This blog is the third incarnation of Real Live Preacher. My original blog was at blogs.salon.com from 2002 to 2005. Then a friend set up a Drupal site for me. I didn’t know I should have been paying someone to upgrade Drupal regularly, so after a couple of years, my site got into trouble. I was inundated with comment spam and other security problems that later versions of Drupal addressed. The server I was using did not give me enough resources to handle the traffic load from Real Live Preacher.
 
I didn’t know it, but Real Live Preacher was on the verge of collapsing. And I didn’t have adequate backup arranged, so I would have lost the entire site. I have all of my writing in the original Word documents, but I have written so much that I probably never would have found the time to manually re-enter it.
 
At that point, Tim Miller found me. Jethro Consultants took over the management of

I hope everyone had a happy holiday season. We went to my parents' home. My brother and sister were there with their families.

sister 3, cousin, cousin, sister 2, sister 1
 
And with me running around behind, tickling everyone
 
The holidays were fun, but I'm looking forward to getting back to writing.

rlp

Note: There is an audio file of this essay below it.

I recently watched “Roving Mars,” a documentary film about Spirit and Opportunity, the two rovers sent by NASA to explore the surface of Mars. NASA’s main mission was to find evidence that water once existed on the Red Planet. The evidence for that seems clear now. Mars once had enough water to make a significant mark on its geological landscape.

NASA’s greater goal is to find out if life exists outside of the earth. The only life-model we have is our own, and water seems to be the essential ingredient. To that end, scientists are seeking to find water on celestial bodies that are close enough for our analysis. One of Jupiter’s moons, Europa, seems another likely candidate for study. Primitive life may be found in the waters below the ice cap of Europa. If so, it would be the most important scientific discovery in the history of humankind. For if life occurs twice in the same solar system, then you can assume the universe is teeming with life forms of unimaginable diversity.

While watching the film I was moved almost to tears by the commitment of the science team to their twin rovers and to the small step they are taking in the history of human knowledge. They love Spirit & Opportunity, and many on the team are convinced that the rovers have distinct personalities. Opportunity seems more reliable, while Spirit seems to be rather impish and prone to trouble.

The rovers were designed to be operational for about 90 days. That they have continued to work for four years is miraculous. But the day is coming when their exhausted batteries will finally expend the last of their energy. The rover wheels will creak forward one final inch and then freeze in place, never to move again. Spirit and Opportunity will then sit perfectly still while time passes, and they are slowly coated with the red dust that covers that planet.

Will we send more rovers to Mars? Will humans one day land there and perhaps bring one of the rovers home? At this point we cannot say what will happen to Spirit and Opportunity because no one knows how much more of our resources will be put into the exploration of our solar system and the universe beyond it.

There are several natural barriers for any species that hopes to explore the Cosmos. Gravity and technology are among them. And the speed of light presents its own set of difficulties. The first two we have conquered, and the third is perhaps for another age of humanity to solve.

But there is one barrier that is making it hard for us to even get started.

Economics.

It is very expensive to explore the Cosmos. The resources it takes to explore even our own solar system are staggering. The United States is the wealthiest nation on earth, if we are talking about technology and the ability to use it. And yet it takes all that we can muster, economically, to put a couple of rovers on the planet that is closest to us. It cost 820 million dollars to put Spirit and Opportunity on Mars. It costs about 3 million dollars a month to keep them running and to analyze the information they send back. Imagine how much it would cost to put a couple of people on Mars.

Currently we have spent nearly a trillion dollars on the war in Iraq*. No one really knows how much we will end up spending because there are so many hidden costs.

It is not my purpose to make a case for whether or not we should be at war. I happen to think we should not, but that’s not the point here. I simply observe that as long as we are at war, we will never have the resources to learn very much about the Universe. Because of this war, things that might have been known in our lifetime will go unknown for decades, perhaps longer if this war leads to other wars, as they often do. That’s too bad. I’d really like to be alive when we get our first peek into the waters of Europa. But that may not happen in my lifetime.

The question is: How do we want to spend our money? Do we want to explore the heavens or do we want to fight amongst ourselves? Amazing, isn’t it, how global politics begins to sound like something from an elementary school playground?

It’s easy for ordinary people to feel that we have little or no control over how the government spends our money. It seems that there is nothing we can do about it. But if the scientists who sent Spirit and Opportunity to Mars can find joy in giving their lives to that one small step of knowledge, perhaps you and I could find joy in taking one small step of our own toward peace.

And that first step might mean using our imagination. It might mean being willing to have a dream. Change often begins when people have a dream. Martin Luther King Jr. certainly taught us that. So you and I have to dream. We have to imagine a different kind of future for ourselves and our children. And we have to want that future badly enough to shout and march and demonstrate and do whatever it takes to move humanity in another direction.

Imagine what the world would be like if we humans could cooperate and work together across national boundaries, using more and more of our global resources to help others live well enough to share in our common, human thirst for knowledge. Can you imagine that world? You want to send a probe to Europa? No problem. You want to explore other planets? Can do. You want to make sure that every child has food to eat and medical care? Absolutely.

Okay now stop. Stop for a moment. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking it’s a nice dream, but it’s never going to happen. You’re thinking I’m a starry-eyed dreamer with some beautiful but impossible ideas. Well, I am a starry-eyed dreamer; I admit that. But I’m also a thoughtful man who considers things carefully and is aware of the limitations of humanity.

I’m very aware of what human history has shown us about our nature and our capacity for evil.

You see, my own spiritual tradition contains the idea that something is broken in our hearts. Our selfishness and our need for money and power and pleasure is not going to be overcome solely by wishing and dreaming, though that is the first step. In the Christian tradition, the climax of our central story has a lot to say about how deeply evil is rooted in the world and how costly and difficult it is to set things right.

Most spiritual traditions teach that we need to be changed, and that change is imagined as a kind of spiritual transformation.

It happens when an alcoholic finds a power greater than herself and is changed so that she finds sobriety.

It happens when you see a powerful movie or documentary, and your eyes are opened to some issue or truth.

It happens when fiercely independent people reach the end of their resources and cry out for help.

Something snaps or breaks in your soul and you are never the same. That’s what I’m talking about when I say a spiritual transformation.

It breaks my heart to know that the various spiritual traditions of humankind have not shown others a clear vision of global peace. While the world fights over land and resources and ideology, we have fought over ridiculous minutia, theological language, and over which of our religions is the right one.

That’s got to stop.

I’ve had a vision, you see. I’m a little embarrassed to say so because I’m not really a vision sort of guy, but I keep having this crazy idea that maybe the age of exclusivity is passing away. It’s passing away slowly, like racism and nationalism and indifference to the health of our environment, but it IS passing away. Religious exclusivism had its day, but the sun it setting and a new dawn awaits. There are now people in every spiritual tradition who are willing to admit that theirs is not the only way. These people will admit that the intelligence behind creation seems to work with different people in different ways and with a cultural language that fits them.

