Dreams Unlocked

The year that was: Moved from downtown Vancouver to the suburb of Port Moody. Transitioned from church planter to lead pastor. Became a Mennonite!!! Moved from a tiny condo. on the 26th floor to a HUGE home with 3 floors. Became more reliant on my car, as there is nowhere to walk to from my house. Watched both Sophie and Adam change in interesting ways. Dealt with some difficult hiccups in church life. Met with the mayor of Coquitlam. Read a lot of books. Saw a lot of movies. Joined a running club. Made new friends.

Sophia reads Grandpa's book: The Jesus Way by Eugene Peterson Grandpa reads Sophia's book: Madeline Gets Sick. Check out these signs - they look like the manager needs to hit certain numbers or he will be made to disappear forever. Ok - this snow is getting a bit much. It was fun for a couple of days, now it's getting to be a bit of a drag. We had a big dinner planned for tonight with my mom cooking up a HUGE amount of amazing Indian food. And.... nobody could make it due to the snow fall. It was pretty disappointing. We had a perfect Christmas day however. Adam still believes in Santa, and was overjoyed to see so many presents under the tree! Both kids got quite a few gifts, which led me to consider maybe a 3 gift max. at Christmas, just to curb the spirit of consumerism and materialism that can infect them early on. Also, hopefully next year, as a family we could do some kind of act of service around the holidays, so that we lift the attention off of ourselves. We got th...

Our house. The Inlet I did something today that I've never done before. I canceled a church service on account of the weather. Our Christmas Service was supposed to be on at 6 PM. It has been snowing non-stop since last night. I have never seen this much snow in Vancouver before. The roads are unreal. At 2:00 we decided to pull the plug. I called everyone and let them know - I felt bad for 3 guys in particular who had put a lot of work into leading worship tonight. But, they all understood this was something beyond our control. Turns out we weren't alone, as the majority of Christmas Eve services were canceled. So we stayed in tonight. At 6:00 the power went out! At least we were INSIDE the house this time. We waited a bit - I ate cereal for supper. Power came back on at 8:00. This weather is really crazy - canceled flights and smashed up cars. My parents are here and Adam and Sophia are thoroughly enjoying their grandparents attention. Looking forward to Christmas morning tomo...

Well, yesterday was pretty interesting. After church, we went sledding with another family in the church. Sylvia made this amazing peppermint hot chocolate. She brought it in a thermos. As we were drinking, I felt like I was in a Norman Rockwell picture. Adam enjoyed the sledding, but I think he liked wrestling with his friend Spencer more. Spencer is 2 years older than him, and a bundle of energy - he's also Adam's hero. Adam is always imitating him. After the sledding we went back to our friend's place - another family was going to join us for dinner and guitar hero. Just before this other family showed up, the power went out in our area, due to the incredible deluge of snow that we were experiencing. We decided to pack it in and head home, as we were all pretty tired from the Arctic air. As we were driving home, I realized that our garage door opener operated on electricity... and our house now had no electricity. We sat in our driveway staring at the useless door. What...

Harvey Milk - Crusader for Gay Rights Another Monday, another day off. As usual, I spent part of it alone in a movie theater. This week's offering was the bio-pic "Milk" starring Sean Penn. This movie chronicles the life of gay activist/politician Harvey Milk. Milk moved to the Castro district of San Francisco in the early 70's as the neighborhood was shifting from a blue collar Irish Catholic neighborhood into an area populated by gays and counter cultural refugees. Milk opens up a camera shop. He starts to see some injustices taking place against the gay community. He quickly mobilizes a rag-tag army of volunteers. He runs for a civic post and loses several times. He finally wins and is elected city supervisor and is a member of San Francisco city council - becoming the first openly gay man to hold an elected public office. The movie moves towards a show-down over "Proposition 6" which would allow school boards to fire openly gay teachers, and even teacher...

