why do you think global warming is a hoax?

These are the notes I took from the film “Jesus Camp” that I intend to use for my ecology/reconciliation paper. My question comes at the end of the dialogue.

Levi 12 years old. Home schooled. Parents interested in teaching him things like creation over evolution. A.G. background. Preaches. Evangelical dream boy. Shows cover of science book “exploring creation: with physical science”

Levi’s Mom: one popular thing to do in American politics is to note that the summers in the United States over the past few years have been very warm. As a result global warming must be real. What’s wrong with this reasoning? (A curious and sarcastic) “hmm…”

Levi: It’s only gone up 0.6 degrees. (Mother shaking her head in approval)

Levi’s Mom: yeah it’s not really a big problem is it?

Levi: Nope…I don’t think that it’s going to hurt us.

Levi’s Mom: It’s…It’s a huge political issue—global warming is and that’s why it is important for you to understand…(Levi interrupts)

Levi interrupts: is evolution too?

Levi’s mom: um…not really

Levi again interrupts: creationism?

Levi’s mom: um…it’s becoming one now…what if you had to go to a school where the teacher said, ‘creationism is stupid, and you are stupid if you believe in it.’

Levi: I think they should…wait a minute

Levi’s mother: or what if you had to go to a school where your teacher said evolution is stupid and you are stupid if you believe in it

Levi: I wouldn’t mind that.

Levi’s Mother: you wouldn’t mind it…if you look at creationism you realize it’s the only answer to all the question

Levi: that’s exactly what dad said

Levi’s mom: um hum…it’s the only possible answer to all the questions (eyebrows now raised in a matter of fact expression)

(Later with a smile on the face)
Levi’s mother: Did you get to the part that says science doesn’t really prove anything. It’s really interesting when you look at it like that…(a devious smile that almost looks like she has just uncovered some monumental truth.)

Later again Levi: I think Galileo made the right choice by giving up science for Christ.

75% of home schooled kids are evangelical Christians

For those of you who may have political convictions that lean right, I was wondering if you could tell me why by and large the person typified by Levi and his mother has it out for the environmental campaign. It has become more difficult to stereotype the person who is against environment. In an interview on 60 minutes about a year ago, Ted Haggard, who all of you should know now, was interviewed as the president of the National Associations of Evangelicals. In the interview when questioned about how Evangelicals may have had it wrong, Haggard replied that more attention needed to be given to environmental affairs. All of that to acknowledge that there has been a swing in Evangelicals concerning the environment.

Still my friend Morrow included a quote from James Dobson, which I don’t know how recent it was but it reads,

“"More importantly, we have observed that Cizik and others are using the global warming controversy to shift the emphasis away from the great moral issues of our time, notably the sanctity of human life, the integrity of marriage and the teaching of sexual abstinence and morality to our children."

So to those of you who would consider yourselves this type of conservative, my question is why. Why take this stance? My research for my paper has shown me that this is a Christian issue. So maybe my question is this. Political rhetoric aside, is there not Biblical warrant for us to be ecologically concerned? If so why not take these issues of global warming more serious? Is it money? God knows we’ve blown money on worse fake problems!

Who's in and Who's out?

I have a certain propensity to want to know who is in the kingdom of God and who is not. I don’t know where this comes from. Well…maybe I do. You see in the type of Christianity I was raised with, there were good deeds, which didn’t get you into heaven, and then there were good deeds that were a consequence of your faith in Jesus. The former was meaningless and the latter was meaningful. I like to think about this in terms of epistemology and ontology. You can do ontology, but if it doesn’t have the right epistemology associated with it, it was deemed worthless.

Consequently a critical tenet to the Christianity I grew up with, was that you didn’t get to heaven by being a good person. This was important because it gave us something to start our proselytizing with. The problem with me these day is that though we have our John 14:6’s the verse that my growing up brand of Christianity puts on banners and never lets you forget about, we also have and I think a substantial amount more of the gospel given to verses like Matthew 7:21. Here the issues seems to be that those who think they have correct epistemic notions about Christ, haven’t done will of the Father, what we might take to be correct ontology.

So who is in and who is out?

$1,000,000 night for a mere 13 bucks

This morning I woke up and made my way to the kitchen to pour myself a bowl of cereal. When I got there I discovered that my wife and set out two steaks to defrost…tonight’s dinner. I got an idea. I asked here if she wanted to go out to eat and enjoy a dollar theatre movie. She enthusiastically responded yes and I put the steaks away. I thought this might be a good idea for a pair of reasons. 1. Frequent readers will note that we are celebrating a lot of lasts, so I thought this cold be our last non-Roy date. 2. I took my 3rd of three midterms today and needed an academic break. A night free form school if you will.

All was well until I passed by a fellow student at Truett who asked me if I would be there tonight. “Tonight, I thought to myself…what is tonight,” and then the light bulb went on. I had my Generous Orthodoxy group at Church tonight. I debated for a while. On the one hand I really love our community groups, but on the other I really thought it was important that my wife and I enjoyed our date. So at about 4:30 I called Jon Mark and asked if it would be okay if I ducked out for the evening to which he graciously responded with a supportive yes. Thanks Holly and Jon Mark.

As it turns out Tuesday is a great night for a cheap date. We began our night by intending to enjoy the Pei Wei restaurant. We got there only to take note of the long line standing outside the door. Consequently we opted for Rosa’s where we each got a soft drink and a plate of three tacos, rice, and beans for roughly $5 a piece. We ran into Janine Jackson’s sister Lindsey and her boyfriend Ben and they joined us treated us with some fine company.

Next we made our way to the dollar theatre which only charges a mere fifty cents on Tuesdays for all shows all times brining out date night total to $11. After our movie, “Night at the Museum,” we drove over to Wooded Acres to enjoy $1 scoop ice-cream night at Baskin and Robins. I got a turtle cheesecake scoop on a cake cone and Lindsay got Everybody’s Favorite Candy Bar in a cup. This brought our total to $13.

It was a perfect evening. Now it is 9:48 and I will retire to my bed and enjoy a great nights sleep. And I think to myself, I’m like Tom Scavo, for you Desperate Housewife fans, I’m the guy who has it all.

reasons I don't follow Christ

Dear Jesus,

I’ve been thinking about why it is hard for me to follow you. Why I am reluctant to join in Molmann’s solidarity, Brueggemann’s prophetic imagination or Volf’s self-donation. I know these are excuses, but at least I’m being honest.

1. You didn’t need health insurance. Either one of two things seems to be true about your life. You could just heal yourself not with a couple of vitamin C’s, but rather with a quick “be healed.” Or you had some good reason for enduring the pain and knew it wasn’t time to call down the help of 1,000 angels. You didn’t have to allocate 300 Caesar coins a month for health insurance. That’s more money for the poor.

2. You didn’t need groceries. If you got hungry, you could just steel a sucker from a baby and make 5,000 suckers out of that one sucker. Or you could just throw a net into the Brazos and pull in 1,000 fish. You never worried about making it down to H.E.B. that’s another way to save money and give to the poor.

3. People just gave you donkeys to ride and the state of Jerusalem didn’t require insurance on donkeys. That’s more money to give to the poor.

4. Though Dan Brown was riveting in his writing, I have a felling you didn’t marry Mary Magdalene. If someone broke into my house, I’d love to turn the other cheek if I had the guts, but I’m afraid I’d fear for the life of my child and wife. I’d probably try and hit them in the legs with a baseball bat.

These are just some of my thoughts. Help my lack of faithfulness unto obedience.

Carney

the political landscape of spiritual institutions

Dear people who think Truett is liberal,

Truett is part of the south and when your neighbors are Southwestern and DTS the proverbial Jerry Fallwell and Pat Buchanan, then yes we are liberal.

But in the larger scope of things, namely the more realistic and national scope of things we are far from liberal. In fact we are probably more like John McCain, with a propensity to draw a few socially liberal, yet conservative Rudy Giulianis.

We find ourselves strange bedfellows with certain folk and even work on stuff with the Joe Lieberman’s (the Fuller, Duke, Denver types if you will) every once in a while bringing people like E.P. Sanders to lecture because we think we can learn from people who don’t believe exactly like us, but we are still moderate to conservative.

Liberal I’ll have you know is out east. And if you’ve ever realized that there is more to the United States then the south, you’ll see schools like Vanderabilt the proverbial Hillary Clintons, and Harvard divinity school your proverbial Noam Chomsky. These institutions consider us grossly dogmatic and fundamental. And you well they don’t consider you legit educational institutions.

