Herban Sprawl

So, I guess this is it....

2005-03-01T17:13:00.000+09:00

Which are you - the kind of person who changes around the furniture frequently, or the kind who leaves it the same for years and years? I am frequent-furniture-changer type. And in the age of computers, the same principle crosses over. My desktop wallpaper doesn't last for more than two weeks, and same with the audio schemes. For a while I had a clip of Bono, from the end of one of his concerts, that would play whenever windows shut down. He would say, "Goodnight, and f*** off!" Well, it was entertaining to me, at least until my mother-in-law heard it as she shut down my computer one night. Her subsequent re-evaluations of her daughter's judgement in finding a good man was something I could have done without.

Why do I babble on so? Because I can't bring myself to face the cold hard truth. It is the end of the line for Herban Sprawl. Anyone watching will have noticed he was on his last legs anyway, and would have seen it coming. But it is time for another re-arrangement of the furniture.

Part of the trouble I have with blogging consistently is that I don't know what my focus is, and I don't really know who my audience is. Who am I writing to? What am I writing about? How well do those two fit together?

Don't worry, I know you were getting worried there. I have the solution. A seed don't fall to the ground without a plant growing up from it. When Old Yeller dies, there's always gonna be some puppies. When the earth is destroyed in a nuclear holocaust, there wil always be some randy New Zealanders to get things going again. Anyway, you get the idea.

So yeah, Herban Sprawl is getting born again, reincarnated if you prefer. And he is coming back as twins:

From here on in, if you want to read about what is going on musically with Diana and I as we gig our way around Nagoya and the internet with our new band, go to this page.

If you actually care to know what I am thinking about in regards to the books I read and the theological storms that brew up in there, go to this page.

See you there!

Really?!? Green Tea Kit Kat?

2005-02-17T21:32:00.001+09:00

Really?!? Green Tea Kit Kat?
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Green Tea Kit Kat

2005-02-17T21:32:00.000+09:00

Green Tea Kit Kat
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Daily Dig - Getting Personal by Kallistos Ware

2005-02-10T20:29:00.000+09:00

The whole person is on the one side open to God, and on the other side open to other people. The isolated individual is not a real person, for a real person lives in and for others. This idea...could be summed up under the word love. We become truly personal by loving God and by loving other humans. By love, I don’t mean merely an emotional feeling, but a fundamental attitude. In its deepest sense, love is the life, the energy, of the Creator in us. We are not truly human as long as we are turned in on ourselves. We become whole only insofar as we face others, and relate to them.

Kallistos Ware

Gosh, can I relate to that....

2005-02-10T09:18:00.000+09:00

William Cavanaugh, a friend and fellow theologian, has this to say about Hauerwas' tough nature: "Indeed, of all the great Christian pacifists over the centuries--Hippolytus, Francis of Assisi, Martin Luther King--Stanley Hauerwas is the one I would want on my side in a bar fight."

Hauerwas himself says one reason he so loudly proclaims his non-violent ethic is that others might keep him from killing someone.

and

"I'm a pacifist because I'm a violent son of a bitch." A profile of Stanley Hauerwas

Another mix for your thoughts....

2005-02-09T23:01:00.000+09:00

Ok, here is the latest mix of Hope. What do you think of this one? As compared to the last couple?

Shane Clairbourne of the Simple Way

2005-02-05T19:34:00.000+09:00

This guy is going to be at CMU in Winnipeg in March. There is one reason why i wish i was home in the winter. Don't come across one of those everyday.

I am going to Iraq to stand in the way of war. Thousands of soldiers have gone to Iraq, willing to kill people they do not know because of a political allegiance. I go willing to die for people I do not know because of a spiritual allegiance. The soldiers have incredible courage, courage enough to die for something they believe in. I pray that Christians would have that same courage.

Mr. O'Reilly

2005-02-02T09:00:00.000+09:00

We used to watch Bill O'Reilly on satellite, and this exchange is fairly representative of what I remember of him. You can't say he's not entertaining.

O'Reilly mistakenly thinks that Barbara Boxer calls down Rice on her "respect for the troops" [that's "truth" Bill]. Then he goes on this rant:

CALLER: Yes, Mr. O'Reilly. I just wonder, why we are speaking against Barbara Boxer? I thought she was there doing her job. She was to question Condoleezza Rice on her past performance and her present performance. What she was going to do in the future --

O'REILLY: Well, you're puttin' a happy face on it, though. Lemme ask you a question. Boxer goes in and says, "Your devotion to Bush and your obsequiousness to the administration was more important to you than the welfare of our troops." I mean, that's grossly insulting, is it not?

CALLER: I don't think she did mention our troops.

O'REILLY: Yeah, she did --

CALLER: And you were just talking --

O'REILLY: [Caller], [caller] -- whoa. Yeah, she did. That's exactly what she said. And then Rice came back and said, "Don't you impugn my integrity. I have tremendous feeling for the sacrifices the troops have made."

So, [caller], you gotta understand if you're gonna come on The Factor, and you're gonna say, "Barbara Boxer asked all the right questions and did all the right things." And then I say to you, "What about this?" And you say, "I don't think she did it," when anybody following that hearing knows she did it -- Lis Wiehl?

LIS WIEHL (co-host): Mmm-hmm.

O'REILLY: OK. [Caller], how can we possibly take your analysis seriously? And I'm not saying this to attack you. I want you to call in again. I want you to be a listener. But, I'm trying to send a message out to everybody. If you're gonna call the program -- this isn't the usual talk show where you can just blather about stuff you don't know anything about -- I'm gonna ask you questions. I'm gonna ask you to back up your position with facts. Now, [caller] didn't know about that exchange, which was the most contentious exchange, and played on every news show.

The rough version of that song from before

2005-02-01T09:21:00.000+09:00

Here is the rough version of the song that we sent to the producer friend of mine. Thanks for the comments and emails. They are helpful to me. I was actually kind of underwhelmed by that particular mix, because I didn't think it was very "us". Anyway, listen to the rough version and see if you agree.

Manitoba in the winter can br fun be you know how to take it on...

2005-02-01T09:10:00.000+09:00

Rally the sleds...

Lend me your ear...

2005-01-30T08:04:00.000+09:00

Hey, could I get some reaction on this from a few impartial judges? Just think of it as blogger idol. I need a few Simon Cowell types to tell me what they think. The following is a song of mine produced and sung by a friend, as we work toward a final mix. I won't say anything of what I am thinking so as not to bias you, but if you would, give it a listen and give your reaction. And don't worry about the goofy lyrics at the end, that was just having fun...

And anonymous comments are perfectly welcome, possibly preferred.

Here is the mix.

Fun with video...

2005-01-28T01:27:00.000+09:00

Check this out. The REAL state of the Union

Not too much posting this month...

2005-01-24T22:45:00.000+09:00

As you can see, I have not spent much time blogging in the new year. That is because I have been busying up my spare time, primarily with Japanese study and music. The music busyness is largely in response to some inspiring words from Jen, who said something in an email a while back that reminded me about motives for the music we do. She basically pointed out that first and foremost it's not about the promoting and the success/failure ratios that we can get so used to measuring ourselves by. She reminded me that we do it because we love it, because we just simply desire to express ourselves that way creatively, whether anyone is listening or not. And I think I had been forgetting that, dwelling too much on my space in life and the fact that any sort of typical musician's life just does not fit very well with a 30 year old, and a wife and two young kids, etc etc. But fact is, I still love writing songs and trying to express myself in music.

Songs can be kind of a riddle in which you try to communicate something that you wouldn't say otherwise. It's an interesting comparison with writing a blog, because it is such a different form of communication. I find it really hard to be too open on a blog, but in a song I can reveal things that I would never otherwise tell; though I guess I always make the really important stuff vague enough that I always leave myself space for full deniability...

But even so, once in while I will get an email where someone has heard one of the songs, and really connected with it, and there is no greater high than that. Once a lady phoned me crying and saying, "Thank you so much for writing that, and I want you to know I understand, I so understand what you are saying." The funny part of it is that, who knows, who knows what she understood or if it had anything to do with what I was trying to communicate. But really, who cares. I just loved the fact that it moved her, and that something that came out of me connected so deeply with something in her. I was high for weeks.

So we are going to try some more stuff, keep making music. We are practicing for some gigs around the city, and a friend in LA is working on a mix of one of the songs that has not yet been recorded. Oh yes, it will be an exclusive Herban Sprawl internet release, and of course I am positive I-tunes will be clamoring to add it to their collection. Probably release a special edition i-pod just for this song.

And more inspiration from jen (she's quite inspiring). She put on the trail of video blogging, which I have been finding quite fascinating. It seems that bandwidth could really limit such a thing, but I would like to give it a try. So I will be making a few video blog posts, if I can get over my fear of talking into a camera. Try it some time. You feel pretty dumb sitting there by yourself, looking into a camera, and trying to think of something to say. But maybe we will just sing you a few songs or something. Anyway...

Hmmmm

2005-01-21T09:10:00.000+09:00

DVC00037
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Not something you see everyday on a sidewalk in Winnipeg. But in Nagoya, not such a big deal.

Nicene baby...

2005-01-10T15:07:00.000+09:00

...The Nicene religion of the baby and the cross gives us Christianity without the politics. The Posh and Becks nativity scene is the perfect tableau into which to place this Nicene baby, for like the much-lauded celebrity, this Christ is there to be gazed upon and adored - but not to be heard or heeded. In a similar vein, modern evangelical choruses offer wave upon wave of praise to the name of Jesus, but offer little political or economic content to trouble his adoring fans.

