The Boundaries of Their Dwelling Place

I grew up reading missionary letters. With my grandparents' career with the Christian mission in the Philippines, we have many family friends who are all over the world. Besides these family ties, I have many personal friends who have decided to take the leap of traveling across the world to minister to a specific location. Other than the immense courage that these folks hold, perhaps their most noble attribute is their intentionality.

The letters that they send reflect a total intention to love the place where they live. They say things like, "We're finally having tea with our neighbor, who has ignored us for the last six months and we're praying that through this tea date they would understand that we love them and Jesus loves them and that is all." They are the most intentional citizens. Everything that they do is for the reason that the world may know Christ and his love.

I'm not sure I live like that.
Just yesterday, I spent about thirteen hours moving and cleaning. I got my stuff out of my apartment on 23rd and W Burnside and, through several trips, made my way to the apartment Ali and I will live in right in the heart of John's Landing. John's Landing is the greatest neighborhood you've never heard of, Portland's best kept secret. And as I moved in my stuff and Ali came over, I started to think very intentionally about this apartment.

Over Ali's famous noodle stir-fry, we sat on the floor and prayed that our apartment wouldn't just be an apartment, but a sanctuary; a place where people could experience God. A place of peace, life, and hospitality.

This morning, I walked to Coffee Plant (a place I'm sure I'll spend many mornings) and prayed for the neighborhood and what God would have me do with the people here. It's full of medical students, teachers, and young professionals. It's quiet but lively, blue collar and collegiate. What are we to do here?

I meditated on Paul's words, which he speaks to the Athenian skeptics on Mars Hill in Acts 17:26

"And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted period and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward him and find him."

You live where you live for a reason - it's a good time to start living like there's a little more weight to our circumstances.

Join me?

Dan Harris and the New Face of Evangelicalism

The major news networks have had a lot of trouble finding their place in today's journalistic media. Because I don't have cable, I just don't get my news from TV. I get my news from the Internet (like a real man) and I get linked to small TV spots randomly. This is where Dan Harris comes in. Harris covered Mars Hill's debate on the devil last year and I really appreciated his inquisitive yet respectful eye on evangelicalism. He seems very interested on the church, but refuses to be cynical. He recently filed this report on the new face of evangelicalism and I really hope you have 10 minutes sometime soon to watch this.



The real question: Is Dan Harris' shirt even buttoned at all? What a man...

You Must Have An Eye For These Things (A Tribute to Alex Ward)

The wait for the streetcar on 11th and Taylor is always interesting. Actually, the wait for any transportation device on any street corner in any major metropolis is quite interesting if you have the right eye. I often do.

I learned to have this eye for people from my good friend Alex Ward. Alex cannot enter any space or plane without examining it with a keen eye for the absurd or the out-of-the-ordinary. He catches things that, even in the strangest circumstances, lies not in the center of the situation, but on the peripheral.

I'll give you an example.

This last weekend at the Sasquatch! Music Festival, there were many weird people. In fact, everyone there is very, very weird. John's mom, Clare, asked him, "Did you see any weird people?" and I heard him answer, "Yeah, mom, everyone is weird." You just stop noticing.

But the second night, after being rocked by Public Enemy, Massive Attack, and others, we were walking back to our campsite when we saw this:

One young, white male standing completely still and holding a battery powered boom-box. Beneath him, was his friend, who was lying on the ground and waving his arms back and forth in the air and singing amorphously. We were all laughing at this because it was so typically absurd for the festival.

But Alex pointed out something else.

Deep in the distance, probably 100 yards away, he spotted a young girl sitting alone in the open field. She was sitting and dancing, which is basically the way people "dance" when they are too tired or drunk or all of the above. She sat out there alone, in the dark, just having a blast sitting and "dancing." Her body moved strangely, and being all alone, the site made you wonder so many things I don't have time to write.

This is my friend Alex. He's a professional when it comes to noticing the behavior of humans. Because he has done this since I first met him at 16, he and I have moments in our lives that we call "Ward Moments" or "Nye Moments," which all have to do with the strange things that happen on the fringes of society that normal people either wouldn't notice, or wouldn't pick out amongst the crowd. So often, we laugh to ourselves because no one else would understand. We love people running in street clothes and we love the way people eat burritos.

Because of my friendship with Alex, I don't just wait for the streetcar or eat my lunch on the Park Blocks alone, but I wait for the weird. We are very strange people. Everything from the way someone is eating to how they listen to their music to what location they are in that is in connection with what they are doing. I like to watch people be people and I have Ward to thank for that.

But sometimes these things are just handed to you. Sometimes you don't look, you don't ask for it, but people identify you as a person they want to reveal themselves to.

