Faithful and attentive readers here may have picked up on the fact that I affectionately refer to my son as "the kid." And so it's with pride I inform you that the other kid is here.
Né 14h25 -- Born 8:25AM EST
3.8 kg -- 8lb 6oz
51 cm -- 20 in
Il partage un anniversaire avec Erica, Travis, and Noah.
He shares a birthday with Erica, Travis, and Noah.
Il est vraiment magnifique, tres beau, trop mignon.
He is truly wonderful, very handsome, too cute.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Monday, June 20, 2011
Baguette: 75cts ... Medical Counsel: Free
The baker has affectionately named our baby François. Every day he asks, "Has François arrived yet? How is he doing?"
From time to time he gives some medical advice too. We can't understand most of what he is saying, and that might be for the best. Today he asked Erica if she was having contractions and if they were painful. He told her which type of medication she could take. We opted for a baguette instead.
But I'm looking forward to the day we get to introduce him to baby François. I hope we at least get some free croissants out of the deal.
From time to time he gives some medical advice too. We can't understand most of what he is saying, and that might be for the best. Today he asked Erica if she was having contractions and if they were painful. He told her which type of medication she could take. We opted for a baguette instead.
But I'm looking forward to the day we get to introduce him to baby François. I hope we at least get some free croissants out of the deal.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Happy Father's Day
Proof You're a Father:
You spend the last two hours of your holiday replacing a toilet flushing mechanism.
Proof You've Still Got a Ways to Go:
Halfway though you discover you need a hacksaw to complete the job (Great design, guys...Bravo!), which of course you don't have (It wasn't included in your Ikea handyman tool kit), and so you decide to improvise with an exacto knife, which slices your Sunday dress pants open instead without making any sort of progress on that stupid piece you're supposed to be cutting.
On the Bright Side:
Your son's asleep, so he doesn't think any differently of you.
The Truer sign of Being a Father:
After changing into your "work" pair of jeans, you succeed in improvisation using an old serrated knife found in the back of the kitchen drawer, a bit of elbow grease, and a bit of stubborn tenacity.
You spend the last two hours of your holiday replacing a toilet flushing mechanism.
Proof You've Still Got a Ways to Go:
Halfway though you discover you need a hacksaw to complete the job (Great design, guys...Bravo!), which of course you don't have (It wasn't included in your Ikea handyman tool kit), and so you decide to improvise with an exacto knife, which slices your Sunday dress pants open instead without making any sort of progress on that stupid piece you're supposed to be cutting.
On the Bright Side:
Your son's asleep, so he doesn't think any differently of you.
The Truer sign of Being a Father:
After changing into your "work" pair of jeans, you succeed in improvisation using an old serrated knife found in the back of the kitchen drawer, a bit of elbow grease, and a bit of stubborn tenacity.
Friday, June 17, 2011
One Everything
In the midst of lots of impending-baby-generosity, we received They Might Be Giants Here Come the 1,2,3s. I'm not sure who's enjoying it more--the kid or me. Hard to narrow down some favorites, but the bass line and backbeat in this one re pretty wonderful, not to mention I absolutely cannot wait to use this line on my teenagers:
"We share the same omniverse...go clean your room."
How can you argue with that? How can you argue with this?
Yes, you've seen these guys here before.
"We share the same omniverse...go clean your room."
How can you argue with that? How can you argue with this?
Yes, you've seen these guys here before.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Rappel
(Reminder)
That Josh Garrels album I was telling you about is up now, available for streaming or a free download. I'm about to listen, and maybe you should too. We could make it like a transatlantic listening party or something.
That Josh Garrels album I was telling you about is up now, available for streaming or a free download. I'm about to listen, and maybe you should too. We could make it like a transatlantic listening party or something.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Pentecost 3: What For?
One could easily develop quite a lengthy theology on the Holy Spirit, but I like the clues that are given in the Pentecost story of Acts 2. While it's a little dangerous to assume anything normative from such an unusual and extraordinary event, I think there are some often-overlooked facets here that should probably be more primary points. In our self-help perfectionist tendencies, we tend to jump straight to the fruit of the Spirit and sanctification. Those aren't to be ignored, but I'm not sure they're to steal the spotlight, either.
In Acts 2, we see the apostles in hiding, when a mighty rushing wind seems to almost literally blow them out of the house and into the streets. It doesn't say that specifically, but somewhere along the way they are talking to a very diverse group of more than 3,000 people, and I don't think that's taking place in their living room anymore.
