Friday Friends - Ray, Chad, and Kris

Exactly two weeks ago I was headed to the North Shore of Lake Superior with my friends Ray, Chad, and Kris. The four of us had a great time.

We set up our camp at Lamb's Resort. Kris and I used my pop-up camper, Chad set up his own tent, and Ray used a hammock tent strung up between two trees. We all kept warm even though the temps dropped to around 40º each night.

Over the weekend, we canoed and fished Nine-Mile Lake. We enjoyed meals at Sven and Ole's Pizza and The Angry Trout. We enjoyed sitting around the campfire and cooking at the campsite. We hiked trails up Britton Peak, the Cascade River, and Palisade Head.

On Sunday, we worshiped with a little group of locals and vacationers at Father Baraga's Cross (the service is a ministry of the Zoar Lutheran Church in Tofte). We checked out a couple of outfitters in Grand Marais. And we scouted out a number of places for future trips, including: Naniboujou Lodge, Two Harbors, and Temperance River State Park.

Monday, on the way home we stopped by Gooseberry Falls and Split Rock Lighthouse, and spent some time at the Duluth Canal. We ate at Little Angie's Cantina and checked out a few shops. All in all it was a wonderful four days with three of the nicest guys I know. I hope we get to do it again next year.

Thursday Thinking - David Eagleman on the Brain

David Eagleman's new book, Incognito, examines the unconscious part of our brains — the complex neural networks that are constantly fighting one another and influencing how we act, the things we're attracted to, and the thoughts that we have.

"All of our lives — our cognition, our thoughts, our beliefs — all of these are underpinned by these massive lightning storms of [electrical] activity [in our brains,] and yet we don't have any awareness of it," he says. "What we find is that our brains have colossal things happening in them all the time."

In this recent interview on WHYY's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Eagleman explains how learning more about the unconscious portions of our brain can teach us more about time, reality, consciousness, religion and crime.

Wednesday Words - Ordinary Virtues

The Patience of Ordinary Things

It is a kind of love, is it not?
How the cup holds the tea,
How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare,
How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes
Or toes. How soles of feet know
Where they're supposed to be.
I've been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how clothes
Wait respectfully in closets
And soap dries quietly in the dish,
And towels drink the wet
From the skin of the back.
And the lovely repetition of stairs.
And what is more generous than a window?

"The Patience of Ordinary Things" by Pat Schneider from Another River: New and Selected Poems. © Amherst Writers and Artists Press, 2005.

Tuesday Tome - The Bible

The Bible has been often referred to as the best selling, most published, most translated, and, unfortunately, least read book of all time. I suspect that's probably true, at least in terms of the number of copies printed in proportion to the number of copies actually read. That's especially true if you mean cover-to-cover reading.

For the last twenty-five years or more, I've been on a personal quest to change that statistic one person and one Bible at a time. I've been reading through the Bible every year and urging others to do the same. I've developed reading programs, tools, classes, and a blog in my efforts to encourage people to get started and to get the most from their reading.

The Useful Breath blog is written for people who are daily Bible readers. The format is simple and follow the Useful Breath reading schedule. More information about that blog and reading schedule are available HERE.

The Useful Breath reading plan starts in September every year. Most annual reading plans begin with January, but I think it makes more sense to get going when the summer wraps up and school gets started. Most church programs follow the lead of the academic year and kick-off in the September, so it makes better sense for a reading program to start then too.

The Useful Breath reading plan includes three reading selections for each day of the year. The first is from the Old Testament history/prophets, the second is from Old Testament wisdom/poetry, and the third is from the New Testament. This gives readers options for customizing their own plan. You can choose to read only the New Testament, or just the New Testament & Old Testament Wisdom, or just the Old Testament. If you do all three readings and stick with the schedule, you will complete the entire Bible in one year.

The New Testament readings in the schedule have a special order. Rather than beginning with all four gospels in succession, the Useful Breath schedule begins with Luke and John, then proceeds through the rest of the New Testament. The gospels of Matthew and Mark are then read at the end of the schedule.

The 2012-13 Useful Breath reading schedule begins on September 2. You're invited to download a copy of the the schedule and read along with me. You can also subscribe to my Useful Breath blog via email or Facebook. Just visit the site and look in the right column for more info. If Lakeville, MN isn't too far from where you live, you could also join me for the Pathway Bible Class I teach at Valley Christian Church on Wednesday nights, 6:30pm. Our fall quarter classes begin on Wednesday, September 12. Send me an email if you need more information.

If you've never read through the Bible, now is the time to do something about that. Join me in reading through the Bible this year (September 2012 - August 2013).

