Holiday Update

***Sorry about the delay of this post. I have been experiencing this Christmas Season more than reflecting on it. ***

On Christmas Adam

We had an exhilarating Sunday morning worship service at Lakeview. We read Scripture from throughout the bible relating to Christ (from Genesis 3 to Revelation 1) and then told the nativity story through the use of candles, with the various characters of the story (Mary, Joe, Jesus, Shepherds, Angels, and Wise Men) being represented by candles. As the Luke 2 and Matthew 2 texts were read, the candles corresponding to those characters would be lit. Then, except for the Jesus candle, each of the others were extinguished.

We then had the Lord's Supper. Three tables stood at the head of each section of pews and we came up family by family to take the Supper. It was a special time. Following the Lord's Supper, the deacons each lit a candle from the Jesus candle and lit the candle of the church members on the first row. They then lit the other member's candles until all the candles in the church were lit. We then had a benediction and departed while singing Silent Night. On the way out, Mrs. Emogene said to me (with a twinkle in her eye) "That's the most beautiful Christmas Service I've ever been a part of, and I'm seventy-two years old!"


On Christmas Eve

Since the kids were with Mom and Dad, my brothers and sister-in-law assembled at our house to cook and to set up the trampoline. It was a beautiful day to set it up, in the 50’s but bright and sunny. Kadie picked up the kids from their grandparents and we ended the evening by watching one of our favorite Christmas movies after the kids went to bed. In this picture, Bartolo and I practice levitating on the trampoline.

On Christmas morning

The kids got up and maintained a holding pattern until we had the video camera set up and running. Like last year, we used the Fischer-Price nativity scene to follow along with the Christmas story. Strangely (though appropriately perhaps) Joseph is now missing from the scene. The kids loved all their gifts, and demonstrated the crass commercial greed that has made kids wide-eyed for generations.

Their favorite gift was the trampoline. As they realized what it was, they shrieked with glee and Squealer stripped out of his footy-pajamas on the spot and went streaking as a naked flash through the house toward his room and his jumping clothes. Fortunately I got all this on tape and will embarrass him in front of future girlfriends in another decade or so.

They’ve loved the trampoline and the netting saved Squealer’s life about 5 times in the first 3 minutes he was on it getting double bounced by his big sisters.

On Christmas Day

My parents and in-laws, brothers and wife/girlfriend all came over for lunch. I am reminded yet again of the importance of family. The day ended with an empty house, all the kids worn out from jumping all day and Kadie and I resting on the couch with only the Christmas tree lights and the fire snapping in the fireplace. We related our bleswsings and went to bed. A perfect Christmas day if there ever was one.


Unto Us a Son is Given

The day after Christmas, the newest addition to our family was born. Kadie’s younger sister (known around here as PT Girl) gave birth to a baby boy Arthur. Although he’s three weeks early, Arthur is in excellent health. Kadie went over to spend the rest of the week with her in the hospital and only returned home today. Kadie was missed, but the kids survived.


Over the next few days I’ll post my favorite links (both mine and others) from the last year...
Happy Holidays to all!

And to all a good night...

Happy FESTIVUS Everyone!!!!!

PSC Etiquette

I have a couple of Pastor Search Committee etiquette questions:

First, what would you think of a candidate who was a reference for another candidate, sending in his own resume while we were still considering his friend? Let me explain. No, there is too much, let me sum up.

Brother Bob sent us his resume through the Associational office. As a part of his resume, he included three references, one of whom was a friend, Brother Jim. As a part of our process of checking out his references, one of our committee members called Brother Jim to tell us about Brother Bob.

As we talked with him, Brother Jim then began to ask our committee member about Lakeview, what our situation is and how the church is doing. None of these questions were too invasive and seemed to be motivated by nothing more than curiosity.

About a week later we received a resume from Brother Jim! In a subsequent phone call with him, Brother Jim acknowledged hearing about our search for the first time from our committee memebhr who called about his friend.

Brother Jim’s reaction hits me wrong. It seems unprofessional and also unethical to me to agree to serve as a friend’s reference and then to apply for the same position.

Your thoughts?

(Back to main Pastor Search Committee Menu)

The Artistic Temperment

Due to forgotten departmental turf wars waged decades past, Religious Studies was somehow stuffed into the same department as Fine Arts. As a consequence of that decision, I've spent part of my time as Chair interacting with and getting to know artists. This is my first prolonged exposure to the artistic temperament and it’s been an interesting education. One of the more memorable encounters I had occurred a few years ago.

It was a busy day, to be sure, but most days are. I was sitting in my office working on ways to slake the thirst of our Administration for various reports, rubrics and requisition approvals. There is a never ending shuffle of papers from Liberal Arts to the Admin building and I often feel like I’m just barely keeping up with it all. I was pulling out small amounts of my remaining hair follicles when Pat walked into my office unannounced.

Pat looks just like Jesus. Or at lest the way Jesus would’ve looked had he lived into his mid-forties. Pat’s brown hair is shoulder length and provides a striking contrast with his piercing blue eyes. Pat has taught painting as an adjunct for us for the last decade or so, predating even my own arrival on campus.

He’s also a sweet, nice guy. Pat's exceptionally well mannered, sometimes frustratingly so. I’ve known him for four or five years as faculty, but he continues to address me as Dr. Taran, despite my constant reminder that we are colleagues. His life is very simple. He paints, lives in a small apartment over someone’s garage, and makes very little money as an adjunct. My predecessor helped him to open his first checking account so that he could deposit his first semester’s paycheck. He also helped him with the process of buying his first car, even though Pat was in his thirties at the time. As the Colonel once described him “Pat is like a duck, every morning is a brand new day.”

Pat came into the office and waited for me to look up from my stacks of papers. Then he softly said “Dr. Taran, you need to come to my class for a minute.” I felt my heart rate increase slightly at his statement. Whenever a faculty member calls me out of my office and to their class, it’s usually for a pretty big reason. A part of my time at work is spent trouble shooting, something I enjoy a lot. But statements like that get the adrenaline pumping.

As we walked out of our building, Pat deflected my attempts to find out what the problem in his class was. Then he surprised me when we walked not to the art lab, but rather to a small grove of trees near our building. There are several benches in the area and several of his students were sitting there with their sketchboards drawing out pencil sketchings of the trees, squirrels and other elements of nature. They were working on outdoor scenes and I didn’t see a crisis in sight.

I started to ask Pat what the problem was, but he was already back into instructor mode. He had walked over to one of the seated students and was offering some constructive criticism of their work. Since Pat was busy, I (somewhat awkwardly) waited in silence. The day was warm, but not hot. The students were all quietly working on their drawings. I stood there for a moment and enjoyed the peaceful tranquility. There was no telephone ring or email chime. No secretaries were in sight. Things could be worse than standing outside, surrounded by nature, and teaching students. Finally, I sat down myself and enjoyed the warm afternoon.

I continued to wait while he finished up with the student. As he started to walk to another of his students, I quickly stood up and reached out for his arm.

“Pat, what’s wrong?” I asked.

He looked mystified at my question.

“Nothing.” he replied.

Somewhat surreally, I said “But you told me I needed to come to your class.”

His confused expression broke into a grin and he said “Dr. Taran, I told you that you needed to my class because I saw you in your office and you looked like you NEEDED to come outside.” He then turned away from me and went back to his students.

Somewhat surprised by his response, I thought for a few seconds before I realized that he was right. Then I sat down on the bench and enjoyed the rest of the class period watching the squirrels and students.

PSC Covenant

With the semester winding down, I hope to pick up the blogging pace a bit. We've had some various things occur with our Pastor Search Committee and I'd love to get some feedback. But tonight I'll simply post our Pastor Search Committee Covenant. The idea of a covenant is to nail down some expectations for the committee and for the church. We hammered these out over our first several meetings and then we read them to the church:

Pastor Search Committee Covenant

Lakeview Baptist Church

This covenant commits the Lakeview Baptist Church Pastor Search Committee as partners together to bring God’s man to our pulpit. We merely serve as the representatives of the Lakeview congregation in this process.

