Got Thirty Minutes?

If you are interested, below is the link to the sermon Matt gave this past Sunday.  He was able to share the full story of how we decided to move to Thailand and was able to challenge us all to love and follow Jesus sacrificially.  My favorite thing he said was, "Jesus did not die on a cross so that you could live a comfortable, easy life."  Spot on.  I also share midway through the talk about my own journey as a wife.  The first five minutes is our pastor sharing his insights about following a call from God, and Matt begins with sharing the video from World Vision which I posted in the previous post.  Hope it is a source of encouragement to you . . .

"One Life, Do Something" Sermon, The Parkers' Thailand Journey

A Bright Spot

Once again, I am left this Wednesday with a deep appreciation for my five friends who come over weekly to talk about things that matter.   And though our journeys are all unique, our discussions leave me feeling more inspired and more known.  Today we were discussing some of the stories Jesus told and were asking ourselves what he meant when he used the term "kingdom of heaven" or "kingdom of God."  Was he talking about a physical place in the afterlife or was he speaking of a condition of our hearts and the choices of our will here on the earth?  Is the 'kingdom of heaven' God's utopian ideal or is it attainable reality?  Excellent food for thought for this small brain.  Regardless, here's a little video I found on the topic.  Enjoy.

And Wednesday-ladies, thanks for being such a bright spot in my week.

Mac-and-Cheese Throwdown

I loathe grocery shopping--especially with three small children.  If I were rich, I would hire somebody else to do it.  If I were smart, I would leave the kids at home and go alone, but since I am neither, I continue to endure the self-inflicted torture weekly.   

Case in Point.  Last week as we were making our sprint down the aisles grabbing the red-labeled sale items, my four-year-old son decided to throw an attitude like a hormonal teenage girl.  The whining was warned, the rude comments cautioned, but it was the defiant dropping of a box of macaroni-and-cheese to the floor that brought the cart to a screeching halt.  And I don't consider myself the world's most consistent disciplinarian, but when your kid starts throwing mac-and-cheese in the supermarket because he doesn't like the picture on the box, you have to draw some kind of line.  And, so I pulled out the big guns--I took away the (gasp) free cookie.  I admit, its the bakery's free samples that provide the carrot I must dangle to navigate any grocery-store run, and my tantrum-throwing preschooler just lost his.

As I expected, wails erupted from aisle three.  Embarrassed, I quickly assesed my surroundings.  One lone audience member was casually witnessing our little family drama-- a grandmotherly lady with glasses perched on her nose and a list neatly marked in her hand.  She was calmly studying the noodle labels, and my motherly injured-pride began to arise from the ashes of my child's public meltdown.  I launched with full gusto into a speech about how "disrespect has consequences," and "discipline is supposed to hurt," and "maybe next time you will obey my warnings, young man."  And as we passed our peripheral-glancing witness,and as my son's protests quieted, I turned the corner, feeling accomplished, redeemed, like a mom that Dr. Phil would be proud of.

The Assault.  Three aisles and a full cart-full later, my six-year-old daughter began her assault.  She'd seen a stuffed animal bear that played music, and launched into her five-point thesis about why she needed to own it by the time we left the store.  Distracted, stressed, and ready for this trip to be over 45 minutes ago, we found ourselves at the bakery.  In front of.  The free cookies.  And the baby gets one in her pudgy hand and my six-year old debate-team member grabs one in hers, and I reach for just one more.  I reason the merciful, "He has been really good ever since the incident on the pasta aisle," and the practical, "Can I really handle a meltdown right now?"  And the hand that threw the mac-and-cheese now happily grasps a cookie in his hand, anyway.

And I start to head for the yogurt, when . . .

Busted.

Grandma with the list.

Staring at the lost cookie, now given.  Mouth nearly forming a "tsk, tsk."

And, so, I do what any respectable mother would--I pretend I don't see her and skip the yogurt.

