Good intentions crumble... just like Christmas cookies

We decided to do something Christmasy with the kids last night.  The boys always get excited about seeing Christmas lights.  So we decided to drive to a little village nearby that we'd heard was all lit up.  We drove for a bit, and walked for a bit.  We heard "I'm bored," and they started acting up, and then two time-outs and a spilled hot chocolate later, Atticus says in the car, "Raise your hand if this was the worst day ever."

I felt like crying; and thankfully, later, we had a good laugh about it.

Batman and Elmo at the Nativity?

We have an abundance of small toys in our home.  (I know, with three children under the age of six – you may find that hard to imagine.)  There are some special ones that create a modest buzz when they are taken out of storage for the Christmas season.  Among these are the Fischer Price “Little People” Nativity scene, Ernie & Bert figurines with Santa hats, and a “Little People” Santa Claus and his Christmas Train (which includes a reindeer and Mrs. Claus bearing a plateful of cookies.) 


Each year I take a mirthful moment to create a new nativity scene with a child-like twist by incorporating other characters into the scene.  See, our nativity scene doesn't just have Joseph, Mary, and baby Jesus with the attending angel, shepherds and three Magi, (for whom we have to incorporate the willing suspension of incorrect time lines, since they didn't really arrive until a few months later, but I'll wait to explain that to the boys.)  But ours also includes Santa and Mrs. Claus.  It also includes Hippos, Giraffes, and Elephants; and then I add other non-traditional visitors to the manger scene.  Our scene also includes characters like Kermit the Frog, Batman, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Dora the Explorer, and Aquaman.  (Aquaman’s “swimming arms” can also be posed to look like he is praising the Lord, which I think is fun.)  There are also some of the less likely characters, including Swiper the Fox, Oscar the Grouch, and Batman's nemesis, the one that gets all the other toys into trouble and is always ending up back in jail - the Joker.

I overheard Joanne playing with the kids and interacting with these toys.  I was quite tickled to hear her giving voice to Mrs. Claus at the manger scene, “Hello Mr. Wise Man, would you like a cookie?”  I like that idea.  I like the paintings that have been done of Santa kneeling at the manger.  The idea of Mrs. Claus being there too and giving out cookies to weary travelers… It just makes me smile.

The boys don’t like Swiper, Oscar, and the Joker.  They often get shoved under other toys and in drawers, but I try to keep them around because we try to make up stories together and every good story has good guys and bad guys.  (I remember a time I came into their room and they informed me that the Joker and Satan had put all the other toys into jail.)

Usually I include these other characters at the manger scene mostly for pure sake of whimsy.  But this year I feel quite intentional about it.  I want to see Oscar the Grouch at the manger scene, because I can be pretty grouchy too.  There are times I am cross with my children and I don’t like the way I sound and I wonder how I ever got Joanne to marry me, and so I hope and pray that there is room for Oscar the Grouch at the manger, so that there may also be room for me.  I want to see the Joker there.  I am not a homicidal maniac, but I have had hatred in my heart, and Jesus said that murder and murderous thoughts are the same thing, so I need to see him there.  I want to see Swiper the Fox there.  He is not beyond hope, and I wonder (and this is where the whimsy creeps back in) if he may be able to connect with Jesus at a deep rooted level, because, after all, didn’t Jesus come to steal all our hearts away?

Our Nativity scene, with added guests.

Joanne at the Women's retreat

I had signed up.  It was official.  I was going to my first women's retreat at our Richmond church the Tapestry and truth be told I was NERVOUS!!

The women were and are hospitable and kind, yet I was wondering what I had gotten myself into.  You see, out of the 40-something women attending this "Girlfriends in Christ" weekend, I was one of the four non-Asians, and my time at Vineyard retreats seemed far away.  But I was determined to do it like Jeremiah 29 says... plant gardens, build houses, and settle down - so I was going to dig the soil to plant seeds of friendship; so going was the first step.

