butch cassidy and the sundance kid

Butch Cassidy: How long before you figure they're not after us?
Sundance Kid: A while longer.
Butch Cassidy: How come you're so talkative?
Sundance Kid: Naturally blabby, I guess.

It's not that we've got the wild west a chasin' us, but the upcoming adventures of Lizzy and Cara could naturally resonate with these characters (and dang that I've already labeled myself the naturally blabby one!)

(Lizzy and I last year in Colorado, taking separate Fuller intensive courses).

On January 25th, dear friend Lizzy and I join forces at the Sundance Film Festival for a Fuller (Seminary) Theology and Film class. Am I excited? YES. Am I hoping to score one of those fabulous $800 celebrity goodie bags, but am unable at this point to decide which celebrity I could pass for? Unfortunately, yes. This past week we submitted our top 11 films we'd like to see, as tickets were then lottery-style picked and accounted for. We didn't get everything we were hoping to see, but I'm stoked regardless. Here are a couple I'm stoked about seeing:

Welcome to the Rileys... A dark comedy masked within the confines of a dysfunctional family setting - what could be better?

Holy Rollers... I'll admit it: extreme cultures, especially from that which are religiously-driven, intrigue me. So here you have the Hasidic Jewish community caught between the ideals of faith and culture in the midst of drug trafficking? It doesn't get much better than that.

What an adventure, opportunity and once-in-a-lifetime experience January 25th-31st will be!

new years, resolutions, all-city YL, and how they all fit together

The new year is upon us, and whether our new year's resolution is to write more blogs, to work out more, to lose weight, to eat all the food in our fridge (that really is a good one for me - hence, today I made apple salsa!), or to simply to NOT have a resolution, each one of us still finds ourselves entering into 20-10 whether we're ready for it or not. This past year (old) roommate Jeannie and I giddily gloated at having a new year's eve date and kiss that wasn't someone we randomly grabbed on the streets of Pac Ave in Santa Cruz. But I digress... And this year's January 1 brought with it further days of rest and reflection for me personally, along with thoughts about what's in store in the year to come.

Moving forward, I spoke tonite at all-city Young Life, which is an event we started this year as outreach for local churches while essentially providing critical mass for YL on Monday nights. And tonite's talk was about just this: resolutions. We step into these resolutions wanting to better ourselves, desiring to slip off that of last year that didn't go so well. And for many of us, 2009 was a year that many soon want to leave behind: job loss, debt, divorce, singleness, infertility, death, illness - those were just a few that seemed to hit me (and someone I know) personally. It's natural to then want to leave it behind and step into the new year.

And of course there was a spiritual parallel, which I'm curious to see whether or not is agreed upon or not; years ago I read a line in a Max Lucado book that stuck out to me like a sore thumb: "God loves you just the way you are, BUT he refuses to let you stay that way. He wants to make you more like his son, Jesus Christ." Sometimes I struggle with this thought knowing that the "but" of the sentence exists, so how can there be a "but" in grace? But the but remains: he wants me to be like Jesus. Maybe, just maybe, as I move into the new year, as I leave behind the things of 2009 and step forward into twenty-ten, I also do so knowing that Christ wants to know me that much more intimately...that much more deeply. And he wants me to be more like him.

So this isn't a blog to then pastor everyone, and say, "well, what are you doing for JESUS this year?!" (emphasis on Jesus, like I'm a southern Baptist preacher), but there is truth in acknowledging the different parts of our being, and perhaps setting goals accordingly: spiritually, mentally, emotionally, intellectually, physically, (though Christ encompasses each part of our being, not just the spiritual).

This was somewhat of what was said tonite - but on a more toned-down, high school-ese level. So happy new year to all, and to all a good night.

peace.

a christmas poem, as such

Twas a couple days post Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not MD, nor a mouse.
The mini fake trees were plopped on the counter with care
In hopes that the spirit of Christmas would still reside there.

The Young Life kids were all on Facebook in their beds,
While visions of status updates danced in their heads.
And the new beau James in his beanie, and I in my Uggs,
Had just settled our minds for a long winter’s nap.

When out in the kitchen there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the couch to see what was the matter.
Away to the hallway I flew like a flash,
Stepped into the room and nearly took out a lash.

Betty Crocker had been in this kitchen, for sure,
For Cara was cooking, and this we'd have to endure.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But an itty bitty Crock Pot, which we were eating for dinner, my dear!

---

So that is a bit of an update: Christmas came and went - and it was good. James is still great - and all is good. I've actually been cooking - and it's been edible so far (beet salsa for dinner, among other delights). My computer desperately needs a bigger hard drive, so I haven't been able to upload any pics - and therefore haven't been super motivated to write on the blog. So that is it.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

---

James and Cara at a lovely beach restaurant in Half Moon Bay for a friend's birthday.

Hiking a couple months back with MD! (James took the pic)

the holiday season is where?

It's here.

So weird.

