I started my position as Director of Discipleship and Family Ministries this week. It’s gonna be a great job - I have no doubt about that. But something else has occupied my thoughts a surprisingly large amount: my children.  Though I had been warned about the transition back to the workforce, I have been amused by the wealth of feelings that have accompanied my first days back in the “real world.”

The strangest sensation has been that I feel like I’m living in someone else’s life a little bit. Like I traded places with someone else and am now occupying their office. Weird. But the most interesting and (hopefully) beneficial change has been my over all approach to work. Before, I was a super-hyped-up-task-list-machine-of-a-man. Alpha male to the hilt. Most of that is gone. And that has shown up in unusual ways.  For example, I’ve been taken back by the directness of other’s comments - things I would have said in past years. Now, those things feel harsh - not wrong or out of line or inappropriate - just forceful. I had forgotten how “strongly” people use words. I’m not sure what to do about that just yet. I just ended two years of rolling on the floor with toddlers and speaking gently to set an example.

Though some people in my shoes would hope that those more gentle attributes might fade away or maybe even feel that they might inhibit the respect of peers, I hope I stay this way. I actually feel comfortable in my skin. Few people ever feel that way. I have always believed that those “home-focused” attributes are found in great husbands and fathers. I’m surprised to learn that those same qualitative traits are essential to good pastoring as well. I’ll revisit the impact of our “great experiment” in a few months to see if I feel the same way.

Good question huh? A good friend of mine deals with this idea in depth here and here. Another post is forthcoming I believe as well. As with most things, things are not quite as black and white as we’d like to believe. Feel free to comment - Jonathan’s a really nice guy and loves the Lord deeply.

I haven’t said what I’ve been reading over the last month or two, so I thought I would update that for you. Like you care, right?

Obviously, I read The Shack  by William P. Young since I blogged about that here.

Robert Alter, The David Story: A Translation of 1 and 2 Samuel (good translation - interesting commentary)

Ellen F. Davis, Wondrous Depth: Preaching the Old Testament (eh, not as good as her other stuff)

Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, Faithfulness in Action: Loyalty in Biblical Perspective. (Excellent treatment of God’s covenant loyalty - a loyalty unmatched by human standards. Wonderful book!)

Robert Fyall, Now My Eyes Have Seen You: Images of Creation and Evil in the Book of Job (Comprehensive, though I don’t agree with some of his approaches to Job)

Robert Hamerton-Kelly, God the Father: Theology and Patriarchy in the Teaching of Jesus (Deals with gender in the Old and New Testaments - a solid read.)

Terence Fretheim, First and Second Kings: Westminster Bible Companion (great accessible treatment of a difficult OT book)

Probably the best book is the one I’m in the middle of right now - Wendy Mogel, The Blessing of a Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children. What an excellent parenting book. I find myself agreeing with every sentence. Mogel is a clinical psychologist who uses tried and true Jewish teachings from the Bible and Rabbinical tradition to shape a God-centered approach to parenting. Read this book, people!

I just got back from vacationing with another family in Orlando, FL. We rented a condo and did the whole Sea World/Aquatica thing. Sea World was fine…but Aquatica rocked the proverbial Casbah. Super fun for kids and adults. However, chances are good that if you take four children under the age of five to amusement parks, you’re gonna experience some strange moments.

Most of mine came on the last day. The other dad had to head back early to minister at his church (jerk ), so I stayed with all the wives and children. That’s when the remarks about plural wives began. We were cracking up about it, thinking about how strange it must look for one guy to be walking around with two women and four children.

However, the low point of the trip came on the same day. We stopped to feed everyone at a “healthy” family restaurant - Beth and I split a sandwich and a side of pasta salad. We are trying to watch what we eat - a post for another day. I started to eat the cold pasta when I spotted something that looked like chicken in it. I told Beth, “I call this chicken!” and stuffed it in my mouth. My “wives” immediately informed me that it was not chicken - it was an artichoke. A big one. We are talking juice here, people. It was at that moment that I thanked God for my strong will that has landed me in so much trouble in the past. I conquered my gag reflex and ate the whole artichoke. It was brutal - something truly worthy of the term “torture.” I suppose this would be an appropriate place to misquote Philippians 4:19 for everybody…

Overall the vacation was great. A good time was had by all and now I get to go back to working in the real world next week…

Dr. Claude Mariottini just started a series on Terence Fretheim’s book The Suffering of God. I asked him if I could link to this series for those who may be confused about the Old Testament and he agreed.

