advice is to make getting married and having babies at least as much of a priority as your education goals and career goals."
Candice unpacks this advice in her book Get Married: What Women Can Do to Help it Happen, which I encourage all of you to read. And once you've gotten married (or even before), you should buy her follow-up book co-written by Steve Watters, Start Your Family: Inspiration for Having Babies.
Hmm. Get Married. Start Your Family. I wonder what their next book will be titled. Any guesses?
Volleyball, boxing, gymnastics, diving, swimming, softball, wrestling, ping pong, trampoline, artistic dance.
Yawn.
The most comprehensive sporting event of the Olympics, the one that tests skills inherent in a Napoleonic warrior courier, the one that requires half a day to complete, is taking place within a few hours: The Modern Pentathlon.
The fact that I'm friends with the U.S. Modern Pentathlete most likely to win a medal, Eli Bremer, and that I maintain his Web site, affects my opinion not in the least, of course. The fact that he spent some time with us on a recent episode of The Boundless Show podcast, similarly, does not influence my passion for this "sport of sports."
Beginning at 8:30 p.m. EST (5 p.m. PST) I'll be watching as much of the competition as I can, and TiVo-ing or catching online what I can't see live. If you have any interest in athletics, I urge you to do the same.
And, on a serious note, if you'd pray that the Lord work through Eli for His glory, both he and I would appreciate it.
It's time to rethink college debt, says Laura Rowley, financial journalist and author, over at Yahoo Finance.
Rowley says: "It's time to banish the notion that all student loans are "good" debt." "... the changing nature of the private student loan industry -- which in recent years doled out dollars with the enthusiasm of subprime mortgage lenders -- makes it critical for students to assess the risk, and borrow with a realistic idea of future earnings potential. In fact, these loans are worse than subprime mortgages, because they can haunt the borrower for life."
I say: Preach it, sister! For decades now, financial aid counselors (and just about everyone else) have promised us that student loans are "good" debt -- that they are an "investment." But not all student loans are equal and, when it comes down to it, they are all one thing: unsecured debt. You can sell your house to pay off a mortgage. You can't sell your brain to pay off college loans. All you can do is work. "Ah, but Heather," some say. "My student loans are debt now so that I can earn more over my lifetime." And on to point #2.
Rowley says: "These products unquestionably offer the opportunity to boost one's career--college grads make 60 percent more than those with only a high school diploma." But, she also points out the work of Boston University economist Laurence Kotlikoff who "demonstrates that over a lifetime of earnings, a plumber actually ends up with a higher standard of living than a doctor, in part because of the debt used to finance the physician's education."
I say: That's the point. While a college degree may offer you a higher earning potential, it also may not. (The bricklayer that works with my dad makes more than I did as a teacher with a master's degree and the welders that work with my hubbie make more than I ever did as an editor.) We simply have to be extraordinarily careful. We have to weigh what we may be gaining with the risk that we're taking.
Rowley has two suggestions:
- Don't borrow more than your expected starting salary for all four years of your education. That should allow you to pay off the loan in 10 years. More than that and you're probably looking at extended repayment time. Borrow more than twice your expected salary and you're at "very high risk of default."
- Go, State! "Give serious consideration to financial offers from a state school, especially if you plan to attend graduate school," Rowley writes.
I have a couple more:
- Caveat to Rowley's #1: Remember that suggestion for borrowing up to your starting salary assumes that you will be working full-time to pay off that loan for the next 10 years. If you plan to stay-at-home to raise kids or have your wife stay-at-home, you need to radically reduce that number.
- Just Don't Do It: According to the article, over half of all students polled in 2004 said they would have borrowed less if they had to do it again -- up from 31 percent in 1991. If there is anything you can do (e.g. live at home, work part-time, go to community college the first year, give up the car) to keep from taking out loans, do it! You will start your working life without the stress of financial obligations. You will have many more choices.
Here's the thing. I liked college. I think my education has benefited me in many ways, including financially. If I had to do it over, I'd go again. I took out a small loan to go to college. I know how long it took to pay back even the small amount. I wouldn't do that again.
If you're deciding whether to borrow for a bachelors or graduate degree, consider carefully.
And for those of us already living the student loan nightmare? Maybe I'll blog on that sometime.
I was a little startled this morning when I checked Facebook, and it reported that my mom just got married. Of course, she's been married for 33 years. But she's new to Facebook.
I've noticed a growing number of my friends' parents on Facebook recently. I even saw an article in Parade the other day called "Facebook 101." It encouraged parents of teens to join the popular social networking site as a way to bond. I don't mind the parental set joining us in Facebook-land. Then again, I'm not a teen.
An article published a year ago in The New York Times, expresses the irritation some teens feel about Mom and Dad invading their online space. Mom Michelle Slatalla describes an online run-in with her daughter: Things were going really well, when suddenly something disturbing happened. An instant-message window appeared onscreen to deliver a verdict.
"wayyy creepy," it said. "why did you make one!"
Ah, there she was.
"What are you talking about?" I typed innocently.
"im only telling you for your own good," my daughter typed.
"Be my friend," I typed.
"You won't get away with this," she typed. "everyone in the whole world thinks its super creepy when adults have facebooks."
Brandee Barker, a Facebook spokeswoman, offered Slatalla this insight: "Facebook is all about being a reflection of real-world relationships," she said. "The same thing you're experiencing with your daughter online is a reflection of how you're not a part of her social network in real life."
Not all teens are nervous about their parents being online. From a recent AP article: Dylan Akers, 17, of Cambridge, Mass., invited his mom, Carolyn Bailey, to join Facebook and helped set up her page. Bailey, 46, a health and fitness counselor, says she has had more conversations on Facebook with her son"s friends than with him.
"I think everybody views my mom as a cool mom," says Dylan. "I'm pretty open with her about my life. I don't have to be too careful. Whatever I put on there, I wouldn’t mind her knowing."
It appears teens' attitudes toward their parents joining Facebook has everything to do with the relationship parents and teens share off line. I, for one, am happy to have Mom online (Now she can finally see all those photos I've posted). And, thanks to Facebook, everyone now knows she's off the market.