The centre was lovely right off the Crescent beach with eagles flying above in the early mornings.  I have never seen so much tea being consumed in a 48 hour period in my life!!  The ladies were kind and generous and open to relationship.  The speaker from the States was lively and genuine and Jesus was glorified.  I had to remind myself that things may look different and be done in ways that I am not accustom to - but we serve the same Lord.  It was good for me to be there.  To do things because I want to be obedient to the one who has called me to be just that.  And yes I was the tallest one there and the heaviest walker by far, but we all have our junk and baggage that Jesus wants.  Jesus speaks all languages and brokenness is found in ALL.  As Andrew and the kids pulled up that Sunday afternoon to bring me home, I left seeing the 40 women- as fellow women and daughters seeking a deeper relationship with Jesus and each other.  

However next retreat I am bringing my own coffee!

Testimony from a friend

A friend of mine, I'll call him Elvis, wrote about his experience in our Living Waters program last year, and he gave me permission to share it.

I came to Living Waters after the breakup of my 23-year marriage. I was angry at my spouse, scared for my kids, and full of self-pity. While I had a supportive church and friend-network, much of my interaction with these groups was stuck in the why-did-she-do-this-to-me phase. While I had great support, I wasn't really processing or progressing through the pain. I was already aware of Living Waters through friends at church and when the fall program was announced, I felt led to inquire more about Living Waters. 


I was immediately struck with how well the program was structured to create a safe, non-judgemental environment in which the unique story of every participant could be shared with complete trust. The small group prayer was Spirit-led, brutally honest, and Christ centred. The leaders were warm and caring, and the bonds formed within the small group helped each of us feel accountable to the group. 


So, 6 months later, the Living Waters program has ended. Am I done? Am I healed? Is my marriage reconciled? Well, no. But those inward-focused questions probably aren't the best ones to ask. Do I know I am beloved by Jesus? Am I aware of His presence with me through this pain? Can I find peace in the knowledge that He is good and wants goodness for His children? The Living Waters program helped reshape my perspective, so I can answer emphatically yes! 


Elvis finished off his story by doing a little commercial for us.


The Living Waters program is not just for people with sexual addictions or same-sex attractions. It is a discipleship program for people who are relationally-broken, which is pretty much all of us! The Living Waters program can help anyone who wants to see what idols in their life are hindering their relationship with Christ and help them leave those idols at the foot of the cross. 


Thank you friend!

Our housing miracle

 I shared about this when I spoke at our home church in Ontario in September, and I wanted post about it as well.

I want to write a bit about our life in Vancouver.  It’s not easy out here.  Sure it’s pretty, but we still feel quite isolated, no matter the view.  (And we’re actually in Richmond.)   But we need to keep reminding ourselves of some of our miracles of getting here when things get hard.  Like so many of the Psalms, recounting God’s goodness when life is hard.  Or in Exodus, after being pursued by Pharos armies, and Miriam sang, “Sing to the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously, the horse and rider thrown into the sea.”

·         The last time I spoke in Ontario, I told them that we were moving to Vancouver, even though we had yet to find a place to live.  We were moving THAT week, with still no home to move to… and we were praying... (and we were also quietly freaking out.)  Joanne and I had spent months going over websites and newspapers and Craigslist, writing e-mails, making phone calls.  It was our nightly activity.  And we were a week away from our departure date and still had no place to live.

·         Then we got a phone call from Toni,  and he’d seen something in the paper he thought we should check out.  It was with BC Housing, so it was supplemented, which was nice because everything that we’d looked at that we could afford, was a dump.

·         So we checked it out online, it looked good, made some calls, they e-mailed an application to us, we filled it out and faxed it back.  Then they called us to let us know that we got it – and this all happened on the day the truck arrived for our stuff.

·         It gets better.  But first I want to take a little stroll through real estate land to give you more of the big picture. Joanne read in the paper that the price of an average starter home in Vancouver is $649 thousand, so I took the figure 649,000 dollars, and I decided to see what it would get me in other places I have lived.  First, in my home town in NC, that amount would get me this

or this

Or the one below in Cambridge, Ontario, notice the pool.


