October 31, 2003 at 11:59 pm
And on the last hour and the last minute and the last second...
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October 31, 2003 at 10:10 am
Andy Crouch: The Post-Consumer Church (Jacob's Well, Kansas City, MO, October 26, 2003)
After receiving a barrage of requests (two Blog comments and one e-mail — whew!) I have decided to post the notes that I took at our church’s recent “conference” in which Andy Crouch discussed “the church in the midst of a consumer culture.” I understand that anyone’s notes, without any sort of context, can be difficult to comprehend and I will make no apologies for the fact that my notes are being presented out of context. This being said, I think that the concept being presented is is fairly self-explanatory — of course, I know why I wrote certain things in my PalmPilot and you don’t. In any case, have a good time reading and share your comments (especially if you need me to explain anything in greater detail).
A few final notes before reading:
October 30, 2003 at 9:24 pm
Who saw that it was good?!
I found this crazy little “utility“ via Lucas’ Blog... It seems to think that my Blog is mostly good:
(By the way, Microsoft came out “52% evil, 48% good,” while Apple was “15% evil, 85% good” — I could have told you that!)
October 28, 2003 at 08:13 am
Narrative Medicine...
I heard a very interesting report on NPR today about a burgeoning trend within some medical schools — one in fairly accredited school particular — called, “Narrative Medicine.” Narrative Medicine is a program that concentrates on improving the facilities of non-medical communication between people in the medical profession; its goal is to teach doctors how to break through the “walls” of their “educated ambivalence” and actually begin to “feel” like their patients and for their patients.
Check out the included courses:
S1 The Philosophy of DeathWho knows? Maybe we will soon have doctors who are more like empaths (see picture above). Maybe we can look forward to doctors who will treat us as people rather than patients.
S2 Faith in the Practice of Medicine
S3 Anatomy Lessons: Poetry of the Body
S4 Reading the Body, Writing the Body: Women’s Illness Narratives
S5 Love and Knowledge in the Clinical Narrative
S6 The City of the Hospital: The Medical Student as Writer
S7 Fiction Workshop
S8 Life Drawing for Medical Students
S9 Drawing from Classical Greek Sculpture
S10 Black-and-White Photography: Introduction to Composition and Printing
S11 Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction
S12 Acupuncture: History, Philosophy, Theory, and Practice
October 27, 2003 at 9:31 pm
A few days later...
Work was good today. My first day on the job. It’s difficult to assess any sort of progress when there are no immediate results — as seems to be the case whenever my job entails getting familiar with a large-scale website that I had no part in creating — but I will have to get used to it…for a few days, at least. In the meantime, we did order me up a brand new Mac G5. I’ll have to live without it for a couple of days too.
Today came after a great, long weekend. Saturday was a full load, but we couldn’t have asked for better.
Andy Crouch (former editor of re:Generation Quarterly) was gracious enough to spend six hours at Jacob’s Well and talk to us about “the church in the midst a consumer culture.” This was more interesting and contained more information than I think I could ever express here, but if anyone would like me to post my notes, I will — just let me know.
Saturday evening, Julianna and I drove out to Odessa, MO, to take part in some fall fun with our Impact Goup. We all cooked hot dogs and s’mores around a bonfire and then went on a hay ride…er, hay-rack-ride? Well, whatever it is called, we had fun! After the ride, we sat around the fire and talked until we were tired enough to call it a night.
Sunday was spent eating lunch with our family and napping… And then back to church, where Andy gave a great sermon on the influence of consumer culture in our society — highly entertaining and highly thought-provoking.
But, all of this fun, and my first day at work today, went ignorantly on as my parents were stuck at home because of the wildfires that were (and are) blazing in Southern California. Seriously, my parents live this close to the fires. My friend Jean took this picture from the hills between Simi Valley and Thousand Oaks. I just heard that firefighters were fending off the Ronald Reagan Presidential Museum & Library from flames; that’s only one mile from my parents’ house.
I just talked to my dad, who said that they were fine. For some reason, though, my recent bonfire experience doesn’t seem quite as fun now that I think about it. My dad had to work from home today because all of the surrounding freeways were closed.
Please pray for those who are affected by this disaster. Not only are houses being lost, but the physical effects on nature and the human body are pretty serious.
As far as I can tell, this tragedy will only stop when God allows it to.
October 23, 2003 at 10:06 am
296/73
Thanks to Darren for his recent “Blog Tips” posts:
Take the Speed Reading Test Online.
With onscreen reading, it appears that I average 296wpm with 73% comprehension. This places me at a bit lower than “Good Reader” status (with both my speed and comprehension scores a lower than required: 300/80). I’m sure that my ratios would be different if this were a “hard-copy” test — which is one reason why I prefer to print out most of the Blogs that I read (and why I definitely print a hard-copy when proofing something that I have written). I know that I read too quickly when looking at a computer monitor. I also know that I comprehend much more when I read something on paper (but at a cost as my hard-copy reading speed is very slow).