I posted a video on Facebook of me relating the stories of meeting Bono twice. It elicited 7 comments which is quite a lot for me. Anyways, I guess meeting Bono not once but TWICE kinda puts me in a special class of humanity... (take that with a big grain of salt - total sarcasm here). Today we had the children's Christmas presentation. There really is nothing that can quite renew you like watching little kids perform. Adam had the prime role of Joseph.... and he played the role more like a concentration camp inmate instead of someone about to usher in the savior of the world. He looked completely miserable and bored throughout the performance!!! You gotta see the video to truly appreciate his somber demeanor. I don't think they had much to practice - there were quite a few lengthy awkward pauses as the kids waited for cued up music to start. The church was quite full - which always makes a pastor feel better about his existance. I am no exception. One thing I have been reflect...

Small, and never goes bad. Settle in for one of the oddest tales you will probably hear for a long time. One of our closest friends at our church owns a company that provides security for a number of medium to large businesses. One of their clients is the largest mall in West Vancouver. Today, he was at the mall, meeting with the electrical contractor that needs to do some work for him. This is a fairly substantial contract, so everyone is probably fairly sober and serious as they conduct the meeting. They break for lunch and head for the food court. My friend asks the contractor if he wants a sub. He says, he brought some food, but he wouldn't mind a bag of chips. So, my friend goes to get his lunch. There are about 5 people at the table - the contractor and the actual electricians. My friend glances down and notices the contractor has opened a tin can of something. And then he sees it. The words "Fancy Feast" are on the can. My friend slowly sits down, his heart beating...

I have been reading a lot lately - almost a book a day. I started a new book today. The title and author are the title of this post. Gregory was Pope in the 6th C. He wrote a lot, and this book was written at a time when he was resisting the call to the ministry. He wrote it to show how tough it is to be a pastor. The book is excellent. The pastor who takes on the guidance of souls must be one: who dies to the flesh puts aside worldly prosperity fears no adversity does not covet the goods of others inclined to the merciful has compassion on the weakness of others grieves over sin

Not a lawyer. Today after church, one of our newest attendees told me one of the nicest things anyone's ever told me. He said, I'm glad you didn't become a lawyer. He was referencing the fact that the only other career I ever considered was as a lawyer in the area of criminal or civil law. He said that if I had become a lawyer, then this church wouldn't have a pastor! I was so touched by his kind words. Went to a new church plant tonight, led by my friends Andrew and Rebecca Stanley. It was the first service of Urban Journey (sounds familiar right?), a new church in the Dunbar area of Vancouver. There was a real freshness to the service, and a sense of excitement at the birth of something new. As they were cleaning up after, it brought back all those memories of Urban Sanctuary and first@night. All those nights when Felicia and I would do everything - setting up, setting down, etc. I really pray and hope for the organic and natural growth of this budding church. Going b...

Met with the mayor this morning. There were about 25 pastors from across the tri-cities crammed into this small conference room. The mayor moved the meeting from the city council room (which is pretty big and impersonal). The mayor is a decent fellow named Richard Stewart. He has a fairly good record of public service thus far, mainly local and provincial postings. He has the sort of confident demeanor and telegenic good looks which people seek out in their elected officials, in this cosmetic age. The meeting began with the mayor welcoming us and quite candidly telling us that he had no agenda, but simply wanted to hear any concerns that we had. The main idea that I got was that he was simply trying to open up clear lines of communication between faith communities and the city. I have noticed that Christians have a tendency to demonize large entities such as the media, society and the government as being blatantly anti-christian. Most of these biases are uninformed perceptions. Once pe...

I had this fantasy of going into the woods and cutting down a Christmas tree, a'la Clark Griswold of Christmas Vacation. In British Columbia, you can actually do it. You print up this license off a government web-site, and it permits you to cut down one tree, in these special government forests. I though it would be cool, until I realized I would actually have to cut the tree down, drag it through the snow and strap it onto my car. Oh, yeah - the forest is in Squamish about an hour and a half from our house. The idea devolved into going to a Christmas tree farm, where you still get to cut down a tree - but they give you the tools, and its all supervised in case you actually can't cut it. After realizing, we'd still have to drive a long way, our idea further devolved into simply buying a tree from the Port Moody Garden Center, which we did this afternoon. We perused the various trees which ranged from short squat trees which looked more like Christmas bushes to large regal t...

