Promises

Looking Back... Looking Forward

Growing up the son of a missionary and gospel singer/evangelist who were committed to living, "by faith:" asking no one but God to meet the family's needs shaped me in some interesting and challenging ways. I grew up having visited many of the 48 contiguous states, and seeing many things my peers only dreamed of seeing. At the same time, Mom would drive up to the house with us in the car and there would be groceries on the front porch that she needed, hadn't asked for, and cooked with that night to feed us. We were always dirt-poor, and always had enough.

If Dad was called for meetings in East Texas or Florida, he'd always say yes, and then he'd pull out the Rolodex and begin calling churches and pastors along the way to build an itinerary so he could afford to get there. You see, Dad never required any payment and never knew what he was going to get (if anything) and so the idea of the church covering his expenses was foreign to him. We paid our own way and graciously accepted whatever was offered to us upon completion of our mission or crusade in the community. Nearly always, every weekend and every Wednesday night were booked and we'd simply travel from community to community in order to reach the place that first booked us. It could take weeks, but it is how we traveled. 

In today's world, I wonder what my parents' Facebook accounts would look like. Undoubtedly, they would post pictures of churches where they ministered and pictures of Dad singing or Mom telling a story or leading a Bible Study or women's meeting, but I imagine there would be a lot of pictures of Timothy and I swimming outside of Boonesborough, Kentucky in the Cumberland Gap where I spent my 10th birthday, or of us touring the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and Straight Street in Philly on the 4th of July 1976. Perhaps you'd see pictures of us playing at Niagara Falls or Fort Ticonderoga, looking at Mt Rushmore, Yellowstone, the Grand Tetons or the Grand Canyon. 

Maybe my parents would have been smart enough not to post those photos that family and friends wanted to see on their public pages so that people wouldn't get the wrong idea about the family and think that we were flush and simply playing all the time. Because that certainly wasn't the case. I don't know how they would have worked that out and I wish I did.

This summer has been a celebration summer for Paula and I. We spent the first two years of our marriage never qutie having enough to pay the bills, and spending at least one, or many times two or three nights each week apart, as I traveled to the Little Fishing Village to the North of Portland for School. Supporters stopped supporting Paula because they assumed, as a man, I'd take care of her financially. After all, isn't that my job? They don't realize that as a grad student, living on the edge, having betrayed my former ministry partners through my adultery, I simply couldn't. 

Like many couples, especially older-- poorer ones, blending our financial lives is one of our greatest challenges. In contrast to my background, Paula grew up in an affluent family who trained her how to manage money well. In some ways, we're good for each other and in others we sometimes want to kill each other. 

So this summer, in the wake of three life-changing years, we've chased beauty as we've lived, using many of the travel strategies I learned growing up. We've taken Dr. Dan Allender's advice and taken the time to connect to each other more tightly, and God in new and fresh ways. It is easier now that I don't have another book to read and paper to write. When we've gone somewhere for business, we combine it with a day or two to relax along the way.

In June I graduated in Seattle and took Thomas to check out a school in British Columbia. I combined the two because I couldn't afford to take him on this campus visit any other way. Since we were in BC, TL and I tagged on two days in Whistler that didn't cost us anything except for the gas to get there. We took our food and had a kitchen in which to cook. We had a brilliant time.

In July, Paula gave me a 50th birthday/graduation gift and we rode 1701 miles to Canmore, Alberta to see the Canadian Rockies. It was a vacation to be sure, and it cost money to do. We were celebrating major milestones. And our celebration was also an act of worship. Paula called it a Pilgrimage. The bonus was that we stopped along the way to develop new ministry partnerships and see people we'd never get a chance to see if we weren't making the trip.

August is Paula's birthday month and September is our anniversary month and so we planned to go to Bend on a working vacation/celebration to see and connect with people for the Kingdom. After that trip was planned friends gave us an actual real-life vacation at Depoe Bay. It caught us both off guard and was probably the best vacation ever, and yet, even then we spent our mornings reading, planning, and writing together before going to play in the afternoons.

So you can't imagine my disappointment when Paula told me that someone said to another of her friends,"It seems like all they do is vacation."

I teach, metaphorically, that there are three legs of the stool upon which I rest. One of those legs is that "what other people think of me is none of my business." I believe that wholeheartedly and I am also aware that this person's hurtful statement will lead us to make some changes, not to how we live, but how we portray the way we live.

