Month: January 2005 (page 4 of 4)

This afternoon, I stopped by the home of one of our women whose mother died yesterday. This woman writes a column in the local paper, she loves “all things book” like I do, and she is the source of much wit and wisdom. We argue about politics and other things. We agree with each other on important issues like the spelling of “y’all.” She has become one of my favorite people in the world.

Anyway, as I was talking to her husband, the mailman pulled up and delivered the mail. One conversation led to another (she said that both she and her husband tend to hog the available audience!) and I found myself in their basement, looking over some great, gorgeous bookcases he had made with the old windows they had replaced. But I digress…

In a few minutes, my friend came down to the basement with a small package and a look of giddy excitement. She showed us a handmade leather journal, that came accompanied by a note. The note described the impact of a column on journaling my friend had written some months before. The letter writer’s husband – himself a long-time journaler – had learned to make these very cool books. They sent along the journal as a token of their esteem for my friend and her column.

Now, as regular readers of this little space know, I am hooked on my Moleskine. But this book…wow!

Picture Indiana Jones’s father’s “Grail Diary,” and you’ll get the idea…

If she reads this – and she’s one of the few of my church folks who do – she now has no excuse not to start that journal she encouraged others to start.

The December 26 tsunami in south Asia was – and continues to be – devastating beyond anyone’s imagination. At the risk of sounding calloused and cynical, I’ve had it up to about right here with those who are now using this serious and unimaginable situation to complain about how stingy the American people are. And those who are moaning and whining about how sorry and rotten and out-of-touch the President is, blah blah blah, ad infinitum ad nauseum…

When it all shakes out, we as American citizens will have given the large majority of disaster aid, through our government (which is, by the way, right out of our private pockets!) but mostly through private charitable and faith-based organizations. We will do that, not because we’re any better than anyone else in the world, but because we are a decent and caring people, who have always tried to look out for those who find themselves in difficult and tragic circumstances.

Check out what Kevin Salwen wrote over at Worthwhile…

Do we ever give as much as we should? No. But a society in which 81 percent of people donate to charity each year and 57 percent volunteer isn’t worth all the handwringing we’re getting now.

Right on the money, from where I’m sitting. Oh, and speaking of money…I’ve sent some extra to help out the tsunami victims and their families. Hope you have, too…

No, not that kind! More of an internal thing in our church’s culture.

Back at the first of December 04, I had a long, productive Friday alone in the office. I read, I prayed, and most of all, I listened to God. I sensed Him telling me that we need to change the culture – the things we value – in our church. I listed five values we need to have in place:

I believe God is calling us to develop, maintain, and share…
~A Culture of Excellence
~A Culture of Engagement (with Him, with each other, and with our world)
~A Culture of Enthusiasm
~A Culture of Encouragement
~A Culture of Expectancy

I shared this from my heart with our few folks last night. It was probably one of the most passionate and powerful messages I’ve taught in a long time. It seemed as though I had re-discovered my “voice,” even as my physical voice was on empty. I woke up this morning with a new sense of purpose. And immediately, I got to walk the walk, after talking the talk. I have had an opportunity to “live out” some aspect of every single one of those values I talked about last night.

A pretty neat day, after a lot of long, dry rides through Ulcer Gulch…