A policeman gives water to one of the youngest victims. Man, oh man - the scenes are horrible and the body count keeps growing. Mumbai was attacked by some unknown terrorist group. This hits close to home, because I lived in Mumbai 8 years ago for a year. I know all the places that were hit. I have been to the Taj hotel several times. It is the top hotel in Mumbai - rooms start at $300 American. Visiting dignitaries such as heads of state stay there, often locking the whole hotel down during their stay. I used to go there, because the book store used to fly in the current issue of Rolling Stone magazine from England. I have had dinner at the Leopold Cafe several times - it is THE place to meet up with other westerners. I would go there to meet others like me, trying to make sense of the kaleidiscope of images that is India. India always seems to be bordering on the edge of chaos, but this thing really tipped it over. To put it in local context - Imagine Hotel Vancouver, the 4 seasons,...

Kings of Leon One week since the last post - mainly because nothing has happened in my life - nothing, na da. Not a thing. I preach 5 weeks in a row, and then I take the 6th week off to concentrate on other aspects of running the church. Like this week, I charted out how our Advent services for go. We're pretty low key this year - there's a special children's service and a Christmas Eve service and that's it. I'm reading an excellent book right now called "Between Two Worlds" by John Stott. It is a book on preaching, and it is really incomparable. There is not a single book written on preaching that compares to the breadth and depth that Stott give the subject. If you are a preacher - READ THIS BOOK. If you attend a church, buy your pastor this book. The title of this post refers to the band "Kings of Leon." I first heard of this motley group of 3 brothers and one cousin on U2's last tour. They opened for them. I didn't pay them much atte...

It was Felicia's birthday on Saturday. I surprised her with an overnight trip to Whistler. We stayed at a nice hotel, went for a nice dinner (crab risotto - how classy of me!). Felicia had rabbit, like a little bunny rabbit. I couldn't bare to look at her plate. Poor little bunny. Then we went to the new Bond film, which was filled all kinds of crazy action. There were references to the last film which I had forgotten. The average age of the theater attendees was 19 - seasonal workers from around the world, working service or retail jobs to cover rent, food, pot and alcohol, and of course lift tickets. We slept in to 8:20! I woke up, and told Felicia it was 8:20. She couldn't believe it. In Port Moody, we are usually awake between 6 and 7 in order to navigate between Adam and Sophia's instant cries for attention. So, it was nice to sleep in and then stroll through Whistler for a nice breakfast. It was pretty rainy so we decided to pack it in. We were gone for only 24 ho...

Essay by Bono on Bob Dylan in the latest Rolling Stone's listing of the 100 greatest singers of all time. Dylan is #7, Bono #32 and Aretha Franklin was #1 (!). Bob Dylan did what very, very few singers ever do. He changed popular singing. And we have been living in a world shaped by Dylan's singing ever since. Almost no one sings like Elvis Presley anymore. Hundreds try to sing like Dylan. When Sam Cooke played Dylan for the young Bobby Womack, Womack said he didn't understand it. Cooke explained that from now on, it's not going to be about how pretty the voice is. It's going to be about believing that the voice is telling the truth. To understand Bob Dylan's impact as a singer, you have to imagine a world without Tom Waits, Bruce Springsteen, Eddie Vedder, Kurt Cobain, Lucinda Williams or any other vocalist with a cracked voice, dirt-bowl yelp or bluesy street howl. It is a vast list, but so were the influences on Dylan, from the Talmudic chanting of Allen G...

We join people in your country and around the world in congratulating you on becoming the President-elect of the United States. Your victory has demonstrated that no person anywhere in the world should not dare to dream of wanting to change the world for a better place. We note and applaud your commitment to supporting the cause of peace and security around the world. We trust that you will also make it the mission of your presidency to combat the scourge of poverty and disease everywhere. We wish you strength and fortitude in the challenging days and years that lie ahead. We are sure you will ultimately achieve your dream, making the United States of America a full partner in a community of nations committed to peace and prosperity for all. - Full text of a message from Nelson Mandela , the first black president of South Africa, to Senator Barack Obama , the first black president-elect of the United States of America. So, the evangelical conservative fall-out has begun. I have receive...

