Some thoughts from a book I’m reading. It’s Erwin McManus’ book Seizing Your Divine Moment : Dare to live a life of adventure, and I’ve only just started it. But a couple of quotes from a chapter called Initiative: Just Do Something:

We have put so much emphasis on avoiding evil that we have become virtually blind to the endless opportunities for doing good. We have defined holiness through what we separate ourselves from rather than what we give ourselves to. I am convinced that the great tragedy is not the sins that we commit, but the life that we fail to live.

And:

When we react, life invades our space, intrudes on our comfort, interrupts our apathy, and forces us to respond. But to react is different than to act. We react when we are forced out of neutrality. We act when we refuse to stay there.

I think this addresses a large part of my life, I’m ashamed to say. First, I think there’s no doubt that, perhaps due to the church I grew up in, I often defined my Christianity by what I don’t do. Don’t curse, don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t this, don’t that. Avoiding the appearance of evil, I suppose. But too often avoiding the appearance of doing good, as well. Mostly just doing nothing.

And second, reacting has been the norm more than acting. More often than not, only when forced to will I act. Some of that, I believe, goes back to some of the things I mentioned regarding fear. But not always. Sometimes it’s a concious choice to not act, to not do the things I know I should, to see good that could be done, and choose to look the other way. He also mentions this well-known verse, which is always hard to hear:

“Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.” James 4:17 (NLT)

I think this is going to likely be both a challenging book, as well as a convicting book at times, and I look forward to reading more of it. I’ll likely be posting more out of it as well.

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Back homeAs I’ve said, we recently moved back to Little Rock from Alabama, a land which, sadly, is almost completely unfamililar with the great sport of basketball. It was 4 years ago today that we moved over to Huntsville, and it’s pretty much football 12 months a year. Sure, there’s some NASCAR talk, too, which is about as exciting to me as watching golf or CSPAN. A lot has changed in 4 years - we have a new son now, who was born in Huntsville, and my daughter is now in 1st grade. I’ve managed to increase my waistline, which wasn’t really that hard. It’s been much harder to decrease it, I can tell you. Little Rock itself has changed a fair amount as well. But there is so much that’s familiar. We enjoyed living in a foreign land for a while, but it’s good to be back home.

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One thing you need to know if you don’t already: as for me, when it comes to the sports world, Duke basketball is king.

You will notice this soon, as this blog will likely contain a large number of posts on college basketball, from November to April. Most of them will be related to Duke basketball, and probably several taking shots at Carolina, Roy Williams and Dean Smith (yes, he’s been gone 8 years, but I still have to make an unkind remark or two about him every year). There are so many names from through the years - Dawkins, Amaker, Bilas, Alarie, Ferry, Laettner, Hurley, T Hill, G Hill, Parks, Collins, Wojciechowski, Langdon, Brand, Battier, J Williams, Boozer, Dunleavey, Duhon, S Williams, Redick - and the one name that matters most - Krzyzewski. And college basketball fans will never forget the greatest game ever played - Duke vs Kentucky, March 28, 1992 - and the classic finish as Christian Laettner hit the game-winning shot - the second time he’d done so in a regional final. I still find it unfathomable that there are so many people out there that hate Duke basketball. There is clearly only one explanation - they’re stupid.

There’s nothing better than a Duke-Carolina game, though, and I was thrilled to find out a couple of years ago that a book was in the works chronicling the Duke-Carolina rivalry. It was originally due in the fall of last year, I believe, but never showed up. Well, I just thought to check on it today and found the date to be set for November 1 of this year. I’m beside myself. And you might as well be prepared to listen to Dick Vitale talk about his book all season long. You know it’s going to happen, and there’s no way you can stop him (not that you should.)

So, as a warning: come early November, I’ll be reading, and likely posting on, Art Chansky’s new book, Blue Blood - Duke-Carolina : Inside the Most Storied Rivalry in College Hoops. (Click on the link and you can read the first chapter).

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I don’t watch much network TV, unless it’s sports, but one show I do watch is Lost. The season two premiere was last night and it was great to have it back on with new episodes. I just happened to see the pilot a year ago, and haven’t missed an episode yet. It’s probably a close 2nd to being my favorite show (behind USA’s Monk). And those are about the only 2 shows I watch regularly.