The second leg of the stool is  "If you spot it you got it." The person thinking we're always on vacation has his/her own insecurities in regard to our actions. Regardless, we live in a world where perception matters. And as supported missionaries, we need to make sure that we are not harming our ability to develop kingdom partnerships with people who are called to support Kingdom work financially.

Unlike my parents, we can't post pictures of the people with whom we meet or even tell the stories of the lives that are changing when we meet with them. It isn't appropriate or ethical in our line of work. Those stories aren't "Facebookable." I thought the beauty we've chased along the way was, but that is apparently not so. APparently we need to limit that to a very few close friends. That is a sad reality we are going to have to face. I think you can expect some further changes to our Facebook feeds as we move forward. It might be that we need to cancel them altogether, creating other ways to communicate with our friends around the world. We'll see. We have some talking to do. 

Please feel free to chime in on this topic either in the comments below the blog or the Facebook post, or in a personal message on FB, or even in an email to Paula or me. On quite another note, I am sure that this is the reason that Allender doesn't use Facebook.

By the way. Here is the link that Paula's friend was sharing with Paula's other friend. It was this link that led to the discussion that has led to this post:

 

Chasing beauty, Day 4 - A long, Beautiful ride north to Canmore with Paula Gamble Grant, MA, NBA

So it ended up being a long 384-mile day. My foot is messed up, swollen and black and blue. The injury slowed us down. I move like Tim Conway in a Carol Burnett sketch. Because of that, we were 40 minutes late to see Josh & Rebecca Jaklich in Hayden, ID. They patiently waited for us and it was so encouraging to see them and catch up. After we left them we grabbed a quick bite to eat.

 

As we finally pulled out of Hayden, my comment to Paula, over our comms was, "Well, we are only getting away 2 hours later than I thought we would." My injury was making things tight. I don't like riding as late as we were going to have to ride. We couldn't mess around.

 

We were both in sweatshirts until we suited up for the rain south of Sandpoint, ID on the shored of Lake Pend Orielle, because of an isolated shower that caught us off guard. We found a pullout and put on rain pants and coats in the rain, but we didn't pull on our boot covers. She asked if we should and I said no thinking that Paula's cute, rugged, Harley boots were waterproof. I was wrong, and her boots leaked water through the laces even after that short downpour. Sorry, Babe.

 

The ride up Hwy 95, through Idaho's panhandle, was peaceful except for my inner state. The panhandle is full of racists, and my stomach turned when I had to follow a Jeep in need of a new muffler who had plastered a Stars & Bars, KKK Battle rag sticker to her back window. Racists notwithstanding, it was an alright ride. The last section of road north of Bonners Ferry is a fun sweeping drive up to the Eastport Border crossing. 

 

Neither Paula or I had crossed into Canada on motorcycles before. Before crossing, we read that:

1. We didn't need to take off our helmets to talk to the border agent but did need to remove our sunglasses and turn off our bikes when we pulled up.
2. We needed to approach the agent one bike at a time. If the officer waves the partner up, that is fine, but we needed to roll up one bike at a time.

Paula likes me to be in front, and so I went first. After I had turned the bike off, the agent informed me he hadn't gotten my license plate. This meant that I needed to walk the bike forward so he could read my plate. Paula had to do the same. This may vary from point of entry to point of entry, but I found it odd that they weren't taking pictures of our plates when we crossed into Canada.

My goal is always to leave people I meet happier than they were before they met me. It is part of how I try to bless my world. How that happens varies, but at border crossings and with customs agents, the general rule of thumb is that if I am friendly, honest, and engaging I leave them with a smile on their face.

The ride from the border to Cranbrook, BC was majestic. The road follows the Moyie river north past Moyie Lake. It has beautiful bends and wonderful scenery. We rode under glorious sunshine and that only added to or joy.

Soon after Cranbrook CA-95 merges with CA-93. They stay together until Radium Hot Springs. (We didn't know any of this as our phone navigation doesn't work in Canada. We could have stopped to get new SIM cards in Cranbrook  but decided not to waste the time. Instead, we relied on the wisdom of people we met in rest stops and gas stations to get us to our destination.

CA-93/95 proved to be a "nice ride" rather than a stunning one. This might be because we knew we were heading into a storm (we could see it just ahead of us. We chose to ride into the darkness.)