We covenant first to keep all of our thinking and reflecting bathed in prayer. Because this is God’s church, not our church, we will seek God’s man, not our man. We will be obedient to God’s direction, and sensitive to the Holy Spirit, knowing that God looks not at a man’s outward appearance, but upon his heart. The only way we can stay attuned to our Lord’s direction is through ongoing, persistent, prayer.

We will act as a unified body. We will wait as one body and we will move as one body. We trust that God will reveal His will to us in His own time. We will not tarry unnecessarily, but we also will not hurry through this process. We will make a unanimous recommendation of God’s man to the church.

We recognize that openness is the key to trust. As such, we will communicate clearly and often with the church body. Communication of course is a two-part effort that involves listening as much as it involves speaking. Our goal will be to listen to the Lord as well as to the congregation as we undertake this search process.

Lastly we understand well the importance of confidentiality. We are dealing with the very heart of this church as we search for our next pastor. But we are also dealing with men of God in other places of ministry. We want to honor and respect even those whom we do not call. In order to maintain confidentiality and sober judgment, we will not individually speak about where we are in the search process or about any specific candidates outside of our pastoral search committee meetings except during public discussions with the church.

These things we covenant with God, with the congregation, and with one another.

(Back to main Pastor Search Committee Menu)

12 Days of Christmas--Straight Up

Since we're around twelve days from Christmas, I thought you'd enjoy this...

Fed-Ex Stinks!!!

We ordered an exciting gift for the kids, one of the larger and pricier Christmas gifts we’ve given. Of course, it is delivered to the house mere moments after Kadie leaves to go pick up Skeeter from school and mere moments before she returns. When the Fed Ex truck pulled up to the house, Scooter looked outside into the car port to see the Fed Ex guy dropping off two large packages. According to our neighbor (who was walking by at the time), the following conversation took place:

Idiot FedEx Guy: “Oh, I’ll just leave these here in the carport.”

Scooter: “What are they?”

Idiot FedEx Guy: “I can’t tell you that, they might be your Christmas present.”

Scooter: “Oh.”

Scooter then starts to close the door.

Idiot FedEx Guy: “Just kidding, it’s a trampoline.”

Scooter “Are you sure you delivered it to the right house?”

Idiot FedEx Guy: “Yep, this is the correct address.”

Then as the Idiot FedEx Guy started to get in his van, he sees my neighbor and comments “Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.”

Words fail me.

The Golden What?

While it's nice to see a certain film snorkeling under 50% at Rotten Tomatoes, there is an upcoming film that the Taran kids are giddy with excitement over...

Random Notes From the End of the Semester

This is our last week of classes, with finals beginning on Monday. The Fall semester is "complicated" by its correspondence with the holiday season.This weekend Kadie and I have two holiday parties (at the school) and two Christmas parties while our kids have one party and a children's musical. Life accelerates during the Yuletide.

**I tried something a little different this semester and taught an introductory course in Hebrew. It went well, though it has taken a lot more preparation than a usual class. I ended up with a class of thirteen, pretty good for a state school where it was only offered as an elective. Our foreign language faculty have approved it for fulfilling a foreign language requirement in future semesters, so I'll be teaching Hebrew II next semester. This afternoon we had our final class meeting and, since our home is located near the campus, I had them over for a potluck lunch.

Since almost all of the students will be returning for the second class next semester, I wanted an opportunity to build community in the class as we go forward. Common meals are a significant way of doing that. We had a good time, with only a pop quiz interrupting the general good will.
The best line of the meal was when Kadie returned home from picking up Squealer from pre-school and one of the students said "So, is this the kid who's afraid of squirrels?"

**I dig a Christmas pin out of mothballs and wear it every year. It has an green L on it with the international "Not symbol"(the red slash) through it. It reads No-L or of course, Noel. So I get some interesting responses from others when I wear it. One student said "No Losers? Are you against losers?" My favorite responses though are people who come up and read "No L? What does No L mean? No L No L?

But today I had a colleague come up and say come up and say (rather seriously) "Why do you hate gays?" I was stunned and could only respond "Why do you think I hate gays?" "Because your pin says that you are against Lesbians, the L word."

It's the most wonderful time of the year.

**Public schools are turning our kids into sales staff as PTAs and school administrators seek monies through various fundraisers. But they hold out trinkets and trash for students who sell a lot of stuff. Scooter sold several subscriptions to Reader's Digest and proudly announced to all who would listen that she could get a mini-slide phone with hands free operation (see here). Which she took to mean a cell phone. There were pictures of a girl, happily talking into the phone with her friends. I tried to tell her that I didn't think it was a real cell phone, but she was captivated with the thought of the wonderful free gift that would make her the envy of all of her seventh grade friends. But when it arrived, it wasn't a cell phone at all, but a cheap plastic piece of equipment with a phone jack in the bottom. You must plug it into the wall for it to work.

She was disappointed, but I recognized the learning experience immediately. Like Ralphie's Secret Orphan Annie's decoder ring, I too had suffered disappointment as a kid. For me it was Sea Monkeys. Apparently it is a rite of passage to get your hopes up as a kid for some mail order gift.

#3

Baylor has just hired Art Briles as a new football coach. He was hired after they interviewed Mike Singeltary (former Baylor great) and unsuccessfully wooed Houston Nutt (the new Ole Miss coach). Baylor then hired their third choice in Coach Briles. I have no idea if Briles is going to bring a successful football team to the Brazos, but I like his attitude.

He was asked how he liked the idea of being Baylor's #3 choice for the new job.

His answer was "I might not have been my wife's No. 1 choice," Briles said. "But she's put up with me 29 years and fixin' to be 30."

FPU Revisited

This last Sunday evening we finished off our Financial Peace University class. Over the course of the last thirteen weeks, I had a front row seat to see some exciting things happen. The class of about 15 “family units” (FPU’s term that includes both couples and singles) paid off $15,690.00 in debt. Because of Dave Ramsey’s emphasis on tithing, I was interested in how the class might affect the class in the area of stewardship. So I asked our business administrator to track the tithing patterns from three months before the class started to the three months of the class. Aggregate tithing (the first time that phrase has been used on the internet) went up from an average of around $7,000.00 to around $9,000.000 during the course of the class. And there were other success stories.

In one couple, the husband went out and got a new job and they also yanked their Direct TV (A major sacrifice for them). Another couple decided to completely pay off their home mortgage (like this person). One lady decided that she could have substantial amount in savings and still retire by a certain age is she got aggressive in her savings. Another class member saved over $1,000.00 a year when one of the lessons led him to shop around his homeowner’s insurance with some other companies. One retired couple said that they were communicating more in general now as a result of working together on a budget. We even had one non-church member take the class after she read about it on Dave Ramsey’s website.

Overall it was a positive experience. I will mention two obstacles:

First, the course is expensive. The main teaching materials (DVD’s, facilitator’s book, etc) is $300.00, a sizeable chunk for our church. Additionally each student’s book is $90.00, another sizeable chunk for people who need financial assistance anyway. We did have some folks in our church who provided partial scholarships for families who needed one. Overall, there wasn’t anyone I’m aware of who didn’t take the class because they couldn’t afford it.

Second, the course is long. It is 13 weeks, two hours a week. That length of time knocks off a fourth of the calendar. It also makes scheduling other events in the life of the church difficult. We ran it on Sunday evenings after our worship service and it made for long evenings for the facilitators.

But despite these two obstacles, Financial Peace is well worth it. Ramsey’s last lesson may be his best. He puts financial peace in a larger context of proper stewardship of all things. I’d recommend it for any church interested in training people how to handle money according to Biblical principles and common sense.

This is My Father’s World

A Review of Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

“Grace is not so poor a thing that it cannot present itself in any number of ways.” p. 240

Grace surrounds us, as though Creation itself is insufficient to contain the evidence of God’s proud pleasure for His world. This world in which we live, though marred by sin, still declares the glories of God.