Usain "Lightning" Bolt's record-setting performance in the Olympic 100-meter final was a dominating victory, the likes of which hasn't been seen in an Olympic sprint event since Michael Johnson smashed the world record for 200 meters 12 years ago in Atlanta. Like millions of viewers around the world, I was awed by just how easily Jamaica's Bolt bested the rest of the field, literally coasting past the finish line in 9.69 seconds as his seemingly pedestrian competitors were left to battle amongst themselves for the leftovers -- silver and bronze.
Bolt so thoroughly dominated the race that the other sprinters seemed like an afterthought.
At just 21, Bolt's upside seems limitless. He's been running the 100 for less than a year and has just begun to tap his potential. The ease with which Bolt broke his own world record stunned NBC analyst Ato Bolden, himself a four-time Olympic sprint medalist. Trouble was, Bolden observed, Bolt might have run a 9.59 if he hadn't started celebrating prematurely.
Ordinary sprinters are taught to continue running all the way through the finish line, even to lunge forward at the last possible moment. But Bolt is clearly no ordinary sprinter. He could tell with about 20 meters to go that he was about to win, and he wasn't about to let the moment pass. He eased up on the gas, spread open his arms, and finally, right before the finish line, pounded his chest in triumph. Bolt's bravado made it feel more like the NBA playoffs than the Olympics.
Bolt then proceeded to soak up the crowd's adulation. "It took him fewer than 10 seconds to run 100 meters but at least 10 minutes to complete his victory lap," wrote Yahoo! Sports' Josh Peter. "He pulled off his gold spikes and held them aloft, wrapped himself in a Jamaican flag and clowned as if he were on stage at a karaoke bar rather than on the biggest stage of the Olympics."
I know, I know. Bolt is only 21 years old and likes to have fun. But I always thought there was something that set Olympic athletes apart from the macho-posing so commonplace in American pro sports. I typically associate this sort of grandstanding with end-zone celebrations and post-dunk glares. I certainly can't fault anyone for relishing the joy that comes with winning a gold medal, but -- like NBC's Bolden -- I can't help but wonder how fast Bolt could have run if he'd postponed the party until the race was actually over. After all, this wasn't a preliminary heat, but the once-every-four-years Olympic final.
But maybe Bolden and I are in the minority. Are we the only ones who wanted more speed and less showboating?
We'll see what happens later this week when Bolt goes for a second gold -- perhaps a second world record? -- in the 200 meters. Believe it or not, the 200 is Bolt's real specialty.
Part of me can hardly wait.
Imagine a church with no pastor. Well, at least you'll never bump into him in the hall. According to Andrew Park, writing for Slate, virtual pastors are the next big thing: Most Sunday mornings at Buckhead Church in downtown Atlanta, one person is conspicuously absent: the senior pastor, Andy Stanley. A nationally known evangelist, Stanley is usually 20 minutes away at North Point Community Church, the suburban megachurch he has led for 13 years. To the 6,000 or so faithful at Buckhead, he appears only on video, his digital image projected in front of the congregation in life-sized 3-D. The preacher is a hologram.
Some 2,000 to 2,500 U.S. congregations operate multiple campuses. The reasoning is simple. You're a talented pastor but a limited number of people can sit in your church. Broadcasting via video allows your ministry to reach thousands more people. Andy Stanley's North Point has 16 video venues, and he'd like to see 60 by 2010. Forget about megachurch; we're talking gigachurches here. Already, the most ambitious pastors are predicting that, thanks to video, they'll have branded outlets nationwide and more than 100,000 followers—twice as large as the country's biggest megachurch today. Gigachurches are the way that next-generation celebrity evangelists are building their empires.
Critics cite a couple of problems with the video explosion. In this system pastors become celebrities—eating up congregants like Pac-Man dots—and only the strong survive. Video congregations remove opportunities for young pastors and teachers to gain preaching experience and receive mentorship. And it's not just a problem for other pastors. In fact, says Shane Hipps, author of The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture: How Media Shapes Faith, the Gospel, and Church, using video goes against a critical tenet of Protestant faith: the priesthood of all believers. Instead of a real experience, it offers a mediated one that inherently puts the pastor in a position of greater power over the masses. "It's actually undermining their theology," he told me recently.
I hadn't considered the danger of a few "celebrity" pastors shepherding a country. What do you think? Is this simply a way to reach more people with the Gospel? Or does it undermine the "priesthood of all believers?" In our franchise culture, this approach to ministry doesn't really surprise me. However, it's troubling that a talented few may dominate our nation's spiritual guidance. After all, God's way is to choose the foolish things to accomplish His work.
I wrote about half-naked Olympians this week, which sparked quite a discussion on the blog. Prior to that post we had a discussion about it on The Boundless Show. So go ahead and press play here or download the show through iTunes because I know you'll want to hear what Candice, Steve, Lisa and Ted have to say too. Especially if you thought I took a hard line.
In addition to immodest sportswear, we address all the weirdness that happens when a communist country hosts the Olympics ... like disappearing pastors. It's more solemn than we usually get in our chat. But we wanted to take a moment to remember those suffering from persecution while the world's spotlight is on China.
Christians and The Office -- 9:20
Most of you probably work in a secular environment. So you've likely experienced cursing, inappropriate jokes, pressure to indulge in too much wine, flirting, and for some of you, even anti-Christian sentiments. Heck, even we have to deal with stuff like that here at Focus, especially working with Lisa. Anyway, we brought in the Christians-working-in-the-secular-environment experts for this Roundtable, Senior Vice President Clark Miller, Vice President Rich Bennett and Executive Director Debbie Rusch. All came to Focus on the Family from Fortune 500 companies and we think you'll benefit from hearing their stories.
The Scripture Singer -- 28:10
You know that question that all the kids are asking these days, "What's on your iPod?" Well, Nathan Clark George (NCG), IndieHeaven's Acoustic Artist of the Year two years running, is on my iPod. I bought a NCG cd immediately after I heard him lead worship at my church. Hearing Scripture put to music -- and put to music very well -- is just edifying, isn't it? In this week's Culture segment, NCG sits down with Lisa and tells us how he got started and answers a question that's on everybody's mind: Why are there so many worship styles in churches these days?
Marrying in College -- 42:00
Is waiting until after college to get married the best advice for all Christian couples? Steve and Candice Watters answer this one with an unequivocal (click here)!