That choice changed my anxiety level and affected my enjoyment of this stretch of highway. (I feel as if I have to at least pretend that I know what I am doing so that Paula doesn't worry. And, though I don't really know what I am doing and may make different choices at different times, if I were making the trip alone, this kind of trip does not feel unusual or worrisome to me.)  

My impressions if this stretch of roadway were also colored by the fact that there is major construction that held us up and then slowed us down: We were stopped for a good ten minutes by a flagger and then rode 45 mph on grooved pavement for a long 16 kilometers. Remember, Paula has only been riding a year and she hates grooved pavement. Please don't get me wrong, none of these 384 miles were boring. All of it was beautiful, and a lot of it spectacular. During this particular stretch, Paula's voice came over comms, "The Cliffs of Insanity!" Sure enough, at the north end of Columbia Lake, the headwaters of the mighty Columbia River, just south of Fairmont Hot Springs are some striking brown cliffs. We stopped to get gas and share a subway 12-inch just north of there.

From that point on, God directed the clouds to spit or pour on us. Dropping into Radium Hot Springs, I wanted to stop to get a picture of a stunning river curving below us. It was spectacular, but because of the rain, we pressed on.

The picture I didn't take as we came into Radium Hot Springs

Radium itself is a picturesque tourist mecca that borders the pass that crosses the Continental Divide. On a different kind of journey, we would have stopped, explored and enjoyed it more thoroughly. We didn't even pause on this ride.

At Radium Hot Springs CA95 / CA 93 split. We turned right to follow 93. Just as we did so, we saw a fleet of bikers coming down the pass, dressed in their rain gear and still pretty wet. 

Stock picture of a motorcyclist climbing out of Radium Hot Springs on Hwy 93

As we rode up the pass, I marveled at the road. It is most easily the steepest most incredibly engineered road I've ridden. It was a glorious ride in the rain. I can't imagine how glorious it would be in the sunshine! Parts of it seemed to be cut through the rocky mountain itself, and the stream that falls down the mountainside next to the road is a majestic shade of blue that is indescribably beautiful. Going up is always easier than going down. We rode down cautiously in the pouring rain. It's a very rough road. Once down the other side in the Mountain Valley, traveling along the Kootenay River, the rain stopped, and we increased our speed.

The Kootenay River Runs along Hwy 93

The rest of the way up to the Trans-Canadian Hwy was rough, but I continually shouted my wonder at the beauty through which we rode. There were, "Wow, look up to your right." and, "O my, wow!" escaping my lips along with songs of worship and an occasional verbal outburst from Paula at an unexpected bump in an unexpected place.

Once we reached Hwy 1, we sprinted to get to Canmore. The Trans-continental Hwy is a well-maintained and easy to ride. Canmore is 22 kilometers past Banf and so by the time we pulled in we were both massively sore. I could barely pull my bad leg across the bike to get off and hobble into our unit. We have covered parking that is close to the elevator to head up to our unit on the main floor. 

So far the clouds have us sopped in, and we can't see much, which is a crying shame because we get glimpses of breath-taking grandeur that we can't quite see. Hopefully, we'll be able to take some pictures over the next few days. 

This morning we rode through town to the grocery store, and Paula bought me a retractable cane so that I can hobble around. Our plan is to lay low today to try to give my foot the time it needs to heal a bit, then spend tomorrow exploring  So pics will come as we get them. Weatherwise, this is not the best time to be here, and it is still the best birthday gift I've ever been given. My wife loves me, and I am grateful. I've decided that her business cards need to read, "Paula Gamble-Grant, MA (Master of Arts), NBA (ninja badass). Maybe I can talk her into it when she orders more.

Chasing Beauty, Part 2: Day One Ride

The "Rever*" map of our first day's route

There is a downside to Coms -- Things you say out loud that normally no one else but God can hear, get heard by your spouse. And it may be hard to comprehend, but I can be impatient sometimes. When Paula heard me giving directions to a car that was slowing me down in angry tones with cursing, she responded, "Stop it! I am viewing this as a pilgrimage. I am not in control. I am not in a hurry. I walk in faith and hope. I greet everyone with peace. I bring back only what God gives me. I'm chasing beauty."