...In the hands of conservative theologians, the Nicene religion of the baby and the cross is a way of distracting attention away from the teachings of Christ. It's a form of religion that concentrates on things like belief in the virgin birth while ignoring the fact that the gospels are much more concerned about the treatment of the poor and the forgiveness of enemies.

Good quote found by Graham in an article in the Guardian.

More from th article:

Nicene Christianity is the religion of Christmas and Easter, the celebration of a Jesus who is either too young or too much in agony to shock us with his revolutionary rhetoric. The adult Christ who calls his followers to renounce wealth, power and violence is passed over in favour of the gurgling baby and the screaming victim. As such, Nicene Christianity is easily conscripted into a religion of convenience, with believers worshipping a gagged and glorified saviour who has nothing to say about how we use our money or whether or not we go to war.

Quake!

2005-01-09T19:03:00.000+09:00

Wow. 7:02 We have got disasters on the brain and now this. I just experienced the biggest earthquake of my three and a half years in Japan. i sat there as my whole living room jumped and the cabinets popped open. Better start checking the news. I can guess this was probably a lot bigger somewhere else...

oh and by the way, from the a few posts back, both friends of mine who were in Thailand are just fine. One was stuck in Bangkok with an ironically lucky sickness, and the other managed to get up the mountain and out of harms way. Another guy who works at the same juku as me was in a boat getting ready to scuba dive. They said if he had been in the water he would have been gone, but being in the boat they just rode a really big wave. Apparently, it was safer being out at sea than on the shoreline.

Update: It was only a four. Wow. I wonder if I will be around if a five or a six ever hits.

Modern day parable of the Kingdom of God

2005-01-09T18:05:00.000+09:00

In Brooklyn, New York, Chush is a school that caters to learning-disabled children. At a Chush fund-raising dinner, the father of a Chush child delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he cried out, "Where is the perfection in my son Shaya? Everything that God does is done with perfection. But my child cannot understand things as other children do. My child cannot remember facts and figures as other children do. Where is God's perfection?" The audience was shocked by the question, pained by the father's anguish and stilled by his piercing query.
"I believe," the father answered, "that when God brings a child like this into the world, the perfection that He seeks is in the way people react to this child."
He then told the following story about his son Shaya.

Shaya attends Chush throughout the week and regular Torah school on Sundays. One Sunday afternoon, Shaya and his father came to Torah school as his classmates were playing baseball. The game was in progress and as Shaya and his father made their way towards the ball field, Shaya said, "Do you think you could get me into the game?"

Shaya's father knew his son was not at all athletic, and that most boys would not want him on their team. But Shaya's father understood that if his son was chosen in, it would give him a comfortable sense of belonging.

Shaya's father approached one of the boys in the field and asked, "Do you think my Shaya could get into the game?"

The boy looked around for guidance from his team-mates. Getting none, he took matters into his own hands and said, "We are losing by six runs and the game is already in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we'll try to put him up to bat in the ninth inning."

Shaya's father was ecstatic as Shaya smiled broadly. Shaya was told to put on a glove and go out to play short center field, a position that exists only in softball. There were no protests from the opposing team, which would now be hitting with an extra man in the outfield.

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shaya's team scored a few runs but was still behind by three. In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shaya's team scored again and now with two outs and the bases loaded and the potential winning runs on base, Shaya was scheduled to be up. Would the team actually let Shaya bat at this juncture and give away their chance to win the game?

Surprisingly, Shaya was told to take a bat and try to get a hit. Everyone knew that it was all but impossible, for Shaya didn't even know how to hold the bat properly, let alone hit with it. However as Shaya stepped up to the plate, the pitcher moved in a few steps to lob the ball in softly so that Shaya should at least be able to make contact.

The first pitch came in and Shaya swung clumsily and missed. One of Shaya's team-mates came up to Shaya and together they held the bat and faced the pitcher waiting for the next pitch. The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly towards Shaya.

As the next pitch came in, Shaya and his team-mate swung the bat and together they hit a slow ground ball to the pitcher. The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could easily have thrown the ball to the first baseman. Shaya would have been out and that would have ended the game.

Instead, the pitcher took the ball and threw it on a high arc to right field, far and wide beyond the first baseman's reach. Everyone started yelling, "Shaya, run to first! Shaya, run to first!" Never in his life had Shaya run to first.
He scampered down the baseline wide eyed and startled. By the time he reached first base, the right fielder had the ball. He could have thrown the ball to the second baseman who would tag out Shaya, who was still running. But the right fielder understood what the pitcher's intentions were, so he threw the ball high and far over the third baseman's head, as everyone yelled, "Shaya, run to second! Shaya, run to second."

Shaya ran towards second base as the runners ahead of him deliriously circled the bases towards home. As Shaya reached second base, the opposing shortstop ran towards him, turned him towards the direction of third base and shouted "Shaya, run to third!"

As Shaya rounded third, the boys from both teams ran behind him screaming, "Shaya, run home! Shaya, run home!"

Shaya ran home, stepped on home plate and all 18 boys lifted him on their shoulders and made him the hero, as he had just hit the "grand slam" and won the game for his team."That day," said the father who now had tears rolling down his face, "those 18 boys reached their level of perfection. They showed that it is not only those who are talented that should be recognized, but also those who have less talent. They too are human beings, they too have feelings and emotions, they too are people, they too want to feel important."

via Scott Williams

One of these cars is not like the others....

2005-01-07T19:19:00.000+09:00

DVC00018
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Can you guess which one is the foreigner's car??

Reading

2005-01-03T22:15:00.000+09:00

I read the bible sometimes and usually when I do, I write thoughts that come to mind down on sticky notes and stick them in the pages somewhere. Now, the sticky notes tend to fall out and I lose for eternity those brilliant nuggets of wisdom, or at least until I find them on the bottom of my sock. So seeing that primarily I use this blog to store things for the future, and that virtually my only readers are Jen, Brian, Paul, and all those people looking for tsunami pictures - and possibly sometimes Steve - oh wait, and Erich, I think, and I know Rachael drops in - anyway, I want to start posting those nuggets here, mainly for me to read in the future, but you guys will see them too, so if you have any "sticky notes" to add, please do...

Ok, so first reading. John 14 and 15.

* The gist of these two chapters to me is Jesus explaining to the disciples just who exactly are really his followers, and it all clearly revolves around love.

* Those who love him are the ones who obey his commandments (v. 21), and his commandment is to love each other.

* In another place Jesus goes as far as to say that all the law and prophets are summed up in the commandments to love (Paul too)

* And in v.21, interesting order. sounds a lot like the open-endedness of 1 John 4:7 - those who obey my commandments are the ones who love me, and then I will reveal myself to each one of them

* Jesus adds that "you can not be fruitful apart from me" (15:4). Acting out in love can not be done apart from God, because God is the source of all love - indeed of every good thing, because God is love. So someone who acts out in love is demonstrating their connection to Christ.

* You see this in Judas question of clarification. He says, in effect (John's Modern English Paraphrase), "Jesus, it doesn't really seem fair that you would only reveal yourself to us in this small select group, and not to the rest of the world. What's up with that (haven't we all thought that!!!)?? Jesus replies, "the world over, wherever there is someone who loves me, you will know it because they will be the ones doing the things I have taught you about(v. 23). Don't doubt for a second that such people are connected to both my father and me. People who don't love me, don't do the stuff I told you was most important. That's what the Father is trying to communicate."

* Matthew 7:21 - "Not all people who sound religious are really godly. They may refer to me as `Lord,' but they still won't enter the Kingdom of Heaven. The decisive issue is whether they obey my Father in heaven..."

* Matthew 7:18 - "A good tree can't produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can't produce good fruit".

*Again, his disciple John echoes this loudly in 1 John 4:7. And Paul in his words on Mars Hill about the unknown god, along with the example of Cornelius, who's prayers and kindness to the poor were heard by God before there was any encounter with Christ. And then Peter in Acts 10:34, "I see clearly now that God doesn't show partiality. In every nation he accepts those who fear him and do what is right."

* In one way these ideas are terribly inclusive - too much so for a lot of conservative theologians. In another way, it is even more exclusive, because love is damn hard to live. It's the narrow path. Selfishness is considerably easier than selflessness.

Whoah. That ended up being longer than I expected. Guess these things still get me fired up...

Happy New Year from Japan

2005-01-01T02:04:00.000+09:00

DSC02235
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

They are ringing the bells and eating mochi. It is 2005 in Japan. I made my way down to the temple actually for the first time in three new years' that I have been here. But that was just for a short walk. Other than that, we spent the evening enjoying the other Japanese New Year's Eve tradition, that of watching grown men beat each other bloody in a fiesta of broken bones or noses. I suppose if I think long enough, I could come up with some sort of spiritual significance to that, but right at the moment, I got nothing. At any rate, Emelianenko the Russian won, and tonight that is all I need to go to bed happy.

Wired article on Bittorrent

2004-12-29T18:48:00.000+09:00

You could think of BitTorrent as Napster redux - another rumble in the endless copyright wars. But BitTorrent is something deeper and more subtle. It's a technology that is changing the landscape of broadcast media.

"All hell's about to break loose," says Brad Burnham, a venture capitalist with Union Square Ventures in Manhattan, which studies the impact of new technology on traditional media. BitTorrent does not require the wires or airwaves that the cable and network giants have spent billions constructing and buying. And it pounds the final nail into the coffin of must-see, appointment television. BitTorrent transforms the Internet into the world's largest TiVo.