On the heels of concerns about the integrity of the opening ceremony and the age of female gymnasts, the Washington Post today reported on a less publicized concern that Olympic athletes are facing in Beijing: The Olympic Village's religious center has become the target of a quiet protest by athletes, coaches and other delegates who say its staffing and services fall woefully short of the promises made by Chinese organizers.
Previous Olympic hosts welcomed foreign chaplains, but China has banned them from living with the athletes. It has instead pledged that it will provide equivalent services from its pool of state-employed pastors, imams and other clerics.
The Post quoted athletes who explained that spiritual support was key to their performance. The lack of sufficient support grew into a greater problem, the paper points out, when a tragedy occurred: The quality of the religious services center came into sharper focus on Saturday after the fatal attack against Todd Bachman, the father-in-law of the coach of the U.S. men's volleyball team, at a popular tourist spot in Beijing. To help athletes with their grief, the U.S. team had to scramble for official permission to get a chaplain who spoke English fluently into the village.
This problem seems like another example of the compromises the International Olympic Committee has made in order to work with a country known for restricting rights. More from the Post: Phelim Kine, a researcher for New York-based Human Rights Watch, an advocacy group, said the ban on foreign chaplains runs counter to the Olympic charter's "dedication to fundamental ethical principals and freedom of expression." He also said the International Olympic Committee shares the blame.
"This is yet another example of IOC's failure to enforce and to stand up to China's efforts to roll back basic freedoms that have been taken granted at previous Olympics," Kine said.
It's obvious we have a lot of Olympic fans here at the Boundless Line. So I thought you'd enjoy this link I found over at World Mag Blog. It's an interactive map provided by the New York Times of the Olympic medal counts from 1896 to the current games in Beijing.
Here are some observations from blogger Harrison Scott Key: It's rich to see which countries were dominant in which years. The first Olympics was a surprise. Then see the U.S. emerge as a world power in the early 20th century. See England's former glory. See Germany in 1936. See the Communist Bloc in the 1980s. Great informational delivery.
It is interesting to see how the Olympics reflect a little of what's going on in world history. I totally forgot that the U.S. boycotted the 1980 Olympics in Moscow in protest to the Soviet war in Afghanistan.
It's official. I'm suffering from Olympic-induced sleep deprivation. Coffee, anyone?
The games are addictive. I was thinking last night -- as Michael Phelps gained more than a body's length lead in his heat of the men's 800 freestyle relay -- about the tremendous appeal of the Olympic games.
Beyond witnessing super-human athletic achievement -- and exulting in the magical moments when the underdog wins the day -- there's something transcendent about a single thing that unites people from around the world. As I watched swimming and gymnastics, I thought about the people in other nations glued to their TV sets to see how their athletes would represent them. Despite our cultural differences -- some extreme -- we are the same in this way.
I once read an interesting essay about spiritual foreshadowing. The author discussed the many "Christ" stories seen in Scripture and throughout history. These "prototypes" foreshadowed the story of Jesus.
I wonder if the Olympic games resonate so deeply because they are a prototype of a great and coming day when people will unite in worship to our Savior. John saw this in a vision and described it in Revelation 7:9: After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.
If the glory of competition and athletics captures our hearts and imaginations so thoroughly, how much more should God's plan of redemption for all nations stir our very beings? Paul said: "Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face."
Our love of the Olympics is not happenstance. The games are a reflection of something much bigger than us. They foreshadow a day for which our hearts yearn. I love how our Creator's fingerprints are everywhere -- even in the Beijing Water Cube.
I really enjoy the Olympics. I love the thrill of competition, the human interest stories, the national pride ... the cheating. Well, I don't really "love" the cheating. But what would the Olympics be without a little controversy? And from a Milli Vanilli opening ceremony to their itty bitty gymnasts, China has definitely given the world a "little" controversy.
After China took the gold in women's gymnastics last night, the controversy about underage Chinese gymnasts seemed to heighten with the U.S. coach [Martha Karolyi] saying, "It could be true. One little girl has a missing tooth."
The Karolyis have been pretty open about their suspicions all along. And as Selena Roberts of SportsIllustrated.com writes, their suspicions seem to have merit. The Chinese gymnasts could have picked out their leotards from Thumbelina's closet as they performed gymnastics in miniature on Wednesday. Wearing blue eye shadow with their hair pulled back, He Kexin, Jiang Yuyuan and Yang Yilin looked like girls who had just rummaged through their mothers' makeup. This was a ladies' final, though somehow it was hard to see how they qualified as women.
Amid pre-Olympic hand-wringing over why the birthdates of He, Yang and Jiang didn't jibe with other registration materials that showed they might be as young as 14, China swore on its stars' passport stamps that the tots are the legal tumbling age of 16. But while the tiny trio helped their nation whisk the gold medal away from a suddenly clumsy U.S. group in the team competition, it was impossible to deny the visual evidence of something unjust in China.
The article goes on to contrast the body types of the Chinese gymnasts with their American counterparts while standing on the podium. Just take a peek at the big lugs who stood next to the Chinese team. The U.S. squad is filled with women who are short to be sure, but with a curve to their bodies, muscle on their bones and driver's licenses in their wallets. This is gymnastics, so truth in aging is often blurred by a brutal sport laden with underdeveloped teens. ...
I saw it too. But the American gymnasts aren't making any excuses. Alicia Sacramone, who fell while mounting the balance beam, took the blame for the Silver medal finish saying, "It was my fault." Which is the mature response you would expect of someone who's 20 years old. I'm not sure how she would have responded if she were only 14.
"What kind of idols do we have these days?" my husband, the awesome Sunday School teacher, asked our class this last Sunday.
"American," I quipped. Te-hee.
Comedy moment aside, we were studying Acts 17, which tells us that while Paul was in Athens, "his spirit was troubled within him when he saw that the city was full of idols." There aren't many statues of greek gods around my town. So what, we were trying to figure out, is an idol in our days?
Several answers came out. Work. Money. Power. Fame. The standard Sunday School stuff. But we realized that the question is a complicated one. Literally, in biblical times, an idol was something that people bowed down and worshiped. Literal idols, of course, still exist. But most of us think of idols today as something that we make more important than God.
So I was interested to see a recent blog by Brent Nelson titled "When Does Sport Become Idolatry?" Nelson asks a good question: How do we know when things become "idols" in our lives?