Keeping My Word.   A group of my friends meet weekly to talk about the words of Jesus and how they apply to our daily lives.  And we are all from different faith journeys, but one of the commonalities we share is that we all recognize the rich goodness of Jesus's teachings.  And as I was kicking myself for the grocery-store-drama later that night, I was reminded of one of these powerful life lessons.  Jesus taught once, "Let your 'yes' be 'yes,' and your 'no' be 'no' " (Matthew 5:37).  Simple and powerful parenting (and life) advice, given many years ago on a dusty hillside.  And I realized that the cookie was not the issue that afternoon, nor was another woman's opinion of me as a mom.  The real issue, the place where I messed it up, was in not keeping my word.

And I will probably never see grandma-list-lady, but you can believe that I am going to quit with the empty threats and am going to start following through with dogged determination more.  I am going to try to make my words mean something, and I am going to make the consequences I give my kids to really stick--regardless of where we are or who's watching. 

You can also bet that I am going to start going to the grocery store alone.  I know my limits, after all.

Upside Down: Greatness in a Child

The following is my humble and quick interpretation of an interaction Jesus had with His twelve closest friends, His disciples, as recorded in the Bible (Mark 9:33-37, Matthew 18:1-5, Luke 9:46-48)

"Who's the greatest?" they argue. And the answers begin to fly around with convicted argument.  The most popular.  The one with the biggest boats and the most cows.  The most attractive or intelligent, the most spiritual or accomplished.  They whisper quietly among themselves, some boldy claiming a higher rung on the ladder, others just secretly wishing they had one.

And Jesus knows.  He knows their conversation-- though it happened in private.  And He knows their hearts--though hidden behind whispers and masks.

And The Greatest Teacher of All gives a lesson none of these twelve grasping men will ever forget.  He grabs the hand of a little one, a child.  Was it a toddler with stumbling feet?  A little girl wearing a shy smile? A 10 year-old boy with bare feet and a dirty face?  In the midst of big strong fishermen and worldly-wise grown-ups, Jesus pulls a kid into the spotlight and asks the strong ones to look down.  And He says empahtically as He crouches beside or maybe picks up,  "This, guys, this is what you have to be and love to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, to be first.  A child is
small and dependent,
trusting and innocent,
and imaginative. 
A child
laughs easily and
believes big and
gives love freely. 
This child-likeness is what makes true greatness.  I want followers who serve, who humble themselves, who are like kids."  And the dozen bearded men notice the small arms and the wide eyes and the easy way of leaning back into Jesus, and their Leader whispers, "Just like this kid."

And maybe ruffling the dark hair of a little girl or tickling the tummy of a squirming toddler, the Rabbi adds another quality of greatness--"And, you follow Me best when you protect and treasure these little ones--the smallest and the weakest, the ones with the lowest status and the least chance of paying you back. "

And I bet Jesus turned from his ladder-climbing friends for a minute and showed them in the flesh what He meant in His words by playing and listening and loving this child with which He had

quieted grown men and

flipped the ladder of success

upside down. 

Thanks, Kelley from The Spill, for sharing this video first.

Making His Prayer Mine

"Let my children have eternal life.  And this is eternal life:  that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.  My prayer is not that You take Kelty, Cade, and Ava out of this world, but that You would protect them from the evil one.  Sanctify them (make them holy) by the Truth;  Your Word is the Truth.  May Your Unity, Glory, Love, and Presence be in their lives, and may they each have the full measure of Your joy within them.  Not what I will, but what You will for their lives."

The above prayer is one I have been praying over my kids lately.  It's based on Jesus' own last words of prayer for His followers and Himself before His death.  I figure if Jesus prayed the things in this prayer at a pivotal moment in His earthly life, I surely couldn't think of something better for the little people who follow me every day.  Honestly, prayer for others is a spiritual area where I struggle to find consistency or power.  And while I don't claim to have the discipline to get up at 5 am and pray for hours on the behalf of others, I have found that simply praying Bible-words over my kids at night as they settle into rest has proven a sweet, powerful habit to practice. 

For further encouagement on the subject of making prayer a daily habit, check out the following blog.  It is full of thought-provoking ideas and artistic photographs by writer Ann Voskamp.

  A House of Prayer at Holy Experience. 

Prayer is taken from John 17 and Mark 14 in the Bible.

Artwork is by Ron DiCianni.

Thirsty

"If anyone is thirsty, tired, soul-dry, discouraged, weary,

Let her come to Me, pursue Me, read My Words, talk to Me,

and drink.