One example of how the world has already changed: Gary Lerhaupt, a graduate student in computer science at Stanford, became fascinated with Outfoxed, the documentary critical of Fox News, and thought more people should see it. So he convinced the film's producer to let him put a chunk of it on his Web site for free, as a 500-Mbyte torrent. Within two months, nearly 1,500 people downloaded it. That's almost 750 gigs of traffic, a heck of a wallop. But to get the ball rolling, Lerhaupt's site needed to serve up only 5 gigs. After that, the peers took over and hosted it themselves. His bill for that bandwidth? $4. There are drinks at Starbucks that cost more. "It's amazing - I'm a movie distributor," he says. "If I had my own content, I'd be a TV station."

During the last century, movie and TV companies had to be massive to afford distribution. Those economies of scale aren't needed anymore. Will the future of broadcasting need networks, or even channels?

via Gen Kanai

Tsunami disaster

2004-12-28T09:06:00.000+09:00

The tsunami disaster is hitting home for us here. Two of my friends and coworkers were in Thailand for beach holidays, and as of yet, nobody here has heard anything from them.

Sifting through the reports of the damamge and death, seeing pictures of little children dead in their parents' arms, I'll admit, gives me some real theological trouble. It is almost easier, thinking about God and all that, to hear of disasters involving human evil, because there humankind and all its evil choices are clearly the focus of the blame. But what to do in a situation like this? Just cry and shake your head I guess.

I remember reading an interview with the famous agnostic Charles Templeton wherein he describes to the interviewer the photograph that led to his loss of faith:

"Was there one thing in particular that caused you to lose your faith in God?" I asked at the outset.

He thought for a moment. "It was a photograph in Life magazine," he said finally.

"Really?" I said. "A photograph? How so?"

He narrowed his eyes a bit and looked off to the side, as if he were viewing the photo afresh and reliving the moment. "It was a picture of a black woman in Northern Africa," he explained. "They were experiencing a devastating drought. And she was holding her dead baby in her arms and looking up to heaven with the most forlorn expression. I looked at it and I thought, ‘Is it possible to believe that there is a loving or caring Creator when all this woman needed was rain?’"

As he emphasized the word rain, his bushy gray eyebrows shot up and his arms gestured toward heaven as if beckoning for a response.

"How could a loving God do this to that woman?" he implored as he got more animated, moving to the edge of his chair. "Who runs the rain? I don’t; you don't. He does — or that’s what I thought. But when I saw that photograph, I immediately knew it is not possible for this to happen and for there to be a loving God. There was no way. Who else but a fiend could destroy a baby and virtually kill its mother with agony — when all that was needed was rain?"

That really bugs me.

Wendell Berry, from Sex, Economy, & Community

2004-12-26T16:15:00.000+09:00

...That possibility, though little honored, is well known; its most famous statement is this: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you." I did not include this idea as a precious possession of our civilization because it is not one. It is an idea given to our civilization but so far not accepted.

In times of war, our leaders always speak of their prayers. They wish us to know that they say prayers because they wish us to believe that they are deeply worried and that they take their responsibilities seriously. Perhaps they believe or hope that prayer will help. But within the circumstances of war, prayer becomes a word as befuddled in meaning as liberate or order or victory or peace. These prayers are usually understood to be Christian prayers. But Christian prayers are made to or in the name of Jesus, who loved, prayed for, and forgave his enemies and who instructed his followers to do likewise. A Christian supplicant, therefore, who has resolved to kill those whom he is enjoined to love, to bless, to do good to, to pray for, and to forgive as he hopes to be forgiven is not conceivably in a situation in which he can be at peace with himself. Anyone who has tried to apply this doctrine to a merely personal enmity will be aware of the enormous anguish that it could cause a national leader in wartime. No wonder that national leaders have ignored it for nearly two thousand years.

Erich wins

2004-12-26T13:12:00.000+09:00

Erich wins Christmas Wish Post of the Year 2004.

Silent Night: The Power of Christmas

John's Christmas appeal...

2004-12-25T16:30:00.000+09:00

Just got a merry christmas email from Oleg and Rita in Vladivostok, Russia. It is looking a little chilly there, but it reminds me of home. Like really does. That could be my Dad's farm yard.

Anyway, check out Oleg and Rita and their family. They are two very big-hearted people who live together in a foster-family situation with all these kids in Vladivostok.

I know I have said it before, but in case you missed it, you can help them out with the expenses of helping out all these kids. Just go over to russianorphan.org and give it some thought. There are a few homes being supported through that page. Oleg and Rita's specifically is here.

Merry Christmas from Japan

2004-12-23T09:06:00.000+09:00

Christmas card 2004
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Smile or else

2004-12-23T08:53:00.000+09:00

Smileorelse
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Well, I tried and tried to get a good family Christmas photo for the yearly Christmas card, but after too many tries, this was the best that we could do. So what follows is what happens on Christmas cards when your kids are at an uncooperative age:

See next post...

Vernand Eller from the preface of Christian Anarchy

2004-12-22T10:26:00.000+09:00

Why, I asked myself, did I always wind up on the wrong side of each of the Christian Left's enthusiasms--peace, justice, equality, liberation, feminism? After all, I was supposed to be part of that gang, not an outsider. Yet no matter what was said or implied about me, I knew I was not a "conservative" over against their "liberalism." I was every bit as unhappy with the positions of conservatism as with those of liberalism. So, being neither a radical, a liberal, nor a conservative, what under the sun was I? What other option could there be?

The chapters here following will recount my discovery of the rather easily identifiable but almost entirely subconscious and submerged tradition of "Christian Anarchy." And with that tradition I had found my home and am at peace. All of my battles of the past thirty years now fall into place and make sense. Now I can see a consistency throughout; I knew what I was doing but didn't have name for it.

I really do believe the key was in coming up with the requisite terminology: "anarchy," with the derivatives "arky" and "arky faith." All along, of course, Scripture itself provided the terms that should have led us to this understanding but had not. Its talk of "the powers" would have done it--except that we automatically identified those only as the evil powers we were eager to combat and not at all including the good powers we embraced. Likewise, both with Jesus' "being not of the world" and Paul's "not being conformed to the world," we read them as counsels to separate ourselves only from the world's bad powers and certainly not from its good ones. Consequently, lacking an explicit terminology, even the greatest Christian anarchists--from Jesus on down--have not had themselves or their condition identified in a way that would make possible explicit consideration, analysis, and debate.

Vernand Eller from the preface of Christian Anarchy

Face off

2004-12-21T16:33:00.000+09:00

faceoff
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

And I just love this one so I had to post it....

Christmas photos

2004-12-21T16:31:00.000+09:00

Cuties
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

A few family pics up on Flickr for anyone who wants to see.

The reason that Best Buy seems three years behind whenever I go home...

2004-12-20T22:32:00.000+09:00

ASIAN POP The Gadget Gap

Why does all the cool stuff come out in Asia first?

Christmas song of the year

2004-12-19T23:11:00.000+09:00

Evey year I seem to find a new Christmas song that really does it for me. Couple years ago it was Dave Matthews Christmas Song. Last year it was Sarah Maclaughlan (man, how do you spell that) with Song for a Winter's Night.

This year the winner is Fairy Tale of New York. Track it down, but get the version by The Pogues, not the one by Pilate, which does nothing for me at all.

Erich's Internet Emporium of Interesting Historical Tidbits

2004-12-19T15:37:00.000+09:00

I did some high school history teaching, and it was my college major, so maybe that is why I am interested (I mean other than the fact that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it :-). I tune in at every opportunity for Erich's mini-history lessons. Today's I particularly liked, because it presents an aspect of truth-telling that is rare in the context I come from. Link that to the fact that i think such truth-telling is foundational to True Worship, and you have a post worth re-posting. Anyway, check it out. This guy is all about balance. I seriously wish I could have long talks over beers with him...

World War II has often been called "the last good war." It is so termed because it seems that the good guys and bad guys in this war were obvious. The Nazis and the Japanese were militarily aggressive and, in retrospect, had clear genocidal tendencies (at least the Germans). In addition to that, the Germans and the Japanese seemed to dismiss out of hand any of the rules of war. The terror bombing of Warsaw and Rotterdam associated with the Nazi blitzkrieg tactics clearly displayed Hitler's lack of distinction between civilian and military targets. How could these not be the bad guys?

Well, clearly they were, but the good guys weren't always as good as post-war mythology was apt to say.

Read the rest here.

Vicarious Atonement vs. Christus Victor

2004-12-17T19:39:00.000+09:00

Something I want to read later...

Vicarious Atonement vs. Christus Victor

Herbansprawl sponsored ad...

2004-12-17T14:24:00.000+09:00

I just got an email from Smith, Funk, and Strauss. The "Smith" in that equation was the guy who recorded my whole CD for basically nothing, and to whom I am eternally indebted.

But it is not that debt that is motivating this post. Because the fact is, these guys make amazing music - deep, intelligent, and moving songs that don't leave you sad or bored. In fact, I will post one here for a few days for you to listen to, as of course in return you will all promise to go straight to their website and sign up from what I am about to describe:

They are going to live on the web! January 8th, at 5pm, Pacific Standard Time. These guys have perfected the live event known as a house concert, and this time, you can choose the house! It's ten dollars Canadian (which is like a buck and a half American, isn't it??).

So check it out here.

Update: Hey, and I just wanted to say that, if you would, please spread the word around on this one. I think it would be a brilliant thing if such grassroots, internet-type concerts were to take off. And it seems to me they would fit hand in hand with blogs, in that wonderful place where creativity and expression meet with some of the more democratic opportunities provided by the web....

