Rice and Beans: Recipes

It has begun. After a nice breakfast this morning of eggs, ham and scones lovingly prepared by sweet Ann, I've shifted to eating only rice and beans. Several Commonway folks are also eating rice and beans. Maybe you are. Maybe you're wondering how to prepare them. This is the place to post some recipes that work for you. Just go to comments and drop in your favorites. If your favorite bean recipe happens to be applying a can opener to a tin of Old El Paso frijoles, I really hope you'll tell the rest of us that. We'll laugh with you.

Here's the recipe we used for the rice served at Commonway today:

Cooking Rice in the oven?

Can someone give me some advice on cooking rice in the oven. I've got to come up with 50-60 cups of cooked rice and I don't have space on the range to cook it. Has anyone ever done this and if so how did it turn out. I found a recipe online:

Heat oven to 350

use oven safe pan pour desired rice amount and add 2x the water (boiling water) to it along with about 1/2 tablespoon of salt to every 4 cups of rice and 1/8 cup of oil to every 4 cups of rice

cover pan with foil air tight

place pan in oven for about 45 min

take out oven and let sit and steam with cover still on pan for approx. 10min.

use fork to fluff rice.

serve hot

I think we used a little bit of butter instead of the oil.

As for the beans today, here's the secret: Plenty of sliced onions, sauteed with minced garlic, thrown into beans and water. Toss in a shake or two of liquid smoke, and simmer until done. You're good to go. 

Now it's your turn. If you've got a killer prep plan for beans and rice, share it in the comments.

a little bit of rice and beans

Personally, I love to eat. I wouldn't say I'm grossly overweight, but my enjoyment of a variety of foods in sometimes less-than-moderate quantities does adversely affect my ability to be svelte. In that regard I'm probably like many Americans. And unlike many people around the planet who hardly get enough food to rebuild or replace their current cells. And for variety? Well, for many there's very little. (Or, so I've heard and believe. I don't really have good documentation for that at hand.) In many places people only have a small portion of rice or beans, and that's what they eat whenever they eat. 

Because this is a foreign reality to me and the folks I do church with, we've decided to take a few days and try to imagine (ever so slightly) what that might be like. For five days, starting on Sunday November 2 we're going to limit our diet to rice, beans, tortillas, and maybe some oatmeal. We're not being psycho about it. There will be no official check ups, tests, or reports. We just want to show a little solidarity with our planet-mates who don't enjoy ample quantities of a variety of tasty food. 

The second step in the effort is to try to determine cost difference between five days of beans and rice and five days of what we normally eat. We'll then take that money and donate it to some worthy cause. We're thinking we'll use it to help construct wells in parts of India that struggle to have clean water. 

If you're interested, click here to see where we got the idea. And here's the info that went out to our church: 

Half the world’s population lives on $2 a day or less. As an act of solidarity with our brothers and sisters around the globe, we encourage you to eat as they do for five days, November 2-7. Set aside the money you would have spent on additional groceries to contribute to a special offering to dig wells in India.

How to join in the 5-Day Rice and Bean Challenge:

• Limit your grocery shopping to rice, beans, plain oatmeal or Cream of Wheat, and tortillas.

• For one week eat only these foods. A one-cup serving is considered generous in most parts of the world. Meat is a luxury, with the average African consuming about ¾ ounce per day—the size of a small chicken nugget.

• Set aside the money you would have spent on additional groceries and redirect it toward the special offering to dig wells in India. Over $4K for these wells has been raised recently at Union Chapel/Commonway. 

John Adams: What a Man

Ann and I are nearing the conclusion of part seven of HBO's John Adams. You know that feeling of impending sadness as you near the end of a really good book? I'm feeling it big time. What a fascinating story. What an amazing man. 

The fear John Adams expresses repeatedly in this film has certainly been proved true in my life. the icons of the Revolution in my mind have always been Washington, Jefferson, Revere. I've given hardly a second thought to the second president. No more. 

