Superman

Who doesn’t like Superman? Who hasn’t wanted to be Superman or some kind of superhero? High Calling blogger Bill Coffey tells the story of his son’s obsession with being Superman and muses about what will happen when he realizes one day that he isn’t a superhero.

My son is in his Superman stage. A vital phase of a boy’s life, in my opinion. He has the cape and the pants and, according to him, the X-ray vision.

“You’d better be good,” he told me, “or I’ll get you.”

Point taken. Nowadays, I’m on my best behavior around the house.

He also has the T-shirt. The cheapie kind, bought on sale. Hold it up to the light and you can see right through it. Which may or may not be where he gets the whole X-ray vision thing from. But it has the “S” on the front, and that’s all he needs. And the fact that the shirt is so flimsy actually comes in handy. He can wear it under most anything.

And he does. Under pajamas and church clothes and sweaters and even other T-shirts. There. Ready at a moment’s call.…Read More

One Mom, Two Mom, Red Mom, Blue Mom

With all of the tension of the political scene these days, it’s always nice to hear some good old fashioned, nonpartisan encouragment. Dena Dyer delivers with a fantastic, uplifting little bit of political parody. You must see this!

It’s Dr. Seuss meets Jim Lehrer.

Update:  Dena Dyer just sent me the full text of her book. Enjoy!

Red (State) Mom, Blue (State) Mom
A Dr. Seuss Parody by Dena Dyer

One mom, two mom
Red mom, blue mom
Short mom, tall mom
Big mom, small mom.

This one wants to go, go, go—
This one likes to take it slow.
Some stay home, some travel far.
Say! What a lot of moms there are.

Some have two kids, some have four.
Some have many, many more.
Some vote red and some vote blue—
Some are purple through and through.

Not one of us thinks like the other,
But each of us is still a mother.
Makes no difference who you choose—
Don’t see red or get the blues.

Have you kissed a boo-boo on a knee?
Or sewn a costume, 1-2-3?
Moms can do it, yes we can!
Even cook green eggs and ham.

Moms are more alike than not.
We work, we fret, we laugh a lot.
So when I talk about my choice,
Respect me please, don’t raise your voice.

And remember when November comes,
What we tell our little ones—
Be polite, and in a pinch
Please don’t turn into a Grinch!

Read every blog in the network in just a glance (or two)

Hey, everyone. Marcus here. You read that title correctly. Read everyone in the network in just a glance. Automatically updated by Netvibes. Super cool! If that makes no sense, just keep reading.

We’ve had a lot of people mention that it is hard to find folks on the network. (And we agree.) We also think our HighCallingBlogs netvibes channel might be the solution. Take a look and let us know what you think!

In case you’ve missed our other community improvements to help you read and encourage the other blogs in the network, here’s a quick list…

1. We created a highcallingblogs public netvibes page with all of our bloggers! (I just wanted to say that again because I’m pretty excited about it.)
2. Chris Cree created a custom google search for highcallingblogs.com that includes the content of member blogs. You can read about all the technical stuff involved with our new search. Or just go up to the upper left and run a search. Learning by play is the most fun anyway, right?
3. Finally, we streamlined the Widgetbox feeds located by category under “Blogs in the Network” at HighCallingBlogs.com. Take a look at our business page, and you’ll see what I mean. And loaded a button so you can add our netvibes page to yours (if you like netvibes). We hope this helps!

Ten Commandments of Talking (or blogging) Politics

Marcus here. For just a minute, I’m going to adopt the role of pastor here. So file in. Take a pew. Sing a song by yourself. Say a prayer. Is your mind in the right place? Good.

Let’s talk about politics.

It’s that time. Now that both parties have had their convention, things could get heated. Here’s a reminder to folks to behave appropriately. In fact, let’s hold each other accountable in this network to a higher level of discourse for the next few months with these Ten Commandments of Talking (or blogging) Politics.