For a helpful discussion on the relative nature of a fundamentalist see Alvin Plantinga’s Warranted Christian Belief. Just look up “Son of a Bitch” in the index and you’ll find the page.

Your moderately conservative future mega church pastor

Carney

Embrace that I really rather exclude

“God does not abandon the godless to their evil but gives the divine self for them in order to receive them into divine communion through atonement, so also should we—whoever our enemies and whoever we may be.” Miroslav Volf--Exclusion and Embrace p. 23

Can I be honest? I’ve been reading a good deal about a brand of Christianity that I did not necessarily grow up with. It is the brand found in Jurgen Moltmann, Walter Wink, John Howard Yoder, Volf and even Brian McLaren. This is a difficult brand that I don’t want to wear. It is too hard.

It is the brand that notes the miracles and sayings of Jesus, but always keeps them at bay and subservient to the more urgent theme of his faithfulness unto death. This is hard, and in my heart of hearts, I read about Volf’s system and I just want to be one of the godless. They are given grace and that would just be easier. But, by the grace of God, the self in me has not successfully extinguished the voice of the Spirit, even with all the wiles of my white Western life begging to do so, I experience God’s voice calling me to conform to the cruciform character of Christ… and I want so badly to ignore it. But this, the life that ignores the voice, as it turns out is not a life that is worth living.

learning

Today I had the privilege of attending a lecture given by one E.P. Sanders. Sanders is a Methodist who is probably closer to being an agnostic. He has a Ph.D. in New Testament studies with specific interest in Christian history. Sanders is undoubtedly one of the more renown scholars alive today, made all the more poignant by his Professor Emeritus status at the prestigious Duke University.

Sanders lectured on Christianity, Judaism, and Humanism. The lecture was pretty good. I made several mental notes and walked away with a few things to chew on. In short he suggested that the top down system of government (Judaism’s contribution) and the bottom up system of government (Hellenism’s contribution) shared humanistic ethics in common. Yet these two systems promoted competing ideological governmental systems that produced wars throughout the centuries. His example: note the middle ages. The solution to all this, Sander’s says, is that Locke and others mined these two systems for the humanistic ethics and saved us from the religious wars that peaked right before the enlightenment. Hence we got the beautiful world of democracy, and the privatization of religion. A place where competing ideals could co-exist. Bono would have loved it. (at this point if you disagree or are angry, please save your comments…this is not the point of the post)

What struck me about the lecture was this. There are many ways to learn, but the way I learn best is not an environment like this one. Maybe more notable though is who I learn from. With all due respect, Sanders is fairly solidified in what he believes, as I would guess most of us are by his age. He has systematic ways of understanding the world and where he sees a problem he applies what he knows as best he can to filter and understand the problem. Though his answer may not be perfect, it is coherent given the data he has. And yet I find that I learn more through the honest questions that come up in my community groups from believers at all different phases of their God journey. I hear the sincerity in their voices and all the sudden I find myself wondering some of the same questions, be they elementary. They share their stories and their context gives the questions all the more meaning. As the semester continues the pieces of their individual narratives come together and by the end of the semester we find that our community is in the midst of it’s own story of mutual learning. It is here that I find some of my most precious theological gems from the most unlikely of characters.

This is a strange juxtaposition, and yet a powerful one that testifies to the creative activity of the Spirit in the life of the church today.

**this is not to take away from E.P. Sanders. Perhaps he could write the same thing about his own community. He just happens to be the guinea pig that helps this post makes its point.

change can do you good

I come to you tonight from our newly acquired rocker. It is the rocker that Lindsay and I will spend countless hours rocking our baby boy on. I look up and I see Roy’s new shelves, his bouncer, bassinet, almost finished crib, and toys that he won’t be able to play with for at least six months. I am thankful. I’m thankful for all the people that gave selflessly to help us get to this point in so many ways.

Lindsay and I first encountered the thought that follows on the eve of Valentines Day. At some point in the evening it came to our attention that this might be our last date ever as Josh and Lindsay. Soon it will be Josh, Lindsay and Roy. It’s weird for me to not put the “and” between our names and instead a comma followed by Lindsay’s name and then the “and.” And who? And a third person. And our baby boy.

The two of us will become the three of us. Lindsay and I are spending the last moments of what has been an eight almost nine year run of just the two of us. We started dating between our sophomore and junior years of high school. We went to different schools and broke up for a little over a year. We stayed friends during that year and so I think that math goes something like this. Three and a half years of dating, one and a half years of being broken up, one year of being engaged and two almost three years of being married. We’ve made all kinds of wonderful memories. Some of them hard, some of them easy, but all of them good.

And now we are enjoying these last moments of just the two of us. And can I confess that I’m sad. Now here I must be clear. I couldn’t be more excited about baby Roy coming in a few days. He was planned and we are blessed and already cherishing and thankful for him. But this…this is a good sad. It’s like the sad I felt when I said goodbye to my house, land, and lake the week after we got married and ready to move down here. It was a crescendo moment for me. I didn’t cry saying goodbye to any of my family. I didn’t cry saying goodbye to my friends, but I did cry in the foyer of my house as I knew I was leaving for the last time. O sure I’ve been back, but it was a moment that solidified a change. A change that I had chosen and was ready to celebrate, but a change still and change is always hard. I said goodbye to more than just my house in that moment. I said goodbye to my specific orientation towards a million memories. No longer would I reach back to those moments as feeling like that was just yesterday, just a couple of years ago…no I knew that, that chapter had to be ended. That feeling hurts a little and that is how I feel tonight. I’m getting ready to say goodbye to Lindsay and me. Just Lindsay and me.

It is sometimes difficult for me to know what to do with these feelings. One of the most healing things for me at Kyle’s funeral was when Burt led us in the responsive prayer. In an incredible way, in the midst of sorrow, the prayer cultivated a deep sense of gratitude in all of us towards God for all the things that collectively beamed the brilliance of the person Kyle Lake.

And so that is how I end tonight. With a prayer in my heart that celebrates all the things that have been so perfect about these last 8-9 years and in response the chorus of a thousand memories respond to each one of these things with, “we give thanks.”

If I had a million dollars

I don’t know if everyone dreams about winning the lottery from time to time, but I do. I occasionally buy a ticket and I don’t win. I believe that I don’t win for two reasons. I believe that I don’t win because of the incredibly poor odds that everyone has when they buy a ticket. More importantly I think God keeps the money out of my hands because I couldn’t handle it.

In reading McLaren’s book the Secret Message of Jesus, it strikes me that there is at least two (probably more that I can’t see) reasons why Jesus tells us to do things. I should give to the poor. That verse is that straightforward. 1. I should give to the poor because giving to the poor is a good kingdom thing. We can see the kingdom beauty when worried parents are able to feed their children and pay the monthly mortgage because they were given money. That is the literal and obvious beauty. 2. I should give to the poor because it heals me. McLaren writes, “Money, it turns out, is a cruel taskmaster; when you serve money, soon you will resent God for interfering with your humming, expanding economic kingdom.” We (I) need to be delivered from love of money.

Let me brag though. I’ve gotten better. I used to dream about buying lake houses and owning a Jaguar. I’ve heard enough Gideon Tsang to let some of those things go. If I won the lottery…at least I think I would give most of it away. I’d be like Jesus, and invest my money in all kinds of good kingdom things…as my friend Lanny says, “do some Bono shit.” I’d only keep $1,000,000. Who could blame me? After all there are plenty of passages that talk about being a good steward. I could put the last $1,000,000 in a high return account and always have money so that I could use my time for good kingdom activities.

And yet there are those passages that are altogether too costly. At the end of Mark 12, Jesus is observing people throwing their money into the money jar. This type of jar was extra loud when the rich people dropped their large sums of money. Everyone could hear the clanking. Then the poor widow comes up to the jar to drop her money. Her coins are so few and so light that they are barely noticeable. And yet Jesus sums his disciples and tells us, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”(43-44)

Dr. Gloer tells me that this is one case where the English doesn’t do the text justice. It should read something like, “has put in her whole life.” Which is interesting because in one of Jesus’ last comments in the public setting we see the metaphor…the coming sacrifice that will require his whole life.

What this text tells me is that the last $1,000,000 I’d keep to be a good steward is precisely the million that would destroy me. It would teach me never to trust, and it would render me like the ones dropping in the large sums of money to hear it clank. Giving her two small coins the lady probably helped someone in some small way, but what she really did was demonstrate that she pledged her entire existence to the kingdom and that money had no power over her.

