Young Life campers heading to the top of Mt. Chrysolite!!


The peerless Rocky Mountains...


Happiness

There were stretches of the hike that were almost flat and the walking was pleasant. Campers all around us were talking, laughing and even singing; but those stretches didn’t last long. Soon we were climbing again and the noise of conversation would die away as we all pushed ourselves; putting one foot in front of the last, keeping our balance on small, shifting rocks and searching for oxygen in the desperately thin air. It was not an easy day, but all you had to do in order to feel encouraged was to simply lift your head off the trail and look around… We were hiking above the tree line in the Rocky Mountains! We were taking in the landscape that Lewis and Clark witnessed and journaled about! Snow capped peaks surrounded us in every direction, and it was the middle of June! As we neared the end, the trail became more and more steep. It was covered in rocks that were hard to negotiate, like a final test to punish the hiker before the great reward of the summit… and then, we were there.

One of the coolest things about going to Young Life Camp at Frontier Ranch in Colorado is what they call “High Country Day” where the entire camp (well over 500 folks) hikes together to a 13,000 ft. peak known as Mt. Chrysolite. When we began the hike, I knew it would be a challenge, but I also knew it wouldn’t be that bad of one because I was in really good shape. I had been running everyday back home and felt confident that I would manage the mountain without too much strain, and had I been on my own, I’m sure that would have been true; however, I was not on my own. There were a couple of high school guys from our group that were not in any shape to be climbing a mountain in Colorado. It didn’t take long for them to start lagging behind and when I noticed them drifting farther and farther back in the line, I realized what my day was going to be about. I realized with a jolt why I was in good shape and why I had done all that running back home… it was about this moment and these two guys. Whatever it took, I was going to get Josh and Marcus up that mountain.

In no time at all my pleasant trot up the side of Chrysolite changed dramatically into a serious physical challenge as I loaded Marcus’ backpack on top of my own, wrapped Josh’s sweatshirt around my already laden waist and grabbed those pretty large guys in turn, inviting them to lean on me and walk. All of a sudden I was using my bag of encouragement tricks on myself internally… “Just one step at a time, Lee, and then the next. Come on, you can do this.” Josh was heavy and he was discouraged. I just tried to keep him talking and tried to make him laugh. I gave him everything I had that day and I’m not ashamed to say that I barely made it to the top. I asked him if he’d ever seen anything like these mountains and he said, “I’ve never really been out of Oak Ridge before.” When we made it to the top and you could see the continental divide and the most majestic peaks in all directions for miles and miles, my tears froze onto my face as I told Josh, “Open your eyes brother, and look…

That day I thought about all the stuff Jesus said about serving people, about laying down your life instead of holding onto it and I remembered John 15 where He said, “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” I know I didn’t die for Josh or anything, but I gave my whole self away that day, and I remember this one moment when we were close to the top… my legs were burning, my back was creaking, my lungs were empty and my heart was full! I had the hardest time holding back the tears that kept wanting to jump on out there! We weren’t even to the top yet, but it wasn’t the mountains that made me burst with joy… I was giving my life away for someone else and in the midst of extreme pain and exhaustion, I was happy; outrageously filled and totally, totally happy. You really should try it sometime…


Some kid pics:

My new Nephew LEVI!!!!!!


Let it Sing!

My wife and I married in college. There were advantages to this, which was good because we couldn’t wait to be together any longer than we already had. You see, financial aid in the form of pell grants are only available to college students who are over the age of twenty four… unless you’re married!! When Christy and I got married, the US government started throwing money at us like crazy; in fact, the checks kept coming even after we graduated! We were debt-free 22 year-olds with college degrees who opened the mail box one day to find a check for $800! Christy turned to me and said, “I think we should buy your mandolin… it’s our only chance to have money like this outside of our budget. I was elated and started researching mandolins online. I soon knew everything there was to know about what is (in my opinion) the most beautifully constructed instrument on this planet, the F-style mandolin, created by Lloyd Loar for the Gibson Guitar Company in the early twentieth century.