We see them receiving the means--not just the courage, but a linguistic miracle--to proclaim "the mighty works of God" to this diverse group.
And most of all, we see Peter, who just a short time earlier was so stricken with fear he denied knowing Jesus Christ three times in a row, and now is delivering an audaciously plain sermon to everyone and anyone who can hear.
This seems to say that the Holy Spirit is not just a friend that brings a fuzzy feeling we get to enjoy and keep to ourselves. Instead, it is what brings the strength to get out of our comfortable homes and proclaim Jesus Christ with clarity and boldness. It's a force of outward movement, of courage, of change.
In most of the contexts Jesus tells his disciples about the Holy Spirit, he is referring to help in days of confusion and difficulty, whether it's persecution from authorities or bewilderment in this job of making more disciples. "There will be a helper telling you what to say. I will give you peace. You will be unified. Don't worry; he'll be with you."
And so, when we put these puzzle pieces together, there seems to be a correlation: your experience with the power, help, and comfort of the Holy Spirit is directly related to how much you are moving out, proclaiming, and encountering scary situations you cannot face on your own strength.
While I think this sound-byte could benefit from a little more context, it's a worthwhile challenge:
In Acts 2, we see the apostles in hiding, when a mighty rushing wind seems to almost literally blow them out of the house and into the streets. It doesn't say that specifically, but somewhere along the way they are talking to a very diverse group of more than 3,000 people, and I don't think that's taking place in their living room anymore.
We see them receiving the means--not just the courage, but a linguistic miracle--to proclaim "the mighty works of God" to this diverse group.
And most of all, we see Peter, who just a short time earlier was so stricken with fear he denied knowing Jesus Christ three times in a row, and now is delivering an audaciously plain sermon to everyone and anyone who can hear.
This seems to say that the Holy Spirit is not just a friend that brings a fuzzy feeling we get to enjoy and keep to ourselves. Instead, it is what brings the strength to get out of our comfortable homes and proclaim Jesus Christ with clarity and boldness. It's a force of outward movement, of courage, of change.
In most of the contexts Jesus tells his disciples about the Holy Spirit, he is referring to help in days of confusion and difficulty, whether it's persecution from authorities or bewilderment in this job of making more disciples. "There will be a helper telling you what to say. I will give you peace. You will be unified. Don't worry; he'll be with you."
And so, when we put these puzzle pieces together, there seems to be a correlation: your experience with the power, help, and comfort of the Holy Spirit is directly related to how much you are moving out, proclaiming, and encountering scary situations you cannot face on your own strength.
While I think this sound-byte could benefit from a little more context, it's a worthwhile challenge:
Francis Chan - The Presence of Jesus in Suffering
The Holy Spirit, then, is not just a companion there to make us act better and feel better. If we're willing to keep in step with Him, he's the one that's going to push us out and help us out. It won't always be easy and comfortable, but that's exactly why he's there, and that's when you'll get to know him best.
And if this sounds like an essay from someone who is speaking from experience, well, let me confess it's just as easy to hide at home here as it always was. I'm writing this first and foremost for my own sake.
Pentecost 2: Languages
We worshiped with a friend's small church plant yesterday, where the quite practical Pentecost illustration was made: in that group of no more than 30, there were people who spoke French, English, German, Malagasy, Creole, and an African tribal language. I was really wishing we would have gone a step further and all spoke at the same time in our heart languages, but that was left to the imagination.
The Biblical account is, in its own words, amazing and perplexing and bewildering: Galileans speaking so that Parthians and Medes and Elamites and Mesopotamians and Judeans and Cappadocians and people from Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, Libya, Rome, Crete, Arabia can all understand plainly what is being said about the mighty works of God.
As my current state in life has brought me to wrestle with learning a new language, I understand all the more how bizarre this is. I understand how difficult it is to piece together a simple sentence in a foreign tongue. More than that, I understand the isolation and division that comes when two people cannot speak a common language together. You can draw pictures and make gestures and use dictionaries and body language and primal grunts and sound effects, but that never lasts long, and you are in the end left to yourself, going separate ways, back to your own desert island. Ultimately, you cannot connect.
But here comes this violent wind, blowing everyone out of the house, into the streets, and all of a sudden there is a connection, there is a common language, an understanding, a gap that is bridged. The spirit of Unity.
"We can hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God!" As if to say, We can understand! And their accents are pretty good, too!