Here's one test Nelson recommends: "One of the ways we can identify idolatries is to ask, 'Where are the sacrifices made?'" For sport, he gives some examples of sacrifices that signal a problem: sacrificing health through drug use; sacrificing the well-being of families; sacrificing integrity; or pushing children to their limits and beyond to elicit performance.
In other words, when we are sacrificing things that the Lord has told us are good (our bodies, families, character and compassion), we're in dangerous territory. (You might enjoy listening to Olympian Eli Bremer talk about the balance in his life on our recent podcast.)
"Above all," Nelson writes, "the greatest sacrifice one can make to the idol of sport is the sacrifice of our soul."
Both, I think, are questions I can relate to my life. 1) Is there something in my life more important than God? 2) Am I sacrificing those things that God has told me to honor or do in order to have it?
I think I'd also add a third question: What does God's Word tell me about it? After all, there are certain things (e.g. power and money and fame) that the Bible warns us about pursuing. Then, there are certain things that Bible encourages us to pursue (e.g. marriage and family and service). While I suppose the second group could technically become an idol (though I have my doubts about how often that really happens), I should be much, much more concerned about the first.
Nelson ends his blog with a verse from 1 Thessalonians. "May it be said of you and me, 'you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.'" Amen!
I don't mean to be a downer but I just couldn't watch the half-naked women playing volleyball last night. I'm not torn up about it or anything. I really don't expect modest sportswear in the Olympics. The skimpiness was just a little too much, that's all. So we had to skip our nightly Olympics viewing as a family because it didn't end before our kids' bedtime.
Funny thing about kids though. They notice stuff like that without provocation. Before we turned off the TV, they made comments about them "wearing underwear" and such. It proved to be a teaching moment.
We mused for a little about why they might need to wear really, really small and really, really tight tops and bottoms. You know, for uninhibited movement for a sport that requires quickness. (Not that that necessarily would make it OK.) But then we saw the men's volleyball team with their much bigger and loose fitting tops and bottoms. So that was out.
We'll address it further in this Friday's podcast but here's a chance to get a head-start on the discussion if you're interested. Are some sports fashions really all about maximizing athletic ability? I just think they're often about style and higher ratings, particularly in the case of women's volleyball.
What do you guys think? Or am I the only one that's a little uncomfortable with all the "underwear"?
I am loving the Olympics! If I don't blog (or sleep or eat or socialize at all) much in the next two weeks it is probably because I am glued to my TV set.
For some reason, I just can't get enough of watching athletes flipping on four-inch-wide beams or smashing volleyballs in each other's faces. And, oh my goodness, who saw the men's 4x100 relay on Sunday night?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! It was the most amazing thing ever. If you haven't seen it, watch this smashing performance right now. Then come back here to share in my excitement. Unless you're French.
It's been interesting watching the human interest stories that go along with the Olympics. There is such a different mindset between America and the rest of the world. When they interview many of the athletes of eastern countries, they seem to be competing mainly for the honor of their country. It is less about them and more about bringing glory to their nation.
Most of the American stories focus on the athlete's goals. They are doing this for themselves -- oh and sometimes the USA gets mentioned, usually as an afterthought. Many of our athletes seem to be in this for their own glory -- most likely a product of the individualism that we've been fed since youth. However, the U.S. men's basketball team seems to be doing a better job of being at the Olympics to redeem our nation's reputation. After being embarrassed in Athens, they seem to be trying to refocus on bringing gold back to the U.S. and participating as a team.
Anyway, have you noticed this type of individualism in the Americans or am I just looking to criticize?
Or if you're not in the mood for all that deep stuff, just let me know which Olympic sport is your favorite to watch. I'm still looking forward to mine -- track and field!
A few summers ago, I was moving...again. It was the third time in three years, and I felt guilty asking people to help me. That's probably why I found myself pitifully low on help that Sunday afternoon. As I was in the process of melting down, my friend Deb called. Close to tears, I explained my dilemma.
Deb said, "Don't' worry. I'm at church. I'll recruit some guys."
An hour later she arrived with nine men, three pick-up trucks and a van in tow. I was overwhelmed by the show of generosity. Many of the guys I had never even met, yet they gave up their Sunday afternoon to haul my oak furniture down three flights of stairs. I felt relieved...and blessed.
That experience taught me to look more carefully for those around me who could use a boost of encouragement or a helping hand. I'll admit: Helps is not my spiritual gift. I balk at jumping in to serve every time. But that doesn't matter. Those are the moments where I have the opportunity to be Jesus to others.
In "Practice Non-Random Acts of Kindness," I wrote about the power of specific kindness: You hear a lot about random acts of kindness these days: scraping a stranger's windshield on a snowy day, paying for the order behind you at Taco Bell, leaving an anonymous note for someone.
I have been on the receiving end of such kindnesses, and they've brightened my day. But there are gifts that hold more power and impact than random good deeds. These acts of kindness tell someone that you know them. They communicate that you've noticed their needs. They demonstrate that you've made a sacrifice on their behalf.
To whom can you show kindness this summer? As Motte pointed out a few weeks ago, family vacations offer some great opportunities for practicing non-random kindness. Those summer moves, outdoor projects and church work days are also rife with opportunity. Deb's kindness saved the day, and those nine guys represented Christ's care for me in a small crisis. That's the kind of thing I want to pass on.
Tim Tebow, a junior University of Florida star quarterback, has won a lot of awards in his day. In high school, he was Florida's Mr. Football and a Parade All-American. As a collegiate, he won the ESPY award for Best Male College Athlete and, last season, became the first sophomore to ever win the coveted Heisman Trophy.
But there's one award Tebow won't get: He won't be a part of the Playboy pre-season All-American college football team.
Now, first of all, who knew that Playboy had an All-American team? Evidently, those named to the team get to pose for the magazine and also attend Playboy's "weekend ceremony." Yeah, wonder what that's like.
So, why won't Tebow be a part of the party? Well, if Tebow had refused the award, he'd still have a thumbs up in my book. But, get this. According to USA Today, Florida's Assistant Sports Information Director Zack Higbee said he chose not to nominate his quarterback for the Playboy spread based on what he knew about Tebow's spirituality.
"I've been working with Tim since his first day here and I know his priorities and his family," Higbee said. "He has that trust in me to make the decision."