I poured over stories of the legends of early Gibson mandolins from the 1920’s and before and read about how they were sold for $60,000… $85,000… even $200,000! Why, Bill Monroe’s 1924 Gibson Lloyd Loar F-5 was sold at an auction for 1.1 million dollars! Every mandolin that is built today is trying (with computers, machines and complex algorithms) to mimic things Lloyd Loar figured out with a chisel, some sand paper and his exceptionally sensitive ear almost a hundred years ago. They are simply some of the finest instruments ever built and in the right hands, they absolutely sing!

A while back, my friend Pottsy told me that his mom had a mandolin in the attic that was really old and he wanted me to come look at it. I asked him about it and he didn’t know much… just that it had been his dad’s, and before that his great granddad’s. I asked him how long it had been since someone played it and he had no idea. I went to his house expecting to see a busted up pile of toothpick-like shards in the general shape of an instrument, but what I saw was something else entirely… right in front of my face was a Gibson F-4 mandolin from 1911!! And here’s the kicker: it was perfect. Barely a scratch was on this masterpiece of luthiery! I picked it up in awe. I mean, the strings were rusted like crazy, but otherwise it was immaculate. I grabbed a pick and warned Pottsy that it would sound terrible because the strings were impossibly old and had to be worn out and totally detuned. Then I strummed it…

It was still in tune! Amazingly… impossibly, it was in tune! The tone was so aged, warm and rich! I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe that this absolute treasure was just sitting up in the attic as silent as a stone when it was made to sing! Pottsy said, “What should I do with it?” I said, “Well, you can probably sell it for a bunch of money, but whatever you do, put some new strings on it and listen to it sing. This thing was made to sing!” In Isaiah 43 the Lord calls us “the people I formed for myself that they might proclaim my praise.” We were also made to sing! The point of the human being is to declare the praise of God… it’s what we’re for and what we’re supposed to be about! Have you been sitting in an attic somewhere silent as a stone when you were made to sing?! It’s time to do what you were made for! Tune your heart to sing His praise and let it fly! You were made for this!

Help

I’m about to leave home for nine days. I’m not going to see my wife and my kids for nine straight days. There will be nine days of kisses and laughter I’ll miss out on… nine days of crayon drawings I won’t see, story books I won’t read and bedtime songs I won’t sing. I’m about to get on a bus with over 60 high school kids and eight adults and drive pretty much all the way across the US through the night. It will be uncomfortable, cramped and tough. It will also be lots of fun, but this is a scary trip for me. This is my sixth time to take high school kids to a week of Young Life summer camp and this trip will be more spiritually daunting than the others. That seems off, right? I ought to be getting better at this and more comfortable with all that is involved with a week of evangelistic camp, but I’m more frightened now than ever before.

I have one of the biggest cabins I’ve ever had… 13 guys to myself. On the one hand, this is extremely exciting and I am fired up about the opportunity to be in the lives of all these guys, but on the other hand, it’s a lot of dudes and I’m pretty sure that the vast majority of them don’t know our Lord in any way! When I look at the names of the guys in my cabin, I feel totally overwhelmed by the task ahead! I usually go into camp with my target on a couple of guys, maybe three or four at the most who I just know are lost and need the Lord. As I look at my list, my crosshairs contain nine or ten guys!!! Whew! It takes me a while to simply write all of their names down in my journal as I’m praying! As I look at what’s coming, I’m asking myself, “How am I going to make it away from my family for so long (especially as my family keeps getting bigger and more fun all the time!)? How am I going to do on that road trip physically? How is my body going to do at 9,000 ft.? And how in the world am I supposed to love on and pour into 13 guys in just 9 days and really connect with them?!? How in the world can these 10 lost boys be found?!?”