As we wrestle with the disunity in this world of so many languages and cultures, this day of Pentecost is an incredible picture of the grand reversal of Babel. The day where people used the unity they had in their language to make man-centered plans, to make gods of themselves. The confusion begins there and is not reversed until Pentecost, where real unity is restored and rightfully focused this time on the mighty works of God rather than the mighty works of men.
The common joke in cross-cultural work is on which language we'll speak in heaven. One professor of Columbian descent told us that French was the language of the angels. I asked her what God spoke, then. Spanish.
I'd like to think the truth is that we'll go on speaking our own beautiful and wildly creative languages to the glory of God, but we'll finally be able to understand--and enjoy--them all together. It will be the day where this Pentecost miracle is not an exceptional event to mark the start of a new age, but rather our eternal reality.
This gives motivation in language school. Why wait for heaven? Let's start the process of working at this Pentecost-reality, Babel-reversal here and now.
(And of course, our prayers have often bordered on praying for the gift of tongues.)
The Biblical account is, in its own words, amazing and perplexing and bewildering: Galileans speaking so that Parthians and Medes and Elamites and Mesopotamians and Judeans and Cappadocians and people from Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, Libya, Rome, Crete, Arabia can all understand plainly what is being said about the mighty works of God.
As my current state in life has brought me to wrestle with learning a new language, I understand all the more how bizarre this is. I understand how difficult it is to piece together a simple sentence in a foreign tongue. More than that, I understand the isolation and division that comes when two people cannot speak a common language together. You can draw pictures and make gestures and use dictionaries and body language and primal grunts and sound effects, but that never lasts long, and you are in the end left to yourself, going separate ways, back to your own desert island. Ultimately, you cannot connect.
But here comes this violent wind, blowing everyone out of the house, into the streets, and all of a sudden there is a connection, there is a common language, an understanding, a gap that is bridged. The spirit of Unity.
"We can hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God!" As if to say, We can understand! And their accents are pretty good, too!
As we wrestle with the disunity in this world of so many languages and cultures, this day of Pentecost is an incredible picture of the grand reversal of Babel. The day where people used the unity they had in their language to make man-centered plans, to make gods of themselves. The confusion begins there and is not reversed until Pentecost, where real unity is restored and rightfully focused this time on the mighty works of God rather than the mighty works of men.
The common joke in cross-cultural work is on which language we'll speak in heaven. One professor of Columbian descent told us that French was the language of the angels. I asked her what God spoke, then. Spanish.
I'd like to think the truth is that we'll go on speaking our own beautiful and wildly creative languages to the glory of God, but we'll finally be able to understand--and enjoy--them all together. It will be the day where this Pentecost miracle is not an exceptional event to mark the start of a new age, but rather our eternal reality.
This gives motivation in language school. Why wait for heaven? Let's start the process of working at this Pentecost-reality, Babel-reversal here and now.
(And of course, our prayers have often bordered on praying for the gift of tongues.)
Tuesday, June 07, 2011
Anticipation
At Versailles, we had to wait until 3:30 for them to turn on the fountains. We weren't the only ones waiting. Despite no lack of things to see, everyone around us was stalling. Sitting. Chatting. Wandering. Checking watches. A sort of unsettled impatience. The kid sat down and played with rocks.
The fist round started at 3:20 causing a new commotion, flittering movement, hurried paces towards the preferred viewing spots. The kid jumped up and sprinted--ignoring parental pleas to wait up and slow down--toward the dog and deer fountains, bending over the ledge and nearly diving in head first.
The announcement came at 3:30, with fountains bursting, finally giving a sigh of relief on this hot day. Pointing, smiling, shooting cameras, running to the next fountain to take in some more.
In our town, we had to wait the better part of three months for any rain. Grass was brown and dry and cars were covered in pollen and sap. I'm not sure anyone has really missed the rain, but there's just a general sense of urgency in recognizing the need.
A thunderstorm came slowly rolling in Saturday night. The curtains by open windows blowing violently, and the darkened sky darkening our house too. You could hear the commotion outside: wind in the trees, people talking loudly and hurriedly, rushing home, motors of cars and pizza delivery bikes sounding stronger and faster than usual. A dad running with the stroller to take cover. Frantic looks over shoulders. Pointing. Closing windows. Securing things on the balcony. Watching. Waiting. Not so much the calm before the storm, rather, the storm before the storm.
