I straddle my motorcycle and give the “parkir” a 1,000 Indonesia Rupiah bill, worth about a dime in U.S. currency. A parkir’s job is to guard my motorcycle while I’m inside the store he stands in front of, and I have to pay him afterwards whether I requested his services or not. When I leave …
Calling All Creatives! Calling All Creatives! We Need You! While riding my mountain bike a few weeks ago, I took a tumble and shattered my collarbone into five pieces. A group of villagers carried me to my house, where I was helped into the passenger seat of my car. I asked someone, “Can you tell …
Continue reading ‘Onward Christian Artist, Going as to War’ »
Re-thinking Creativity and Ministry In the season when kings mounted swift stallions, unsheathed gilded swords and went to war, one king called in sick. Following a massage and a hot bath, he stretched himself across fluffy white, goose down pillows. His mind began to whimsically drift away from the fierce battles raging outside. His thoughts …
David McCullough’s masterful biography John Adams gives us a raw look into the relationships between the founding fathers of America.[i] John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were united in their fight to establish the new nation and were the most responsible for crafting the Declaration of Independence together. However, the two intellectual giants soon became bitter …
“This is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” I John 3:16 For centuries, the people living in villages clustered along the south coast of Java have lived in terror of Nyai Loro Kidul, the …
In my last few blog posts we’ve been looking at how vibrant community comes when members are willing to risk vulnerability and engage in healthy conflict. Last week we looked at conflict’s out-of-bounds areas, and now we’ll focus on the rules of the playing field. When to have conflict? The short answer is when …
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In his insighhtful book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team [i], Patrick Lencioniso outlines what causes teams to breakdown and finally either implode or explode. The first time I read this book I was in a team leader role and was discouraged to discover that we had all five dysfunctions down pretty well! Lencioniso’s thesis is the foundation for …
Continue reading ‘Authentic Community: When Not to Have Conflict’ »
What keeps our communities as deep as a casual chat in the church foyer? The problem, as my friend Mark Buckner explains, is that we have competing needs: the need to be loved and the need to be respected. It feels like I have to choose one or the other. If people really know me, …
Continue reading ‘Authentic Community: From Chit Chat to Transparency’ »
I was a bored and fidgeting six-year-old, attending a special program at our local Baptist church. My older sister sat on my left and our neighborhood friend Russell Brooks sat on my right. We stared ahead at the churchy proceedings and I asked Russell what the tank of water was in back of the stage. …
When I served as a youth worker back in California, we asked the kids at our church to give a Saturday a month to serve at a convalescent home. We’d scatter through the hallways, going into the rooms of the elderly, sitting down next to their beds and listening to their stories. We’d often strum our guitars …
Continue reading ‘Joy Ride (Embracing the Seasons of Life)’ »