Imagine if the spiritual people, the dream keepers of the sacred, archetypal stories that arise from our collective unconscious, were to embrace one another and celebrate the ancient beauty of our various traditions. Imagine if we spiritual people held hands across the world and called for peace instead of causing religious wars, which is what we are doing right now.

If that were to happen, the people of our world might see us differently. They might see the beauty and necessity of caring for our myths and traditions. Even brother and sister scientist would celebrate our ancient stories which are, after all, our earliest attempts to understand the world around us.

Peace would be our hallmark, and we would preach that it is the birthright of everyone born on this planet. And we would be set free to pursue truth in all of its wondrous forms.

Wouldn’t that be amazing?

And maybe there would be energy and money enough to take a peek at what lies below the ice on Europa. What we find there might show us that life is bigger and broader than we ever imagined.

Sigh.

It’s crazy talk, I know. And maybe it won’t happen.

But I can’t stop thinking about it.

rlp

http://marsrovers.nasa.gov

*Cost of War - Washington Post

This is the third incarnation of Real Live Preacher. I began as a Salon blog at http://blogs.salon.com/0001772. Later I moved to my own domain using Drupal. That's when the chatroom and the threaded comments began. I guess that was RLP 2.0

Well, here we are with what I hope will be the final version. Now that Jethro is in charge of the nuts and bolts, I'm guessing they will update Drupal for me so that I don't get behind again.

So okay, so the new site is up and running. There are a number of issues I want to tell you about.

1. We lost all of our user accounts. There was no way to help that, unfortunately. However, there is good news. On the old site, having a rlp user account meant that your name appeared on comments, and you could visit the chat room. Well, there is no chat room. Anymore. It fell out of use. I could always bring one back if people wanted it, but for now there isn't one. AND, you can leave your name when you leave your comment, if you like.

2. You can still sign up for a user account if you want. If you are signed in, You won't have to do the captcha thing. And, in the future, I'll have some features reserved for registered users only. For example, users might be able to launch a discussion forum if a particular essay brings a lot of discussion. I'm not sure if we'll have that, but there are a lot of things Drupal can do. We could add a number of things.

3. Subscribers (Those who support the site financially) Your blogs will be listed here, just as they were before. We're going to recreate your user account for you, so don't worry about that. And as before, there will be an area of the site for you only. I can't promise this, but I've asked Jethro to find a way to feature your sites in a rotating basis as well. So every day there would be a featured site or two from the subscriber sites. Be patient; we're doing a lot.

4. I have a lot of clean-up work to do. All of the old stuff is here: http://reallivepreacher.com/rlparchive. But it won't be linked by subject. I'm actually considering republishing all of the old essays in the new system so that they can be tagged for easier retrieval. I don't even know how to get started with that. I've written so many essays since 2002. Even if I only do the serious stuff, it's a daunting task. I'm still thinking about that.

So why the change?

First, I had no spam protection in the old Drupal site. Second, there are a lot of things behind the scenes with the newly upgraded Drupal software that will ultimately make my life a lot easier. Images will automatically thumbnail for me and are easier to upload. My audio files will have an RSS feed, making them a podcast if I want. And I really enjoy doing short videos. Tim Miller tells me they have a solution for making that easier to do as well.

Finally, I'm working toward only dealing with my word processor and Drupal. Previously I wrote things, then put them in FrontPage, then finally into Drupal as an html file. I have some editing options here that are helpful to me.

So I'm glad for the upgrade, even if it means things are a little out of order for a time.

Tomorrow: The first essay on the new site. Some thoughts about war, the Mars rovers, and an impossible dream.

rlp

Starting sometime tomorrow (1-24) this site will be temporarily frozen. See details above.

rlp

Welcome to the new real live preacher site. I'm on a new server, and the dns will still be propagating for the next day or so. I'm so appreciative of the folks at www.JethroConsultants.com for helping with this migration. The old site was falling apart and beginning to break every few days.

A lot of things at the new site won't be working yet. I don't think the dns has changed in Australia, so the guys at Jethro can't make a lot of the final changes. The entire old site will be archived intact. That's going to mess up any links out there to specific essays, but there's no way to avoid that. And some of the links inside the archive may be broken. But you will definitely be able to get to all of my old writing there.

So for the next week or so, things will be coming online. Thanks for your patience!All of my subscriber's blogs will be listed here somehow, so watch for that.

We lost our user accounts, but I don't know if there is any reason to have them now. All they really allowed you to do was have your name on your comments. Well, you can do that now without registering. I'm checking with Jethro on that question.

I want to thank Tim Miller and the people at Jethro for their fantastic work. These guys have been great to work with. I'll write more about that later!

I ate a whole can of olives the other day. Is that bad? It doesn't seem bad. They're fruit, right? I've never heard anyone refer to olives as fruit, but they're plants and plants are generally good for you. They are very salty, which I think might not be good. Salt is one of those things they used to say was good for you and they even handed out salt tablets to athletes. But then I think they said it was bad for you and everyone was trying to cut down on salt. But now I don't hear so much about salt anymore. I think it's maybe bad but not as bad as, say, eating nothing but fast-food all the time. Compared to that, eating a can of olives might even be kind of good for you.

One would think so anyway.

I can't keep up with this stuff, to tell you the truth. When I eat I have to look over at my wife and say, "Is this bad for me?" She seems to know about these things. Take bread for example. Years ago bread was fattening and a thing you had to watch out for. But then everyone said it was red meat you had to avoid. Red meat would clog up your arteries. So bread wasn't that bad. But then suddenly they said meat was okay as long as you avoided bread completely. And there were those diets where you ate no bread at all or anything even remotely resembling bread.

So bread has been sometimes good and sometimes bad for us. I don't mean white bread, of course. I think white bread became bad for us sometime back in the 70s and has remained bad ever since. I think it has stayed bad the whole time. That's okay because Jeanene got me used to wheat bread years ago, and now white bread gives me the creeps. The way you can roll it into little balls and it turns kind of gray if your hands weren't all that clean. I never liked that about white bread, even when I was a kid, even before it was bad for us.

There were two great, abiding
mysteries in my life when I was a young boy; mysteries that I puzzled over for
years but never solved. I discovered them while lying in bed trying to fall
asleep. Bedtimes are convenient for adults but they may or may not align
themselves with the sleep patterns of a child. I was an overactive boy who had a
hard time convincing his cerebral cortex to shut down after a day of
full-throttled activity.
Many nights I lay in bed, watching
the shadows deepen on the walls and listening to Bible stories or music on a
record player. Waiting for sleep was grueling work. Minutes slowly ticked away,
and a single hour was an eternity. It was in these mysterious hours of waiting
that I discovered two mysteries which I could not explain or understand.

