Status report

I'm almost two-thirds of the way through David Murrow's book, Why Men Hate Going to Church. It's a fascinating companion to John Edridge's Wild at Heart. There's a lot to think about. Murrow spends some time wading through statistics to validate his premise that men don't attend church--much less participate in ministry work--as much as women. Though the pastorate may remain a men's club, everything else is dominated by women. I'm currently working through the section of the book that deals with some of the particular things men struggle with in the church.

This book should be required reading for every church leader. And every woman.

You never know how God will use you

The morning hasn't ended, and I've had the opportunity to be a blessing to someone today. At least I hope so. A young man from the church came into the office, and mentioned he needed help with a cover letter. I asked, "Why?" He said he was just laid off. Rats, I said.

Since I have lived through two layoffs myself, which connotes to several hundred letters over the years, I said I could help. So we massaged his cover letter: tweaked the basic structure, fleshed it out. Offered some layout suggestions for the resume. And gave him some stationery stock I have left over from the last layoff go-round. (It's a nice mute gray marbled paper. Looks nice.)

It's just neat that I got to help him.

It's officially summer!

Celebrated our 26th wedding anniversary Wednesday. It's been a long hard year for us, given some of the stuff we've had to deal with. But things will get better we hope.

*****

I recently completed Dan Kimball's book, They Like Jesus, They Just Don't Like the Church. Three years of conversations and research with non-Christians and their take on organized Christianity are baked into this book.

In the first part of the book, Kimball outlines the characteristics of the emerging generation, which the church is very quickly losing in practically every way. In the second part of the book, Kimball shares how non-Christian "emergents" perceive the church. Some of these perceptions are well deserved; others are based on erroneous conclusions.

The chapter dealing with the church's stance on homosexuality ("The church is homophobic") proved particularly enlightening. I've struggled with how to relate to folks who pursue this lifestyle. How does on "love the sinner, but hate the sin." Which is NOT a biblical command, by the way. The only thing I find in the Bible is "Love the sinner." Anyway.

Kimball draws a distinction between someone being attracted to someone of the same gender and someone who acts on that attraction. This makes the attraction no different (from the sin perspective) as someone who lusts for a married woman, or an unmarried couple who insists on living together. It's not the attraction that connotes the sin; it's the behavior that follows.

*****

After two and a half years, I finally have internet access in my office. I installed a router and ran the Ethernet cable myself. This means I don't have to battle four other people for access to the office PC. Yay! This also means I can hopefully keep this blog a little more current. Now wouldn't that be nice?