Dynamic Yet Consistent

no plans, left-overs for dinner, pajamas until noon, marathon board game sessions, 6 hours of Lonsome Dove, dirty diapers, cooking and washing dishes, minor plumbing work, disc golf…

This is how Beth and I spent last weekend.  Pretty mundane and typical.  At first glance seems no different than most free weekends we have.  But, last weekend was incredible as we spent it in Tallahassee with two of our closest and oldest friends Catherine and Dave* and our daughters.

Catherine, Beth, Molly and Mikayla

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What was so incredible about the weekend is just how ordinary it was.  There was no evidence of the 5 months that had elapsed since we were last together.  There were no expectations and there was not a need “to be doing something.”  Instead, we just hung out… exactly like we did in high school, and in college, and in our early married lives.

Everytime we get together, it always strikes me how natural things are.  In fact both this weekend and the last time we were together in the Smokies, I had a hard time finding pictures.  I think that’s because there has never been the feeling that what we were doing was “special” as much as it was just a regular weekend together.

Beth and I have many close friends, some of whom we have known for decades, but there is something special about our relationship with the Altmaiers as it epitomizes authenticity and friendship.

*Dave has “retired” his blog, but we are trying to encourage him to start it back.

We all like to help out worthy causes when we can.  Often that just requires a few bucks, or a text message, or volunteering a couple hours.  Don’t get me wrong, all those things matter, but when someone really gets behind something, and is willing to make true sacrafices, that is when amazing things happen.  Two of my Chicago cousins certainly fit into this later category.

A few weeks ago I received an email from cousin Amy about her participation with a St. Baldrick’s Foundation event.  Basically, participants shave their heads to raise money and awareness about cancer.  A few days later I received another email from my cousin Lauren saying she too was going to participate.

I consider myself a pretty bold person, but I have never been brave enough to shave my head… and I am a guy.  Here, my two FEMALE cousins are willing to shave theirs in solidarity and support of cancer research.  This is especially poignant considering our grandfather, who fought various types of cancer, passed away last year.

Beth and I are very proud of Lauren and Amy and wanted to share what they were doing.  We donated to both of them, and we want to encourage you to consider doing the same.  Here are their participant pages:

https://www.stbaldricks.org/participants/mypage/participantid/375041

https://www.stbaldricks.org/participants/laurens

Amy after shaving her head.

Most of us have noticed the longer days, warmer temperatures and the insatiable desire to wear shorts and sandals.  Not only does that mean spring is coming, it means we are getting ready for things like weekly disc golf, trips to the farmer’s market, barbeques, and picnics.  It also means the gardening season is fast approaching.

Last night, we borrowed a friend’s tiller to prepare the garden (FYI – I have another trend going: for the past three years I have broken a belt on a tiller).  As I was breaking up the soil, I realized just how much I love this part of the process; in fact, preparing the plot is probably my favorite part of gardening.  There is just something about putting the sweat equity into a project after several months off.  Plus you get the instant gratification of seeing your accomplishments.  So much in gardening requires patience and persistence; it often takes months for your work to pay off.  Tilling is the one time where brute force actually works in your favor.

[Garden half way through the second tiller pass.
Notice the asparagus patch in the back right.]

But, it’s not just the actual work of prep that I enjoy – it is also what it represents.  In order to till you have to have had several days of sunny spring weather, so the process usually starts right when people are getting spring fever.  Tilling also goes hand in hand with planning.  It is exciting to begin deciding what crops are going to be planted where and what schedule you are going to follow.  While I was tilling, the neighborhood kids were out playing, the birds were swooping into our bird feeder, and the sun was just dipping below the horizon.  I could not ask for a better life.

For Beth and I, beginning the garden holds special significance as it reminds us of the birth of Mikayla.  Last year as we were prepping the garden, we were also getting ready to welcome our daughter into the world.  Three days before she was born, we were planning our crops.  And, as we were nurturing her and working through the challenges of a newborn, the garden was our escape and place of renewal.

Depending on how our plans for Swaziland develop, this could be our last year to garden here for quite a while.  That makes the start of the season even more poignant for us.

We have many hours of work ahead of us in the garden this year, but as anyone who does it knows, you do it because you love it.  We are both looking forward to another year of playing in the dirt.