Or this in Vancouver...

Same amount.  This house costs $649,000 dollars.



·         Isn't that nuts?  We face the same problem in the grocery store.  A block of cheese for $12.99
(If you’ve been supporting us, Thank you, please pray about continuing.)

·         Which makes it all the more miraculous that we found this place.  


      There is a playground nearby.  And I can get to work in less than 15 minutes.  It’s a Godsend.  And when we moved in, we were talking to a neighbour, and she was raving about the place and said that she had been on the waiting list for a year before she could get in.  I did not have the heart to tell her that we got in in less than 24 hours.

·         I later met another neighbor that told me that only 5 of these units are supplemented.  (I thought they all were.)  And she said that she had been on the waiting list for TWO years!  So how was it that my boss saw something in the paper?  Weren’t there a bunch of people on a waiting list?  And wouldn’t they have been flooded with phone calls?

·         Or is this my horse and rider thrown into the sea?

·         We know that God wants us here.  And I know that this is what He has called and equipped me to do.

Plans, plans, plans...

Many people come and take Living Waters and they have Big Plans.  It is natural to have hopes - that’s a good thing.  But sometimes we can allow those hopes to build up momentum and they can become Plans.  We want God to deal with A, B, and C, and we’d prefer if He kindly left alone E, F, and G, thank you very much.

Sometimes I find myself praying that people will be open to surprises.  God may have plans to touch something entirely different.

Psalm 94:11  "The Lord knows all human plans; he knows that they are futile."

Often in prayer, after a big emotional release, a participant will say, "Wow, I had no idea that was in there."

Prov 19:21 "Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails."

Below is a video of a guy that had Big Plans.  His plan was to propose to his girlfriend in the middle of the forest and to capture her reaction on a video camera.  A lovely idea, but our plans are not always God's plans... or even the dog's.

Some observations on ministering in Indonesia.

Me with my small group

I found it interesting that 4 of the 5 guys in my group had been abused by their mothers.  I usually assume the fathers to be the abusive ones.  Now I don’t know if this was specific to my group or if this could be applied to the general population.  Nevertheless, it was interesting.  The damage from their relationship with their fathers was usually that he was an absentee father – he had simply gone elsewhere to find work.  Regardless of the reasons, God was able to do some great healing work in the guys in my group.

One humourous observation:  Indonesians apparently have no rhythm.  (And I realize that I am an extremely white boy as I write this, and my rhythm is challenged at best.)  But I found it funny that as we sang worship songs, one third of the congregation is clapping on the “off beat,” one third is clapping on the “on beat,” and the other third is doing something else entirely, but no one seems to notice or care.  Frankly, I wish I were that free.  I get so self-conscious if my rhythm gets off that I will just stop.  I pray that someday I won’t care what people think about my clapping abilities.  But I will also say this about the Indonesians – boy can they sing!

Durian

If a coconut were to have a porcupine explode inside of it, it would resemble Durian. If you were to crack open that porcupine coconut, and find several large soft albino kidney beans, this would be the fruit that you eat. If I were to combine the creamy nature of avocado, the stringy-ness of a mango, with a whipped mixture of sugar and butter, and then for the olfactory component threw in Jeff Kuhn's socks after he's been hiking in the woods for two weeks... this would be my experience with Durian.

Indonesia

I’m in Denpassar in Indonesia.  Toni and I flew out to be a part of the training for the Indonesian LW team.  The picture above is of me teaching with my translator.  The training is wrapping up and it has gone very well.  It has been a huge challenge because I was leading a small group of five guys and I had no assistant leader, and English was the second language for four of them.  One had very limited English and the others had to help serve as translators.  It has been nerve-wracking at times, but God is good and we have been able to build trust anyway.