Whoever believes, trusts, puts her weight on, has faith, in Me

as the Scripture has said,

streams of living water, kindness, life, truth, love,

will flow from within her,

spilling onto and blessing everyone she meets."

-Jesus, book of john 7:37-38

italics mine

photo courtesy National Geographic

"This Is Our Prayer"

The Discussion. One of the highlights of my week is meeting with four of my favorite women in the world (you know who you are!) to talk about things that matter. We hire sitters to keep the kids, and the five of us sit downstairs treating ourselves to iced coffees and fancy muffins, enjoying deep conversations with friends. Though each of us is from different faith backgrounds, we talk about spiritual things, mothering, life journeys. This last week's conversation still has me thinking--it was about faith and mothering. Specifically, we asked ourselves these questions: How important is it to be authentic with what we believe personally and what we teach our kids about faith matters? What are our goals for teaching spiritual things and how do we want to accomplish those? And so we talked about our own parents (Mom, thanks for all you instilled and modeled for me in my young years), our kid-stories and the dangers of "brain-washing", and we challenged each other in this specific-- and important--area of motherhood.


A Song. And, in the timing that seems to happen Divinely when a Truth is stirring, I heard a song this morning on my walk that had me in tears. It's by a group I had heard at Vanguard Church (a large post-modern church) down in Colorado Springs. I downloaded their latest album, Make a Sound, to listen to on my new "surprise-I-love-you-gift" Ipod from Matt (gosh, I love that man). The song is all about a parent's heart for their kids in their spiritual lives. I like that the main thrust of the song is the idea of wanting your children to have a dynamic relationship with Jesus--that its not about them going to a certain church or holding to Conservative political views or being with the "right" crowd, as our Christian culture might suggest.


Two Forces. I love the idea in Ted Tripp's book Shepherding a Child's Heart (I think) that talks about how a child has two main shaping factors--outside circumstances and internal responses. Tripp talks about how parents can control the outside circumstances for a child's development--how much television they watch, the atmosphere of the home, friends they hang around, activities they are involved in, etc. But the other huge portion of a child's spiritual development is their personal responses to those shaping circumstances--the choice to rebel, the softness of a heart, personality, choices of their own will. And, no matter how hard we try, we parents cannot control our children's responses to life circumstances-- those that are controlled by us and those that are not (rejection from a peer group, a family member getting sick, etc). And, in many ways, that is freeing, isn't it? Because in the end, I have to submit to the fact that my children have to make their faith their own. Their own spirituality is their journey, and that journey may look different from mine. Now the Bible does talk about the importance of teaching our children about God and Scripture, but Jesus doesn't say that becoming a follower of His is merely a tradition that's handed down. He says time and again, "If you want to be my disciple, you must take up your cross and follow Me." He wants individual relationship with each of us--including our kids. And, no matter what my culture might say, my motherhood and my own value as a person is not defined by the choices of my children.


This is Our Prayer. And in the same breath that I recognize that my kids ultimately must have the freedom to make their faith their own, it would be just as inauthentic of me to not teach them about the Faith that I have come to believe in. It would say a lot about my own relationship with Jesus if I didn't desire them to have one, too. Yes, I want them to have freedom to ask questions--especially while they are still under our roof--and, of course, I want to show them unconditional love and pursuit of relationship despite where they may "land" spiritually, but I would be lying if I said that I didn't want them to fall madly in love with Jesus, like I have. Which brings me back around to our Fike and Dana song, This Is Our Prayer. Below are the lyrics. If you have Itunes, it would be totally worth the 99 cents to download. It speaks of the kind of people I want my three kids to become, and it highlights that relationship with Jesus is really the core matter of Christian spirituality--for us and for our kids.


"You would be wise beyond measure,
Seek Truth over treasure,
Love above everything.
You would find Hope in the hard times,
Grace in the good times,
And God in the days in between.

This is our Prayer,
This is our song,
You would grow humble as you will grow tall.
This is our hope,
This is our dream,
That you would fall madly in love with the King.

That you would be patient with passion,
Give praise unabashed,
Hold Faith in the highest regard.
That you would give all your attention,
To the God of Creation,
And serve Him with all of your heart.