Robinson does the best job I’ve seen in capturing the grace-drenched world in which each of us live, move, and have our being. Gilead, the 2005 Pulitzer prize winner, depicts the story of a dying minister who is reflecting back on his own life, and reflecting forward on the life of his son. John Ames is 76 years old and facing death of a weak heart. This news prompts him to reflect on his life with his much younger wife and his seven year old son, the offspring of their May/December union.

The narrative of Gilead consists of a series of these thoughts, jotted down to his son, in which John shares about God, life, pain, forgiveness and grace. He also shares the passionate relationship between his own grandfather (a one-eyed, fiery abolitionist minister who worked closely with John Brown) and his father, an equally stubborn pacifist.

Gilead is a novel about fathers and sons, and their relationships both loyal and prodigal. Gilead also captures the often complicated relationship between pastor and parishioners. Marilynne Robinson has a writer’s eye. Her eye is every bit as exacting and precise as the grandfather’s own one eye that John lives in fear of offending.

For example, it is a rare gift that can see the grace of God in a child’s bubble:

“I saw a bubble float past my window, fat and wobbly and ripening toward that dragonfly blue they turn right before they burst. So I looked down at the yard and there you were, you and your mother blowing bubbles at the cat, such a barrage of them that the poor beast was beside herself at the glut of opportunity. She was actually leaping in the air, our insouciant Soapy! Some of the bubbles drifted up through the branches, even above the trees. You two were too intent on the cat to see the celestial consequences of your worldly endeavors. They were very lovely. Your mother is wearing her blue dress and you are wearing your red shirt and you were kneeling on the ground together with Soapy between and that efflugence of bubbles rising, and so much laughter. Ah, this life, this world.” p. 9

A walk to church becomes an opportunity to reflect on baptism and the newness of life that believers associate with water.

“That mention of Feuerbach and joy reminded me of something I saw early one morning a few years ago as I was walking up toward the church. There was a young couple, strolling along a half a block ahead of me. The sun had come up brilliantly after a heavy rain and the trees were glistening and very wet. On some impulse, plain exhuberence, I suppose, the fellow jumped up and caught hold of a branch, and a storm of luminous water came pouring on the two of them, and they laughed and took off running, the girl sweeping water off her hair and her dress as if she were a little bit disgusted, but she wasn’t. It was a beautiful thing to see…it is easy to believe in such moments that water was made primarily for blessing, and only secondarily for growing vegetables or doing the wash. I wish I had paid more attention to it. My list of regrets may seem unusual, but who can know that they are, really. This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.” (p. 27-28)

Most of the time evangelicals engage with culture, we do so in an adversarial fashion. We poke and prod for hidden messages, count up profanities and double entendres, and deplore the God-forsaken wasteland of popular culture. Books like Gilead remind me that there is no corner of either our world or of our culture where God is not at work. The fact that even a secular jury awarded this novel the Pulitzer gives me hope.

All too often I’m overcome with the difficulties and obstacles of this life. Any random day on this blog gives evidence of the relatively minor difficulties that I encounter from time to time. Gilead is itself quite a gift in reminding us how wonderful our God-blessed lives are.

Marilynne Robinson rightly sees that it is not the Devil, but rather God who is in the details of our lives.

(I'm not sure of the proper etiquette for a reading hat tip, but I first encountered this book as a review in the Rabbit Room).

A Book Idea

Part of the greatest fun of the annual SBL meeting has nothing to do with friends or papers. It’s all about the books. Imagine a couple of football fields covered with religious publishing companies from all over the world and you get some idea of the SBL Book exhibit. It is a bibliophile’s dream. Frankly, when every year when I see this set-up I think to myself. “Surely I can write a book on something…” (I mean a book that people will actually read).

Because of its focus on ministry instead of on academics, I was surprised to see the Alban Institute with a booth set up. The Alban Institute has published some of the best works on the Intentional Interim Ministry. (Temporary Shepherds and Healthy Congregations: A Systems Approach are two of my favorites). While there, I spoke to their publishing director and gave him my “elevator pitch” for a book idea I’d been running though my head for awhile.

One possible thought I’ve had is in the Fall of 2008, I’ll apply for a sabbatical for the following year (2009-2010). During that year I will find a church in need of intentional interim work and move with our family to that location. I would like it to be located far away from the Bible Belt so that I will be more of an outsider going in. I’ll then lead the church through the Intentional Interim process for a year and write up the results as both an introduction to Intentional Interim work and as a case study of how it might work. Interestingly, it was the process of blogging the various narratives about Susan Song which lead to this idea.

The publishing director seemed open to the concept. (Of course, every publisher nods their heads and agrees with you at the meeting, they keep their options open that way). He did say “Well you know Taran, not every church needs the Intentional Interim process. For us to be interested in this work, you will need an unusual church situation and a clear instance where the process was definitely needed.”

Reading between the lines, I said “You mean, if my family and I endure a year of pain and misery assisting a highly dysfunctional church, then that would make a better book for you?”

“Exactly!!” was his response.

This is a difficult situation to plan out. For example, how do you tell what church will be without a pastor in fall of 2009? The director of the Center for Congregational Health has offered his assistance with placement. There are also some hurdles to overcome at my own institution where my supervisors might not consider this proposal academic enough. But the largest hurdles to jump would be family concerns as fall of 2009 would be the first year of high school for Scooter and the first year of Middle school for Skeeter. Something to think about.

San Diego

I’ve undergone radio silence for the last few days, recovering from an onslaught of tryptophan…Last Friday through Tuesday I spent in San Diego at the national Society of Biblical Literature meeting. As always I found the trip delightfully engaging, stimulating and at times frustrating.

San Diego is a beautiful city (I shudder to think how amazing it is in the summer!). Our hotel was excellent and located right downtown. The convention center was a short walk away and located near a beautiful marina. We also made a quick trip to Coronado Island, which a local pastor refereed to as “Leave it to Beaver land”. The village is quaint and picturesque, which led one of my colleagues to refer to it as Stepford. I would’ve blogged some from the city, but was too cheap to spring for the $10.00 a day internet.

The annual meeting consists of a series of seminars on a veritable blizzard of topics in the fields of one of two religious organizations: the American Academy of Religion (AAR) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL). They are divided along disciplinary lines with the SBL consisting of papers in the fields of Old and New testaments, generally (though not exclusively) consisting of Jewish and Christian scholars. (See here for a look at some of the paper topics.) The AAR consists of everything else, a wide plethora of including other religions (Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism) and non-Biblical Studies fields (Church history, theology, etc.)

Participants at the SBL/AAR come in all different shapes and sizes. As you would expect, there are numerous Christians and non-Christians who participate representing state schools, Christian colleges, seminaries, Jewish seminaries, and churches.

Highlights:

Hearing N. T. Wright. Wright is the Anglican bishop of Durham who may be the foremost New Testament scholar of this day. I heard him give a lecture on the role of God in public discourse that was remarkable. As someone who has to deal with a multicultural context even more than we Americans do, it was impressive to hear him speak so passionately about the role of the church in public society. I think that his best line was that “tolerance is a low grade parody of agape love.” He argued that although contemporary culture holds up tolerance as the greatest goal, we need to press beyond tolerance to friendship, then phileo, then agape.

So what is the church’s role? Our role is to speak out as witnesses to society. That might entail martyrdom or other lesser stances. I think that in the evangelical community we have far too often been co-opted by power and snuggled up to governmental leaders for too long. Outstanding stuff.

I also attended several seminars but my favorite was one sponsored by the National Association of Baptist Professors of Religion which looked at the thorny issue of the divine conquests narratives of Joshua (and others) in which Yahweh commands the community of faith to wipe out the enemies of God. The session focused on how to raise that particular issue with students. It was a difficult topic and some of the proposed solutions were, quite frankly, disturbing in their treatment of the biblical narrative.