Click here to read the rest of this essay at

The Christian Century online.

Archive of Christian Century Articles by Gordon Atkinson

a

Christian Magazine 

Christian Writing
rlp
 

or
Is There Anything Else That Could Possibly Go
Wrong?
Note: I intend to conclude the water chronicles
with a piece on cultural re-entry and a final summary of the trip which will be
posted at ChristianCentury.org
But for now, the events of the last day
---------------
Unfortunately for me, there seems to be no end
to the things I can and do forget. I’m the one who still gets lost in his own
city. I’m the one who forgets what day it is; indeed, sometimes I forget what
month it is. Occasionally I’ll be so lost in whatever it is I’m doing that I
forget what SEASON it is.
Okay wait, is it like Fall and we’re moving
toward Christmas, or is it sort of in the Spring and we’re moving toward Summer?
You think I’m exaggerating for effect with that
last bit about the seasons, right? Think again. That happens to me at least
twice a year.
So of course I’m going to leave a couple of
things behind in Santo Domingo. Of course I am. That’s a given. The only
question is, will the things I leave be important things?
In this case, they were.
For some reason I was the only one on our team
flying out Monday. My flight was at 4 pm. The women from Murray State left on
Sunday. The others were to leave on Tuesday.
I took a taxi to the airport, stopping along
the way at a bank to get some money to pay for the ride. It was about an hour
drive in traffic, and the driver told me it would be 1000 pesos - roughly $30. I
went to the ATM machine and withdrew 1500 pesos. Foreign money is always
interesting to look at, and Dominican money is very colorful, so I was pretty
intrigued by it. A 1000 pesos bill and a 500 pesos bill, both with strange faces
and markings on them. I was fascinated and walked away staring at the money.

Dominican Republic Pesos
I was so happy. I was happy to be going home
and back to a culture that is familiar to me. Back to a place where I actually
understand what is being said around me. The taxi driver spoke no English, but
we managed to communicate a little bit. He bought us both a popsicle from a
street vender, which was nice of him.
When we got to the airport, I tipped the driver
500 pesos. I mean, what was I going to do with 500 pesos? And he bought me that
popsicle. There was that. He seemed pretty pleased with the tip and shook my
hand vigorously.
This is the point where everything started
going wrong.
The first person at the Delta line said,
“Passaporta por favor.”
That’s when it hit me. I didn’t have my
passport. We put our passports in a safe at YWAM when we first arrived, and I
never gave it another thought.
If this was a movie, there would be a
fast-motion camera replay of the taxi drive going backwards, ending with some
sort of swooshing noise and a close-up of the door of the safe at YWAM.
Here is something you should know to fully
comprehend my predicament. While in Santo Domingo, I never paid attention to the
location of the YWAM house. While we were driving around, I was too busy looking
at traffic and houses and people to worry about where we were. I was like a
child in Santo Domingo. Other people were driving, so I felt free to just look
at things. What can I say? I like looking at things and then writing about them
later.
I didn’t know the address of the YWAM house. A
lot of the streets didn’t even have names, so it never seemed important to me. I
didn’t even know what part of town it was in. And I didn’t know their phone
number either. I never had to call them.
I had nothing. I had no idea where I had been
staying for the last 5 days. And I didn’t know enough Spanish even to explain to
anyone that I didn’t know where I was.
Strangely enough I didn’t panic. I think this
new reality was too shocking to accept. I just couldn’t emotionally comprehend
the fact that I was in a foreign country, in an airport without my passport, and
with no way of explaining to anyone where my passport was.
The only thing I could think of was that I
needed to find a way to call YWAM and get them to send my passport with another
taxi. There was no time for me to ride there and back again, and I wouldn’t know
what to tell a taxi driver anyway, even if I could find one that spoke English.
I opened my wallet to get out my ATM card,
knowing that I was going to have to pay for another taxi. No ATM card.
If this were a movie there would be another
camera shot in fast motion, going back to the bank and wooshing up to the ATM
machine. The camera would show a delighted Gordon, so amused by the pretty money
that he walked away staring at the money and left his ATM card in the machine.
Now I panicked.
In my wallet were 100 pesos - about $3 - and a
$20 bill. Not even enough for a one-way taxi drive, even if I knew where I was
going. I have to tell you, I’m not sure I remember a time in my adult life when
I felt more helpless and vulnerable.
I don’t know about you, but I think it’s time
for a little good news. There was one bit of saving grace in this story. When I
got out of the taxi, I noticed one of the YWAM staff, a man named Ony
(pronounced like only but without the L), who was there with a group of medical
missionaries who were also flying out on Monday.
All I could think of was, “Find Ony!”
I ran through the terminal, praying that I
would find him before he said goodbye to the team and headed back to YWAM. If
this were a movie, the camera would circle around my panicked face, surrounded
by a blur of
airport people going every direction.
I went back to where I had seen Ony, but he
wasn’t there. I looked all around and had just given up when Ony saw ME. He ran
up to me and said my name in his rough, Dominican way. “Gorrrrdown.”
I could have hugged him. He doesn’t speak much
English, but he understood “No have passport. Passport at YWAM.” His response
was one I heard many times in Santo Domingo. It is a colorful phrase with many
meanings.
“Ay yi yi!”
The crazy thing is, everything worked out very
quickly once I found Ony. It’s amazing how easily things work if you speak the
language and know your address and phone number. He called YWAM and they
immediately dispatched a taxi with my passport. A quick international call to
Jeanene from the airport cost 12 pesos. She cancelled the debit card. Ony stayed
with me until the taxi arrived. I bought a Diet Coke and a cup of coffee for Ony
with my last 100 pesos, gave him a huge hug, and got to my flight with about 5
minutes to spare.
Ay yi yi!
The last thing I said to Ony was. "SO glad I
found you." He pointed to the sky and said, "Es El Señor," which is the
delightful Spanish way of saying, "It was the Lord."
I did not argue with his theology.
It’s amazing how an experience like this can
change your perspective. When I got to San Antonio, Delta had lost my luggage. I
went to the luggage counter to report it, but who can worry about lost luggage
when you’ve been a lost man in a foreign land?
The woman behind the counter was speaking a
language I understood, and I was home. I had to have been the nicest person she
had ever dealt with. She told me the luggage was probably somewhere between
Santo Domingo and Atlanta.
“So what happens next,” I asked. “You’ll call
me when you find it?”
“Yes sir. We’ll find it and deliver it to your
home.”
“Really? Thanks, you guys are great!”
I walked off whistling, with no luggage and not
a care in the world.