Rarely do I find a book that radically overhauls my view of God in a significant manner. Fretheim’s book did that for me several years ago. Fretheim is an Old Testament scholar and Luther Seminary in Minneapolis and a true trendsetter in scholarship. The Suffering of God (in my OT book section to the right) is fairly dense and technical. That’s the reason I wanted to recommend Mariottini - it’s a straightforward and accessible treatment.

When I was growing up, I had a very separate view of God in the OT versus the image of Jesus in the NT. Fretheim’s book helped me reconcile the heart of God behind his dealings with Israel as well as Jesus’s comments about being the expression of God on earth. The OT no longer scares me since that duplicity of “good/bad God” no longer confuses me. Fretheim’s book unlocked that mystery for me. If you deal with that same issue, then read away.

I just updated my blogroll with a few blogs I have been reading. My brother is now on there (Jamie Nunnally), and well as a couple of biblical archaeology blogs I enjoy (Bible and Ancient Near East and Bible Places Blog). I also added OT professor Claude Mariottini and Trinitarian scholar C. Baxter Kruger. Hopefully you’ll like them - particularly the last two if you are into theology.

You’ll be happy to know that I resist the popularity/hierarchy blogroll thing that travels through the blogosphere. I just link to who I enjoy, not particularly because there’s anything that “qualifies” one blog to be special over another. I think that’s stupid. Imagine that?

I passed 12,000 “reads” about a month ago. Respectable I suppose. I’m not exactly changing the world one blog at a time or anything, but I do get a good bit of random traffic. If you’re a regular reader, let me know who you are - I’d love to check out what you have on your blog as well…

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. I had a few things going on! The final interview went fine and I’m pleased to announce that I’ve accepted the position of Director of Discipleship and Family Ministries at Thomasville First United Methodist Church. It’s a great opportunity to work with a great staff. I’m really excited about it. So what will I be doing? Everything family. Children’s ministries, small groups, marriage and family spiritual formation, member assimilation. I start in two weeks after a quick vacation with the family.

TFUMC is an unusual place. It’s a unique mix of traditional and contemporary worship. It has a membership of around 1200 or so. Big church for a small town. But what is most interesting about the church is that there has been a personal and individual revival going on for about four years now. No one announced it - it just began to happen one person at a time. People are hungry to know God more and are excited about worshipping him. We are in the middle of a large building program to accomodate the steady growth. The staff began to gauge my interest in ministering there about six months ago - which was a surprise. We went there, not only because we were spiritually feed, but also because we could remain “under the radar” while finishing school and entertaining ministerial positions elsewhere.

We honestly didn’t think the opportunity was there to minister. But we have grown to love that church and are extremely excited about the chance to “give back” to a church that ministered to us in such a personal way. Plus we get to stay close to grandparents and friends. So, when the chance to stay was presented, we jumped at it! We were looking to serve in an associate role in a larger (1000+) church anyway. We just assumed we’d have to move across the country to do that. So, God met our needs in every way. He’s good like that, you know…

On Friday, I graduated from the doctoral program at International Seminary in Orlando, FL. Thank God I’m done with school! I’ve learned soooo much and have enjoyed my academic training. I’m interested to see how that aspect of my ministry finds a place at TFUMC. I was part of a class of about 95 graduates - and International is truly that. I sat next to a doctoral graduate from Ghana during the ceremony and another two seats down from me travelled from Singapore. Cool huh? The funniest thing about the trip was our inability to find a restaurant before or  after commencement. We ate fine quisine at Checker’s before the ceremony and three hours later, Beth grabbed some pizza on Church Street while I circled the block since we couldn’t find parking. We celebrated by heading back to the hotel to watch the last half of “The Wedding Crashers” on TV.

I know it’s normal for doctoral students to end up teaching somewhere…and maybe I will. But right now, I think I’ll stick with pastoring in a local venue. That’s really where my heart is anyway. I did school for me, not for an occupation. I suppose I’ll keep blogging if that’s okay with everyone. Though I don’t know if I’ll have the time to do so quite as much. If they are less frequent I’ll do my best to make sure they’re worth your reading them. So, a new stage of life begins - we’ll see how it goes.