Try it out for yourself. What do you score?
October 21, 2003 at 4:00 pm
Defunkified?!
I began writing something today… And I wrote a lot. Maybe I don’t really have the funk afterall. Maybe my funk was just misappropriated. Maybe I just needed to find the right defunkifier.
I’ll let you all in on it a little later (which might mean a couple of weeks). We’ll see how it goes.
October 21, 2003 at 11:15 am
Who got the funk?
Seriously. I’ve got a week off and I have nothing in me. No music. No art…nothing. I’ve got a half-finished website that I can’t find the inspiration to look at. I’ve got a list of things to do around the apartment. And nothing. I’ve had weeks like this before — weeks that I would look forward to because I’m normally just oh-so-busy. But, nothing. These weeks usually come and go quicker than the blink of an eye and I have nothing to show any of the free time.
My wife would tell me, “This is your time. Take a break.”
( You see, I am one of those people who has to have a big list of things to do at all times — someone who doesn’t like to be “jobless.” )
But, I’m not without a job. In fact, I’m starting a new one on Monday. So, I should be able to get off of my butt and do…something.
Nothing.
I would like to record a new album — this is almost a fading memory. I have a number of ideas for films that could be made. My art box screams at me to pick up a brush or a pen everytime I see it.
Nothing.
It’s like my heart is completely disconnected from my brain and the creativity that I used to think I had was only temporary insanity. I yearn to create, but my senses are dead…or dying…or comatose…or…
Nothing.
And I hate this because it seems like every week off I ever have — every one that doesn’t include a trip to somewhere or a plan to do something with other people — is like this. I know that I should be doing something, but I can’t. Or I won’t.
But, I don’t feel lazy by any means. I feel…inspirationless. (Emerging Minister is just flooring me with his new project — this is inspired and, years ago, I might have conceived of something like it.)
I wish there was a Lost-and-Found for vision and direction… I tried to look up Muses-R-Us in the phone book to no avail.
I got the funk.
October 18, 2003 at 10:17 am
MT-Blacklist (comment SPAM blocking script)...
I just finally got around to installing Jay Allen’s MT-Blacklist script for my Weblog. If you suffer from annoying comment SPAMs, then you should install it too — it’s fairly simple to install and only take a minute.
Take that SPAMmers!
October 17, 2003 at 5:22 pm
My last drive to school...
Click to enlarge…
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Today was very sad.
October 14, 2003 at 9:47 pm
Impending despair...
Ok, ok, ok… It’s not that bad. But, this is my last week at Ozanam, and I can just sense it coming on.
October 10, 2003 at 5:13 pm
Hope...
Last night at our Impact Group, we read the essay “Hope,” by, C.S. Lewis (the essay can be found in Lewis’ book, Mere Christianity). After reading the essay, we spurred some conversation with a number of prewritten questions. We covered a variety of subjects, from how the media distorts peoples’ perception of hope and heaven to how our own hope and perception of heaven affects the way we live our lives. It was quite an interesting discussion. There was one thing that struck me as extrordinarily profound, though, and was most definitely new to me.
One of the members of our group brought up a fairly taboo subject — at least, taboo in some “we’ve got Christ so we’re all right” circles. This subject was the feeling of utter hopelessness; the times when we are so overwhelmed with life or circumstance that we pray to God asking that He would just end it then and bring us up into heaven. (Of course, these feelings aren’t feelings or inventions for suicide, but once in a while something happens that makes us wish that we were literally in our Father’s arms.)
The moment that he said this, I had a revelation. It was a revelation of the hope that believers of Christ truely have. The hope that faith gives us. The hope that indwells in us because of the Spirit. You see, when my friend spoke of his feelings (although fleeting and unrealistic), he was ashamed. He was afriad that he, someone who possessed faith in our Creator, would think about something like having his life end.
“No!” I proclaimed. “Don’t be ashamed of this, be thankful! Aren’t we fortunate to have the hope of God’s kingdom in times like these? Isn’t this the hope that we are talking about? The hope of one day being in the presence of God?” It was amazing.
I went on to tell a story about something that had happened earlier that day.
I teach at a school for kids with emotional and behavioral disorders (or, at least, I will still be teaching there for the next week). This day, we had a kid who was actually on the verge of literal suicide. Earlier in the year, we developed a plan for him in which he could grade his emotional status on a scale from one to ten. This day, he graded himself a “one.” He was hopeless. He didn’t want to continue. He wanted to die. After a few hours of dealing with his emotions, though, we were able to get him to sign a “suicide contract” (a form that allows students to promise that they will not try to kill themselves that day). He was up to a “three” at that point and later on, up to a “five” (which is pretty normal for him).