Taxi driver and popsickle.


Ony (right), his two friends, and me waiting in
the airport.


Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
 

Saturday Afternoon, January 12, 2008
This entry was meant to be posted Sunday,
but Internet outages made that impossible.
As usual, I have pictures with captions posted
from Saturday afternoon and evening at Flickr. Pictures

here, slideshow

here.
One of the most important things Edge Outreach
does is sanitation education and training. It’s well and good to setup some kind
of purification system, but if people don’t know how to use it or if something
goes wrong with it, they can be worse off than they were before. They could be
trusting water that isn’t clean.
Saturday afternoon half of us went to the home
of a man that everyone here calls pastor Antonio. He lives in a very poor part
of town, and though he is confined to a wheelchair, he works and ministers in
this little community. 80 to 100 people come to his house to get clean water
from an Edge system that was put in a few months ago.

Pastor Antonio's house. This room and two small
bedrooms.

The system is on his tiny back porch. One tank for
purifying, two on the roof for storage. He purifies three or four tanks of
water, two days a week for the community.
On this day pastor Antonio found a group of
children from the area to come and learn about water cleanliness and general
sanitation issues. There were a number of adults that showed up as well, though
the presentation was definitely geared toward children.
Edge has a set education program for children
in other countries, based on pictures. All you need is children, the pictures,
and a translator.
This was about as poor a neighborhood as I’ve
seen here in Santo Domingo. There is a vacant lot next to the pastor’s home
where they meet for church services if it is not raining. That vacant lot is
also, apparently, the local trash dump. There was a smoldering stump no more
than 5 yards from the stage.
And yet the children were spotless and dressed
in their finest clothes. Truly, these families take great pride in their
children.

I suppose the teaching would seem rather
obvious and simple to many, but the fact is, great numbers of people in poorer
areas do not know that bacteria in water cannot be seen. Just because water is
clear does not mean it is safe.
In one part of the training, the team uses a
little wooden doll, jokingly referred to privately as Diarrhea Debbie. Her
stomach is a clear baggie of clean water. Something dark is introduced, clouding
the water and making Debbie sick. The bag is punctured and she loses her water.
At this point the team talks about the necessity of hydration if you have
diarrhea.
Well, Debbie’s bag got punctured in the wrong
place on this day, and she sprayed water sideways on Amber and all over the
stage.
The children were delighted. Howls of laughter!
But apart from that, things went very well. We
broke out some balloons at the end and got mobbed by the children. I made as
many balloon sombreros as I could before we had to get on the bus.
At this point, all of our work was done. Both
purification systems were in place, and we had visited this previous
installation to check on it and do further education.
Saturday evening, we went out to eat at a Dominican
restaurant, treating ourselves, our driver, and our interpreters to a fine meal.
Not wanting to miss out on the experience of Dominican food, I ordered a lot and
then shared it with anyone who wanted to try things. I had boiled Yuca
(pronounced “Jooka” here), fried plantains, rice and beans Dominican Republic
style, and skewered chicken. It was all delicious. The plantains were not sweet
at all, more like fried potatoes.

Click for larger view
Sunday morning, the women from Murray State fly
out. The rest of us will attend church with our hosts and do a couple of final
things. Monday morning I'll try to post some final pictures and thoughts from
the trip. As always, internet access is irregular. I'll post when I can.
 

Sunday night: Internet very spotty tonight. I have reports for Saturday along with many pictures. I also have four slide shows with music I'm trying to get online at Google video. Will be working on this for three hours Monday morning, IF the Internet cooperates.

check back.

Note: It appears that anonymous commenting
has been turned off temporarily at real live preacher. That's because we have no
spam protection until the Drupal upgrade is complete. So if you normally comment
anonymously (and many of you do) don't worry. You won't have to register to
leave comments once we get the new rlp up and running.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Yesterday half of our team came very close to
completing the purification installation at Cure Hospital in Santo Domingo. If
you'd like to see the hospital using Google Earth, plug the following coordinate
string into the search box that says "fly to."

18°28'30.14"N 69°54'26.27"W
I have pictures from yesterday's work at the
hospital online at Flickr

here. Slideshow

here. There are a fair number of pictures
with captions and explanations of the work that was done.
Today we're at the hospital finishing up some
electrical work and preparing to train the hospital engineer in the use of the
system. The system is easy, but constant testing of the chlorine levels is
essential. You have to carefully test each batch of purified water. Obviously,
if you do not, you're worse off than you were before. You're trusting the water
from the tap and it isn't clean. But the engineer is clearly an intelligent
and educated man, so it will be no problem for him.

The original pump house

Working on the pump house

The new pump house

Our team in the tank enclosure
Later today half of our team is going to an
previous installation to continue health training. I'll be with that group and
will report on that tonight or tomorrow morning.

Mustard Seed Thoughts
This whole situation reminds me of something
Jesus once said. We'll leave soon, and the hospital will have a continuous
supply of clean water. Someone from Edge will return in time to see how things
are going. Edge is committed to following up all of its installations. This one
is unusual because there is an engineer here who is capable of fixing the
system. They will probably be fine. In any case, most of us will never come
back. Children will come and go in this place. Some lives will be saved because
of the clean water. Other lives will be enriched. Suffering from infections,
etc. will be lessened. None of us can look into the future to see what will
come.
Jesus once said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like
a mustard seed. It is the smallest of seeds, but when it is planted, it grows
into a large tree and the birds of the air nest in its branches." So it is with
goodness and with evil. Seeds are planted, either in selfishness or in goodness
and service. What grows from those seeds is only known to those who are there.
The ones who planted the seeds often never know what good or evil comes of their
actions. Further, the idea of sin suggests that all of us have planted seeds of
evil from time to time. I know that I have. Grace is being forgiven for the evil
I have begun in this world. Redemption involves the changing of my heart and
life, so that I can be a part of goodness.
Pretty simple deal really. I don't know why we
Christians have made it so complex.
rlp

Friday, January 11th, 2007
Our team was split for the entire day today.
One part went back to the hospital. They didn't get back until late, so I'll not
be able to tell you about their work until tomorrow. The other team was the five
women from Murray State University who were in charge of the YWAM installation,
which is the one we paid for here at rlp.
Hooray for us!

I was hanging out with the young women, helping
some and taking pictures too. It was a basic installation. Two tanks in a
pumphouse, chlorinating the water and providing access at a spigot. It's not
fancy, but instead of buying 5-gallon bottles of water, they can fill them up
themselves at their pumphouse.
This installation was done almost entirely by
these young women, lead by Courtney. We were all so proud of them. And I thought
you'd like to see some pictures of the water purifier you made possible with
your gifts. I have a lot of pictures up at Flickr, but I'll include a few here
as well.

