Journaling
September 2, 2010
School is going and I have met with my first two classes with another tonight and my cohort next week. I have fewer students than normal this term since both of my evening classes are smaller. I like that since it means I can get to know the students better.
We did the Hood to Coast again last weekend with me driving van one: six runners, three legs of about six miles each down Mt. Hood to Sandy, from Portland to Scappose and Mist to the Rock Quarry in the wilds of NW Oregon (pictures here.) We had excellent time in the van with lots of conversation ranging from silly jokes to deeply significant wrestling. You can imagine which I prefer! We finished our legs about 9:00 am Saturday, drove to Astoria for triumphant breakfast at Pig ‘N Pancake and then back to Portland. In the meantime Elizabeth (Lizzy) had arrived at our house. Susan was in town for the weekend but had to go to LA for a funeral so we got Elizabeth for 24 hours. Sherry brought her to the seminary and we left right away to go to Cannon Beach to spend the evening with Cyndee. More driving wasn’t exactly what the doctor ordered but we had a great time. I got these “glamour pictures” of her Sunday morning.
Sherry’s Mom is having knee surgery on the 10th, so Sherry is going back to Arkansas for a week, leaving Thursday the 9th and returning Wednesday. Her knee replacement will be Sept. 27, a big process. We have the instruction class next Tuesday so I can be a good support for her.
I continue to work with some super gnarly situations. It’s such a challenge when I don’t know what I’m doing. But then the professionals don’t either! So we team together and pray a lot. I have been working with one reconcilation which came to culmination last week. As I left the seminary, 20 minutes after the 2 1/2 hour evening session, they were chatting happily in the parking lot, a most joyful sight. I also am doing pre-marital with Paul and Kacy. She just graduated and they are a marvelous couple. It’s a joy to work with them to build the most godly for their life as one foundation possible.
August 23, 2010
It’s been a SUPER busy summer. I’ve put some of the stuff on the main page or Facebook (I decided to open most of my FB stuff including status updates and pictures to friends of friends): Grand Canyon, Alaska, Fishing vacation with Cyndee and such. But there’s been a lot more that’s gone unjournaled. I just got back from ETS Exec Committee in Louisville, KY. I spend Saturday afternoon through Sunday with Gregg and Nora Allison before flying back. It was great to catch up with them. It’s been seven years after they left Western for Southern. It’s amazing how quickly time with these kinds of friends goes deep. I sure like that. But the traveling has gotten really old. I’m super glad it’s over. No more until November when I go to ETS and then back through Kansas City for football with Donn, Susan and Elizabeth.
Sherry is counting down to knee replacement: Sept. 27. She has lost more than 70 pounds and still going. I’m around 50 and stablizing. But I have popped out a hernia, so I’ll be getting repaired soon. The doctor’s appointment is tomorrow. I hope it will be soon. The hernia belt helps, but it’s still painful and awkward. Getting old! The nurses keep being surprised that I’m not on any medications. That I’m glad for.
Faculty retreat tomorrow and then our sex trafficking conference Wednesday. Steve and Celestia Tracy are coming up for that and will stay with us. I’m looking forward to more time with them. Then new student orientation and Hood to Coast Friday-Saturday and school starts Monday. Whew!
David and Tadmor separated about a month ago. Not sure what all happened, but I think it was around his lack of supervisory skills. In any case, he’s taken a job at Safeway in Pendleton, OR. They’ll be moving there soon. It’s near her family who live in Hermiston, so Max and Marianne are happy. He’s coming through tonight to have supper with Sherry and me. It will be good to catch up live vs. phone.
July 3, 2010
We are in Phoenix for Liz (Sherry’s sister) and Tom’s vow renewal on their 20th anniversary. Donn and Elizabeth joined us for the family time. It’s been super hot, 114 yesterday, going through 105 while we were at the zoo yesterday morning. (pictures here.) I really enjoy hanging with smaller groups of family and of course, the smallest is Elizabeth (Lizzie, she prefers). Going to the zoo with her is a different fun than last week’s trip with Joy (pictures here.) The absolute delight of an almost 3 year old is contagious. She is very curious and pretty adventrous for her age. And she loves to play with grandpa.
Yesterday afternoon and evening was at Liz’s house with family coming in. Tom’s mother lives with them. His sister and his brother and his wife arrived and then John and Shirley, Sherry’s brother and sister in law. As the group got bigger, the conversation got more superfacial and insider oriented. It’s interesting for me to watch my reaction. I can do OK with watching World Cup with Donn, mostly because it’s Donn. I am completely into significant conversation. So talking with John about what it is like to have his wife be discovered to have lung cancer, do surgery, chemo, and now radiation really grips me. I would like to have dug in deeper and he was very willing to go there. But we got interrupted and the group conversations took over, with food and furniture plans for today’s renewal reviewed the fifth time (at least — Liz enjoys planning). Then the supper time conversation was completely superfacial. John enjoyed both levels. I can only enjoy the deeper levels. I simply don’t know how to do the superfacial level stuff. Of course no one is interested in what I think or do. Maybe that’s a part, but I don’t think so. I never expect that will be so except for a few like souls. Before I left Portland, Dave and I were having one of our regular talks and he asked me about some missionary friends who are returning. There are lots of things around that. It was typical that he probed in. But it left me with stuff up front which is quite painful. So I was no company for Sherry for most of the time of our trip down to Phoenix. Make me wonder what’s lacking in me. I don’t know and sure don’t know how to fix it. So thinking of today’s time there is mostly not a happy anticipation, unfortunately.