I am going to try Durian tonight.  It is also known as “stinky fruit.”  I am inside and it is now sitting outside on the porch and I can’t believe how much I can smell it inside.  My Filipino friend Tony says that it tastes like heaven but smells like hell.  We shall see.

We still have another day of training, and would anyone who reads this please pray for Rina, who is a member of our team here and her father died this morning.

I am tired and looking forward to going home.  I miss Joanne and my children.  Two of the local leaders here have brought their children and my eyes light up when they come in the room.  I miss my kiddos.

Post conference snapshot

I'm finding that I blog in bursts.  I get on a roll, and then I'm off the roll.  I don't know if it's a cinnamon roll or a sushi roll.  My waistline would prefer the sushi roll... but I digress...


I wanted to just mention about the wonderful guys in my small group at the training in Calgary. I was hoping to give a brief, vague, snapshot of them, without naming them, just to give you an idea of what it was like.  I had 4 guys in my group, and I'll call them Larry, Moe, Curly, and Shep.


Larry worked at a Catholic retreat centre and was a divorced father of two grown girls.  There had been much abuse in his childhood and God brought much healing to these wounds and memories.


Moe was a pastor of a struggling church and had come to learn how to help others.  He was wonderfully surprised to see that God had another agenda as He brought a much deeper healing to areas that Moe felt had already been "dealt with."


Curly works with a ministry in India that reaches out to male and female prostitutes.  Similarly to Moe, God was able to touch some of the pain in his life that he had stuffed down.  God also did a tremendous amount of equipping in this young man who has been called to work in a very dangerous area in a city of hardship.  I am excited to see what God is going to be doing through him.


Shep was from the UK, where he had been ministering for years.  He had recently moved to Canada and was wondering what God had in store for him here.  God brought some other layers of healing to him, and hopefully, some direction.


It was an honour and a privilege to work with these Godly men, to pray with them, and witness God doing deep works in them.

Calgary day one

The drive to Calgary went well.  The kids are good little travellers, but not as good as Joanne.  She’s amazing.  I was driving and sitting in awe while she made up more and more verses to sing in “The wheels on the bus to round and round.”  I particularly liked, “The Lucy on the bus goes woof woof woof,” and “The Phinehas on the bus does a little dance.”  “Itsy bitsy spider” was also joined by a great big hippo, which also climbed the water spout.  I have a very resourceful wife.

The Rocky Mountains are amazing.  Just stunning.  We also kept track of the animals we saw.  (Atticus, ever methodical, made sure we wrote them down each time.)  We saw 1 bear, 1 fox, 1 elk, 8 deer, 1 coyote, 4 mountain goats, several bald eagles, and numerous ground squirrels that posed for pictures at Roger’s Pass while the boys giddily picked dandelions to feed to them, which the friendly rodents gratefully accepted.

The space they have for us here is great.  We were able to put the boys on two mattresses side by side on the floor, which they think is great fun.  There’s even a kitchenette attached to our room, which they are letting us use – a huge blessing!  Unfortunately the mosquitoes are worse than we imagined.  I received more mosquito bites in my first minute in Calgary than in my last ten months in Vancouver.  Seriously, I got out of the car, and they descended upon us.  I think I heard one ring a tiny little dinner bell and shout “Lakin blood!  Come and get it!”  They’ve always been bad here, but these are the size of small sparrows.

Prayer requests:  Please pray for health.  Both Phinehas and Beatrice have bad coughs, and it’s waking them (and us) up at night.  Also please pray about the mosquitoes.  That may sound like an insignificant thing, but Atticus has strong reactions to them, like I do, but even worse, and he’s afraid to go outside.  And the thought of being cooped up indoors for a week is unbearable for Joanne, especially when it’s so lovely outside.  Phin also dislikes them, but he doesn’t react as strongly as Atticus.  Even so, he has asked if we can move back to the country that doesn’t have “skomeetoes.”