Courtney working on a water line.

Amanda working on the external spigot.

Putting together the Purifier

The finished system!

The team that put in YOUR purifier!
The hospital team ran into some...issues. So
we're a little behind there, but I'm sure we'll catch up tomorrow. The whole
team is going to the hospital, then the Murray State women and I are going to a
previous installation to do some continued water health training.
Please do check out the Flickr photos. They
show you more detail about the YWAM installation.

Pictures here.

Slideshow here.

I've got a couple of free minutes here, so how
about some personal stuff?
1. Dominican Driving - Driving here in
the Dominican Republic is unlike anything I've ever seen. At first I was
terrified. People pull in front of each other with the smallest amount of space.
Motorcycles weave in and out of cars. Two cars will merge into the same lane,
barely missing each other, horns blaring. And yet, we saw no accidents. My
theory is that there are several elements going on.

First, all traffic boils down to official
rules and unofficial morays. In the Dominican Republic, it's more morays
than rules. Everyone understands that if a person can pull in front of you,
they will. And it's your responsibility to watch out for that. Everyone
knows there will be motorcycles weaving around and people walking in the
street selling things. The whole thing forces you into a constant state of
defensive driving. You can't eat a sandwich or talk on the phone and drive
here. You have to be watching because on every trip, at least 5 or 6 people
are going to cut you off and pull in front of you or edge you over in your
lane.
In the United States, we drive according to
strict rules and expect others to follow them. This leads to us being on
auto-pilot. Then when someone makes a mistake and pulls in front of us, we
might not notice it because we aren't expecting such a thing. I wouldn't be
at all surprised to find that there are less accidents in the D.R. than in
the U.S., though I have no figures to support that.

2. Cold Showers - There is no hot water
where we are staying. None. At first this seemed like a terrible inconvenience.

"How in the world am I supposed to take a cold shower?" I wondered. Well, guess
what - If you are dirty and tired, you'll take any shower you can get. That's
the first thing to remember.
I don't have much experience with this, but
there seems to be two theories to surviving the cold shower. The first involves
sticking your head under the water and getting it wet, the pulling away,
shampooing, and sticking it back under to rinse. You basically do this with your
whole body. Quick wetting, soap without the cold water hitting you, then grit
your teeth for the rinse.
The other option is to suck-it-up and stand
under the cold water until you get somewhat used to it. Then shower as usual. It
never feels comfortable, but you do get so that it doesn't bother you as much. I
recommend the second method, but then I've only been at this for 4 days.
rlp

Thursday, January 10th, 2008
Note: Rolling blackouts caused an
internet outage yesterday. As I said in the beginning, if you don't see a fresh
post from me every night, there was an internet problem. Here is Thursday's
posting:
Pictures of our day along with captions and explanations can be found at Flickr.
Read this but don't miss the pictures. They give more details about the work we
are doing.

Click here for a complete list of pictures
and captions.

Click here to view them as a slideshow.
(Note: clicking a picture in the slideshow
displays the captions. Clicking again hides them.)
We actually began work on the hospital
filtration system today. We placed three large, 400-liter tanks on a platform
right above the existing pump for the hospital cistern. We’ve dropped a pipe
into the cistern that will pump the water through our chlorination system and
into the tanks. Then a pipe will go from the tanks back into the main hospital
pump, allowing clean water to be pumped throughout the building. In a short
time, even the pipes will be cleaned by the chlorinated water.

There were several little glitches here and
there, nothing that Kurtis couldn’t figure out. We had to drill a hole for new
pipes into the back of the concrete housing for the existing pumping system.
Most of the morning was spent getting the tanks positioned and busting a hole
through 6 inches of concrete into the pump housing. During a slow time, some of
the team folded bandages and helped sort medical hardware in the pharmacy.

At 2 pm, our team split in two. Half of us
continued working on the water system at the hospital. By the end of the day
they had run pipes from all three tanks to a central location where the
purification unit will be housed in a box of its own.
The other half (I and the 5 women from Murray
State University) went to visit an orphanage in a very poor area of town. The
place was spotless on the inside, but very simple and poor. There didn’t seem to
be any area for the children to play outside, as far as I could see. When we
arrived they were lined up waiting for us. A fair number of these children have
disabilities of one kind or another.

The street outside the orphanage

 
They sang us a couple of prepared songs, which
made me really uncomfortable. I don’t think children like this should be made
into a dog-and-pony show. But this is their world and their country, and I
wasn't the one making those calls. So I listened to their sweet voices and
clapped appropriately.
We brought balloons and candy and crayons and
coloring paper. You’d have thought Santa arrived in person and gave them the
whole world. We sang and played and hugged and made balloon hats and flowers and
swords. I took pictures of the kids with my digital camera, then turned it
around and showed them their pictures. They were delighted by this and crowded
around, wanting me to take more pictures. Courtney got attached to a young child
and held her in her arms most of the time. We connected with this crowd of
children in a whirlwind hour of delightful chaos.
We just visited them and played. No big deal,
right?

Well, it was obviously a big deal to them. And
yet, I couldn’t help thinking, “Yeah, but what are we doing for these kids,
really?” And one answer to that is - not much. They need money and food and
clothing and parents. And we came with our resources and time dedicated toward
our two water projects. This was a quick side-trip that we put together because
we had some spare time and we were asked to go. I mean, what can you do? Not go
because you’re not going to make a full commitment?
So for this day, there was nothing we could do
except love them and play with them. And trust that when you love and play with
a child, it is a goodness that requires no explanation and no justification. You
don’t have to explain yourself to anyone.
Two sisters caught my eye, both in wheelchairs,
both terribly small for their ages. Stephanie is 11, the same age as my youngest
daughter Lillian. But she has the body of a two-year-old. Her older sister Clara
is not much bigger, though she is 15. That’s the age of Shelby, my practically
grown and healthy middle child. In very crude Spanish I tried to tell them that
my own children were the same age.
“Uh...Me Nina es (I tried to think of
the word for 11 but couldn't) eleven... tambien?"  I’m really
embarrassed that I live in Texas and don’t know Spanish well enough to get out
such a simple sentence. That’s not correct, but maybe the idea got across.
Stephanie and Clara and Pauline each colored a
picture of Jesus, signed their names on them in crayon, and gave them to me to
keep.