That's what happened this morning. I'm waiting for the streetcar when a round man in hiking boots, short cargo shorts, and a huge hoodie approached me saying, "Can't believe those library security guards wear bulletproof vests."

"Yeah," I said.

"They didn't have to do that when my grand-daddy was alive," he said. "They used to round up the homeless guys and ship 'em out to build all the state parks we enjoy today. They'd teach 'em a trade and sober 'em up. The government did good things for them and they were thankful. You can't do that anymore, it's all about meth and cocaine." When he says, "cocaine," he emphasizes the second "c" and lets the rest of the word fall off.

"It's those [expletive] chemicals. Nobody wants to grab a beer anymore, everyone just wants to get high," he concludes.

I'm interested now.

"I see what you mean. It's more difficult to sober up and teach a man a trade when he's chemically dependent on something like meth. It's terrible." That was what I decided to add to the conversation, and that's what ended the conversation. Or at least I thought.

The man and I both get on the streetcar, take standing positions next to one another. It's quiet for a long time as I looked around the streetcar for the unusual, but he beat me to it.

He points with his index finger down to a pair of galoshes warn by a young urbane girl.

I give him a look.

"Where I come from, you wear those boots to slop pigs," he said quickly.

"Yeah," I chuckled.

"That chick wouldn't know the first thing about sloppin' pigs," he continues. When he says "sloppin,'" he gives his inflection some grunt, which seems to catch the attention of the bystanders. I think she can hear us because she sort of looks around to see who's talking on the silent morning streetcar.

"Crazy world," he says.

It is a crazy world, I thought as he cleared his throat at an inappropriate volume. And I have Alex Ward to thank for teaching me to notice that this world we live in is as serene as it is chaotic, and that, my friends, is precisely what makes it so beautiful.

Words to Be Conquered

Ok, so enough of you have harassed me to put up my summer reading list that I'm just going to do this quickly to make you peasants happy.

Here's the deal, though, this list is not final. NOT FINAL. And while I would like to stick to this list, I cannot promise that it will contradict itself. Stay tuned for my "Conquered Words" series to see if I finished these books this summer and, if I did, if they were any good or not. This whole summer will be crazy, so we'll see what happens. HERE WE GOOOO.

They're in list form and have just brief comments about what they are and maybe why I want to read them or how I heard about them. If you want to know more about them, I suggest Amazon because I love Amazon. Or Powell's if you're in Portland.

1) Columbine by Dave Cullen. Chronicles the April 1999 shootings in Colorado. Cullen has spent 10 years researching and interviewing people in order to write this. It's also supposed to just be a great commentary on 21st century youth.

2) My Losing Season by Pat Conroy. Alex Ward gave me this book and read me the introduction on the porch of my apartment while it rained. I must read it now. All about 1960s basketball through Conroy's personal story of playing as a young scrappy point guard under the home of an abusive dad.

3) In Dubious Battle by John Steinbeck. I read one Steinbeck every summer and I suppose this will be this year's.

4) Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. The famous story of an English teacher in Tehran who formed a secret society of Iranians who read Lolita together. Stories about youth in the middle east and how literature affected them.

5) Who's Your City by Richard Florida. Florida is probably today's leading voice in global urban studies. He says that despite globalization, where you live really matters, and he's supposed to have a good case.

6) How to Be Good by Nick Hornby. Some people really rag on Hornby, but I think the guy is phenomenal. He has this niche that not many people pick up on and I don't think I've ever heard someone talk about that "good love" as well as he talks about it. In an email correspondence I had with a Duke professor, he told me to read this particular Hornby piece.

7) Lewis' Space Trilogy. I just don't know if I'll get there this summer...

So...What are you reading? Let me guess, your iPhone.

A Chicken Is Done, I am Finished

In the completion of my absurdly difficult astronomy final wherein my professor expected a unique comprehension of special relativity, I write now because I'm finished with this term and have now entered the glory that will be my three and a half month summer break. This term was oddly difficult, but mostly because of other things happening outside of the classroom.

You would think the thought of writing another word would be causing my gag reflexes to fire, but oh how you would be wrong. When I'm happy, I do one of four things: 1) Take my lady out for a fine meal 2) Play Frisbee 3) Sing or 4) Write. Often times one leads to another so I will start with the fourth option.

In celebration of this burden being lifted, I'd like to tell you what on earth is going on in my ever-changing life. This is something I do not do often, because I find it strange, but today I find it both helpful and exciting.

Let's try bullet points, shall we?