This is a hard word.

Grrr....

The only way the whole thing could have been any cheesier is if Meredith would have been awoken from her deep slumber by a kiss from Prince Derrick, and the camera would have ended with the seven dwarfs (led by Doc of course) rejoicing.

a new problem

Some of you may have remembered my post some time ago about evolution and God’s breathing of his spirit on humans at an opportune time. You might have also remembered my good friend Tom called me on my understanding of microevolution and what turns out to be adaptation.

I had a question I meant to ask him and never did, but did get a chance to run by the good people at upsilon beta chi today. I was wondering how this complex part of microevolution or any evolution worked. Let’s say that some people move north and consequently need to develop the characteristic of hairiness in order to be warm and survive. My question was, “how is that the human body can figure out something like I’m going to need to be hairy to survive here and consequently communicate that to it’s DNA in order to change that feature in the offspring and over time change the feature of non-hairiness to hairiness?”

As the good people of from the world of biology patiently explained to me…that is not how it works. Survival of the fittest. It turns out I should have paid more attention in 7th grade biology. For the minority of you who don’t know, it works more like this. Say 100 people move north. What happens is that the 13 hairiest people survive as a consequence of already possessing the necessary feature. When the other 87 die, they must get married by default and have offspring that posses the combined trait of hairiness and hairiness to become a little more hairiness.

For those of you really educated in this stuff, I apologize for my gross oversimplification, but I need to put it a way I can understand it.

I was okay with the formula…God creates through evolution. If God created in a more “poof” and it appears fashion we tend to be o.k. with that because I think we think it matches the form of sovereignty and power we preconceive God to posses. But to say that God creates over time, through evolution seems a little more counterintuitive. Funny question arise like, “Well did God need a trial and error period to figure stuff out?” Enter my good friend Singleton who is sure to remind me about God’s relationship to time. And in the least, I must concede that the Bible communicates that 1000 years is a day to God. So maybe to God the evolution thing seems more like our preferred “poof” thing.

So here is the problem. If the new version of evolution is true, I think God seems a bit more crass. What I mean is this. The whole of the revealed salvation history throughout the Biblical narrative seems to be about grace and often about God’s identifying with the lowly, weak and poor. Take care of the Widow. Leave the extra wheat in the field. The year of Jubilee. Be like a child. The woman at the well. Blessed are the poor. Even if some of it seems impossibly idealistic to us it remains prescriptive from the almighty. So why the exception with evolution? Why if this the best way to do things, does the process champion the supreme? Those who are genetically predisposed to do well?

My wife who is always thinking in a more creative fashion suggested that it might be the mercy of God to design the process precisely the way God did. Perhaps it is mercy to the would be offspring who would be born without the necessary features for survival. I thought that was interesting.

What do you all think?

McLaren anyone?

“This is the scandal of the message of Jesus. The kingdom of God does fail. It is weak. It is crushed. When its message of love, peace, justice, and truth meets the principalities and powers of government and religion armed with spears and swords and crosses, they unleash their hate, force manipulations and propaganda.”

And a few paragraphs later

“what if the only way for the kingdom of God to come in its true form—as a kingdom ‘not of this world’—is through weakness and vulnerability, sacrifice and love? What if it can conquer only by first being conquered? What if being conquered is absolutely necessary to expose the brutal violence and dark oppression of these principalities and powers, these human ideologies and counter kingdoms—so they, having been exposed, can be seen for what they are and freely rejected, making room for the new and better kingdom?”

Brian McLaren, The Secret Message of Jesus, 69-70.

This was a hard teaching for me the first time I heard it. I heard that Jesus was crucified for my sins all my life. But what really shocked me, was when I discovered MLK’s death and passive resistance resulted in following Jesus. I can almost get it though. Christianity has room for something called eschatology. Eschatology is the answer to a lot of theology’s questions these days.

Let’s be honest. If MLK was killed and there was no future hope of his vindication, some might recalculate the worth-whileness of his efforts. Yet we know that we can rest in the comfort of God’s saving grace. How do we stand in front of tanks in Tiananmen Square? By resting in the grace of God. How do we struggle through apartheid in
South Africa? By resting in the grace of God. How do we understand Jim Elliot’s being murdered as a missionary? By resting in the grace of God and knowing that in the end it will all be worth it.

Here is what strikes me though. This will be telling of my eschatology and subsequent belief in the metaphysical—especially of my deep convictions that the cosmic conflict is indeed real—but at some point does the Kingdom of God not have to get violent? After all Satan is going to flare his tail between our metaphorical D-Day and V-Day (resurrection and the second coming) and I don’t suspect he’ll stop until forced to and violently so at that. So what happened? Do the metaphysical principles of the cosmos change at this point? Seems like the Kingdom has to get violent?

Let me be minimalist for a moment. Let’s suppose that God comes before the world burns up and at this point in history there are still people inhabiting the earth. Let’s also suppose that God still operates in this subversive politeness, whereby God overcomes by being passive and all that other good stuff. It seems to me that at the very least he has to tell the remaining people who choose a “soteriological no,” …”o.k. that’s fine, but I’m going to have to force you into your ontological hell (be it a friendly self-chosen isolation type hell), because I need to get one with the Eschaton.” This is still somewhat of a violent action. Is it not? It is at least a forceful action. And it seems to me that it is the type of action that McLaren and others often tend to ignore.

O.K. I’ve said enough, now for your always thoughtful responses.

the secret

Last week Oprah had on a panel of people who participated in the making of the D.V.D. the secret based on the book, “The Secret.” (http://thesecret.tv/) Today she had a follow up show. I have not had a chance to read the book, but think if I get the time towards the end of the semester I may bite the bullet and read it to see what all the fuss is about.

What I’m doing here is inviting you post any thoughts you might have about the book. Is it another folk religion? Is there some truth in it that just uses different language than the major world religions?

One caveat. If by some small chance you are a reader that I do not know and happen to stumble onto my blog and feel compelled to post a comment, please specify your worldview, by that I mean a religion or life philosophy that you practice.

a good fix

For those of you who don't know, my good buddy Shea Butta is in Scottland for a semester to teach em' scotties a thing or two. Consequently he has taken up blogging to communicate with us all back state-side, so check em' out. Link "livin the dream again"

the plight of meredith grey

It was some time ago last year. The only sound for five minutes was the annoying guy who couldn't sit still and was subsequently clicking his pen. Then a bold soul sighs, leans forward and says, “well, if we kill her the show will be immortalized forever, but if we bring her back you will be able to purchase season 3 on D.V.D. at a discount price in five years.”

It was true in Stranger than Fiction and it’s true now.

Looking for a fight???

I shouldn’t even post this, but it will probably help my ratings. I’m by no means a politician and don’t know much about the political frontier and consequently should not comment. I consider myself moderate, but I’m sure both sides could question me, determine my political platform and find much to critique. Anyhow…

It’s recently come to my attention that the Baptists have spoken out against the coal plants coming to the area and elsewhere around the state. First let me say, “wow, didn’t know you had it in you Baptists.” Secondly, let me say I agree. I’d love the money and all the other benefits, but I just don’t think we can afford it ecologically.

Here’s my problem. From my culturally cool progressive democratic rebel friends in my Baptist undergraduate experience I learned that it is/was wrong to legislate morality and that there should be separation of church and state. That is how they eluded the abortion/homosexual problem leveled against them by the college republicans. I began to believe. Though I had convictions about both of those issues I thought and still do that as an American citizen (mind you not as a participant in the Kingdom of God), they have those rights, be they the wrong or right decisions. As time went on and the ethical dilemmas of life did not cease I started to realize that almost no issue is devoid of some kind of moral conviction. Thus I don’t really think we can ever separate religion and state no matter how hard we try.

Here’s what kills me. I’m listening and it’s silent. I do not hear the cry from the left. I’ve yet to hear the screaming from the left about conflating our church and our politics. And let’s not pretend that the good leftist Biblicists haven’t used religion, even concerning their environmental convictions, to back what they believe. And now when there is apparently another marriage in our church/state relationship the left is silent. This leads me to believe that the original argument shouldn’t have been, “separation of church and state,” but rather the more honest, “were pissed because the Evangelicals don’t champion our banner issues.”

As one who considers himself fairly close to middle, I have to award the right a point. At least their honest about their motives.