-A.

rolling rolling rolling

well we are off another Lakin family roadtrip and I wanted to let you guys in on what we are up to and whats happenning in our neck of the woods. life is busy and i know its busy for everyone so i thought i would send out a quick hey guys to keep you updated.

we are heading out to calgary this thursday for a conference that andrew will be working at. This conference invites people from all over canada to come and take the leadership training course to then help do the program at their local churches. it is a fairly good sized group this year and andrew will be doing some teaching and acting, pretty much doing what is needed really. anyways us guys are going with him YAY!! it is a retreat centre about an hour outside of calgary where the nearest tv and icecream i am told is 30 min away. it is a lovely place where yours truly won't have to make or clean up a meal!! i tell ya this is thrilling!!! yet we all have to sleep in one room which i am not as thrilled about but the boys are beyond excited about it...... my oh my the fun they are going to have.. anyways we are taking 2 days to get there... its a GLORIOUS drive thru the rocky mountains. we are staying in banff the one night checking out lake louise etc. we are pretty excited about that. on the way home we are stopping in edmonton to say hello and spend the night with mike  peng and kate holt- do they know what they are getting themselves into? next we are off to jasper to see the glaciers yahoo!!! we are then heading home via the okanagan valley to stay a few days with my friend barbara and her hubby al ( you may remember them from the wedding... not dating yet) anyhoo they live in kelowna near the vineyards so we are going to relax cause we will need it after andrew's busy busy week. if you could remember to pray for us that would be so appreciated. sleep will be a tad sassy for us and with the conference schedule it will be mommy big time.. also the mosquitos are terrible and our atticus reacts so horribly. other than that safety driving and safety hiking with little ones.... well that makes me nervous sometimes... with climby magoo beatrice.. good grief!!
life is busy and time goes sooo fast we are missing being a part of your physical lives.  we will post photos when we can. we would love to hear from you guys & with whats going on with you. we love you and pray God's riches blessings on your lives.

much peace much joy and many coffee breaks along the way

joanne

BANFF

Jasper

Messy Church

We've been going to a church called The Tapestry.  The pastor is Albert Chu, and I had lunch with him a couple of weeks ago and I think he's a great guy.  I look forward to getting to know him better.  As we finished our lunch he ended up inviting me to speak on a Sunday morning.  I took him up on the offer and spoke at our church two weeks ago.

I spoke on “acknowledging our needs” and it went very well.  The idea of coming forward for prayer after the service is new here.  When I spoke to the pastors and asked why they do not do it, they said that they had never experienced, or even seen it.  So I am trying to introduce the idea.  “Let’s get messy,” I said.

An older Asian lady came up to me and asked for prayer.  She was crying, and said, “I’m just realizing how long it’s been since anyone prayed for me.  And I don’t think I’m doing too well trying to fix everything myself.”  One of the elders came along side us and we were able to pray with her as she invited Jesus to deal with her problems she was trying to fix.  Another guy came up and asked for prayer about some addictive behavior he’s struggling with.

Praise God!  Let the messiness continue!

-A.

Teachable moments... or maybe not

We have an action figure Jesus.  Joanne's had it since before we got married.  I think it started as a joke.  He came with a blue cardboard cutout of water and he has wheels on the bottom so you can roll him across the blue cardboard and watch him "walk on water."  We kept him because it was kitchy and fun.   Now as the boys play with him and all the other action figures, I make sure they know this is not the Jesus we pray to.

Tonight, the Joker, (Batman's nemesis from a Happymeal) and Swiper, (the swiping fox from Dora the Explorer - and I can't believe I'm writing about this...) were wreaking more havoc than usual.  Usually I try to make sure these trouble makers get put in jail - such is much of the adventure of playtime.  But tonight Joker and Swiper had succeeded in putting all the other toys in the jail, and there was no one left to set them free... then I spied the Jesus on the shelf.