I don't think I swore the rest of the ride. We looked at multiple possible routes to get here to the South end of Coeur D' Alene. We had to stop for gas before leaving Portland. Riding sanely, my Goldwing gets approximately 39-40 miles to the gallon. Paula's NT700 is supposed to get 54 but got over 57 MPG. My tank is only 4.6 gallons, and so I can only safely go 175 miles on a tank of gas. Paula can go 260 or so. We weren't overloaded fo the trip, but we are loaded. 

Monday morning traffic through Portland was relatively light. We cruised out Interstate 84 taking note that the exit to Multnomah Falls was closed since the parking lot was full. They pull a gate across to stop even motorcycles from entering. Traffic in the Dalles was gnarly. At one point an RV pulling a trailer did change lanes causing Paula, who was riding behind me to gasp, me to lay on my air horn and hit the brakes quite hard. 

Paula occasionally would shout surprise when heavy wind gusts tried to push her over or out of her lane. That is when the coms were toughest on me. Her shouts made me nervous, but we both got better at handling the wind and the subsequent verbal responses to it.

Biggs Junction at milepost 104 was our first gas stop. We also shared a "two for four" deal and hit the road again. The pic above was taken at this stop. When riders get to Biggs, they have an option, continue on I-84, which nearly everyone encourages, or cross the Columbia and take WA 14 east. We chose the road less traveled. It was the right choice. 14 is enjoyable. It is well maintained, and it stays within a stone's throw of the river most of the way. Not two curvy, but not boring either, with ample opportunities to pass. I followed Paula, turned the music on and up, kicked my right foot up onto my crash bar, resting my right elbow on my knee and rode without a care in the world, chasing my wife -- who is beauty -- down the road.

Our next stop was Columbia Park in Kennewick Washington. This park is the host of the hydroplane races in the Tri-cities. It was a necessary oasis for us. We stretched and held Yoga poses to stretch some more. We snacked and then hit the road again. A few miles up the road we made a gas stop in Connell, WA. So far I was familiar with all the roads on our route. That was about to change. We turned East on WA 26 toward Pullman. We immediately noticed a difference. The road was bumpier and not as well maintained. It wasn't bad, simply rough. We were still able to travel around 70 MPH, and there was hardly any traffic going our way. After about twenty miles of straight, "Nebraska-esque" road, it began to find some curves through unique, liminal land that transitions between the Eastern Washington planes and the foothills of the mountains we were approaching. The shifts are subtle but also profound. When you are on a bike, you have the opportunity to take it in and observe the subtle changes in ways you never could, if in a cage, traveling the same roads.

The road becomes so curvy and hilly that it became virtually impossible to pass safely and, as is often the case, this was precisely the place that five cars in front of me, the two of us and a couple of cars behind us all lined up behind a slow moving rancher in his pick up. I remembered Paula's pilgrim prayer those last five miles dropping into Colfax, WA. At Colfax, we turned north on WA 195 toward Spokane. 195 bends up a hill as it leaves town to the north. It is a two-laned, pot-hole laced road. Halfway up the hill, Google maps beeped at me to turn off the major road onto Hume Rd. Hume passed to the east of Steptoe Butte, and though the posted speeds said 50 MPH, we traveled much faster as we climbed into OakeDale.

This last section of our ride was a hoot. It was twisty and windy with good surfaces to place our tires. We traveled through Oakedale, Tekoe, and Plummer, through beautiful farming valleys that are tucked away from the rest of the world. We transitioned from the high, arid planes to lush forest lands, through the fertile green farming country. We never did see a sign that we entered Idaho.

On the last section of road on the way to Pat's

And what can be said about Lake Coeur D Alene itself? It is truly a beautiful and wondrous lake, over 26 miles long with fingers that explore the hollers of Idaho's panhandle. We are staying with Pat Cooke, a long-time friend of the Gamble family and one of my favorite people. She has a beautiful lakeside home on the shores of Lake Coeur D'Alene's south side, across from Harrison, ID (the blue dot on the map). It reminds me of the lakeside home on Chelan where I used to vacation growing up. We are here until tomorrow when we head north, meet some friends for coffee, then ride further north, cross the border to Canada to Lake Louise, Canada. 

After a hard day's work the bikes get to take a break

------------------------------------------

*Rever is a free app that tracks riders, letting them know their speed, maximum speed, time riding, and miles ridden. It then maps the route you ride. I'm liking what they are offering and they are continually making improvements.