Waiting for criticism
Carney

A Theology of Celebration on my Birthday

February 13th 2006 was the day I began blogging. It has been one year and a good deal has changed. Last year I started my blog as an attempt to take one step closer to being both emergent and post-modern. I sat in Uncommon Grounds with Shea sipping on mug full of Kyle’s Cowboy Coffee (the only thing my uncoffee appreciating taste palate could handle) trying to find music to become literate so that I could fit in by dropping names like Damien Rice and Sufjan Stevens.

Now on February 13th 2007, I live in a house, am a month from having my first child, and am in my last in class semester at Seminary. I have been a park ranger for 7 months and have even more great friends.

Listening to Gideon’s sermon on Sunday, one thing that caught my ear was his comment about a theology of celebration. I’m going to try and fight the system. So for my blogs first birthday I’m going to offer a personal prayer that embraces a theology of celebration--for this past year.

Oh divine mind (I actually like that opening of that prayer)
I celebrate the blessing of “fun” I find everyday in my marriage
I celebrate that baby Roy is healthy
I celebrate that you provided with me with a job that I love to go to everyday
I celebrate that I am able to go to a school I love and engage you in a meaningful way
I celebrate that my family has their health and that my dad got one positive post cancer report after another
I celebrate the community of believers that Lindsay and I get to participate in You with.
I celebrate my healthy fingers and toes that allow me to do things I love like mountain bike and play ultimate Frisbee
I celebrate that we are able to purchase our house
I celebrate that you’ve opened my eyes to all the ways I’ve been wrong this year
I celebrate the grace that you’ve given that enables me to admit that I am wrong
I celebrate the fact that we haven’t had to pour tons of money into car maintenance thus far
I celebrate your faithfulness
I celebrate that you let me be creative in the way I live
I celebrate that I can live in the comfort of knowing that my narrative is always rooted in the transfinite narrative of your story
I celebrate the joy I have in knowing you
And I celebrate the peace that underscores our life because of the cross

Amen

Central Texas's most ravishing

In case there are any of you who read my blog and not my good friend Craig Nash’s, please check out his blog www.clocktower74.blogspot.com and consider casting your vote for Central Texas’s finest.

Lindsay funny story two

Roy Clemens Carney has been in, what the medical field calls, a breech position for the last couple of weeks. This is not real call for alarm because Dr. Sawyer reports many babies are in a breech position at this point in the pregnancy and as long as he flips by week 36 we are o.k.

Last night we were in bed and Lindsay who has an uncanny sense of motherly things and is usually correct, pointed out to me that she thought that Roy’s head had moved down indicating that he flipped. I responded in my Southern Baptist voice, “that’s because I prayed.” This is in part to express two things. 1. my own arrogance in belief that God is my cosmic vending machine and is just waiting to answer my prayers and 2. The sarcasm of the first motif was cover up the truth of the second--namely the fact that be I a good post modern progressive emergent—indeed believe God is really in the business of answering heartfelt prayers and that prayer makes a genuine difference.

Anyhow, so the whole of my response was, “that’s because I prayed, and when I pray God moves,” to which my wife wittingly responded, “apparently Roy does too.”

She kills me.

The most cheating case of Nintendo computer cheatingness ever.

My relief from the punishment of the world, or at least the stress of seminary, is super tecmo bowl on my original NES.

If any of you grew up in the original NES generation you know all about the computer cheating. It doesn’t happen all the time and usually you can conquer a game if you play it long enough, but every once in a while the computer cheats and the computer cheats bad.

Last Friday I came home from work and played the next game in my Atlanta Falcon regular season. This game happened to be the super bowl. For those of you who don’t know this is how tecmo bowl works. The computer usually does little to challenge your team at the beginning of the season. However, throughout the season the computer gets better until you reach the crescendo of winning the game that will clinch your division. When the playoffs role around the difficulty level usually lessens a little. So having cruised passed the 49ers and the Giants I played the 10-6 Stealers in the super bowl.

I was crippled by the fact the season MVP running back Mike Rozier was injured, but I still had back up quarterback and pro-bowler Hugh Millen and an all star cast of defensive players including Deion Sanders, Tory Epps, and Jesse Tuggle.

Things were a little sticky by half time when I found myself down 14-7, mostly on account of a few computer forced turnovers, but in my fabricated halftime interview I told Stuart Scott that when we play our best football we can’t be beaten and that was exactly what was going to happen in the second half.

I’ll take you straight to the drama. With about two minutes left I’m down 21-14, yet putting together a promising drive. I called a pass play and ran with my pro-bowl quarterback who gets the first down and is subsequently injured on the same play. Now I’m without both my all star running back and quarter back with about 2 minutes to go and 30 yards to drive. Bring in former starter Chris Miller and on the first hand off to Steve Broussard I fumble. Amazingly Michael Haynes comes flying through a pack of about 6 Stealers recovers the fumble and gets another first down. One play later Miller finds Andre Rison in the end zone to tie things up. I kick off and they return it to about the 40 yard line. They make a couple of key plays and get inside their 30-yard line, well inside of field goal range. With about 15 seconds left they kick the field goal. Amazingly I block it. Merrill Hodge who normally runs about 10 second 40 somehow gained superman speed and ran for about 200 yards, recovered the fumble and ran all the way till he was two yards shy of the first down. Great turn over right? Nope, clock ran out.

To over time I go. I win the coin toss and elect to receive. The Stealers decide to kick an onside kick and get it. At about the fifty, furious, my defense drives them back 3 straight plays to about the 42-yard line. Anticipating a punt, I get mentally prepared. Nope they decide to kick a field goal again. What is ridiculous for those of you who don’t know football is that this would be about a 75-yard field goal. The record in the NFL is about 63 yards. I’m thinking even if Gary Anderson, by the way who has and atrocious post season track record, kicks it perfect, it will certainly fall short.

The impossible.

Distraught, I headed to the elite bar and grill to share my woes to my Friday afternoon friends.

family pics

mission accomplished

It is strange how some things can make us feel. Let me share. For about two years now I’ve need two new windshield wipers for my Toyota. They simply don’t get the water of the windshield when it rains.

When we had this ice storm last week, I daily practiced my duty of warming up the cars and getting them ready for use. In the process of cleaning of my windshield I ruined the driver’s side wiper. The jaggedness of the ice pulled the rubber off of the blade. So after about two days of having no use out of the driver side wiper, I purchased a new one at Wal-Mart finding it in one of the those, “let’s make money of some recent phenomenological happenings” type endcap.

Purchasing the right wiper blade is only half the battle. After all you have page through one of the oil filter type books to find the right make and model. I’ve always found these books a bit intimidating. Not because they are actually complex, but more because anything mechanical seems way too technical and overwhelming to me.

The second half of the battle is to actually install the wiper. Naturally after purchasing the wiper I threw it on the floor of my car, having no idea of when I’d actually get around to trying to figure out how to install. Well, in the chaos of my daily schedule, I found myself about 15 minutes early to class one day, so I decided to give it a whirl. After three rounds of not looking and the direction and trying to jam the new wiper on to the old fixture I fell pray to reading the directions. Realizing that I wasn’t even close I implanted the one easy step that was instructed of me by the directions and had a new working wiper in no time.

I guess it’s probably because I haven’t had a wiper that has worked correctly for some time now, but let me tell you how much I love my new wiper. Rain or shine, I always start my drives by giving my windshield a squirt simply to watch my wiper do an impeccable job of cleaning my already clean windshield. And when I do I swell with pride. I have such a sense of accomplishment. In fact I think I would go as far as to say I enjoy this routine moment more than I did watching the Bears/Saints game today. More than I enjoy my mediocre turkey sandwich for lunch. More than enjoy the current Clark Pinnock book I’m reading on Biblical Revelation.

I think we often complain about life’s small hurdles, but I think God throws them in there for a reason. Good Lord, I almost sound like John Piper. I’m bad!:)

who's the funny guy?

Most of you who know Lindsay and me well probably think of me as the funny guy. And for the most part that is true, especially in our more public settings. However, once in a while Lindsay drops one-liners that kill me. Here is an example of the most recent. I was sharing with Lindsay one of my findings from seminary that went something like this.

J: “Want to hear something interesting?”

L: “Sure”

J: “I found out today that the noun used to describe Eve in Genesis chapter two (helper) is the same noun used to describe God’s relationship to Israel. So if someone wanted to use Genesis two to demonstrate man’s authority over woman, they’d have to essentially say that God was Israel’s B****.”