I said that I knew someone who could set them free, because that's his favourite thing to do, and I brought out the Jesus, and I tried to make it a teachable moment as I was using the Jesus toy to set all the other toys free and explain that Jesus, the real one, does this for all of us... and I was hoping some of this was actually getting through as I "rescued" the last of the toys.

Then the boys used their Swiper and Joker toys, grabbed Jesus, and gleefully crammed him in the jail, and victoriously looked at me as if to say, "Now what?"  And all I can think is... maybe I should have just left Jesus on the shelf.

-A.



Truth hurts.

I love this cartoon.  It's so sad that it seems to be true.  And I just now caught the detail of the landscape.  Notice the barrenness of the terrain surrounding the people lining up, and the other path, while vacant, is surrounded by life.

Anger Recovery

It's amazing that when a city shows its worse side, often it can follow up with showing its best side.  This has happened in Vancouver since the riot.  I have been surprised by my own emotional journey, which I guess you could call one of recovery.

Since the riot, downtown has been flooded with volunteers cleaning up.  The windows that were smashed out in the historic Hudson's Bay Company have been boarded up and people have been writing apologies on it.  People have been calling it the "Wall of Sorrow" or the "Apology Wall."

The girl in this picture is wearing a Canuck's jersey.  I thought she was holding a hockey stick, but that's actually a broom.  She must have been cleaning up.  Many fans have written messages on the wall like, "REAL men don't riot," "Never Again," and "Our team came in a respectable second, the rioters came in last."

The wall has since this picture become absolutely filled with apologies, outrage, condolences, and inspiration.  The mayor and the premier even visited and wrote something.


Another interesting thing has been happening.  People have been leaving sticky notes on police cars, saying thank you, we're sorry, and we love you Vancouver Police.

It reminds me that this city, like most cities, no, I'll say all cities, is full of good people, and a few idiots.  There are idiots in Paradise City, and there are good people in the scary back alleys of Detroit.  I need to look for the good, and not be overwhelmed with the idiots.

Riot rant continued...

Let me add to this tirade that the next day, after the riot, Joanne went to her women's Bible study at church and when she dropped the boys off at the kid's care area, she learned that the lady who works there had volunteered to go downtown that morning to help with the clean up... in her wheelchair.

This just fuels my personal fires of injustice.  That drunken young hoodlum men can wreak havoc, and trash our lovely down town, and then a sweet wheelchair bound lady goes down with her help-dog to clean up their mess.

I know that I am self-centred and always cry out for mercy for myself and justice for others, but for right now, that's going to continue.

Vancouver... Vancouver...

How disappointing.  Yes, it was disappointing to lose the Stanley Cup, but to finish it off with rioting and looting and setting cars on fire, well... that takes my disappointment to outrage.

To my family in the States, let me describe how big this was.  Imagine it's the NBA Championship, and the Charlotte Hornets are playing, and the final game is in Charlotte, where you live.  Or imagine the Carolina Panthers are playing in the Superbowl... in your town.  Add to this the home-town feel of college sports where people feel like, and talk as if, they know the athletes personally.  This is what it's been like in Vancouver for the last three weeks of playoff craziness.  Canucks flags on every other car, people wearing Canucks shirts, hats, and hockey jerseys everywhere.

I was getting caught up into the excitement myself, which surprised me since I am not a hockey person.  But I'd been watching the playoff games with the boys, who always cheered for "the blue team."  I'd even considered buying a t-shirt for myself or for the boys.  It was like watching the Olympics and wanting one of those pairs of red mittens.  You want to feel a part of the fun.  And when I found out that no Canadian hockey team had won the NHL in 18 years, that made me root for the home team even more.

But now with all the rioting that took place after we lost, I do not want to wear anything that associates me with these fans.  I don't have a problem with the team; they did their best. I have a problem with the fans.

I can't believe this is the same Vancouver that captured the world's attention with their hospitality during the Olympic games... it feels like all that has gone down the toilet.

More frightening than the burning cars is the fact that these hoodlums are the adult men of tomorrow.  Also frightening are the young girls, there were lots of girls there too, girls who want attention from angry young men.

