Four

I sat down, pulled up the blog, and had just decided I had nothing to say. Not one thing. There are several things I've been meaning to write about but keep putting off until I have more time to be delving into topics that require more mental alertness and creativity than I have at this point in the day.

I remembered that it was about this time of year that I began my blog and started to wonder what date exactly I first entered the blogosphere. And what do you know? It was January 27, 2007--exactly four years ago today.

In 2007 I was a single mom with a fifteen-year-old daughter who was just learning to play around with her little camera and a thirteen-year-old son with a round baby face who couldn't remember ever having a dad. I was in love with my work as an editor at Discovery House Publishers, and--even though I was sick to death of dating--I was spending my Friday nights getting to know a mysterious, kind, reserved man named Henry who was different from anyone else I had dated. I couldn't really tell you at that point why I was saying yes to his dinner invitations every week. I was tracking the number of dates we had gone on in my planner, just wondering how many it would be before we had our last--an inevitable circumstance based on previous experience.

In 2011 I'm married to the mysterious (not so much now), kind Henry--who isn't so reserved once you get to know him. We still go out on dates on Friday nights, except during Jonathan's basketball season. Marriage has brought with it a different house, church, and a whole new set of great friends. The daughter is in her second year of college now, and the camera play has taken a much more serious turn since she's a photojournalism major. The equipment is a little more expensive too. The boy--now 17--knows what it is to have a dad who makes him shovel the sidewalk and mow the lawn, teaches him how to shave and tie a tie, and talks politics and watches World War II movies with him. The baby face has to be shaved on occasion, and the somewhat longer legs can be found running up and down the basketball court at Tuesday and Friday night basketball games.

I still love being an editor--but I'm doing it at Reformation Heritage Books, and there are different adventures in books, new authors, and a range of responsibilities that makes my head spin some days. And my hair is just a little bit longer now than it has been--a quite daring move for me.

So happy birthday, my blog. You came into my life at a time when I've had lots to write about. And if there isn't quite as much now, that's okay too. Having a somewhat uneventful life that looks a lot like everyone else's may not make for great blogging material, but I don't think I mind having nothing to say.

Words, Words. Words

POLONIUS: What do you read, my lord?

HAMLET: Words, words, words.

POLONIUS: What is the matter, my lord?  

HAMLET: Between who?

POLONIUS: I mean, the matter that you read, my lord.

Words have been in the news a lot recently. Most of the time we don't think about them much. We throw them around here and there, letting them fall where they will--sometimes biting and stinging, sometimes soothing and calming, Sometimes our words provoke thought and response; sometimes they have about as much substance as marshmallow cream.  Sometimes the words directed toward us, like sticks and stones breaking our bones, hurt us. Sometimes our words are like junk mail. We send them out to anyone, anywhere and hope that someone will notice and buy. But the words most of us remember and hold dear have come like elegantly wrapped packages, and we store them someplace safe so that we can revisit them when we need to.

Words are certainly powerful things,even though we're not always conscious of their power when we're using them. And that's why they've gotten a lot of attention of late. Soon after news got out of the tragic shooting in Tucson that left six people dead and others, including a state representative, wounded, words came under attack. "It was the violent language of the ultra-conservative political pundits that we hear on radio and television that incited the shooter to violence," some said. If only the words they use against those who disagree with them politically weren't so hate-filled, so full of metaphorical violence, this tragedy never would have happened. And in a great show of sensitivity, the Republicans responded by renaming their repeal of Obamacare "job-destroying" rather than "job-killing" because everyone knows that destroying is much nicer than killing. And all of this fuss over words when so far no evidence suggests that the words that are being blamed influenced the shooter in any way at all.

NewSouth Books has made news too. The publisher is releasing an edition of Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, one of the great masterpieces of American literature, without the words "nigger" and "injun." "Nigger" will be replaced with the word "slave." The book has been banned from many school libraries and classrooms through the years because of its use of  politically incorrect language that many find offensive. The editor of this new edition believes that now teachers will feel more comfortable using Huck in the classroom, and students will be able to enjoy all that the book has to offer. With a master's degree in English, as a former teacher who frequently used this novel in the classroom, and an editor, everything in me screams NO to this ridiculous attempt at political correctness. One thing is sure: the students who use this edition of Huck Finn will not be enjoying all that this book has to offer because one of the great themes of this novel is the young boy Huck's growing consciousness that Jim, the character in the novel often described as a nigger, is a noble man who loves his family and is more of a friend and father to Huck than the white people in his life. Twain's message is anti-racist, and to draw attention to and remove language that a young boy would likely have used in the pre-Civil War South is to miss the point entirely.

