I found out last week that the sister of a woman who comes to our home community (whom I met at a wedding) thinks that I used to be a cool kid! No seriously, her impression of me was that I was like the cool kid jock in high school that everyone loved! The reason it came up was because she was wondering what my dad was like and how my dad would have approved me, the cool kid, marrying a hippie girl!
This is the best day of my life! (I hope you can tell my be excessive use of exclamation points that I’m very excited about this news).
The next bit of identity news is that while at a store last week a guy came up to Jessica, Matt (one of the associate pastors at Renovatus), and myself and asked if we knew the Lord! Do you know what that means? It means that we don’t look like church goers. It means that we look like our neighbors! Why am I excited about this you ask? Well it’s just that we’ve decided that when the Bible says to be in the world but not of the world I don’t think it’s refering to clothing and hair styles but rather a way of living and loving. Anyway, while I’m cool with wearing shirts that proclaim the gospel message, I don’t feel as though t-shirt evangelism is the most effective type…I could say more about this but I feel as though it’s distracting from my excitement!!!

Here’s the dealio yo: In Jr. High I carreid around a cork head. Yep. No need to explain much because it won’t really help. I had a head made of balsa wood that had a face carved in it. And I carried it around. Me and two of my freinds had micky mouse hats with the three stooges names on the back…I’m not sure why…In high school and all thorugh my college years I had a pickeled shark that I named Alan Cornell Jr. I didn’t get my drivers liscence until I was 17 and in the mean time my dad dropped me off at Clark College in either the churches big fifteen passenger van or in our old beat up truck that was painted to look like the galaxy. Need I say more? I was not and am not the cool kid! In no shape, way, or form am I or have I ever been even near the cool kid…maybe I’ll do that Drew Barrymore or Billy Madison thing and go back to school and try to relive it as the cool kid…maybe not…but for now I’m going to revel in the thought that there are two people in the world that think I look cool. I’m pretty sure Jesus would be proud.

Is redemptive violence a myth? We see it played out in our world as we are in the middle of a “war on terror”, we see it in our superhero stories where we cheer for the guy/hero to destroy all the bad guys, we experience it in our lives when someone does something terrible and hurtful to someone we love, we see it all around us. It is tightly connected to our sense of justice I think. But is it a myth?
Oh, and just in case you’re wondering what I mean by redemptive violence, I’m referring to the idea that peace can come through violence. And on a bigger scale with regard to my reference point I’m talking about comparing the idea of redemptive violence with the Jesus that we meet in the New Testament. Was it something Jesus “believed in” (for lack of a better term) or was it something that he straight up opposed?
I’ve believed so many things for my whole entire life as base fact that I am now beginning to question with much evidence concerning the message of Jesus. I do not have a clear thought out theology concerning much of it, but I am in the beginning of a journey that could possibly take me somewhere I never thought I’d be.
Can violence beget peace or does it just beget more violence? If it does beget some sort of peace is it a peace more similar to the infamous Pax Romana of the subjugation of other peoples? Do we really believe that Jesus meant it or knew what he was talking about when he said love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, or turn the other cheek, or do not resist and evil person, or do to others what you would have them do to you, or…I could go on. I know that interpretation must take place for each statement but I feel like in the past I’ve interpreted those scriptures in such a way so as to place my own meaning on them (isn’t that what we always do?). Anyway, lets say those passages mean exactly what they sound like they mean…do we really believe that is possible? Do we have the faith in God to belive it? Do we have the creativity to practice it? Would we be willing to?
I’ve still got some issues I’m working through concerning all this, but it’s the beginning of a journey which I hope to share with you.
Now that I’m rereading this post I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a pretty poorly written piece. But as I mentioned in a previous post, I’m still trying to develop and flesh out my own words to express this fledgling belief inside of me. Anyway, sorry for the odd post. I hope it brings up some good questions or something.

So it’s time for an update on our family’s commitment to not purchasing anything new. Or in other words, The Compact.
In some ways it has been hard while in other ways it’s been completely refreshing. We find ourselves without thinking about it wanting to make exceptions in every single situation. Some examples:

• We’ve got a killer wasp problem in our backyard and my thinking was, how in the world are you supposed to find wasp traps or wasp killer used? You can’t, so we should just buy some new. (end result: made a homemade wasp trap out of a used pepsi bottle)
• Jess wants to paint with acrylics. Where do you get used acrylic paint? We looked at SCRAP, the recycled art supply store and didn’t find any. We look on craigslist and found nothing. (end result: Jess was sick for week and I felt really bad ’cause she was miserable…so I bought her $5 worth of new paint)
• We’re learning to use our bikes to commute and travel on now. But the problem was that we didn’t have bikes that were setup for commuting, we didn’t have a helmet for India, and we didn’t have child seats for both kids. If we want to start commuting now is it practical to think in terms of waiting and being patient until we find the stuff used somewhere? (end result: we found a helmet at Play It Again Sports, and we’ve found all other needed items on craigslist)
• I love books. I do. Jess does too. We love books. But sometimes when shipping is factored into your amazon purchase it is actually cheaper to buy new books with free shipping instead of used books with 3.99 shipping. It seems kind of ridiculous to pay more for a used book. (end result: we chose not to compromise in this situation. We figured if we compromised in this respect why would we then not compromise when we found jeans on sale at Old Navy for 4.99 or tee shirts for 1.99. In the end we either bought used or waited until we found it cheaper at Powells Bookstore)