I hear Lizzie in the next room, so it’s time to go join them while Sherry sleeps. She’s not feeling good, unfortunately.
June 22, 2010
I was working with a couple who have a super soul tie but some major landmines in their relationship. As I was listening to them work through an issue, he said something about thinking about beautiful things. My mind immediately went to a most favorite passage:
Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think on these things.
That’s Phil. 4:8, of course. It has been a focus for a long time. I realize with all the heavy stuff I deal with, it’s important to keep that up front. When I’m dealing with lies, infidelity, domestic violence, and all that constantly, keeping noble, true (pure), lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy things there will help balance it a lot.
We have this passage cross stitched by a friend and framed hanging above our dining room table. It should be in front of my computer screen!
Sherry is having a great time in Kansas City with Donn, Susan and Elizabeth. They went to Dallas for my niece’s wedding so she got to be with Ann, my sister and her whole family. Elizabeth saw Stephanie coming down the aisle and whispered to Susan, “Is that a princess?” Indeed she was! So while she is gone, I’m doing house husband stuff. Last night I installed a second ceiling fan, this one in our bedroom. It would have been more fun to be doing this with my friend. But it is up and whirls without doing sparks, which is very good!
June 16, 2010
My time at the Acton Institute has been informative and interesting on the whole, but not transforming until tonight’s session with Immaculée Ilibagiza. I wish you could hear her live, but if that’s impossible, her story is here.
She was a college student in Rwanda who was hidden in a 3 foot by 4 foot bathroom along with 6 other women for 91 days while the genocide was raging there. She went in a bright, vibrant 115 pound college student and came out a 65 pound orphan. As she told her story of all the emotions running through her and how she was able to come to the point to forgive the man who murdered her family, I was overwhelmed. I would find it impossible to believe except that she cannot be disbelieved as she tells the story. It came through her Christian faith and especially in the ministry of the Rosary that her father had given her as he sent her into hiding.
The agony of her locked in a tiny bathroom for 91 days with horror at cruelty and impending death combined with deep rage mixed with despair connected with where some of the people I work with live. That she could ever be free was an impossible hope through the endless days as it is with some of those trapped in their own horrors. But now she is through the power of her Christian faith.
Her final charge to us was this: if you are in a place where being right conflicts with being kind, always choose to be kind. I don’t want to be in that place, since I want both truth and kind. But if I have to choose, I want to choose kind.
I think of what it took for her to forgive, but I also think what it took for the one who killed her family to repent and come to the point where he could receive her forgiveness. With that in mind, I refuse to give up hope no matter whether I am the helper or the one who has caused hurt. But I am also “realistic” knowing that things take a very long time, as long as 91 days in a tiny bathroom.
June 10, 2010
June is usually time to host returning missionaries. Sherry and I enjoy that so much, especially when they are close friends. Alas, it is not so this year, which is a big loss. We are hosting three NorCal Western guys up for an enrollment team meeting. And wouldn’t you know it, our water heater blew up hours before they arrived! Why do inanimate objects know when to do that?? We were hosting a missionary family in our Mt. Tabor house when the sewer line clogged. And I mean CLOGGED. I felt privileged to serve them by hand emptying their toilets. It was a John 13 type service, I think. But not one I’d choose, all things being equal. It’s odd how things can hit me. I arranged with Doug to return some borrowed things to a returning missionary family and the sadness attacked me. Someone sent me a 2 minute clip of Glen Beck completely misidentifying the Dead Sea scrolls which sent me into a rant (which is why I don’t listen to political talk). Sherry’s sadness with not working and seeing the tightness of finances with water heaters and carpenter ants draws me to her strongly. Strange.
May 25, 2010
Today is the day of my surgery. They will repair a Zenker’s Diverticula. You can see a picture of it here. The picture isn’t me, by the way! But it’s what I saw when they did the barium swallow. I am now on nothing by mouth until surgery time. We check in at 6 am. I don’t know if the procedure will be the oral procedure or the incision in my neck. It depends on how deep it is. Dr. Iuga, the surgeon, wasn’t sure as she looked at the xray films. It’s right on the borderline. So I’ll find out what happened when I wake up, I suppose.
Sherry and I had a “last meal” at Sizzler since I’ll be on clear liquid diet for a week following the surgery. There’s not much chance of the thing perforating, but the doctor wants to be very sure nothing goes bad. I appreciate her conservatism even if I’m not looking forward to the extreme diet. I’ve already lost 45 pounds on Medifast. I don’t need a faster loss.
I woke up after a couple of hours of sleeping with my head running. Not on the surgery but on a couple of really nasty pastoral things I”m involved, one of them just coming up on Monday (that’s today back, by the way. The surgery is today forward. Strange). So prayer work in the night hours. I do need to sleep, so I’m doing this and then I’ll head back.