It would be foolish to argue that words have no power, that we can use the language of violence and racism without consequence. But it's just as foolish to believe that if we only eliminate the language, there will be no more racism, no more violence. The words are just a reflection of what is in our hearts, and we know that hearts are full of hatred and violence, "desperately wicked," the prophet Jeremiah tells us. And so we must be careful not to oversimplify and blame words themselves (especially if the words themselves aren't to blame) for what lives deep in all of our hearts.

But the good news is that there is a powerful Word that was in the beginning, that was with God and was God. And that Word, in the most perfect way, reveals the Father's heart to us. Those who know this Word know the beginning of the end of violence and hatred. This Word--and not simply the elimination of words--is the solution to hatred and violence. In fact, this Word will both kill and destroy all that is evil, so that words will only ever communicate all that is good.

An Obsession?

Via: Online Schools

Got It Covered

Katie finishes working at her college's library, drives my car back over to the seminary building where I work to pick me up, and I  hop in the driver's seat. The next leg of the trip is west on 96 to 196, south through downtown on 131, and off at 36th Street, where we pick up our next passenger, Jonathan, who has just finished two hours of basketball practice. We have miles to go before we sleep--or at least I thought we did.

I drive around the corner to the grocery store to pick up a couple of things that we need for dinner, and both kids stay in the car. I hurry through the store, gather fresh vegetables, and stand in the less-than-ten items line for a few minutes. I dash back out to the car, where both exhausted children (19 and 17, mind you) are leaning against the windows in the front and back seats with their eyes shut. Neither of them even looks up as I get in the car and back out of the parking spot.They've had a hard day.

As I drive through the parking lot I comment, "A kidnapper could be driving the two of you away, and you wouldn't even know it. You'd be ten miles from here, and there'd be nothing you could do."

Summoning all of the strength left in his weary 17-year-old body, Jonathan speaks up from the back seat: "I'd beat him up. Katie has her license--she could drive away. We'd be fine."

And I feel much better now knowing there's a strategy in place.

A New Beginning

Regardless of how many new years we might have experienced, each one, in some sense, marks a new beginning. On January 1, many of us allow our minds to jump ahead to December 31 and guess how life might be different for us 364 days later. Some of us have hopes, and some of us fears. All of us, though, expect that we will experience change.


The book of John reveals a beautiful beginning in chapter 2 that shows the amazing changes that Jesus brought to the world--we still experience the results of this change over two thousand years later. 


In John 2, Jesus is attending a wedding with his newfound disciples. There weren't many who knew yet about Jesus and the history-making, life-changing ministry he was about to embark upon. John the Baptist knew who he was, and John, Andrew, Peter, Nathaniel, and Phillip had been introduced to the Messiah. Jesus' mother, Mary, indicates that she has some notion of her divine Son's capabilities in this chapter.


The wedding is in Cana, and apparently Mary feels some responsibility for coordinating food and drink because when a huge problem arises, she approaches her son for help. Probably worse than any modern broach of etiquette we can imagine has just occurred: the wine has run out, and this will be a tremendous embarrassment for the host.


Mary turns to her son and tells him the problem, and he--seemingly with some reluctance because he reminds her it is not yet his time--instructs the servants to fill six large water jars--about 120 gallons, some scholars believe. Next Jesus instructs the servants to draw some of the water out and serve it to the master of ceremonies, who observes that most people would serve the good wine first, and later the worse. But for some reasons, this host has held back the good wine until now.


As we learn when we study John, nothing is just about what it seems on the surface. It's true--Jesus turned the water in the jars into wine. And yet what happens in this new beginning is about so much more than that. One of the things that John continually reminds his readers is that this Jesus is the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, and in the Old Testament, wine is often associated with joy. Psalm 104:15 tells us that God gives plants for man to cultivate so that he can bring forth wine to gladden his heart. In Isaiah, we're told that the great feast the Lord will one day prepare for us will include well-aged wine. Wine is associated with joy and God's blessing at times. So in restoring the wine at the wedding in Cana, Jesus brings the joy that would have been missing from the wedding feast.


A couple of other important things to gather from this first miracle at the beginning of Jesus' ministry. He provides abundant amounts of wine. The party went from no wine to more than the hosts and guests ever could have asked for or imagined. The other thing is the wine's quality: Could the Creator of all things, the one who sends good and perfect gifts, provide anything less than the best wine?


We see from his first miracle, that Jesus means to bring joy--abundantly and greater than any other joy we might experience. May the beautiful news of this beginning of Jesus' ministry shape the beginning of this year: despite any changes we may experience in 2011--good or bad--Jesus, by whom all things were created, is the source of our joy--a joy greater than we could ever ask for or imagine, a joy that satisfies like nothing else ever could.


May you have a blessed new year, filled with abundant joy!