There will be trials that will shape you,
Truth that will break you,
And Love that will take you to your knees.
You would be quick to surrender,
Your heart and be tender,
To God and to your family.

This is our prayer,
This is our song,
That you would grow humble as you will grow tall.
This is our hope,
This is our dream,
That you would fall madly in love."
-Fike and Dana, 2008, Make a Sound



Thanks for reading while I process a bit about this wildly changing, ever-challenging, constantly-breaking-me thing called parenthood. And an even bigger "thank you" to those who are of different faith beliefs who have stuck through to the end of a post like this. Your acceptance of me is something I appreciate and want to model for my own children, as well.

Broad-Minded . . . or Not Really?

I have the privilege of meeting with some of my closest friends here in Woodland Park on Friday mornings to talk about spirituality. We hire a sitter for all eight collective children who play upstairs and outside, while the moms hide out downstairs for two hours, drinking tea and enjoying uninterrupted conversation. It's one of the highlights of my week, honestly. Here's a quote I found in reference to some of our discussions of late and thought I would share:

"To overlook obvious differences between religions might seem broad-minded. In reality it is about as proud and narrow as a person could get. To say all religions are basically the same is to claim to be smarter than each of the billions of people who believe the unique aspects of their religion are of supreme importance to God. It is to claim that even though you are not an expert in their religion, you know they are wrong--you know their religion is really no different."
-Grantley Morris (I have no idea who that is, but he's the one who said it)

"I once had a conversation with a Baha'i priest. He told me that all religions were equally valid. . . . The man responded by saying that he didn't know anything about Islam, Judaism, or the rest but that he did know they were all the same. I wondered aloud how anyone could assert that all religions were the same when he had no knowledge of what those religions professed or denied. How can Buddhism be true when it denies the existence of a personal God and at the same time Christianity be true when it affirms the existence of a personal God? Can there be a personal God and not be a personal God at the same time?"
-R.C. Sproul

Just some food for thought. Happy Wednesday.

Death is Not Dying: A Faith that Saves

If you have been reading this blog, you will know that some dear friends of ours have a daughter with terminal cancer. (To see past posts about her, type in "Remember Rachel" into the search engine of the blog.) Rachel is married and has two young children. She recently was able to speak at a women's event for her church for over 500 ladies. They have posted the speech on their website. I downloaded it today and took it with me on walk outside by myself (good thing I was alone, since I cried almost the entire time). It was one of the most powerful hours I have spent--probably in my life. Rachel speaks honestly about suffering and questioning and faith and how to have a relationship with Jesus that means something. I know it's hard to carve out an hour of time for anything, but I can not say enough how listening to this talk will challenge and encourage you--whether you are a Christian or not, married or single, a mother or a student. The talk is raw and powerful and full of honest truths. She talks about the four things she has learned in her battle with cancer, the four things she wants her children to know as they live out their lives in the future, without her. Listen to it while you are folding your laundry or during a naptime or on your drive to work. I promise, it will not leave you unchanged. The download is free. They are doing a video of the speech, as well, which I will post when it gets finished. Following are some quotes from the talk to whet your appetite for it, as best as I can remember from my walk earlier today.
"At best estimate, I have 6 to 18 weeks to live. 6 weeks sounds like a long time when you are waiting for Christmas or something to arrive on backorder, but it seems incredibly short when its the last weeks you have to cuddle your children or be with your spouse."
"We have to start talking to ourselves--telling ourselves truths about God and about life--rather than just listening to ourselves and our changing emotions."
"Cancer does not define me. Being a wife and a mother do not define me. They are parts of who I am, but they do not define me. The only thing that defines me is my relationship with Jesus."
"I used to say 'no' to my children a lot. 'No, you can't jump on the bed, because I don't want to tidy it up again. No, you can't have a snack right now because I don't want to stop checking my email to fix it for you. No, we can't do that craft because its another mess I will have to clean up. ' Do you hear it? My reasons for my 'no's'? Me, me, me. And I am learning, as my days are short with my children to say 'yes' a lot more. 'Yes, you can have that cookie. Yes, jump on the bed. Yes, let's do that craft right now.' "
"In mothering, I used to serve. I served a lot, all day, every day. But I didn't do it with joy. We are here to serve with joy."
"The hardest part of my day is the moments when I am just coming out of deep sleep in the mornings, and as I get my bearings, I remember that I am dying."
"He has promised to make all things new. And I will get a new body, in heaven one day, and my sufferings here will seem 'light and temporary' in comparison to the joy and wholeness I will taste for eternity."
"The focus of life is too often ourselves, when it should be God. And this is sin."
To download the talk, go to:
http://www.churchonthewestside.com/qry/page.taf?id=81&_function=detail&sbtblct_uid1=126&month=03&year=2009&_nc=b7dce21d03c05a9a78dd8603d16e1fb4