... and if it goes real well I might steal the idea...

He is not risen, he is here...

2004-12-17T08:48:00.000+09:00

Mahikari claims that this is the last resting place of Jesus Christ. They teach he died on the same day as Yoshikazu Okada (The founder of Mahikari and now considered by them to be the God of salvation for humankind) on June 23rd (May 4th of the lunar calendar), although around 2000 years apart.

...Yoshikazu Okada's claims, that Jesus was of Japanese descent, trained in Japan, escaped the crucifixion, returned to Japan, and eventually died there, and that all Christians have to go to Japan to receive salvation...

Size matters

2004-12-17T08:41:00.000+09:00

"The Hutterites (who came out of the same tradition as the Amish and the Mennonites) have a strict policy that every time a colony approaches 150, they split it in two and start a new one. "Keeping things under 150 just seems to be the best and most efficient way to manage a group of people," Bill Gross, one of the leaders of a Hutterite colony outside Spokane, told me. "When things get larger than that, people become strangers to one another."

via Len

Jubilation

2004-12-16T15:23:00.000+09:00

Jubilation. I thought it was appropriate that this was kanji number 2001 in my textbook. Because that is somewhat how I was feeling. Now I am up to 2042 kanji learned, in exactly the time I had planned. Setting and accomplishing a large goal. New thing for me. Think I will try it again soon. Next project: the rest of the Japanese language...

And quotes from Generous Orthodoxy

2004-12-13T07:51:00.000+09:00

And I sent off my copy of G.O. to a friend but I snatched some quotes from it before I did. So I will post a bunch of them in the days to come. My favorite one first. When I want to note something in a book I am reading, I draw a line beside it in the margin. This one got three lines, and it was just in there as a footnote:

Having read this sentence, you may perhaps better understand why I believe a person can affiliate with Jesus in the kingdom-of-God dimension without affiliating with him in the religious kingdom of Christianity. In other words, I believe that Christianity is not the kingdom of God. The ultimate reality is the kingdom of God, and Christianity at its best is here to proclaim and lead people into that kingdom, calling them out of smaller rings, smaller kingdoms. Christianity at its worst, using the definition in this paragraph, can become a sin when it holds people within its ring and won't let them enter the kingdom of God. Jesus diagnosed the religious leaders of his day as doing this very thing.

And another related one:

In the previous chapter, I suggested that Jesus didn't come to start another religion, which would include the Christian religion. I wasn't kidding. I do, in fact, believe that. That the Christian religion formed as it has is not surprising. It was no doubt necessary and in many ways good, and I know God is in it, and I am in it, too. But "the Christian religion" is neither the ultimate goal of Jesus nor the ultimate goal of God, in my view. Rather, the goal of Jesus is the kingdom of God, which is the dream of God, the wish and hope and desire of God for creation-like a parent's hopes and dreams for a beloved child.

And if your are wanting to reference this and wondering the page numbers, sorry. I scanned the quotes in by taking digital photos of the pages, which only caught a fdew of the page numbers, and so you're just gonna have to take my word on it... it's all in there.

And in the book McLaren points to this article by Joshua Masssey, His Ways Are Not Our Ways. Good read. Kind of a postmodern missiology. Go find out what a Muslim follower of Jesus is.

More from DF

2004-12-13T07:46:00.000+09:00

Dwight expanded on his post from before, and I just want to put it here for later:

Ryan Pettit wrote a thoughtful response to my "Christianity maybe an antichrist" entry of 12/4. He graciously critiques my post, offering seasoned rational for his claims.

Ryan began his response by offering three definitions of religion, these are useful. He stresses his third definition as the most precise, as it positions a person for thoughtful engagement with the religions of the world. Religion, he writes is: "a system of ideas and behaviors that assist participants in relating properly to their God and the rest of the world." That feels pretty solid.

The Second Movement of his response began with the powerful statement, "Religion is your friend, Christian." I returned to his definition of religion, and I thought, "ok, I can mostly buy that." From my perspective in laying out his rational for the Christian defense of religion he almost underscores my initial post.

What is the religion that God accepts according to James?

I want to be clear that I am not trying to throw out History, or Orthodoxy. That is not my intention. We are who we are in large part because of "the great cloud of witnesses" that came before us. To throw out history is to fail to know one's social-self. Anyone who seeks to know God in Christ by the Spirit will find themselves sitting under others who have also walked with God.

If God wanted a religious humanity would we not see signs of religion in the pre-fallen state of the Garden of Eden? Instead what we see is a relationship between God and humanity that is tacitly intimate without need of religion. Or maybe we'd see signs of religion in the New Heaven and the New Earth, here again we see relational imagery in contrast with religious imagery. Our Lord Jesus Christ makes for an interesting study for religion. After all Jesus Christ is fully human and fully God, so if one wants to see what a "religious human" looks like, a Christian will look to Christ; and if one wants to see how God sees religion, a Christian will look to Christ.

Jesus Christ was religious. After all, he was a Jew - a Rabbi. Jesus didn't walk around areligiously, he was thoroughly Jewish, in fact there was no option. This is one of the most important aspects of the incarnation, Jesus was more radically particular than most Western Protestant Christ-followers are comfortable admitting; Christ was born into a social/cultural tradition; he was born to a specific family, etc. Jesus did not magically appear out of thin air he was reared in such a religious context that likely he would have scarcely been aware of his religiosity (certainly not as we think of religiosity today). Kind of like a fish being aware of water. He lived at a time and a place where there were a handful of distinct groups; for our purposes we could say Jews of that day saw two groups: Jews and Gentiles.

So Jesus Christ was a Jew but he was different Jesus first concern was not Judaism; Christ's concern is better described as a passion for His Father, love for one another, and the Kingdom of God. What do we defend when we defend religion?

Ryan's hermeneutic tweaks a phrase I used. His reworking of my statement reads, "[God] wants us to live fully human lives, and that can only be accomplished if we live according to God's instructions." I find it interesting that King David breaks almost all of the Ten Commandments yet he is called a "Man after God's own heart" while the Pharisees of Jesus' day kept all the laws and Christ called them "white washed tombs." So what is God looking for? To suggest that God is looking us to live according to God's instructions may be to miss the point.

Len Sweet, in his own unique voice says, "There is no point to Christianity;" there is only Christ (I hope you hear Trinity when I say Christ). To make a point is to set up an idol.

I loved Ryan's emphasis on Divine narrative. The idea that God reveals Godself to the world through history and that part of the privilege and responsibility of those walking in the Way of Christ is to live into that tradition and pass it on. Of course tradition is never passed on without bias and emphasis; this is why prophetic voices are so important, and why religion can be so dangerous. Religions of any stripe often kill their prophets. The gospel which each generation receives is as tainted as the gospel each generation will pass to the next; this is not a reason to despair or give up on faith, rather, it is an act of faith - it is an invitation to live in the Spirit.

By the grace of God and as best as I am able, I love God; thus I love learning more about God. So I study theology. But I study theology carefully and confessionally, for the study of theology can very quickly become an I/It relationship rather than an I/Thou (see Buber). Christian theology is the ongoing joy of the people of God. After 14 years of marriage I still delight to discover the wonder of Lynette; to see her in new light, to be surprised by the beauty of her love. That's not too far from Christian theology. Theology might be described as the perichoresis of soul, text and culture with the Spirit of God.

In passing on tradition we run into the issue of institutionalization and reification. When I was a preteen looking forward to attending my church's youth group, the youth group decided to hold a youth retreat. Everyone loved it. The next spring they held another retreat. Well, the following year the spring retreat was a given. By the time I entered the youth group the spring retreat had been institutionalized. The group that created the retreat to serve the group was now serving the retreat. This is reification in action. Peter Berger handles this masterfully, "Reification implies that man is capable of forgetting his own authorship of the human world, and further, that the dialectic between man, the producer, and his products is lost to consciousness" (Berger 1989, 89). As a Christ-follower writing to a different audience then Berger was, I would want to stress that Christian religious tradition is not a human creation apart from God. After all, the hope of Glory is that we are in Christ and Christ is in us. God by the Holy Spirit is the unifying person of the social construct we call Christian religion.

Earlier I suggested that Ryan's "Christian defense of religion" might underscore my initial post; let me briefly unpack this. Ryan's defense is one that every human takes. We return to what we think we know to be true because it feels solid. It's a lot like a battered woman returning to her abusive husband; a classic case of our solution being part of our problem. Christ always comes to us and says, "Surrender your confidence in anything but me. Trust me."

God in grace uses this "Balaam's ass" we call Christian Religion. God has used it and I trust/assume God will continue to use it until the great day when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. The day when religion melts away and we see and are seen, we know and are known, and the oneness at the tail-end of Christ's High Priestly Prayer is experienced in fullness.

But until that time we live in the paradox of honoring our traditions while deconstructing them as an act of love. This is a relational move of faith, trusting in the Holy Spirit of God. It is ancient-future (to borrow from Robert Webber), but it is neither ancient nor future – it must be both. And so I am a student of theology, who loves the church of Christ, yearns for the relational reign of God and question all of it to the Glory of the Triune God reveled in Christ and present by the Spirit.

Religion loves rules; Christ breaks them. People rely on religions; Christ bids us to trust him. He invites us to lay down that which we think we can and should rely on to become humble servants, hosting meals of bread and wine to a hungry and thirsty world - not religiously but out of Divine love.

Ryan, thanks so much for the gift of engagement. Midrash is the work of the church, its the process of Orthodoxy; may God continue to give us grace as we wrestle, as we live and as we love.

One more for the Christian Anarchy files...