Perfect amount of pause…

L: “or that woman is more like God than man.”

I thought that was funny.

For my more conservative readers, both theologically and politically, namely my family, please excuse the explicit language. Here I think it help drives home a pertinent exegetical point.

2007

I’ve never been one for New Years resolutions, but I have made two. The first is to wear my seatbelt every time I get into my car. For some of you this is like “yeah, well duh,” and I wish it was for me too, that is why it is a resolution. I remember our high school band teacher (pertinent side note: I was not in band, I was too cool for that sort of thing) mentioning that if you do something 30 times it becomes a habit. I hope so.

Secondly, and very un-uniquely I’m going to try and eat healthier in hopes of loosing a few pounds. Because I’m a park ranger most of you know that I have the luxury of exercising substantially 4 times a week on my mountain bike. Turns out that depleted metabolism levels renders that not enough. I’ve half-heartedly tried this in the past, without much success, but I need to change my eating habits. My method is baby steps since I love most of the food I eat and am fairly routine at it.

So far…

Step one- one bowl cereal in the morning instead of two. Success

Step two- switch to skim milk…I can’t really tell the difference anyway. Success

Step three- this is tricky--Blair Browning tells me that by merely switching from a regular to diet soda he was able to drop a good amount of weight. Conversely, my co-worker/ranger Lanny tells me his health experts he reads say they would rather have him drinking regular soda because of its comparative lack of chemicals. My compromise has been to stick with regular Coke, but shoot for only one a day. Kind of success

Step four- Alcoholic beverages on the weekends only or on special occasions. Success for both my health and checking account☺. Success

Step five- fruit and vegetable—mostly carrots and bananas—for lunch every day to fill up on instead of other sides like cookies and chips. Success

Step six- this is going to be my next step. I’m going to try and switch from my usual sugar cereals Cpt. Crunch and Coco Pebbles, to a healthier brand/fiber based crappy tasting cereal. I’m also going to buy some raspberries to put on the top. I’ve seen that in the commercials.

Do you have any suggestions that could be small steps for me, while not entirely turning me into someone who can only eat crappy food?

Life...yesterday

My Christmas reading was almost entirely given to Voltaire’s Candide. At the books end, after enduring many of life’s evils, Candide and the book’s supporting cast of characters end up working on a small farm that Candide was able to purchase. The story is saturated with philosophical concepts, and in one of the last scenes one of the characters asks which fate is worse, the one they have all previously experienced, including rape, being brutally beat, enduring execution attempts, etc. or being board by the mundane activities of their new found life.

I find this question strange when juxtaposed to the attitude that often characterizes the attitude of us (the human race) as we near the end of a vacation, much like the Christmas one a good deal of us just came off of. Most of us can’t wait to get back to the routine of life. We want to get back to our homes, and into the routine of work, supper and our evening ritual.

I think this is right. I think God designed the unfolding of earth and our participation in it exactly like it should be. Work is a good thing. The routine of life is a good thing. Let me give you an example of an extraordinary day in the midst of ordinary life.

Yesterday Lindsay and I went to a church we love, and saw the people we love. Afterwards, we went to Rosa’s with Craig and Jen and the twins. Then home to finish painting Roy’s room. At four Potter picked me up to go to church football only to find out that no one else came. This happened to be ok though because I was pretty sore and Potter and I were able to have the kind of conversation that I tend to treasure. At about 5:00 Lindsay and I left to go to Wal-Mart to pick up some gifts that people had sent to the store from our shower in Tomahawk. Afterwards we went to the Outback Steakhouse and were able to buy two nice dinners for about $20, which was paid for by a gift card that the Seelig’s gave us a while back. And to cap off the evening, we went to the Dugan’s to eat our luscious meal and watch Desperate Housewives, an all-new episode, with our friends the Dugan’s.

I don’t know how a day could get much better than that. It was the type of day that Disney Land couldn’t compete with. And that’s our life.

some pics for my family

Dearest family,
here are some pictures. One of my foxy wife and I at Christmas. You can put this one in your pregnant scrapbook. The second is from our game night last night. Third, our newly painted room, or should I say Roy's painted room. Notice the colors of the quilt. They are supposed to match the wall. Hopefully we got close. Also in the picture are a few items from our T-hawk shower. Notice the “under the water theme.”

love us

Christmas part 2

Part of the Christmas fun for a young adult is to make a trip home over Christmas break and check in with the few friends from either high school or youth group, that you have left in your small hometown of 3,500. Yesterday I made a trip to church (twice) and ran into my good friend Emily and her husband. In our conversation I learned that her husband Josh is now working in California as a director/producer. Natrually I asked him how things were going, to which he replied that he had produced some music videos for MTV. When I asked him who for he hesitatingly answered, “probably a band that you have never heard of…Arcade Fire.” I must confess that if I didn’t attend UBC, I probably wouldn’t have known who Arcade Fire was, but I do and I did. I responded with a good deal of enthusiasm and even hummed the chorus to my favorite and really only song I know.


Come to find out he was an original member of the band, and got out before they were got big. What’s funny though is this. Emily and Josh were married by my dad in our church. Several members of the band were not only in the wedding, but also played a few tunes for it, in our church. My dad a small town pastor in Northern Wisconsin had non idea and could care less.

home

After a grueling 14 hours of travel, I’m home! I find myself in rather enchanting circumstances. I have access to good Wisconsin beer. There is a light dusting of white snow covering most of the ground. The temperature actually requires something other than summer attire, and Christmas music tickles my ears all day long. All the local lakes and rivers are either frozen or near frozen and so picturesque that anyone with a camera could put Thomas Kinkade to shame.

I picked up the local newspaper last night and took in all the insignificant news that would only make the paper in a town of 3,500. This morning I listened to the local radio station, which includes an hour for local residents to bargain their goods, which is brought to you by our local grocery store Nelson’s. I find comfort in the local accent of our states fine residents.

I think I’ll head to town today. I’ll probably run into 15 people I know at the grocery store alone, all wanting to know how
Lindsay and I are doing wishing us a happy holiday. Then I’ll make my way to my house, greet my parents and the neighbors and make a cup of hot coco as I sit on the mantel of the fire place while it warms my back. I look at things around my house from where I sit and they will invoke childhood memory after childhood memory. It will be glorious!

This is the Holy of Holies!
This is Tomahawk, WI!

UnBiblical thoughts that answer theological questions

I remember the first time I heard that Genesis 1-11 might not be trying to explicitly communicate the details of early geological history. Commitment to this tenet soon led me down a road of other theological/geologica/biological/chemicaliological (I can use that word because I almost have a masters degree) conundrums. For example, some sort of Bill Craig’s version of the cosmological argument…God must have been the first cause of something…namely matter. Here is my favorite though. At some point I decided some version of evolution would be all right. After all, my smarter science friends report that microevolution is empirically observable. So the predicament becomes what to do with creation, or at least the Genesis account of the same. My park ranger friend Lanny tells me he believes God created evolution. My recent conversation with my friend Singleton, has shed some light on God and time--though I still won’t commit to timelessness, I think there is something to…for God a thousand years is like a day. Given these I’ve become comfortable (especially with my commitment to O.T.) with a belief that humans have evolved. So in what sense did God create? I like that answer that in the process of evolvement God picked a critical moment in man’s development and breathed His Spirit and consequently the image of Himself on us, which I believed is expressed chiefly through relationality Call me dualistic…call me Platonic…call me NorthEastern…I don’t care. If you want to know where I get this one from--Carney 1:1. Fry that on your Southern Baptist toes—I’m demergent!!!

Chirstmas part 1

Tivo it turns out is a great tool for maximizing your holiday experience. The older I get the more important it is to me to slow life down to a pace that is able to recognize the intoxicating experience of Christmas. Part of this experience requires that I see the right season specials on T.V. This line up includes must sees such as Rudolph, Frosty, Mickey’s Christmas Carol and Charlie Brown’s Christmas. If I’m honest about this, what really matters is not so much these shows in and of themselves, but the connotations that are created when I view them. They take me back to a time that is retrospectively seen as perfect. A time when Christmas was more magical than David Copperfield and David Blaine.

