One other little chunk of information to share....After months of planning and hours of grueling work (spread out over months of resting and procrastinating), I have almost completed my first partial piece of fine furniture.  The table top is together, screwed and glued, sanded, and most of the finish layers are applied.  For now, I hope to use the table top for my computer and relinquish the dining room table top to either wider use or storage.  The table top is made of Oak boards that I actually helped to cut down,  drag out, mill, plane and age.  After each coat of polyurethane, I get more and more excited about my accomplishment.  It's good to make stuff that looks really good.  Some day, we will have to find some legs and create a wonderful game table, but for now, I have a beautiful shiny table top that my hands had a major part of creating.  Life is still good.                             (back to top)
                   

9/10/02

   It is virtually September and it seems that nothing has changed, really.  It is hard to be faithful when faith is all there is.  I'm not complaining, mind you.  I know that compared to millions of people in this world, my life is luxurious, but firstly, I try not to work out my life on a comparison basis.  And more importantly than that, when I do get weak and begin to compare my life to anyone's, it is usually someone around me, and virtually all of the people around me, according to the world's basic standards, have tons more of the fun and easy things in life that I do right now.  Things like jobs and steady income spring to mind.  I don't generally find myself being envious of them or what they have, in fact, it comes very natural for me to celebrate with their every step of progress and benefit.  However, there are still times when my flesh gets the better of me and I get selfish.
        For example, a dear friend of mine recently changed jobs.  We were excited for him for this opportunity because it means that he will be around more and more consistently with this new job, but he told us also that he took a fairly substantial pay cut for the benefit of having a regular job with regular time for his family.  We still are celebrating that he has this much better job, but I got weak for a minute at one point and thought that I would feel like a  rich man if I could only earn what he LOST.  The amount that he lost in the job transfer, if I were to be able to  earn that much, would multiply my family's income by 18 to 20 times.         I think about things like this and I am thankful that my focus is not generally or even usually on what I don't have.  (Yes, there are times like I am experiencing right now, where my thoughts are preoccupied with money and where and when I might be able to get enough to pay my bills).  But God has always been faithful to me and my family.  I can testify that when we got to Seminary  almost five years ago now, I knew that I would not be able to work and go to school.  At that point, I was afraid, once classes actually started, that I would not even be able to even go to school. (Classes were really, really tough, and I had been out of school for 13 years).     So after a short time, my wife found a job.  It was a part time job that paid only $5.50/hour.  When she told me that she had found a job, I was excited, but when she told me the details of the job, I had to ask her one question.  It was the only question that I felt was pertinent.  I asked her, "Do you feel that you're supposed to take this job?" (in other words, do you feel like God is pointing you to work here?)  She said, "yes, I think it is the right thing to do."   That was all I needed.  Honestly.  I didn't have any trouble believing that if God had provided this job opportunity for her, and she felt confident that she was being guided to take the job, then what she made would be enough.  It turned out that it truly was enough.  At first, it was not easy, and we made some hard choices, but eventually the job grew to full time, and
the raises were regular.  God was providing for us and  by the end of my schooling, while we were by no means on top of it all, we had enough of even what we wanted that life felt very in control.
    So, here I am now, waiting for God.  Actually, if I were totally honest, I would have to wonder if God were not waiting for me to be more faithful in prayer and devotions and bible study.  But, what I mean is that I still do not have "a job" and we have a very part  time income.  According to the wisdom of the world, I am an idiot because I don't just run out and
find work.  Even according to the Christian world, I am an idiot for the same reason (which makes me very sad and frustrated).  But I do not feel any freedom to go out and find a job.  I take work when it comes, and am not "holding out for a specific job," or "keeping myself free from a daily work schedule in order to be ready to serve God."  I would honestly LOVE to go out and find a decent job, for a  decent salary, and while I could do that and remain a good
Christian, I don't feel that this is what I am "supposed" to do.   I  have been, and continue to be a servant leader in the household where I am living.  I try to do any task that I can do that will lighten the load of another member of the household.  Therefore, I cook supper almost every night, I take out the garbage  on garbage night, I take time watching my cousin's daughter so that mom can take a break from that at different times of the day, I have been working with
my wife, repairing a car that was given to my father so that he doesn't have to work all day then  come home and work on the car at night, I take trips to the store for things that we need around the house, and I watch for opportunities to take up the slack in other ways.  I think it is far more difficult to do this and be a servant leader than it would to simply find a job, but I know that God has a plan for me, and if I am faithful, and a good steward of what I have now, that I will know what that plan is, and move on each step of it when it is time.