Recently I have been reading the Psalms of Ascents, which contains Psalm 120 through 134. These were the songs the Israelites sang as they journeyed three times a year to Jerusalem for the festivals God told them to observe there. These were their pilgrim songs they sang to praise the Lord, getting their hearts ready. They were the comfort songs they sang to fill each other with peace during the often dangerous journey. And they were the memorial songs they sang to remind themselves who they were, who God was and what He was doing in their lives. Today I read Psalm 127, written by Solomon, which says, “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain.” And my heart was pacified as I remembered that I am not responsible for saving these boys, God is building this house. I am not the one who protects my Christy and the kids, God watches over our little family.

As I was spending time writing out my prayers early this morning, I was praying for Christy and I was thinking a sentence that went like this: “Lord, please help her to…” but instead, without meaning to, I wrote this: “Lord, please help me…” I was praying for her, but instinctively my hand wrote, “help me…” This is what I’m learning from the songs of ascents. It’s what I’m learning as I go into yet another Young Life camp and it’s what I’m learning as I get older and our family keeps growing… that is, I am weaker than I used to be. I am less capable than I once was. I need more help everyday than I did the day before. I need God Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth to help me.

Here's Anna hard at work on some awesome drawings (which follow the post...)



Answering the Question

For a couple of years now our kids have actually been sitting in our church services as we worship. In the early days they were always in the nursery, which was appropriate because they were either sleeping, eating or crying like crazy and those aren’t really the things you want going on during worship (although you can always find a few sleepy heads doing the open-mouthed, jello-necked head bob). At one point when Anna was two-years-old we tried to bring her into a service, but she couldn’t handle seeing me up front playing the guitar and Christy up front singing while she had to remain seated with her grandparents… she lost control completely and we decided that maybe a few more months in the nursery wouldn’t hurt.

Nowadays Anna and Norah both hang out in the worship service, dancing and singing when they know the words and not losing control at all. It’s awesome. There is one part of the service that has become sort of a favorite tradition of mine where I make eye contact with both of the girls and we exchange ludicrously sappy and outrageous smiles. I love that part. Sometimes it happens right before the music starts and sometimes it happens during Tom’s announcements, but it nearly always happens and Norah has started to do the sweetest thing… When I catch her eye and we smile our cheesiest smile, she signs “I love you” to me. You know, where you stick out your thumb, index and pinky fingers, which means “I love you” in American Sign Language? Well, when she makes eye contact with me during worship, she sends that sign and I send it right back to her. It has become our little tradition, and I can’t tell you how it makes me feel that she takes that moment to tell me that she loves me!

This morning I read one of the sweetest passages in all of Scripture. I’m sure you’ve turned this page many a time, but consider it again… John 21. The resurrected Jesus had already spent time with all of His disciples together two times before this and had already had a one on one meeting with Peter. Now He met them all in Galilee. Peter and the boys were out fishing and had spent all night catching nothing. A voice called out to them from the shore saying, “Got any fish?” When they answered, the voice said, “Try the other side of the boat.” When they obeyed the voice, the nets were full of fish and they knew it was Jesus! They hurried to the shore (Peter jumping out of the boat and swimming) and He was already cooking breakfast. When they finished eating Jesus asked Peter one question three times…

“Simon, son of John, do you love me?” When I read that question this morning, it hit me that my day today is all about that question. He’s asking me, “Lee, do you love me?” And He’s not just asking me three times, but many, many times, over and over again all day long He will be asking me this question. Everything I do today is an answer to that repeated question. Every conversation, every glance, every reaction, every prayer is my answer to His tender question, “Do you love me?” All day long He’s trying to catch my eye and in everything I do, (just like Norah) I want to smile back at Him with all I’ve got and send up that little sign that says, “Yes, Lord, You know that I love you!”


This first one is of Christy and me with baby Jack in his mom's lap:



This one is of me and my guitar:


And here we have a bird, a frog, a duck and a blooming lily pad on a pond:

Hoedown at CCC!!

