Fatherhood
Serendipitous, I’d say, that I stumbled across this blog post by Josh Brown today. It’s about fatherhood, and the exceptionally little amount of effort it takes to be a decent father (especially compared to what a mother does).
I say serendipitous because this morning I really felt like a lousy father. Once again I was upset with Tanner for disrupting my sleeping pattern. Instead of waking myself up an extra 30 minutes and goofing off with him, I sent him off. And angrily at that.
What I found most disheartening after reading Josh’s post is the realization that even with all my shortcomings, I’m still viewed as a pretty good father. Yet there are millions of the kids out there growing up without a father that even matches up to society’s lousy standard, which just blows my mind. Did you know that 94% of the people in prison are men, and 85% of those grew up in a home without a father? This whole discussion reminded me of a post I did a few years back called Why Do Dad’s Suck.
So today I felt a bit convicted and thought I’d make a few action items for myself…
• Appreciate my parents more, and let them know how much I appreciate them.
• Appreciate my wife more, and let her know how much I appreciate her.
• Spend more unselfish quality time with my son.
• Cherish the time.
• Listen to him more.
• Show more grace.
• Encourage other fathers to be more involved in their kids lives.
I want to continue to build on the solid legacy of parenting that my mother and father began. Don’t our kids deserve the best we have to offer?
Paying It Forward
I love inspiring commercials. All day, every day, we’re inundated with advertisements that say nothing more than, “You Need This Product!” Wouldn’t it be great to run into at least a few that relay a message that speaks on a different level, one that inspires us?
These commercials by Liberty Mutual have always been some of my favorites. They paint such a nice little utopian picture. The little things really do add up.
The song is “Half Acre,” by Hem.
The song is “The Part Where You Let Go,” by Hem.
Bullet Soul
Bullet Soul — Switchfoot
[Embedded Audio]
I want to sing one for all the dreamers
I’m singing this one for the sparks
Here’s one for the friction makers
We are the bleeding hearts
Don’t care whoever you are
We rise and fall together
Our hearts still beat below
You can’t stand by forever
You’re a kid with a bullet soul
Are you ready to go?
I want to turn up the radiation
I want to glow in the dark
Love is the one true innovation
Love is the only art
Don’t let ‘em blow it apart
We rise and fall together
Our hearts still beat below
You can’t stand by forever
You’re a kid with a bullet soul
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
We are the children of the scar
We got to start from the start
We rise and fall together
Our hearts still beat below
You can’t stand by forever
You’re a kid with a bullet soul
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
Are you ready to go?
Glenn Beck, Social Justice, & Your Local Church
If you know anything about me, you know that I try my hardest to steer clear of political debates, online or off. However, this newest Glenn Beck twaddle really chaps my hide. Here’s what you might have missed:
On his daily radio and television shows last week, Glenn Beck set out to convince his audience that “social justice,” the term many Christian churches use to describe their efforts to address poverty and human rights, is a “code word” for communism and Nazism. Beck urged Christians to discuss the term with their priests and to leave their churches if leaders would not reconsider their emphasis on social justice.
“I’m begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them . . . are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words ’social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”
Now you can be on either side of the political isle, and debate your entire lifetime on whether or not it’s good for the government to be involved in helping the poor, but let me make one thing crystal clear… that is exactly what the church is here for. We are to be the hands and feet of Jesus, giving food to those that are hungry, helping those in need, practicing “the religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless … looking after orphans and widows in their distress.”
What Glenn is doing here is taking a hot political issue and trying to sound pious while tugging at the emotions of his followers. He’s (mis)using religion to effect legitimate political discord… and to make a name for himself. I thought Glenn jumped the shark quite a while back, but this solidifies my decision to steer clear of this ignorant fear monger. I’d urge you to do the same.
And for the record, I want no part of any organization, religion, or church that does not take seriously our mandate to help those in need—spiritually AND physically.
Review: Crave – Wanting So Much More of God
Before I began my blog back in 2004, and well before other amazing social tools such as Twitter, whenever I had a theological concern I was limited to the thoughts of those directly around me. Friends, family, church, etc. Unfortunately that world view was slightly limited and I found myself keeping my questions internal for the most part and wondering silently about my convictions in all this God stuff.