That's a double thumbs up in my book. Not only does Tebow hold certain beliefs dear--the article describes his homeschool upbringing, his Christian missionary parents and how he went on mission trips to the Phillipines, Croatia and Thailand this year. But his beliefs are so clear, that those around him know exactly where he stands.
Playboy's reaction was a little laughable. According to the article, "Playboy Sports Editor Gary Cole downplayed the university's decision, however, and said that Tebow would not have made the team anyway." Uh huh. Because, you know, who would want the Heisman winner on their team?
Evidently, Tebow isn't the first to pass on Playboy. Danny Wuerffel, another past Heisman winner and Florida player, turned down the award in 1996 and Georgia Tech player Andrew Gardner turned it down this year.
Refreshing. In a world where Hugh Hefner and his three "girlfriends" are deemed worthy of a prime time television show, it's nice to see that there are still some who realize that certain awards are no honor at all.
20- and 30-somethings are in a financial mess, says a recent MSN Money article. Then it asks: Is it because we're dumb, arrogant or simply uneducated?
The article goes on to answer it's own question. Evidently, it's not the first ("the problem is not lack of smarts," it says). It may be a little of the second (we "get out of college and we have to have that handbag and iPod" but it's not our fault because "it is so easy to take on debt"). But it is a whole lot of the third (the article bemoans that only 52% of high school seniors could pass a recent national financial literacy test).
The article lists other places, too, to lay the blame for our financial woes, including:
- Our helicopter parents who coddled us
- Increasingly complicated financial products
- More financial temptations (e.g. credit cards on college campuses and easier access to student loans)
What's the article's solution? "The ray of hope is that government and business authorities are starting to take financial illiteracy seriously."
Interesting. I would wholeheartedly agree with encouraging more financial literacy education. But I wonder if in all the finger pointing, we're forgetting the most obvious target: ourselves.
It seems that we bemoan high tuition costs (often, rightly) but then act as if we have no other choice but to take out tens of thousands of dollars in loans. We like putting zero down on our houses (as opposed to the previous generation, who were required to put down 20%), but then we're offended that we might have to face the consequences: higher interest rates, higher insurance payments and more risk of foreclosure.
Even the young woman featured in the MSN article as an example of how Gen Y-ers struggle financially is described as a 28-year-old New Yorker with "a master's degree from a prestigious university, a successful career in photography, stamps in her passport from around the globe and, until recently, personal finances that were out of control" who complains that "no one had ever taught me to make a budget or balance a checkbook."
Come again? I mean, kudos that she's got her finances in order now, but ... a prestigious master's degree for a career in photography (along with $60,000 in prestigious student debt) and passport stamps from around the globe? And we're supposed to chalk her problems up to a lack of financial education?
I don't know. I know I'm stepping on toes, including mine, but I sometimes wonder if our generation doesn't just have a giant Scarlett O'Hara complex--we know what we should do, but we'll just think about that tomorrow.
Let's agree that more financial education is a good thing (although, don't even get me started on question #5 of the literacy test). But let's also agree that nothing replaces personal responsibility. If I'm an adult and I take out loans, buy on credit and spend more than I earn, I don't think it's my parents or my middle school econ teacher or the credit card company who are responsible.
I agree with Forrest Gump: "stupid is as stupid does." So I think the article missed one big thing. Sometimes, our generation is just acting dumb. And we need to stop, or we'll pay some serious consequences.
This is a tale of two U.S. Senior Open golf spectators.
I'm a golf fan. So I was thrilled when my brother-in-law called me last Saturday with free tickets to the U.S. Senior Open at the Broadmoor Resort here in Colorado Springs. The ticket even included entrance into a hospitality tent called The Bunker with free food and drink. It was a real treat.
Lisa doesn't like golf. So of course she got a free ticket too and an invitation to the Focus on the Family hospitality tent, which I didn't even know existed. But I'm sure there was a very good reason for that. *sigh*
Anyway, before the big event, Lisa drops by my desk and asks, "Did you know golf stands for Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden?" I was skeptical, understanding that Lisa is a closet feminist. So I looked it up on Snopes.com. Sure enough, my skepticism was warranted; that's not at all the origin of the word.
But that's not where the tale ends. Listen to The Boundless Show for more great stories from the Senior Tour's most prestigious event. Lisa's is particularly enjoyable, even if it is a little demeaning to the game.
The New Hire Handbook -- 6:15
Last week's Rountable was about how to land the job. This week, we'll tell you how to keep it by beginning well. It's part two of a three-part series on career advice for Christians. The talking points were taken from a blog I wrote last year titled, "Entering the Work Force Well." And though the tips may seem a bit obvious, you'd be surprised how many new hires I've worked with (some in Christian environments no less) that have forsaken every one of them.
Olympian Eli Bremer -- 17:53
You know how sometimes you become a fan of something as soon as you understand it? Well, it was like that as soon as I heard Eli Bremer talk about the origins of the Modern Pentathlon, which was modeled after "the Napoleonic courier and the skills this soldier would need to deliver his message." Cool stuff involving horseback riding, shooting, fencing, swimming and running. But that's not all Eli's about. In between his rigorous training, he leads a marriage small group at his church here in Colorado Springs.
The World is Watching -- 25:55
Do you know what it means to live outside your own self-absorption? Charlie Jarvis gives us a picture of a life worth living in part two of "Living a Dangerous Faith." Because the world is watching. The whole world is watching.
Candice and the Big Diss -- 36:02
I've been giving Candice some tough questions lately. But I know that Candice loves the tough ones; and that she is more than able to handle them. This week's questioner thinks Candice's advice is sometimes a bit idealistic for women who live in the "real world," particularly those working in a city and field where Jesus is a four letter word. How does Candice respond? Very well.
While my reasons for writing this are emphatically self-serving, the conversation may help other readers make digital camera buying decisions, and bring to the surface those of you who are photographers.
I'm considering buying a Nikon D40. I've used Boundless graphic artist Mike Heath's D70, and loved it. It's my understanding that the D40 has most of the features of the D70, but at a much lower price. It's received good reviews, but I'm interested to know your opinions before we invest the money into this camera.
So, what do you think, camera aficionados? Is this digital SLR a fine camera, or only so-so?
