Dreams Unlocked

I have a beautiful home office with floor to ceiling windows, which overlooks Yaletown. But, now that Adam's idea of fun is climbing on me, I need to start working away from home. I now work at the Starbucks in the Pivotal building - 1/2 a block from our apt. I also go to the top floor of the Library - the special collections floor - its so special I never see anyone else up there except Library staff. It's working out well, I have internet and my cel phone - everything I need. I am preaching through 1 peter - my last sermon was on ch. 1:13-25 - I think by the end of this series, I should have enough material to write a book. It would cover all the themes in the letter - especially the identity of believers - the purposes of the new community and the engagement of the new community w. the surrounding culture. I have done a fair bit of writing for various publications - with some decent editing, I think I could be better. Also the blog is now reaching a whopping 100 hits/day whi...

National Post ran a story w. the headline "Vancouver and Prairies in deep freeze. Uh, it was like -3 here with some snow, and -50 in Saskatchewan. It wasn't exactly a deep freeze here - people were shoveling their walks in their shorts. When it snows in Vancouver, it's a major event. 2 big items for Urban Sanctuary: 1. We are now incorporated as a society. One step closer to obtaining charitable status. 2. We have now secured a publicly accessible location in a prime spot in Yaletown. A very nice coffee shop has agreed to rent to us on Sunday nights - this is a HUGE deal for us- I just hope and pray we use this wisely. Other then that, life continues to move on by.

3 films have come out recently that explore the depravity of humanity: American Gangster, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. Out of the 3, There Will Be Blood paints the bleakest picture of the dark side of human beings. Daniel Day Lewis blows the screen away with his formidable acting skills, proving once and for all that he is in a very small and elite group of the very best actors alive today. He dominates the screen as this single minded oil man, out to own as much land and make as much money as possible. On his journey he shows disregard and contempt for those closest to him, including his own family members. There is an interesting character of a young pentecostal type preacher who appears to have stepped right out of a Flannery O' Connor novel. The preacher confronts Lewis' character at different times. This film has some hard scenes to watch, but surprisingly it is rated PG. One reviewer said the final 10 minutes of the film will stay with him for a long l...

George Verwer challenging us with the opportunities for global missions. This weekend is Missionsfest at Canada Place. Missionsfest is an amazing event - several thousand people come to hear about global missions. They bring in excellent speakers. This year George Verwer spoke. I first heard Verwer speak at Urbana 87. His message 20 years ago changed my life. Now, 20 years later I had a chance to hear him speak again. Verwer looks great for a 70 yr. old! He is as dynamic, humorous and challenging as ever. I think you would be hard pressed to find anyone as passionate about global missions as Verwer. Back is much better - thanks to time and prayer. Had our monthly community dinner tonight - Lowry's supplied Guitar Hero for our entertainment - what an awesome game! And it's even better in a large group. Also - the leadership team made an important decision about the future Urban Sanctuary, without me there! It was a decision about me, and I had to excuse myself so they could dis...

It's 4:20 AM - I've been up for more than an hour because my back is hurting so bad -same thing happened last night. Going to a medical doctor today to see what's what. Did not leave the apt. today. Worked and moaned in pain. I'm even considering acupuncture - anything to get some relief. Please pray for me.

U2 at the premier of U23D at the Sundance Film Festival. This is basically the greatest movie ever made. It was so unbelievable - you get within inches of the band and the 3D effects just put it over the top. I told my Dad I'm going to see a 3-D movie. He said "They still make those? I saw them when I was a teenager in India." Yep, they still make them. If you have an Imax theater in your town, I highly recommend going to see it. Busy, busy day. Meetings from Kitsilano to downtown Vancouver. And, I saw the Chiro doctor for an "adjustment". He went over all these tests they did - my x-rays show that my posture is slightly better then the Hunchback of Notre Dame. He said that eventually the nerves can't take it anymore and start screaming and causing my back to go nuts. So, he wants me to come in for "adjustments" 3 times a week. Each "adjustment" costs $35, so basically I'm going to pay $420 for 1 month of treatment, which is ro...

Adam is wearing clothes of mine that my Mom saved. 1. Heath Ledger - dead at 28. How sad. The entertainment web-sites are going nuts, updating every minute on the latest developments. 2. My back is killing me! No joke - I woke up this morning and I could barely move. I've been popping Motrin every 4 hours to stay sane. Going to see a Chiro doc. tomorrow - Coming from a medical family, we never really held much creedence in chiro guys, but it's better then waiting 3 months to see an orthopaedic surgeon. Please pray for me - it really really hurts. Today was pretty much a write-off - the pain kept it hard to concentrate. Adam asked if my back was broken up. 3. Oscar Nominations - No Country and Blood lead the pack. It's interesting both films and American Gangster glorify the darkest elements of the human psyche. Oscar seems to always go for the grimmer fare.