Sophia turns the world upside down. rI czx bcm I zM AQW - Sophia's comments on Barack. She had control of the keyboard for a minute. The global consensus on Barack is he is the greatest thing ever, with the exception of the Prime Minister of Russia, who failed to mention Barack by name during a 45 minute state speech. Barack it seems has been elected president of the world divinely chosen to lift us out of the morass of 8 years of the failed Bush doctrine into the promised land of the ideal America that resides in the back of most people's minds when they think of the words "liberty and freedom". We want to leave behind the America of Gitmo and corporate greed and embrace a nation that cares for the poor and uses its incredible wealth and power to help others. I was chatting online with a relative who lives in the States who celebrated with champagne and tears last night. I mentioned that there were parties all over Vancouver last night to celebrate the mo...

Yes he did!!! Barack Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States tonight. I honestly didn't think that I would see a black man elected president in my lifetime. I thought it would be another hundred years or so. I was at a Canucks game tonight, and watched the election results in between periods on the tv's in the hallways of GM Place. When they flashed the election results on the big screen during the game, the whole arena exploded in cheers! When I saw that he had won, I welled up with emotion. I hadn't felt like that since watching Nelson Mandela walk as a free man in South Africa almost 20 years ago. What a historical day. We can all say we were a part of watching history unfold. My day was also filled with sadness as well. My friend Andrew Temple died yesterday. Andrew had been battling cancer for the last several years. He finally succumbed. Andrew was a friend of mine from Bible school. Over the past year we had been corresponding over facebook. He kept...

The Dinosaur and the Hula Girl terrorize Port Moody. Pretty good service today. After church, I had a meeting with the finance meeting. After that, I curled up on the couch and fell asleep watching NFL games. I love Sunday afternoons. There are usually at least 3 different NFL games on, and sometimes a couple of CFL games. It's great just to zone out, while mulling over the sermon that is now history. We had a huge dinner last night - 15 adults and 10 kids. It was our home group and a couple of other people. It was fun, but the 10 kids were quite a handful. One of the blessings of being in a house as big as ours, is that we can accommodate such large groups. I'm really hoping and praying that we can buy a house like this one next year - it seems unlikely, as this house is really quite beyond our reach. But then, our Yaletown condo also seemed like an impossible purchase 6 years ago, and we still got it. This huge house we're in presently just dropped into our lap, without u...

Fasting is a spiritual discipline where you abstain from food for a period of time in order to pray and deepen your relationship with God. It is practiced in many religions. I fasted lunch and supper today. I was going to fast breakfast as well, but only had a few hours sleep last night, and so decided I needed something to make it through the day. I'd like to be able to fast one day a week, but it's kinda hard because so many of my meetings take place over lunch. And also, I really like to eat. Fasting is very difficult, but it is good. It is hard to explain the effects if you've never done it before. Some days when I fast, I really experience a real spiritual high. Other times I end the day angry and hungry. But fasting opens up spaces inside you. For example, if I feel angry at the end of a day of fasting, then there is a reason for the anger, apart from just lack of food. And then I need to explore the root of that anger. Halloween - this was the first time Adam got to ...

Guess What? You're free... now find another acting job. If you haven't discovered this web-site, you really need to. It always cracks me up. It should be actually Stuff yuppies like - I know many Asians that like the stuff listed on this site. The one on Hummus today was awesome: http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/10/27/112-hummus/ Is anyone else watching Heroes this season? I have totally given up trying to follow this convoluted show which seems to be making less sense every week. Also - Prison Break, which should really be renamed "A Bunch of Random Guys Try to Figure out Something About a Powerful Company While The Company Is Trying To Kill Them". Look - they got out of prison in the first season!!! The show was over back them. Now, they're just trying to milk it for what it's worth. Good thing Cops and Intervention are still on.