Another session was on the relationship between film and theology, an important and interesting topic. I think the best speaker was S. Brent Plate from TCU who argued that film makers are engaged in creating a world just as much as religion is. He mentioned two things in particular: trailers and movie studio logos. Trailers oftentimes open with the phrase “In a world…” (as this article notes) while the logos of movie production studios often depict the logo coming down from “heaven.”

Lastly, and most importantly is the opportunity to connect with friends, old a new. This particular trip was enlivened by my great friend Bobby who drove down from Los Angeles to immerse himself in this alien religious subculture. I also spent time with several friends with whom I studied at Baylor. One of the high points of my stay was the dinner with my doctoral studies mentor, who goes out to eat with his former students every year. It is a great opportunity to reconnect.

With these friends we fight as much as we catch up. Each of us are passionate about our faith of course, but also with our fields. So we spend much time arguing and laughing and even some time crying. It was a marvelous, joyous time.

Rough Draft Feedback

So I read my flash fiction for the writer's group. Since my story is so short, I will reproduce it here and you won't have to go through the laborious process of clicking a link:

Mary looked up from the newspaper. “Jack, what do you know. Do you remember that high school guidance counselor, the one that said little Jimmy wasn’t ‘college material’?”

“Ummm-hmmmm” replied Jack as he carefully poured out the molasses on his biscuits. With a satisfied turn of the wrist, he managed both to stop the flow out of the jar and twist the lid back into place at the same time.

“She uhhh…she died. Last night in a car accident she was killed on Buncombe road.”

Jack was silent for a moment. “Well….she wasn’t very good at her job.”

The group consists of about eight undergrads and a new faculty member, an English prof. Since I was one of the first to read, folks were nice. Lest I rip them in return. The students and my caolleague each said positive things.

One of the students said "I really like the foreshadowing." I thought to myself "How can you have foreshadowing in a 100 word piece of fiction?!" She continued "I should've anticipated the death of the counselor by the way you mentioned the molasses being cut off."

Oh.

No wonder I wasn't an English major.

Because I'm the Mom

Although the term "Christian Comedian" is one I tend to flee from, Anita Renfroe may have me rethink that. Enjoy "Because I'm The Mom"





To see her on the CBS Morning show, click here.

Cowboys Tight End

Dave posted (it's gone from You Tube now) an incredible run sans helmet by Jason Witten, the Dallas Cowboy's current tight end, from Sunday night. It reminded me of a run by their best ever tight end from a few Thanksgivings back...




How do I know he's their best ever? How many Super Bowls did Troy, Michael and Emmit win without him????


(that would be zero)

Reel Life Dan

A milestone for our clan this Sunday evening. Due to a large fellowship on Saturday, our church took Sunday night off. At home, Kadie and I fed the kids and then took off to see a movie. What is significant is that this is the first time we’ve left Scooter in charge of her younger siblings for 2 hours so that we could see a movie. (Of course the theater is 1.3 miles from our home, which helps a lot).

Unfettered freedom I tell ya’!

In celebration, a movies review. May it not be the last.

We went to see the flick Dan in Real Life (DIRL) a romantic comedy for the middle aged, and further evidence I suppose that Kadie and I are easing our way into that particular demographic. It stars the likeable Steve Carell and the beautiful Juliet Binoche.

Carell plays Dan an advice columnist who is also a widower dealing with the onerous task of raising three daughters ages 9, 15, and 17. Like the cobbler whose kids have no shoes, Dan’s kids don’t have enough of him as a Dad. The youngest daughter wants his time, the oldest daughter his car and the middle daughter just wants him to disappear.

Every year he takes his brood to his parents’ home on Chesapeake Bay. He is joined there by his two brothers, his sister and all their assorted spouses and kids. The film plays out over three days as the assorted two dozen people engage in Pictionary, touch football, and family traditions like talent shows and walks on the beach.

The central narrative is generated by a chance encounter that Dan has with Marie (Juliet Binoche). Dan has been so overprotective of his daughters that his mom sends him away for some time by himself in the local town bookstore, named the Book and Tackle Shop, a name so small-town cute, it must really exist (Yep).

In the bookstore, Dan and Marie meet, awkwardly flirt and seem to make a connection. In a scene that demonstrates how intimacy can occur without physical contact, Dan shares with her about the loss of his wife which seems to surprise even himself. “I don’t usually talk much about her” he confesses.

After Dan returns to his parent’s home, he is brimming with excitement about his newfound friend and tells his family that he’s met someone special. Sharing in his joy is his younger brother Mitch who has brought home someone special as well. Mitch introduces his new girl friend to Dan and … it turns out to be Marie. The story then unfolds as Dan, Marie, and Mitch try to come to grips with this new reality.

Three things I didn’t like:

1. The Predictability of the Plot – This is usually a big one for me. If I’ve invested 30 minutes in a film and can tell you the direction it is going in, then the screenwriter (who has presumably spent more time with the story than I have) has done a poor job.

2. The Equation of Love and Attraction – Both Dan and his middle daughter (see below) equate these two distinctive realities. Part of the difficulty in adequately portraying love on film is the limits of the medium. Love takes a long time to build and an even longer time to maintain than two hours. I must confess that his criticism could be made of almost every film.

3. The Tidy Ending – The film ends and everyone (everyone!) is appropriately paired off with who they should be. Not hard feelings anywhere in sight. While this might make some people leave the theater happy, it doesn’t confront the messiness of life.

Three things I liked:

1. Steve Carell – I like him in the Office and in the two Almightys. He plays nice and funny well, but I didn’t know if he could play any drama. He does a very good job. Dan loves his family, but doesn’t always like them. Carell portrays well that delicate balance. Part of the emotional satisfaction at the end of the film (as he finds love again) is due to the investment that the film makes in depicting how deep his sense of loss is over his wife. The highest compliment I know is to say that half-way through the film I saw Dan on the screen, not Evan or Michael Scott.

2. The Relationship of the Father to his Daughters – Not many films get this right. In most films the dad is an idiot, or the kids are wise beyond their years…or both. But in this one, there is an entertaining dynamic that doesn’t shy away from the fact that parents and children can love each other desperately and still fight passionately. The most entertaining relationship is between Dan and his middle daughter Cara. Cara has met the boy of her dreams and Dan doesn’t think that she has any idea what love is about and grounds her when he sees her kissing her boyfriend in public.

Cara responds the way preteen and teen girls so often do—with tons and tons of drama. Brittney Robertson plays Cara in a melodramatic, over the top way…exactly the way teens and preteens so often behave. It’s not just that they say “The World is coming to an End!!!” They actually believe it that it is.

3. The Family –DIRL presents family as a mixture of joy and sorrow, best friends and bitter rivals. There is love, there is dysfunction, bad advice, and laughter. The family reunion setting highlights all of the attractions of family. Like other good movies about family (The Royal Tenenbaums comes to mind), it makes the viewer wish we could be a part of that family too.

Overall I recommend the movie. Like the proverbial bumble bee, this movie flies when it shouldn’t. The predictable, sit-com like plot is tiresome, but fortunately the film is not.

A Nice Note

The Dallas Cowboys' team chaplin has died. Matt Mosely has a sweet entry about his testimony here.

Rough Draft

Our school has begun a writing club and I attended the first meeting. It is a student club, and I was the only faculty member there aside from the faculty sponsor. We will meet every month or so and share writing samples. Why am I participating? Mostly because I would like to work on my "skills" as a writer. I would one day like to write a book that people will actually read...Anyway, our assignment for this Sunday's meeting is flash fiction.

Flash fiction (not to be confused with Flash Gordon) is a literary artiface, somewhat similar to a haiku. Except different. What it shares with haiku, I suppose, is that it it places extreme limitations on the writer and forces writing into (hopefully) creative directions. Our assignment was to write a work of fiction in less than 100 words. Here's what I came up with...