Sophia and her hairy dad, hanging out. I preached at a Mennonite church in Port Moody this morning. This church is awesome - people are super friendly and the pastor is very humble. They meet in a school gym, and it sort of gives me hope for Urban Sanctuary. I think I can officially claim being the pastor of the smallest church in North America. I said that this morning to much laughter. I have been reading David Fitch's book "The Great Giveaway". I agree with some of his stuff. But, there's some stuff that I feel gets a bit overly critical of some modernist tendencies of evangelical churches. We need to keep our ecclesiological categories a little wider. Derek Vreeland posted a very very good post about his journey out of some aspects of pentecostalism. Read it here . I have grown a beard and it's pretty hairy now. My office is really really messy. When I am in here with my bearded face, surrounded by books wearing torn slippers, pajama bottoms and a worn out ...

If you google Santosh - this is the first image that comes up - that is not me. I read a lot - probably a book / week. And I try to keep up to date with current emergent and other Christian trends. I've read Mclaren, Padgitt. I listen to the Emergent podcast. Here's the thing - I think these folks are more concerned about this world then the next. They want to do a lot to make this world a better world to live in - which is commendable, and indeed a great deal of Jesus' Kingdom teaching was about this. But, along the way, the message of individual redemption gets lost. Indeed, you are chastised for using the word "individual". Everything is about the restoration of kingdoms, principalities and powers. What about the soul? Where is the motivation for evangelism? Spent the day in meetings - from Surrey to downtown Vancouver. I'm bagged. Tomorrow at 7 AM the race begins again. Only one meeting - rest of the day, exegeting 1 Peter 1:13-25 whi...

1. Took Adam to the new Veggie-Tales movie. Halfway through he fell fast asleep, and could not be woken up. The theater refunded our tickets and I carried him home. 2. Marc Emery is known in Vancouver as "the prince of pot". He is a local pot activist. He has been sentenced to 5 years in prison. He was interviewed by the media today and he was COMPLETELY LOADED!!! I couldn't believe how stoned he was! Great service last night.

One of my favourite pics I have ever taken. Well, 2 interesting meetings in the last 2 days. Both with some key leaders in the church in Canada - at a national level - one a denominational president, the other, one of the key church planting guys in Canada. After these 2 meetings, looks like there could be some interesting changes in 2008 for Urban Sanctuary. Will elaborate more as things solidify. Had an other nice service tonight - still missing quite a few people, but it was still really good. I played a killer version of "Everybody Hurts" performed by The Corrs which merged into a cool David Crowder song. Katie made some soup which we all enjoyed after. She is an amazing cook. I have been hearing some criticisms of the emergent church lately - if you read material on the emergent church, you will notice that there is not much discussion on the after life. There seems to be more of an emphasis on making THIS world better - end poverty, global warming, etc. But the passion ...

When you're the richest man in the world, you can get any celebrity you want to be in your video.

Soph checking out the fridge. Planned out my week. I have this new goal of meeting with 10 people per week - a mixture of leaders of Urban Sanctuary, attenders of Urban Sanctuary and then a mixture of people in the community and others that are on the fringes of the faith (but will still talk with a pastor!) I figure if this church is going to grow, it's not going to happen with me locked up in my home office reading Mirozlov Volf, or worse reading about church planting, w.out actually planting the church!!! Also - I am trying to spend more time at my local Starbucks - I know most of the staff - it's an excellent place to connect with people. Started prepping for a new home group study we are starting. It is a video series of one of the best Christian books ever written: Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. I have read the book 3 times - I think there is some sort of special annointing on it - it is absolutely stunning. We have the DVD of Foster doing some teaching whic...

Santosh freezing in English Bay - Jan 1 2008!!! Monday's are my day off. I used to take Saturday's, but I find after Sunday night's, I am pretty much useless on Mondays. Most of my days off I do something w. the fam, or catch a movie. Today I saw Juno. It's been much hyped, and was actually pretty good, and will probably make my top 10 of 2007, which I am still working on. Then I was going to my favourite Starbucks to read some Flannery O'Connor and ran into a friend of a friend. She in turn was another friend. We decided to sit together and chat as new found friends are apt to do. It turned into a nice time. The new friend that I just met, turned out to be a writer (which I often aspire to be, during my more optimistic moments). So we had a nice chat, and I managed to recruit them and one of their husbands to coming to our home group on Wednesday night! One of the great things about living in a larger city, is the great array of restaurants available to you. Tonig...

Had a nice small gathering at the Delgado's last night to usher in '08. Played Pictionary, where I marvelled at the Delgado's abilities to draw. Katie seems to want to do a whole back story to the word. For example, for the word "bone", she started to draw a house and a dog running after a bone - Juan just drew a bone and the other team got it in about 2 seconds. Then Juan thought the word "lather" was leather" and proceeded to draw a cow, and then a wallet. The best move had to be Brent who for the word "Indian" just drew an arrow pointing at me! We had lots of tasty food, and for some reason there was an over abundance of alcohol! We brought Kirkland Signature Champagne that we got at a Costco in Washington some time. We watched a couple of espisodes of the British Office which still makes me laugh as hard as the first time I saw them. Then at about 11:40 we watched Dick Clark's Rocking New Year's Eve thing from Times Square. A c...