But then I discovered the blogosphere, and a whole new world opened up to me. I started discovering that I wasn’t the only person feeling the way I felt, or asking the questions I had. One blog led to another. Through that community I discovered some other reading material that assisted my journey as well. Books like Searching for God Knows What and Velvet Elvis have a special place in my heart.
So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that Chris Tomlinson and I would bump into each other online, and that when I started reading his book, Crave: Wanting So Much More of God, I would resonate so completely with him. Chris has masterfully woven a series of stories and questions and confessions together out of his own experiences that will give any Christ follower ample food for thought.
Although I thoroughly enjoyed each chapter, I found the one entitled Different to be the one that gave me the most pause. Here’s just a taste…
I’ve spent too many years glossing over hard truths about God in favor of pleasant ones in an attempt to make Him more palatable to my taste or softer to the touch of others’ ears. In the process, I have developed inch-deep beliefs about a mile-high God.
I know this is hard to deal with intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually, but the simplicity and cogency of Scripture bring us face-to-face with a God who takes our sin and His holiness really seriously. He takes love and mercy seriously too. If A.W. Tozer was correct when he said that “what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us,” then we have no choice but to embrace the smooth wine and the hardtack of God’s descriptions of Himself. When we are tempted not to savor the wine or to spit out the hardtack, we must resist the urge to adjust our beliefs about God to suit our sensibilities.
It seems that when we encounter a hard truth about God, we either bend our understanding to Him or bend Him to our understanding.
One of the first virtual brothers-in-arms I encountered in the blogosphere was Aaron Conrad. In his recent review of Crave he states that he resonated more deeply with the chapter entitled Extras. I have a sneaky suspicion that when you read it, you too will find something different that speaks directly to you. In a culture that seems to be capitalizing on the Jesus brand, it’s refreshing to hear an authentic voice amongst the noise.
Thank you Chris and Harvest House for giving me the opportunity to review your book!
» Download the first three chapters
cravesomethingmore.org
twitter.com/christomlinson_
facebook.com/tomlinsoncr
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Chris and his publisher were kind enough to send me an extra copy to give away free, here on my blog. Simply leave a comment on this post and I’ll randomly pick a winner on Monday, March 8, 2010.
February Debrief
February was pretty blasé. It came and went rather quickly with relatively little to show for it, other than the five feet of snowfall left in my yard.
• Dad and the drill team went to Africa again.
• The last season of Lost began. Unfortunately that seems to be a good thing.
• Hosted a nice little Super Bowl party, and the team I was rooting for actually won!
• Tonia turned 32 and I had my first negative experience buying something from Amazon.com.
• The winter olympics were on and ironically the only sport I watched was hockey.
• Our running posse racked up 50 miles this month!
Books Read in February:
The Appeal — John Grisham
Crave — Chris Tomlinson
Movies Watched in February:
Street Kings – 4/5
What Women Want – 3/5
The Sting – 4/5
Hackers – 3/5
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid – 5/5
A Serious Man – 5/5
Rock Star – 3/5
To Live and Die in L.A. – 3/5
Summer Catch – 2/5
The Color of Money – 3/5
Hart’s War – 4/5
The Invention of Lying – 3/5
The Abyss – 3/5
Reality Bites – 3/5
The Wolfman – 4/5
Shutter Island – 4/5
Eight Men Out – 2/5
Taps – 5/5
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant – 2/5
Raising Arizona – 3/5
Politics, Faith, & Condescension
I thought this was a well-written essay by Michael Roth, the president of Weslyan University, in which he argues that education and faith should lead to a similar end: a realization of how little we understand and thus an openness to other points of view/belief systems.
Liberal learning is, after all, supposed to make us aware of how little we know. That’s what Socratic insight is all about: we need to learn because we understand so little. Education should lead to intellectual humility as we become more aware of our own ignorance. Conservatives also prize education, after all, but they do so because it should deliver the lesson of intellectual humility. Education should prevent us from thinking we can solve our deepest problems with science, technology or political structures.
There is a parallel here with faith. Some believers, infused with confidence in their own righteousness, display a spiritual arrogance that is offensive to those who don’t share their beliefs. But many people of faith discover a deep humility through their spiritual life—a humility that leads to openness to others rather than a proud sectarianism.