    For now, my family and my close friends who know me (and pray for me) are confident, with me, that I am on the most excellent path according to what I know.  With that confidence, and what little faith I can keep together, I am at peace about my life.  I don't love it.  Many times I don't totally even like it, but I know that I am being faithful to what I have been asked by God to do, and that is the place that I want to be, no matter what.  If tomorrow, I felt directed to find a job, I would simultaneously find a job and prepare to hold a party with my first paycheck.  But if tomorrow I feel the same way that I do right now, I will boldly stand under the scorn and condemnation of the church and the world, knowing that if I am correct, what happens in my future will only be attributable to God's great grace and provision.  You can look at me funny if you want to.  It doesn't matter.  What matters to me is that when all is said and done, and my life is over, that what I will hear is, "Well done, good and faithful servant."  (At that point I will know that God does not like his steak bloody or even pink in the middle- assuming that my first job in heaven is barbeque chef!) !                         (back to top)

11/15/02
    Wow, does the time ever fly!  I have trouble believing that it has been almost a year since Amy and I  left Kentucky.  We finally moved home (so to speak) on November 6th from our amazing house sitting adventure that didn't seem like it would end.  We left for the North Side on Sunday, August 25th,   and when we got to the house after church, we had been given the wrong key for the house.  I should have taken that as a clue to what would come, but I just looked at it, chose to laugh about it and waited for the Realtor to come and let us in.  I really didn't plan to talk about this, and I'm not going to spend much time on this topic. I will say that while we would love for God to give us the next direction, which we pray will include provision for us to finally find a home of our own, it is SO good to be home.  Even if it's crowded, and my Internet Service Provider -Pittsburgh Connect, can't provide me with a single modem that I can connect to before midnight with any regularity, it is so wonderful to be among people who care about US, not just themselves.  It is nice to be comfortable with a lot of our own belongings.  It is also really wonderful to live in a house with cable, so that I can finally watch "Iron Chef" and Fox News again.  Our own stuff and cable are such trivial comforts in the light of eternity but to be without them for such an extended period of time really has made me very thankful for them .
        This message may contain several topics which may change at the turn of any paragraph, so hold on to your seat belts.  This first topic is the tough one.  Politics.  I have come to recognize that I tend to fit in, politically, in the place normally called conservatism.  I believe that, while no party is all that good, and people are inherently flawed anyway, I tend to believe that if people are allowed to keep most of their own money, and invest it and spend it, instead of paying way too much of it to the government, that the government would actually wind up gathering up more.  That makes sense to me on a level that I cannot easily reason out.  I guess it is much like my philosophy of dealing with behaviors, especially with children.  If you give children good solid boundaries to play within, they will first test them, then, once the edges are proven solid, they will play freely and creatively within those boundaries.  The more free space they have that is securely given limits, the more they will use the space with abandon.
           However, if you give children no boundaries, no fences, no limits, they spend all of their time trying to find what they really need, the walls, and they never wind up playing because they never know where the safe zone really is.  I can see this philosophy at work in all ages and manners of speaking.  For little kids, the boundaries need to be real and tangible, like a fenced in back yard.  As kids get older and more "reasonable," I can see the power of  setting  boundaries of time and space, but allowing freedom according to their trustworthiness, and keeping track of them that way.  For example,  in my later High School career, I got into theatre and did many productions with a local college theatre.  My parents knew me and I was honest with them, so, when it came time for odd things like all nite work (set construction) parties and cast parties, if the events weren't pushing up against more important things like school, I was often allowed to stay out all night.  The direction that I was given was that if we were going to change locations, I had to call, no matter what time, and let my parents know where I was.  They trusted me and my character, and had given me good boundaries and chances to make decisions for myself and in that,  I had shown myself trustworthy.  No matter what the college kids were doing, I knew and my parents must have been quite confident,  that if the activity was illegal for me or went against my moral character, I would not participate, and if it started to go over the edge, I could always leave or call for a ride.  I remained trustworthy, amazingly, and was granted ever more freedom.