Monday Media - Kenspeckle LetterPress

I'm a big fan of Rick Allen's work available at Kenspeckle LetterPress. His art is a celebration of Duluth, Lake Superior, and the North Woods of Minnesota's arrowhead region. Rick's work is both beautiful and whimsical--always a great combination in my book. I'm especially fond of his "Trapper's Daughter" prints. I hope he has plans for a large format book of the complete series.

Two weekends ago, I went camping up near Tofte, MN with several friends. The Sunday of that weekend, August 19, was the 34th wedding anniversary for Cheri and me.

Lest you think me old and crusty for being away from my lovely wife on that special occasion, I ask you to please remember that I am a romantic at heart. Yessiree, on that very day, Sunday, August 19, I purchased the Rick Allen print (above)--"Love in a COLD Climate"--to take home to my beloved spouse. Appropriate, don't you think!

Not only did I give her the joy of a nice quiet weekend without me, but she was thrilled when I returned with this Kenspeckle treasure which will now occupy a special place in our home sweet home. I should also pass along that, in additon to the print, she was pretty dang thrilled with the sea-salt chocolate covered caramels I brought her from the Great Lakes Candy Kitchen.

Here's a little video about Kenspeckle LetterPress. I hope you enjoy it.

Sunday Supplication - Life and Salvation

O God, we are so thankful for your mercy and love.

We thank you for your Son, Jesus, and for the life and salvation he has made possible for us. Help us, as part of your Church, to be a living demonstration of your power to save and transform and renew. Make us a true community of grace.

Forgive us our sins. Help us to turn away from darkness and to love the light. Make us willing and able to forgive others as you have forgiven us. Help us to think, speak, and act in ways that restore lives, nurture relationships, create peace, and bring honor to you.

O God, thank you for Jesus, who did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself and became a servant. Help us, like him, to reach across barriers, to welcome the weak, to serve, and to look to the interests of others.

It’s in His name that we pray all these things. Amen.

Saturday Smile - Online Star Ratings

From XKCD Webcomic

Friday Family - Minnesota State Fair

If you're attending the Minnesota State Fair this weekend, make a point to get over to the Heritage Square Stage to hear my sons Page and Jack performing with The Cactus Blossoms. They'll be playing shows at 10:30am, 11:30am, and 12:30pm on both Saturday and Sunday, August 25 and 26.

Performing on Prairie Home Companion - State Fair Show 2010

Thursday Thinking - Community

A number of our regular ministry programs at Valley Christian Church get rolling again in September.  LifeGroups is one of those programs.

The primary pastoral objective of our church LifeGroups is to promote relational care, friendship, and spiritual maturity through Christian community. It's difficult, however, to get people in our church to embrace and pursue this objective.

It's no surprise that one of the difficult things about any small group program is trying to promote genuine community rather than comfortable association or, worse yet, cliques. One of the most common reasons people give for not wanting to be in a LifeGroup is their discomfort with being with people they don't really like. There's always someone the wrong age, or socially ackward, or always whining about life, or always dominating the conversation.

In short, when small groups are not formed by easy and comfortable associations, they tend to expose how difficult it is to really share our lives with others. Small groups reveal how miserable we are at truly being kind and generous with poeple different from ourselves. They uncover our selfish and lazy hearts. They make clear our need for grace and spiritual maturity. In other words, they're not naturally comfortable.

So okay, I will come clean and admit that my pastoral goal for our church's LifeGroup ministry is uncomfortable fellowship. I'd rather have fewer groups that truly stretch people toward true community, than have lots of groups that don't make us grow spiritually and become able to break through social barriers.

Yesterday, Richard Beck, posted about community on his Experimental Theology blog. His post was prompted by his recent reading of Jean Vanier's book, Community and Growth. As the founder of L'Arche, an international network of homes and programs dedicated to helping people with disabilities, Vanier knows very well the sacrifice and challenge of Christlike community. Beck quoted from Vanier's book and challenged his readers to think about their own church communities as they read the following excerpt.

Community is the place where our limitations, our fears and our egotism are revealed to us. We discover our poverty and our weaknesses, our inability to get on with some people, our mental and emotional blocks, our affective and sexual disturbances, our seemingly insatiable desires, our frustrations and jealousies, our hatred and our wish to destroy. While we are alone, we could believe we loved everyone. Now that we are with others, living with them all the time, we realise how incapable we are of loving, how much we deny to others, how closed in on ourselves we are.

Beck then followed the Vanier quotation with these comments:

I think the reason I found this quote to be so powerful is that I've encountered many Christians who love people in the abstract. That is, they believe they love everyone. But when it comes time to loving flesh and blood people they remove themselves from the daily grind of simply getting along with others. (The classic illustration of this is liberal Christians talking a great deal about loving the poor but never getting around to being friends with any poor people.)