Unless you have serious issues of conscience with television, I urge you to buy, rent, or borrow this series and watch it through. It's not entirely kid safe (Well, depending on your kids, I suppose.), so be aware. Except for a gruesome tar and feathering in the first episode, the three other snips that we'd edit out for our kids come with ample forewarning. And there are some bad words. Noble as the founding fathers were, they sometimes spoke with passion expressed by the oaths of the day. 

Here are some lessons for me from John Adams:

• Think hard, study hard, work tremendously hard.

• Marry a good woman (I've done this.) Listen to her often, carefully and with a mind to put into action what she says. (I could do better at this.)

• The anticipation of your place in history can haunt your fiercely.

• Adams had remarkable foresight in his younger days, but seemed as an old man to lose some of it. But what do I know of being old?

• Invest in good friends and stick with them.

• Revolution is for young men, but we'd all darn well better listen to the old men. They know, and realize they don't know, things which we have yet to imagine. 

One last thought: This film helped me decide one important issue. I'm definitely getting Paul Giamatti for my movie. And probably Laura Linney as well. No, I don't actually have a movie right now. But when I do, these two are definitely going to star in it. Until then, I'm going to work on perfecting my Paul Giamatti/John Adams glare, scowl and grin combo. See what I mean in these youtube clips. Go here for more info.

Guest post from my brother, Joel

My Dad, my hero. . .. 

Joel Bennett, Ridin' Shotgun, http://ridinshotgun.blogspot.com/

Dad passed away last night. He heroically battled cancer for over a year. 

Now my dad is a Christian so I have full confidence that I'll see him again in heaven.
And if you'll indulge me, I want to share a few memories...this is for me...feel free to read or not.
My dad always provided for our needs...not always our wants, and, for that, I am glad. When we kids started putting our extra pennies in a huge poodle shaped bubble bath bottle to save for a horse, he smiled, at least I think it was a smile. He knew that was a want, not a need. He was wise. We didn't get that horse, and that was probably for the best. We always had more than enough food, shelter, stuff. When we were very little he had a friend with a backhoe dig in the swamp on the property to make it a swimming hole. It was a rainy Labor Day...I would take breaks from the Jerry Lewis Telethon to go watch. He stocked it with some fish that he and our neighbor, Carl, got at a fish hatchery. I got to go on that trip, too. Maybe he was making a fishing pond that we could swim in and not a swimming hole that he could fish in...either way it was great for a kid.

As we got older and the fish didn't survive in the murky swamp water, he bought and constructed a swimming pool in the back yard. We helped him build this incredible deck that surrounded half the pool. What a delight summer after summer.

We always had many animals. My first memory of pets was our german shepherd named Joker. Joker chased and ate bumblebees. I don't know why. He was big enough for us to lie down on, and amazingly let us do so. As we got older, and Joker went to doggie heaven, we got other dogs. One was Lobo, a black lab mix. On the ride home after the purchase of Lobo, he decided car riding wasn't good on his tummy. He abruptly ralphed on my leg. I still liked him. Many dogs came and went. Bananas was the longest tenured dog. She listened to me rant and rave on many occasions. We also had a working farm...not that we farmed, but we had farm animals. Dad and Mom always bought baby calves and we raised them for meat. My vegan friends wouldn't approve of that, but, come to think of it, I may not have any vegan friends. We also had goats...one time as many as 21. Springs were incredible when the mama goats would have the babies. Baby goats are so much fun! A friend of ours even did an article in the newspaper about Dad, the farm, the goats and Dad's earth conscious behavior. Dad read a magazine called "Mother Earth News". While the magazine itself was full of weird new age propaganda, he was able to glean the good stuff out of it to help provide for the family. He made a solar powered shower out of a barrel, put it up on the roof of a building he built, and we had warm showers without using any electricity. He was way ahead of his time. 

I really enjoyed growing up where I did and how I did. We worked hard cutting wood, taking care of the animals, taking care of the land and playing on a great property in the quiet of the country. 

