home again

so here's what's up:

my wonderful fiance katie brannan has now arrived in tennessee where i have been living and working by myself for the past three months. i am overjoyed to have the love of my life actually back in my life once again. here's a time-line of events for the past seven months that we've been apart.

march 20th(ish) - katie leaves iowa city to begin her internship with musicworx music therapy company in san diego, ca.

april 1st - katie's internship in cal. begins.

may 15th - i graduate from the university of iowa.

may 20th(ish) - katie visits iowa city for the weekend.

june 25th - i interview in bristol, tn for a resident director position at king college and am offered the job after the interview process.

july 1st - katie becomes a senior intern at musicworx.

july 13th - i fly to san diego to visit katie and propose engagement that night on the beach!

july 16th - our one year dating anniversary.

july 26th - i move to bristol, tn. to start my job with king college.

sept. 30th - katie finishes her internship in san diego and drives back to iowa city to spend three weeks planning our wedding, visiting friends, and packing.

oct. 20th - katie arrives in bristol!!

it's been quite a ride these past seven months. God has brought both of us a long way, but the whirlwind is far from over: katie is now starting the process of starting her own music therapy business while working part-time in the area. i will continue working at king and pursing college students through music ministry, and both of us will continue praying for God's direction as we transition to marriage and to our eventual move overseas to become missionaries. thank you to all of you who have been praying for us during this time apart; your prayers and considerations have meant the world to both of us. i'll continue to keep you all updated.

osteen

i just watched joel osteen (pastor of lakewood church in houston, tx.) give an interview with byron pitts of 60 minutes, and while i was all prepared to get on my soapbox about how his ministry only presents the "happy" side of christianity while leaving out all substance, i'd rather not spew out any more rhetoric than this controversy (as i see it) is due. plenty of theologians and professors have been well obliged to challenge mr. osteen's ministry, but the name of that ministry's game is prosperity, not challenge. so i leave it to you to form your own opinion. below is a clip from osteen's interview, and directly underneath is a bit of a message john piper gave on the "prosperity gospel." both men claim to be engaged in God's global purposes: osteen through his television broadcasts, personified by his massive rotating globe, and piper through his missions mobilization efforts. see what you think and post a comment; it would make an interesting discussion.

nigeria

this is a report from christian solidarity worldwide of an ongoing occurrence in nigera; the latest happening just two weeks ago. please pray for these families and that God would heal this broken country.

Dear Friends,

We are asking for urgent prayer for Christians in northern and central Nigeria.

Over the weekend at least nine Christians were killed, churches were set on fire and businesses and homes owned by non-Muslims were destroyed by Muslim youths in the Tundun Wada area of Kano State following unspecified allegations that Christians had blasphemed the prophet Mohammed.

According to Christian sources on the ground, not a single Christian church, house or business has been left undamaged. Furthermore, an unknown number of people were injured and/or displaced during the violence. In a worrying development, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has received reports indicating that in an attempt to disguise the true extent of the violence and injuries the authorities in Tundun Wada have evacuated Christians and other non-Muslims from the area into neighboring Bauchi State, where victims are said to be receiving shelter and treatment.

Confusion surrounds the reason for this violence. One theory, which has been discredited, is that an unidentified Christian cut out a cartoon of Mohammed and pasted it on the wall of a mosque. However neither the mosque nor the picture has been located.

According to another story, members of Nigeria’s Youth Corps assigned to the area had held a prayer meeting in a classroom and left the name of Jesus on a blackboard, thereby occasioning offense. However, this incident is said to have occurred two weeks ago, and is therefore also unlikely to have been the trigger for the recent violence.

Yet another report contends that tensions have been rising throughout northern and central Nigeria following stories of the publication on the internet of a new cartoon depicting the prophet Mohammed. This may refer to a publication in a Bangladeshi newspaper that was meant to caricature some of the nation’s cultural traditions, but was deemed by some to be offensive to Islam, and led to the jailing of the young cartoonist.

The final report contends that violence erupted and spiraled when students from a local Islamic school rampaged after mistakenly assuming that a serious disagreement between students from a nearby secondary school was religious in nature.

Kano is a notoriously volatile state where regular bouts of anti-Christian violence have usually resulted in massacres. According to the Kano Chapter of CAN, over 2000 non-Muslims died during the last bout of violence, which occurred in 2004, and prior to the current violence Muslims in the Kurna area of Kano were initially reported to have threatened a similar rampage once the month of Ramadan comes to an end on 12 October.

