Voices of My Generation :: Joshua Harris

Every generation asks questions about what the generation before it says about life, the universe and everything. This is true in every culture and subculture. My generation, and specifically the sub-culture of my generation that was raised in the church, is no exception.
We asked questions about worship.
We asked questions about ritual.
We asked questions about hypocrisy in the church.
We asked questions about relationships.
Specifically, we asked questions about the quality of the culture and environment that was created by dating.

During that time a young man voiced what many of us were developing in our own understanding of relationships in his book I Kissed Dating Goodbye. While we had arguments and disagreements about the firmness of the stances he took on the issue, in that book Joshua Harris emerged as one of the voices of my generation.
One of the voices that is listened to.
One of the voices that can reach into our generation and culture and put into words the events and philosophies on our hearts.

We grew, we married, we experienced life, and Josh Harris continued to write books on these experiences. Now we're the adults in the world. We're the ones having kids, running companies and shaping ministries. As we enter this new phase of life, Josh has once again written a book that looks with insight into the ideas that our communities are talking about in his newest title: Stop Dating the Church

...this book is marking a very important transition in my life. The church isn't some other generation's responsibility—it isn't somebody else's business. I have to take responsibility. I have to be passionate and committed to it. Through the pages of this book I'm calling my generation to do the same. -Joshua Harris

Once again, he says it all in the title. With the exception of my friend Andy, who has been part of the same church for years, most of us wandered from church to church in our younger years. We actually embraced the fact that they were the wandering years of our lives. I havent read Joshua's newest book, and being on the other side of the globe I might never get to read it, but it's not hard to see this is my generation's new challenge: Dig In.

If there is hypocrosy, weakness, dullness, whatever-ness in the church we have a choice. We can continue to "break up" with our churches when things aren't what we want and move on to something easier, something new and sexy, but that road leads to dirty old men, set in their hypocrisies. Isn't that what we had problems with in the first place? Or we can dig in, we can follow God and impact our brothers and sisters around us to do the same.

Many of us are still young, still prone to run, but it is time to dig those heals in and make the church our family, not a one-night stand.

Tags:

• church

Albert Pujols with Dr. James Dobson :: Podcast

Barry Bonds. Terrell Owens. Kobe Bryant. As spectacular as it may be to watch them hit baseballs, catch footballs or play basketball, these names don't immediately bring to mind ideas of high character. In fact, there are personalities in all sports whose names leave a sour taste in our mouths. But here's one to encourage us:

Albert Pujols.

The Dominican kid who became the Major League MVP and who, despite fame and fortune, values his family, marriage and faith in Christ. If you have an MP3 player, or if you just want to listen on your computer, take the time to listen to Focus on the Family's Dr. James Dobson and his conversations with Albert and Dee Dee Pujols:

Podcast Part 1 :: Podcast Part 2

Tags:

• baseball
• family

Now that's Amazing

It's a quiet morning in the village (except for little Mi-Yo making her presence known to the world by using our bamboo platform as a trampoline). We are waiting for an Akha Foursquare friend of ours to come visit. In the relatively peaceful morning I caught up on some tech news and found an amazing article. It seems that the sharpest object in the world has been made - and at the tip of the 'needle' it is one atom wide.

Tags:

• science

Accountability from the People

I have been frustrated by News coverage from the United States. CNN has become absurdly liberal while FoxNEWS has responded with equally unbalanced conservative bias. I have found that local news is often the best source for actual news, but it's hard to get local coverage from everywhere in the world. That's why organizations such as the Associated Press and Reuters exist.

If I thought we had problems in the U.S. - I'm shocked by news sources around the world. Currently I get my news through an RSS feed which combines dozens of world news sources. I am often sickened by the direction that the world is going... so quick to shout out injustices but unwilling to get their hands dirty actually helping people.

The point of this post, however, is that the people of the world are gaining the voice to combat the propaganda that news sources, governments and, yes, even Google (so much for 'don't be evil') throw our way. This voice is rising from the world of blogs, or blogosphere. No longer just for radicals, tech people and anti-whatever sites (though many of these do still exist), legitimate news and accountability sources are growing throughout the Blogosphere.

The most notable recent case, which has been dubbed Reutersgate, is regarding the current war between Israel and the Hezbolah. The good folk at Little Green Footballs have uncovered doctored photographs by a "news photographer" which were falsified to invoke sympathy for the Labanese in this war.