Probably the best thing he ever did for us was to take us to church. I was in church at two weeks old. His faith, as far as I knew, never faltered. He taught Sunday School for as long as I can remember. When he began watching TBN and learned about the Holy Spirit, he studied voraciously. He taught us, too. When the knowledge and experience he had with the Holy Spirit grew, he moved the family to another church that embraced the Holy Spirit. The skill and leadership he had was used well at Union Chapel. He has many friends to attest to that.

My dad always had a hobby...some out of necessity, some out of pleasure. Again, sorry to my PETA friends, if I have any, but I remember Dad would trap. The animals he caught would be sold to provide for the family. His pleasure hobbies were always changing. He was very musically inclined. I remember as kid we would all sit in the den, or "gun room" as we would call it, and sing along with him as he played. He mostly played folk music on his autoharp. He was very good. He loved Peter, Paul and Mary, Flatts and Scruggs, and '50's music. In his job at the Central Indiana Gas Company, he would work a swing shift. This was hard on me, but way harder on him. One week he would work days, then two days off, then afternoons, then two days off, then midnights. Then the cycle would repeat. I don't know how his body always handled that. It was just like him. It had to be done, so he did it. He had to perpetually be in jet lag mode. Anyway, his job provided him some down time, especially in the wee hours of the morning, so he would learn a new skill. He picked up a harmonica and taught himself how to play. He was very skilled at that, too. He got into CB radios. He used them to talk to the family when he was out of the house or driving way before cell phones were the norm. He also set up an elaborate cb at home that he would try to talk to the world with. He had a map on the wall with pushpins on the countries he'd talk to. I remember Japan as one of them along with all fifty states. When computers came along, he slowly made the trek into that world. He became very skilled at surfing the net for information, Photoshop, and great emails. In the past few years, he realized his dream...retirement and a pond. This time around, he designed the pond, had it dug professionally, stocked it with great bass and bluegill and cared for it meticulously. I think that may have been his proudest accomplishment on his property. It is still a great gathering place for all the family.

He traveled this country in the National Guard...took us on great vacations including Washington, DC, Charleston, SC and Panama City, FL. He loved deep sea fishing. He traveled the world spreading the Gospel. He went to India on several occasions and made some lifelong friends with some believers there. 

He helped shape me into who I am today. He took care of the earth. He took care of others. He took care of us. He led people to the Lord. 

He took the talents God gave him and multiplied them. 
And he made God smile. I know it.

And then some. . .

I was challenged at church today. Our pastor spoke about how to do well at your job and enjoy it at the same time. Along the way (I say "along the way" because I really don't remember the context!) he said that three words make the difference between just getting  by with our work and really knocking it out of the park: And then some. 

Most workers do what it takes. Excellent workers do what it takes, and then some. Sometimes we do the minimum. What if we did the minimum and then some? He challenged us to think about our town (which presently suffers from a collective self-esteem problem) and what would happen if everyone decided to do what was required and then some. It's a cool vision. 

I'm going to try to keep this rolling around in my head for a few days. It would do me good (and maybe some others) if I would do what was right and then some. 

Yeah, well, I've got a wish. . .

We celebrated Ann's 12th birthday this evening with friends, presents, and cake. At a lull in the action, I posed a question, "Got any birthday wishes? Any wishes for your twelfth year?"

Check out the video (low bandwidth folks read below):



Anna says she has no wishes. Well, I have a wish for her: My dear, never grow older than twelve.

Ladderball

We tried out a new game during our recent staff day at the lake: Ladderball. You may know it as Hillbilly Golf or an even less flattering moniker. Since it was pretty fun and I'd found a bag of old golf balls left by the previous owners of our house, I thought it would be fun to make one today. A quick trip to Lowes, just under $20, two hours of time and we're playing ladderball in our front yard. So far I'm the reigning champion. That is, if you don't count Ann or the dynamic duo of Alia and Abigail, who have all beaten me!

Here's the photographic evidence:

Queen of Jumping

Once a year our pastor opens his lake cottage to the staff for a big time party day. God smiled on the event with gorgeous weather. The water was fine, the fellowship warm, and the enjoyment the kids had was worth the price of admission.