Chasing Beauty: Introduction

On Monday morning Paula and I will start a motorcycle trip that will take us to Coeur D' alene, ID. On Wednesday we will leave Coeur D' alene and head north to Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada. 

Amidst the insanity this country is creating right now, we've decided to search out beauty that neither of us has seen, so we can encounter it together, find refreshment, meet God together, and enjoy the hope that beauty creates.

For the next week or so this blog will become a travel blog of sorts. Some of the wonder of this trip is that the journey on the bikes together is as important as our destinations. We will be free to roam, saunter on our bikes and frolic along the way. We will get to spend time with longtime friends while lingering on the shores of a majestic Idaho Lake, hiking in the majesty of the Canadian Rockies, or traveling with the lazy Columbia River as it flows south through Washington. 

I hope as we post pictures you will get to enjoy our ride with us, as we celebrate life together, and revel in God's absolute delight with us, and you. I'll post again soon. Enjoy the ride. #livetoride #ridetolive #wiveswhoridearethebest #adventuretogether #saunterlingerfrolictogether #worshiptogether #transformedtogether 

Roadtrip

I've driven the United States 47 times, visiting all 48 contiguous states. I can't count how many times I've travelled north and south. I remember going to AAA to get their "Triptiks." Triptiks were fantastic. I'd go into an AAA office and tell them where I was going. I'd sit down with a representative, and we'd plan out the route I wanted to take and create alternate routes to consider. We'd physically hi-light the route on both a national map and regional or state maps. Then the rep would find individual pages of maps that they would turn into an itinerary. Each page would
have whatever highway I was travelling. The page would include rest areas, restaurants, gas stations, and motels and hotels, along with the mileage and the time that it should take to drive. My family's game was to see how much more quickly we could complete the route than the page said it should take. One year, my brother and I travelled from Portland Oregon to Pensacola, FL in 48 hours and 34 minutes. That particular year we stopped and watched a movie in Amarillo, TX because a hurricane was rolling through the panhandle of Florida and we wanted to take our time getting there. 

Perhaps because of this upbringing, but I get wanderlust regularly. I get restless, and I need to explore and roam. The last three years inoculated me a bit. Every week I'd drive or ride to Seattle. And then for our honeymoon, Paula and I took a road trip to Lake Tahoe. 

Today we are leaving on a business/pleasure road trip to British Columbia (One of my favorite places.) We are going to see friends along the way and talk about A.C.T. Intl., reFresh, and Gracefall. I am looking forward to it. A friend is coming to take care of our animals, and though we will miss them a great deal, we know that they are being cared for. 

If you are the praying sort, would you pray for us for safety, courage, wisdom, and connection over the course of this week? We are in a season where we are actively seeking ministry partners to help us build the section of wall in the Kingdom of God to which we have been assigned. It is a daunting, humbling, frightening, and holy task. This is one of our moments to be faithful. 

If you'd like to partner with us, simply click here.

Please note that a copy of this is also being emailed to Gracefall's email list.

Living Like Jesus because of the testimony of Bill Wilson

This week, while in school I am staying with some friends I made when I sold them a car over a year ago now. We are all friends of Bill Wilson.

It is wonderful to be so well taken care of. When I arrived at nearly 10pm last night: tired, hungry, and feeling a bit alone, I discovered they had waited dinner on me! They went to the grocery store because I was coming so they would have food and drink that I could share with them. They welcomed me, they fed me, they fellowshipped with me. They treated me the way Jesus wants us to be treated -- the way the church is called to treat one another and the world she inhabits.

There are few in the church that live so faithfully. My friends here in Tacoma follow Christ without the trappings of a "Church". Like my little congregation in Forest Grove follows Christ, they follow Jesus. I am truly blessed to know people that know Bill Wilson and so are trying their damndest to follow Jesus.

Letter 3: God is...

There is no right or wrong way to start talking about God. On Sunday night Thomas overheard me whisper under my breath, "No...." to a point the speaker was making at church. Then last night we heard a bunch of really cool things at the Rock and Worship Road Show that we can talk about too. We'll begin here.

On Sunday the speaker was making a connection between God and human parents. He talked about how if a kid was a pill all day and then decided she wasn't going to be at 6 pm, she couldn't expect her parents to treat her the same as if she'd been good all day. Then he said, "It is the same with God."