Nostalgia is a powerful thing. I have to tell you about this last Monday though. Part of the Carney holiday experience includes a 1,000 piece Charles Wysocki jigsaw puzzle. So this last Monday, I made my way to Wal-mart, purchased the most comparable puzzle I could find and made myself a fine meal (Lindsay was away for the evening). I put on my Frank Sinatra Christmas album, plugged in the Christmas tree and worked on my puzzle for the next couple of hours. It was heaven interrupted only by the occasional trip to the kitchen to warm my mug of hot coco. This was not a nostalgic night, but rather a connotation creating night. Those don’t happen all the time. Some day I will look back with fond memory on the night where I sat in the cozy first home Lindsay and I purchased with great Christmas music playing, hot coco in hand and more holiday cheer than the laundry soap and I will long for those simple days in Waco.

welcome new comers

have added a few new links. Let me introduced them

AMLBD is an intelligent 6 year old, who has undertaken the impossible task of writing to the world. Some of you might know her father “for the poor” who made a triumphant trip to UBC today. AMLBD brings lots of cheer into our lives. As of this morning AMLBD and I were accused possessing the same level of maturity by “you make it is single-town.” I don’t know if that is a compliment for her or a rip on me…perhaps both.

Roll em’ and I struggled through two classes together this semester. Roll em’ is happily married and lives in ??? Burnett ??? …I’ve never been good with Texas geography. For all of you SBC readers, of which I know I have a lot, she is a remarkable preacher.

Hannah-gun also brings the wisdom of youth to the table. A seventh grader here in Robison, she is a proud Rocket. She owes me at least a story a week and if I don’t get it on Sunday or Wednesday, perhaps I will get it via the internet. Watch out though, she’s got more punch than a 1991 Mike Tyson.

Last and certainly not least is “the best man” who consequently was my best man at my wedding. We’ve been best friends since we were 4 and 6 and lived next door to each other in the Holy of Holies…Tomahawk, WI. “the best man” is currently working his MTS and a sound third voice in my discussions with him and “Princeton-smart” who by the way will most likely be doing a Ph.D. in practical theo. at Princeton starting next. He’s not even emergent…move over Tony Jones.

family pics

Here are some shots from K.J.'s play last week and thanksgiving.

thanksgiving day thoughts

I have two thoughts this evening.

I just looked at a friend’s facebook profile. I noticed that their religious views read: “bible.” I can’t tell you how much that personifies who she is. She is a dispensationalist who believes things, that for some reason, when I read them I get me very angry. I think if I’m honest I could care less what she really believes only the dogmatic attitudes that surround her belief.

On the Bible thing though. This is exactly why I find Karl Barth’s three-fold revelation so helpful. Jesus Christ, Bible, and the proclamation of the Gospel. Sometimes, especially in the western garbage of Scofield’s trash, we elevate the Bible above Jesus Christ himself. We would do well to remember that as sacred as the Bible is it is merely testimony to the true word of God, Jesus Christ.

The second thing. I watched the Family Stone last night, for I think the 3rd time. Each time I watch that movie I’m reminded of why it is one of my favorites. Last night among the many moments I made mental notes of, was the scene when the oldest sister is watching “Meet me in St. Louis.” I think the thematic move here is to symbolize that it is the last Stone family Christmas all together, much like it is the St. Louis’s family last Christmas. What really gets me is that amidst all the chaos, someone is noting that this may be the last Christmas they all have together. I feel like those are the moments in life that deserve a infinite pause. I feel like that same person in my own life. I note the moments over the holidays when I think to myself, “this could be the last when this reality is still present among us.” And then however awkwardly, I try to cherish the moment.

Happy Turkey Day!

God in the..babies!!!

I’ve never been a big fan of any of the arguments for the existence for God, but this is at least noteworthy.

Yesterday on Oprah, which I don’t watch, but which my wife informs me of, they had on a lady who has a photographic memory for sound. I guess this means that she can recite whatever she hears. Anyhow, the story that was shared to substantiate her claim, was that when she was 2 years old, her mother played Beethoven’s 5th symphony on the piano and when her mother had finished, she hopped up on the piano bench and played it back perfectly.

Anyhow, here was what was impressive. This lady did research all over the world and found that there are five fundamental sounds that all babies make to indicate five different needs. Regardless of race, ethnicity, or origin all the babies made the same five noises to indicate the same five needs without any kind of training.

I find this interesting.

The already not yet

we say that the kingdom of God is already and not yet.

Among the many moments, I would like to point out a few of those already moments I've witnessed in my lifetime

1997 SuperBowl
Green Bay Packers 35, New England Patriots 21

1991 Final Four
Duke 72 Kansas 65
1992 Final Four
Duke 71 Michigan 51
2001 Final Four
Duke 82 Arizona 72

And tonight

Cardinals 4 Tigers 2

I think 2006 is candidate for the year of the Carn-Dog.

First I find out I'm having a Roy and then the Cardinals win the world series.

Roy Clemens Carney

More Mourning

The event that I wrote about yesterday has become the third official scar that death has inflicted on me. I’ve experienced a lot of the same emotions that I did when Kyle died. I keep running the scenario through my mind and as Craig pointed out in a conversation we had a week ago, I bargain with God. “Wait that didn’t really happen. God I’ll give you xxxxxx if you just turn the clock back.”

I’ll be doing something during the day and then almost like I’ve forgotten for a split second, the dark reality of what has happened hits me again and I replay the tragic event over. I’ve thought about why Gabriel’s death has hit me so hard. I think it is in part because I know so many precious four year olds in my own life and the thought of that happening to Caleb, Ellie, Calla, Judah, Jack, Sutton, Jude, Avery, or Annie is horrifying. But I think that is how we empathize and enter into situations like that. We ask of ourselves how we would feel in the same situation. I’m sorry if you find that a bit bold, but I’m not in a bull-shitting mood tonight.

I study the problem of evil or more broadly providence quite a bit at seminary. It doesn’t seem to me that any answer really ever satisfies. Maybe that is why Job ends the way it does.

O God where are you now?

Ellie Wiesel located God in the gallows, hanging next to a Jewish boy who was slowly suffocating in a concentration camp.

When I think about Gabriel’s last couple of moments, I don’t see him running towards his death, I see him running into the arms of Jesus. Gabriel ran out the present and into the eternal. I see him doing all the things that four year olds love to do. And then I hear him being called by God. And God says to Gabriel, “Well done thy good and faithful servant. You demonstrated Me to those around you and you brought about joy in those in lives around you especially your parents and brothers and sister. They’ll be here soon Gabriel, but for right now I want you to begin to enjoy Me for all eternity.”

Gabriel knows nothing of our pain. For him perfect joy has just begun.

……interlude of thought……

Every time something like this happens I think the stakes get a little higher for me. I have all my eggs in one basket. Either the resurrection is true and everything about my existence makes sense or it is not and it does not.

Lord I believe, help my unbelief.

I Cor. 15:50-7

50 What I am saying, brothers and sisters,* is this: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die,* but we will all be changed, 52in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 54When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled:
‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’
55‘Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?’
56The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Amen

Dancing to Mourning

Tonight I got a call from my sister (Noel) who in a teary and broken voice told me that my other sister’s (Kristin) best friend lost her youngest child. As her husband was backing out of his driveway, he ran over the couple’s youngest of five Gabriel. Gabriel (4 years old) is with Jesus now.

I don’t really know where to begin with this one. It’s not that my personal loss in this situation is great, I’ve only met the couple once, but as one who is now expecting and increasingly aware of just how precious children and life are, I’m heartbroken for this family.

The other night I was watching 7th Heaven, which though it celebrated it’s last episode ever last season is now again on the air for another new one???, and in the episode Reverend Camden told his daughter Lucy, who had just lost twins due to a miscarriage that, “you don’t get over some things in life, you just get though life and they never go away.”

Someday Gabriel will be raised from the dead. We will all ask with Paul “Where is your victory death, where is your sting?” Until then, we will mourn and remember.

Maybe the best answer I have is this. John 11:35 “Jesus wept.”

Mourning to Dancing

Today I went to Dr. Foster’s funeral. Afterwards I made my way to Kyle’s gravesite. On my way there I realized that two of my soon to be three trips followed funerals. I guess that is because they get me thinking about death, and up to this point in my life Kyle’s may be the most poignantly felt death that I’ve experienced.

Julie Pennington Russell did the funeral and she did a wonderful job. Her message was “The Death of Death.” She pointed out a strange sort of juxtaposition that crossed my mind when Kyle died. In 1 Cor. 15 Paul quoting Hosea asks of death where is it’s victory where is it’s sting. I suppose that, that is a comforting passage and there are times when death is not so immediate, that this is exactly what we celebrate as Christians. We can in a cocky fashion taunt the very thing Christ has defeated.