So maybe condescension depends less on questions of ideology, learning and faith than it does on differences in character. Some people just find it easier to sneer at others rather than to try to understand people with different points of view. The satisfactions of condescension are a temptation for people who feel they already know so much, just as the pleasures of elitism are seductive for people who are certain that God is on their side.
March 2010
February 2010 is going out with a bang, it seems, with this final week blizzard. However, glancing at my calendar this morning, I can’t help but be giddy about the prospects of March. I’ve mentioned before that March is my favorite sports month of the year, but add to that a couple other niceties and you’ve got the makings of a GREAT month!
Sports
Spring Training Games – 3/2
March Madness NCAA Tournament – 3/15
Movies Being Released (Theater)
Alice & Wonderland – 3/5
Brooklyn’s Finest – 3/5
Remember Me – 3/12
Green Zone – 3/12
The Bounty Hunter – 3/19
How To Train Your Dragon – 3/26
Movies Being Released (DVD)
2012 – 3/2
Gentlemen Broncos – 3/2
Up in the Air – 3/9
The Boondock Saints II – 3/9
Precious – 3/9
The Time Traveler’s Wife – 3/9
Brothers – 3/23
The Box – 3/23
The Informant – 3/23
The Men Who Stare at Goats – 3/23
Other
The Oscars – 3/7
Daylight Savings Time begins – 3/14
St. Patrick’s Day – 3/17
Spring begins – 3/20
Breaking Bad Season Three begins – 3/21
Switchfoot concert – 3/24
I’m sure I’m missing something else, but this is more than enough to give me a light at the end of this snowy February tunnel.
Successful People
*Originally posted on April 7, 2008
• Successful people accept life as it is, with all its difficulties and challenges. They adapt to it rather than complain about it. They accept responsibility for their own lives instead of blaming or making excuses. They say YES to life in spite of negative elements and make the most out of it, no matter what the circumstances.
• Successful people develop and maintain a positive attitude toward life. They look for good in others and in the world, and usually seem to find it. They see life as a series of opportunities and possibilities, and always explore them.
• Successful people build good relationships. They’re sensitive to the needs and feelings of others. They’re considerate and respectful. They have a way of bringing out the best in other people.
• Successful people have a sense of direction and purpose — they know where they’re going. They set goals, accomplish most of them, and then set new goals. They accept and enjoy a challenge.
• Successful people have a strong desire to learn: about life, the world, and themselves. They see learning as a joy, not a duty. They continually enrich their lives by learning new things and improving themselves. They are always discovering, always growing.
• Successful people are action-oriented. They get things done because they’re not afraid of hard work, and they don’t waste time. They use it in constructive ways. They don’t get into ruts or become bored because they’re too busy looking for new experiences.
• Successful people maintain high standards in their personal conduct. They know that honesty is one of the main ingredients in the character of a good person. They are consistently truthful in both their private and public lives.
• Successful people understand the difference between existing and living, and always choose the latter. They get the most out of life because they put the most into it. They reap what they sow. And they enjoy life to the fullest.
(ht: The Maverick Spirit)
Without It
Without It – MuteMath
[Embedded Audio]
Here we are
Isn’t life bizarre?
It likes to take from us and throw it out
We’ll carry on
What’s done is done
Yeah, we’ll do without it somehow
The world is gone, don’t think about it
Cuz life is short we’ll do without it
They say the road is long, don’t think about it
Cuz life is short we’ll do without it
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
The best we’ve known is yet to come
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
The worst won’t get the best of us
Some memories, a crippling
Don’t let the disease bring us down
There’s nothing else to know
Just let it go
Yeah, we’ll do without it somehow
The world is gone, don’t think about it
Cuz life is short we’ll do without it
They say the road is long, don’t think about it
Cuz life is short we’ll do without it
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
The best we’ve known is yet to come
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
The worst won’t get the best of us
The world is gone, don’t think about it
Cuz life is short we’ll do without it
We’ll do without it
We’ll do without it
We’ll do without it
We’ll do without it
Go
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
The best we’ve known is yet to come
We can move on forward
Don’t worry
Don’t you worry
Though the world is gone
We’ll carry on
We’ll do without it
We’ll do without it