I wanted to yell at the top of my lungs, "No it isn't!" That is the polar opposite of God. This side of the cross God can't even see your sin. That is the wonder of grace. You can be completely fucking up and God is still going to love you just the same -- exactly the same -- with no difference. God can only see who Jesus has made you to be and that is a complete new creation -- Thank you Bart, of Mercy Me for underlining this point at the Rock and Worship Roadshow.. My job as a parent is to be a lot more like God and a lot less like I am naturally inclined to be. God does not have to be appeased when I screw up. That appeasement was made at the cross.

A quick aside: May I suggest you read when you get the chance, What's So Amazing About Grace, by Phillip Yancey on this topic. It will literally blow your mind. Grace isn't fair, grace makes no sense. And grace is one way we can start to understand God.

Lets get back to Genesis. If you don't end up a creationist you have some work to do around the whole topic of Adam and Eve. It can be done, but it is tough. The Adam and Eve story which begins in Genesis 2 might be a myth, but I don't think so. And even if it is, there is much to be learned from those two and how the story is told.

The way the story is told, God made Adam, and then gave Adam the task of naming all the animals. It must have taken a long time. All the while it seems like God was trying to find someone that could provide fellowship for Adam, "but no suitable companion was found..." So according to the story, God Anesthetized Adam, cut out a rib and then made Eve from the rib.

Lots of people will make an argument that this is the starting point for a discussion why women are to be second tier citizens to men (not pastors and the like.) Our friends in Forest Grove tend to take this hierarchical view. They will point us to other scriptures to get there as well, but lets just say that I think they are wrong on this. The order of creation and the fact that woman was created out of man while man was created out of nothing does not bolster an argument that men have authority over women. As a matter of fact a little later on we will see that if anything, each sex's desire to control and rule over the other is a result of sin and needs to be an anathema.

What I am most intrigued by though is how they lived together, "naked and unashamed." They weren't self-conscious at all. They were completely comfortable with one another and recently I've become aware how comfortable they were living in creation -- no biting mosquitos in those days; spiders weren't freaky but beautiful; apparently snakes had legs (that gives me a very humourous picture); and their job was to tend to the garden. Work was pleasurable.

I think that the garden is a picture of complete contentment with the "other" -- the other of the partner, and the other of creation itself. Work wasn't frustrating, rather it was rewarding and joyous. It gave Adam and Eve a chance to enjoy getting good at redeeming tasks and find happiness in that work. There was intimacy -- no secrets -- nothing hidden -- no reason to hide.

You know how sometimes we long, or yearn for relationships? We tell ourselves, "If only they would like me, or love me, I'd be better." We look for approval. I still wonder, I wonder what Dad and Mom would think about that? I can't get away from it. We look for other people to make life better. We long to be loved and to love. All the good things in relationship -- all the things we long for -- are the things that come from God. Saint John helps here.

John is attributed four books in the New Testament: His Gospel, and three letters (numbered 1-3). He refers to himself in his gospel as, "the one who Jesus loved." Can you imagine writing a story about Jesus and saying this about yourself? It is his first letter that I want to point us to here. In this first letter, John stated very simply, "God is love." We hear this repeated all the time, but we don't stop to think about it.

God didn't become love after He created something to love. No, God created us in his image. That means we were created to be a people of love. John also tells us that God is light and that in him there is no darkness at all. So, if we are made in the image of God we are to be a people of light. What does that mean anyway? Should we only where white clothes? What does it mean to be a people of light?

Here are a couple of options for you: Light means that things aren't hidden. They are open and seen. If that image is correct, we are to be a people that doesn't keep secrets in order to keep things hidden. You might ask, "What does that really mean?" It means that what should be true is that what you see is what you get. And it means that we need to be a people who shine light in dark places, uncovering other lies that are told.

Have you ever noticed that when you go to church people put their best foot forward? Some will try to tell you that this is part of the way they are light. They are creating a good testimony of who God is and what He has done and is doing.

Can I tell you something? That is not what being light is all about. Being light is revealing to people who we really are as a people, who God is in the midst of that, and being a people where individuals can be who they really are.