Mary looked up from the newspaper. “Jack, what do you know. Do you remember that high school guidance counselor, the one that said little Jimmy wasn’t ‘college material’?”

“Ummm-hmmmm” replied Jack as he carefully poured out the honey on his biscuits. With a satisfied turn of the wrist, he managed both to stop the flow of honey out of the jar and twist the lid back into place at the same time.

“She uhhh…she died. Last night in a car accident she was killed on Buncombe road.”

Jack was silent for a moment. “Well….she wasn’t very good at her job.”

That's the best I could come up with in a first draft.

Soccer Finale

Like a meteorite streaking across the fall sky, soccer season has now come and gone. The kids played their last games on Saturday. Squealer’s team performed exceptionally well. It’s interesting to note that some kids just seem to “get it” at an earlier age than others. I’d guess that 95% of the goals were scored by about 4% of the kids. Squealer’s team had one kid who got it and she scored 4 or 5 goals a game. The other kids scored only when the mob of kids happened to migrate into a net. Squealer scored a couple of goals throughout the season, but spent a lot of his time zoning out on both butter and dragon flies.

Strangely, right after his final game, he was stung by a bee. I tried to comfort him by explaining the impressive symmetry that the bee sting brought to the season, bookending his and Scooter’s experiences with soccer, but he didn’t find much succor in that.

Scooter’s team was beaten day in and day out throughout the season. There were three teams in her league and the other two teams just beat on her team relentlessly. They lost all their games. She had a blast though, manning (?!) the defender’s position and blasting out soccer balls whenever they came her way.

Skeeter’s team performed well. We (for I am an assistant coach on this team) played the much hated Red team for our final game. We had played them in our initial game and they pasted us 5 to 1. They then went undefeated the rest of the season. Shockingly, we also went undefeated, although we had one tie game.

In this final game we scored two quick goals and then managed to hold onto a 2-1 win over the fearsome Red team. After the game, the opposing coach told me that our two defenders (back guarding the goal) were the difference. “Every time we got back there, one of those two little girls would clear the ball out. They were the difference in the game.” Needless to say, Skeeter was one of those two. Because of our tie, the hated Red team won first place.

Final Thoughts:

1. It was worth it. Trying to watch three kids playing on three different fields at three different times was often a pain, but they all enjoyed it.

2. A church league offers just a slight reduction in the insanity level of parents. I suspect that it doesn’t happen all the time, this leagues was a good choice.

3. The cheesy pablum often offered up about team sports is true. It’s good for kids to work with other kids toward a competitive goal. The children learned a lot and I suspect we’ll be doing it again next year.

Pastor Search Committee Questions

We've worked out a procedure for making initial contact with the candidates whose resumes we've received. As a committee, we reached the decision that I (in my role as committee chairman) would contact the candidates and ask them similar questions in the initial phone conversation. In order to standardize our communication and to treat each of the candidates as identically as possible, we developed the following questions.

When I first contact the candidate, I ask the following questions:

1. “Are you interested in being considered for the position of Pastor of Lakeview Baptist church?” A necessary question of course. A few times the answer has been “No.”

2. “Would you please tell me a little bit about yourself?”

We felt that this question was open ended enough that it would allow the candidate to talk about the things that are either most important to them or would best tell others about them. Many candidates share their testimony at this point, or will discuss their role as a father or husband. This question also serves as an ice breaker because it starts them off talking about themselves…and we all tend to like to do that!!

3. “Why do you feel that God may be leading you to another place of ministry?” This question identifies the elephant in the room by determining why they want to leave their current church, without asking it quite so blatantly. I’ve been appreciative about how honest and straightforward people have been. Some answers:

“I’ve got teen age kids and there’s nothing for them in this country church.”

“My current church is comprised of mostly senior adults who are satisfied with how church is.”

“God told me and my wife in January of this year that we would be going to another church.”

4. Our final question is “Given the fact that you have always pastored Baptist churches and attended a Baptist seminary, being a Baptist is obviously very important to you. Why is the Baptist tradition so important to you?”

This question gives an initial opportunity for the candidate to share a bit about their theology. Also if they are politically active in the convention they will often mention this fact at this time. Plus if they give an answer indicating that they haven’t thought through being Baptist, that reveals important information as well. Most of the answers revolve around the importance of baptism by immersion and inerrancy of Scripture.

One question that we had planned on asking was “Why do you feel that the Lord might be leading you to Lakewood Baptist?” We’ve abandoned that question because most of our resumes have been sent by Directors of Missions and friends, not be the candidates themselves.

(Back to main Pastor Search Committee Menu)

On a Pale Horse: Grades

AS I said in the original post, the pale part usually comes from the color draining from mom and dad's faces when report cards arrive. Grades are a thorny issue with our family, due no doubt to the different roads that Kadie and I traversed through school. Kadie was a student who was highly motivated and performed consistently at a level of excellence throughout her academic experiences. At a very large high school, she was the valedictorian. Nuff said.

I…was not the valedictorian. My memories of middle school are pretty dark. For reasons that still escape me, I rarely did any school work. I met exams and homework alike with a shrug. For some reason, I simply didn’t care. (This was all brought back to me recently when I received a call from my old school and learned that they were throwing out their old records and they asked if I wanted mine).

Through Hurculean effort, my parents got me into a great magnet high school (I suspect money exchanged hands). One of the great stories in our family’s lore is how my docile and gentle father became unhinged as the guidance counselor tried to dissuade him by saying “Some young boys, like Taran, are just not meant to go to college”.

While there, I suppose I only supported the counselor’s case as I maintained a C average during my best semesters there. In college I did a little better but really only got things going at Seminary and later in my doctoral work.

So all this means is that Kadie and I bring a different set of experiences to the table when our kids come home with report cards. One of the girls does above average work and the other does average work. But they are each capable of performing at the top level of their class. So Kadie and I have to really work at communicating because Kadie sees things as simply an act of caring enough about the work to do it. At the same time I remember well my parents and/or the teacher asking me as a 12 year old “Why aren’t you doing the school work?” and I simply had no answer for them.

We’ve tried rewards to ensure performance and we’ve tried punishments (no TV, no computer). So far, the punishments have proven to be more effective. So when report cards come home, the anxiety level rises and punishments and restrictions are meted out. Kadie and I feel our parenting skills are at their weakest in the area of motivating our kids toward school performance.

On a Black Horse: Night(mares)

Nights have been unusual for us for years. Ever since Scooter was born a dozen annums ago, our schedule has been off its pre-child orbit. I was a heavy sleeper when Kadie and I married, but now I wake up at the slightest sound. An overactive paternal gland and active infants have ruined my slumbering prowess.

Scooter has been a sleep walker for years. I’m not sure what the proper term is, but I refer to it as “bladder induced somnambulance”. When her bladder is full, she wanders around the house, drawn to any light source. Usually it is the television in the living room. It is not uncommon, while Kadie and I are up late mocking Joel Osteen, that Scooter will wander in and start speaking nonsense. We then will carefully guide her to the bathroom and then off to bed. The next morning she never remembers the previous evening’s activities.

Skeeter is the only one whose sleep patterns approach normalcy. She’s simply a grouch when it is time to get up.

Squealer is still young enough to wake up crying out at various times. Recently he woke up screaming and screaming. When we arrived in his room he was obviously terrified and still shaking under his blanket. We asked him what was wrong?

“It…..it jumped up on my bed!!!” said the most pitiful voice imaginable.

“What was it, Squealer?” asked Scooter.

“It was….it was a SQUIRREL!” he shouted in terror.

We’ve got them all over our neighborhood and now that he knows they can jump up on his bed, he regards them more circumspectly.

On A Green Horse: Vomiting

Vomiting comes up (sorry) often in our home, usually in a quotation which occupies the highest insult in our family “You miserable vomitous mass!” Plus there is something inherently fascinating to kids about throwing up and our household is filled with juvenile euphemisms ranging from the amusing (tossing cookies) to the brief (Yack) to the 70’s (throwing the velvet green carpet) to the crass (blowing chunks) to the literary (Great Expectorations).