Speaking on behalf of the Christian community following the violence, CAN National Secretary Eng. Samuel Salifu said: “We are pleading for the government to step in. I am directly telling President Yar’Adua because this may be a very good litmus test for his administration”. The government responded positively by announcing plans for a national religious conference to address the problem of religious violence in the country.

Tensions also continue in the Gwoza area of Borno State in the north east of Nigeria where Christians are once again facing imminent violence from the Al Sunna Wal Jamma group. Also known as the “Taliban”, remaining members of Al Sunna Wal Jamma fled into the Cameroon hills in 2004 after a resounding defeat by the Nigerian Armed Forces. Recent events indicate either that it has regrouped, or that it has been reformed by people sympathetic to its aims and objectives.

Please pray

• For an end to the tension and violence;
• For God to protect Christians in both Kano State and Borno State and comfort and provide for those who have lost loved ones, livelihood and property during the recent violence;
• That God would prevent any attempts by the ‘Taliban’ or their supporters to regroup or to harm Christians in any way;
• That state authorities in northern and central Nigeria would act decisively to forestall any further violence, ensure adequate protection for Christian areas and bring those responsible for religious violence to justice;
• Praising God for the initial response of the new federal government to the violence in Kano, and praying this translates into effective action to end the cycle of religious violence and discrimination in northern and central Nigeria.

Thank you for standing in prayer with Christians in Nigeria.

for more information, visit christian solidarity worldwide.

right

sometimes God chooses to reveal to you things you never knew before, but at other times He allows forgotten realizations to return from a dark memory often clouded by the unimportant and mundane. it could be from a certain conversation, a few lines from a film, or, as it was for me tonight, from a book and a new song. however one's memory is sparked, it is always simply wonderful to return to a state of mind you had lost and to recall a notion that once made you happy.

it is often times a struggle to live a christian life in a world that is so obviously broken; it is even harder still to lose sight of one's christian purpose because of that brokenness, for when all one sees are the things which are wrong, one can hardly be assured of the right that is to come. a track on derek webb's new album entitled "this too shall be made right," webb puts his own spin on ecclesiastes 3 (as the byrds did some 40 years ago with their hit "turn turn turn"). in its original, solomon writes, "there is an appointed time for everything. and there is a time for every event under heaven." i highlight "under heaven" because the writer goes on to list the contrastive elements of life as a part of this creation: birth and death; killing and healing; love and hate; war and peace, etc. it is reality from a christian perspective (and perhaps from a secular one as well, though i would not feel confident enough to comment) that things in this world just aren't as they should be, and webb translates this sad state for this generation with his lyrics. here's the transcript of the song:

people love you the most for the things you hate
and hate you for loving the things that you cannot keep straight
people judge you on a curve
and tell you you’re getting what you deserve
this too shall be made right

children cannot learn when children cannot eat
stack them like lumber when children cannot sleep
children dream of wishing wells
whose waters quench all the fires of Hell
this too shall be made right

the earth and the sky and the sea are all holding their breath
wars and abuses have nature groaning with death
we say we’re just trying to stay alive
but it looks so much more like a way to die
this too shall be made right

there’s a time for peace and there is a time for war
a time to forgive and a time to settle the score
a time for babies to lose their lives
a time for hunger and genocide
this too shall be made right

I don’t know the suffering of people outside my front door
I join the oppressors of those who i choose to ignore
I’m trading comfort for human life
and that’s not just murder it’s suicide
this too shall be made right

when i am confronted by the reality that this world is ripped at the seams, that we have ultimately failed, i can't help but wonder if it's just fantasy to hope and dream for a mending; to believe that everything will come 'round in the end of it all. but such disillusionment is my own human short-coming, for it is precisely because of my dissatisfaction with the state of creation that i know beyond any doubt that there is more to this than what we see here.

c.s. lewis puts it best, "the christian says, 'creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. a baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. a duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. if i find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probably explanation is that i was made for another world. if none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing.'"

my friends this world can never meet our deepest needs, no matter how hard we try to make it. all of our happiest moments are nothing more than glimpses into the life we were meant to have before the fall; this shadow of an existence is merely a hint at the reality of heaven, the reality of a perfect life with our Father, and if we would only embrace this notion and truly believe that God will make everything right one day, that we aren't foolishly chasing some unattainable illusion, then we can begin to live a life unfettered by our insecurities and released from the weight of this broken world. it was the eloquent julian of norwich who said, "all will be well, and all will be well, and all will be well." i'm finally starting to believe it.

(check out derek's new album at derekwebb.com)

farris

i just picked up a new cd by a relative unknown named mike farris. he describes this project as a "traveling tent revival," and when you hear the sound you'll understand what that means.

check out his website to read his amazing story and to sample some of his great tunes.