Kontakion

Since it’s pretty certain that I’m not going to be done my current read by Monday I figured I’d go ahead and do this post now. A few years ago I got into the habit of using Microsoft Excel to keep track of my readings. I put in the month read, title, author, number of pages read (because some are for class and I didn’t have time to read the entire book), and what I think (bad, okay, good, excellent, also re-read). So what I decided to do this year is pick a few of the excellent as a recommendation and put some honorable mentions. So here we go Natural History – “Salt: A World History” – Mark Krulansky, I started reading this book before President Bush did so no I didn’t copy him. This book is an excellent little primer on salt, where it came from and the important role that it has had society as a monetary value and as a preservative for food. It’s a short read that is thoroughly enjoyable. Cooking – “I’m Just Here for the Food” – Alton Brown, yes this is a cook book, ...

I’ve spent the last couple of days enjoying time with my beautiful daughter and thinking. In particular I have been thinking about some of the conversations I was involved in this past weekend. Katie and I had some people up for dinner this week, old friends from high school some of whom have a college education and some who don’t. I was thinking this week that I need to hold to what I have always felt for minister, and that is to have friends who are not wrapped up in the church. In conversation this weekend I was speaking with one individual and he was expressing his frustration over his mother who has fundamentalist overtones in her religious expression. That’s not the way he said it but after some minutes in conversation this is what I understood the issue to be. He has known me for quite sometime and knew that I was at one point going Liberal religious. He was surprised the other week to find that I have gone back to evangelical with definite religious conservative...

Things are now calming down around here since the semester is done. I just wanted to make a quick post because I am going to slow down blogging to. My intent for the winter break is to write one piece a week and work on my writting skills. If something catches my imagination I may just do a quick post just to get it off of my chest but hopefully I can use this break productivly. My intent is to write on each of the Methodist Articles of Religion, there are more articles than weeks in the break but its a place to start :)

With classes being over I have been able to wander over cyberspace, and have finally made my way to yourtube. I know, I know, its not new, I wasn’t saying that it was. Being my first time on yourtube I snooped around and found many music videos’s that I have never been able to watch, songs by Paul McCarthy, John Lennon, the Beatles, U2, Pearl Jam, and Steve Miller Band. As I watched I began to reflect on my musical journey. I grew up in a musical family, my parents didn’t play instruments but some of my earliest childhood memories are of my mother singing in the praise and worship team at the small Foursquare Gospel Church we were apart of. My Father would be quick to tell you that the only thing he can play is a stereo, but that didn’t stop them from singing as much as they could and as often as they could. Growing up we would listen to a lot of Christian music, Petra , Stryper, Carmen, and Amy Grant to name a few. When I got older I played percussion in band, late...

I feel good tonight! This afternoon I finished my last two papers (I may have another assigned tomorrow but I’m not worried about that) and I’ve begun to study for my UM polity exam which will be the first exam I’ve taken in two years so that has me a little nervous but hey what are you going to do? I feel really good tonight because I’ve stayed up late and cleaned my office. I haven’t done things like vacuum or dust yet but just picking up all the books and putting away the massive clutter that accumulates over the semester feels great. The act of cleaning always makes me feel like I’ve got a new start. I hope that’s true as I make my way into some much needed rest.

I am Evangelical. I’ll be honest I’m still working through the full ramifications of that, and exactly what type of evangelical I am but this is an admission, I am Evangelical. I have been stewing over this the last several weeks that is since we got the definition of what an Evangelical is in our Christianity in America class. Here is the definition offered by that professor (in italics) with my own comments behind them and where I’m going at the moment. The Christian Life requires 180 degree conversion (this is the lowest common denominator), and this conversion has a definite emotional component in it. This particular one I struggle over a bit. I am one of those Christians who can’t tell you when I was not a Christian, I can’t point to a definite time and date and say, “Here this is where I was saved.” So for me I readily affirm that type of salvation but I do leave it open for continuous Christian life with multiple salvation points within it. I have posted pre...

We finally did it, we put up the tree and the rest of the Christmas decorations. Katie had already been after me about getting up the decorations she wants them up the first week o f December. I have to say this year I’m glad we did, there are so many new things that we are doing as a family and I’m really looking forward to the holidays this year. As you notice here’s our tree, there is quite an assortment of ornaments on it and garland which Katie loves…I prefer tinsel. It actually looks like it may be the last year for this artificial tree. We’ve had it for 5 Christmases now and its beginning to get a little ratty. Notice all the non-breakable ornaments on the bottom, its so Olivia will learn to treat the ornaments gently. Underneath the tree we have a nativity set for Olivia to play with. It’s a Veggie Tales decoration, unfortunately Baby Jesus, and the French Pea’s (who play the sheep) are currently MIA, but I’ll have you know that Jimmy and Jerry play the p...

This week has been massively busy, even though it has been busy in large it has been good as well. This week was worship week for United Methodist. Monday night we had the band Stained Glass from my home church Avondale play. The service probably had the best turn out of any Monday night this semester, there were 20 people not including the worship team. Then on Tuesday I preached in Santee chapel. I was worried about several things in the service. For one I preached on the ground level not in the pulpit. While I consider it an honor to preach in the chapel I woke up Tuesday morning and realized that I couldn’t say what I wanted to say from there. I also preached in bare feet, an old trait I got from my parents. It has to do with comfort and to me with acknowledging the fact that where ever the word of God is preached it is holy ground. I also ended my sermon with a call to salvation or recommitment of their lives to Christ, that didn’t appear to go over very we...