Another thing that bothers me, and I'm just rambling here, or ranting, or blogging, I really don't know the difference... but what bothers me is this:  how everyone is taking pictures of everything.  Like you smash a guy in the face with your iphone and then take a picture of his bleeding face with your iphone.  Also, lots of posing with flaming cars.  It's almost like, if i cannot get my picture taken with a celebrity (like a victorious hockey player,) then I will BE the celebrity in the name of anarchy, and my facebook account can almost guarantee it.

Camp Day

I do not care for Tim Horton's coffee.  I call it "the cup of disappointment."  I have heard others refer to it as "brown water."  And being a former Starbuckaneer, I've been known to say o so snooty things like "I no longer drink from the cup of disappointment." And I now only drink French pressed Indonesian fair traded mud.

But today is Tim Horton's Camp Day, and they send a lot of kids to camp.  So I went down to the local Tim Horton's to do my part.  And I have a confession:  I liked the way it tasted.  It tasted like Ontario, and it made me miss all my friends and family there.

So there on the corner of Marine and Fraser in Vancouver, I raised my Medium Regular into the air.  (I'm no longer a Double Double guy.)  And I sent my salute across the miles, sorry, kilometers to Ontario and said, "Send a kid to camp."

Jet laaaag....

It's good to be back, but this jet lag thing is a real bummer.

I was not able to post as much as I'd hoped while I was in South Africa, because the internet connection was quite sketchy at times.  I lost a couple of e-mails to Joanne, which was very frustrating, so I decided not to risk posting any more on the blog.

Now that I'm back, I hope to go back through my pictures and post some more about the trip without risking it getting lost in cyberspace.

Because when you're adrift in cyberspace, I don't think anyone can hear you scream.

"Healing through Weirdness"

That's what I called my workshop.

Well theatre exercises and games are pretty weird, but in theatre it’s what we do to hone our craft.  So I tried thinking of where goals in theatre exercises and goals in Living Waters intersect.  So I focused on freeing ourselves from perfectionism; freeing ourselves from the need for control; and freeing ourselves the fear of man.

Really that it’s ok to laugh at yourself.  In the body of Christ, we all take ourselves so seriously, and sometimes we need to let ourselves be silly, to look stupid and be ok with it because everybody is looking stupid in one way or another.

I’ll share a quote about perfectionism from Julia Cameron’s book The Artist’s Way:

To the perfectionist, there is always room for improvement.  The perfectionist calls this humility.  In reality, it is egotism… Perfectionism is not a quest for the best.  It is a pursuit of the worst in ourselves, the part that tells us that nothing we do will ever be good enough - that we should try again.

I think I need to read that to myself over again... and again... until I get it right!   ;)

Monkeys and mourning

You know you’re far from home when a monkey steals your toast.

Not mine, but a friend’s here at the retreat.  She decided to have her breakfast out on the deck because it was such a nice morning.  When she got up to refill her coffee, a monkey came up and walked off with her toast.  I don’t know what kind, a local told me they call them Blau, or Blue monkeys.  I’m not sure why, they’re not blue, but they are a good size, bigger than a beach ball.

Another one came up and started to come in the window right next to where we were eating and then someone shooed him off.  They are pests to the locals, but at least they’re cute pests.  The locals roll their eyes, but I was as thrilled as one of my little boys would have been.  On the outside, I’m saying, “Wow, how about that… how interesting.”  Inside I am gleefully jumping up and down and clapping my hands, saying “Yayy!  Monkeys!”  I wanted to put some fruit out to see if they would come back, but was dissuaded from doing so.  My adult brain understands, but my little boy inside said “Awwww, c’mon.  Pleeease?”