Leadership Team with Alan Hirsch So much has happened since the last post. Saw Neil Young last Thursday - Wow. Seeing Neil Young was unbelievable. When he played "Heart of Gold", I nudged my friend and said: "We are seeing Neil Young play Heart of Gold!!!!" The guy is simply a living legend. Very few artists share his rarefied space: Bob Dylan.... and who else - Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison? His influence spans U2 to Radiohead to grunge. The next day I left for the NOVA conference in Kelowna, hosted by Willow Creek Canada. Speakers included Donald Miller, Erwin McManus and Alan Hirsch. I went with 8 other people from our leadership team. It was a pretty good conference, but I find as I get older I am less inclined to attend conference. I have been to several large ones with really big "names" in Christian leadership. The thing is that I read a lot, and will know most of the stories that the speakers are going to share. Many of these conferences tend to be q...

I am currently reading "The Politics of Jesus" by Mennonite theologian, John Howard Yoder. This book was written in 1972, but it is as relevant now as ever. In an age where varying political parties attempt to co-opt Jesus for their own ends, the church is left to decide what side of the culture war it will be on. Or, the church beats a hasty retreat and creates a parallel culture where we can feel safe and secure and our kids will grow up believing that Adam and Eve played with dinosaurs. Enter Yoder. "The Kingdom of God is a social order and not a hidden one. It is not a universal catastrophe independent of the will of human beings; it is that concrete jubilitary obedience in pardon and repentance, the possibility of which is proclaimed beginning right now, opening up the real accessibility of a new order in which grace and justice are linked, which people have only to accept." - p.105 Christianity needs to get beyond a "free ticket to heaven when you die...

Neil Young If you are on Facebook and we are friends, you will notice that I have been updating my status all day with Neil Young quotes. That's because Old Shakey is coming to town, and me and my buddy Joey are going to see him! The show is tomorrow night, and I can't wait. I got into Young a bit more recently and really like him. I have After the Gold Rush, Freedom, Greatest Hits, Prairie Wind, Harvest Moon and Live at Massey Hall. I also have bought songs from other albums such as: Chrome Dreams II, Decade, Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, Old Ways, Ragged Glory, Rust Never Sleeps and Weld. He is similar to Dylan in many ways, in fact the Sun ran a story comparing the two, because Dylan plays this Friday and there are whispers that he may join Young on stage tomorrow night. The only way it could be better is if Johnny Cash strolled on stage too. Our leadership team from church is going to a conference this week-end in Kelowna. I'll be blogging from there - I think I get...

Ambulances full of sick people. This morning Felicia hosted a woman's group meeting from the church. From all accounts, it was a success. I took Adam and Sophia for the morning. We went to visit a member of our church who is in hospital. As we were walking towards the hospital, it happened again! Adam let his world-view slip out! It was a beautiful warm sunny day, and I said to Adam, "Isn't it an amazingly beautiful morning!" To which Adam, replied, "But, those ambulances are full of sick people." I can't get enough of this kid!

Felicia received a bonus check from work, after she quit her full time line. It was an accumulation of all her unbanked vacation days. So, because she's so nice, she said we could go clothes shopping. She felt she needed more dressy clothes for Sunday mornings as the pastor's wife and all. So, I was pretty excited. An excursion to a suburban shopping mall really gets my heart pumping. After a healthy meal of Arby's roast beef, we ventured on. And here's the thing.... clothes are really different now. I wanted a sort of casual button up shirt - either white or grey. I thought Gap was my best bet. But, it appeared a small explosion had blown up at the back of the store - there were shirts helter skelter. The overly zealous manager looked for an oxford button down, but came up empty handed. He tried to sell me a pink one - I gripped the stroller a little tighter in an effort to assert my heterosexuality. All I got at the Gap was a white t-shirt - wow. Then I went to 4 more...