        So, back to politics and the connection.   I tend to believe, like Ronald Regain did, I guess, that if you allow Americans to make money and grow their own businesses, without punishing them by taxation, they will grow rampantly, and relatively freely pay a reasonable tax for that freedom and protection.  BUT, if you keep punishing people, especially those who have the potential to make money with higher and higher tax penalties, they will keep what they have and hide as much as they can, thus punishing the people who work for them, and looking for ways to cheat their way out of that punishment.
        I guess I should take this philosophy one more step, and connect it to my faith; I think I actually can.  God's economy is based on his character.  Even the word "economy" is grown out of a Greek word that means household.  God's economy is rooted in families and communities.  God has also quite clearly told us that while He owns everything and technically, as we work, it is He that provides our wage through our employer, He does not need what we have, He therefore has requested that we give 10% of our gross income back to Him.  He has also, so amazingly turned that 10% over to the priests and Levites (originally) to be the source of income for the people who do ministry for Him.  But more than that, I have personally found it to be true that the more I give to Him freely and with joy, the more I wind up having for myself and my family.  The converse of that is what I have seen to be most often the truth of our church and culture.  When people refuse to give freely to God, they are constantly restricted more and more in what they have for themselves.  Another aspect of this economic life in God, I believe, is that God's economic "laws" work, no matter who applies them, much like gravity happens as a universal law of nature.  If a business person decides to give 10% of his or her business to charity, their business does better, and even more if they are more generous.  The connection and point is that God in his eternal and infinite wisdom has set eternal principles into play.  He doesn't punish us with demands, but requests and allows us to give, under some basic guidelines (10% tithe), and with His economy, when we are faithful to give to Him, He gives back to us, though not always in kind.  It is precisely that concept that seems to work fiscally, but it is that concept that those who are "other" than conservative, refuse to accept.
        I am almost violently curious to understand how believers can be fiscal liberals.  I really do not understand how a believer can be a social liberal either, maybe even more. However,  I do not judge them for their beliefs or practices.  In fact, I have several very close friends who profess their "faith,"  in regards to politics (certainly NOT to God), in liberalism, or at the least to the general views of the Democratic party.  I never know how to begin a conversation that would allow me to understand their political bent.  I can never seem to formulate questions that would allow me to ask questions to gather information, rather than argue politics and policies.  I suppose that this commentary is a request to have that conversation in some form or another, probably by email.  I would love to understand how they perceive their political leanings to fit into their Christian belief system.  I am not saying that their way is wrong, necessarily.  I am only saying that I don't understand it, and cannot yet see how it fits, and would love to.
        I guess another facet of this questioning grows out of the fact that, for the greatest part, those in power who hold similar views (liberal and/or Democratic), tend to also be those who most often show disdain, disgust, and even hatred for Christianity, and often war against us in and from their arena of power.  I have trouble with what I perceive to be double mindedness.  If the champions of liberalism generally tend to hate Christians and Christianity, how can they be trusted to be compatible with it on other fronts?  It is all complex, and again, this is an honest struggle, not a judgment really.  I love my friends, even if I cannot celebrate when what I perceive to be truth, wins on election day.  And on the other hand of an already deformed body of thought, I also do not fully "trust" those that I tend to understand best, as being of higher political ideals or better character in general, even though I can see more "light" in their beliefs and thought processes.
        So, where does this leave me?  I really don't know.  I feel that what I believe is true, but so do my friends.  There are certainly also hundreds of other issues and ideals where we differ, and I don't even know how to go toward them here.  Do they matter in the long run?  I have no idea.  What I know is that while there are areas of our lives where my friends and I differ ideologically, I love them.  I know their hearts, and trust their faith in God which is what is really important.   I guess I am at the end of this desktop rant.  I know that I had quite a few other things that I wanted to say when I started, but no longer can remember them.  Maybe in a couple of weeks, they will come back, or perhaps they just weren't that important (as if this is).  No matter, while I thought I was going to talk about many things with you, I no longer will.  I should work on my history page anyway, so for now, may God bless you.  If you have any thoughts or are willing to explain what you believe, I would love to hear them.  Actually, if any of you who might read this happen to be Democratic or even liberal in your politics and can shed some light on this, please do.  
    Until the next time I feel inspired, so long, and remember to serve God with all you've got!  No matter which side of the aisle you sit on.........     (back to top)