But as Julie pointed out we cannot lie to ourselves because we know that death indeed has a sting. The day Kyle died, two very dear couple friends of Lindsay and I came over to pray with us. Probably because of disbelief and hurt I didn’t have anything to add to the prayer. I simply needed to hear from God. My one friend opened up the prayer very prophetically and therapeutically with, “Father we confess that death does have a sting.”

These are two tensions and/or perspectives we live with. Dietrich Bonhoeffer is helpful on this point. He had two categories for understanding dialectic truths like this. He referred to those truths that belong to the ultimate and the pen-ultimate. Julie eloquently brought those both together for us today.

So today when I took my trip to see Kyle I did so celebrating the pen-ultimate for the first time. This is the reality to which Kyle and Dr. Foster now belong. So to celebrate with Kyle, I stopped at Common Grounds and purchased a cup of Cowboy Coffee on ice and pulled into the graveyard not with the somber notes of Simon and Garfunkel, but rather with the celebration of Coldplay. I thought about how well I lived my life this last year and thanked Kyle for all the growth he’s help foster in both Lindsay and my lives.

Psalm 30:11
You have turned for me my mourning into dancing

Better than Harris

I’ve voiced this complaint to a few of you, but here it is on paper. So I take time to try and write thoughtful and consistent posts for a week. I get like one maybe two nods over the course of a day or two. Harris on the other hand, basically verbally barfs and posts something with the title “random” and within fifteen seconds has about 20 comments. Wish I had wranglers, a sexy ass, and an aura that screams rugged.

Anyhow that is the same style employed in what follows. Random.

Today Lindsay I went to Dr. appt. number 2. We got to hear the baby’s heart beat. Man that was a trip. The kid is real.

Went to Circuit City to buy the Zoo Tour DVD which is being released for the first time ever on DVD. Found it on the shelf and went to ask why it was priced two dollars higher than I saw it on the internet. Answer…”Oh, sorry that actually isn’t for sale until tomorrow. We just put it on the shelf or people to see. Don’t worry the sale price goes into effect tomorrow.” At least they are finally going to release it. Keep your fingers crossed for the 1997 Pop Mart, live from Mexico City DVD.

I preach a sermon for my class on Wednesday. I’ve been preparing for about a week now. I keep envisioning myself giving it and I keep trying to be like Gideon in my head. I’m afraid this may end in disaster and a bunch of moments where I try and be humorous only to have crowd stare at me blankly. Maybe you could pray for me for that.

Watching Letterman right now. Rupert G. is on. Love that guy.

O.K. I’m finished writing

predictable?

There are about three ways I know of in which open theists suggest that God comes by the knowledge he does have of the future. One of them is through knowing agents who have characters that have become completely solidified and thus the truth value of the counterfactual of creaturely freedom is no longer understood as “might or might not,” but rather as the molonists suggest “would or would not.”

I’ve often wondered how a truly libertarian free agent could ever reach a point where she is completely predictable, but recently I was the subject of a incident that demonstrates precisely just that.

Every morning the last one to leave the house has three jobs. Turn of the Early Show, set the thermostat, and set the alarm. This last Friday I left first, but to be helpful decided to undertake two of the tasks. I turned of the T.V. and made my way to the thermostat. When I got there I added some typical sound effects to my action. By typical I mean that I’ll often add sound effects to my simple duties, but not typical in the sense that I’ve ever added this particular sound effect to this action. Anyhow, as I turned up the thermostat three degrees I offered the onomapopoeia “beep, beep, beep” indicating that the temperature had been raised three degrees. Realizing the thermostat now read 84 degrees instead of 81 degrees I quickly realized that it had already been raised by my wife. Naturally, I lowered the temperature three degrees and again offered my narration, “Beep, beep, beep.”

Now my wife who was in our bathroom clear across the house somehow figures out exactly what I am doing and yells, “I already set the thermostat.” Dumbfounded I’ll peaked around the corner to see if she was looking. Nope, just as I suspected she was still in the bathroom. Somehow, I guess being married for the past two years, I’ve become so predictable that she can tell what I’m doing by listening for my sporadic noises.

Crazy, I figure this makes Boyd et. all’s tenet more plausible.

shot guns and pick up trucks

I’ve been working for the city for about 3 months now. One thing it has done is give me significant insight into the blue-collar community. Growing up I more or less socially scorned them and their practices thinking that they were somewhat Bush league. There is a website where you can type in your zip code and it gives a few words that describe the demographic make up of the area. If you put in 54487, where I grew up, you get the description "shot guns and pick up trucks." Needless to say, growing up in this community colored my experience and opinon. Like all people though, once you know one, your opinion generally changes. I used to wonder why they could all stand around a truck for ten minutes talking about one guys dog story, or about how one guy had to fix his water heater.

The truth is they need community just like we do at UBC. The truth also is, they do community very well. When one of them leaves, they mourn. When one of them gets hurt they get concerned. When one of them gets promoted, they celebrate.

I was tickled and taught by a conversation that ignored radio etiquette this last Monday, as I was patrolling. One of the maintenance guys gave instructions to the other over a radio. Then after about a minute after they had exchanged their have a good day I’m going home dialogue, the one guy comes back on the radio and asks in a tentative tone, “Hey, XXXX, how is your wife doing?”

I learn stuff from the blue-collar folks and if I’m honest I guess I’m one of now. They have a deep appreciation for life. I think they genuinely enjoy a lot of the simple things that I miss. I’ve actually inaugurated, well not me alone necessarily, we’ll say I’ve decided to participate in my own blue-collar practice of late. I meet with a couple of friends for happy hour on Friday afternoons. I hope I get as good at bullshiting about the same seemingly insignificant material. There is something magical about the way they live and enjoy life, and I’m going to figure out what it is.

different cowboy hats

Last night Lindsay and I joined my brother and sister-in-law for some Labor Day fireworks and carnival type fun. It was put on by their church, which is nothing less than what I characterize as a mega-church. I’ve gotten cynical of such institutions, probably because of my post-secondary educational experience. So I went with a bit of skepticism.

When I got there my expectations were disappointed by friendly people, great organization, and a good time. While I was sitting watching the fire works, ignoring the conflation of God and country, I thought to myself, “is this a good mission for a church?” It is a highly suburbanized population that brings in other suburbanized people. I’m not sure that this is anything to be cynical about. After all, the gospel makes no qualification about which people bring the gospel to which people. Bottom line the church is creating a place for families to be, and in the process getting other families involved.

Here’s part of the reason I’ve lost my cynicism of such institutions. My good friend and co-worker Lanny tells me that we all go to cowboy churches, it’s just that we wear different hats. This comment came at the end of a lengthy discussion we had about how dumb we thought it was that they would have a church just for cowboys. I’m mean what’s next, a church for stockbrokers, one for shoe salesmen etc. The conclusion we came to is characterized by Lanny’s statement.

I go to a cowboy church. At my church the cowboys are mostly 18-35 and somewhat cynical about the institutional church. At Antioch, the cowboys raise their hands and have a unique zeal, at Dayspring the cowboys like it sacred and simple, and at 1st Baptist the cowboys like it traditional with ties. At my brother’s church, the cowboys love their families, are deeply convicted about the things they do believe, are trying hard to figure out what it means to follow Jesus, and put a lot of energy into serving their community.

I’m going to try and be less cynical.



On a different note, I’m saddened by the loss of Steve Irwin. I’ve been thinking about why I might care about his death a little more than other celebrity’s. I think Steve embodied a passion that was contagious. I never saw a moment of him on the camera where he wasn’t genuine about his love for his family, animals, or conservation. He was very likable and he will be missed. Thanks for the memories Steve.

satruday afternoon thought

My favorite chick flick of all time is “You’ve Got Mail.” I’m not exactly sure what it is, but I love just about everything in that movie. I like Tom Hanks boat, I love the bookshop, I love Meg Ryan’s apartment, I love New York but most of all I love the dialogue.

I think this is interesting too. Throughout the movie both main characters identify reasons why they couldn’t be with each other, yet at the movie’s conclusion they both find out that indeed they could love each other and in fact do.

This reveals something I’m often guilty of. I couldn’t even count the number of times anymore where I initially judge a person and as I get to know them find out just how likable they are and how wrong I was. Hopefully I won’t get it wrong forever.

confessions of a seminary student

I know that at some point a reformed counterpart will read this e-mail and comment something like, “see you just confessed what we accuse you of. We are completely Biblical in our conclusion.” In the past I’ve asked such people not to comment, but I give up.