Here's Christy and Jack all ready for the Bluegrass Breakdown!

Tom, Austin and me after the square dance! (it was hard work playing two chords for twenty five minutes!!)


Jack with his great grandma... NAN!


Rosie and me, complete with overalls!


Where The Fish Are

I know I have been frustrating Norah lately. It’s not really my fault and it’s not really hers either… she’s just three years old, you know? Sometimes at naptime she wants to simply sit in her bed and play around instead of sleeping. When I go back in that room and tell her she had better lie down and sleep, she freaks out; but hey, I’m right! If she doesn’t sleep, it’s bad business for everyone including her! She only thinks she wants to stay up. The truth is, she needs to sleep and would be a million and five times happier if she would just get a little rest (as would everyone else). Norah is also lactose intolerant. When I tell her she doesn’t want seven gallons of ice cream, she doesn’t believe me. And look, I know she thinks she wants seven gallons of ice cream, but she’s wrong, because when she has a bunch of good ole cow’s milk, she starts feeling terrible on the inside which comes right on out to the outside! I know it’s frustrating, but the rules we set up aren’t just arbitrary standards intended to make Norah miserable, they are designed (and tailor-made) to make her happier.

This past weekend was our fifth annual High School Bible Study Retreat. My friend Devon spent the weekend telling kids what it means to really follow Jesus. On the first night He shared with them the story of the miraculous catch of fish from Luke 5. This guy Simon and his business partners had been up all night fishing but had caught nothing. They were professionals who had the best gear, experience and knowledge of when and where to find fish and how to bring them in; however, that night they came up empty handed. They came into shore, tied off the boats and got out to start washing the fruitless nets. At the same time a crowd was forming around Jesus, waiting for Him to speak to them. He stepped into the boat belonging to Simon and asked him to push off a bit so He could preach to the crowd on the shore.

Luke says, “When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch." Simon answered, "Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets." When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.” I know how Simon (later called Peter) felt. I’ve had people stand over me and tell me how to do something musically who didn’t know a minor triad from a major seventh. You just politely smile and pretend to take their advice while you are thinking and want to say, “Let me handle this, okay? I have been doing this for a living for years now and you don’t know what a pentatonic scale is.”

Whatever he was thinking about this strange command, Simon did put out into deep water and he did let down the nets. What followed changed his life… The nets were so full of fish they began to break! Just listening to Jesus even when he didn’t understand wound up being the smartest thing Peter ever did. Jesus doesn’t just randomly make up things for me to do and He doesn’t arbitrarily take me through hard times… no, He doesn’t tell me to drop the nets over here or over there simply because He wants control, but because He knows where the fish are. Everything He takes me through is part of the perfectly worked out plan of the one who knows absolutely everything… Or, as Paul puts it in Ephesians 1:11, “In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will.”

The Old Wells

The past couple of weeks have been a trip for me… my dad is back home in Oak Ridge coaching high school football! In some ways I feel like a little kid again seeing him out there in cardinal and gray on the practice field training a new generation of Wildcats how to block and tackle. In some ways it feels just as it did in the old days; and then again, in some ways it doesn’t. You see, Dad is having to start over from scratch with these guys he doesn’t really know yet. Back in the day when I played, we all learned the system in the third grade, so that by the time we got to high school and were under Dad’s coaching, he knew that we knew what to do. Nowadays guys are having to un-learn everything they learned and re-learn it all his way. It’s like going back to the basics and redoing things that should have already been taken care of.

The basics should be second nature, but they aren’t. These guys ought to know at certain times what to do and where to be. They ought to get in certain positions and respond to certain circumstances automatically, but they don’t, so Dad’s having to go back the basics and re-teach the stuff they ought to have down by now. The other day I watched him tell one of his boys over and over again that he was coming off the ball too high… that he needed to get his body down low. These are football fundamentals I remember learning in the fourth grade when I blocked so low that my coach nick-named me “Toenail.” I can’t imagine getting to be a high school junior or senior without knowing how to block low!