-JOBS: I have two new jobs that both start this month and I'm extremely pumped about them. The wonderful people at Willamette Christian Church have hired me on as their full time High School Pastor, which is something that gives me great joy to report. I've been working for Willamette since January of this year on a contract basis in order to try and keep the youth ministry afloat. You know what was amazing? We didn't just keep afloat, we've been CRUZIN' USA! (sorry). We've nearly doubled in the past five months I've been there and there's no way it has to do with me, because I only worked 20 hours a week. The Ghost decided to move and the leaders responded. I'm humbled to be a part of what he's doing at this quickly growing church. Plus, I get to work with Joel Dombrow again...are you kidding me?

-SUBSECTION: I am also now a staff writer at the Rearguard monthly paper. I haven't been already, you say? I was hired on an intern basis to write and get school credit in exchange. Now they got me on staff on the contributing level, where I'll supposedly see money for my writing every month. I say "supposedly" because I truly have no idea where or how I would get my check from that office. Adventures!

-TOTALLY GETTING MARRIED STILL. July 24th. Crazy pumped. I would love to start writing about her, but I'm afraid I might not stop. More on this later.

-SHE'S A SCIENTIST: Ali graduates this coming weekend and I'll be in Seattle from Wednesday-Monday helping her move her things down, connecting with as many people as possible, and seeing that girl WALK. She'll have a BS in bio and a minor in creative writing. That equals smart, in case you're wondering. In addition to being a very proud fiance, I am a very proud friend of the numerous other graduates that I know. This would be my class, had I stayed at Seattle Pacific, and I love them all dearly.

-MOVING: July 18th, I'll be moving into Ali and I's schmancy two bedroom in John's Landing. It's the greatest neighborhood you've never heard of in Portland. Also, parking is still free there (shh, I know). The part I refuse to discuss right now is that my roommate/friend/brother/example and I will have to depart from one another after three years of sharing close to everything. I get emotional about this. Like a girl. More on this later.

That's the thin of it. Ultimately, in the grand scheme of things, God lives, the world is being made new, and my heart is gradually changing.

Today is a day of wrapping up things in this town and packing for five days in the Emerald City. If you so happen to find yourself in Seattle over the next week, let's get together and celebrate what God is doing.

Until then...

Before I Go To My Last Final

Observe:
From: Techno Tuesday

This is Your Brain on Computers

The Sunday New York Times included this article entitled, "Your Brain on Computers: Hooked on Gadgets, and Paying a Mental Price" and is, in my opinion, one of the most important articles for middle class Americans to read this year. It should not take you long to read and if you cannot hold the attention to finish this article, it's even more important that you soldier through it.

Here are some choice quotes to entice you:

"The nonstop interactivity is one of the most significant shifts ever in the human environment, said Adam Gazzaley, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Francisco.

'We are exposing our brains to an environment and asking them to do things we weren’t necessarily evolved to do,' he said. 'We know already there are consequences.'
...
Mr. Nass at Stanford thinks the ultimate risk of heavy technology use is that it diminishes empathy by limiting how much people engage with one another, even in the same room.

'The way we become more human is by paying attention to each other,' he said. 'It shows how much you care.'

That empathy, Mr. Nass said, is essential to the human condition. 'We are at an inflection point,' he said. 'A significant fraction of people’s experiences are now fragmented.'

The Best Argument

"Character is almost the most authoritative form of persuasion."
-Aristotle, On Rhetoric. Book 1, Chapter 2 Section 4.

Working as a minister to young people is an amazing job to have at 22. The types of things that you see and the experiences that are seemingly handed to you are so diverse that you always wonder how and why you are getting paid to be there.

I am a third generation teacher, coming from a line of men who taught everything from Math to Sexual Education. I love teaching. I think that education (both in the church and outside the church) is our society's silver bullet for a profitable and peaceful future. But the type of teaching that most of us 21st century teachers do is very distant.

For a lot of my job, I speak to groups of people. Each Wednesday night, our high school students gather together and I teach the Bible from a stage (what Christians call a "pulpit"). This lecture style teaching has been with us for the last 400 years or so in Western Europe and America and has thus traveled across the globe.

Recently I have noticed the profound limitations of this teaching style. Lectures and sermons can only go so far. My teaching is a weak support for my argument that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. What could persuade the world, is how I life my life as a servant.

In my research of Aristotle's On Rhetoric (which is an endless research project), I came across the quote I began with. In the section, Aristotle defines rhetoric and what it means to persuade an audience. Through his exhortation, he says that sometimes people can have no evidence but their own character, who they are, and use that as the best possible means of persuasion. People are more convinced by watching your life than by you explaining the best way to live life. That's how most of you fell in love with a certain subject in school. There was some teacher in high school who was enthralled by the subject, intoxicated by it, and you wanted a piece of what they had.