Technical Note:

For those of you who are interested, I thought I would quickly mention our plans for this year’s garden:

• We expanded our garden space by about 20% this year.
• We have already planted two rows of onion sets.  Last year our onions did not do too well, but I think it was because we planted them too late and they were too wet.
• After we tilled the garden, we covered it with black plastic.  We did this last year to kill the grass and it seemed to work well.  It also helps to keep the ground warm, keeps it from getting compressed, and doesn’t allow early spring weeds to grow.
• Instead of a regular compost pile, this year we are going to use a home-made compost tumbler.  I will keep you posted on that process with that.
• We are going to use our rain barrel again, but this year we will raise it up off the ground and possibly try adding a second capture container to it.
• Here are the crops we have planned: sweet corn, tomatoes (mostly roma, but some larger varieties), peppers (at least green, jalapeno, banana, and chili), broccoli, onions, carrots, parsnips, basil, okra, asparagus, squash and zucchini.

I have several running trends in my life:

I have never watched Titanic (in fact, of the 10 highest grossing films of all time, I have only seen two of them).  I have not thrown up since middle school.  I have only paid to have my hair cut once in the last 8 years (for my wedding 5 years ago).  And, I have not been completely clean shaven since I grew my first goatee in 2001.  Well after last week, only 3 of those trends still stand.

[Last picture with the scruff] 

It all started when I got the itch to change up my facial hair.  I thought Beth would be pleased with this new "edgier" look.  But as you can tell, she was not impressed:

She was able to convince me that the burnside look went out with with General Ambrose in the 1800s.  So I decided to connect with my days out west when I was fighting fire and sawing down trees:

Again, you can see that Beth was not a fan.

From here I decided to go with just the standard mustache; however, I looked so much like a child molester that I thought it best not to take pictures… those are not the kind of images you want floating around cyber space.

Normally when I decide to change things up, I shave everything except my flavor-saver / soul patch.  Something about having just a little tuft of facial hair to remind me I am a man:

 
[Picture from 2007 with our good friends Cat and Dave…
whom we are super excited about going to visit this week]

But, for some reason, I decided if I was going to shave, I might as well go all out.  So for the first time in nearly a decade, I shaved every inch of my face:

Not only does the "baby face" look make me appear younger and fatter, it also is a pain in the butt.  I have to shave every other day and and I am not a fan of that.  One of the main reasons I grew a beard was because I hate shaving so much.

I doubt this look will last long, but since it is a once in a decade kind of thing, I figured I had better document it.

In preparation for our move to Swaziland, Beth and I have had to get new passports.  My ragged blue book (which survived the washing machine while in Germany) has now been retired.  Gone are my stamps from Frankfurt A.M. and San Jose Costa Rica.

Here is a look at old and new:

No passport photos are ever good.  I think I traded a “really bad” for a “moderately bad” one:

Kickert, Benjamin D

Beth and I have (slowly) been working on our siSwati in preparation for our move.  Since siSwati is only spoke by 1.5 million people in the world (0.02% of the world’s population) there is not a whole lot of learning resources.  Because siSwati is related to the Zulu language, we have also been looking at some of those lessons.  Below you will find a video clip of the numbers from 1-10.  We were feeling pretty good about things until we got about half way through things.

Learn Zulu Numbers for Free with Byki

What are the chances we can 5-10 years without using the numbers 7-9?

The following is taken from a 2004 lecture/discussion with Emergent Village by Walter Brueggemman.  You can find video of the sessions on their site.  (HT also to Prodigal Kiwi and soupablog).