Now, we have all seen various photographs by email accompanied with the thrilling tale of "how lucky I was that my kids were distracted by the friendly neighborhood polar bear rather than playing in the park behind my home when terrorists blew up the gas line... send this to 10 friends and you will have good luck too"
These images are generally harmless, even entertaining, but when photographs doctored by a Reuters journalist are being sold as real world news a dangerous line has been crossed, and there must be a standard of accountability.

This is where the Blogosphere has responded, and since the Little Green Footballs discovery there has been a real fallout throughout the press regarding this war. According to Sherra Claire Frenkel of the Jerusalem Post:

Photographs whose veracity has been questioned by blogs in the past few weeks since Reutersgate began include:

Two pictures used by The Associated Press and Reuters, in which the same woman appeared to be crying over the destruction of her Beirut home. Distinguished by a red-checkered scarf and scar on her right cheek, the woman was pictured crying in front of two different locations two weeks apart.

Several photographs of a bombed bridge in Beirut which appear on Reuters and AFP with the different captions stating that the bridge had been bombed on July 18, July 24 and August 5. Bloggers claim that the striking image was photographed to look like several different bombings in order to make destruction in Beirut appear more severe.

In The New York Times photo essay "Attack on Tyre," a photograph of a man who appears dead is accompanied with the caption reading "bodies were still buried under the rubble." However, in a later photograph in the same series, the same man appears to be walking in the foreground of a photo. The Times issued a correction for the first photograph, stating that the man was injured.

We can only hope that scrutiny like this will push press coverage further into journalistic integrity, reporting the news and not creating it.

Tags:

• worldview

Some Humble Corrections

It's been a while since my voice broke through the noise that is the World Wide Web (2.0) and out of the silence comes a whimper of little-valued observations.

No not on life, or grief. Those were dealt with in our newsletter. Not about spiritual observations or even technology and computing (although maybe I should - the most popular page on our site is a computing article I wrote). No, this is a look back at a look forward.

I'm writing about Baseball. During spring training I wrote a short article prognosticating (yes, I believe that is a word) the 2006 MLB season. Well I made a mistake or two. So, in light of the American League clinching the home field advantage (once again) by winning the 2006 All-Star game in the 9th inning, here are some humble corrections to my original thoughts:

(Original) Best Gimmick: This one is easy. The Gateway Grizzleys (minor league) of Illinois have released what they claim is the Baseball's Best Burger. It is a combination of two things we just can't get in Thailand - a good old American Hamburger and Krispy Kreme doughnuts (Burger King has nothing to do with this promotion, I just thought the image would look good - plus McDonalds has had some rough publicity lately). Although I can't say I particularly find this combination very appealing, it is uniquely American.

(Revised) Best Gimmick: Come on, can you really beat the Gateway Grizzlies' (yes, I had misspelled it before) Doughnut-Burger?!? I don't think so. However, I am willing to give a well-you-tried-award to the Golden Baseball League who have embraced the juiced up king of the B-rated superstars Jose Canseco, asking him to pitch in their All-Star game. I'm sure there wasn't a young deserving player who could have been there.

(Original) Biggest Newcomers: I have to name two here. The most exciting up-and-coming teams in baseball are the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Milwaukee Brewers. I don't think either make the playoffs this year, but they will be fun to watch.

(Revised) Biggest Newcomer: Boy did I hit this one on the head. Neither of those teams will make the playoffs. Although Milwaukee has been a mildly entertaining product this year the Pittsburgh Pirates are challenging the perennial celler-dweller Kansas City Royals as the worst spectator product in Major League Baseball. But it is the Detroit Tigers who have taken the baseball world by storm. Coasting through the AL this could be a 100-game team. Who'd have thought? I can hear children in the streets of Michigan singing: "We're all behind our baseball team, Go get'm Tigers!" Prediction: this team loses (despite home field advantage) to the AL wild-card team. Prove me wrong Detroit, I still don't believe.

(Original) Best of the AL: Again two must be named, the teams to beat will be the Yankees and the Los Angeles Angels.

(Revised) Best of the AL: I hate to say it, but the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees will play for the pennant again. Sorry Detroit, no love here. I am holding out hope that Abreu can pull the Yankees through until they get their 5 injured starters healthy, because if he cannot the pennant is Boston's to lose.

(Original) Best of the NL: Hands-down the St. Louis Cardinals. No one else is in their league.

(Revised) Best of the NL: Hands-down the New York Mets. St. Louis will have to prove it in the postseason.

If you made it down to here, you really love me (or you are also a Yankees fan). Here's hoping for another subway series and the first Asian World Series MVP, get well soon Godzilla!

Tags:

• baseball