Photo by pdesigner.com I don’t know how many of you have been following the news this past week, but there are a lot of global things going on right now. Recently, the United Nations (U.N.) had their 61st General Assembly session in NYC. Not only was this meeting a bit tense […]
Making Changes
Photo on Flickr Even though it has been a little less than 3 months since we have been here in Indonesia, God is showing us a lot of different things. By His grace, God has allowed us, not only to transition well, but to reinforce a lot of the values that […]
The Concept of Personal Space
Photo by Reuters As you can tell from the picture above, things are crowded in Indonesia. This picture describes not only the massive amount of motorcycles on the road, but also the chaos on the streets as people are all trying to get home for the Hari Raya Idul Fitri holiday. […]
The “I” in Idolatry
Photo by Anne Elliott The American Heritage Dictionary defines “idolatry” as, “blind or excessive devotion to something.” It is interesting that throughout the Bible one theme that keeps on coming up is the topic of idols. It is germane to who we are as God’s people. God created us to worship […]
True Freedom
Photo on Diane Beeler website In class yesterday, we had a good discussion on the topic of freedom. I challenged the students to think about the true meaning of freedom as we were going over the Old Testament. I pointed out that we see the plight of humankind constantly disobeying God, […]
Kanye West and Manners
Photo by Getty It has been a couple of days now and I was debating whether to write some of my thoughts on what happened at the MTV Video Music Awards (VMA). At first I wasn’t going to write anything, but then I decided for the sake of reinforcing the values […]
Producing Racist People
Photo by Smart Expressions There was an interesting Newsweek article entitled, “Is Your Kid a Racist?” It caught my attention to say the least. What parent wants to raise their child as a racist? I guess there are probably some but that is for another blog entry. If a parent knew […]
The Greatest Ever
Recently, in light of Michael Jordan’s induction to the NBA’s Hall of Fame, I was reminded of the inspiration Michael Jordan has been to so many people who played and play the game of basketball. It is hard not to get a bit nostalgic, since I grew up in Chicago. I still remember in […]
Music by the Birds
Here is something for those of you who enjoy music. Birds on the Wires from Jarbas Agnelli on Vimeo. “Reading a newspaper, I saw a picture of birds on the electric wires. I cut out the photo and decided to make a song, using the exact location of the birds as notes […]
The 8th Year Anniversary of 9-11
Photo by Derek Jensen It is hard to believe that eight years have passed by since the September 11th terrorist attacks on the United States. It seems like a distant memory. As every year passes by, more people will either get numb to what happened or they will feel distant from […]
Doing the Father’s Will
Photo from Craziestgadgets This morning, I was reminded of this quote from Charles E. Hummel’s book, The Tyranny of the Urgent: “Jesus did not finish all the urgent tasks in Palestine or all the things He would have liked to do, but He did finish the work which God gave Him […]
HMCC Inaugural Celebration in Indonesia
It has been a few days since our Inaugural Sunday Celebration and I had some time to soak in and reflect on what God has been doing here in Indonesia. Here are some of my thoughts: 1) Church planting requires 110% commitment. I have been telling our team that church planting is not for […]
The Impact of One Person
This week has been a sobering week for me – not only in trying to prepare for the Inaugural Sunday Celebration, but more importantly because I attended a funeral service for a woman that I just met once. It is hard to believe that a person that you have only met once can make […]
Going Through the Open Doors
Photo by Sierrasong It is just amazing how God gives us opportunities to experience new things every single day. But one caveat to this is that when God does open the doors, then we need the discernment and the courage to obey or we will miss the opportunities. This principle was […]