So back to bed.
May 19, 2010
Donn posted a video of Lizzie in her first experience witha violin. Watch here and tell me if you think this 2 1/2 year old has talent.
Carl’s surgery went well as expected. Now we wait to see what the status of the cancer is. Really praying that it is minimal, but for some reason I don’t have good feelings about this. I don’t trust those feelings at all, but they are still there.
My own surgery to fix the pouch in my esophagus is coming up next Tuesday. I am glad for that. I am really tired of the phlegm in my throat all the time. I was taping a piece for a CLL class and had to stop and swallow constantly as the phlegm kept coming up. It’s not always that bad, fortunately. I find myself doing a lot of option planning. It might not happen. It might be oral, stapling the pouch shut and not too impacting beyond the effects of the general. The pouch could be deeper and she’ll have to do the incision in my neck and resect the esophagus and take the pouch out completely. That could really slow me down, which I don’t like, obviously.
Sunday’s sermon at Grace on 1 Cor. 8 and 10 is taking a lot of energy. But it is coming together. I’ll blog on it later this weeek.
May 15, 2010
May 14 is a Valentine’s Day so Sherry and I went on a Willamette Rive Cruise compliment of the Family Wealth Institute. The leader is a co-member of the Pregnancy Resource Centers of Portland Board. The guy who invited me is a fellow who also works in Marketplace Ministries. The day was one of the most beautiful of all Portland days. The food was very good (Cajun but only one spicy dish) and the company pleasant. I like doing things with my valentine!
Off to an all day elders’ on another beautiful day. Sigh! Then Sherry and I will go with another couple to see the movie, “Babies.” It’s a no commentary picture of the first year of four babies: San Francisco, Tokoyo, Nepal and Namibia. Intriguing!
May 1, 2010
I’ve been working all day on my sermon for tomorrow. It’s been a long time project. 1 Cor. 7:1-7 is a tough passage. It’s one of those chapters I’ve long said, I need to get this figured out. Did Paul really think we’d all be better off single? If so, why the positive marriage passages and why is marriage the norm for elders? I’m still not fully sure. But it is clear to me that verse 1 (it is better for a man not to touch a woman) is not his own teaching, but rather the Corinthian muddle. The mutuality of the relationship there is amazing, as is the very straight forward expression of the importance and pleasure of love making in marriage. I like that, of course. But getting all that I want to say into a single sermon is a challenge!
I came up for a lunch break and was looking out in the beauty of our back yard when I heard the unmistakeable sound of four or five shots. They weren’t close or it would really have freaked me out. Later Sherry was at the Salvation Army store at 116th and Halsey. I went up to help her pick out our new dining room hutch and transport it home. As I came home, I saw the police car blocking 122nd and then the bus that really blocked it. Wondered if it was connected to the shooting, and indeed it was. The news told of an apparently gang related shooting near 122nd and Glisan. Someone dropped the victim off at Portland Adventist before disappearing. The shooter seems to be holed up in an apartment on 122nd. A little nerve wracking since that just a half mile away. Story at 10!
We had our Grace missions banquet last night. It was primarily a fundraiser but we also had some singers, dancers, and speakers from various nations. I brought Eyesau Malsamo from Ethiopia. He’s finished his D.Miss. and headed back home after not seeing his family for 18 months. Pretty eager! His stories of the commitment of the Ethipian people were very engaging. I had no idea there were only 48 converts when SIM was kicked out of the country. When they came back a decade later, there were 10,000 Christians. Now there are 6.5 millions with 400% growth from 1995 to 2007. Eyesau said they should have more! It’s his job to train evangelists who will train lay people. As he outlined the strategies, I was amazed. I may teach there next summer.
April 22, 2010
Graduation is this weekend which means all sorts of papers to grade, and processes to finish up as well as celebrating accomplishment of the students. This will be my 30th Western commencement which is quite amazing. There are so many stories in the students’ lives. I wish I could tell some of them here, but that will be the privilege of six of them at the commencement banquet tomorrow.
I am at the 35 poound point in the weight loss so the goal is in site. The bigger goal of supporting Sherry in her loss will continue, but in a different way. Gotta figure that out.
I preached 1 Cor 15:5-58 at Grace on Sunday. It was one of the more powerful sermons I’ve ever done, which is amazing since I only got the assignment a couple of weeks in advance and had to push really hard in a very busy season to get it prepared. Now I am back to pondering 7:1-7 and the questions of marriage vs. singleness and the place of sex in marriage. LOTS that has to be right!
Helping people find cleansing is a big part of my ministry. I had the cool deal of helping a woman who had been abused as a child and then being there as she helped her Mom cleanse from a very similar experience. In both cases there was the abuse joined to a curse, a bad word, aimed at them by well meaning people. The basic of the curse was “this didn’t happen, you are lying.” When the women received the curse, it messed them up as badly as the abuse. I helped them confess (speak about), reject and restore, using Word and prayer. I need to blog it sometime.
Paper grading and senior grades by noon today!