According to my morning paper, there hasn't been this much excitement about a date (which, of course, is 8-8-08) since, well, thirteen months ago (7-7-07). While 7-7-07 still holds the title as the king of wedding days (it was catchy and fell on a Saturday), according to the Associated Press there are still gads of couples planning to tie the knot today.
Some are even committing full force to the theme -- having eight-course dinners, eight bridesmaids and 8:08pm first dances. Thankfully, sanity prevailed and one groom-to-be drew the line at Magic 8 ball centerpieces.
One New York bride chose the date because "eight has always been our lucky number." Seems she and her fiance like to sit in seat 8 of row 8 at movie theatres with eight screens. According to the AP article, "she started planning her wedding a year and a half ago and was surprised that venues were booked."
Now, I can actually relate to wanting a certain date for your wedding. But not to the waiting a year and a half for it. My husband and I thought it would be neat to get married on his grandparents' anniversary date. Unfortunately, my church was booked, so we moved on and set a new date. Once we'd decided to commit, what was the point of waiting? And, let's be honest, to try to force purity to last another year would have been downright foolish. So our anniversary is now the week after his grandparents' anniversary. And still just as special.
According to one groom from the article, getting married today will forever help him to remember his anniversary. "8-8-08, I'll never forget," he said. Maybe. But I hope he didn't have to wait a long time for it. Because even though Hollywood likes it as a plot device (the "he forgot our anniversary" storyline is about as cliche' as they come), I haven't seen a whole lot of "forgotten anniversary" fights among my acquaintance. For one thing, we wives don't let our husbands forget.
So what do you think? When you find someone to commit the rest of your life to, will the date be important?
And, for those of us not getting married today, remember ... we still have the Olympics.
I find myself once again pausing at Ephesians 2:1-7, once again powerfully moved that the fearsome Creator of everything is "rich in mercy." And that this mercy, this "great love," this "grace in kindness" ... is expressed not in an abstract way, but is extended specifically to me. Me whose heart has enjoyed rejecting God by eagerly disobeying His clear and reasonable commands.
And so I find myself reflecting on truths I had written about on The Line a couple of years ago....
* * *During yesterday's devotions I was reminded again how much I love the "But God" verses. Consider Ephesians 2:1-7, for example: And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience -- among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ -- by grace you have been saved -- and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
I had everything against me. I was not "sick," but "dead" in my sins. I was following the "prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience." I was a slave to "the passions of my flesh." I was by nature a "child of wrath."
I was in an unfathomable predicament.
Ah, but God....
I find that as I meditate on the gap between the severity of my helpless condition and the Lord's insurmountable grace toward me, and how He so mercifully and sovereignly chose to make me "alive together with Christ," my love and appreciation for Him deepens. Other "But God" passages include Romans 5:7-8, 1 Corinthians 1:25-29 and Galatians 3:18.
May your ever-widening grasp of this "But God Gap" serve to stir your affections and expand your love for the Lord.
There has been a lot of good news out of Iraq the past few months -- al-Qaeda has been virtually destroyed, violence levels are at their lowest in four years, and the Iraqi government has solidified. And the latest is that anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is disarming his Mahdi Army.
Many times I've been tempted to write about the progress. But my sense is that nobody really cares anymore. So I thought I'd write about that instead.
Even if we do leave Iraq with irreversible victory, I'm convinced the anti-Iraq war crowd will always be about being anti-Iraq war. The "war is lost" politicians and like-minded citizens will spend their time diverting everyone's attention away from victory to the intelligence failures, war-strategy failures, and the cost of the war, both in lives and money.
Not that these issues are illegitimate. They're absolutely worth considering. But I don't think most of the "Bush Lied, People Died" opposition really want an honest discussion on the "was it worth it?" question. Because that would open up the possibility that it was worth it. And that is an untenable prospect for them.
But no matter how many see-no-good, hear-no-good, and speak-no-good Americans there are on the Iraq war, it won't change the good that can come from a stable, democratic Iraq. And the truth that we're likely a much safer nation now than before.
Consider this possibility: What if our national security has a little to do with forecasting, sort of like the price of oil. If nothing else, the Iraq war has "forecasted" to our enemies that we won't "cruise missile" our way out of committing troops when we're attacked. And our decision to stay the course when things were at their worst has "forecasted" our resolve to complete the job no matter what.
Does anyone remember what our response was to the first Trade Center bombing in 1993, the U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, and the U.S.S. Cole bombing in 2000? No? Well, that's sort of the point.
Success in Iraq won't be easily qualifiable. And the "worth it" question will be debated for years. But at the very least, the absolute minimum, it is right to claim victory when it happens, acknowledge the good, and learn from the mistakes.
In an article titled "Immodest Dress in the Church: Like Frogs in Boiling Water," Jenna Murphy expresses her concern about both the lack of modesty among Christian young women and the apparent apathy about the subject altogether.
"In recent years what with acceptable fashion standards taking a major plunge (literally) into the realm of 'anything goes', young women are left to face conscious decisions in how they dress themselves, not realizing the weight that such decisions carry," Murphy writes.
What weight do our decisions carry? Murphy's answer: power. All women need to begin recognizing, Murphy writes, "the power inherent to the human body and respecting this great gift (through dressing modestly) instead of harvesting its power for selfish reasons."
The power inherent to the human body. A good point, but let's be specific: it's the power inherent in the female body. The female form holds an influence over men that the male form simply does not hold over women.
Most women, of course, know that. But to be honest, we don't necessarily get it. After all, seeing a writhing half-naked man on the hood of a Honda Accord is going to make us less likely, not more, to buy it. I know I've watched many a beer commercial (I'm a sports gal) and thought: Are they serious? Do guys really believe that a less-than-average Joe suddenly gets the buxom blond because he drinks this brand of beer?
Then, it's all too easy to fall into mild contempt. Why in the world, a woman may ask, should I have to guard how I dress just because some man can't keep his mind out of the gutter?
To be sure, it's a Christian man's responsibility to fight lust and "keep his mind out of the gutter." But I wonder if that question isn't the mirror logic of a man who would ask: Why do I need to guard what I say simply because she reads more commitment into my words than I mean?
The fact is that a woman is attracted relationally. It makes no sense for a man to say she shouldn't be that way. She is. God designed her that way. And the fact is that men are attracted (in part, at least) visually. God designed them that way.
