The Ultimate Anti-Zombie Weapon

You know you want one.

My Buddy, the Pirate

Michael Wurl is my buddy. He and his parents, Gary and Jennifer Wurl, are member of Lifepath and very involved in the life of the church. He's now about 23 or 24 and I guess I've known him about 11 years.

Michael has always been a bit of a character. He recently graduated from chef school and he must be pretty good at it. He has just gotten a job to be an executive chef in Nigeria at a five star hotel. He'll be leaving in January and gone for the next year. I'll miss getting together with him and playing video games.

But if you ask Michael what he really wants to do, he'll tell you he wants to be a pirate. He just called me from Ireland where he has been doing a cooking internship. He announced that he had made the national television news and the national paper.

You can read the story on the Irish Times website found here. But I'll go ahead an post the text:

Student's sea paddle prompts rescue operation

An American student sparked a full-scale rescue today after paddling a mile-and-half out to sea in a tiny boat to photograph a lighthouse.

The man in his 20s, who is taking classes at the famous Ballymaloe Cookery School in Co Cork, set off in rough conditions from nearby Ballyandreen, using a stick as an oar.
The RNLI lifeboat crew at Ballycotton said the Texan would have lost his life in the choppy waters if he hadn’t been spotted by a local fisherman.

“A major tragedy was definitely on the cards,” said eagle-eyed Redmond Lane Walsh who saw the 10-foot punt, a half mile off Ballycotton Island, in the Atlantic.
“If he hadn’t been rescued when he was, there would definitely have been a bad outcome. No-one knew where this guy was and they wouldn’t have known if he was missing.”

Lane Walsh, a fisherman and RNLI volunteer, noticed the boat as he walked along the Ballycotton pier and quickly alerted his RNLI crewmates.
They launched the Austin Lidbury lifeboat, which took just 15 minutes to reach the frightened sailor, who was being pulled further out to the ocean.

“When we got to him he had no oars, no flares, no mobile phone, lifejacket or safety equipment and nothing to bale out the water,” said Mr Lane Walsh.
“The wind was picking up and the waves were building so the boat would have floundered. There was no way in which he could alert anyone to let them know he was in trouble.”
Apart from some seasickness and shock, the hapless visitor was uninjured and made his way back to his hotel.

“People need to use their heads and not treat the sea lightly,” warned Blathnaid Lane Walsh, RNLI spokeswoman, who is also Redmond’s wife.

She said the rescue highlights the invaluable work done by the Ballycotton RNLI as it celebrates its 150th anniversary this year.
PA © 2008 irishtimes.com

Michael, I love you but you need to stick to cooking. No more adventures on the high seas!

Happy Seventh Birthday!

Today was a big day. Jake and Judith celebrated their seventh b-day at Monkey Business with 15 of their closest friends.

You can see the combination of cheetos and cupcakes as Jake reveals how old he is.

We were dressed in our most festive tie-dyes.

Best of all were the party favors. Pez is truly nature's gift.

Happy Turkey Day!

We're all headed down to Clear Lake to celebrate with my parents. Blessings on your day as well.

Encouraging You to Share Your Faith

Equipping and encouraging people to share their faith with non-believers is an important and difficult task for every church. At Lifepath we are thinking of hiring a consultant to give us the needed encouragement.

Here is his promotional video. Let me know what you think.

Back from Cleveland

Allie and I spent most of last week out of town. My parents watched the kids (thanks, Gran and Pop!) and we got to spend a couple days away. What exciting romantic spot did we pick?

Well, we were at the New Wineskins Presbytery meeting in sunny Cleveland, Ohio. And what could be better than attending a presbytery meeting.....in Cleveland.....in November?

Actually, it was fun. We got to meet some new people and forge some new friendships. Presbyterian pastors tend to let their hair down when they're away from home and there were some late night sessions involving the smoking of cigars. I did my best to not look like too big a geek around all the cool kids.

Plus, we got to spend some time with our former worship director Melissa Curtis and her husband Jason who actually seem to like the weather up there. Melissa has written about our day with them on her blog found here.

We miss you too, Jason and Melissa!

Dogs, Heaven, and You

So last week I posted a debate between two church signs - a Catholic church sign which lightheartedly maintained that all dogs go to heaven and a Presbyterian sign which argued (not so lightheartedly) that because dogs have no souls, they can't go to heaven.

Which sign was right?

Actually they both miss the point - in a big way. The underlying assumption of both signs is that the ultimate destiny of human beings is that “our souls go to heaven.” People who have gone to church all their lives have this idea that God's ultimate goal is to get us out of the world to float around as disembodied “souls” in a non-physical heaven. But that's not a Biblical idea. It actually springs more from the (pagan!) Greek philosophy of Plato than it does to the Bible.

The hope given to us in the Bible is that God's ultimate goal is to renew all of nature. The end of Revelation puts it this way: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. . . .” (Revelation 21: 1) The end of the Bible doesn't have us going up to the “sky” to live in the New Jerusalem. It has the New Jerusalem coming down to earth. (Revelation 21: 2)

What's the point?

God intends to restore, renew and perfect this physical universe he has made.
That's why the bible doesn't talk to much about “the immortality of the soul.” Instead it promises the resurrection of the dead. When Jesus was raised to life on Easter morning, he wasn't a disembodied ghost or spirit. He was a transformed human being, fully physical and capable of eating, drinking, being touched and touching. Yes, he was renewed and had transcended death but he was still physical. That's why the tomb was empty. His old body was transformed - but it was still his body.

What God did on Easter morning resurrection of Jesus, he intends to do for the universe itself – Renew, Restore, Make it the way he originally intended! Look at Romans 8, paying special attention to verse 11 and 19. You can see the process:

1. Jesus was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit.

2. This same Spirit is currently at work in us renewing us our character and transforming us into God's people.

3. Just as the Holy Spirit is renewing our character, one day he will renew our bodies.

4. When that happens all of Nature will be set free from death and renewed.

This isn't just in the New Testament. Isaiah 11: 6- 9 says,

The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them.

The cow will feed with the bear,
their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox.

The infant will play near the hole of the cobra,
and the young child put his hand into the viper's nest.

They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD
as the waters cover the sea.

There you have it. God's big project is not to get us out of the world but to get himself into it.

If I have just shocked you and you are wondering what kind of weird cult I belong to, you might look at two books by authors from two very different streams in the Christian faith - Heaven, by Randy Alcorn and Surprised by Hope, by N.T. Wright. They both do a great job of explaining our ultimate destiny as the Bible describes it.

So what about dogs? Well, if God is going to renew all of creation, I imagine dogs will get included.

On the other hand, I'm not so sure about cats.