Book Writing and Home Buying

I figured a brief update of things in my life might be in order since I’ve mentioned these two things on this blog. Here are the updates:

1. The attempt at a Novel is going well. I’m ahead of the curve, currently at just over 30,000 words which is 3/5 of the way to my 50,000 word goal. I’m really enjoying it, but I also realize as I push for quantity there are a lot of things I want to go back and rework. The whole practice has been enjoyable though. You can read it in progress here.

2. If all goes well, my wife and I will purchase a home in less then two weeks. I’ve blogged about the decision on here a bit and we feel confident we are making the right one. We are very excited about all the possibilities for community, stewardship, faith and more that this stage of our lives will bring. Lot’s and lot’s more to come on this as time goes on.

That’s really the update, not much more to it. Being a dad is awesome. Having a beautiful daughter and beautiful wife is amazing. What more could a guy ask for?

We Need More Television Like This

Recently, I’ve been watching the DVD of a great television show that was on the air in 1999 and 2000. The show is hilarious and at the same time raises awareness about important issues that you typically don’t hear about in the news or media. The show’s host is a controversial media figure because of his recent works, but I still find a lot of what he’s done extremely creative, important and beneficial to important causes that I care about as well.
One of the things I really like about the show is it’s creative use of the money typically spent paying celebrities and creating expensive sets. It’s a fairly low budget production which uses its finances to do some creative activities and actually help people also.

Anyways, I hope you can reserve previous judgment you might have of the host and watch a few of the clips below. Here’s some examples:

The Ten Commandments Aren’t the Only Bible Verses Are Politicians Try To Follow:

A Wallet Is Not a Gun Campaign

Thank You Women, For Helping Men Rule the World

Continuing Gulf War and $0.60 Gas

Mistreatment or Deportation? What To Choose?
Part 1

Part 2

Bonus: Ever seen a Plant run for political office?

I’d love to know what you guys thinking of the clips.

Link: Christianity And The Social Crisis

Guess who wrote this and when:

If it is religious to advocate rebuilding a church, why is it non-religious to advocate tearing down and rebuilding slum districts? If it is religious to encourage the church to recarpet the aisles and cushion the seats for the feet and backs of worshippers, why is it non-religious to speak of playgrounds for young feet and old-age pensions for aged backs?

If you guessed Walter Rauschenbusch 100 years ago, your absolutely right. Looks like we still have the same theological dilemmas in the church today that we did back then.

Zach has put together a great collection of quotes from Walter’s book and wrote a post about the importance of writings such as this.

Read Zach’s Post Here.

Read Walter Rauschenbusch Quotes Here.

Read the entire Christianity and The Social Crisis Here.

Link: Mistaken Identity

A story of mine:
When I was in middle school I bought this sweet jacket, it had a reversible red vest inside, which had a black side and a bright red side. The red side was way stylish, but too cool for me to wear to school, however, I was in the mall one day and so I flipped it, red side out. I happened to be in Walgreen’s when an old lady came up to me and asked me if I could show her where the pepto bismol was. You can imagine my embarrassment, she had mistaken me, the cool middle schooler with the red vest, for a Walgreen’s employee. It was a case of mistaken identity, that ended only in my own embarrassment. Needless to say I never wore my vest red side out again.

Now, imagine if you couldn’t change your identity with just the flip of your vest… And, the mistaken identity resulted sometimes in more then just embarrassment.

Also, for some inordinate reason, white people often seem to mistake me for an employee of home improvement stores. Hello! No orange apron! (But every once in a while I like to answer the questions anyway.) Maybe it’s the tape measure and the manly stride. A white woman once abusively screamed that she wanted to see my manager RIGHT NOW because she did not feel I was helpful. Even after she found out she was mistaken, she did not have the grace to apologize.

There are a lot of stories both in the post and in the comments section. You absolutely must read this post, get a glimpse of what kind of regular encounters people of color tend to have with white people.

Read here. (ht. Ally Work)

And, once your done reading and realize something must be done about this. Read Ally Work’s post on Qualities of an Ally.

Link: On Modesty

Mak writes a great post on the topic:

Which then led me to think about the concept of “modesty” in general. And as I pondered all of these things, I finally figured out why I can’t stand the typical conservative Christian teachings about women’s appearance that go on all over the world in youth groups and Bible studies and women’s ministries every week…the whole point of these “lessons” teaches girls/women that our bodies do not in any way belong to us.

Read the Rest here.

Link: Intentional Suburbunites

I’m an advocate for people moving out of suburbia for a number of reasons, but I can respect people’s decisions to stay there. Will Samson is one of those people I’ve come to see as a conscience suburbunite. He recently posted a letter from someone else about 10 Ways to Live Intentionally in the Suburbs and I think they are worth checking out:

1) Live with others from your church community

Whether you share your home with another person or family, or whether you have several families that have homes in close proximity or both, sharing life together is perhaps the most powerful (i.e., going against the grain of suburban culture) way to be the body of Christ in suburbia. If you can’t live together, at least find a way to share resources (power tools, lawn mowers, children’s clothes/toys, etc).

2) Work Less!

One of the major powers that enslaves suburbia is the idolization of the career. There are many ways to pay the bills that do not involve a 9-5 job, and even within a 9-5 job, there are ways to work less (turning down promotions, taking unpaid leave, etc.) Working less will free you to serve your church community, your family, your neighbors, etc. It will also spur creativity: finding a solution for working less, finding a way to “make ends meet” financially, etc.

3) Throw out the television

Another (and perhaps larger power) that enslaves suburbia is consumerism. You’ll be amazed at how your desire for things ebbs as you take the TV out of the picture. If you can’t bring yourself to kill the television, at least take steps to lessen its influence (get rid of cable, only use it for movies, put it on a cart that can be wheeled in and out of a closet, etc.) Throwing out the television will also stimulate your creativity.


Read the rest here

Danger: Gospel Followers Ahead

If you didn’t know, I’m writing this book. Just a fun little project, a fiction piece, an attempt to articulate in a creative form my feelings on how it looks like to live out the faith, following the Gospel.

I’m realizing following the Gospel is dangerous. I’m also realizing that following the Gospel is so obvious. There are some things Jesus says that are confusing and quite stuck in the cultural context, however most of what he said is pretty plain. In the book I’ve set up the characters in a society that has no connection to our current society and it’s understanding of the Bible, Jesus, Christianity or organized religion in general.
As I write, I find myself having two very clear feelings:

1. My first reaction is to explain why I think the words of Jesus should be followed in the way that I suggest in my story. The thing is that I’m reacting to our current religion, where we say we follow Jesus, but aren’t really following a lot of what he says. Fortunately, I’m writing my own fiction book, so I don’t have to defend myself.

2. My second reaction is that reading Jesus’ words lately seems even more starkly obvious in what type of actions they require of us, particularly as it relates to stuff. How in the world do we miss this?

(It’s late, I have a feeling this didn’t make much sense. If not sorry.)