Abigail, who's six, demonstrated admirable bravery and jumped off the top level of the dock. The twelve foot plunge was scarier for me than I like to admit the first time we went off the edge hand in hand. After a few duo drops, she continued on her own. If you've got the bandwidth, enjoy these two videos.



"I am the queen of jumping," Abigail says just before she takes the plunge.



Solo jump as seen from the lower deck. 

Sermon hat trick

I heard three sermons today. So, as you might imagine, I’m feeling pretty holy.



This wasn't one of the three preachers I heard today, but it is cool that he has two microphones!

Pastor Matt and I took our interns to a Lutheran church as part of our effort to introduce them to different styles of following Jesus. That service, which featured real, but nasty, wine, ended just after nine am. This gave me enough time to zip over and slip into Union Chapel just as announcements ended for the first service. Gregg’s sermon was sharp, but not longer than usual. (Surprising since he’d been out of the pulpit for three weeks!) A quick hop across the parking lot and I was ready for message number three at CommonWay.

The first sermon had to do with prayer. While I’m a big fan of prayer, I’m afraid most of the content was pushed out of my brain by the latter two sermons.

Sermon two was the first in a three part series on service and volunteering. It centered around Moses’s call at the burning bush, particularly God’s question to Moses, “What’s in your hand?” The key point was that God has put stuff in our hands and given us opportunity to use it for His kingdom. We can if we will. What’s in your hand?

The third message (far and away the longest!) dealt with Christ’s reign in our lives and how it works out not only in good times but also in bad. It featured a brilliant real life example of letting Jesus carry out his character building work when life is bleak and challenging. The speaker was honest and authentic, without being maudlin. I appreciated it.

Are you wondering which was best? Keep wondering. In the unlikely event that someone besides my mom reads this blog, ranking them could only mean trouble!

Looking for God's Kingdom in Louisville

I’m writing this afternoon from Louisville, KY. The family is on a bit of a pilgrimage with some friends to sit in on two meetings with evangelist Todd Bentley. We’re in line right now at 3.30 pm, waiting for the doors to open at 5.30. Both the temperature and the humidity are right around 100, and I’m wondering if I’m nuts. In spite of the heat, people are singing, crying and praying for the sick right in the line. Wild.



Joseph and the line between us and the door.



This lady has a lucky green ticket that got her and whoever had one into the building 30 minutes ahead of those (like us) who were totally green ticketless!

I don’t know what you’ve heard about Todd Bentley or the goings on in Lakeland, FL, but it’s fun to think about God’s kingdom growing in fresh ways in our midst.

One thing that struck me, both as we’ve watched the revival online, and today here in Louisville, is the degree to which the focus is placed on Jesus. I don’t have much experience with this sort of thing, so I have little to compare it to. I do know that my cynical side would expect the focus to be on the main guy or on the healings. There’s a bit of that going on here, but not as much as I feared. The proof of that pudding will be if similar stuff happens on a similar scale without the Bentley-boy showing up.

Which is a key reason why we’re here. We’re wondering if God might desire to work in similar ways in our church.

Cool healing: A war veteran who’d been in a wheel chair or electric cart for 41 years, got up, walked, leapt and praised the Lord. His wife confirmed this was a whole new deal for him. She then got prayed for healing of a couple major issues. It was precious to watch them hug onstage, enjoying their divine two for one deal.

Heartbreaking sight: The service wrapped up, leaving a possibly Bengali couple onstage holding an obviously troubled child of one or two. They stood there, nearly alone, looking confused, as the focus of the meeting shifted away from the stage. I prayed that God would meet their needs some way.

Walking away from the meeting, I thought that it was probably good that Jesus came to the planet when he did. Early in the gospel of Mark the whole town gathered at Jesus' door and he heals many who had various diseases. What would happen today? When thousands can fly or drive to a place where people are getting healed, how would Jesus have handled it?

For that matter, how does Todd Bentley handle walking away when there are unmet needs? But the guy’s got to sleep. A friend once talked about the stress he felt while running an eye hospital in Azerbaijan. There were always more people than he could help. Every hour he didn’t work meant that someone who might have been helped remained sightless. That’ll keep you up at night.

