April 2006

I just finished my last paper for the term, and it looks like there’s no appropriate classes I can take in the summer, so I’ve got a couple months of living and working like a normal person.

I’ve gotten back on reading. Currently going through “The divine conspiracy“, “The secret message Jesus“, and I just picked up ‘The world is flat” from the library.

A couple early quotes from it.

“Those who get caught in the past and resist change will be forced deeper into commoditization. Those who create value through leadership, relationships and creativity will transform the industry, as well as strengthen relationships with their existing clients.”

In a conversation with a leader of an outsourcing firm in India: “We are in the middle of a big technological change, and when you live in a society that is at the cutting edge of that change [like America], it is hard to predict. It’s easy to predict for someone living in India. In ten years we are going to be doing a lot of the stuff that is being done in America today. We can predict our future. But we are behind you. You are defining the future.”

A lot of this sounds like the usual globalization talk, and sometimes I think there is a perception that this is how things will always be. That developed nations, like America, will constantly lead and innovate while ‘helping’ other nations through outsourcing while they race ahead. What I believe, and hope Friedman gets to in the book, is that this won’t always be the case. If it’s true that every soul longs to create, express, dream, and innovate, then in a ‘flattening’ world, there could come a time, i hope, where every nation leads and innovates, and no person is reduced to a commodity. Sadly, I think the thought of this frightens some people, corporations, and countries.

Speaking of corporations, I know I’m late on this, but I finally watched “The corporation” with Yvz last night. It really is a must-watch.

Right this moment, we’re raping the earth, and one another, and we barely feel a thing.

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We also watched “Invisible Children“. I’m completely distrubed by it. Though I am amazed at the type of resiliance and hope these children have with the conditions they live in… especially when I compare them to the punk kids I’ve come across.

Something in these kids, that I’d like to believe is the image of God in every human being, allows them to still experience glimpses of joy while longing for better days. For them, not being murdered, raped, or abducted is cause of celebration. What does it take to make you celebrate?

Our small group just had it’s first baby. Chris & Sharon just gave birth to Caleb. what a great name…

Caleb was one of the spies who explored the Promise Land, but because the Israelites didn’t listen to his advice, they ended up wandering aimlessly for fourty years inthe desert. In Joshua 14, Caleb is an octogenarian. He says, “Here I am today, eight-five years old! I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out: I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then.” And then you can hear forty-five years of pent-up conviction in his voice. “Now give me this hill country that the Lord promised me that day.” Caleb doesn’t want Joshua to simply settle on a piece of property and retire. He’s still passionate anand willing to fight even in his old age. He wants the hill country - the land of giants.

Here’s a picture of the family. Below it seems like a favorite on my flickr site, of Sharon comparing her belly with my dad’s.

On the front page of the Toronto Star newspaper today was an essay by James Loney. He was abducted in Iraq by Islamic militants and held hostage for three months and shares his life-altering experience. Full article here.

I felt the below excerpt was deeply profound:

I am learning many things from my captivity, and have a universe of things to be grateful for. Among them is a new and deep appreciation for the women and men who wear the uniform of military service. I likely would not be writing this today if it were not for them. Thus, I am confronted with a great paradox. I, the Christian pacifist peacemaker, am alive, am free because of the very institutions I believe are contrary to Christian teaching.

Christ teaches us to love our enemies, do good to those who harm us, pray for those who persecute us. He calls us to accept suffering before we inflict injury. He calls us to pick up the cross and to lay down the sword.

We will most certainly fail in this call. I did. And I’ll fail again. This does not change Christ’s teaching that violence itself is the tomb, violence is the dead-end. Peace won through the barrel of a gun might be a victory but it is not peace. Our captors had guns and they ruled over us. Our rescuers had bigger guns and ruled over the captors. We were freed, but the rule of the gun stayed. The stone across the tomb of violence has not been rolled away.

I’m learning that there are many kinds of prisons and many kinds of tombs. Prisons of the mind, the heart, the body. Tombs of despair, fear, confusion. Tombs within tombs and prisons within prisons.

There are no easy answers. We must all find our way through a broken world, struggling with the paradox of call and failure. My captivity and rescue have helped me to catch a glimpse of how powerful the force of resurrection is. Christ, that tomb-busting suffering servant Son of God, seeks us wherever we are, reaches for us in whatever darkness we inhabit.

May we reach for each other with that same persistence. The tomb is not the final word.

I’ve been waiting forever for this. finally just got in the beta.

try logging in with you gmail at www.google.com/cl2

there’s a couple bugs still and not all features are enabled yet, but just an update on how much I love this already, here’s a screenshot of my current month.

What I love are the calendar overlays so I can click off certain calendar types, ie when I don’t feel like looking at work stuff. I made a calendar for tasks / so it’s like a to-do list of the day as well that I can turn on/off. I’d love to hear how other people are using it and what mash ups come out of this.

Head down in another paper again… but here’s some hot stuff I’ve stumbled upon while constructively avoiding school work.

Mosaic’s began video podcasting!

Windows will run on Mac’s now.

Zooomr - Like flickr but seems even slickr.

Criswell Theological Review is now available. Articles from both Mclaren and Driscoll on the emerging church.

“Under the overpass” - dude who voluntarily went homeless for five months and wrote a book about it.

Mary J. Blige and U2 team up to remake “one”, see the video here.

Join us at the Vox Book Club as we’ve just started reading Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard.

And finally, another home made burger shot. It seems like every time people have come over the last while I’ve cooked these up. My wife loves’em. They just keep getting bigger. The burgers patty alone weight in at about a 1.5lb’s.