Season one is on DVD now. If you haven’t watched it, go rent it this weekend and watch them all, so you can start watching season two. It’s the best network show on right now.

And while you’re at it, Monk seasons 1, 2 and 3 are also on DVD. You should be watching it, too.

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Dr. Phil

By the way, here’s something I’ve been wondering about Dr. Phil: Who the hell is this guy? I saw him on television again last night. He’s constantly on TV telling people how they’re screwing up their lives and what to do about it, or pushing some book he’s written. Why should anyone listen to him? What’s he ever done? Why is he famous? The only thing I can figure out is that people listen to him (and have thus made him famous) because Oprah said to. And don’t even get me started on Oprah…

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So, I hear we’re going back to the moon. I find space travel pretty fascinating, and think it would be pretty cool - that is, if it was aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise or one of those Imperial Star Destroyers. But regarding going back to the moon, I have one primary question: Why?

The cost is supposed be roughly $104 billion. Granted, it’s over 13 years or so, but still - could we not find a better use for $104 billion than flying back up to the moon and looking around? It reminds me of one of Jerry Seinfeld’s bits about the motor vehicle they drove around up there before:

“What are we doing with a car on the moon? You’re on the moon - isn’t that far enough? There’s no more male idea in the history of the universe than ‘Let’s fly up to the moon and drive around.’”

I’m sure there are good scientific reasons that we should go back to the moon. I probably wouldn’t buy any of them, but I’m sure they exist. The thing is, how much more important is that than other problems that exist HERE? I mean, are we going to find something on the moon to cure cancer or AIDS, or to assist the poor and homeless in getting their lives back together, or to stop the seemingly endless onslaught of bad ‘reality’ television shows upon the American public? Somehow I don’t think so.

I would be more supportive, perhaps, if we were going to take some folks up there and leave them there for good. Osama bin Laden, Michael Jackson and the cast of Friends come to mind. But I suspect there’s got to be a better use for $104 billion than flying up to the moon. Does this seem unnecessary to anyone else?

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I still remember that Sunday morning. Eight years ago today. We rarely got a phone call while we were getting ready to head off to church. But a friend called that morning. She, like myself, loved Rich Mullins‘ music. She had heard the news, and was passing it along to us. Rich had been killed in an auto accident on Friday night.

I saw Rich in concert for the first time in 1991. I wasn’t even a fan at the time, but had heard “Awesome God” on the radio and liked it, so I thought I’d give it a shot. I was living in Memphis at the time and went to a lot of concerts during the 2 years I lived there. Rich, however, was not like everybody else.

The first thing I noticed was that he wasn’t as “pretty” as everyone else. Christian music was starting to take off about that time, becoming more and more popular, and the artists were looking pretty polished and professional. Rich, on the other hand, was anything but polished. He looked like he’d not bathed in a few days, and as if he may have just rolled out of bed, pulled some clothes out of the dirty clothes basket, and then walked onstage (barefoot, I might add). He looked like he might not own much more than he was wearing.

The concert was nothing fancy, just Rich, Beaker and a few other musicians. Rich impressed me by playing 5 different insturments that night - and playing them well. I was wishing I could just play one. He also impressed me because he didn’t talk like other Christian artists, with pleasant little song intros that made you feel good. He talked more like a real person would talk to you. And he made you feel uncomfortable, convicted, making you think about what it means to follow Jesus, in a way you didn’t hear other artists talk. That’s one of the reasons I grew to love his music and his example so much.

His work with Compassion International, especially in his last few years with the Navajo children on a reservation near Window Rock, Arizona, was another way Rich impressed me. I heard a lot of Christian artists talk about their work with CI, and I’m sure they did good work, but Rich is the only artist I know of who left his home to live among Compassion children and teach them. He had moved to the Navajo reservation in 1995 to teach music and the Bible to the children there. He was not just a sponsor in another part of the world sending money every month. He genuinely loved people and wanted to do more than provide from afar for these children. He wanted to live with them and serve them. That reminds me a lot of Someone else who left His home to live among those He loved so much. In a CCM magazine interview, Rich once said “I hope that I would leave a legacy of joy, a legacy of real compassion because I think there is a great joy in compassion. I don’t think that you can know joy apart from caring deeply about people - caring enough to actually do something.”