May God give his people the wisdom to do the work he’s designed for them to do (Ephesians 2.10) and not stress about the rest. Jesus gave us a good model for this. He said, “I can do only what I see the Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does..” (John 5.19)

Yurt Snoozin'

I’m blogging tonight from the yurt. I’d rather be sleeping right now, but two things are keeping me from it: 1. How often do you get the chance to say you’re blogging from a yurt? And 2. My yurt-mates, Emily, Alia, and Abigail are still in chat and chuckle mode. (This is fake sleeping below!)





We’re hanging in the yurt tonight because ten of our friends are in Kazakhstan and we want to remember them and pray for them. They’ve gone off for a brief trip to love on some young folks who are “graduating” from an orphanage.

This is something I never thought of for the first 42 years of my life: Orphans eventually outgrow the orphanage. "Graduate" is a nice word for what happens at that point. You’ve heard how tough it is for some former inmates to adjust to the world outside of prison. Imagine growing up your entire life in the regimented environment of an orphanage, then all of a sudden heading out into the real world. To soft pedal it in a big way: It’s a bit of an adjustment.

So our friends are over there helping some friends make the adjustment. I can see Jesus doing that sort of thing. In fact, I can see Jesus in them now, doing the sort of stuff he likes to do.

Because we care for our friends, and want in some measure to care for these graduating orphans through them, we set up the yurt in the gym at church. It fills up most of the stage and covers some of the powerpoint screen, but the worship team is flexing. Over the course of ten days maybe thirty of us will spend the night here. If you're in driving distance and want to stay tomorrow (Friday) night, let me know.

Punch the button, not the attendant

My friend Matt and I were on our way to breakfast recently. Matt's claim to fame is that he nearly died on a Tibetan mountain pass when his car broke down one time. He, his wife and son were saved by the thoughtful actions of their driver. He pointed the disabled car toward the fading sunlight and, using the hood, redirected sufficient rays to thaw the frozen line. Matt has other claims to fame, but that was the coolest one I heard during this particular breakfast.

At any rate, on the way to food, we stopped for fuel. I would think by now we would have standardized the gas pump. Apparently not. This one, with it's unique variety of questions to answer, selections to make, and buttons to push, nearly stumped us. And that's saying something: Matt's an engineer and me, well, I graduated from Ball State University.

Once the gas was flowing we noticed the button and sign shown below. Apparently we were not alone in our frustration with the complicated pump. It looked liked someone had tried with great vigor to "speak with an attendant," enough vigor to snap off portions of the button!

I love orange shirts

I recently attended a conference at Wheaton College. I'd been to the school before, but didn't really know where anything was. My friend Matt and I parked within a dozen yards of a banner denoting our conference. But it turned out that was mostly a good place to hang a banner, not really the main place where the meeting was being held.



As we walked up toward the banner we were met by a couple young people in orange shirts. They informed us that our first order was to register in the gym. "Follow the sidewalk that way," the orange shirt pointed and said. Matt and I strode off obediently. Just at the point when I was thinking, "Where's the dang gym?" another orange shirt materialized and said, "Need to register? Just this way." At the gym, an orange shirt opened the door. At dinner a particularly intrepid orange shirt held open two doors at once to let in the thronging masses. Like signs in the Paris Metro, the orange shirts seemed to always be where I needed them.

I wanted to bring one home with me.

How cool would that be? Someone who knew the schedule, knew where the places were that you needed to be, and held open the door when you got there. And all this with a smiling face. Amazing and wonderful.

It makes me wonder if the orange shirts all came from Utah or maybe Enterprise Car Rental.

Lessons in Influence from the Book of Esther

Last Saturday I had a cool opportunity to sit with a few others, listening to our senior pastor Gregg Parris talk about what it means to be a leader. He spoke briefly about some of his success as a leader. He also spoke in depth about several of his devastating failures. I’ll blog some of those stories in coming days.*

Drawing from the book of Esther in the Bible, Gregg presented us with eight leadership lessons. I missed many of the connections to Esther, so you may want to read the book for yourself. It’s a fascinating story.