I taught this morning and it went well.  We did a “team teaching” kind of thing with Toni, Kirsten and I.  The session was about addiction, how we cope with our pain through our own methods instead of going to God.   We tried to incorporate a grieving process into it; a time of lament.  The South African team has gone through a very difficult time.  South Africa in general is going through a difficult time.  There are painful places in our own broken hearts that need to be mourned, and invite Jesus into those broken places to bring a deeper level of healing.  This is why this retreat is called “Dive Deeper.”  It went well and people really seemed to respond positively to it.

This is the lovely chapel where we meet.

Our first day

This retreat is called “Dive Deeper” and it is for all the Living Waters leaders in South Africa.  So the leaders from all the major cities are here, and the retreat centre is a beautiful place.  The flowers and birds are incredible.  There are also great big bugs, but let’s not talk about those.

Toni spoke this morning about how we, as leaders, can get caught up into ministry, and helping others get their needs met, that we neglect our own.

I am leading a small group of four other LW leaders, some of them are pastors, so it’s a little intimidating.  But I am really facilitating more than leading, and we all prayed for each other, so it was good.

Paul Stokes is our worship leader, and he is a lovely man.  He’s one of those guys who worships from his toes.  Where you feel like you are almost intruding on a private exchange, that he is not performing, but I would see the exact same Paul if he were playing and singing by himself in his college dorm stairwell.  I found myself being envious.  Here I am trying to worship, and I end up sinning, comparing myself to the worship leader, and wishing I could be more like him.  Isn’t that pathetic?  I even found myself praying, and asking God to help me to worship more like Paul.  But I felt like God responded, No, because he wanted me to worship like me.

This was taken just outside the town of George, South Africa, as we were coming in for the retreat.

Heading South... DEEP South

I leave tomorrow for South Africa.  Toni Dolfo-Smith, our director, also oversees Living Waters in several other countries, South Africa being one of them.  We are taking a team down to do some training for the Living Waters leaders in that country, and to minister to them as well.  LW South Africa has had a rough year.  Their national director was asked to step down by his board due to some issues in his personal life, and this has sent the various teams in that country through an awkward and painful year.

We are taking a team down to lead a retreat to help these guys re-center themselves in the heart of this ministry, to train them in some of the newer approaches, and to lead them through some times of personal healing.

What will I be doing personally?  Well, besides checking to see if the water drains out of the sink in the opposite direction down there (I am such a nerd,) I will be leading a workshop on addiction.  I will be team-teaching this with Kirsten, and we also see this session as a time for the team to lament, to really grieve the losses they've experienced.  (Addiction is often about coping, dealing with our losses and pain with our own pain-numbing activities.  So we want to facilitate a time for them to really sit in their grief, and then to invite Jesus into it, to allow him to minister to the deeper places that we often self-medicate.)

I will also be performing some pieces that I've written, to hopefully enlighten and encourage.  And I will also be doing, believe it or not, a theatre workshop, yes - at a Living Waters retreat.  (Toni requested it.)  I guess there's nothing like an afternoon of weird theatre exercises to help you shed some of your control issues.

So please pray for safe travel for me and the rest of the team.  Pray for our times of teaching and ministry, that we will be guided by the Holy Spirit.  And also please pray for Joanne and the kids as I am away.

A Hard Day

Two of our kids have a virus, diarrhea, vomiting, really fun stuff.  Joanne battled a milder case of it earlier, and now it's my turn.  Then Atticus, our only well child, was being a real handful.  He was frustrating us and we were frustrating him.  In time-out, he complained that I was not nice to him, and that he did not like this day.  Then, finally, at dinner time, we sit down at the dinner table.  I think I was thinking something really spiritual, like, "OK, fine, let's just eat."  Atticus said he wanted to say the blessing, I say "sure," or something equally exhorting, and he begins his prayer which is the same, most of the time.  "We thank you God for a good day and - "  And Joanne cuts him off.  "No, Atticus.  Don't say that.  It has NOT been a good day."  Then, with tears in her eyes, "It has been a hard day, but God is still here, and we are still grateful."

God, I thank you for my wife, who practices what I preach, even when I do not.