1. Everybody lives by a script. The script may be implicit or explicit. It may be recognized or unrecognized, but everybody has a script.
2. We get scripted. All of us get scripted through the process of nurture and formation and socialization, and it happens to us without our knowing it.
3. The dominant scripting in our society is a script of technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism that socializes us all, liberal and conservative.
4. That script (technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism) enacted through advertising and propaganda and ideology, especially on the liturgies of television, promises to make us safe and to make us happy.
5. That script has failed. That script of military consumerism cannot make us safe and it cannot make us happy. We may be the unhappiest society in the world.
6. Health for our society depends upon disengagement from and relinquishment of that script of military consumerism. This is a disengagement and relinquishment that we mostly resist and about which we are profoundly ambiguous.
7. It is the task of ministry to de-script that script among us. That is, too enable persons to relinquish a world that no longer exists and indeed never did exist.
8. The task of de-scripting, relinquishment and disengagement is accomplished by a steady, patient, intentional articulation of an alternative script that we say can make us happy and make us safe.
9. The alternative script is rooted in the Bible and is enacted through the tradition of the Church. It is an offer of a counter-narrative, counter to the script of technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism.
10. That alternative script has as its most distinctive feature, its key character – the God of the Bible whom we name as Father, Son, and Spirit.
11. That script is not monolithic, one dimensional or seamless. It is ragged and disjunctive and incoherent. Partly it is ragged and disjunctive and incoherent because it has been crafted over time by many committees. But it is also ragged and disjunctive and incoherent because the key character is illusive and irascible in freedom and in sovereignty and in hiddenness, and, I’m embarrassed to say, in violence – [a] huge problem for us.
12. The ragged, disjunctive, and incoherent quality of the counter-script to which we testify cannot be smoothed or made seamless. [I think the writer of Psalm 119 would probably like too try, to make it seamless]. Because when we do that the script gets flattened and domesticated. [This is my polemic against systematic theology]. The script gets flattened and domesticated and it becomes a weak echo of the dominant script of technological, consumer militarism. Whereas the dominant script of technological, consumer militarism is all about certitude, privilege, and entitlement this counter-script is not about certitude, privilege, and entitlement. Thus care must betaken to let this script be what it is, which entails letting God be God’s irascible self.
13. The ragged, disjunctive character of the counter-script to which we testify invites its adherents to quarrel among themselves – liberals and conservatives – in ways that detract from the main claims of the script and so too debilitate the focus of the script.
14. The entry point into the counter-script is baptism. Whereby we say in the old liturgies, “do you renounce the dominant script?”
15. The nurture, formation, and socialization into the counter-script with this illusive, irascible character is the work of ministry. We do that work of nurture, formation, and socialization by the practices of preaching, liturgy, education, social action, spirituality, and neighboring of all kinds.
16. Most of us are ambiguous about the script; those with whom we minister and I dare say, those of us who minister. Most of us are not at the deepest places wanting to choose between the dominant script and the counter-script. Most of us in the deep places are vacillating and mumbling in ambivalence.
17. This ambivalence between scripts is precisely the primary venue for the Spirit. So that ministry is to name and enhance the ambivalence that liberals and conservatives have in common that puts people in crisis and consequently that invokes resistance and hostility.
18. Ministry is to manage that ambivalence that is crucially present among liberals and conservatives in generative faithful ways in order to permit relinquishment of [the] old script and embrace of the new script.
19. The work of ministry is crucial and pivotal and indispensable in our society precisely because there is no one [see if that’s an overstatement]; there is no one except the church and the synagogue to name and evoke the ambivalence and too manage a way through it. I think often; I see the mundane day-to-day stuff ministers have to do and I think, my God, what would happen if you talk all the ministers out. The role of ministry then is as urgent as it is wondrous and difficult.

It has been a little while since I have written about our Swaziland plans.  Lucky for you we have some news to share.

Malolotja Nature Reserve in Northwest Swaziland

We just renewed our passports and purchased our tickets for our summer exploration trip (let’s hope that is $3,600 well spent).  We will be flying out of Nashville on July 12 and returning on July 26.  Since the flight is over 20 hours (with a stop off in the west African country of Senegal) that will shave a day off our trip each way giving us 11 or so days to explore the country.

Our goal for this trip to get a good feel for the country, and meet with as many people/groups/organizations as possible in preparation for a move to the Kingdom in 2011 (You can read more details about our plans to move to Swaziland here, here and here.)  Right now we are hoping to find an organization we can work with for our first six months.  That way we can have some stability when we move, but are not having to commit ourselves for multiple years without being very familiar with the specifics.

So far we have made contact with 4-5 people on the ground.  We are hoping to follow up on several leads with strong potential and then leave enough time open during our trip so that we can discover other connections we had not planned on.  I have a feeling we will be playing a lot of this trip by ear.