Adam walks the line. I need to keep a record of all the interesting things that Adam has said in his 4 years thus far on Earth. Here's a sampling: One time Sophia was crying and my Mom was saying "It's ok, its ok its ok". To which Adam responded, "It's not ok, its not ok, its not ok. " Later my Mom told Adam that on the beach we can collect shells, which is very exciting! Again, he responds with "But, some of the shells are broken." One day I picked Adam up at school. It was a beautiful sunny day. I told Adam, "Isn't it a beautiful day!!!" He said, "But, the wind still blows the trees." And then this morning may have been the pinnacle in his pithy statements. Every morning Adam crawls into our bed and hangs out for a bit. He crawled into bed at some point in the night last night, I never heard him. This morning at about 7 AM, we had the following conversation: "Dad" "Yeah" "I have to tell you som...

I have discovered a whole world of music out there: the blues and soul music. People like Pee Wee Crayton, Al Green, Charlie Parker and Red Prysock. I really really like the old Delta blues from the 30's and 40's. Their influence is most pronounced on bands like White Stripes and The Black Keys. And, we probably wouldn't have Zeppelin w.out th elbues. There's something just so REAL about these artists, that over-dubbed Britneys cannot reproduce. Listening to Pee Wee Crayton right now - Early Hour Blues. I ran into a faithful blog reader over the weekend, who felt it was a bist surreal actually talking to me in person, as he follows my life on-line daily. Thanksgiving week-end has come and gone. We got together with some family for dinner last night in Langley. Had some great turkey dinner. Felicia is working tonight and Sophia simply won't sleep. She's been crying and screaming for the past half hour. I took her out for a bit, but I'm hoping she'll settl...

The Ninans on ice. This blogging thing seems to have been on a perpetual pause. I normally blog late at night, reflecting on the day that has just ended. Recently I have been dead tired at night and have been dragging myself to bed, instead of wandering downstairs to the lap-top. maybe I should take my lap-top upstairs and blog from up there. Anyhow - it is noon on Saturday of Thanksgiving week-end. And I am blogging. I heard Walter Brueggeman speak on Wednesday night - the guy was unreal. It was basically like listening to a modern day prophet. I need to get the audio downloads of his other messages. Brueggeman is liberal on things like inerrancy and some aspects fo sexuality. But, he is more perceptive and insightful then most Old Testament evangelical theologians that I have read. Read him. Other than that, things are pretty swimming. Exodus is rolling along nicely. Various other groups are beginning to emerge from within our church: young adults, moms groups, a couple new home grou...

Dealing with suburban isolation This afternoon we headed downtown on a lark. Felicia took the kids to science world and I was dropped off at one of my favorite pubs: The Irish Heather in Gastown, which is quite a bit more upscale since it moved into new digs across the street, making me wonder if it is still my fave. What I liked about it before is it was a bit grubby, similar to some of the pubs I've been to in Dublin. I ran into one of my mentors: Brian Buhler. Brian is a local pastor who is one of the best preachers I have ever heard. I have known Brian since I was a Bible school student in 1993 - wow, 15 years! Brian was there with his wife and son. I joined them briefly and caught up a bit. I also worked on my sermon in the pub. Brian asked if I needed my "urban fix". I hadn't thought of it like that before. We came downtown for the kids, and also to check out a new Izakaya called Gyoza King. Coming downtown after being away for a month, I felt my heart beat a li...

This Sunday I am preaching on Exodus 2:15b-4. The passage includes the following text which I need to figure out a way to interpret and apply to life in 2008: 24 At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met Moses and was about to kill him. 25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched Moses' feet with it. "Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me," she said. 26 So the LORD let him alone. (At that time she said "bridegroom of blood," referring to circumcision.) Pray for me.

The above picture is a typical picture of me at work. This is my home office, which is quite nice, although lacking the stellar view from our downtown apartment. I have a window to the left, where I see maybe 3-4 people strolling by, and a few SUV's driven by hockey moms who themselves seem to be driven by something else entirely. I often dress like this as well - a t-shirt and shorts or jeans. Unless I have a meeting, then I'll spruce things up with a collared shirt and socks! 3 AM - Can't sleep. Awoken by a disturbing dream where I become best friends with the mom from the series "Little People in Big World" or whatever that show is called about 2 little people and their kids living on a farm in Oregon. The dad got busted for a DUI last year, which is more than scary. More thoughts on Palin: Gawker magazine is running daily clips of Palin's interviews with Katie Couric. Here's the thing: Palin seems completely incapable of being able to answer direct que...