Eight Lessons in Influence from Esther

Pray to see things as they are. Often times the stated issue isn’t the real issue. Gregg said the younger you are when you learn this, the better off you’ll be for the rest of your life. Ask, “God, what is really going on in this conflict?”

Influence influencers. Gregg said that this principle is why he showed up on Saturday morning to speak to our small group. He sees potential to influence in our little band of interns. (No pressure, guys!)

Be courageous and self-sacrificial. You will never be a great leader unless you’re willing to suffer. Those who suffer with grace do so because of their courage.

Timing and preparation are crucial to influence. You have to pick your battles. And you need to be prepared. With regard to issues of the kingdom of God, timing is everything.

Be crucified to personal ambition. Authority to lead comes to the degree that you lay down your life for the people you serve. If you will take care of the depth of your relationship with God, he’ll take care of the breadth of your influence.

Be positive, not destructive. Destruction is what happens when we’re not positive. Think the best of people.

Get control of your pride and ego before exerting influence.

Trust God with the results.

If I had to choose one or two of these to consider in my life, maybe to focus some growth and training on, I think I’d go with “Pray to see things as they are.” I could also do with a greater sense of personal sacrifice and courage, but I’d rather not think about that.

One thing I see at work in my life, that I delight in, is the privilege I have to influence influencers. I spend a good bit of my time speaking to and writing for people who love Jesus and want to respectfully invite others to follow him.

How about you? Any of these you’d like to grow in? Any you’ve seen God give you or build in you lately?


*OK, truth be told: Gregg didn’t talk about failure and I wouldn’t blog it if he did. I just put that in there to encourage you to keep reading!

Grateful for God's provision

Here’s something I’m thankful for today: Food. Yummy food in ample quantity. Many people around the world do not have ample food, tasty or otherwise. If there’s food to buy, they lay awake at night wondering how they’ll afford to get it for their kids. Other people can’t enjoy food right now like my friend who struggles with anorexia and my dad who finds little or no appeal in food as he battles cancer.

But I’m thankful for the food I’ve enjoyed today: Fresh blueberries to put on my cereal this morning; tasty kettle-fried potato chips with the box lunch at the conference I’m attending; and as I walked to the workshop in which I’m typing this, some young volunteer was passing out Dove ice cream bars. Wow. Culinary utopia and dinner hasn’t even happened yet.

Of course I’d trade it all to see my friend and dad share a large pizza or a bag of White Castle hamburgers. And whole cities, nations where the food is running out? Well, that’s hard to even imagine.

Come on baby light my fire. . .

Ann and I added a new house rehab skill to our toolbox tonight. We installed a flexible gas line from the propane tap in the basement up, down, around and through the floor to a gas stove.

I don’t know about you, but Ann way prefers cooking with gas. Switching from electric will make her happy, which in turn makes the rest of us happy! My Dad should be happy to know that we used pipe dope instead of teflon tape!



If you realize after a week or so that nothing new has shown up here after this post, maybe you could swing by the house and check on things. Just put out your cigarette before you open the front door!

Un-cool car in a cool place

I got off the plane feeling pretty cool with life: Got car reserved, a cheap hotel room waiting, and a presumably nice drive in the morning through a part of the US I’d never visited. Like a good vibe black hole, the rental car agent sucked all that joy away in a moment.

“We’re out of compacts, so I’m putting you in a Town and Country.” Somehow, my mind heard that as a bigger, nicer car than what I had reserved. Then it began to dawn on me, “A Town and Country is a ding dang minivan.” Ack. The movie in my mind involved me zipping around the great forests of the Northwest in a zippy little car. It just didn’t work if you took out the Focus or the Mazda 3 and replaced it with a minivan.

“Surely you have a car,” I implored imploringly.

“Yes, we do,” she answered hopefully. “It will cost you $10 extra.”

“Ten bucks for the whole rental period?” I asked stupidly.

“Per day,” she responded with triumphant finality.

Lacking extensive blogging experience, I don’t know if it’s good manners to say the name of the rental car company. Suffice it to say, even if you’re really trying to be thrifty (wink wink, nudge nudge), I’d still advise renting from Enterprise.