Jesus Wants to Save Christians, Day Four

" A converted church will cause the mountains to tremble. A group of people taking the bread and the cup, asking, 'What now, Jesus?'--the stars sing when that happens." - p 179

"Jesus wants to save us from religiously sanctioned despair, the kind that doesn't believe the world can be made better, the kind that either blatantly or subtly teaches people to just be quiet and behave and wait for something big to happen 'someday.' " -p 179

"If evil always takes some form of violence, then more violence isn't going to solve anything. But (some people are) addicted to the myth of redemptive violence." -p 87
--> That phrase "redemptive violence" has been a real thought-provoker for me. Is there such a thing? Any thoughts?

-Rob Bell and Don Golden

Jesus Wants to Save Christians, Day Three

"Human history has never witnessed the abundance that we consider normal. America is the wealthiest nation in the history of humanity. We have more resources than any group of people anywhere at any time has ever had. Ever.

God bless America?

God has.

And we should be very, very grateful.

Empires accumulate. And that accumulation has consequences. Blessing and abundance can turn into burdens and curses.

The number of Americans taking antidepressants has tripled in the past decade.

If all of this was supposed to make us happy, why are so many of us so sad? But not everybody is sad. There is another response to accumulations, and it's called entitlement.

In the empire of entitlement, when the fundamental awareness is lost that this is all a gift, luxuries can begin to seem like necessities. Excess can become normal. And it can be very easy to lose perspective on just how much we have."

Rob Bell and Don Golden, Jesus Wants to Save Christians

Jesus Wants to Save Christians, Day Two

"The gathering of the church, in a service or worship or teaching setting, is to remind, instruct, and inspire people about being Eucharist for the worlds they find themselves in. It's written in the letter to the Hebrews that they shouldn't give up meeting together because they should 'consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.'

The phrase 'good deeds' comes from the Hebrew word mitzvot, which refers to actions taken to heal and repair the world. For the writer of Hebrews, the church gathers so that the body will spur one another on to live a particular way day in and day out.

These gatherings aren't the end; they're the beginning.

When the goal of a church is to get people into church services and then teach them how to invite people to come to church services, so that they in turn will bring others to more church services--
that's attendance at church services.

And church is not ultimately about attending large gatherings.

Church is people,

People who live a certain way in the world."

-Rob Bell and Don Golden in Jesus Wants to Save Christians

Jesus Wants to Save Christians, Day One

I was enthusiastically trying to read Matt some sections from Rob Bell and Don Golden's newest book Jesus Wants to Save Christians last night. It was too late at night, I was reading way too much at once, and apparently I was reading too quickly, and so his response was a sleepily dull, "Yeah, that was pretty good." Not exactly the inspired response I was expecting.

And I'd love to share some of the challenging quotes from the book, but I figure sometimes less is more. And since there is a feature on blogger that lets you preset when your posts are going to show, I thought I would break up some of the quotes I have been chewing on this last week. So, today I am going to take a sec to type some passages from the book, and just set them to show up at 4 pm for the next several days automatically. That way, maybe it won't be so much like drinking from a fire hose. :)

And, fyi, if your response is a "yeah, pretty good" one, that's okay, too.