Today, about 4:00. (Bad Euro-techno is playing loudly on a cheap portable system in the background). It's rare to have a day as warm as today, when its almost October. But, it was a hot hot day. The Vancouver Film Festival started on Friday. This is my favorite two weeks of the year in Vancouver. Its different this year - I'm not volunteering, and I live too far away to go to as many films as I'd like. I will miss the people I have worked with for the last 2 years at the festival, and the killer party they have at the end! I had planned on going to a Thai film this afternoon about a village rebuilding itself after the Tsunami. But, it was just too hot and sunny to spend the afternoon in a darkened theatre with a bunch of other film geeks. So, I packed up the family and headed to White Pine Beach to soak up the rays one last time before the rains come to wash away our joy. It was fun, except for the people who insisted on playing their brutal music really loud. The only resp...

I can't believer its been almost 2 weeks since my last post. What's been happening? My friend wrote a book and its really good. I am going to order a few copies for some friends. I've been involved with all kinds of delicate ministerial/leadership matters. I have come to the conclusion that leading a church is sort of like being on the end of a plank all by yourself, doing acrobatic manouevers which allow a variety of balls to stay in the air. There's no one else out there. A few people come running out and either help or don't help - but mainly you're on your own out there. I've been running. The owners of the house we are renting came home briefly before heading overseas to Cambridge. We had an awesome time hanging out with them. My parents left for China, where my dad is teaching at the University of Shanghai for a month. I preached 2 sermons on Exodus chapters 1 and 2. We started a Young Adults Bible Study in our home. Felicia started a Mom's group a...

Negotiating the space between. I went to a meeting in Vancouver today with some church planters and other pastors. We watched a video of a mega-church pastor from America who shared his greatest leadership decision. And the decision was..... to only work 45 hrs/week. I know - doesn't sound so great. He explained that he was not going to devote his life to the church, and miss out on his family. Instead, he was going to devote time to his family, and miss out on certain church activities. Family first, ministry second. It was basically about life balance, and I thought it was excellent. The question that I raised for my ministry colleagues was that in some ways we do not have "normal" jobs with "normal" hours. That is, when Brian in my church died last week. I couldn't say, I'm done work for the day and couldn't go to the hospital. In some circumstances we simply need to put in time, after we are "done" for the day. Another thing I learned t...

Cute walk. My stupid router is acting up again. I keep going off-line, and when I'm on-line, its super-slow. ARGHHH!!!! We had our "Home Opener" today, which is an event where we invited the community to our church to check it out. We had a free barbecue after. Note - I am now writing this a day later because the internet kept going out. I spent 30 minutes w. Ronald from Delhi who led me out of the wireless wilderness. Home Opener - lower numbers then expected, but we still had a great time. Been dealing w. all kinds of craziness lately - this too shall pass. Saw "Burn Before Reading". More Coen brothers craziness. Good, but not great. But good for the Coen brothers is better then most others.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: whatever you think a pastor's job is, it is never boring. Example: I'm cozily nestled in my home office reading the book of Exodus (doesn't sound exciting, but it is). I am starting a new sermon series next week on Exodus. Whenever I start a new book series, I start by reading through the book in several different translations. Then, I start to divide up the book, according to the passages I want to preach on. Finally, I schedule it out - With Exodus, I'm thinking it will be over a 4 mth. period. Anyways, I just finish reading about the hardening of Pharoah's heart when my phone rings. A guy from our church was walking his dogs last night, had a massive heart attack and died. Well, he's on life support with no brain acitivity. I head down to the hospital and enter one of the most surreal episodes of my ministry career. I spend some time with the wife and step-son, praying and just being there with them. The wif...