The next morning I drove my decidedly uncool car out of Seattle into some of the most beautiful geography I’ve ever seen. It inspired this photo essay called, “Un-cool Car in Cool Places.”


Daring white minivan at Deception Pass



Mild-mannered minivan with fierce fighter plane



On the ocean with a Town and Country

Teaching that works for adults

I participated in a helpful workshop yesterday about dialogue education based on the ideas of an apparently very bright woman named Jane Vella. I want to learn more and more how to help people capture and apply valuable information. A good sermon still packs a punch, a powerful speech builds vision, inspires passion and catalyzes action, and well written articles (and blogs?) extend the range of communication. But many people learn best in a situation in which they’re given a chance to interact with the content being taught. Creating such settings was the point of this workshop.




Here are a couple of key take aways for me:

Six principles of effective adult learning theory

1. Respect: Respect your students because they each bring something to the table. Their life experiences matter.

2. Immediacy: Help students understand how they can immediately use the information being conveyed.

3. Relevance: Similar to immediacy, communicate the relevance of the content to the students’ lives.

4. Safety: Build a learning environment that is challenging, but not threatening. Students should feel like they can be involved without embarrassment.

5. Engagement: Students should be involved in the learning event, not simply passive recipients.

6. Inclusion: Teachers should make an effort to engage all students.

I plan to review my next several talks to see how they measure up to these six principles. I think I do well with respect, safety and inclusion, but could do better with immediacy and relevance.

Our instructor, Karen Ridout, also laid out four ways to involve students during a class or presentation by giving them four types of learning activities. She called it:

The Four A Model

Anchor (inductive): This is a task that has the learner access their own prior knowledge or experience with the topic or content. It helps them center on the topic and realize they have stuff to bring to the table.

Add (input): This a learning task that has the student hear, see, or experience substantive new content (information, research, theory, skill).

Apply (implement): With these tasks the learner puts the new content into action during the class.

Away (integrate): This is a task that connects the new learning back to the life of the learner and its future use. Think, “homework with a purpose.” These tasks include action plans and commitment statements.

My plan is to integrate one task from each of these categories into the next four talks I give.

Go here for more info on these ideas. Go here to buy Dr. Vella’s books.

Link Chat: Will You Be My Buffalo?

I had a chance recently to talk to forty or fifty kids at our church. I don’t often talk to kids other than my own, so I was a bit nervous. I felt some pressure to be cool, but not to look like I felt pressure to be cool or was in any way responding to that sort of pressure. So I wore a decidedly dopey seer sucker shirt and sandals. I doubt any of the kids thought as I walked forward, “Wow, that’s one cool old guy.”

Even so, by the time my 30 minutes were up, I felt like I had communicated what I wanted and had connected, at least a little, with the group.

I used to challenge my friend Dave to blog his sermons. He didn’t really want to. Something about modesty and not wanting Rick Warren’s lawyers giving him grief for copyright violations, or something like that. I can’t really remember.

But I thought it might be fun to post an outline of the talk I gave the kids and invite your feedback. At least watch this video that we showed at the start of my talk. It’s amazing.



Battle at Kruger

In case you don't watch it, this video is amateur footage of a wild life battle in South Africa. Some lions cut a Cape Buffalo calf from the herd and wrestle it to the ground at the edge of a watering hole. They fight with a crocodile for possession of the calf before the herd fights to take it back. Ultimately the herd frees the calf and chases away the lions.

With that background, I began my talk:

Cast of characters:
• baby buffalo in distress
• lions on the prowl
• the thundering herd
• opportunistic crocodile, aka: oppy croc

Who of these are you right now?
I’ve been most of these (I threw in some confession sort of stories here.)

Bible in I Peter 5.8: says our enemy is roaring lion, seeking someone to devour

Jesus is the the buffalo (I told them that saying Jesus = Buffalo could get me fired from my job, so let’s just keep it among ourselves.)

Jesus’ interaction with the Pharisees and the woman they caught in adultery is an example of him being the buffalo to rescue someone.