Rich was one of those people who doesn’t come along very often. I, along with many others, were truly blessed by his short time here, and continue to be blessed with the legacy he’s left behind.

One of my favorite lyrics of his is from the song “If I Stand”:

So if I stand let me stand on the promise
That you will pull me through
And if I can’t, let me fall on the grace
That first brought me to You
And if I sing let me sing for the joy
That has born in me these songs
And if I weep let it be as a man
Who is longing for his home

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Switchfoot is one of my very favorite bands, so obviously I was looking forward to their new release this week, Nothing Is Sound. They seem to have gotten better with every album released, although I was not expecting such this time around. Their last, The Beautiful Letdown, was one of those albums that you point to and say, “That’s their best, and they’ll never top it.” I consider albums like U2’s The Joshua Tree in that category.

However, this is still a great album, and very likely close to being as good as Letdown. After only a few listens, it’s evident that this will be, like Letdown, one of my favorite albums of the year, and favorite albums in my collection as well. I’m not a music critic and won’t try to officially review the disc, because I’m not good at that. But I will tell you that you should drop what you’re doing, and run out and buy it immediately.

Track Listing:
1. Loney Nation
2. Stars
3. Happy Is A Yuppie Word
4. The Shadow Proves The Sunshine
5. Easier Than Love
6. The Blues
7. The Setting Sun
8. Politicians
9. Golden
10. The Fatal Wound
11. We Are One Tonight
12. Daisy

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I heard this story yesterday. I’m sure there similar stories around the country right now. A couple posed as hurricane victims and not only managed to get $2000 of aid from FEMA, but even went as far as to move in with a couple near Little Rock who was offering homeless victims a place to stay. It’s not unexpected, I suppose, but it still makes you angry that someone would go this far to take advantage of a horrible situation.

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So, yesterday a district judge in San Francisco ruled that children reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in public school is unconstitutional. He actually said that reciting the pledge “violates school children’s right to be ‘free from a coercive requirement to affirm God’”. This was a case brought on by Michael Newdow, an athiest who’s already lost one case attempting to ban the pledge. So now religious and family organizations are all up in arms and planning appeals.This doesn’t really affect me for two reasons. First, I’m not in California, and unless the Supreme Court rules the same, it won’t affect me (at least I think that’s correct.) Secondly, my daughter is now in a private Christian school.

I used to get a little more worked up about things like this. I remember in 91 or 92 there was a case, which I believe upheld previous rulings preventing prayer in public schools, or something like that. I remember thinking it was terrible that such a thing had happened. I used to be more into the ‘America is a Christian nation’ thing, but I’m not so convinced of that now. I don’t think you can dispute that many of the founders were religious and many things were done based on Christian principles, but I’m not sure they were promising prayer in school and reciting pledges until the end of time. Besides, with the way things change (and are changing), Christianity could very possibly be a minority religion in the future.

I’ve seen Newdow on TV before, back when he lost his previous case. I guess part of me thinks he should get a life. Is this the best thing he has to do with his time? Are large numbers of children with athiest parents being converted to Christianity due to repeated recitations of the pledge of allegiance? I find that hard to believe. I guess I don’t see myself (were I an athiest) being as offended by it as he is. But maybe I can’t fully see his point of view.

I’m as concerned as the next guy about the possilibity of religious liberty being taken away. But I think there are times when it’s unjustly taken away and times when it’s not. Removing public prayer from schools or prohibiting ‘under God’ in the pledge does not strike me as unfair, considering public school does not exist for religious teaching or activity. On the other hand, a child prohibited from writing a paper on Jesus or bringing a Bible to school is going too far (and I’ve heard these and similar stories before).

So, I guess, in the end, this is not a great concern from me. God is still God, even if children aren’t reciting the pledge in school and no matter how often Michael Newdow tries to say he’s not there.