2004-12-06T08:48:00.000+09:00

Christ trumps all religious systems. Jesus Christ did not create a religion, he lived meta-religion; no religion could contain him. Though he was a Jewish Rabbi, he didn't teach the law, he fulfilled it. When Christ-followers brought Christ with them into the Greco-Roman world Christ transcended Hellenistic religious systems thus Christianity was deemed a threat. The life of Christ is a threat to any system. Just as God's Kingdom is too large for the church; Christ is too large for Christianity.

Christ refused to serve the religious structures of his culture instead chose to serve people, especially the people being marginalized by the religious structures. This is one of the reasons why Christ is killed by religious structures; because Christ demonstrations the failures of those systems. The way of Christ renders the "point" of religion obsolete; Christ makes all religions antichrist… including Christianity.

The "more excellent way" which the Apostle Paul describes to the church in Corinth is Christ's way; it is the way of love which trumps religion.

God has no interest in creating a religion; rather God has always yearned to do life with people who simply live their tacit knowing/experience of Divine love. God does not want Christians; God wants humans. Christ, who is fully God and fully human invites us to live his life. "His life" is life in the Spirit of God.

via Dwight

New keyboard

2004-12-03T17:56:00.000+09:00

It seems to take a lot to motivate me to write something on this blog, but today I got a new keyboard and that is doing it for me. Gotta test this thing out. Ok well, everything seems to be working fine.

Later.

Another good answer

2004-12-03T01:02:00.000+09:00

Ooo. Another good one:

Q. To what extent does a biblical view of God's justice and mercy "drive" your thesis?

A. By its very nature, grace entails that no one deserves it. So, since everyone is a sinner, God could justly leave us all to suffer the consequences of our rebellion. He has no obligation to show mercy to any of us. Synergists like Charles Finney have argued for the accessibility of salvation on the basis of God's justice, but I cannot do so. When God showed himself to Moses, he described himself as "the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness" (Ex 34:6). God spoke his last and fullest word in his Son (Heb 1:2), and in Jesus we see a God so tender and compassionate, so troubled by the plight of people suffering under sin, and so passionate about delivering them from all forms of bondage, that I think we have much reason to be hopeful that God's grace and mercy to sinners will be very great. So the mercy of God is a much larger driving theme in my construct than is his justice.

Good answer

2004-12-02T23:58:00.000+09:00

Good answer in an interview with a guy named Terrance L. Tiessen whose book I want to read:

Q. Some evangelicals will wonder whether your proposal doesn't dull our motive for mission. But much of your life has been invested in missions. Briefly, how do you respond?

A. I am well aware of the concern that the nerve of missionary motivation will be cut if we inform people that God can save people without the ministry of missionaries. In earlier years I shared that concern, and I appealed to people to go and send and pray for missionaries because without that human witness, people would be irrevocably damned. When I came to believe that Scripture did not support that view, I also noticed that the New Testament provides very strong motivation for missionary work without ever basing its appeal on this ecclesiocentric or restrictivist ground.

The good news concerning Jesus is God's ordinary means for bringing sinners into relationship with himself and maturing them in communities of faith that provide a small foretaste of life in the kingdom of God. Evangelism is not just about getting individuals saved from eternal condemnation, it is about bringing into being new covenant communities of people in and through whom God is working to turn back the ravages of sin--personal and social--and to establish his reign on earth. It is hard to overstate the blessing of knowing that we are God's people, who live in his love and constant care and whom he gifts to be a blessing to other believers and to the world. If we really love people and want them to flourish, we will want them to be part of the church and of God's continuing work of transformation in and through it. I believe that we should rejoice in the thought that some of God's elect are among those whom the church, in its weakness or disobedience, has not reached with the gospel, and at the same time be passionate about serving God's purposes for the well-being of those people, here and now. Few things are more exciting to a missionary than the surprise of finding that God has been at work before we arrive with the gospel and that people's hearts are already turned toward God and eager to receive his fuller revelation. Why would it disturb us that God may have saved some of those people, particularly ones who had lived and died in the years before we got there?

Orthodox Peace Fellowship

2004-11-23T22:51:00.000+09:00

I keep running into things from those Orthodox that I like. Might come in handy if I ever do make it to Russia. A friend just got back from Khabarovsk today. Why I am the only one who finds it an intriguing place?

For my future reference:

The Orthodox Peace Fellowship

and article:

Following Christ in a Violent World

And I thought this was interesting in relation to other stuff I have been reading of late:

The state and anarchy: Regarding Romans and "the sword," my New Testament professor once pointed out to me that there are basically two images from the Scriptures that the Church has used historically to describe the state.

The first is the "minister of God" image from Romans; Romans was written by Paul in a time when his citizenship in the Roman government was offering limited protection in his proclamation of the Gospel.

But the second is the Beast of the Apocalypse, a book written during a period of state-sanctioned persecution of the Church, and which regards civil government (the "kingdoms of this world") as irredeemably corrupted by the principalities of "this age," its power as deriving from Satan, not from God.

Historically speaking, the Church has tended to use one image or the other depending on whether the state was assisting or hindering the Church in its mission at the time. One cannot simply point to Paul's image in Romans as if this were the only way to think about the Church's view of state power; in the pre-Constantinian church, it is the image of the beast that predominates when speaking about the state, not the "minister of God" image.

Regarding anarchy: I think it is fairly easy to detect an underlying stream of what might be called "Christian anarchism" within the Orthodox tradition. For example, the Desert Fathers frequently harbored fugitives from the law, to the point that some abbas advocated lying to authorities in order to protect those charged with capital crimes from the very "sword" that St. Paul refers to in Romans.

The coercive power of the state was mostly unenforceable in Scetis, part of the reason the monks chose to settle there, and the early monastic communities felt free to subvert or ignore that power, in part because their view of the state was more like that of the Apocalypse than that of Romans; as Merton once wrote, they saw the entire culture as "a shipwreck from which every person must swim for his life." They refused to identify the enemies of the state as their enemies, heeded no call to arms, and regarded themselves as citizens of no earthly kingdom.

It is interesting to note that imagery from the Apocalypse forms a dominant theme in the iconography of the monasteries on Mount Athos, something you find hardly anywhere else (books have been written on this subject). This imagery represents, among other things, the deep-seated mistrust of the monks of all forms of civic government as representative of the power of the beast, their absolute non-allegiance to the kingdoms of this world. The anarchist spirit of Scetis lives on in Mount Athos through the fact that Athos constitutes a self-governing entity, not under the legal jurisdiction of any state.

Fr. Paul Schroeder
paterpavlos@earthlink.net

2004-11-21T15:40:00.000+09:00

Len points to William Law quote that I will store in my Christian Anarchy files:

It is very observable that there is not one command in all the Gospel for public worship; and perhaps it is a duty that is least insisted upon in Scripture of any other. The frequent attendance at it is never so much as mentioned in all the New Testament, whereas that religion or devotion which is to govern the ordinary actions of our life is to be found in almost every verse of Scripture. Our blessed Savior and His Apostles are wholly taken up in doctrines that relate to common life.

Reminds me of this related quote from a while ago:

According to A.N. Wilson, the Nicene Creed, to which all Christians now subscribed on pain of banishment, notably 'contained not one jot of the ethical teachings that Jesus had once preached...

Now before you get offended because I am using the "a" word again, understand that I am not calling for the institutions to pulled down and for everyone currently in them to leave. I am just saying let's see the institutions as what they are - not something mandated by God, but something we erected in our searching for him. Hopefully seeing them in that light keeps us majoring on Jesus and what he majored on, rather than all the stuff we tried to build on top of him.

Band names

2004-11-21T15:34:00.000+09:00

We are thinking about making a new band, coming up with band names. Whaddya think:

The Pitied Cherries

The Bloody Do-Gooders

Sumi Masen (only people in Japan will get that one)

Any Others?

Update: Actually, that gives me an idea. How about:

The Others

Cute Japan moment...

2004-11-17T14:48:00.000+09:00

I know this kind of thing drives some foreigners here nuts, but I thought it was so cute.

Two kindergarteners sit down beside me on a train, assuming, I suppose, that whitey don't speak Japanese, and start into this little dialogue:

Kid one: Whoah. A foreigner. Scary!

Kid two: Naw, I'm not scared. I'm used to foreigners.

Kid one: Wow. Not me. I'm not used to foreigners.

See, the times they are a'changin. A little.

Toilet humour

2004-11-16T20:33:00.000+09:00

Well, actually he likely didn't intend it as humour, but, hey, he's talking about a toilet. Always cracks me up...

This is the toilet of my home in Tokyo. It has a control panel with some buttons. For what? Well, if I push them after stooling and then a washing arm is sticking out beneath my hips and washing my ass hole. It is a surprising experience.

And by the way, wherever I live next, I will import one of these - at any cost. Yes, they are that life-changing.

Toyohiko Kagawa (the Japanese Mother Theresa) on action

2004-11-14T21:34:00.000+09:00

The religion Jesus taught is a religion of life. People who are fully alive, people who are living strongly, can understand it; but those who deny life, who do not want to live, cannot get its meaning. The God of Jesus is a God of Action. People who stay at home and read their Bibles and pray and meditate, and do nothing for the poor who beg help before their very doors - such people will find the God of Jesus unintelligible. His God is One who is naturally reflected in a man's heart when he has saved even one suffering human being, or lifted up one who has been oppressed. The loveless do not know God. Only when a man has plunged into the blindly struggling crowd and tried to save them from their sins and failures, can he know this God. Only through the active movement of love will he intuitively come to know the God of Action.