My revelation was that no matter how low we get — no matter how depressed or hopeless or helpless or overwhelmed — we, as believers of Jesus Christ, always have the hope of His abundant life to hold onto. It is this hope — the hope of heaven and eternal life with Him — that keeps us going. It is why we, in C.S. Lewis’ words, “make it the main object of life to press on.”
My student at school does not yet possess this hope. He has the hope of his hobbies, his friends, his group home, his weekly visits to see his family… But, he doesn’t possess the hope of complete and total communion with his true Father in his “true country.” The hope that delivers us from the abyss of self-loathing and self-reliance.
The hope of heaven is why we continue.
Lewis’ entire essay is below.
October 06, 2003 at 4:19 pm
The decision has been made...
I’d like to thank everyone who prayed for me because of a Blog post that I made a few days ago. The decision that I was referring to (the “more later” part of the aforementioned post) was about whether or not I should keep my current job or say “yes” to the offer of a new job. Well, this morning, I gave my two-weeks notice at Ozanam and in…two weeks… I will be a full-time web/graphic designer again. It’s been a while (oh, four and a half years or so) since I have had a non-freelance, full-time design job and I am very excited.
While my wife and I talked and prayed about the decision last week we just couldn’t come up with enough reason for me to stay where I currently am. I have been patiently (and sometimes not so patiently) waiting for something like this to come up and, while I will miss my “kids” terribly, we think that this opportunity was most definitely from God. It has been a very fun and demanding two years at school. I have learned a lot and, if anything, my experiences and aquired expertise with troubled children, should make actual parenting a breeze (yeah, right!). I do love the kids at school and I appreciate the fact that I was helping to facilitate a better life for them. I will continue to pray for their development as “good” human beings. I will pray for their lives and situations to change for the better. I will pray that they find our Lord.
It is time for a change, though. I will miss where I was, but I know that there are great things ahead. Hensley Technologies is owned and operated by a friend of mine from church, along with his father and brother. It reminds me of what my first, real design job was like ( intimate and personal, where everyone had to wear many “hats” ) before it became what it became.
Anyway, I’m sure you’ll all hear a lot more about this in the days and weeks to come…
October 06, 2003 at 3:46 pm
Are you treating me right?
I think Neal Stephenson‘s (or here, or here) assessment of this article, by Jonathan Rauch, is right on the mark. I’m seriously thinking that I should link this article to the “About Me” section of this Weblog.
The conclusion to the article holds great wisdom:
How can I let the introvert in my life know that I support him and respect his choice?Thank you for your support.
First, recognize that it’s not a choice. It’s not a lifestyle. It’s an orientation.
Second, when you see an introvert lost in thought, don’t say “What’s the matter?” or “Are you all right?”
Third, don’t say anything else, either.
October 05, 2003 at 12:27 pm
"Thank you, it was good."
I hope that my last words are as profound.
“Thank you, it was good,” were the final words from Yukichi Chuganji, 114-years old, just hours after going to bed last Saturday night, September 28. Guinness World Records had him recorded as the world’s oldest man. Chuganji imparted these wise words after drinking a glass of home-made apple juice. But who knows whether he was speaking of the juice or his life?
Sources say that he died peacefully while he was sleeping.
“Thank you, it was good.”
October 05, 2003 at 09:29 am
My inner child...
Thanks to Bene Diction...
My inner child is ten years old!
The adult world is pretty irrelevant to me. Whether I’m off on my bicycle (or pony) exploring, lost in a good book, or giggling with my best friend, I live in a world apart, one full of adventure and wonder and other stuff adults don’t understand. |
October 03, 2003 at 8:27 pm
98% digital and counting...
Early in life, I began to accumulate an embarrassingly large amount of electronic equipment: electric guitars, keyboards, digital effects processors, computers, etc. The one thing that I never did break down and buy, though, was a digital camera. 
Sure they have been getting better over the years and it may have paid-off to wait until the higher-quality cameras were a bit less expensive… The thing is, my number-one reason for never getting a digital camera was that I just liked the quality of real-life, “non-zero-and-oned,” celluloid film! But, that’s a bit snobbish, right? And digital output has become much better over the years, right?
Well, as of today, Julianna and I are the proud new parents of a Minolta Dimage G500 digital camera. And I must admit… It’s awesome! It’s a small and stylish, 5 megapixel, little chunk of great design.
We’re not ashamed to admit it! We’re almost completely digital…
Wait… Maybe it’s complete.
October 01, 2003 at 4:20 pm
With the hope that faith comes easier...
For some reason, this passage just hit the spot last night. We’ve all had so much example of what it looks like to be faithful.
Why is it so difficult sometimes?
Why do we constantly fail at being faithful; at the root of our relationship with the Creator of the universe?
This passage lifts my spirits. I hope it does for yours.