One thing we have found is that it is much easier to get a hold of the Western Christian organizations than it is to contact the local and secular organizations.  Unfortunately we are also finding most of the Christian groups are a bit too evangelical and charismatic for our comfort.  We are open to working with Christian groups, but we want our focus to be on indigenous solutions and community development, not proselytizing.  In many ways Beth and I feel like we would do better with a “regular” job where we can live out our faith a part of it.  Our main focus in moving to Swaziland is to expose Mikayla (and ourselves) to life outside the United States so our worldview can be informed and shaped in a global context.  Of course we want to be apart of something good and make an impact where ever we are, but that is not our primary goal.

Of other Swazi news, Beth and I have been working on our siSwati, but I must admit we are not as dedicated as we should be–we are still working on the standard greetings and responses.  Hopefully by July we will have the basics down and then can spend the next year mastering it.

That’s the update for now.  I will let you know more as it develops.

There is outrage in this country, but I fear it for the wrong reason.

A story just broke this week which revealed the weapons company Trijicon has been branding their military rifle scopes with Bible verses.  I have included one such example below.  The ACOG4X32 model number ends with "JN8:12" – a reference to verse 8:12 in the New Testament Gospel of John.  The fear is that this constitutes "proselytizing" and thus is outside the regulations.  People have been outraged that such blatant Christian influence was allowed to find its place in our military.

Oh believe me I am upset by this, but not for the same reasons the ACLU is upset.  It is more likely someone will convert to being a fan of Nashville Hockey by flying an unmanned drone than it is someone will become a Christian after using these sights.  What is frustrating to me is how offensive this juxtaposition of worldviews is.  In John 8: 12 Jesus says:

I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

That is written on the side of a device used so you can see people more clearly so that you can kill them.  Does anyone else see how screwed up that was?

The entire life, death and resurrection of Jesus points to a life of non-violence and sacrificial subversion.  Jesus embodies love, grace and mercy, yet his words are used to brand an instrument of war and destruction.

We might as well name our next warship the USS Martin Luther King Jr. or put a picture of Ghandi on our nuclear weapons.  I am not worried Muslims will be offended by this verse on the side of a rifle scope.  I fear they will be upset when we use this rifle scope to kill them. 

I guess I must admit that I do fear proselytizing, but not in the way many have expressed.  I am not worried about people sharing their faith in Christianity through verses written on a scope.  I fear people will continue to be converted to this false gospel that the way of Jesus is one of force and privilege.  I fear people will convert to seeing an American Jesus and ignore his radical message of peace, love and non-violence even in the face of oppression and persecution.

Trijicon messed up when they put this verse on their product.  Not because it broke military regulations, but because they have grossly misrepresented the savior they have claimed to serve.

I fear the legacy of Martin Luther King has been lost in popular society.  We have acknowledged his role in bringing about racial equality, but have failed to remember his poignant words concerning peace and systemic injustice.  He not only fought (non-violently) for equal rights, he stood firmly for the cause of universal peace and justice regardless of who it was standing against it.

King was notably critical of the inaction and complacency of the church.  I am reminded of this as I reread his Letter from a Birmingham Jail.  He does not mince words in calling out those who stand by in the face of hatred and oppression.  Many of his words perfectly mimic the juxtaposition of hope and pain that I feel concerning the church.  I have included a few segments from the end of his letter (emphasis mine).

I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say this as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church. I say this as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who ‘has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of Rio shall lengthen.

…

In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard many ministers say: "Those are social issues, with which the gospel has no real concern." And I have watched many churches commit themselves to a completely other worldly religion which makes a strange, on Biblical distinction between body and soul, between the sacred and the secular.

…

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the church. How could I do otherwise? l am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson and the great-grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and through fear of being nonconformists.

There was a time when the church was very powerful in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being "disturbers of the peace" and "outside agitators"’ But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were "a colony of heaven," called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment. They were too God intoxicated to be "astronomically intimidated." By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.

Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Par from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent and often even vocal sanction of things as they are.

But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust.

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom, They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

…

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood,

Martin Luther King, Jr.