Of course, what God intended to be a pathway to bond us to our spouses, can also be an area of vulnerability to sin. Just as a woman can be tempted through her heart, a man can be tempted through his eyes. I remember how in the movie Clueless, the main character, Cher, tries to get a boy's attention by sending herself chocolates and flowers and then she makes an observation: "Sometimes you have to show a little skin. That reminds guys of being naked and then they think of sex."
Of course, I disagree with her statement, but she's absolutely right about the result. And, so, if I'm going to help to keep my Christian brothers from stumbling, I need to be careful how much skin and how much, ahem, form I am revealing.
In other ways, my brother will be my keeper. But in this way, I can be his. I can help him by making sure I'm one less skirmish in the battle against lust.
Honestly, summer is not quite as exciting once you are in the work force. You may take a week or two off, but the majority of those sweet summer days are spent indoors.
However, the sun stays out longer and we do get to enjoy the outdoors a bit more. Once you're worn out from biking, swimming or hiking, I recommend sitting outside with some lemonade and a good book.
I've been reading a lot more fiction lately, thanks to my new roommate and her stack of books that I've never read. She introduced me to one of my new favorites, Leif Enger's "Peace Like a River." It's well-written and quite entertaining.
I've also re-read a couple of Frank Peretti books this summer. Although his type of writing is not what I normally go for, it's been kind of fun to enjoy the suspense -- to cheer for the angels and encourage the prayer warriors to get to work.
I spent much of my spring reading through all of the Anne of Green Gables books and I also started re-reading good ole "Jane Eyre."
If fiction's not your thing, no worries. I also enjoyed these non-fiction reads:
"UnChristian" by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons (great insights into what people think of the church)
"Our Father Abraham" by Marvin R. Wilson (fascinating stuff about the Jewish roots of Christianity)
"Ask Me Anything 2" by J. Budziszewski (more great advice from Professor Theophilus!)
"Real Sex" by Lauren Winner (practical and insightful thoughts on chastity)
"The Promised Power" by Roc Bottomly (balanced view on the working of the Word and Spirit)
OK, that should be enough to get you started. If you're not into books, there's always the excellent articles that Boundless and TrueU have to offer.
What have you been reading this summer? Let me know -- I'm always looking for a good book!
I have a steady handful of friends I do stuff with throughout the year. Those comfortable, all-season friendships are great. But summer is a good time to meet new people. The season abounds with barbecues, picnics and outdoor activities -- non-threatening ways to hang out with new groups. I met some new friends this summer when I attended my neighbor's Fourth of July celebration.
In "Single While Active" I wrote about another benefit of branching out: Good marriages begin as good friendships, and friendships are developed through activities. Last year my college roommate, Gretta, married a man she'd led rafting trips with for four summers. During those years, Gretta and Jay saw each other at their best and worst and built a solid friendship. Eventually their friendship developed into romance.
Whether you're an outdoor enthusiast, a musician, a photographer or a movie connoisseur, find new places to develop your interests. Join a mountain biking club. Sign up for an art class. Volunteer for children's ministry at your church. If you are looking for someone to share your life and passions, what better place to meet him or her than while pursuing those passions? Even if you don't meet someone, you're doing things you love.
I spent some time with Jay and Gretta this past week. They've been married for five years, have two children and continue to enjoy doing outdoor activities together. Any fun summer meeting stories out there? Any creative ideas for summer socialization?
If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart? -- Alexander Solzhenitsyn
In 1974, while recovering from a serious illness that required weeks in the hospital and even longer recuperating at home, I received a copy of The Gulag Archipelago to help pass the time. The book had only just been published in the West, but for years it had been circulated as mimeographed samizdat in the Soviet Union. It was Solzhenitsyn's j'accuse against the Communist Soviet Union, and he introduced to the world the gulag and the zek. Solzhenitsyn died on Sunday and is being laid to rest today in his beloved Russian soil.
Reading Gulag was, to say the least, a bleak experience -- but bleak in an eye-opening way. This was the height of the Cold War, and I remember having seen films in history classes about the atrocities of Stalin and Mao, complete with archival footage of firing squads and summary executions. But as shocking and visceral as those images may have been, they were but glimpses. Reading Solzhenitsyn, on the other hand, was a thousand-plus pages of brutality both casual and calculated. It was day after day of a punch to the gut.
Despite the brief thaw under Khrushchev that allowed the publication of Solzhenitsyn's first book, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, in 1962, Solzhenitsyn still had much to fear from the Kremlin and the KGB. But he fearlessly persisted in calling the world's attention to the totalitarian nature of the Soviet Union and the crimes against humanity that were perpetrated in the name of creating the New Man. Solzhenitsyn's work put the final lie to those on the political Left who claimed that the horror of the Soviet Union was only because Stalin had distorted the system; Solzhenitsyn showed that system was the horror.
Not wanting to make a martyr of the man, the Soviets expelled him in 1974, and he came to live in the U.S. But if Americans and others in the West thought that because Solzhenitsyn hated the Communists he would love them, they were in for a rude surprise, as they found out when Solzhenitsyn addressed the 1978 graduating class of Harvard University. He considered the West weak and decadent, and he was as forthright in saying that to our faces as he was in denouncing the Communists to their faces. A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today. The Western world has lost its civic courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, in each government, in each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling and intellectual elites, causing an impression of a loss of courage by the entire society. There are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.
Solzhenitsyn was soon dismissed as a crank. He lived in exile in Vermont and occasionally would be quoted in public, but with the fall of communism, he was seen as irrelevant. He returned to Mother Russia in the 1990s and found, not the Russia of his dreams, but a country exhausted by 70 years of tyranny and eager to adopt the luxuries they'd so long been denied. There were McDonalds in Moscow, no less.
Solzhenitsyn was not the pure saint some imagined him to be. In a way, he was a crank. And in the irony of ironies, Solzhenitsyn's wish for a Dostoyevskyian Russia dominated by a strong Czar and the Russian Orthodox Church led him to support an incipient tyrant in Vladimir Putin. He also supported the Serbs, ostensibly Orthodox Christians, in their genocide against Muslim Kosovars and Bosnians.