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Well, Agassi could not quite pull it off. He played another great match in the semi’s to knock off Genepri, but Federer, as expected, was just too much. He held on up until the tiebreak in the 3rd, and it seemed Federer just jumped to another level to win it in four sets. I noticed a curious statement by Agassi after the match - something about playing the Open 20 times and how “it’s been a great ride”. It made me wonder if he was saying that the ride is over. I guess we’ll know before too long. Regardless, it’s also been a great ride for tennis fans. Watching Agassi play over the years has been a real treat, and when he’s done, like so many before (Connors, McEnroe, and Becker come to mind for me personally), he will definitely be missed. Thanks, Andre.

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Why is it that people can’t follow simple instructions?? I go to my daughter’s school every weekday to drop her off. They gave everyone a map at the beginning of the year to demonstrate the proper flow of traffic in the parking lot. And yet so many of these people either cannot read or just don’t care. They pretty much do what they want. It frustrates me every day, but none more than the last two days I’ve been, when (1) I almost got hit twice by people ignoring the rules (not to mention common sense) and (2) I got blocked in my parking space today for a good 30 seconds (which is longer than it sounds when you’re trying to get to work) because people had backed up the drop-off line down the wrong row of spaces. I know I shouldn’t get so frustated, but I hate driving as it is. Having other people doing stupid things just makes it worse. A friend once was filling out a survey in which he recorded his pet peeve as “bad drivers.” I told him that wasn’t enough for me - my pet peeve was not just bad drivers, but other drivers.

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There are events in the world every now and then that are so significant that people always remember where they were when they first heard. I’ve always heard peope talk about where they were when President Kennedy was shot. The first one I remember was hearing of the death of Elvis - I’d been jumping on Nelson Peacock’s trampoline and when I got home, my mom told me. Not exactly the president, and I was 10, so it didn’t profoundly affect me, but for some reason I’ve always remembered that.I was in the same place - our family room - a few years later after school when I heard that President Reagan had been shot. I walked into the Student Center at Harding University in 1986 to find a large crowd gathered around a television, and moments later found out the reason was that the space shuttle had exploded. I remember being home sick one day in 1999 and turning on CNN, only to see footage of poeple fleeing Columbine high school in Littleton, CO.

Four years ago yesterday, my wife and I did not follow our normal routine on one Tuesday morning. Nearly every morning, we turn on ABC and Good Morning America, which tells us a little of what’s going on in the world. For some reason, we didn’t that day. Instead, when I got to work, I found a large group of people gathered around a television on my floor. The television was showing footage of one of the World Trade Center towers with smoke pouring out of the side. As the events unfolded that day, more and more information came. But the image that still sticks with me, even more so than later footage that showed the planes crashing into the building, was watching live footage as the first tower collapsed. That was something I’ll never forget.

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Being a tennis player and fan, I’ve always loved the grand slams. I used to watch more tennis in years past, but now I pretty much limit it to the grand slams. And while Wimbledon, with all of its tradition, is the most celebrated, my favorite has always been the U.S. Open.

Perhaps one of the reasons is that I always get to see more of it. The French and Wimbledon don’t play at night, so their matches are over by early afternoon here. Even if they did, they’d still likely be over before I got home from work. The Austrailian is usually on late at night due to the greater time difference, so I don’t watch much of that. But the U.S. Open is always on primetime on USA Network for 2 weeks (as well as on CBS daytime on the weekends), so I get to see a lot of tennis in early September.

There always seems to be one special match that stands out every year. One of the all time greats was a night match between then 39-year-old Jimmy Connors and Aaron Krickstein in 1991. They bring it up every year during the Open, even 14 years later.

I thought I’d already seen the best match this year, in the 5-set match between Davide Sanguinetti & Paradorn Srichaphan, in which the final 3 sets went to tiebreaks before Sanguinetti finally won. It was another classic night match at the U.S. Open. But it only took a few days to top it.

They’ve mentioned the Connors-Krickstein more than usual this year because of Andre Agassi. Agassi, at age 35, could be the first man at 35 or over to reach the semis since Connors amazing run in 1991. Agassi has, at times in recent years, looked as if he didn’t really have much left. After a first round loss at the French earlier this year, and then missing Wimbledon entirely due to injury, it seemed it might be time to retire. But after Wednesday night, tennis fans are glad he hasn’t just yet.