I used to think this was a failure of effort, of not wanting to put in the time and effort to be in concrete relationships with others. But in light of Vanier's quote I wonder how much of this might be driven by ego. The disciplines of community expose our selfishness, vanity, impatience, entitlement and our brokenness. Rather than face this exposure it's easier to withdraw and live with the illusion that we're awesome loving people.

So for any of my Valley Christian Church friends reading this, I urge you to think of our LifeGroups with these ideas in mind. Consider being part of a LifeGroup as a way to be stretched and pulled toward true community. Think about hosting or leading a LifeGroup, knowing full well it will require you and others to change and grow.

LifeGroups challenge us to participate in genuine fellowship that extends beyond our comfort zones. After all, what good is it if we only love people like ourselves? We don't even need God or grace or church for that! Think about it. Isn't this the challenge Jesus calls us to embrace? Read Matthew 5:46-47.

Wednesday Words - Rise & Shine

Inscription for the Ceiling of a Bedroom

Daily dawns another day;
I must up, to make my way.
Though I dress and drink and eat,
Move my fingers and my feet,
Learn a little, here and there,
Weep and laugh and sweat and swear,
Hear a song, or watch a stage,
Leave some words upon a page,
Claim a foe, or hail a friend—
Bed awaits me at the end.

Though I go in pride and strength,
I'll come back to bed at length.
Though I walk in blinded woe,
Back to bed I'm bound to go.
High my heart, or bowed my head,
All my days but lead to bed.
Up, and out, and on; and then
Ever back to bed again,
Summer, Winter, Spring, and Fall—
I'm a fool to rise at all!

"Inscription for the Ceiling of a Bedroom" by Dorothy Parker, from The Poetry & Short Stories of Dorothy Parker. © The Modern Library, 1994.

Tuesday Tome - Upcoming Book Club

The political climate and polarizing rhetoric is sure to be inescapable as we approach the November 6 election. Wouldn't it be good to take a step back and consider the values, ideas, and virtues that gave birth to our nation? How did those early Americans work for unity and democracy despite their profound differences of belief, religion, and national origin?

You're invited to join me and my upcoming Pastor's Book Club at Valley Christian Church as we read and discuss philosopher Jacob Needleman's book, The American Soul: Rediscovering the Wisdom of the Founders. Read the book description below.

Our discussion schedule will be:
September 25 - Ideas and Beginnings (pp. 1-188)
October 9 - Crimes and Failings (pp. 189-268)
October 23 - Democracy and Hope (pp. 269-356)

If you have any questions, please contact Pastor Dave. Books will be available at the Valley resource center and at Amazon.

From Publisher's Weekly--
San Francisco State philosophy professor and author Needleman invites readers to contemplate the deeper spiritual meaning of the American legacy of "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." Finding a deep resonance between the founding principles of this country and the ancient spiritual quest for an inner liberation, Needleman proceeds to examine and "remythologize" the founders and some of their great deeds.

The reader is asked to consider Franklin's courageous experimentation ("...the man played and worked with lightening!"), Washington's restraint retiring from the army and later from the presidency rather than exploiting his matchless popularity and political power, Jefferson's brilliant articulation of the value of community, and the sheer gravity and awareness in Lincoln's face.
....
While Needleman clearly finds much to love about America, he balances our light with our darkness, our genuine good will and spirituality with our great crimes of slavery and the genocidal abuse of the American Indian. Decidedly not for strict materialists or historical literalists, Needleman's latest work gives open-minded readers a new set of spiritual role models and much valuable food for thought at a crucial moment. 

Monday Music - Missy Higgins

What a great song and video. I'm eager to see and hear the live performance in next Sunday night when she opens for the Gotye show in Maplewood.

Sunday Supplication - Our Merciful Savior

Almighty God, you have sent your only Son into the world to save us from sin and death.

We thank you for his sinless life, his selfless sacrifice, and his example of godly life. Give us the wisdom to take hold of all Jesus has so freely given. Thank you for his redeeming work in our lives and in our world. Help us to follow daily in his steps.

Forgive us and help us to turn away from wrong.  Transform us and give us the faith to press toward life, healing, restoration, holiness, and good deeds.  You are so gracious to us, and we ask you to make us able and quick to be gracious and forgiving toward others.

O God, you have shown mercy to us. Give us the attitude of Christ Jesus that we might be a testimony of your grace and instruments of your mercy to everyone around us.

We pray in the name of Jesus, our merciful Savior. Amen.

Saturday Smile - Minnesota on Colbert

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