Then again, I think I can imagine how that feels… I know how it feels to be so far along that you ought to have the basics down but you just don’t yet, and you’re constantly having to re-learn the same old lessons again and again. I’ve been reading through the book of John again and the thing that keeps blowing my mind is that I am getting so much out of the very basic things… Like in chapter 3 when Jesus told Nicodemus that you can really start over again... how did I forget that?! Or like in chapter 7 when Jesus told everyone at the Feast of Tabernacles that if you’re thirsty, you can go to Him and believing in Him will make streams of living water flow from within you… that’s so basic! How in the world am I still learning that lesson?

Then there was today… I was feeling low and just totally disconnected from Him and I turned to John 10 and read again (as if for the first time) those peerless verses where our Lord said that I am His… in His hand and no one can snatch me out of His eternal grip! How did I forget the most basic thing? That’s why it’s always good to ground your heart in the Word… to mine the fields of the fundamental truths of our faith so that even if you forget, you remember again. Genesis 26: 18 says, “Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug in the time of his father Abraham, which the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died, and he gave them the same names his father had given them.” That’s what it’s like to go back to those basic things… you may forget, and they may get buried, but dig them back up… keep reopening the old wells so you can have their refreshing water once again.

Sweetness

Right now I am in a season of just loving Jesus so much! I don’t really know what has brought it on or if this just means I’m growing, but I find myself loving Him so much… just thinking about Jesus when I wake up, when I’m driving, reading, doing the dishes or just whatever. When I have conversations with people, I find myself thinking about Him and sort of talking to Him in the back of my mind. The other day I had a chance to lie down and take a nap and as I was drifting off to sleep, I was looking forward to a time later that evening where I wanted to just curl up with this book on Psalm 23, so I said to Him, “Lord Jesus, I’m gonna go to sleep for a little while, but I can’t wait to hang out with You later on! Okay, see you then!” Look, maybe it’s just a season or a phase and in a couple weeks I’ll come back down to earth, but it’s like something has come over me and I just keep hoping the change is permanent!

But then again maybe I do know what’s come over me… maybe I can put my finger on a change or two. For one thing, last week I read the book of Ruth at the same time as I started reading the book of John; and if you’ve never read those two books together, you’ve simply got to try it! You see, in the book of Ruth, this foreign girl marries into a situation that becomes pretty broken-down and hopeless. All the men in the family died, leaving the women destitute and hopeless with no prospects, when along comes this man who is able to help them and save them and change their whole lives, which he totally does! His name is Boaz and He is such an awesome picture of what Jesus is like for us… the way he swoops down like a superhero of the heart and saves the day!

The thing that struck me when I was reading Ruth was the tender affection and sweetness of Boaz toward Ruth… When she and Naomi arrived back in Judah, they had no money and no food. Ruth went to the grain fields of a relative of her dead husband and gathered the leftover stuff that had been dropped on the ground so that they could have some bread to eat. The field belonged to Boaz and his workers told him Ruth’s story. When he saw Ruth for himself, he liked her. In Ruth chapter 2, He found her and said, “Whenever you are thirsty, go and get a drink from the water jars the men have filled.” At lunchtime Boaz found her again and said, “Have some bread and dip it in the wine vinegar.” After lunch, as Ruth got back to work Boaz told his men, “Even if she gathers among the sheaves, don’t embarrass her. Rather, pull out some stalks for her from the bundles and leave them for her to pick up and don’t rebuke her.”

Boaz offered her water for her thirst, bread for her hunger and protected her tender heart right where it was from embarrassment and humiliation. As I was reading this alongside the book of John, I couldn’t stop thinking about Jesus and the way he said to a woman at a well who was down and out, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him and He would have given you Living Water.” I thought about the time He fed five thousand hungry people with a sack lunch and then told them, “I am the Bread of Life. He who comes to me will never go hungry.” And I thought about old Nicodemus who came to Jesus at night because he was afraid to let his friends know how he felt about Jesus, and how Jesus went ahead and met him at night. He didn’t make him face up at high noon at the temple, but met Nicodemus right where he was. When I looked at the tenderness of Boaz alongside the sweetness of the One he represented, I just fell in love all over again. Jesus is the sweetest, the most tender and gentle lover of the wounded and broken heart… what’s not to love!?