1. Do not worship political theories or parties. (You shall have no other gods before me.)
Do not worship ideas or theories instead of God. Not your stance on global warming or Capitalism or deregulation or education or abortion or gay marriage or health care or international trade or war. Do not put your hopes in a political stance or party line or economic theory. Those things are important, but they should not distract us from our unity in Christ Jesus.

2. Do not worship political figures or images. (You shall not make for yourself an idol.)
Obama is not the savior. Neither is McCain. Neither is the Republican Party or the Democratic Party. Do not bow to Elephants or Donkeys. Good leadership is important. Political pep rallys and mascots are fun, but they should not distract us from our unity in Christ Jesus.

3. God is not divinely endorsing your political opinion. (You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your God.)
This is slippery. But it is important. We can’t answer the question Who Would Jesus Vote For? except in the privacy of our own hearts. I’m serious. This doesn’t mean Christians can’t express political opinions if they are so inclined. But it does mean we must humbly represent our opinions as our own personal opinions, not God’s opinion. Neither party is God’s party. And in a sense, both candidates already belong to God because they both acknowledge him publicly. (And of course, we don’t judge hearts.)

4. Do not use God to prop up your politics. (Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.)
OK, people. Both sides fail at this too. Corporate worship is not the place for political messages. Period. This is a fine line to walk. It doesn’t mean politics can’t come to church at all. Rick Warren did a fair job at Saddleback recently. But it wasn’t under the guise of worship. In your blogs, do not use the Word of God to prop up your political hopes. Don’t.

5. Honor your father and mother. (Honor your father and mother.)
Election season is probably not the time to try to convert your parents to your political viewpoint. Here’s my suggestion. If they start ranting and raving against your candidate, respect them by keeping your mouth shut. Don’t take the bait. And certainly don’t bait your parents! This doesn’t mean all political discourse is off limits—but remember that elections aren’t sporting events. Do not let abstractions become a wedge between you and your family. It’s not worth it.

6. Don’t be cruel. (You shall not murder.)
Elvis may have said it best, but Jesus had some good words on this too. He said, “Anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment… anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.” (Matt 5:21-22). If another blogger slanders you, talk to him or her privately first (Matt 18:15-16). Don’t air ugly conversations in your comment sections. Don’t attack people or ideas in public posts. This doesn’t mean you have to be silent. Respond to comments with an email. Engage them as Jesus says. And remember that it isn’t a sin for two Christians to disagree about politics.

7. Be pure. (You shall not commit adultery.)
I’m not sure how this applies to politics except as a reminder that we need to be examples of purity. Before you post a comment for or against someone, ask yourself if you are going to sully yourself or discredit yourself as a Christian. And don’t forget the comparison between idolatry and adultery. Don’t get so excited about politics that every conversation and post and comment reveals which side you are “in bed with.”

8. Be honest. (You shall not steal.)
Be honest when you vote. Stolen elections won’t help anyone. For some people, this may be a call to volunteer to work the polls on Election Day! A friend of mine volunteers for every election. Of course, every state is different, but she recommends contacting your local democratic or republican headquarters. Tell the party chairman for your party that you want to volunteer on Election Day. (You will need to be trained before you can work the polls.) The phone book should list contact information for both parties under “Associations” or “Political Organizations.”

9. Defend the truth and the facts. (You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.)
And who is your neighbor? Barack Obama. John McCain. Joe Biden. Sarah Palin. But also the Democrat next door and the Republican across the street. Here’s my practical suggestion. Refrain from sending asinine email forwards. But let’s take it one step further. If you receive a slanderous email, check the Snopes page on McCain or the Snopes page on Obama. Then send a kind response to the person who forwarded the email (NOT the whole list) explaining the error as gently as possible.

10. Be prepared to accept the results. (You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.)
In November one party will win control of the executive branch. The other will lose. When the time comes, do not covet your neighbor’s political victory if your side loses. If your side wins, do not gloat.

With God’s grace, we can all get along for the next few months regardless of who we will support at the polls on November 4, 2008.