That is one of the things I appreciate about Refuge.They are a church where people can reveal who they are pretty freely should they choose to. Like any place, as an organization they choose to keep their secrets and not really reveal what is going on with themselves as a group. If you spend much time with them you discover it is kinda like a secret society. But I think we need to cut them some slack and  simply ask for progress rather than perfection in this. They create far more light than shadows, and in doing so they mirror back to God His image of being light.

I realize I jumped ahead of myself by talking about the church already when I am really talking about humanity. We'll come back to the Church later. For now lets stick with humanity as a whole and our calling to be a part of that whole. If humanity is supposed to be made in the image of God, and I am supposed to be a part of that whole then it follows than I need to hold up my end of the bargain. I need to be light and love. I need to be a person of honesty -- not creating and wearing masks to hide who I really am from others and I need to love the way that God loves.

I'm realizing that I could write a book on each of these. CS Lewis did write a book that is a tough but good read. It is called, The Four Loves. Like most things Lewis wrote, at some point, this book is worth reading, In it Lewis expounds on the four greek words for love: agape, phileo, eros, and storge.

"Storge" is the love we have for Rascal, or Maggie has for her tablet, or Thomas has for basketball and soccer. It is love for a thing or an animal. "Eros" is romantic love. It is the kind of love that makes you say, "Get a room!" "phileo" is the kind of love between best of friends, or parents and children or siblings. And "agape" is the kind of love that is manifest when one soldier falls on the grenade to save his fellows lives. It is the kind of love that Mother Theresa had for the orphans in India... the kind of love that Jesus has for us-- the kind of self-giving sacrificial love that He asks us to have for all the rest of His creation.

When the Bible says, God is love. He is all of these things and we are to be all of these things too. All are pictures of the relationship God has with Himself. That is such a weird saying, but it is accurate. All those word pictures are pictures that reveal who God is and who we are to be.

There are other phrases that we'll come across as we take this journey together that we may need to unpack: God is gracious, God is kind, God is truth, God is jealous, God is slow to anger, God is holy, and the list goes on. We will work on beginning to unpack them.

And I hope you spend the rest of your lives continuing to unpack them -- what it means to be people of light and love, truth and grace, patience and kindness, holy and jealous, etc... for there is a lifetime of work to be had in sorting it out. This is just the beginning.

There is so much more to say and no good way to say it here. The rest will be the conversations we have along the way, and the conversations you have with your own children helping them to figure out what it means to reflect God.

Now that is beginning with the end in mind, isn't it?

Travelogue of the Trip to Florida

I am breaking our experience kin Florida up into two sections: Naples & the Keys, since there were two distinct parts to our trip. We stayed in Naples 2 ½ days, and then got away to go to the Keys to recover before flying home.

Several things strike you when you land in Florida. The first is that you almost need a straw to breathe since the air is so humid. The second is that it is a flatter state than Kansas or Nebraska. I am sure that its highest point is a mole hill I saw being dug the other day. The third, is that the state bird is the mosquito.  It is a green state and it is a state that no one would live in were it not for the water that surrounds it.

Naples

We were late arriving to Ft Lauderdale because the plane they originally loaded us onto in Atlanta was broken and we had to get off and then find another one to fly. So we arrived 1 ½ hours late. We got our rental car and headed out to Naples, Florida where we dropped Sam off at his Dad’s rental house. We then made our way to a fantastic hotel, the Hawthorn Inn & Suites. We loved our room and the service we got there. It was cheap too. We purchased our tickets through www.lastminute.com. If you haven’t checked them out you might want to try them out. We found some killer deals. They also help you with reviews of places you are going to.

Naples reminds me in many ways of Pam Desert. It is a retirement community. It is a “moneyed” community and it is a conservative community. It does not believe in mass transit, is designed for cars rather than people; and has wide, straight boulevards and high speed limits. It has the sub tropic foliage to keep things beautiful and the beach as a bonus distraction.

Though it is a great place to visit and it has much to commend it– their schools are well funded and Sam has a school curriculum and facilities this year that would make his Oregon teachers’ drool, I would hate to live there. Naples is a mass of asphalt, heat, suburban sprawl and poor land use and urban planning.

On Labor Day, Michelle and I traveled south to Everglades City and took an airboat ride. What an adventure! We rode Speedy Johnson’s Airboat and would recommend them to anyone. We sped through the mangrove swamps through water trails that only the airboats could go, coming face to face with alligators, and then we hit the grasslands and the swamps at high speeds and did cookies while watching giant osprey dive from the sky to catch their fish dinners.