Here's Anna at her end of the year pre-school concert...





Tempering the Extreme

I have a tendency toward dorkiness… I can’t help it. When I was in about the fourth or fifth grade, my dad bought me a comic book for a long road trip and it changed me forever. I became totally obsessed with comics, sci-fi movies and all things fantasy. I know the history of every X-Man, can tell you which characters were in both Star Trek the Next Generation as well as Deep Space Nine, and I do a pretty mean impression of Chewbacca. I mean, I’ve even read The Silmarillion multiple times… I know, that’s a little ridiculous, but hey, I’m a dork. Here’s the thing though, I know I’m a dork. I’m not in denial about it. I’m fully aware of my condition, unlike some folks out there…

You see, this week the new Wolverine movie came out and today Charlie and I are going to go watch it. I am inordinately excited about a movie that may in fact be terrible. The thing is, I’m so excited that somewhere in the back of my mind there is this temptation to totally geek out… but I guarantee that this temptation will be held in check by the presence at the movie theater of some guy who has no idea that he’s a dork. I just know that at theaters all across this country there will be guys who have spiked up their hair, grown struggling little beards and even tried to fashion some claws for their hands. It’s like the time I got so excited to see the new Star Wars movie a few years back that I could hardly contain myself and then there he was… some uber-dork at the theater brought his light saber and a Darth Vader mask, which calmed me down in a hurry. There was a part of me that wanted to completely geek out, but seeing the extreme tempered my geekiness.

This week started out pretty crappy and there was this huge temptation welling up inside me to be extremely grumpy and complain about all of the stuff that’s not going well in my life, and then I read the first chapter of Ruth and changed my mind… Basically Ruth starts out telling the story of this one little family from Bethlehem. There was this dude named Elimelech, his wife Naomi and their two sons. There had been a severe famine in Judah, so Elimelech packed up his little family and moved to Africa, where his sons met these two really cool girls and married them. Not long after that, Elimelech and the two boys died, leaving Naomi a widow along with her two widowed daughters-in-law. Naomi decided to go back home to Bethlehem, so she told the girls to stay in Africa and make their own lives. One of the girls did just that, but the other girl said, “Nope. I’m with you. Wherever you go, I go.” That was Ruth.

So Naomi and Ruth headed back to Bethelehem with no husbands, no money and no prospects. When they arrived, everyone was like, “Hey! It’s Naomi! She’s come back home!” In Ruth chapter 1 Naomi said, “Don’t call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty.” You see, ‘Naomi’ is a word that means, ‘sweet’ and ‘Mara’ is a word that means ‘bitter.’ She was so angry with God about all the hard stuff in her life and it made her gross. She used to be called ‘sweet’ and now she was complaining, hardened and bitter toward God and life in general. When I read that little speech Naomi gave, it helped me snap out of my funk! I don’t want to live like that! I don’t want to be running around telling everyone who’ll listen how terribly God has treated me when the truth is, He’s been so very good! When things are going rough, it’s tempting to get frustrated and complain, but in the end, you’re only mad at God and it just makes you bitter… I decided right then and there to have a day filled with praise for God and love for Jesus and I did! It was the sweetest day ever, and I gotta tell ya, life’s a whole lot more fun that way.