NOTE: For the sake of simplicity and familiarity, I’ve used the protestant version of the Ten Commandments from Adam Clarke’s commentary. However, there are other ways to splice and dice Exodus. Wikipedia has a simple chart to show other views.

And just in case you are still confused about Commandment #6:

Tell the Truth - What do you need?

Marcus here. Kaye Torgerson sent me an email a few days ago telling me about something she’s doing over at Silencing the Stones.

I will be starting a new project on my Silencing the Stones blog, in the blogroll here, on Friday. You can read about it here.

Please look over it when you get a chance and let me know what you think. If you like the idea, please get the word out, as I think we could all use a little more support in this crazy life.

Thanks!

Kaye Torgerson

So I headed over to her site and I like the idea. Here’s the bottom line:

Starting Friday, I’m going to feature on this site a Mr. Linky. Please write a post about your current needs. What are you going through? What are you frustrated about? What are your prayer requests? What mistakes have you made that you need help with? What questions do you need answers for? Then I will ask each reader and entrant to pray for the other needs on the list. You can be as general or specific as you want, but know that you are met here with love and open arms.

What can High Calling Bloggers do to help?

Well, you can certainly participate in Kaye’s little writing project if you’re inclined. I’m sure she’d love to get a good turn out.

You could also just click through the posts of people who participate and leave comments of encouragement.

Finally, like she said here, you could pray for each other. Either pray for each other directly based on the needs people share. Or pray for this network in general. That God’s will would be done here.

I mean, we’re making this up as we go folks. We need your help and your prayers if we are going to do a good job of honoring God here.

Find Grace in Hard and Hidden Places

The blog network is quickly approaching 200 members. (We’re doing our very best to welcome everyone, and visit your blogs.) L.L. Barkat of Seedlings In Stone has been with us almost from the beginning.

More importantly, L.L. understands what we’re trying to do here. L.L. caught the vision.

And that vision is expressed beautifully in her recent book Stone Crossings. The subtitle is “Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places.” Which makes me wonder. Where has God shown you grace today?

For example, L.L. finds grace in doubt.

When Peter is faced with the reality that Jesus will die a criminal’s death, doubt assails him. The truth is too difficult, too bloody, too dirty to hold… When we see Jesus in a new unexpected way that fails to meet expectations, we are tempted to falter and say: This is hard; who can accept it?

As an example, L.L. tells the story of a former professor, “David D.” He was “an excellent customer service representative,” she explains. “The attendant who goes beyond the company script, who makes you feel you are a person with read needs and concerns.” When L.L. went to his office with doubts about God’s mere existence, David didn’t flinch.

She writes, “An unquestioned faith is questionable… Covering doubt and demanding unexamined allegiance holds its own special dangers.”

So true.

Here’s another example, L.L. finds grace in sacrifice, the daily living sacrifice that Paul describes in Romans 12:1-2 and that Jesus requests in John 21:17.

Tending sheep is a mundane job. It is a lot of same old, same old–the way we feed kids breakfast, lunch and dinner, or drive to the office and deal with the same people day after day. It is repetitive… So it’s easy for us to overlook the power of small acts…

Recently, I sat across the table from a friend who does all sorts of mundane tasks. She drives her daughter to eight specialist appointments a week. She feeds her family. She and her husband are opening their arms to a new baby from another country.

As we sat at our corner table, this woman raised her cup and sipped. Then with much earnestness, she said, “I just wish I could do something for the Lord.”

I’m not the type to get sappy over tea. But when she said this, I just about spit out my scone. It took a second before I could speak.

“It hurts so much to hear you say that,” I told her… My friend is a rich gift to her family, a shepherd given them for life’s journey. No one is going to put her on TV for what she does every day. She will never be an American Idol star.

Because the rewards are quiet, being dependable in common love is not always inviting.

That’s what high calling blogs is all about. We want to remind people every day to be dependable in common love. Find grace in hard places like the workplace and the grocery store and your daily commute.

Where has God shown you grace and common love today?

One more thing. People often ask how they can help us out. They want to be more active in the network. Believe me, we’re working hard on building tools to help connect you. But here are three FOUR different things you could do.