Having said that I’m going to tell you how all seminary students (including my Calvinist, dispensational, and fundamental counterparts), come to have a systematic theology. It goes something like this…

Today in my Paul class we talked about Ernst Kasemann’s article on the “righteousness of God” in Romans. Now this particular article and another topic “pistou christou” have been of much interest to me as of late. They both deal with the subjective vs. objective understandings of genitive Greek constructions. This is the first material to really interest me for quite some time in seminary. It’s not that the debate is new only my discovering it.

This is usually what happens in order for me to get excited about any idea in seminary. I have an existing idea of how something should work. Eventually I find that I’m not the first to think such a thing and then the journey begins. For the next couple of weeks you find all of the historical characters in the history of theology that have said the same thing and then eventually you come to the conclusion that you can hold the theological tenet and not be a heretic, or at least if you are going to be accused of heresy you can be such in good company. After this process is completed the idea is chewed and applied to other theological doctrines and then the position is solidified.

In short all thinkers and theologians have presuppositions and most theological journeys are simply about finding data to corroborate those initial presuppositions that one is comfortable with.

My point is this. I wonder how many of us really come to seminary to learn? How many of us really come with a blank slate in search of truth? I don’t think it is as many as we might like to think.

chap stick makes for a good marriage

I think I wrote some time ago about loving your wife more now than you did the day you got married. Maybe I have not. Anyhow, that is the nature of this post. My dad used to tell me that all the time. I never really understood what he meant until I got married, and have now been married for two years. And even now I’m afraid to write that because experience tells me again in 10, 20 and 50 years I’ll think about this post and think to myself that I really didn’t even know what love was at that point in our marriage. For now I’ll just assume that is both true and false and both for good reason.

Well here is my little anecdote that corroborates the above comments. Lindsay I made our weekly trip to the HEB this last weekend. Somehow we ended up in the cosmetic isle and in very Josh fashion I looked at the Burt’s Bees chap stick and commented that I would purchase one if we were not poor. Here I add a couple of qualifiers. First, were not really poor. In fact most days I come home to my new home feeling immensely blessed to have all that we do. The term poor rather, refers to the fact that we are due with our first child in about 7 months and thus need to pinch the occasional penny. Second qualifier. As an undergraduate marketing major and thus someone who should know better, I am a complete sucker for brand imaging. The only reason, if I’m honest, that I wanted the chap stick is because of the following mental process.

“I’m rugged or at least trying to make people think I am. Rugged people are outdoorsy. Bee’s wax is a natural occurring substance. Rugged people are into natural. I better buy this chap stick since I like to be rugged.”

This is the same reason I recently purchased the Old Spice deodorant that has the word “mountain” in the name, ordered Harp beer occasionally and used Irish spring soap until I realized that my skin was too sensitive to use it. You see not only am I rugged, but I’m also deeply Irish.

Anyhow, back to my wife. When we finally got home and started unpacking our groceries, I found a stick of Burt’s Bees.

One of my favorite scenes from Good Will Hunting is when Robin Williams describes the little peccadilloes that make him love his wife. This was not a little peccadillo, but it was a small gesture that made a big difference. These are the small unselfish things my wife does that make loving her so easy.

Necessary Evil???

I first encountered this term in my long over drawn out study of the providence debate. Certainly its use is usually in a much different manner than I intend to do in what follows, yet the premise in a very small way, is much the same.

I think about soteriology quite a bit and probably more so lately because I’m going to re-explore “The Great Divorce” with the good people at UBC this semester. Anyhow, one of the issues that inevitably comes up in the soteriology discussion is heaven…and hell for that matter and their relationship to epistemology.

Here’s my point. I once heard a professor say that heaven is probably nothing like we think it is. For example, my professor loves golf yet he maintains that even if he could play golf for eternity, it would turn into hell. For some reason the one thing I’ve never grown weary of is playing ultimate Frisbee. I get really frustrated doing it sometimes, but every time I get a chance to play I love the experience. I really think that if I had to choose one thing to do for all eternity though, it would be playing baseball. I absolutely love the game. One of my favorite kinds of fun is the feeling of the baseball hitting the sweet part of the bat. Yet if I were to do this for eternity, one thing would have to be true. I would need to have something to work towards. I would hate it if I batted 1.000 ever year I played and hit a homerun every time I batted. What is much more exhilarating is the idea of improvement, getting better. A non-perfect batting average would be a necessary evil if you will for an eternity of fun.

What do you think?

HarryBU

Harris has left. Someone said to me that his leaving definitely feels like the end of a chapter. Somehow they are right. I don’t know what it is about Harry leaving, but it has introduced a strange sense of finality into our lives. We’ll see him again, but still, life will be different around here.

Someone how I was smart enough to anticipate his departure and have treasured the final moments I’ve had with him this summer. I soaked up the few bike rides we did for Friday mountain biking. I remember the few times we were able to play Frisbee together, and I remember all the memories I’ve gained from being with him the last two years.

Harris and Blair B. were the first two people I really talked to from UBC. There have been some other big hitters that have left since I gotten to UBC: Val T., the Evans, etc., but Harry I have known the best.

This reminds me of my post about my Tolkein friends. Hopefully Harry and I will stay in touch, but if I’m honest I’ve only done that real well with about 4 friends my whole life. Anyhow, as my life precedes it will do so marked by Harry. And somewhere in my own narrative I will write in a special character. Maybe Harry’s character will be someone with a relatively small role, but yet largely significant. For you Tolkein readers, Tom Bombadil comes to mind. I think I’d introduce him and then slowly weave him out of the story, till you almost forgot about him. Then, at a moment when the main character me is down and out and probably unable to make it any longer, I’d bring Harry back into the story and have him perform a super critical function.

Harris will be missed.


In the picture we are at Kyle's parent's ranch. Pictured are Ben UBCwaco Dudley, Matt Single Tons of Fun, Me, Harris Bechtold you so, Kyle, and Avery. Harry looks a bit strange, but its one of the few pictures I have with both of us in it.

knee deep in the lakes

This Sunday was a special day for me. I keep bugging Jen Lake to let me hang out with the boys without the 25 UBC girls that storm to the nursery after church to drool over them. Well, this last Sunday, my insider contact (Craig), got Lindsay and I into an exclusive lunch with Mrs. Gornto and the three Lake kids. Life was beautiful. I got to observe them for about an hour. Pure joy, that is what the kids elicit from folks around them.

Then, as if the day weren't already perfect, Mrs. Gornto picked up the tab. I fake fought her on it, like I do most times people offer to pay. No truly it was a blessing, especially since she hadn't really any idea who Lindsay and I were before Sunday.

On a different note, Betsy Dugan shattered her wrist this last weekend in New Mexico. The Dugan vacation was cut short with a surgery that most marathon runner couldn't have endured, but Betsy pulled through and now has a left hand that resembles robo-cop. Please pray for a speedy recovery for her, as there are lots of chocolate chip cookies that need to be baked.

To my friends who are absent this summer...I hope all is stellar.

thanks for the help

thanks moving helpers! We got moved out and into our new home in 1 1/2 hours.

6-5

Tonight I helped out at UBC with garage sale stuff. If I were to have a birthday party, these would by and large be the people that I invited (well at least in Waco). That is the main reason I like doing stuff at UBC. Most things are a good chance to hang out with peeps that I don’t get to see everyday. Craig was not there through. His presence would have made it better. Damn Barnes and Noble.

Our closing date got bumped because the city did not correctly do their job. We’ll hopefully close Wednesday. House stuff has made my life a zoo. I start my new job this week, move and am taking a class.

By the way for those of you who don’t know, I’m officially a park ranger at Cameron Park. My job includes leading kayaking, hiking, mountain biking, and canoeing trips. Pretty much the awesomest job ever.

I’m taking a course in Reformation theology. Pretty interesting. Today I read 60 pages of why Martin Luther really was anti-Semitic.

My reading has slowed down. I’m still fighting my way through the Da Vinci Code. If you want to see a good program on why many of Brown’s tenet’s fail come over and we can watch it on Tivo. Other than that I’ve just been reading a Karl Barth commentary on Philippians for another class I’m taking.

I watched that new trailer on Kyle everyday since Shea told me about it. Man is that powerful. I tried to download a thing on my blog, but all it did was turn my links blue. Hey does anyone know which Coldplay song that is? I would greatly appreciate it if you could tell me.

That is all for now…