Ok - here's another list. But w. 10 different artists, instead of U2 dominating the stats. Shins, Cash, Ritter, and then... 4. Crazy - Gnarls Barkley. Big hit last year. Catchy. Odd band, though. 5. Weighty Ghost - Wintersleep. 6. Harry's Game - Clannad - This is an amazing song that appeared on the Patriot Games soundtrack - very haunting. 7. Everything in its right Place - Radiohead. This makes it up there because I used it in concert w. an a/v presentation on the passion of christ. 8. Love Sick - Dylan. "I'm walking through streets that are dead.... I'm sick of love." Need I say more? 9. Lovers In a Dangerous Time - Barenaked Ladies. The only re-make that is better then the original (by Bruce Cockburn). The video is very Canadian. 10. Lord of the Starfields - Bruce Cockburn. I think this song is about his conversion.

Top 10 played songs on my itunes player: 1. New Slang - The Shins - Catchy song w. weird lyrics. 2. Devils' Right Hand - Johnny Cash - Another catchy song by one of my favorite artists of all time. 3. Girl in the War - Josh Ritter - Saw this guy on Letterman and thought he was swell. 4. Miracle Drug - U2 5. Sometimes you can't make it on your own - U2 6. I Will Follow - U2 7. Vertigo - U2 8. Love and Peace or Else - U2 9. City of Blinding Lights - U2 10. One Step Closer - U2 (5 more U2 songs are numbers 11-15) All the U2 songs, except for Follow, are off of Atomic Bomb, which is simply a fantastic album.

Our neighbor. Finally unpacked and settled in. (Linksys seems to be ok - Jamie). My home office is almost set up - I really love it, mainly because it has a huge wooden desk, where I can lay out a lot of books. I wish it had a door, though - the young 'uns wander in quite often. Interesting day. Went to the bank and ran into a mother and son from the church. Then I went through the A&W drive-thru and the guy who handed me my junk food, had been at the church for the first time on Sunday - he recognized me and introduced himself. I wanted to pretend the teen burger and root beer wasn't for me. Instead, I invited him back on Sunday. And then tonight, I went for dinner with a friend who is getting baptized and wanted some guidance on writing his testimony. As we were leaving the restaurant 2 young good looking servers - one Asian guy and a blonde girl told me that some of my friends from church said hi. I asked if they were in the restuarant. They sort of smiled mischeviously...

Our neigbors backyard. Adam and the deer right in front of our house! The movers showed up Saturday morning an hour late, because someone had slashed the tires of their truck - I knew we were off to a good start. The movers were 2 19 yr. old guys covered in tattoos and smoking. Within 3 hours they had packed up most of our stuff and packed up the truck and were on our way. I and some other friends had also taken 2 SUV's worth of smaller items as well. When I got back to the apartment, where Felicia was cleaning, to my shock there was still a bunch of stuff left - our dining table, a desk, a cd rack, a dvd rack plus a multiple of smaller items. I couldn't believe it. I actually had to rent a cargo van AND get someone w. an SUV to help us again. I am sending the bill for the van to the moving company But, by Saturday night we had all our stuff under one roof. I still had to print up my sermon and go through it before the next day. But, we're here - the burbs. The house we are...

Adam enduring the rain. Well, this is it. After calling downtown Vancouver home for 7(!) years, we are moving away. We first lived on Granville st. on the 3rd floor of a brand new tiny 1 bedroom apartment. We lived near a lot of clubs, and it was always noisy on week-ends. After a year there, we knew we had to move - too small and noisy. At the time, we felt God was calling us to plant a church in Yaletown. So, we explored the possibility of buying an apartment in Yaletown. God miraculously led us to the beautiful apartment that we have enjoyed for the past 6 years. Our apartment is large for downtown - 1100 sq. feet. It's on the 26th floor w. floor to ceiling windows in every room. The building has a gym, pool and hot tub. We are walking distance from everything downtown. In fact, for 3 years we didn't own a car, because we rarely needed one. It's an amazing apartment, and a great investment as well. We plan to continue to rent it out over the next 2-3 years, including ov...