So in the end we’ve stuck to our guns pretty good. The strangest thing now is to walk through Fred Meyers or Walmart. The first few weeks when out of the corner of my eye I’d see a sign that says 50% off the sale price and I’d just avert my eyes. But now I walk through those stores and I’m just bored. It strange. It almost feels dirty walking through there. Strange.
Hey, if you were thinking about joinig in with the compact here are a few places we’ve found good buys at (some are kind of “duh” while others are pretty cool):

• Goodwill, Value Village, and other used clothing type stores
• Garage sales
• craigslist (you can add in here any other online used item website)
• SCRAP
• The ReBuilding Center
• The Community Cycling Center
• The Building Materials Reuse Association
• My inlaws garage, barn, or shop
• There are a few more but I can’t seem to think of them right now!

Between that short list you can find virtually everything you need. I’ve said this before, but just in case for you newbies out there, joining the compact doesn’t mean that you can’t buy medicine, food, underwear, and maybe a couple of other things of that nature. We’re not crazy here and there are exceptions to every rule…except the rule of love.

Jessica and I are looking for another couple or two who would be interested in going to the P.A.P.A. Festival with us this June. Watch this video. What do you think?

I don’t know if I have words to write what I’m processing through right now. Right now I think all I’ve got is other peoples words. It’s too much. It’s still churning. God is still shaping. Often when we can’t articulate something we think or believe it is because we have not truly thought through it but have instead adhered to someone else logic or decisions. I hope that is not the case with me. Because I believe that there are other times that things bubble below the surface for a long time, under the surface different authors collide and different world views are looked at and opposing view points are measured and former habits or behaviors are questioned. During that time there is no tidy conclusion, only process. Often during that time we have to borrow words until God shapes the words in our mouths.
God is teaching me so much about creativity. I grew up in a highly creative family. From every corner and facet of my family it oozed creative genius. While I didn’t always feel that way about myself it is none the less true about my family as a whole. I am part of a church that highly values creativity. It’s core to who we are and how we see God and how we function. And yet, it has only been recently that I have started learning more about this word “creative” as I’ve been reading different authors that challenge the creativity of the church in how we live out our faith. We have forgotten to be creative. The call of the Kingdom of God is to view life as an opportunity to creatively live out it’s kingdom principles. Love. Peace. Beauty. Forgiveness. We’ve lost our creativity. And so I don’t believe that turning the other cheek or loving my enemy actually works in the “real world”. And so I think that if I give a bum a blanket I’ve shown him love like Jesus does. And so I think that if I fast once a year during Lent I’ve practiced the presence of God. And so if I don’t cuss, don’t look at porn, only listen to Christian music, and wear a cross around my neck I’m a good Christian. And so if I write a check to the church every month I’m being faithful with my money. And so and so and so and so…And so we’ve become unimaginative and uninspired. We’ve lost our creativity.
What did Jesus do? He made mud with spit and rubbed it in guys eyes. He told the sinless one to cast the first stone at the prostitute. He touched the lepers. He died.
As I’m writing this Jessica came up to me and told me something she had decided tonight. You see Jess has decided to stop working her Mary Kay Cosmetics business. She has been a fairly successful independent beauty consultant with them for about four years (as succesful as her health and children would allow) but with our commitment to go as chemical free as possible and with Jess turning into a hippie that wears little makup we decided carefully that it was time for her to move on from this (even though we still believe strongly that Mary Kay is an amazing company). With the ending of her business means that she needs to sell off all her stocked up product. So to get rid of it she was planning on selling it all for cost (half price) which would leave her with quite a few hundred dollars at her disposal. But as I’m writing this post she tells me that she’s decided that instead of selling it all she’s going to go down to the homeless shelter and let the women pick out makup that they normally wouldn’t be able to afford. What a blessing for those women! What a great example of creativly showering those women in crisis with love. Three cheers for Jess! Hip hip Hur…awkward…
Back to the origin of this blog. God is doing something in me and I don’t yet have the words to express it. His Kingdom is so much more than a destination when we die. And his kingdom is so much more than wearing a cross or not cussing. His kingdom is so much more than I ever imagined…and I think it’s going to rock my world…and I hope that one day it rocks the Carter Park neighborhood here in downtown Vancouver.