Into the Wild

Think About It- Commitment

NT Wright on life after life after death (that's not a typo)

Here's an interesting couple paragraphs, very short by NT Wright standards, about the after-life.

Paul Byrd on Competing with God

I just read this article on ESPN.com, and it communicates some of the various points of friction between answering the voice/motivations of God and the voice/motivations of athletic success and the power of the crowd or sports team. It's an interview with Paul Byrd, a MLB pitcher with the Indians, who struggles with "following God" in professional baseball.

I would like to ask Paul whether he thinks God really cares about the outcome of a baseball game when there are much bigger things going on in the world i.e. human trafficking, genocide, AIDS epidemic, etc.?

"That's How We do Pull Ups at Stanford"

I am a 'C,' I am a 'C-H'...

I am toying with the notion that whenever a movement or idea is branded and labeled with a name for the masses, that it inevitably fails in communicating anything. As my thoughts piggy back off of a conversation recently had with Gordon Cosby, where Gordon said that essence can never directly be talked about but only around, I cannot help but notice that Jesus never told people to come be a "Christian." He always said, "come follow me." Come experience what cannot be put into words. Come experience what the essence of my movement is. Then he went on to live deeply with a core group of people, confront the abusive power structures of his time, and live boldly for a furiously, loving Creator God. He did it in a way that communicated what he was about, but it could never be fully explained or communicated in a book or article or essay. It was experienced and dialogged about in real life. Jesus was truly a master teacher and communicator- it's just that his communication style cost the people really willing to listen more of their life than what we'd dedicate to a leisurely read of the USA Today or any other publication no matter how academic. I think part of why the real Jesus was such a masterful communicator is that he forced his listeners into action and didn't let them sit in a hammock mulling over his words on a Sunday afternoon.

Stanford Football- don't want to forget this one

LA Update

After taking the last week to get my bearings and settle into some kind of a routine, I figure I'll update the world on my slide south to Los Angeles. So far, my buddy Gray Harmon has put me up in the wonderful Park la Brea townhouses, and I've been sleeping on my mattress on his floor. He's got a really big room so it's no problem. He keeps telling me to stay as long as I like, but I think it's best if I find a place in the next two weeks at the latest.

On the house hunting front, I thought I had a place lined up when I came down here. It would have been perfect: right next to this guy I know who is involved with an authentic church called Kairos (http://www.kairos.la/), a half mile north of USC's campus, and in a Hispanic neighborhood. But as things turned out, the place got snatched out from under me within two days of moving down here- bummer. So with that apartment being out of the equation, I'm still looking. I think the thing I most would like, much more than a convenient house, cheap rent, or nice surroundings is a roommate that I'd have "spiritual traction" with. So I'm keeping that as my primary focus and we'll see how things fall out from there.

I think the best story from my time here so far has to be when I was looking at the above mentioned apartment that I thought I had in the bag. I drove my Tahoe, with all my belongings inside, down to central LA and walked around the Hispanic neighborhood. At first I was a bit apprehensive because I'd never really taken a stroll through a neighborhood like this one. It butted up against the 10 freeway (and I mean right up against it) and there was just about one white person on the block, me. I felt a bit uneasy walking the street as I tried to find the 1311 address on West 22nd street, and I must have looked a bit out of place. As I strolled up the sidewalk last Sunday, a family sitting on their porch just waved and said hello. I responded and we maybe chatted for thirty seconds, but the interaction made me realize that everyone is still human no matter what the surroundings look like.

I went back to that neighborhood yesterday as I visited my new friend Greg Christman, who had tried to hook me up with the apartment next to him and his wife Julie, and I saw the same old man walking around chatting up a storm with everyone he came in contact with. The neighborhood is quite unique, and I hope to find a place around that area.

Greg has been really helpful even though we barely know each other. He's involved with a church called Kairos (http://www.kairos.la/) out here and after I sent him an email telling him about my decision to move to LA, he said I should move next to him and his wife because an apartment had just opened up. Like I said earlier, it got rented right out from under us, but he's been great in helping me look for places. We drove around his neighborhood and wrote down a bunch of phone numbers but haven't had any luck as of yet. His vision in LA is to create a place where people trying to authentically follow a real and relevant Jesus can share a common courtyard and living space while they live close to one another and then go out and serve the surrounding community- definitely some possibilities for traction here. He said one of his donors is looking to buy some property in LA to make that happen, so maybe they'll hurry up and buy a place. Interestingly, there is a block of apartments for sale right across the street from where he lives now, and he's in the process of mentioning it to his money bags, donor now- who knows, maybe I'll end up there?

More updates to come for whoever is interested.