The Eucharist: literally "a good gift". The idea that as Jesus was Himself broken and poured out for humanity as a "good gift", and so His followers are called to be "good gifts" to the world around them. (see 2 Corinthians 4:8-12)

"The church, the Eucharist, says no to religiously sanctioned despair. The Eucharist is an invitation to be the new humanity. To suffer, to bleed, to open the heart, to roll up the sleeves, to have hope that God has a plan to put the world back together, and it's called the church.
In the Eucharist, there's alway hope.
Hope for the poor,
and hope for the rich.
Hope for the bored,
hope for the restless.
The Eucharist confronts its culture with the question,
if we can spend a trillion dollars on a war,
what else could we spend a trillion dollars on?
Water?
Food?
Medicine?
Education?
The Eucharist is about converting all of that ability and energy and entrepreneurial skill and can-do attitude into blessing for those on the underside of power.
Those on the margins.
Those who aren't in the game."
-Rob Bell and Don Golden

Just a Little Baby

Vulnerable. Tiny. Defenseless. Dependent. Needy. Weak. Small. These are the words I think of when I think of my own children, especially those first few days of life in this world. And when I think about the vulnerability of an infant, my own adult mind immediately rebels at the thought of myself existing at that level of defenselessness. There's no way I would want to go back to that degree of vulnerability. Of need. Of Utter Dependence on those around me--for food, for safety, for protection. And during this season of Christmas, it never ceases to amaze me that that is exactly what Jesus did on humanity's behalf. The King of the Universe who breathed creation into existence chose to become an infant . . . along with all the realities that that involves. He chose to experience humanity fully, from fetus to adulthood, without any kind of supernatural "pass" when things got hard. He opted to place Himself in a position of complete dependence on the very ones He created, choosing to have to cry when He was hungry, choosing to feel pain and to know poverty, choosing to be little. What a miraculous picture of humility, of trust, of love. Jesus, Jesus, as a baby.


"The Second Person in God, the Son, became human Himself: was born into the the world as an actual man . . . . The Eternal Being, who knows everything and who created the whole universe, became not only a man but (before that) a baby, and before that a fetus inside a Woman's body. If you want to get the hang of it, think how you would like to become a slug or a crab." --C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

O Holy Night

My all-time favorite Christmas carol is "O Holy Night." I love the music and the words (though there are way too many for me to know by heart.) I think I like it so much because it reminds me of the wonder, the biggness of Jesus Christ's entrance into the world. I think of how little and vulnerable my own babies were during those first few precious days of life, and it fills me with awe that the God of the Universe would stoop to become that. Our family gets so busy during the holidays with parties and gift-buying and baking that I sometimes miss the simple wonder of Christ's birth. I want to not to do that this season.

So, gather the kids around and take a few minutes to watch this compilation from the movie "The Nativity Story" set to my all-time fav. sung by the band MercyMe. Kelty and Cade just loved watching it (several times) this morning.

Merry Christmas! Gotta run, I have 10 minutes to get to Kelty's class party at school . . . (see what I mean? ha ha)

O Holy Night! The stars are brightly shining, It is the night of the dear Saviour's birth. Long lay the world in sin and error pining. Till He appeared and the Spirit felt its worth. A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices, For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn. Fall on your knees! Oh, hear the angel voices! O night divine, the night when Christ was born; O night, O Holy Night , O night divine! O night, O Holy Night , O night divine! Led by the light of faith serenely beaming, With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand. O'er the world a star is sweetly gleaming, Now come the wisemen from out of the Orient land. The King of kings lay thus lowly manger; In all our trials born to be our friends. He knows our need, our weakness is no stranger, Behold your King! Before him lowly bend! Behold your King! Before him lowly bend! Truly He taught us to love one another, His law is love and His gospel is peace. Chains he shall break, for the slave is our brother. And in his name all oppression shall cease. Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we, With all our hearts we praise His holy name. Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever praise we, His power and glory ever more proclaim! His power and glory ever more proclaim!

Woman at the Well

I recently attended a gathering that focused on the power of Story. We talked about how stories have such connection with our human hearts, how Jesus knew that and taught with them, how our media is floaded with the element of Story, and the incredible value of our own--whatever it may be. We talked about how sharing our faith is not a "sales pitch", but just the telling of our Story and how it intersects with God's Bigger One. They showed the following clip of a modern-day monologue from the Woman at the Well who interacted with Jesus as recorded in the book of John in the Bible. She was a social outcast, a woman who had been passed around and used, and a member of a distasteful race in ancient Jewish culture.  And yet, and yet, her encounter with this man Jesus totally transformed her world.  Somehow she found hope and felt love in His knowledge of her story--in all its bitter wounds and its inescapable ugliness.