Later that evening back in Naples, we went to the Dock at Crayton Cove for dinner and sat next to the window and watched a flock of wild parrots land on the masts of the boats parked next to us, while enjoying a good meal. That flock of parrots was a gift to us. Later we went to the Naple’s Pier to watch the sunset but the clouds built up so there wasn’t much to see.

The Keys

After making sure that Sam was safely introduced to his new school we headed south to the Keys. I had never been there before. I pre-booked us into the Ramada Limited in Key Largo. It had rave reviews and a water view. The hotel overlooked the Key Largo canal rather than the ocean, and so Michelle quite rightly suggested we move on. We kept driving south to Islamorada. We walked into the Pelican Cove Resort and scored a room at an even cheaper rate than I had managed at the Ramada on line. The Resort is right on the water with a pool and bar a stone’s throw from the ocean, a swim area dug out in the ocean and a water sports shack on the property. Our room overlooked the Atlantic and though somewhat spartan was adequate for our needs. There was no free wi-fi there and so we didn’t connect, but one of the most relaxing things was to simply stand in the pool resting on the side reading, while sipping a drink from the bar, occasionally looking up to soak in the view.

That night we went to the Island Grille. It was perhaps the most enjoyable dining experience of my life. It was not necessarily the best food of my life, but the best experience…

…Billy Davidson was playing. You gotta check this guy out. He was going to quit soon after we arrived but we talked him into another set. (It probably didn’t hurt that a bunch of people arrived after us.) When you eat on the deck at the Island Grille you are sitting on a deck with your back to the water that laps not more than two feet underneath you. It is everything you expect the Keys to be.

The next day we rented jet skis from the rental shack at the Cove and played and then headed to Sundiver to snorkel. It was a great trip; much better than I hoped for actually. That night we had dinner at the Bayside Grille which had great views of the bay to the west looking out at the gulf. The food was good and the view incredible. After dinner we walked out onto the dock and saw a baby manta and fed the fish, watching the guy at the next dock land a small shark while fishing. The sunset was beautiful and we headed back to Ft Lauderdale for one last night before flying home.

Looking Ahead

    Michelle and I think that God is pointing us in a specific direction. I hinted at this earlier, but could not give details. Here they are. We are excited to see how God works it all out:

• We want to be part of a church plant that is "recovering addict friendly". We believe in bi-vocational ministry teams rather than full time paid pastors (That is simply our thing. We don't think that all full time paid pastors are bad – or anything like that – we just have a different vision of what God wants for us.) For this to happen we see at least a couple of things needing to happen:

• Stephen needs to go back to school. We are moving toward him getting an MSW. This will allow him to work with recovering addicts and their families. It would also allow him to use some of his counseling gifts and actually get paid for it.

• The right pastoral team needs to begin forming soon to pray and plan together… indeed to begin living life together – this will be a community thing.

• The new "Shop to Earn" Business needs some attention to become another stream of income.

• Michelle needs to continue to build her client base with AAB Jewelers. (Michelle is the North American Sales and Program Manager for them.)

• We want to begin taking teams of people to India for "missions". The difference here is that not everyone on the team will need to be a Christian. Construction people can come and build. Medical personnel can come and heal, etc… The idea is to serve the Indian ministries and gear the trip in such a way that those that go that don't know Jesus yet, will be exposed to him in the best possible light.

• Down the road we want to open a house for people suffering the fallout from sex addiction to find refuge, safety and recovery. We are not looking to open a half way house for sex offenders but rather a short stay house for men who need some space to heal, or a place to stay after their wives quite rightly kick them out for a time. We are looking for it to be a place where families can find resources for healing and recovery. This is a long range dream. However it too requires that we have it in mind as we take the next steps in our life together.
  • We need to find a house that we can sell at a profit in six-eight years, so we have money to invest. This means that we not only need to find a house that meets our immediate family needs, but also meets them "with eyes on the future." This means that we spend a lot of time praying, and have to believe that god has something up His sleeve that we don't see. We have been taking a lot of encouragement from the Barnabas Family Ministries story.
  • We need to begin looking at what other people have done – what they have done well and what we would change.

A Favourite Spot

One of my favourite Spots...