Option 1, you buy L. L. ’s book. It’s only $12.00.
Option 2, at least click through to IVP’s website so they’ll see our referrals coming in.
Option 3, you can support L.L. by posting about her book and getting the word out.
Option 4, show up on L.L.’s blog and leave an encouraging comment.

If this network is going to be more than just another link exchange, we need to support each other! Be active! Be encouraging! Comment. Post. Link. End of sermon.

Now back to that question. I really do want to know the answer. Where has God shown you grace and common love today?

Are You Ready for Life Streaming?

In our GodblogCon.com conversation with Andrew Jones (Tall Skinny Kiwi) last week, we talked about life streaming.

That got me thinking during my web 2.0 time today. First, I logged into Facebook to think about that as a location where someone might start life streaming.

Facebook Has Applications to Bring Your Feeds into One Place

Certainly, Facebook’s applications allow other activities to be distributed to your friends. For instance, I link my Twitter updates to my Facebook status with the Facebook Twitter application. And I’ve used a variety of applications to share my blog feed through facebook. After experimenting with several things like Facebook’s Mirror Blog, I finally settled on Facebook’s friendfeed application.

Which requires a friendfeed account, of course.

When Life Streaming Gets Redundant

Still with me? Here’s where things start to get weird. friendfeed aggregates feeds similar to Facebook. I can bring my blog, my flickr, my Twitter, even my NetFlix queue, all into friendfeed. Then shoot it back out in one RSS “life stream” to Facebook and similar services.

Forget the anonymous second and third life stuff of the late 1990s. Life streaming is online transparency that helps us hold each other accountable.

But the technology is still clunky. For instance, Facebook Twitter and friendfeed don’t play well together. Twitter shoots directly to my Facebook status. Then, friendfeed routes the same Twitter post to my Facebook stream. So my friends were getting double notifications.

Mark Goodyear tweets via Twitter and Facebook. Followed by identical Mark Goodyear tweets via Twitter and friendfeed and Facebook. Just look:

I still have the problem with redundant blog postings on Facebook.

And now I’ve got the problem of redundant social book circle sites. Oh, the woes of web 2.0. Do I stick with Shelfari? Do I switch to Goodreads (which has the PERFECT name)? Or Library Thing?

After the conversation with GodblogCon speaker Wade Tonkin, I’m also curious about experimenting with one of these as if I’m an affiliate marketer.

Who knows. Who knows. Is anyone else trying this kind of stuff?

Before you answer that, here’s a cool widget from Goodreads:

Two Men Fighting with a Knife by John Poch

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
Not many poets these days are committed to forms like John Poch. He’s the editor of 32 Poems Magazine and a professor of poetry at Texas Tech. And he understands sonnets. This collection of sonnets, sestinas, and other forms often has a wonderful southwestern flavor. Poch isn’t limited to that, though. His sonnet crown written in thanks to a neurosurgeon, for instance, transcends any brand of American regionalism in a way that is joyful, playful, and spiritual.

View all my reviews.

Do You Have Cause Fatigue?

Marcus here. Over at New Breed of Advertisers, Sam Van Eman has confessed “I think I can’t, I think I can’t.”

Ouch, Sam. That’s bleak, man. That’s Cormac McCarthy bleak. I know what Sam means, though, and I appreciate his bold, if slightly shocking honesty.

Sam explores the idea in much greater depth in his MUST READ article at Catapult Magazine called Melinda Mae Missiology. The title of his article refers to a Shel Silverstein poem. (Click here and listen to Shel’s crazy reading.)

I’m no Melinda Mae. I lack focus. I lack patience. I lack perseverance. To be honest, I’m flat-out tired. In fact, I have had “cause fatigue” for sometime now. You know cause fatigue, right? Ten Facebook “friends” everyday tell me I should support their causes: “Spay Your Dog” and “Recycle Your Cans” and “Change the World This” and “Change the World That.”