Although it afflicts each of the kids equally, it seems to arise suddenly and with little prior warning. (This very day, as I am writing this, at 10:00 am I received a call from Scooter at school telling me that she had thrown up.) One day recently I had Squealer in my car after having dropped off Skeeter at school. Squealer said “My tummy hurts” as I drove along a major highway in our town. Looking quickly around the inside of the minivan I spotted my 2006 Dallas Cowboy souvenir cup from the last time I went to a game in Texas Stadium. Torn between my love for this particular cup and a new green interior for my vehicle, I quickly handed him my cup from the front seat as we sped along the road.

Just. In. Time.

But last week it hit Squealer pretty hard. Last Sunday evening, Squealer was acting lethargic at church which is another way to say something was seriously wrong. But as we so often do, we ignored the problem until we got home. Kadie left church earlier than I so that she could begin a 12 hour night shift. I took the kids home alone.

After we got home, I held a thermometer under Squealer’s arm and found that he had a raging fever of 103. I called nurse Kadie at work and she instructed me to give him some children’s purple Acetaminophen chewable pills. The color is important because I was to see it again later. A few minutes later I heard him cry out and complain about his stomach feeling like it was “wiggling”. He then arched his back (in that way familiar to sick children everywhere) and deposited the contents of his stomach on the floor and side of his bed. He then settled down and restlessly slept through the night (on a sleeping bag, for his bed linens were now in the wash).

We were presented with a problem the next day. Kadie arrived home from work around 7:00 am and was going to sleep through the day while the kids were in school. But Skeeter was now at home. After working all night, taking care of sick patients, she now worked all through the next day, keeping up with a sickly four year old (who obviously couldn’t go to school). Moms are saints.

She called me during the day and informed me that he needed suppositories for his fever. I got them for him and went back to work, thanking God yet again that He brought a beautiful R.N. into my life. It means that for any medical procedure, I can opt out due to her recognized expertise. I was unsure how it would go. What possibly passes through the mind of a four year old as he receives his first suppository?????

When I returned home I asked how the “procedure” went. She told me that she described it to him as a “bottom pill.” I applauded her descriptive prowess. “So how did he handle it?” I asked. She paused in thought for a minute and then looked me in the eye.

“He took it like a man.”

On A Red Hobby Horse: Fever

Riding a red hobby horse is that marauder of small families: fever. Each of the children have run a fever over the last two weeks, with Squealer and Scooter each going through it twice. It presented an early problem because we only possessed a very cheap thermometer, the kind where the kids must keep it under their tongues for 19 minutes before it chirps its completion. (Yes, that will work with a four year old. So you put it under their arm and add a degree, or put it in their rectum and subtract a degree. Or something like that.)

We had a tympanic thermometer that was beautiful and registered temperature after a few seconds by simply pressing a button. For reasons which remain unclear it was taken, and then left outside by one of the children. (I vaguely remember a brief snatch of conversation a few months ago involving the kids wondering “if the dogs were sick”, but the three children have remained remarkably united in their silence). In any event it was left outside.

Then it rained.

It no longer functioned and we didn’t want to drop another $40.00 on a new one when we did have the cheap digital thermometer that continued to work, albeit at a glacial pace. (And as a side note, both of these options are far better than the medieval practice of filling a breakable glass tube with deadly mercury and inserting it in a child’s mouth…now there’s a bright idea).

In any event, after Squealer developed a fever, I made the decision to purchase a new thermometer. I was immediately confronted with a new option: the temporal thermometer. With a wave of the hand, one can swipe it across the forehead of the afflicted person and it registers a temperature from the temporal artery. I had seen one of these first used in our pediatrician’s office and after some initial internet research I made the purchase.

So we got it and used it. It is about the size of an electric toothbrush (or a lean cucumber) and gives a healthy feel to the user. It makes you feel a little bit like Leonard McCoy as you scan your child’s forehead. But the best part is, it’s instantaneous, generating an immediate reading. It is particularly helpful when the kids are asleep.

The only problem is that the kids want to play with it, so we’ve had to restrict its use to humans. On several mornings, the kids have come into the kitchen and announced “I think I’m sick, can I take my temperature?” And immediately another one will yell “I’ll take her temperature. Our new rule is that if you are well enough to fight over who gets to use the medical tricorder thermometer then you must not have a fever.

So as for now, we have a new thermometer in the house. At least until the next time it rains.

In some ways the fever is the worst of the four riders. It snatches your normal electric kids and replaces them with burning, sluggish, automatons. While the fever rages they don’t move or even speak that much. Although the house is quieter, it

The worst thing about fever though is that it is often a emissary, an initial messenger, yea, a harbinger of worse things to come.

Tomorrow: Riding the Green Horse -- Vomiting

On a Pale Hobby Horse: The Four Riders of the Children’s Apocalypse

I dedicate the next few evenings of blogging to those who look back fondly upon their childhood memories. As with the rest of our lives, childhood has its depths as well as its heights. While I’ve mentioned several of the fun times with our kids (see here and here for example) fond memories they will no doubt recall, we oftentimes forget that life can be tough as well. This series recounts how the last few weeks have progressed for us. Anyone who ever yearns for the halcyon days of bygone childhood has forgotten weeks like these.

So with that, let me preview the next four entries

On a Red Horse : Fever
On a Green Horse : Vomiting
On a Black Horse : Night(mares)
On a Pale Horse* :Report Cards

*Pale refers to the shade of Mom and Dad’s faces when we saw the grades

PSC as Ministry

Over the last few weeks, I’ve had a few encounters that have put an interesting perspective on the Pastoral Search Process. What has surprised me the most so far is the possibility of this committee work itself being a form of ministry. I haven’t read any other accounting of the Pastor Search Committee as an act of ministry, but this possibility was pointed out to me over lunch a few months ago.

What planted this concept in my mind was a lunch conversation I had with the search chair from the previous search committee. He mentioned that in the course of their search, they had an opportunity to minister to pastors, even the ones whom they then did not call. That got me thinking about ministry possibilities with this committee. I think there have been a few opportunities for ministry already in the process.

First, and perhaps most obvious, are those opportunities for us as a committee to minister to our own individual members. We’ve had a few scary situations arise involving the family of committee members and we’ve taken the time to pray for them and to encourage the committee members themselves. The Pastor Search Committee has provided an additional support system beyond Sunday School. At times our meetings consist mostly of prayer and a substantial portion of that prayer has been for ourselves and for our families.

A second opportunity for ministry has been to individuals within our church. Due to distant conflicts, our previous pastor made the decision to isolate the senior adults within our church. They have not been included in any decision making over the course of the last decade or so. After our committee was announced, we noted that no senior adults were included on the committee. So we designated one of our committee members a special liaison with the senior adults in order to provide them with appropriate input. We also conducted a special break out session with the senior adults during the Sunday school time (instead of during the evening service, as we did with the rest of the church) because so many of them are fearful of driving after dark. They have expressed a lot of appreciation and I think are feeling like they have more of a role in the decision making process of the church.

Lastly has been an opportunity to minister to pastors. I’ve had several initial conversations with around seven pastors and several of them have expressed appreciation for our conversation. They mention being flattered, or feeling honored that we have even contacted them. Some of them have described private hurts, or frustrations, and have identified us as a “safe” group to talk with about their ministries and their dreams. There are a lot of good, humble men in the ministry out there.

I must confess that I am intrigued by this concept of a PSC as ministry. We’ll see if I still feel that way later on!!

(Back to main Pastor Search Committee Menu)

Frogs and Doughnuts

“The frog jumped off the log and onto the blue lily pad” said a serious voice.


I wasn’t sure what to do with that information.

Kadie was on the other end of the phone, driving home from picking up Squealer from his preschool program.

“Hmmm” I replied, trying to match the gravity in her voice.

“You have no idea what that means, do you?”

Silence.