What Is and What Will Be

Last week I was at the high school, doing what Young Life calls ‘contact work,’ which basically means meeting kids and trying to build relationships so that you can tell them about Jesus. Well, when I’m doing contact work, I have my eyes peeled for high schoolers… the ones I know and the ones I don’t. I’m almost constantly praying and I almost never even notice adults who happen to be around. Last week though, as I started down this ridiculously long hallway that leads from the basketball arena to the main lobby, I noticed an older lady all the way at the other end and instantly had the thought, “Oh, there’s Mrs. Skeen.” I immediately dismissed this rash thought due to the fact that this lady (whoever she was) was about seventy yards away and I hadn’t seen Mrs. Skeen since the fifth grade. Not only that, but why would she be at the high school? She taught at Linden Elementary!

Well, as I continued to walk down the hallway and we continued to get closer and closer together, I realized that I had been right! It was Mrs. Skeen!! My elementary school art teacher was coming toward me with every step, only her hair was completely white now instead of dark as it had been. She glanced at me without recognition and I called out to her… “Mrs. Skeen?” She looked up and that great big smile flooded her face as she said, “Well, hello!” and then… “Now, you’ll have to help me.” I offered, “I’m Lee…” but, before I could say my last name, she said, “Oh yes! Lee Younger! How long has it been?” I told her that she had taught me in the late 80’s and we both laughed. She asked about what I was doing these days and how my little sister was. She gaped when I told her I had three kids and that one of them would be starting kindergarten this fall. As I walked away from that little meeting, I was struck by the fact that I had been her student twenty years ago!

I wondered what Mrs. Skeen thought about all of us back in third grade art… Did she see anything in those days that would tell her who we would all become? Did she know some of us would own businesses and some would stock shelves? No, she was a great art teacher, but all she really saw were our novice attempts at Batik and Conte Crayons.

This week I’ve been reading the story of Gideon… the guy God raised up to save Israel from the hands of the Midianites in the book of Judges. I remember hearing this Bible story as a kid and thinking how awesome, brave and strong this guy must have been to take on a massive army with only 300 men, but the truth is, he wasn’t really like that… in fact, when the story opens up, Gideon is hiding in a winepress, doing his farm chores in secret so the big, bad Midianites don’t see and kill him! In Judges 6, the Angel of the Lord appeared to him and said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.” Gideon, a mighty warrior?! Are you kidding me!!?? The dude was shaking in his boots in his little hiding place! There wasn’t anything mighty or warrior-ish about that at all!

But God saw something no one else did. He looked at Gideon and didn’t just see the guy cowering in a winepress… he saw the man who would go on to rout the Midianites, tear down all the wicked idols and kill the enemies of God’s people with his own sword. God doesn’t just see what is, He sees what can be… what will be because of Him. You might look at your own life sometimes and wonder if it means anything. You might consider yourself a benchwarmer in the kingdom of God, but when He looks at you, He already sees you as you will be in Him! He sees stuff no one else sees in you. He sees things you don’t even see in yourself, and He’s the one who knows where this thing is going!

OLD SCHOOL PICS!

We can't find the replacement battery pack for our camera, so we haven't taken any pics this week. Therefore, I rifled through the external hard drive looking for some old pictures to post. Naturally, I got a little carried away... rest of the pics after the post.






Trembling

So, I was just feeding Jack some solid food and he did such a great job eating it! I was watching him watching me so expectantly while I got that next spoonful ready and I just felt so pleased… I was simply pleased with him. It made me happy just to see him tearing up that food. What’s more, I was impressed! I mean, he did a whole lot better than I would have done with pureed sweet potatoes. In between bites I would tell him, “Good job, sir!” and his perfectly round face would just break open in the most radiant grin… oh man, I was having the best time ever. After he ate, I got him out of his high chair and held him close. There was a particularly groovy Sara Groves song playing on the iPod, so we just started dancing and as usual, when I started singing, he smiled (if possible) even more than before. It was a blast.