Gave them to me to keep. Gave them to me to
keep. For a moment, it seemed like the whole world narrowed to that instant in
time. Gave them to me to keep.
Okay, just stop for moment. Stop your busy life
and think about this with me. What did it matter that we visited an orphanage
today? And what will it mean, ultimately, in the lives of these children? What
will this hour of fun mean to them? And what am I to do with these cheap,
coloring book pictures of Jesus? What value would you place upon them? Or what
would you give me in return for them? Wouldn’t you agree that in the eyes of
God, these pictures are worth more than the Mona Lisa?
Do I really believe that? Yes, I think so. What
am I to do with the pictures? I don’t know. It’s quite a dilemma, isn’t it? I
can’t treat them like ordinary pieces of paper, right? I can’t throw them away -
God forbid. And if I take them home and tack them to the wall of my office at
our church, what does that mean? Does that mean I’ve committed something to
these little girls? Will I look at these drawings sometimes and tell people,
“Oh, those are from two little girls in an orphanage in the Dominican Republic
that I visited once upon a time." Will people who see these pictures think I'm a
nice guy because I spent an hour in an orphanage one afternoon?
See, there’s no good answer to this. I ask you,
what am I going to do with these pictures?
Hurting children have a way of doing this to
you. Their presence demands some kind of response. I wish I could give them
enough to care for them for the rest of their lives. But I’m pretty used up
these days. Long on ideas and feelings but short on time and strength and money.
And my oldest daughter is talking about a trip to Moldova this December that
will likely end with our family making a commitment to a child or two for the
next decade or so. That’s the problem with the depth of the need in the world.
It is endless.
But listen to me now. You just CANNOT let that
get you down. Or at least you cannot let is stop you from giving yourself to
every small act of goodness that you can. Don’t worry about the big picture.
Just find something good to do for someone, and DO IT.
If enough of us commit ourselves to small acts
of goodness, the world really does begin to be a better place.
And if not, well, then the hell with the world.
Live in your small moments of goodness. Just live there and let that be your
highest reality.

Okay back to those pictures. I truly do not
know what to do with them. I've placed them carefully in my backpack with my
computer, in a place where they cannot be harmed. I'm going to carry them back
to San Antonio. And then, I'm going to figure out what to do with them.
Something about these pictures is bothering me. I can't figure out a decent
response to their obvious value and meaning. Maybe you'll have some suggestions.
Think about it, will you?
Oh, and I finally figured out what this day of
play with these children means.
It means everything.
rlp

Wednesday night
January 9, 2007
It's so hard for me to write
without a lot of planning. I'd like to put the events of the day into a
nice, linear package for you. But I can't. I'm tired and it's very
late. And I'm still in culture shock. Shocked by the poverty, shocked
by the crowds of people, shocked by the lack of privacy, shocked by the
loss of control.
Other people feed us. I
don't even have any Dominican money on me. I just eat what our hosts
provide. It's sort of nice to let go of the job of getting food, but I
don't think I realized how much the simple freedom to eat whenever you
want is something I take for granted.
Tonight I put together a
rather extensive Flickr collection of photos, all with descriptions.
You can follow along the day by viewing them.
The collection is here. Or you can view it as a slideshow here.
Today we learned about what
Edge calls, "fluidity." You have to stay fluid when you are overseas.
It would be easy to let today become frustrating, but it didn't. We had
hoped to get started with the two installations, but we had troubles
getting materials in both places. The details are unimportant - it just
turned out to take the entire day to gather the tanks and make some
rather complex plans for the hospital. The hospital was supposed to
have gotten supplies ahead of time but didn't because an engineer
wanted to talk about it first. Apparently it didn't occur to him that
we were going to be on a tight schedule. We ended up buying exactly the
things we asked them to pick up for us. We lost a day. No big deal.
Kurtis is sure we'll make it up.
We did get to see the
hospital, and I was once again touched and surprised. Touched by the
good that they do and surprised by the primitive nature of the
facility. It is a Care
Hospital; there are a number of
them around the world. Their water system is horrible, but
it's not their fault. The entire city of Santo Domingo has a water
problem. You can't get clean water from the tap. You just can't.
Everyone uses bottled water. This is extremely expensive for the
hospital. They use a fair amount of water, as you can imagine.
Their specialty is pediatric
surgery for children with birth defects. 
Half our team worked with
Kurtis and an engineer from the hospital to plan our rather complex
system. Our three tanks of purified water will tie right into the
plumbing of the hospital. Usually our water systems are suited to
people coming up to the tanks and drawing water off of them. While some
of us went out into town to buy supplies, the other half of our team
folded bandages.
That's right. They don't buy
pre-packaged bandages here. They buy bulk bandage material and fold
them by hand.


Care Hospital Santo Domingo is a 6-story building

The Cistern at Care Hospital. The water is clear, but not
safe. Full of bacteria.

Typical traffic in Santo Domingo. One of the reasons it
took all day to gather supplies.
We
were also able to get the supplies we will need for the YWAM
headquarters install, the one you guys payed for.
Let me
mention YWAM. I didn't know anything about Youth With A Mission, and I
still don't know much. It seems to be a movement started by American
Christians that spread this way and has become an indigenous expression
of faith. This facility is run by Domincans for Dominicans. I
can tell that they are a very conservative group of Christians. Much
more conservative than I, certainly. And yet, here they are working
amongst the poorest people. And we are in their country. I'm called to
be as respectful as if I was dealing with Muslims in Iran or Buddhists
in China. Their Christianity is now an indigenous movement among these
people. They tend toward charismatic expression and are absolutely
passionate about their faith.
Tomorrow
night we might go to a worship service. I hear we might have two hours
of singing BEFORE the sermon. I'll let you know how that goes.
And
there is this. These guys take trips to Africa to help people
less fortunate than themselves. They who don't even have clean water in
their own facility. That seals the deal for me. So you guys are going
to make it possible for them to drink their tap water instead of buying
water, which they do for the hundreds of volunteer teams of all
denominations who stay here from time to time. Not too many Americans,
I wouldn't think. We're too spoiled and the accomodations are too
rough. But I'm glad I'm here. I'm glad I've experienced it.
Whether
you are a Christian or not, I can testify that you who donated money
would be happy to be giving clean water to these people. Absolutely.
On a
personal note: The food was very good today. There was something for
breakfast that I never did identify. Some kind of pasty, grits-ish,
puddingesque thing. Sort of sweet and sort of like Oatmeal. Whatever, I
ate every bite. Lunch at the hospital was fun and delicious.
Traditional Dominican food. (Pictures of both meals at the Flickr
site) We put in a full day, and I'm ready for bed. Check out
the flickr photos I mentioned. They tell the story.
Tomorrow
we begin the installation work in both places. One of our teams is also
going to spend some time taking care of children in a local orphanage.
We feel the YWAM install will be so easy that we can spare the time.
And the hospital has a solar water heating system that was installed
incorrectly. Kurtis the magic man feels we might be able to fix that
for them while we're there.
These Edge folks
are INTENSE. I kid you not. Do not try to stop them or get in their
way. They will find a way to get things done. And if something prevents
them from doing one thing, they'll find some other acts of goodness to
fill the day.
Tomorrow
I'll show you the work we do and introduce you to the team in more
detail. I can't wait to show you a picture of Kurtis.
peace,
rlp