Finally, I said “Nope” popping the “p” as much like Black Adder as I possibly could.

She sighed wearily, reminded yet again about how often she must explain things to the other four members of the household, and with a voice of resignation said “All the kids in Squealer’s class have frogs with their names on them sitting on a log. When the kids misbehave, their frog jumps onto a blue lily-pad. If the kid continues to misbehave, the frog next jumps onto the red lily pad and a note goes home to their parents.”

A few minutes before, Squealer had gotten into the car and announced to his Mom that his frog “fell off the log” and onto the blue lily pad. I loved how he described the frog as “falling off,” thus absolving himself from all blame by characterizing himself as a helpless pawn who is merely the passive recipient of universal forces far beyond his ken.

As punishment, we grounded him from Words World.

{In an unrelated note, whenever Squealer gets out of his bed at night and starts roaming the house, Scooter normally sees him first. When she sees him she announces in an official sounding voice “The jelly has left the doughnut.” I’m unsure where she first heard this, but it never fails to induce laughter from me.}

Unbelieveable!!!

Since I noted the "Seattle Slip" last season, I feel obliged to note the most incredible four yard run I've ever seen.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylON9AzHr8M







You know it's an incredible run when the Rams are the ones who call time out after the play!

Update on Pastor Search Committee

We've had a few weeks without any entries regarding the search committee, so I'll pass some notes along here. I’ve been thinking about this “live blogging” of a pastoral search and balancing the fact that some might find this helpful verses the confidentiality which we keep as a committee. My intention is to be somewhat circumspect and emphasize that this is how we are approaching this task and other strategies would work equally well. I hope some might find it helpful.

The PSC (Pastor Search Committee) put together a Search Committee covenant. I think we’re going to put it up on our church’s website, but I would prefer not to link to our church through Coffeespoons. We signed the covenant and shared it with Lakeview. They appreciated (or feigned appreciation for) the fact that we communicated our expectations for ourselves and for the church in the document.

We then decided that to give the church an opportunity to identify our own strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. We conducted break-out sessions after a Sunday evening service and divided the congregation into smaller groups to get their perspective on these issues. I should mention that there were a few in the church (though not on the committee) who found it to be a waste of time, apparently thinking that we should simply go into seclusion for eighteen months and then signal our choice for the new pastor with white smoke. We then went through their responses so that we now have a good idea of the church's self perception. (It was almost identical to our own evaluation of these areas of our church).

The committee has also spent several meetings identifying the particular procedures we will use for interacting with candidates. We have received several resumes over the last few months. As the chairman, I will call each name we receive and will have an initial conversation with them to see if they are still interested in being a candidate for the position. Following this conversation we will begin the process of prayerfully considering the various candidates. When we have a few that we want to hear we will go and attend a worship service at the church where they are currently pastoring.

Looking ahead, I have been somewhat concerned about the level of theological understanding of Lakeview Baptist. Oddly, I think our church has a strong understanding of tier one and tier three level doctrines, but not as much of tier two doctrines. Essentially, whatever the pastor has believed, the church has followed. For example, I don't know that our church has a position on the issue of open or closed communion, accepting those baptized by immersion in another tradition, or divorced deacons. My concern is that when we begin the process of talking with candidates we will get some questions that we have not previously addressed as a church.

So in an effort to begin a conversation on these questions, each PSC meeting will include a discussion about a sections of the BF&M. My hope is that it will help us have a clearer understanding of our theological foundation. Then when we begin to speak with a pastor we will have a better understanding of our own beliefs and a framework for discussing his.

(Back to main Pastor Search Committee Menu)

First Semester Spanish Spanish Love Song

It is one of the great ironies in my life that I work in a department which includes foreign languages. This song is about equivalent to my Spanish level. (Plus I also have trouble with eleven).

The Thrill of Victory...

Soccer Round-Up

Squealer:

Squealer’s and Scooter’s games were at the same time, so we ended up running back and forth between them. I had Squealer duty first and saw him score his first goal!!!!!! Or rather to say, that he was at the head of the scrum that migrated into the goal along with the ball (and about three of the kids).

His team was superior to their opponents only by virtue of the fact that they were a little older and thus concentrated on the game the whole time. The other team was quickly distracted and would only have three of the four kids going after the ball at any given time. Squealer ended the game in goal, although the ball spent the entire time down at the other end of the field (pitch?). I was behind him in the goal as a helicopter parent, trying to keep him interested in the game. The game ended without the other team even shooting at his goal while he was goalie. He was quite sad and lamented “I didn’t get to play.”

By far the most excitement of the game was afterwards when there were snacks. When the coach announced that there were snacks, there went up a tremendous cry and they assaulted the mother who was unfortunate enough to have drawn snack duty for game one. While he ate his snack, Squealer was bitten by an ant in an, uhhh uncomfortable and private place that necessitated a trip to the doctor’s office today (he’s fine).

Scooter:

I didn’t catch as much of her game, but she played very well as a defender during the time I watched. She cleared the ball out from her end of the field (pitch?) on numerous occasions and her team won 3 to 1. The low point of the game came right after she went in and I was distracted talking to Skeeter. When I looked back out there I saw that she was crying and clutching her thigh. I yelled at her (while the game was ongoing) and asked her what was wrong. She told me that a bee had just bitten her on her leg.

When she came off she was crying hard (it was her first bee sting). Through tears she said “Well, at least it died.(sniff, sniff)” I said “Did you kill it?” Through her tears she rolled her eyes and said “Daddy, everyone knows that a bee dies after it stings you.” Ummm..right, I certainly knew that, though entymology was not foremost in my mind with a weeping daughter.

Skeeter:

We were smoked. Destroyed utterly. Due no doubt to excessively poor coaching we were pummeled 4 to 2. Skeeter played well and aggressively. A pall was cast over the team when one of the coach’s daughters took a wicked shot to the mouth by soccer ball. It was apocalyptic as she bit her tongue and blood flowed as high as a horse's bridle profusely. The little girl is Skeeter’s best friend and Skeeter was sad for the rest of the day. (Although she is also doing better today).

All in all, I think the following video summarizes our day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPk_IZ44DMc

From Alan to Schlomo

It's not often that two of my favorite areas of interest watermelon seed spitting and Manimal reruns Dallas Cowboys football and Old Testament studies, overlaps.

But it appears that Alan Veingrad, an old name from the Cowboy's 1992 Superbowl run, has converted to Hassidic Judaism. See the Dallas Morning News story here.

He's also changed his first name from Alan to Schlomo.


(Schlomo is Hebrew for Solomon and is no reflection on Veingrad's impressive 40 time).

All Good Things

Imagine that you are a “successful” pastor. You are called to a church and are faithful to that place of ministry for decades. Under God’s direction, you have navigated countless crises, business meetings, weddings, and funerals. You have made thousands of hospital visits and shared countless meals at every restaurant in town.

But beyond those more formal times you have spent with people are the deep relationships you have forged. You've been with families when they are at their best and when they are facing the deepest emotional chasms of life. You’ve attended high school football games and town parades. You’ve celebrated the joyous births and the tragic deaths. These shared experiences have brought you into a close relationship with many in the church. In some important ways you are closer to some families in your church than you are to some of your family members. You are now at the end of your ministry and can look forward to years of retirement with the self-satisfying knowledge that you have been faithful in all things.

But you have one more ministry task before you.

You must leave this church.

Bob Campbell, former BGCT president and long time Houston pastor has written a piece for the Baptist Standard arguing that a retired pastor can remain at his home church if he adopts some specific guidelines. While each of his guidelines are reasonable, I think that they are also overly optimistic. A retired pastor will always exert an effect on the church, no matter what steps he, the new pastor, or the church may take to prevent that from happening.