I just returned about 45 minutes ago after a day's worth of shotgunning and driving from San Diego this morning to good-byes with 75 precious new high school friends to a flat tire (of course...) soon thereafter. This high school youth group in walnut creek, CA takes a mission trip down to a place called Rancho de sus Ninos every Thanksgiving break, and I was honored to speak on the trip again this year (as I spoke on it in '04 as well). It was a beautiful week with these friends. My mind is swimming with the immediate of GO TO BED, but I'm also in that quasi-delirious, reflective stage. By far one of my favorite parts was that one of our local YL leaders, and a favorite of mine [okay, I have a lot of favorites - I'll be honest], Juvy, was able to go with me. though i think it was a little harder defining her role, I was blessed to have that #1 companion and friend beside me, as the job of speaker can be rather lonely at times otherwise. But then, truth be told, it's pretty stinkin' awesome to be able to just let go of life back home for a week and just BE ... especially when that "being" involves getting to know teenagers, playing with little mexican orphan and daycare kids, building schtuff, and seeing god in action.

But my thoughts swim as to short-term missions...

does enablement take place within the local culture every time we "rich" americans cross the border, bringing gifts and good tidings of great joy?

where is the long-term investment of relationship in these short-term missions when thousands of people pass through the lives of (these orphans in particular) every year?

what does it mean then to truly serve?

...

I am back to claiming the aforementioned state of delirium - hope ya'll had a happy Thanksgiving - we instead ate steak tacos!

he's kind of my new favorite...

...and I call him James. :)

the risk of love...

A spiritual director of mine sent this poem my way, and I stopped dead in my tracks:

The Risk of Love: I John 4:18 (NEB)
by Luci Shaw, from Polishing the Petoskey Stone

The risk of love
is that of being unreturned.

For if I love too deep,
too hard, too long
and you love little
or you love
me not at all
then is my treasure given,
gone,
flown away lonely.

But if you give me back
passion for passion,
return my burning,
add your own
dark fire to flame my heart
then is love perfect

hot, round, augmented,
whole, endless, infinite,
and it is fear
that flies.

---

this poem is beautiful to me. i think of the risk of love with god, and the risk of love with man - both of which i've kept at arm's length because it's safe...because it puts me in control...because I know what to expect. So I find myself at a crossroads in the aforementioned risky business(es) - and am left with realizing that it's just that: a risk without knowing what to expect.

How do I need to risk love?

To whom do I need to risk love with?

and this fear - this fear that so easily entangles me even when I don't even realize it - where does it fly to when it flies away? be gone, fear!

---

Your thoughts on this risky business ... called ... love?

"roommate"

I'm afraid I'm not always one for originality. As I sat in a meeting today, I just started giggling as I spewed out facts and thoughts and aphorisms and bits of wisdom and realized that NONE of it was my own. So I confess, I'm an unoriginal, plagiarizing, stealer of a, well, creative genius if I do say so myself...which leads us to the main point of this short post: "roommate." The word in itself connotes what two posts ago sought to run far far away from: the 28 previous housemates over the past 12 years of my life. And here my attempts at originality fail me, as I post this picture of a favorite roommate off and on of the past two years, Jeannie Reed. There's a point at which someone moves from a first name to the endearing "roommate" as their name, and Jeannie wears the hat along with other women of glorying fame. But alas, she's roommate of the hour tonite, so this post goes to her. In this pic we celebrated our last night as roomies together by heading to a posh little wine bar in Palo Alto - though I'll miss the everyday interaction with her, we've ironically had better, more intentional and FUN time together as friends-in-separate-houses in the past week. Love you, rooomate!

one of those nights...

tonite was one of those nights in ministry that just made sense....and I LOVED it. One of my favorite nights of the year has got to be when we (young life) buy out the menu at Taco Bell and just go for it. Thanks to a generous donor who swiped his credit card for $163.74 at the local TB, bags upon bags of greasy, nasty, processed "Mexican" food were consumed - so that ultimately kids could hear about Jesus. I love that kids showed up who hadn't been to YL before, and even though some sat on the sidelines, ultimately laughed and felt like they belonged. I love the leader who gargled hot sauce for 32 seconds just to be "in" with kids (this was after they gargled "Jingle Bells" with the aforementioned hot sauce for 32 seconds, of course). I love the kids CHOWING down on all the food that was left after being broken up into teams to see who could finish the food first. I love the strangers who walked into this restaurant on the corner of El Camino and 20th and just watched what was going on. I love that Juvy, one of our leaders, talked about the fact that Jesus cares about the heart...that it's the most important part - and that most of those strangers seemed to walk in at 8.47 pm when she was giving the talk. Would the paralyzed man have eaten Taco Bell with Jesus? I think so! I love that two friends of Young Life, Annie and Gilbert, refused to leave before the last kid did, and were determined to leave Taco Bell cleaner than they found it. I love that the Taco Bell employees, though sweaty at the end of the evening, waved good-bye to us and thanked us for being there.

It was a GREAT evening.

yo quero taco bell.