Monday night - January 7th,
2008
I know I've been scarce
lately. Well, actually totally absent. I'm not sure I remember a time
when I went this long without posting. I promised the family that I
would stay away from the blog for the holidays, and I have. And it's
been good for me.
Truthfully, I've been in a
less productive season with writing, mostly due to some pretty major
transitions in my life. I will tell you that a serious writing season
is coming after I get back from the Domincan Republic. I feel it
inside. I know when a writing burst is coming.
Speaking of the D.R., I
leave tomorrow morning at 5:45 am. I'll Fly to Atlanta and then on to
Santo Domingo. It is my intention to document our project in pictures
and words. I will post every day while there. I might end up staying up
late at night, but every day gets a post. If there isn't a post, assume
I had problems with internet access and will post that day as soon as I
can.
Worse case scenario:
Internet access is completely unavailable. If that happens, I'll write
my daily entries all the same and post them all when I get to someplace
with Internet.
Over 100 of you donated to
help with this water installation. We raised just a little over our
$4500 goal. That means the second water install we do was made possible
by you, bloggers and readers of real live preacher. This is our
project, you might say. That's why I'm so dedicated to documenting it
for you.
Next time you hear from me
should be Tuesday night.
peace,
rlp
ps - If you don't have
Google Earth installed, you might want to. I'll be including longitide
and latitude coordinates.

Tim writing from Jethro again with another minor technical update.

We are in the process of cleaning this site up so we can archive it and switch to the brand new rlp website we are building.

First congratulations and a huge Thank You is in order.
The rlp AntiSpam Squad deleted / removed over 130,000 spam comments. Thats amazing.

There is another minor job to do. 850 blog posts need to be checked for internal links and edited. I need some volunteers for this one as well. Please comment below this asking for access and then go to the instructions.
I will give you access as soon as possible after seeing your comment.

Thanks in advance for all your help.

Tim

Children are so soft. Their skin is fragrant
and pure, like baby leaves. Their minds are eager and ready, their hearts are
trusting and open, and their eyes will lead you softly to the very bottom of
their souls.
Children know God because God can be found in
the soft places of the world. In mother’s hands and in father’s soft shirts. In
laughter and at dinner and in the goose bumps that rise when lips slide across
skin.
It is a terrible thing when soft, childish
flesh meets the hard steel of religion. We cut through children like butter. In
our collective unconscious there is a swishing sound. It is the sound of the
swords of Herod’s men rising and falling on the children of Bethlehem.
O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see
thee lie.
Take a deep breath now, and free your mind. Do
you remember when your spiritual softness was taken from you?
Did it happen at church?
What sort of church was it? Was it a brick
building in the suburbs? Was it a synagogue or a mosque or a cathedral? Was it
the secret church of one man’s desire, or the feral church of neglected
children? Was it the cold sanctuary of science that stole your myths and left
you wounded and empty and suckling at the stars? Or did you construct your own
lonely chapel, like Saint Frances, barefoot and one stone at a time?
I was wounded along the way. It happens to
everyone. Life is hazing. It’s one big rite of passage from beginning to end. I
grew tough as leather, deeply protected, calloused, and hard. But I worked my
leather with the oil of my hands and with tears and time until I became soft
again. And soft, worn leather is such a comfort to have and to hold.
Now I guard children’s hearts against all
religions, sacred and secular. I will throw myself at you, church man. Stay away
from that child’s mind. Let her be a pagan; let her be a skeptic, a scientist,
or a saint. Let her be any or all of these, but for God’s sake, let her be.
Let her be because her soul was never yours for
the taking. If you lay your hands on her, she will grow hard, and still she will
not be yours. But if you love her and let her and listen to her and allow her,
one day she may return from the far country, fully grown and newly wise.
And soft, still soft. And strong, so strong.
rlp

To the middle sister, my
string of pearls,
That’s a big heart you’re
dragging around these days, and you’ve only just discovered how hard life can
be.
Play the hand you were dealt.
Be soft.
Be true.
Be strong.
Be you.
-Daddy
 

The next in the series. There will probably be one
more and then we're done.

The Reading List:

The Jewish Scriptures: Genesis, Exodus
1-20, I Samuel, selections from Psalms, Amos, and Micah.

The New Testament (Christian Scriptures):
Matthew, Acts, Romans, I Corinthians, James.

I’m not in the mood to tell the truth today,
having told the truth recently and seen what it can do. One person was hurt
badly, and another was embarrassed and forced to deal publicly with a reality
that he wanted to keep to himself. The whole thing was messy and painful. I
think everyone is going to be okay, but it was touch-and-go for a time.

That’s the way it is with truth. Truth does not
care about how you feel. Truth will not be diplomatic; it will not wait for an
opportune moment. Truth is cruel. It's like a conveyor belt on an assembly line.
No matter how fast you cram the truth into your pockets, more truth keeps coming at
you.
Truth is a white-hot virtue of uncompromising purity. Its burn is painful,
and yet we reach for it. Its light is blinding, but still we turn our faces
toward it in hope. Truth hurts; it hurts so bad. You shut your eyes and nod
while tears run down your cheeks.
Jesus said that the truth would set us free. I
believe that, but I also know that freedom has a high price and is only
available for those who stand ready to put cash on the barrelhead.

rlp
"The
Truth Will Set You Free"
 

We are now asking the question that nations
closer to active terrorists have been asking for years. What can be done about
terrorism? It's easy to create a simple dichotomy with two solutions on the ends
of a spectrum. We can either get angry, go out and find the terrorists and
destroy them. Or we can try some diplomatic solution that seeks to address the
causes of global terrorism.
Perhaps the first way makes us feel strong. It
makes us feel like we are "doing something." Maybe the second way feels weak to
some people. It doesn't seem tough enough for our nation's ego and status as the
current world superpower.
I don't know what the answer is. I know we've
tried the first way, and so far it is an ABSOLUTE disaster.
There is a pretty interesting article over at

Christian Century entitled,

"What If? The Missed Opportunity of 9-11.
The author suggests that we face some hard realities: we will never be safe from
terrorism, and indeed, we have some responsibility for the root causes of it.
I wonder what you think? Clearly there is no
easy way out of Iraq. But as far as terrorism is concerned, where do we go from here?
I'd love to hear from you in the comments on
this one.