If things go exceptionally well with the new pastor, there are still issues. If the retired pastor excuses himself from business meetings and is both publicly and privately supportive of the church’s leadership, he will still be on the new pastor’s mind as someone who would (at least tacitly) need to be included in the loop on certain decisions that involve changing long held traditions. Even with a successful transition to a gifted successor, the retired pastor will still occupy an important place in the hearts of many in the church. When the retired pastor says that he will do no funerals or weddings “unless asked by the new pastor”, it still puts an inordinate pressure on the new pastor to include him. “Well, Brother Smith, I will not participate in your wife’s funeral unless asked to by the new pastor.”

And it things go bad for the new pastor they will go worse with the retired minister in the background. He will serve (even against his wishes) as the individual around whom opposition will coalesce. Not only will people speak nostalgically about his past ministry, they will also wonder about what he might be able to do again. If the new pastor leaves, the former will likely be asked to ride in as a knight to restore stability.

It is a sad irony that the place where a pastor has invested so many of his years is the one place to which he cannot retire.

The retired pastor has sacrificed himself for his entire ministry. He must make one more sacrifice.

Random Conversations

Conversations I’ve had over the past week:

Conversation #1 (At Home)
Skeeter: “Dad, do you know where my shoes are?”
Me: “Skeeter, I don’t even know where my own shoes are right now.”


Conversation # 2 (At Soccer Practice. Caleb is 8)
Me: “Caleb, at the beginning of the drill did you hear me tell you to pass the ball three times before you shot it?”
Caleb: “Yes”
Me : "While you were dribbling to the goal did you hear me shouting at you ‘PASS! PASS! PASS!!!!!”
Caleb: “Yes”
Me: “Why didn’t you pass the ball???”
Caleb: “Because I’m hyperactive!!!”

...silence...

Me: “Do you see that goal over there on the other side of the soccer fields?”
Caleb: “Yes”
Me: “Go run from here to there five times as fast as you can.”
(I'm experimenting with the hypothesis that an exhausted hyperactive kid is more manageable than a rested one. I'll report back the data as the season progresses.)


Conversation #3 (After Kadie asked me to take Squealer to Cubbies)

Teacher: “Do you have his mission money for this week and last week? Did he memorize his verses? Did he bring his item for show and tell?"

Me: “Ummm, I, uhh…Kadie was busy and she asked me to uhhhh..."

Teacher: (Interrupting) “Or are you just drop off Dad?”

Me: (In a crystal moment of clarity) “Yes, that’s it exactly. I'm merely drop off Dad.”





Conversation #4 (Out on a date)

Lastly, I took Kadie out on a date last Thursday evening. We went to a nice restaurant and returned to our Vue, which has a standard transmission. I had parked on an incline. I turned it on and then absentmindedly put it into reverse. We heard a horrendous screech as the car painfully moved a few inches backwards.

I quickly took the car out of gear.

Kadie: “That would be the parking brake, genius.”

A Bad Fit (II)

But certainly in the months and years following that job rejection, I have come to see God’s hand even in that. Certainly the way that things play out, I see that I would’ve been a poor fit in that particular seminary setting. Although I never anticipated working in a state school context, I have seen my current position as a more appropriate context for me. During my time at seminary, I developed only one friendship with a faculty member. There was often the sense of a distance between faculty and students, I think a part of the reason was the adversarial nature of those times (1991-95). Faculty could never quite trust the students. There was an institutional fear among faculty (and administration) that a faculty member was only one tape recording away from a call from the trustees.*

And a lack of trust can be a problem. In an ideal setting, a class is conducted more as a dance than a debate. A seminary setting would not allow me the freedom to explore difficult issues from as many directions. Students are always aware of what the right answer is. Since students are generally unaware of my own biases until the end of the semester, I am able to advocate more than one position in order to challenge the student's presuppositions.

Scot McKnight made the (unusual) jump from seminary (TEDS) to college (Northpark) and has blogged on this very issue. I follow his thinking in this area. (At least his first three points).

I’m pleased to see God at work in this State University and feel called to be here.

As I’ve briefly noted before, I do have a sense of sadness in regards to Southwestern. Since Ashley asked, I do have a few comments:

On the matter of the letter from an anonymous seminary professor. There are certainly discontents at every university and many people unhappy with their jobs. There are also many who have axes to grind due to real or imagined slights. I have no idea of course, if any of the professor's statements are true, no doubt some of them are. I would simply say that this is not necessarily an indication that any unusual things are going on there. And despite the anonymous nature of this blog, I agree that these charges shouldn't be hurled from behind a cloak of anonymity. (Although I certainly understand why they were. SBC seminary professors are afforded minimal protection from capricious dismissals).

As to the women’s home-making program? I personally don’t see it as a necessary component of higher education. I’m not even sure what degree would credential a person to teach in that field. But ultimately, that is a decision for the ATS, not for me.

The main argument in favor of teaching it is that wives are colaborers with their husband in ministry. I certainly agree with that, and have even blogged about it. But I am unsure of its priority. I think that there are several other areas where our seminaries would better prioritize their efforts in education. For example, additional coursework dealing with any of these issues would be a start. Combined with the Klouda dismissal, it certainty seems to me that the seminary has a clear stance regarding the role of women with which I disagree.

As a sort of post script, several months ago, I ran into Ken Hemphill. He was in our community leading a workshop on his new endeavor, Empowering Kingdom Growth. I was tempted to approach him and thank him for not hiring me. But I didn’t want that come come out as too snarky, so I just introduced myself among the throngs of others.

He did me and the seminary a favor. (I did however, ask him what he thought of Ratatouille)

P.S. I neglected to mention that I left my mark at Southwestern. Literally. A few days before we moved out of our Carrol Park triplex, I engraved my initials in a plot of wet cement that is still there, forever connecting me to the institution. (And leading my father to mutter to my brother Bartolo, “Do you think he’ll ever grow up?)

*Kids, back when I went to school we recorded sound on these things called "tape."

A Bad Fit

Recent articles have caused me to do some thinking and reflecting. In late 1998 I interviewed for an Old Testament position at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. At the time I was only a few years removed from my completed MA degree at SWBTS and the idea of returning to Fort Worth was incredibly attractive. All other things being equal, “Foat Wuth” remains our favorite place to have lived. To get a chance to go back there would’ve been a dream come true.

After an extended discussion with the faculty in OT, they asked if they could put my name forward for the position. They scheduled an interview with President Hemphill and with Provost Tommy Lea (who sadly died that following year). It was an intimidating experience. As the OT faculty arrived in the room to observe the spectacle interview, it dawned on me that their credibility was on the line as well. They had after all recommended me.

The conversation with the president and the Dean was very congenial and thorough. They asked me questions about my testimony and call to the teaching ministry. They asked me about the newly revised Baptist Faith and Message and if I could teach in accordance with its principles.

The only “huh?” moment in the process was when President Hemphill started off a question “Due to the recent movie about the Exodus, there’s been renewed interest in the JEDP theory. What do you think about Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch?”

What!? My stance on Mosaic authorship is a fair question to ask, but I was flummoxed by its supposed connection to a cartoon. I haven’t known too many biblical scholars who take their cues from Dreamworks.

But despite that non sequitor by the end of the conversation, I had a good feeling. Dr. Lea did most of the questioning and led us all through my views on various topics. Finally President Hemphill stood up and thanked me for coming. The Old Testament faculty were silent through the whole experience. As I filed out with the faculty into the hall, a mentor of mine slapped me on the back and said “Taran, you just hit a home run.” I turned to him smiling, but then he continued “Unfortunately your team is losing by 15 runs with two outs in the bottom of the ninth.”

Apparently the other candidate for the position was interviewed right before me and was the clearly preferred candidate by President Hemphill. In fact, the other candidate was invited to lunch after his interview by the President. (When the person interviewing you asks the other job applicant to lunch, it’s not a good sign.) The other candidate was a longtime professor at Criswell College and (in retrospect) was a better fit for the direction of the Seminary that was I. The years have born that out as he has risen successfully into upper administration at SWBTS.

I received the official rejection letter a few days later and our whole family was heart broken by the news. (More tomorrow)