Few things going on this week. I have a final interview with a church committee on Wednesday for a local ministerial position. And then on Friday, I graduate. Woo hoo! I haven’t donned a cap and gown for a while so that should be interesting. I’m most excited about the fact that I get the chance to get away for a day or so with Beth.

This article caught my attention this morning: “Americans: My Faith Isn’t the Only Way to Heaven.” Give it a read and give me some feedback on what you think about it. I’m curious as to your reactions. I also have some thoughts I hope to put down soon. Most of its contents didn’t surprise to me too much.

The title is obviously tongue-in-cheek, people. He’s a little story from my past.

In the fall of my senior year in high school, I closed off the subclavian vein in my right shoulder and developed multiple blood clots in the same region. No one is exactly sure how that happened - probably a combination of heavy weightlifting and a smaller upper chest cavity. One evening, I notice my right arm had swollen and was becoming discolored. I wasn’t too worried about it until we saw a vascular surgeon who admitted me to intensive care the same day. As a eighteen year old with his life ahead of him, I faced the possibility of restricted use of my arm (a horrible scenario for a piano player) or worse - death.

Needless to say, that information pulled the rug out from under me. Though I loved God and served him wholeheartedly, I was unaware of the numerous other aspects of life that I allowed to define me: academics, popularity, sports, music, and physical appearance. Though I had prided myself on being above such trappings, when confronted with the possibility of loosing them, I was terrified. Obviously, I survived the ordeal - I was in ICU for about seven days (I think) while the clots were dissolved and a network of ancillary veins slowly took over for the damaged one. But my time in that hospital bed changed my life.

I remember coming back to school a few weeks later after missing the last two games of football season. As I walked the halls with the other students, something had changed. Conversations that I normally would have jumped in or found interesting held absolutely no significance for me. I was completely lost within a new paradigm far removed from my immediate surroundings. I didn’t know what to do. I don’t think I talked much for a few days other than basic pleasantries and questions about the hospital stay. I was overwhelmed by the two conflicting sets of priorities. Personally, my priorities had shrunk to a very tight set of values revolving around God, family, and evangelism. Suddenly who I was taking to the prom seemed frivolous.

Gradually I adjusted back towards a normal “teenager” mentality before I headed to college. But I will never forget that feeling of being completely lost inside the familiar. One literature teacher, after watching the look on my face for about two weeks, asked me about it. I told her how I was feeling and she still uses the story in a lecture on some book - I think All the King’s Men. Anyway, some experiences in life, no matter how unforeseen, can change you permanently. I guess the lesson in all of that is this: when you find yourself in the middle of one of those life experiences, do your best to recognize how those events may shape your life in the future. In this way (pardon the philosophizing for a moment ) process philosophy’s concept of humans as the sum of their personal experiences is correct. We are, to an extent, our history. Whitehead was just stating the obvious. And everyone has a “storyline” that shapes their paradigm. True friendship comes when others are interested enough in you to learn your “storyline” and interact with it.

On a side-note, as a Christian, one of the other most memorable moments in that whole ordeal was right before a surgery. I had been tired and nauseated for days and really didn’t want to speak to anyone. I had people praying in my hospital room constantly. Frankly, I was tired of praying. Really tired. I put on some headphones and started listening to a CD, Extreme’s III Sides to Every Story to be exact - a really good rock album, by the way. The people in the room stopped me. Saying, “You’re right before surgery, don’t you think you should pray some more?” I said, “No. I really want to listen to this music. I just need a break.” They said, “There will be time for music later.” Reluctantly (mostly because I was too tired to argue) I turned off the CD player and listened to people pray the exact same things they had been praying all morning. I don’t mean to sound flippant or ungrateful. I was thankful and I believe God brought me back to health - I should not be able to use my arm at all…and I have full use of it without restriction. But in that moment, I did swear to myself that I would never put someone that emotionally and physically tired under that much spiritual pressure. I wanted to think about anything else other than that surgery. As Christians, we should learn to read the nuances and respect the wishes of those we are praying for. Strange lesson to learn when facing the possibility of death, but an important one nonetheless.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the trip down memory lane with me. I’ll try to pick a lighter topic next time…