Prayer and action...

2004-11-12T20:09:00.000+09:00

We knew that there were many who pray but do not act and many who act but do not pray. But it seemed to us that such people had misunderstood the meaning of both prayer and action. Prayer, for us, was the inspiration for action. "When we prayed, we came into the presence of a Love so profound that it challenged all our plans, opinions and prejudices, and called us to a cause of pure compassion. In the presence of that Love we had to act with love. Because to do anything else seemed utterly absurd. In the presence of that Love we were set free from a preoccupation with meeting our needs for a vocation of seeking peace on the basis of justice for all."

Thus it was, through prayer, we developed a concern for the people in our city. And it was, through prayer, we developed a commitment to the people in the slums. And it was, through prayer, we developed contact with the Kanjars, the so-called "Unclean Ones", that lived across the road...

...We were aware that there was a power that could be released in prayer that could be explained in terms of psychology and sociology. "A self-therapy takes place", Jacques Ellul explains. "There is the giving up of anger and aggressiveness, a validation through responsibility and meditation, a recovery of balance through the rearranging of facts on successive levels as seen from a fresh outlook."

But we were also aware that there was a power that could be released in prayer that was beyond the capacity of contemporary psychology and sociology to explain. Ellul calls it 'the effectual, immediate presence of the wholly Other, the Transcendent, the Living One'.

We knew that if we were to access enough power to break the bondage of our conditioning, so that we would be free to think, and talk, and work towards an alternative future with the community, we not only needed as much "self-therapy" as we could get, but we also needed something "wholly Other" than anything we had ever tried before.

Read the rest of the story about the Kanjars, down near the bottom. It's a good one.

Burger King mug

2004-11-11T09:57:00.000+09:00

Buger King
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

Remember these mugs that would buy at a garage sale for a quarter? Well, they are hip and cool here now and going as collector's items. See that price? That translates into about $250!!

No Longer a Christian

2004-11-10T19:45:00.000+09:00

I was told in Sunday school the word "Christian" means to be Christ-like, but the message I hear daily on the airwaves from the “christian ” media are words of war, violence, and aggression. Throughout this article I will spell Christian with a small c rather than a capital, since the term (as I usually hear it thrown about) does not refer to the teachings of the one I know as the Christ. I hear church goers call in to radio programs and explain that it was a mistake not to kill every living thing in Fallujah. They quote chapter and verse from the old testament about smiting the enemies of Israel. The fear of fighting the terrorists on our soil rather than across the globe causes the voices to be raised as they justify the latest prison scandal or other accounts of the horrors of war . The words they speak are words of destruction, aggression, dominance, revenge, fear and arrogance. The host and the callers echo the belief in the righteousness of our nation's killing. There are reminders to pray for our “Christian” president who is doing the work of the Lord: Right to Life, Second Amendment, sanctity of marriage, welfare reform, war, kill, evil liberals. . . so much to fight, so much to destroy.
Let me tell you about the Christ I know. He was conceived by an unmarried woman. He was not born into a family of privilege. He was a radical. He said, “It was said an eye for and eye and a tooth of a tooth, but now I say love your enemies and bless those who curse you.” He said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.” (Matthew 5: 3-9) He said, “All those who are called by my name will enter the kingdom of heaven." He said, "People will know true believers if they have the fruit of the spirit--love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self control.“

He knew he would be led like a sheep to the slaughter. He responded with “Father forgive them.“ He explained that in Christ there is neither Jew nor gentile, slave or free male nor female. He explained that even to be angry is akin to murder. He said the temple of God is not a building, but is in the hearts of those are called by his name. He was called "the Prince of Peace." His final days were spent in prayer, so that he could endure what was set before him, not on how he could overpower the evil government of that day. When they came for him he was led away and didn’t resist his death sentence.

via Dwight

Brian McLaren interview at Next-wave

2004-11-08T14:38:00.000+09:00

McLaren: Don't get me started on this, or I'll lapse into rant. Let me just say that I'm very very afraid of what's happening in the church in America. I'm afraid we're falling into a warrior trance, where the church baptizes the state or seeks to reclaim a kind of Constantinian power in the American empire. We're not listening to our brothers and sisters across the globe who are shocked and disappointed in our uncritical support of our government. We say we trust in the Lord, but it seems to me that our trust is pretty enmeshed with "horses and chariots" as the Psalmist said. We're succumbing to the politics of fear. We think that because we're pious---because we pray and sing and use lots of highly religious language - that we're immune to this kind of seduction, but it's happened a thousand times in history, and I think we're no less vulnerable. In fact, our wealth and power should make us more vulnerable to these seductions. As I said ... don't get me started.

"The principle of equality kills all initiative."

2004-11-08T11:00:00.000+09:00

How sad that this is generally so true. But within the Kingdom of God, such a statement is patently false.

Jesus and the Non-Violent Revolution

2004-11-05T01:03:00.000+09:00

Think I want to give this one a read if I can get it printed out so I can read it one the train: Jesus and the Non-Violent Revolution.

There is nothing fancy about Trocmé’s approach. With prophetic intuition rather than weighty analysis, he renders interpretations that are both subtle and provocative. His core argument is simple: Jesus inaugurated the kingdom of God based on the Jubilee principles of the Old Testament. These principles call for a political, economic, and spiritual revolution in response Jesus and the Nonviolent Revolution to human need. Jesus intended nothing less that an actual revolution, with debts forgiven, slaves set free, and land returned to the poor.

It was this threat to vested interests that awakened the hostility toward Jesus that led to the cross. Jesus understood the kingdom of God in terms of God’s work in human history; every sphere of life was a domain for God’s rulership. But he saw, too, that such rulership would always cost a struggle. The first Christians, who were charged with seditiously "turning the world upside down," understood their master well. They had caught this vision and begun to live it out.

I am needing to have my memory refreshed as to how and why Christ is central to how I live my life. This looks like just the thing.

John the meteorologist

2004-10-29T14:57:00.000+09:00

I may be bored, or mad from hearing other prairie-types bad mouthing Winnipeg winters (only we are allowed to do that), but I was just spending some time looking at weather statistics. Here are my conclusions:

Calgary: Ok, they can brag a little. Seems winter is not so cold there. Damn chinooks.

Edmonton: Have us by a hair, but not really much to brag over.

Saskatoon and Regina: They got nothing to say at all. Same as Winnipeg.

And before you Vancouverites start getting all smug, check out this one:

January hours of sunshine: Winnipeg - 120; Vancouver - 55.

And here's one for the gang back home. Thiruvanantha, India: January avg - 27 degrees; August avg - 26 degrees. Hours of sunshine, January - 263.

Can get it out of my head...

2004-10-29T11:47:00.000+09:00

U2 has a knack for soundtracking my life, and that latest single has got me again.

It's everything I wish I didn't know
Except you give me something I can feel

Uh huh.

Man, that's well said...

2004-10-26T22:30:00.002+09:00

So elections are being held in America. We’re watching curiously here. Previously, Iraqis didn’t really take a very active interest in elections. We knew when they were being held and quite a few Iraqis could give an opinion about either of the candidates. I think many of us realized long ago that American foreign policy really had nothing to do with this Democrat or that Republican.

It sometimes seems, from this part of the world, that democracy in America revolves around the presidential elections- not the major decisions. War and peace in America are in the average American’s hands about as much as they are in mine. Sure, you can vote for this man or that one, but in the end, there’s something bigger, more intricate and quite sinister behind the decisions. Like in that board game Monopoly, you can choose the game pieces- the little shoe, the car, the top hat… but you can’t choose the way the game is played. The faces change but the intentions and the policy remain the same.

Strong quakes rock Japan, killing two and derailing train

2004-10-23T21:15:00.000+09:00

This wasn't anywhere near us, but it the number of quakes this year is starting to make me nervous. Nagoya is awaiting its own "big one" and we are just hoping that in such an event our old house would hold up. What a weird mental state to live in - any day a huge quake could, no, will kill a bunch of us, and there is nothing to do but get as ready as you can. What are you gonna do? Shikata ga nai, as the Japanese say. Coming from Winnipeg, where the only natural disaster is winter, I am having a hard time with all the time Japan is spending in the news recently. Typhoons, quakes, and even a volcano. What's left? I suppose Godzilla should be along fairly soon.

Joke of the Day

2004-10-22T06:36:00.000+09:00

Q. What's the difference between the Vietnam War and the Iraq War?

A. George W. Bush had a plan to get out of the Vietnam War.

Fight peaceful

2004-10-20T09:56:00.000+09:00

Fight Peaceful
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

That sounds right to me.

Jon Stewart responds to his "Crossfire" visit

2004-10-20T07:33:00.000+09:00

And it's a bit lighter than that previous clip...

and

Jon Stewart 'Crossfire' feud ignites Net frenzy

...glad to a part of the hype.

Good comment

2004-10-20T07:20:00.000+09:00

I'll give my two cents twice in one day. I think a key point is whether God sent Jesus to die like some sadistic daddy or whether God voluntarily chose to participate in the suffering of the world to show us the path of redemption. I believe option B. The truth is that most evangelicals and fundamentalists aren't really monotheistic - They believe in two gods - the Father and Jesus. The Holy Spirit is sort of this extra subsidiary thing they mostly ignore. Anyway, if there is one God who sacrificed Godself, then God suffers with us. Suffering is inevitable, but if we enter into it, rather than avoiding it, then we find resurrection on the other end of it, and God there with us. Conversion is our continuous journey of death and resurrection.

Anyway, that's how I understand it.