a

Christian Magazine 

Christian Writing

rlp
 

I am among the last generation of American
males to grow up before video games, VCRs, and cable television. Without easy
entertainment inside the house, we went outside and played catch.
You know playing catch. You grab your mitt and
your best friend grabs his. You get a baseball and you throw it back and forth
until it gets too dark to see the ball. You do this every day until throwing and
catching is as natural and easy as walking. Around 13 you start trying to throw
curve balls. You put your fingers to the side of a seam and snap your wrist hard
as you throw the ball. Then you shout with great hope, “Did it break?” Your
friend yells back that he thinks maybe it did, a little.
There is a secret to throwing a baseball. You
can’t think too much about it, and you certainly never try to aim the ball. You
lock your eyes on your target, rotate your shoulders, cock your arm, and shift
your weight. Then you cut loose and let it go. Your muscles and some deep part
of your mind somehow know when to release the ball. This deep knowledge comes
after years of playing catch. The feeling of your arm springing forward behind
the power of your shoulders is incredibly satisfying. This is your power, the
power of a man’s shoulders. You are strong and the ball zips along a straight
line and pops into your friend’s glove. The sound of the ball hitting the mitt
is a wonderful thing.
And then your friend winds up like a spring and
then unwinds. You see his arm blur around his body and there is a white circle
coming toward you at a terrific speed. But you feel no anxiety because your
gloved hand slips forward smoothly and you pluck the ball right out of the air.
You’ve caught a thousand balls, and you know you’ll catch this one. There is a
sharp pop in the leather of your glove that stings a bit, but even the sting is
nice in its own way.
My father bought me my first baseball mitt a
few months before I was born. I loved that mitt and used it until I lost it in
the park one terrible day. The grief was very intense, and even now I mourn its
loss. I saved money from mowing lawns and bought a used glove from a man in our
church. It was my second mitt, and it got me through Pony League and on through
high school. It was delightfully broken in, well oiled and supple, and it fit my
hand like, well, a glove.
In 1980 some of the rawhide straps broke, and I
tied them together in a makeshift manner that lasted through college. After that
the mitt ended up in the back of my closet. Seminary, marriage, and children
changed my life, and baseball was no longer a part of it.
Then I met Cristopher
Robinson, an Episcopal priest here in town. We both grew up
playing baseball and were talking about it and also about sermons. I mentioned
that I had been wanting to get another lectionary study group together. I was in
one years ago and enjoyed it greatly.
Right in the middle of the conversation, I
asked Cristopher, “When was the last time you played catch?”
“Just catch?”
“Yeah, just got out with a friend and threw the
ball back and forth.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Years, I guess.”
“So why did we stop doing that? I mean, I LOVE
playing catch. I wish I could play catch right now!”
And so was born a new kind of lectionary study
group. I pulled my old glove out of the closet – the one I’ve had since I was
12. I had to re-lace parts of it, but it still feels perfect on my hand.
Cristopher and I get together once a week or so. We throw the ball around while
talking about the passages in the lectionary for the coming Sunday. Sometimes we
just play catch and say nothing. Or we might stop, sit down and talk more
seriously. We do whatever we want to do.
I was scared the first time we met, wondering
how long it would take before I regained my instinctive feel for my arm and my
release. The baseball felt very small in my hand, and I was pretty wild. And
man, was I ever sore the next day. We’ve gotten together three times now, and my
arm has loosened up considerably. It’s starting to feel natural for me to throw
a baseball. I don’t worry about it. I just let it loose and feel the power of my
arm. My whole body moves in the follow-through, and when our "study session" is
done, I feel loose and warm all over.
It’s like the ultimate male yoga.
So this is our lectionary study group. The
rules are simple. If you want to join us, you have to be a minister who is
preaching, and you have to strap on your glove and whip the ball around with us.
While we play catch, we talk about the Bible and what
it means to us. If these requirements don’t work for you, no
problem. Most lectionary groups don’t require you to play catch, so I know
you’ll find something out there that works for you.
As for Cristopher and me, we don't know where
this thing is going, but there has always been a needed connection between body
and spirit, and between work and play. Maybe we'll learn some unexpected things
on this journey. I don't really care though, because I'm playing catch again,
and it's been too damn long since I did that.
rlp
 
My beloved mitt. I'm back
baby!
Ps – Visitors who want to join us for a
session are welcome. You can hang with us even if you’re not a minister. The
glove requirement stands though. You gotta bring it. If you happen to be in town
and have your glove, you can join us. Send me an email.
 

Viva has the Learning Bible Discounted: Viva is
offering The Learning Bible at a discount. They can only get the hard cover, and
only in NIV. I was wrong about the NRSV being available. The NIV version is what
I have. Regularly $50, they will sell it to you for $37.50 with $3 shipping.
They didn't want me to say this,
but they will lose money on this deal. Thanks Viva!!
 
Okay, here's the next in the series. I made
this one #6 and renamed the last video because it really wasn't in this series.
I tried a new setting. The echo is too much, but I was in a big room. Also,

Gabe sent me a 1 gig SD card, so I wasn't
limited to 6 minutes. I'm worried that this is too long. You know how it goes,
you tend to fill up the space you have. Let me know what you think. I went 14
minutes. I could be disciplined and keep it to 10. 6 really is hard to do.

Click here to get
a copy of the Pocket Guide to the Bible.
Coming next: I reveal the coolest

lectionary study group EVER. Seriously,
even my atheist buddies will want in on this. There is, of course, one thing
you'll have to bring with you if you want to participate. And it ain't a Bible.
rlp

Note: This video is a bit
of an excursus from the series on how to read the Bible. I intended the
next video to be a discussion of some interpretive tools that are a little
beyond the study Bible. But my latest story gives me a chance to talk a little
bit about reading the Bible with an awareness of ancient worldviews. 

 
Number 6 in the series on how to read the
Bible. Demons and the New Testament.
rlp
 

Covenant Baptist Church Advent Set
3-sided rectangle with diagonal aisles and 2-chair offset rows
Click for larger view
I've been setting up chairs at our
church since 1991. When I began, we were meeting in temporary places—a school, a
fire station, and even a bar for a time. Setting up chairs and taking them down
after worship is routine business for migrant churches.
I have handled many chairs over
the years. There were the fancy wooden chairs at the
Duck Blind Lounge. I used to set them up in
three rows around three sides of the dance floor, facing the bar. If you got
bored during my sermon, you could check out the variety of beers available on
tap or look at the sign that told you when happy hour began.
You don't see that in church very
often...

Click here to read the rest of this essay at

The Christian Century online.

Archive of Christian Century Articles by Gordon Atkinson

a

Christian Magazine 

Christian Writing
rlp