Teaching is as much about information as it is about the character who brings the information.

The Apostle Paul and Christ himself spoke like this in places through the New Testament and I believe this to be my championing concept for today's teachers. The raw information must come across, the essence and historical information of the Gospel is real and must be communicated (as it is "news"), but do not be fooled: your greatest argument is who you are, the person you are to your wife, the man you are amongst your friends, the citizen you are to your city.

This is why I am so confused by Evangelicals who believe that climbing the political ladder will help us advance the good news. Getting a bigger megaphone to project your rhetoric will only go so far and it will rarely change hearts and even minds. But serving and loving your neighbor, your city, and your world could be the best rhetorical strategy for our church leaders, school teachers, and politicians to create a better world. Your character, who you really are, is the most powerful vehicle for true change.

24 A dispute also arose among them, as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest. 25 And he said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those in authority over them are called benefactors. 26But not so with you. Rather, let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves. 27 For who is the greater, one who reclines at table or one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at table? But I am among you as the one who serves.

-Luke 22:24-27

When You Listen to Robert Schumann or Chopin

A rare poem for you all...

***

When you listen to Robert Schumann or Chopin,
make sure you look at the world you're in.

Because the world certainly looks like a different place
when you watch it listening to classical music.

Running looks absurd,
the pouring rain looks beautiful,
and the words between two old men
seem to be the most comfortable place to rest your eyes.

***

Ahhh...back to editing, my friends.

John Wooden, You Beast

When I was in seventh grade, I can remember watching the NCAA finals in our living room. This large space was centered on our humble television that sat near the northwest corner of the living room. It was in this living room, before we got the big screen, that my father would organize my entire family to watch college basketball. Duke was always the team and had been the team since the beginnings of my memories. My fuzzy remembrances would piece together images of an old house in Los Gatos, California, watching Duke play Michigan, my father cheering for the Blue Devils.

By seventh grade, in our house near Reed College, we had similar rituals. I was more versed in the rules, more perceptive of the game's ways (all thanks to my dad) and we would argue strategy and possible outcomes until the buzzer rang out through the room. For all that I learned from my old man about basketball, the most important lessons came when earlier in that seventh grade year he handed me an old copy of John Wooden's They Call Me Coach. The jacket was worn down and the pages were rough. "If you want to play basketball, you gotta read this book," he said. I knew all about John Wooden's success, how he was certainly the greatest basketball coach that ever lived, that he took a program like UCLA into the history books and every coach and player that is involved in the game since has looked to that man as the leading exemplar of basketball.

But what I didn't know was Wooden's key to success. Growing up as a third generation basketball player and basketball fan, I was under the impression that success in basketball was preceded by the fact that basketball was the most important thing in your life. You had to be obsessed with the game, it had to be the primary thought in your mind and heart.

To my total surprise, Wooden did not think that way. "What you are as a person is far more important that what you are as a basketball player," he said. Wooden's key to success was that he understood the game to be just that. His secret lied in the fact that basketball was not all of his life. In his book, he talks more about character, faith, and family above strategies of the game. His role as coach was a mentorship role and his idea of teamwork was an exercise in character building. The game of basketball was a vehicle for producing better men.

As a society, sports began for us to build character and to discover the wonder of corporate play. It was a way for us to teach our children the value of teamwork and the importance of sportsmanship.

The idea of sports has dramatically changed into a way in which we use our children to brag about our genetics. We push them to extremes so that, as parents, we can brag about the fact that our fourth grader pitched a no-hitter. And say goodbye to seasons; the junior high kids that I mentor right now are more busy than I was last year. They go from school to baseball practice to a year-round basketball game and then to bed. Baseball is not just a spring sport. There are training camps for all sports, weightlifting classes at junior high schools, and "conditioning" that starts at the 3rd grade level. Important question: how do you "condition" an 8 year-old other than to condition him to unload the dishwasher and clean up after himself?

Our kids are not learning the wonder of corporate play or the value of teamwork, they're learning the great American dream of being constantly busy and winning.

I hate to be a curmudgeon, but I get one free pass right? I see a lot that I dislike and, more often than not, I don't mind the changes. Downloadable music, eBooks, remaking movies that our already perfect (e.g. "The Karate Kid"), and the list goes on. I don't mind that, I don't expect the world to stay the same, nor do I desire it to be. But more than anything, I despise what has happened to youth sports. The pressure we put on these kids is tremendous and absolutely unhealthy.

Look, I'm 22 and without kids, but what I see in some of the parents I come in contact with is an extremely unhealthy and juvenile expectation of what their kid should be. These parents act like children.