I liked that comment enough to track the person down and add her to my newsreader. From Christy.

Solzhenitsyn on freedom

2004-10-17T20:39:00.000+09:00

After the Western ideal of unlimited freedom, after the Marxist concept of freedom as acceptance of the yoke of necessity - here is the true Christian definition of freedom. Freedom is self-restriction! Restriction of the self for the sake of others!

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Daily Dig - Freedom and Security by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

I post this because I am finding it in my life to be very true, when I do it. It is a vital thing to grasp the fact that you are free to do as you wish, but I am finding in so many areas of life, big to small, from eating right to living more simply to making friends in places I normally would not, that it is restricting my own freedom that makes things get brighter all around. Doing that hard stuff that there is no obligation to do in the first place - good things happen there. I guess maybe that's the point of the cross.

VIOLENCE IN CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY

2004-10-16T22:57:00.000+09:00

Yep. 'Zactly. What Paul said.

Brothers in arms

2004-10-16T21:55:00.000+09:00

Brothers in arms
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

I think this pretty much captures how Simon is adjusting to the new little brother.

Whew. That was tense...

2004-10-16T21:24:00.000+09:00

I am used to Jon Stewart the funny guy on The Daily Show. But check him out on Crosstalk. Starts out funny, but, wow, you find out JS is not all humour...

Update: Man, I'm still feeling awkward.

via Gen Kanai

Zahar in Vladivostok

2004-10-14T11:26:00.000+09:00

We are having a great time emailing back and forth with Zahar, the guy we are sponsoring at an orphanage in Vladivostok. This is the first time I have ever done a sponsorship, but I must say there is something really good about the personal connection. The kids we are connecting with are not just a faceless organization (not that that is always bad... but this is good too!) and maybe they are changing us a little as we try to help them out. And the fact that they are just a two hour plane ride across the water means that the hope of us being a little more involved in each others' lives is a very real one. Already some other friends in Japan have sponsored kids there as well. Maybe we will have to make a connection some time in the near future. I'd better work on my Russian...

Why doesn't someone give some consideration to sponsoring Zhenya or Oksana. Go give their stories a read. It would be about $40 a month very well spent.

This was supposed to be a comment...

2004-10-12T09:52:00.000+09:00

Yeah, a comment over at Maggi Dawn's site, but it said it was too long, so I will put it here because I don't wanna just delete it:

That's an interesting post. Good to be reminded of.

Having come from an "evangelical inerrancy" type perspective, these days I often find myself wondering if the power of what the bible communicates would lose one bit of strength if the bible "inspiration-level" were the same as, say, that of the works written by Plato about Socrates. In that case, the strength of the message comes simply from the truth of what was said. And for me, it is the same with Jesus. My faith in him doesn't flow from the idea that he makes an appearance in a divinely inspired book. It comes from just how convincing he was to me in what he said and how he lived.

My concern is not so much "is what the writers wrote inspired by God" as much as it is "is what the writers wrote true" (ie: not propaganda). Because if it is true, then we have a record of the words and actions of a divine being, of what God wanted to communicate to humankind. And therein lies its authority. Not because a council got together and agreed "these books are from God, these are not".

I can imagine the canon could be different by a few books in this direction or that, and it would have minimal effect on our expressed faith. I mean, with the closed canon that we have, there is already enough breadth and diversity of opinion so as to seem ridiculous at times. Closing the canon seems to have had little bearing on what is orthodoxy.

That's why, for me, centering strongly on Jesus makes a lot of sense. I admit this sets up a kind of biblical hierarchy (Jesus first, epistles and OT informing what he was about) but I think that is defensible. To me there is clarity and simplicity of thought and action in Christ that gets muddled or even ignored when we raise things like biblical inerrancy, church tradition, etc. to places of vital importance.

English folks debating about the atonement...

2004-10-12T08:33:00.000+09:00

Blogs can be an interesting way of connecting with things I am sure I would never have heard of otherwise. I have been reading reports about the controversy in the UK over a guy named Steve Chalke and a book he wrote challenging the majority evangelical view of the atonement. That is a subject that always interests me because I think it is one theological point that can have a big influence on our action and expression of Christianity.

I am no fan of a really rigid approach to atonement theology that treats anything diverging from penal atonement as heresy. I mean, the early church had no formal theory of the atonement, yet they seemed to do as well as any of us in being disciples of Jesus. I think that fact points to the possibility that we need to consider and hold a number of theories in tension in order to grasp something of the fullness that God is trying to communicate in Jesus.

From what I heard about Chalke's point of view, it sounds like is putting forth a lot of good ideas that need to be heard. In an article some time ago, I struggled with some of the theology of Christ on the Cross that made no sense to me, and from what I read on Graham's blog, it sounds like I should read Chalke's book; it seems like he is communicating clearly what were just a bunch of muddled hunches for me.

The one thing I don't understand though, and that has a lot to do with not knowing the English context they are in, is why the debate actually arises in the first place. Not that that is at all a bad thing - on the contrary I think it is great that they would all get together and talk these things through. I guess what I would expect to happen would be for Chalke to write the book, get labelled as a heretic and written off by some segment of the evangelical community, and everyone would go on quietly with their lives. I mean, its not the first time ideas like this have surfaced. J. Denny Weaver in America wrote a book full of very similar ideas, and I don't think it even caused a stir (heh, maybe evangelicals just ignored it because they figure Mennonites aren't really evangelicals anyway). And Steve Chalke seems to be quite concerned with remaining an evangelical in good standing, enough so to defend himself vigorously and passionately in a packed debating hall. Rather than just saying, "so what, some people think I am not an evangelical, who cares" he seems to demonstrate that being a member in good standing of the evangelical fold is of great value. Can anyone explain this to me?

Jesus was a Canadian (or possibly a Russian)

2004-10-12T07:54:00.000+09:00

I always figured Jesus probably played hockey...

via Conrad

Jesus links personal holiness to getting rid of your money...

2004-10-11T07:07:00.000+09:00

I wanted to note this passage because it was making me think today:

37As Jesus was speaking, one of the Pharisees invited him home for a meal. So he went in and took his place at the table. 38His host was amazed to see that he sat down to eat without first performing the ceremonial washing required by Jewish custom. 39Then the Lord said to him, "You Pharisees are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are still filthy--full of greed and wickedness! 40Fools! Didn't God make the inside as well as the outside? 41So give to the needy what you greedily possess, and you will be clean all over.

42"But how terrible it will be for you Pharisees! For you are careful to tithe even the tiniest part of your income,[8] but you completely forget about justice and the love of God. You should tithe, yes, but you should not leave undone the more important things.

At some point I should write what it was making me think...

Strongest typhoon in decade strikes Tokyo

2004-10-10T07:04:00.000+09:00

Wow. That one was supposed to hit us, but veered off. Wasn't so bad here yesterday...

Nana-chan

2004-10-09T21:34:00.000+09:00

Nana-chan
Originally uploaded by fatblueman.

So there is the first one. One of my favorite little friends. And just as her shirt says.

direct to blog

2004-10-09T21:17:00.000+09:00

Apparently I can now send photos from my phone directly to this blog by usinf Flickr. I shall be giving that a try. I have thus far been using Phlog, but it doesn't let me put anything directly on to this one. Very nice.

kanji progress...

2004-10-08T18:56:00.000+09:00

By the way, as of today, I am up to 1246 kanji learned. Only around 800 to go. That's eight more weeks. Oh yeah! And then I think I'll learn Chinese after that. I mean, its the next logical step. And Korean too. Yeah, why not...

Uzbekistan...

2004-10-08T18:51:00.000+09:00

There is no such thing as a “quick” hello here because it takes you five minutes just to finish the common greeting, which is spoken continuously and simultaneously between you and everyone else present. The trick is never try to answer their questions. Just continue to say your greeting until everyone stops, then answer the last question you heard and then say, “And you?”. Translated, it goes something like this: “Peace be unto you. (And also with you) Are you fine? How are you? Are you healthy? Is your health fine? Are you working? (or…going? coming? – whatever they/you are doing) You’re not tired, are you? Is your family fine? Are you healthy?…(repeat if not everyone is finished yet)” And the whole thing ends with everyone saying, “Fine, thank you.” “Fine, thank you.” “Fine, thank you.” “Fine” “Fine” “Fine” repeatedly, until everyone finally stops.

from Top 10 Absurdities (so far)
By Dee Warren on Uzbekistan

I so completely agree...

2004-10-08T18:40:00.000+09:00

So well said Junicus. Today I am walking around in the rain in a t-shirt to celebrate.

In Canada, relief came when spring showed it's face. The snow melts, revealing the smell of bark and brown grass. It's only 10 degrees, but you feel like wearing shorts. Or if you're like me, you feel like stripping naked, and running wildly through the streets with a huge smile on your face because you can feel warm sunshine on your skin.

In Japan, relief comes now. After 5 months of humidity so bad you feel like taking a second shower an hour after the first; where a perpetual layer of grease is everpresent on your face. I carry around a cloth for the sole purpose of wiping the dripping sweat off my face and neck.
I still feel like stripping naked, but not to feel the sun. Instead I want to feel the wind. I want every pore to become a goosebump, and feel chilled to the bone. I never thought it would feel so good to be cold.

Just when I thought I had found a healthy fast food...

2004-10-07T15:12:00.000+09:00

Gen Kanai says don't eat cheap sushi. So much for my trips to Atom Boy...

Just some things I wanted to file for the future...

2004-10-06T14:15:00.000+09:00

Chris Smith's Doulous Christou Books

and

Declaration of Sentiments adopted by the Peace Convention, 1838

Natasha Bedingfield. These Words.