In short, Solzhenitsyn was a difficult man. The phrase "speaking truth to power" is a horribly overused cliché that should be put to a violent death, but if any one person ever personified it, it was Solzhenitsyn. Yes, he was stubborn and sometimes wrong. But when he was right, he was dead right.
The world needs difficult men. And some of what he had to say is just as important to us today as it was 30 years ago. He told his Harvard audience: Harvard's motto is "Veritas." Many of you have already found out and others will find out in the course of their lives that truth eludes us if we do not concentrate with total attention on its pursuit. And even while it eludes us, the illusion still lingers of knowing it and leads to many misunderstandings. Also, truth is seldom pleasant; it is almost invariably bitter.
Yes, but it is still the truth.
I honestly see worship music primarily as a gift from God to us. It's more of a blessing to us, for our edification and joy, than an offering to God or as "spiritual warfare." It is more about receiving from the Lord than about giving to Him.
This is reinforced in Colossians 3:16: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God." That verse indicates that the singing serves to teach and admonish the singer and those around them, to build up their faith and therefore their joy and love.
I recently came across a sermon by John Piper on "The Inner Essence of Worship." Among other things, he points out that it is fine to seek happiness in God during times of singing worship: There are millions of Christians who have absorbed a popular ethic that says it is morally defective to seek our happiness, even in God. This is absolutely deadly for authentic worship. To the degree that this ethic flourishes, to that degree worship dies. Because the inner essence of worship is satisfaction in God, experiencing God as gain.
Therefore I say to you that the basic attitude of worship on Sunday morning is not to come with your hands full to give to God, but with your hands empty, to receive from God. And what you receive in worship is God, not entertainment. You ought to come hungry for God. Come saying, "As a deer pants for the flowing springs, so my soul pants for thee, O God." God is mightily honored when a people know that they will die of hunger and thirst unless they have God.
Recovering the rightness and indispensability of pursuing our satisfaction in God will go a long way to restoring authenticity and power of worship.
What might happen if worship music is more about "our gift to Him" than "His gift to us"? If the focus shifts onto our giving to God, one result I have seen again and again is that subtly it is not God that remains at the center but the quality of our giving. Are we singing worthily of the Lord? Are our instrumentalists playing with quality fitting a gift to the Lord? Is the preaching a suitable offering to the Lord? And little by little the focus shifts off the utter indispensability of the Lord himself onto the quality of our performances. And we even start to define excellence and power in worship in terms of the technical distinction of our artistic acts.
Reflecting on our Lord's character, and the overwhelmingly merciful things He's done for us, is a gift to us. It moves our hearts toward His, which is heavenly joy.
Five hydrothermal vents, each of which heats the surrounding water to between 570 degrees and 752 degrees, were recently discovered well inside the Arctic Circle, between Greenland and Norway. Scientists are aware of other hydrothermal vents farther north, but to date haven't been able to examine them up close.
Other scientists, expecting to find minimal magmatism under the ice, were stunned to find extreme volcanic activity in the Arctic: "surprisingly strong magmatic activity in the West and the East of the [Gakkel] ridge and one of the strongest hydrothermal activities ever seen at mid-ocean ridges were found." They also noted that "[h]ydrothermal hot springs on the seafloor were also far more abundant than predicted."
Not surprisingly, scientists believe that these superhot vents raise the temperature of the water around and above them, leading some to conclude that heat can melt ice.
Veritas vos liberabit.
The college football season is right around the corner and the USA TODAY kicked things off last week with their preseason poll and then followed it up with an article about the Georgia Bulldogs' (whom they picked to finish No. 1) head coach, Mark Richt.
Much of the article focused on how nice Coach Richt is. And how many in the business wondered whether he had the toughness to succeed as a college football head coach. Just before Vince Dooley, then Georgia's athletics director, offered Mark Richt the head football coaching job after the 2000 season, he spoke with Florida State coach Bobby Bowden. Richt had spent 15 seasons with Bowden's Seminoles, primarily as offensive coordinator.
"The one thing that worries me about him is he's too nice," Bowden told Dooley. Seven seasons later, Richt is still as nice but also has won nearly 80% of his games, becoming one of only nine coaches in major-college history to record 70 or more wins in his first seven seasons. He also restored the glory, glory to old Georgia, as the fight song goes, winning two Southeastern Conference championships.
Now Richt, 48, has the Bulldogs ranked No. 1 in the preseason USA TODAY Coaches' Poll, which raises the question: Can nice guys finish first?
Richt isn't just nice, he's a Christian. And Christian coaches will always have to answer the "passion gap." Fans want someone who is as passionate about their team as they are. And a "Christian" countenance can often be construed as an inverted priority, particularly for southern college football fans.
Ultimately it's results that matter. And Richt seems to have found the balance. A couple of championships and an eyewitness account of him bawling out a player seems to have answered the passion gap ... for now.
HT: World Mag Blog
After my second pregnancy, I noticed something. Or somethings, really. About 40 pounds of them.
So I went on a diet that emphasized healthy eating: lean meats, lots of veggies, no sugar. The weight came off and I learned one big fact: even before my pregnancy, I didn't eat all that well. To drop the weight, fast food was off the menu -- except the occasional salad. Once I hit my goal weight, I let fast food back into my life, but vowed to stick to the kids' menu.
According to an article in today's USA Today, I need to be even more careful than that. In a study by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, nutritionists analyzed 1,474 different kid meal combinations from 13 chain restaurants and found that the majority have too many calories, too much fat and too much salt (based on the 1,300 calories needed by a 4 to 8-year-old).
Yikes. So I hit one of my favorite chain's websites. Good news: my kid chicken strips, tater tots and Diet Dr. Pepper ring in at 430 calories. Bad news: My daughter's grilled cheese, fries and slushie hits in at 830 calories. But, then again, she never eats her crust and leaves half her fries.
One surprise, though. My kid meal and diet drink actually has fewer calories than the grilled chicken salad with light ranch dressing. Of course, there's more nutritional value in the tomatoes than in my tots.
"Eating out is no longer a special occasion, it's a lifestyle now, so we have to be more selective about what we eat," says Keith Ayoob, who works with overweight kids at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.
Looks like it still comes down to choices. I know an apple is healthier than fries. I know water is healthier than soda. The question is: Which will I choose? I'm just happy that my chicken strips are still in.
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