One of John Wooden's proverbs goes like this: "Success is never final, failure is never fatal. It's courage that counts." Thank you, Coach, for always emphasizing the most important part of the game: that it's a game and not a life.

The Inner Church

"Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom."

- MLK, "Letter from a Birmingham Jail"

Guilt Trip

After just posting a whole blog about NOT reading and some of its benefits, I am yet again humbled by C.H. Spurgeon:

"The man who never reads will never be read. He who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains proves that he has no brains of his own."

-C.H. Spurgeon, Sermons on New Testament Men, Book 2.

If you don't like Spurgeon, it's probably because you haven't actually read Spurgeon, but you've just read stuff about Spurgeon (like blog posts or crappy books).

I'll take this opportunity to once again tell you, my lovely reader, to read primary sources. Never hold an opinion on a writer without reading their primary work. A huge annoyance of mine is to hear people say, "I hate Plato because [insert large generalization here]" without ever reading the text in which he claims such an idea. In reality, he probably didn't say it like that or in that context.

This is where I see college and other forms of higher education becoming very important. I've been blessed in my college career to get the right professors who teach primary texts and teach them well. But for all the great stuff I've received, there's a ton that I've missed out on (The Wealth of Nations being one).

Colleges should be held to the standard of teaching primary texts to all of their students. They can be boring, but primary texts become so very important in our understanding of the history of ideas and the formation of our own opinions.

I will especially admonish my readers who are seeking Jesus. Reading books about Jesus is pretty great, and reading books that quote these famous theologians has merit, but never ditch the Christian's primary text (the Bible, duh), from which all Christian thought is formed and reformed.

Conquered Words: May

This is my monthly post where I tell you what I have read and (ever so briefly) what I thought about each work. If you haven't read these books, then read this blog and pretend that you did!

Everybody disappoints themselves, that's for sure, and no exceptions exist in the life of a reader. Your hopes of reading The Wealth of Nations or the entirety of Nabokov's letters in one summer normally find themselves half finished and abandoned earlier than expected. More often than not, your books sit on your nightstand or desk (or wherever you place them) like the good friend you always forget to call. You see their name in your contacts list, see a post by them on Facebook and think, "I should really call that old bag of a man" and you "never get around to it." That friend is your books. And that was my life with my books during the month of May.

This May, I read zero books...stuff just happened and happened fast. "Conquered Words" huh? More like UNconquered Schmerds!!! ROFL LOLZ FTW (!!!)

Anyways.

An acceleration in work means a higher pressure in school and vice versa. With all of this, reading things outside of school/work ended up in a big fat bagel (zero books read).

I certainly do not view this as a negative thing. While reading is of great benefit, it is no longer a communal activity, which it was until the invention of the television. Before the early to mid-20th century, reading was done in community. People would sit together and read books both silently and out loud. Reading poetry together was a very common social event. I know, BOOOORRRRIIIING. Aren't you glad we have such great thing to spend our time with? Shows like The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, America's Got Talent, America's Next Top Model, Hell's Kitchen, The Real World, Celebrity Rehab, What Not To Wear, The Biggest Loser, Cake Boss, Survivor, American Idol, True Life, Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?, Wife Swap, Dr. Phil, Keeping Up With The Kardashians, My Super Sweet 16, the Marriage Ref, Run's House, Undercover Boss, Top Chef, Dancing with the Stars, The Hills, Laguna Beach, The Amazing Race, Last Comic Standing, Big Brother, The Real Housewives, Project Runway, John and Kate plus 8, The Apprentice, Average Joe, Celebrity Fit Club, Pimp My Ride, and Jersey Shore?

Me too.

Anyways, reading is a very solitary activity for me, and sometimes when I read a lot I look back and see how few interactions I had with people. This month was full of amazing interactions, conversations, and dialogues with people I have been blessed with in my life. I also wrote a TON.

But most notably, I just returned from three full days with some of the best brothers God has given to me in my life. Three great gentlemen and I (and hundreds of thousands of others) attended and camped at the Sasquatch! Music Festival deep in the Columbia River Gorge. I was without internet, my computer, cell phone, and any other technological devices for three blissful days. We listened to the most amazing artists of our time, seeing concerts from about noon to midnight each day. While the shows were off the chain (word), the best part was experiencing all that a music festival is with your best buds. Worth. Every. Penny. Thanks dudes for blessing me and thank you, God for inventing music and letting us play with the notes what we were given. Also, this was my view all weekend:
Reading has incredible value, the likes of which we will certainly never be able to fully know, but the same value or greater is possible in the bet we offer when we give one another the possibility of rich and real friendship.

Keep reading, friends.