And eventually those big raindrops started falling, giving a sigh of relief in this dry town. The smell of rain hitting asphalt drifted in through the remaining open windows as everyone settled for indoor evening activities.
It's that thick sense of anticipation then relief, the suspense and release, the expectancy and resolve, the inhale and the sigh.
Of course, today, I'm speaking allegorically.
The fist round started at 3:20 causing a new commotion, flittering movement, hurried paces towards the preferred viewing spots. The kid jumped up and sprinted--ignoring parental pleas to wait up and slow down--toward the dog and deer fountains, bending over the ledge and nearly diving in head first.
The announcement came at 3:30, with fountains bursting, finally giving a sigh of relief on this hot day. Pointing, smiling, shooting cameras, running to the next fountain to take in some more.
In our town, we had to wait the better part of three months for any rain. Grass was brown and dry and cars were covered in pollen and sap. I'm not sure anyone has really missed the rain, but there's just a general sense of urgency in recognizing the need.
A thunderstorm came slowly rolling in Saturday night. The curtains by open windows blowing violently, and the darkened sky darkening our house too. You could hear the commotion outside: wind in the trees, people talking loudly and hurriedly, rushing home, motors of cars and pizza delivery bikes sounding stronger and faster than usual. A dad running with the stroller to take cover. Frantic looks over shoulders. Pointing. Closing windows. Securing things on the balcony. Watching. Waiting. Not so much the calm before the storm, rather, the storm before the storm.
And eventually those big raindrops started falling, giving a sigh of relief in this dry town. The smell of rain hitting asphalt drifted in through the remaining open windows as everyone settled for indoor evening activities.
It's that thick sense of anticipation then relief, the suspense and release, the expectancy and resolve, the inhale and the sigh.
Of course, today, I'm speaking allegorically.
Thursday, June 02, 2011
Worth it
Ikea's running a deal right now. Buy their smallest, cheapest couch and get a free clubhouse. Of course, like all their products, some assembly is required.
Checking in
I was probably a freshman in college. I went to a church that had a serious coffee bar in the lobby, serving lattes for everyone who wanted one, which for that time in the middle of Indiana was somewhat of a progressive idea. They deliberately didn't put carpet down in the new sanctuary so they wouldn't have to worry about spilled lattes.
One Sunday a guy got up and talked about a trip he was going to be taking. He played a song on his guitar and it was a mesmerizing little thing.
He played at Taylor's union shortly thereafter, and I ran sound. A guy on my floor recorded it for his little operation that he was calling something or other "bootlegs" and I listened to that CD-R pretty frequently.
Over my four years there, there were plenty more opportunities to see Josh play, and it was always enjoyable. One time Nate and I were rehearsing with a drummer at the church, and Josh spent most of the time skateboarding around the (carpetless) sanctuary. I wasn't sure which was more cool: that we were playing music that was good to skateboard to, or that skateboarding was allowed in the sanctuary.
Those were fun days.
Anyway, I've checked in on him off and on since then, and just found this nice little composition:
(Speaking of which, this little collective called Mason Jar Music seems like something definitely worth checking out and following...)
I've also been reading about his new album, releasing soon, which will be available for free download on his website if you're interested.
If you're intrigued, you can also watch him entertaining a bunch of 10-year-olds, which, because there is still a spot in my heart for 10-year-olds, I absolutely love.
One Sunday a guy got up and talked about a trip he was going to be taking. He played a song on his guitar and it was a mesmerizing little thing.
He played at Taylor's union shortly thereafter, and I ran sound. A guy on my floor recorded it for his little operation that he was calling something or other "bootlegs" and I listened to that CD-R pretty frequently.
Over my four years there, there were plenty more opportunities to see Josh play, and it was always enjoyable. One time Nate and I were rehearsing with a drummer at the church, and Josh spent most of the time skateboarding around the (carpetless) sanctuary. I wasn't sure which was more cool: that we were playing music that was good to skateboard to, or that skateboarding was allowed in the sanctuary.
Those were fun days.
Anyway, I've checked in on him off and on since then, and just found this nice little composition:
Mason Jar Music Presents... Josh Garrels
(Speaking of which, this little collective called Mason Jar Music seems like something definitely worth checking out and following...)
I've also been reading about his new album, releasing soon, which will be available for free download on his website if you're interested.
If you're intrigued, you can also watch him entertaining a bunch of 10-year-olds, which, because there is still a spot in my heart for 10-year-olds, I absolutely love.
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