2004-09-27T22:07:00.000+09:00

Natasha Bedingfield. These Words. I heard it on the radio. I know it is kind of candy pop, but she talks in the lyrics about writing a killer hook... I think that "I love you, I love you" part is a killer hook. Bravo.

Last FM

2004-09-26T16:30:00.000+09:00

From Joi Ito. Sounds like a good idea. I'll try it... but for now I can't access the website...

Last.fm has been around for awhile now and they've even been covered in Wired so many of you may already know about them. It is a music site based on collaborative filtering. Using one of the many Audioscrobbler plugins, you can set your music player to upload the titles of the music you are playing to their site. This starts to create your profile. You can also go to the site and browse songs and artists and add them to your profile. It will recommend similar artists and also show other fans of those artists. You can browse the profiles of those fans as well. Eventually, you will have enough songs in your profile for it to calculate your neighborhood. These are other members with similar taste. It's quite uncanny how similar some people's taste in music can be. You can visit these people, see what they are listening to, send them messages or add them as friends.

Wendell Berry - The Failure of War

2004-09-24T20:06:00.000+09:00

Obviously, we would be less absurd if we took better care of things. We would be less absurd if we founded our public policies upon an honest description of our needs and our predicament, rather than upon fantastical descriptions of our wishes. We would be less absurd if our leaders would consider in good faith the proven alternatives to violence.

Such things are easy to say, but we are disposed, somewhat by culture and somewhat by nature, to solve our problems by violence, and even to enjoy doing so. And yet by now all of us must at least have suspected that our right to live, to be free, and to be at peace is not guaranteed by any act of violence. It can be guaranteed only by our willingness that all other persons should live, be free, and be at peace—and by our willingness to use or give our own lives to make that possible. To be incapable of such willingness is merely to resign ourselves to the absurdity we are in; and yet, if you are like me, you are unsure to what extent you are capable of it.

Here is the other question that I have been leading toward, one that the predicament of modern warfare forces upon us: How many deaths of other people’s children by bombing or starvation are we willing to accept in order that we may be free, affluent, and (supposedly) at peace? To that question I answer: None. Please, no children. Don’t kill any children for my benefit.

If that is your answer too, then you must know that we have not come to rest, far from it. For surely we must feel ourselves swarmed about with more questions that are urgent, personal, and intimidating. But perhaps also we feel ourselves beginning to be free, facing at last in our own selves the greatest challenge ever laid before us, the most comprehensive vision of human progress, the best advice, and the least obeyed:

"Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."

via Paul Fromont

The Daily Show's Steven Colbert - Media Culpa

2004-09-24T18:58:00.000+09:00

Dan Rather is the head, the Commander-in-Chief if you will of his organization. He is someone in an ultimate position of power who made a harmful decision based upon questionable evidence. Then to make things worse, he stubbornly refused to admit his mistake, choosing instead to "stay the course" and essentially "occupy" this story for too long. This man has got to go!!!

Small is Better?

2004-09-24T13:29:00.000+09:00

Napster allowed people to hear what they are going to buy before they buy it. The result is that good indie records are selling more copies, and bad major-label records are selling less.
...
Despite what the RIAA would have you believe, the shifts the industry has witnessed haven’t been a matter of quantity so much as they’ve been a matter of quality. People are making their purchasing decisions less on the basis of hype and blind faith, and more on the basis of what they actually enjoy listening to.

And that has really screwed up the trend-driven marketplace it took the major labels more than 40 years to perfect.

LA Weekly article via Gen Kanai

Fun with home videos...

2004-09-23T10:35:00.000+09:00

If you are interested, and have the time and bandwidth, check out Simon's first music video. We got a new toy a little while back (camcorder) and have been having some fun with it.

But it is big (about 30mb) so if you want to see it, better right-click and choose "save target as".

Minn. Trooper Writes 205 Mph Ticket

2004-09-22T22:48:00.000+09:00

Man, I remember those days. Cople bored young guys on an empty prairie road. Except in our town the coffee-shop-cop gossip was that the fastest they ever clocked was 160mph. Said they didn't even chase. No chance of catching something going that fast. But 205... wow... I mean wow, that's stupid. But, maybe that's 20 years old a lot of times too. Used to think I was invincible too. Only took nine years to convince me of my vincibility.

A Conspiracy of Cordiality

2004-09-22T22:45:00.000+09:00

What we call "church" is too often a gathering of strangers who see the church as yet another "helping institution" to gratify further their individual desires. One of the reasons some church members are so mean-spirited with their pastor, particularly when the pastor urges them to look at God, is that they feel deceived by such pastoral invitations to look beyond themselves. They have come to church for "strokes," to have their personal needs met. What we call church is often a conspiracy of cordiality. Pastors learn to pacify rather than preach to their Ananiases and Sapphiras. We say we do it out of "love." Usually, we do it as a means of keeping everyone as distant from everyone else as possible. You don’t get into my life and I will not get into yours.

Stanley Hauerwas in Resident Alien from the Daily Dig

Temperature tops 30 C in Tokyo for annual record 68 days

2004-09-22T06:27:00.000+09:00

I know at home they had one of the coldest summers on record, but after this many days of this kind of heat, a cold summer doesn't sound too bad to me. And it's still not over. Yesterday was still hot and humid. We will see what today brings.

Do you speak English? Or American?

2004-09-20T08:36:00.000+09:00

A list of words that Brits say that we don't. Especially important knowledge for living in an environment that mixes English speakers from all over, like we have here. I met a friend of mine from the UK who I hadn't seen in a while. Asked him what he was up to and he said he had changed jobs from the company we both used to work for. Why? He told me that he had been "pinched". I start freaking out, imploring him for the details of this apparent sexual harrassment. He says, No, no. "Pinched". Means stolen. A student from another company offered him a better job and thus "stole" him away.

Right. Gotcha. hehe.

Micah's pics

2004-09-20T08:07:00.000+09:00

A few more pictures of McJunior over at the Phlog. I figure it is my job to think up every strange variation of his name before the kids at school do.

The importance of detachment from things

2004-09-19T17:21:00.000+09:00

"The importance of detachment from things, the importance of poverty, is that we are supposed to be free from things that we might prefer to people. Wherever things have become more important than people, we are in trouble. That is the crux of the whole matter."

Thomas Merton

The Daily Dig via Mike

Coco in Tokyo

2004-09-19T17:02:00.000+09:00

Just reading this blog by a girl who grew up in Canada, but is Japanese and now living in Tokyo. Her entry describes something who encounter quite a lot here, the notion among many that if you have lived outside of Japan for a time and then come back, you are not quite the real deal anymore:

Being returnee is often considered as plus. Language, perspective or etc. but actually in Japan, returnee is not treated as 100% Japanese. We returnees are called "Gaijin" (means foreigner) often. When I can not read some Kanji, when me and someone Japanese have different opinion, when I tell Japanese I rarely have miso soup or not owning rice cooker, they say "you are returnee/gaijin". However there are many Japanese who can't read Kanji, have different opinion or not like miso soup or steamed white rice, only people who have 100% Japanese parents and born in/grown up in Japanese are treated as Japanese. Many of Japanese people refuse mutual understanding with returnee. It is sad. or is it only happening to me?
On the other hand, the country I was born Canada is not my country either. However I still keep Canadian citizenship, I am a foreigner there. I'm Japanese in overseas, I am not Japanese in Japan. I am foreigner in everywhere. Permanent solitude.

I have been here over three years altogether now, so I am quite used to the feeling of always being a foreigner, always being "visible". But some people hate it a lot more than I do. I suspect those are the people who don't stay here very long. But being from here and feeling like that might be tough.

Japanese volcano calmer after five straight day of eruptions

2004-09-18T23:17:00.000+09:00

And this is what was going on when he came into the world. I should have said something, but last week there were four earthquakes, two typhoons, and a volcano. Whoah, that makes this prairie boy a little nervous. The only natural disaster I ever saw at home was the river getting a little too high. But where I come from, the ground doesn't just start moving.

It's a boy!!!

2004-09-18T22:00:00.000+09:00

Well, we all knew that, but now it's for sure. He came yesterday evening at 9:20pm. He weighs in at 3.5 kg, 49 cm, dark hair, and gooooood lookin! His name is Micah Raine Janzen. We'll call him Mick.

Andrea was happy that the whole ordeal only went on for seven hours. She is doing just fine, though in Japan they make you stay in the clinic for five days. So Simon and I are bach'ing. Simon was a little freaked out at first at the sight of this intruder, but today he was a lot happier with the whole idea.

2004-09-17T13:39:00.000+09:00

Baby's on the way and we are off to the hospital! No posting for the next few hours... hahahahahahahaha

2004-09-17T10:12:00.000+09:00

"…Leadership is not a person with a plan or vision for the future, a leader is one who forms environments in which the people of God, among whom the Spirit resides, can get in dialogue with others and narratives of Scripture…”

Winn Griffin via Paul Fromont

2004-09-15T21:38:00.000+09:00

Just a bit more on the Russian Orphan site. I was getting all inspired again reading a news article about the guy who started it up. I posted once before about what a great thing it is when someone decides to be deliberate in constructing their lives in such a way that they can extravagantly give to others, and it seems that this guy is one of those.

2004-09-15T21:09:00.000+09:00

These seem like good folks. I've been chatting with them by email. Think I would like to learn more about them. Vladivostok is not too far away, and I think they could probably teach us a few things. Send them some money... I mean really, go read some of the stories of the kids you can sponsor, and at least think about it.