Oh yeah. And this one. Join our Facebook Blog Network. (Actually, that’s not a cause. It’s a cool Facebook plugin that looks like it will aggregate all of our content on Facebook. Or else it will just be a fancy Facebook blog roll. I’m not sure.)

Even with the apologetic parentheses there, I feel bad about even asking people to join something else, click on one more link, stand up and digg or favorite or tag or participate in one more networking possibility or world improvement campaign.

There are just so many options that we start to shut down.

What else can we do except focus on the world in front of us? I don’t know where else to work on building the kingdom of God–whatever that means exactly. I’m still thinking about Sam’s article at Catapult when I make comments like that.

Here’s what I see in my life. I can be a good dad–and do things like watch a pickup softball game with my four-year-old son in the evenings. (We watched warm-up and ten minutes of the first inning last night.) I can be a good husband–and do things like encourage my wife after she has a tough rehearsal for Willy Wonka. (She’s Mrs. Gloop.) I can work hard at my job–connecting people online, editing articles, and doing my best to pay writers on time.

And I can write poetry. Which has no value in the free market sense, but it brings me joy. And for me, it is a kind of prayer.

Sure I do church and charity stuff too, but the real mission of my life is what I spend the bulk of my time on. Work and Family seamlessly (hopefully) integrated with my Faith in God.

None of those are very earth shattering causes. In fact, they seem almost cowardly in their simplicity. But they are what I do. Should I do more? I don’t know.

What do you do?

Morning Gardening and Simple Prayers

Gardening and landscaping are full of spiritual lessons. The plants at our church never stop teaching me things about God. The tenacity of the plants around our church in retaking the land that we so rudely claimed as our own reminds me that the earth is old, and its purposes are deeper and older than our own. God’s creation will still be working and growing long after we are gone.

Thomas Turner of Everyday Liturgy has written a piece about the spiritual lessons he learned while pulling red onions from his garden.

As I watered the plants this morning I noticed our onions had “jumped” out of the ground again. My wife and I pile dirt on top, but they keep pushing their bulbs above the surface of the soil. I suppose they were trying to tell us they just didn’t feel like being in the ground any longer, so skipped my regular morning prayers and began filling a colander with little dirt clod covered red onions.

Well I didn’t really skip my morning prayers, just the one in the Glenstal Prayer Book. I focused my soul on how gardening is a metaphor for how God deals with us. I prayed that though I am sometimes as inpatient as an onion who pushes itself out of the soil to kiss the air and sun, that God would use me in the best way possible.…Read More

Spiritual Decompression

The modern world taxes us. Literally of course, but also emotionally and spiritually. We are far too busy, far to distracted, juggling too many tasks, keeping up with schedules that are too full. You can step out of the modern world for a time, taking a vacation. But it often takes a few days to settle into a slower pace of living.

Real Live Preacher noticed this on a recent vacation. He wrote about it in a piece called “Spiritual Decompression.”

It’s a little unnerving when you first arrive. When darkness falls and there is no television or news, you might find yourself fidgeting a bit. But Jeanene and I have learned to wait patiently until our bodies adjust to the simple sounds and the simpler pace of life. Once you emotionally let go of the modern world and the fast pace of life we’ve created for ourselves there, your body settles quite nicely into what I would say is a more natural state. Before you know it you’ll find yourself happily staring off into the distance, listening to the echoing booms of a thunderstorm, or watching a hummingbird float gently in front of a flower. You might look up to find that you’ve spent an hour trying to feed a cracker to a chipmunk.

Our daughters have not been to Creede as often as we have, and they are not used to the awkward decompression time. The first night we were here, our middle daughter finally grasped the reality of our situation. No television and no internet, which means no MySpace. She panicked.

“Dad, what are we going to do? There’s nothing to watch on TV, and I can’t get to MySpace. What are we supposed to do?”

“Well, that’s why we come here. You have to settle into a simpler kind of living.”

“Yeah, but what are we supposed to DO?”… Read More

Filed Under Featured, parenting, pastors · Leave a Comment  

Next Page »