Yesterday we drove through our old street to see our next-door neighbors, the Cunningham’s. Mrs. Jo had made us some of her delicious food to take home and while we were visiting with them, her husband Jack said the sweetest thing about our little Jack. “Come over here Jo,” he said, “Look at this little fella… he’s so friendly.” And he’s right! I love that description because that’s exactly what our little boy is like! He’s friendly. If you make eye contact with him, smile, and say, “Hi” he will return that gesture with the sweetest smile around. I was thinking about what the Cunningham’s were saying while we were dancing and my heart was just full to overflowing with pleasure over this little guy.

I was supposed to be putting him down for a nap, but I was waiting on a fairly reluctant burp, so we kept on dancing as the songs changed. Eventually the song How Deep the Father’s Love For Us came on and the first line cut me straight to the heart… “How deep the Father’s love for us, how vast beyond all measure, that He should give His only Son to make a wretch His treasure.” It wasn’t the first time I had ever heard that song, and it wasn’t new information. In fact, it’s the most basic thing about our faith, that God has given His only Son for us, to make us His own. But standing there, holding my only son in my arms… the little dude in whom I am so very pleased, the love of God just broke me open and gratitude spilled out all over place in hot tears that ran from my face to little Jack’s.

I thought of Abraham walking back down Mount Moriah with his grateful arms around his living and laughing son. I though about Jesus going down into the waters of the Jordan like a picture of the death that would come, and how the blue sky split open, the Dove descended and the voice of the Living God said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased.” And a question occurred to me that I had never thought of before… was that heavenly voice trembling?

Okay, how bout some more old pics...

We went to the awesome Aquarium in Gatlinburg this week!






Training

Last Friday at 8 PM, President Obama gave the Navy permission to use lethal force in the rescue operation of a merchant ship that was taken over by pirates off the coast of Somalia. After a scuffle with the crew of the merchant ship, the four pirates took the captain as a hostage to a lifeboat. The USS Bainbridge came onto the scene to negotiate the release of the American captain. One of the pirates, who had been injured by the merchant crew left the lifeboat on an inflatable vessel to seek medical attention from the U.S. Navy. Then the lifeboat ran out of fuel and agreed to let the USS Bainbridge tow them to calmer waters. A Navy Seal team parachuted onto the back of the USS Bainbridge to takeover negotiations…

So this is the situation: Navy Seals were on the back of a US battleship that was towing a lifeboat with three pirates and one hostage on it. Two of the pirates were visible through the glass of the engine room with the captain and the other pirate came above deck at the same time that one of the pirate’s AK47’s was pointed in the back of the captain. The commander of the Seal team gave his orders and three shots were fired… it was over in an instant. These Seals fired only three shots and each one was fatal. Here’s the really impressive thing: this was at night on the open sea! The lifeboat was listing up and down with the waves, two of the pirates were indoors and the three simultaneous shots were all right on their mark!

When I read the report of this story, I thought about those Navy Seals and all the training they went through… all of the target practice, the stationary and moving targets… the millions of times they have taken different types of shots in different situations. Did they ever feel like, “I don’t need to practice shooting today, I’ve got it down.”? Did they ever just get tired of practicing different scenarios where they had to simply take orders when they were given even if they didn’t have all the information? Did they ever get tired of doing the same fundamental things every single day, hour after hour? And yet… when it came down and they had to step up and do the very thing they had been trained to do, they were ready! More than ready, they were perfect.

Sometimes when people get into the trial of their life, they feel like they are suddenly drowning… they look around and panic because they realize they are in over their head and they simply don’t know what to do. Tom always says, “When you don’t know what to do, do what you know to do.” That usually means that when there’s nothing around you can do, you can always pray. Here’s the thing… what if you never really pray? What if you’re not really in the habit of talking to God? What if you don’t really spend any one on one time with Him? That’s like a marksman who never takes a shot… you get rusty. The Apostle tells us in 1 Thessalonians to “Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Maybe part of the reason it’s God’s will for us to always be joyful, praying and thanking Him is that these are our fundamentals! These are the things we need in a pinch! If you are always training, then you’ll know what to do when you get in the trial of your life and you just don’t know what to do.