One of Jesus main instructions was: "Follow me. Believe what I say, sure, but also do what I do." We need to be the herd for each other.

I asked how we do this. A couple students offered: "We hold each other accountable to following Jesus and we give each other a shoulder to lean on." I said, "Don't gossip. Hang out with the smelly girl. And look for people who are getting drug down to the water."

Questions
• Who’s one person you might need to watch out for at church?
• Who’s one person you might need to show some care for outside of church?
• What’s one way you need the others here to watch out for you?

We ended by shouting together:
Will you be my buffalo?
Yes, I’ll be your buffalo!

The ending was pretty fun. I’d never roused a bunch of kids to yelling and it was pretty enjoyable. I suppose there’s a paragraph early on in the Youth Leader’s Manual that advises: Don’t mistake rowdy yelling for successful communication. I’ll keep that in mind.

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Another candidate for "God's country"

Sometimes it’s hard to believe I get to do this job. I’m writing this post from a ferry in the Puget Sound, going from a Perspectives class last night to my final Perspectives class of the spring tonight.


This part of the U.S. is unbelievable. I'm a hazard driving around, my head swinging back and forth as I try to drink in all the beauty. I can’t figure out why we don’t all live here. Sure it’s remote. Sure there’s a little bit of the weirdness that comes with living on a island (no, offense, Marti and Nanette). But God is at work here: Three healthy Perspectives classes and lots of people wondering how they can make their lives count for God’s purposes, how they can lovingly and respectfully invite others to follow Jesus.



It makes me happy to join in.

Poor turtles

On the way to church today we passed two dead turtles about fifty yards apart, run over and lying on the shoulder of the road. Not cuff link sized pets that you might see in a small fishbowl, these were hub cap size snappers.


This isn't one of the turtles we saw. This lucky snapper made it across the road!


How do you hit a turtle driving in your car? The second turtle I can understand. It got run over because someone was looking at the first dead turtle. But that first one has me confused.

I mean it’s not like a squirrel that starts to cross the road, stops, starts, feints, dodges, head-fakes, reconsiders, sprints, jukes, faints, revives, runs down the road away from your car, then does an abrupt 180 and dives for your tire. No one blames you for hitting a squirrel. But a fourteen inch snapping turtle? Even a sleepy driver’s ed student should be able to judge the trajectory of a turtle and guide the car safely by.

Plus there is the morphology to consider. Hitting a turtle is like running over an aluminum briefcase only to discover it’s full of spaghetti sauce and fried chicken. It can’t be good for your car.

Chapter three of John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath has some interesting thoughts about turtles and highways. Go here and scroll down a bit to read it.

Big Time Fun this Summer

The coming summer promises to hold some fun and productive times for our family. Today was the first full day of summer school break for the kids and Ann. It was a little bumpy, resulting in the following challenge from the Mom and teacher: “Tomorrow will see improved behavior and a higher percentage of chores done or we go right back to school!”

Should that not happen, the kids have some fun stuff ahead. On June 23 they’ll start a week long service project with church. The older three will spend the whole week at the church, sleeping in class rooms and spending their days throughout the city building, tearing down, pulling weeds, painting, giving away candy and cleaning toilets. Ann and I will serve as coaches, doing what we can to help a couple teams succeed. You're welcome to join us on Friday evening for the big Party in the Parking Lot wrap up event. Look for me doing my staff duty, sitting in the dunk tank for the amusement of all!

I have two training opportunities in June. I’m excited about the Perspectives National conference that will be held in Dallas. It should be a great chance to hang out with some of my heroes and colleagues, and it may open some doors for new speaking opportunities. A couple weeks later, I’ll attend an Alpha training event in preparation for our church running that program in the spring.

We also have tons of family and friends coming in for visits. Ann’s brother and his family will fly in from Arizona because they heard in Indiana it’s a “wet heat!”

Throughout the summer, I’m teaming up with our Commonway pastor to host a training internship for several young leaders in our fellowship. We’re planning to help these guys take steps toward the roles of vision and influence that God has in mind for them.