Once again, its easy for me to forget that the people in the Bible were just that--real people. I love how the media can bring power and connection with that reality. The clip is about two minutes long.

The Passion

For the first time ever, I have actually stuck with reading through the Bible in one year. Now, there are several days when I am reading four days at once and I still have two months in the year to go, but I am almost through it. I am reading in the Chronological Bible, which orders the Bible according to when the writing or events occurred. So, when I was reading about the story of David in the Old Testament, I also read the Psalms he wrote alongside it. The story of Jesus is compiled into one account, as opposed to divided into the four separate books of the gospels. This version puts the Bible into a "big story" perspective which is easier for me to understand, and I have really enjoyed it.

October and November have taken me into the Gospels and into the story of Jesus's final days on earth and His crucifixion. I just finished reading about His trial, the betrayal of His friends, the persecution He suffered. And it was good . . . but I must say, I felt dry, too. I wasn't weeping after reading of how He was beaten, and I wasn't moved beyond my selfish thoughts after reading His plea to love others. But, then, I watched a video clip on YouTube, and it put that Scripture into a whole new perspective for me. The clip is from the movie The Passion, by Mel Gibson, which was released several years ago. Matt and I saw it in the theaters, and honestly, I haven't brought myself to see it again. It is brutal and graphic and raw. Apparently, Gibson did detailed research and made the crucifixion scene as historically accurate as possible. And it is really just tortuous to watch. For me, watching this clip today put real, live flesh on this story I am reading in the Gospels of the Bible. Where my imagination lacks, this scene depicted for me in a realistic, gut-wrenching way. I think because I have heard this story of Jesus's death since I was a child, it can tend to become a faraway, fuzzy, old truth instead of a gripping, life-inspiring, overwhelming reality. Because I wasn't there myself, because I don't understand the Jewish culture, because I have heard it casually talked about in our culture for my 30 years of life, I think I am quite insulated to the realities behind the Scriptures which talk about Jesus's death. In this case, I am thankful for the power that modern media can have.

I usually do not post links to such extreme material, and I totally understand if you would rather just skip watching the clip altogether. I haven't posted the actual video on this blog, because I don't want to push it on anyone. As Matt said, "you sorta have to be ready to watch it"--it is quite graphic. If you want, you can click on the link below, and it will take you to YouTube to view it.

I know that many of you reading this have very different opinions about Jesus, and that is totally okay, too, but I still think we could all be encouraged by the strength, the love, the passion this Man exhibited.

And I will definitely read tomorrow's reading with new eyes.

Here's the link below. The clip is about four minutes. The song is by the band, "Third Day."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5okakANuu7I

Faith and Politics

I must admit, I do not claim to be a super political person. I honestly thought until about a year ago that "global warming" just meant that the temperature would get "warmer globally," which I didn't mind so much since we live in the mountains where the winters are long and cold. I know, I know, pathetic. But, at the motivation of my sister Cassie, I am reading through Tony Campolo's book, Red Letter Christians. It's all about faith and politics. He takes each major issue facing our country and gives some statistics and history, and then he talks about how people can really live out Jesus's teachings practically in politics . . . in a totally nontraditional way. For example, he talks about what it means to obey Jesus's command to care for the poor, as Campolo writes about world poverty and the AIDS pandemic. Chapters include: the environment, Palestine, abortion, gay rights, immigration, gun control, the federal budget, the war, and others. The tone here is definitely NOT the "far right, super conservative, Republicans-only, tunnel-visioned about one or two issues" tone I would assume many religious authors would use in writing about politics. It's honest and far from dogmatic, but gives lots of information about the current issues and offers many Biblical challenges.

Anyway, I would highly recommend it as a good read, especially right now. If you know a lot about politics and world issues, then maybe this book would just be a good refresher course. I can't say I totally agree with everything written in it, but it has opened my eyes to a lot of new ideas. And at least now I can say at least one smart thing about each issue when politics comes up in conversation.

And now I know what the big deal is about global warming, too. Cool. Or actually, no, not really.