Blake has been playing great (including upsetting #2 seed and French Open champ Raphael Nadal) and he came out on fire Wednesday night. He was making Agassi look like he was wearing lead shoes, hitting winners past him left and right to take a two set lead, and then breaking him to lead in the third. It was about 10:30pm, and I was about to go to bed, because it looked like it was over.

Fortunately, I didn’t. Agassi turned it around, with the crowd cheering him on, and won the 3rd and 4th sets. But then Blake broke him in the final set, and it looked like Blake’s momentum - which had disappeared midway through the 3rd set - had returned, as he took a 5-3 lead. But it still wasn’t over. Agassi stormed back again and pushed it to a tiebreak. Then, shortly after midnight (central), Agassi jumped on a Blake second serve and hit a winner down the line to win the match.

Andre may not win it all in his 20th U.S. Open - we’ll see tomorrow and Sunday - but if this is his last run in New York, it will certainly be a memorable one. And I suspect from now on when they mention the Connors-Krickstein match, they’ll be mentioning Agassi-Blake right along with it.

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I stayed up past midnight (highly unusual for me these days) and watched the Andre Agassi-James Blake quarterfinal match at the U.S. Open last night, and all I can saw is “Wow!” What a great match. I’ll say more on this later…

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Thinking more about the devastation along the gulf coast, and the lives lost and displaced by Katrina, I was reminded of a quote from the movie Hotel Rwanda.First of all, let me just say this - if you haven’t seen this movie, you need to. It’s the true story of Paul Rusesabagina (played by Don Cheadle), an assistant manager at a 5-star hotel in the Rwandan capital of Kilgali. When the Hutu militia began calling for the extermination of all Tutsi’s in the spring of 1994, the Belgian owners of the hotel fled the country, leaving Paul as acting manager. All around the country, and outside the hotel gates, Hutu’s were murdering Tutsi’s at will. In the end, around 1 million people were killed, most in a matter of a few weeks. During the conflict, Paul, a Hutu, managed to house over 1,000 refugees in the hotel - mostly Tutsi, along with some Hutu’s who opposed the actions being taken against their neighbors. He also bargained with those in power to spare their lives, as well as obtain food and other supplies needed to take care of them. This movie is the story of Paul’s heroic actions.

At one point in the movie, a cameraman (played by Joaquin Phoenix) from a news crew returns from outside the hotel gates with footage of some of the massacres taking place nearby. He returns to their hotel room to show another member of the team, and starts the tape in a player. What he didn’t realize is that Paul was across the room, fulfilling a request of the other members. Later, he apologizes to Paul for having shown the film in his presence. Paul, however, said he was glad that they have the footage and glad that now people around the world will see it, and help will come. The cameraman is not so sure help will come. Paul asks how they could not come after seeing such atrocities. He responds to Paul with this: “I think if people see this footage, they’ll say, ‘Oh, my God, that’s horrible.’ And then go on eating their dinner.”

I thought of that scene as I wondered about the response people (including myself) would have to this disaster in our own country. It certainly seems that, so far, countless people are rising to the occasion here and helping their neighbors in need.

In response to Jesus instruction to “love your neighbor as you do yourself”, he was asked “And how would you define ‘neighbor’?” Jesus then tells the story of the “Good Samaritan” (Luke 10:25-37). When Jesus asks the man which of the characters in his story became a neighbor to the injured man, he replied “The one who treated him kindly.” Jesus then tells him to “go and do the same”.

We have managed a to help a little so far, and are looking for further opportunities now. I believe God calls us to act in such situations and not just “go on eating our dinner.” It’s easier, perhaps, in times like this, when everyone is rallying together because of the magnitude of this tragedy. It seems everyone is looking to help in some way. What I’m trying to keep in mind, though, is that when storms pass and those affected return to some sort of normal life, there will still be those in need, all around us. It doesn’t take a national crisis for there to be folks needing help. They were there before the storm, and will remain afterward. Who will be looking to help then? Who will be their neighbor?

“Go and do the same.”

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An additional note regarding the Rwandan conflict in 1994: for more information beyond the movie, I will highly recommend Philip Gourevitch’s book We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families : Stories from Rwanda. This is an excellent book.

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