Life in the Fast Lane

Once again, my blog updates have fallen victim to the Tyranny of the Urgent.  Our lives have had so little margin since the beginning of the year that 'normal life' seems a distant reality.  We just can't seem to slow down... and in some cases, it appears we don't want to.

For the past several years we've used the analogy of having a revolving door installed to our flat to accommodate the coming and going of all our visitors.  Never has it seemed more appropriate than now.  Since December, we've had house guests every month... usually multiple guests per month, and it looks as though that trend will continue until at least August.

In addition, we have and host more dinners, meetings, birthday parties, baby showers, gatherings, and general hangout times than we've ever done before.  Yes, that includes when we had apprentices/students filing in and out on a weekly basis for 3 years.

The thing is, this exercise of hospitality is simultaneously life-giving and taxing.  We can honestly say that each of our house guests have been a blessing; they've been encouraging, helpful and gracious - playing with our kids, babysitting them, and helping out around the flat.  In most cases, they simply jump into our routines with us.

As good as it's been to host these great folks - friends and family - we're loving the family time that we're getting for the next couple of weeks.  Our girls are so used to having folks in the house, that when a bathroom door is closed or the curtains are drawn, they call out for the guest they think is responsible for that.

It has been good, however, to really concentrate on giving Gabrielle and Isabelle our undivided attention.

Aside from the hospitality, Jasheen and I have some pretty exciting things in the cooker right now, not the least being a new missional endeavor for me.  I've taken the point on a project that would see Mosaic launch and indoor skateboard park in the city of Glasgow.  In a place that sees so much rain, this could be a great place for local kids to skate during the cold, winter months.  We anticipated the park being built and ready by the end of the year, but research showed that the project will take much longer than that.  In addition to acquiring the necessary funding for the park, we also need time to find the right facility and get all of the certifications and permissions needed to launch and operate such a business.  It will be a business.  It will need to be at least profitable enough to cover the costs required to keep it open.  No margin, no mission.

I'm in the process of raising a team of folks to help with the administrative legwork for the project - not my strongest suit.  Jasheen has been vital to much of this on the front end.  Her business knowledge and experience has really helped me grasp a realistic timeframe for this endeavor.  We're praying about how all of this is going to come together, but one thing I would LOVE is if someone would catch the passion and vision of this project and take a year of their life to join us over here and commit to the project until it's ready to open.  But that's just a dream and prayer of mine.

In the meantime, I'm continuing to serve at Mosaic and Jasheen continues to be supermom and piano teacher.

The girls are growing so fast.  At 3 1/2, Gabrielle is still a relational dynamo... making friends hand over fist at nursery school.  Isabelle turns 2 this month, and she is doing well to keep up with her sister in all their playful adventures.

I will try to be more diligent in keeping the blog current.  Several folks have been encouraging me to write a book (subject of said book is still coming together), and some of the most important exercises for writing is... well, writing... and reading.  I'm going to try and write a little everyday, perhaps in blog posts, and perhaps in my own journal.  Either way, it should help me keep up with the blog better.

2008 Reading List

It was kind of a slow year for reading.  Maybe I'll get back into a reading rhythm this year!

Gregory A. Boyd: Letters from a Skeptic

Sam Harris: Letter to a Christian Nation

William P. Young: The Shack

Andy Freeman & Pete Greig: Punkmonk - New Monasticism and the Ancient Art of Breathing

Philip Yancey: Soul Survivor

Miroslav Volf: Free of Charge

Mike Erre: The Jesus of Suburbia

Gilbert Bilezikian: Community 101

Greg Spencer: The Welkening - A Three Dimensional Tale

John Twelve Hawks: The Traveler

Fire in the... bins?

As Mosaic was about to get started yesterday, and I was just switching my mobile phone to silent, Jasheen (ill at home) rang frantically, "Chris, the bins are on fire!!!"

The bins she was referring to sit unattractively to the left of our front window.  Due to the increased size of todays' waste bins, the excessive rubbish produced by an average family, and the fact that there are three families that occupy our building, we have three large brown plastic bins for organic garden waste, three large blue plastic bins for recyclables, and five large green plastic bins for other rubbish - scratch that - we HAD five large green plastic bins for other rubbish.

"Chris, the bins are on fire!!!" 

There's pretty much only one response to that phrase, "WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT??? WHAT BINS?!?!?"

"The green bins.  They're on fire," Jasheen repeated.

What followed was a realtime report of what was happening, from dialing 999 (Emergency), to attempting to douse the 6' flames with a bucket of water (which seemed only to make the blaze spit sparks in all directions), to a description of the trail the fire was blazing, to the arrival of the hunky firemen who finally conquered the inferno.

We were left with a hunk of molten plastic, ash and charred debris.  Remember the Simpson's episode when Bart accidently burned down their Christmas tree and all their presents, and then buried the evidence in the snow?  Well, our bins look like that; one solid piece of melted gunk.

It's oddly funny, actually.  On Saturday we woke to discover that our boiler wasn't working properly and we could not heat our flat - it's winter here and the temperature outside is literally freezing.  Being an old, drafty structure, our flat gets really cold really fast if there is no heat.  We spent most of the entire day in the lounge with a space heater while the rest of the flat was a meat locker.  Needless to say, it was challenging to have a good attitude... especially since we've all been sick.

So we watched TV... and what did we watch?  Extreme Makeover: Home Edition - that show where a disadvantaged family goes from a shack to a mansion in a massive exhibition of compassion, goodwill and free advertising.  It really helped put things in perspective, and by the end of the fourth episode - yeah, it was on back-to-back all day long - we were very grateful for our freezing, drafty, old flat.

Our gratefulness extended through Sunday as we thanked God for the couple who came knocking on our door to tell us that the bins were on fire right next to our living room window. Who knows how bad it could have been if no one was home to call 999?

St. Andrews Day

Today we celebrated Scotland's main national holiday, St. Andrews Day.  While I won't go into detail about the history of the holiday, I thought I'd share a St. Andrews prayer:

O Christ, our Lord,

Who didst beautify the most blessed Andrew

with the grace of apostleship,

and the crown of martyrdom,

by granting to him this special gift,

that by preaching the mystery of the cross,

he should merit death on the cross;

grant us to become most true lovers of Thy holy cross,

and deny ourselves,

to take up your cross

and follow Thee;

that by sharing Thy sufferings in this life,

we may deserve the happiness

of obtaining life everlasting.

Amen.  (Attributed to Eusebius, 263-339 c.e.)

Me, teaching on St. Andrews Day Sunday, wearing my kilt.

(the lighting was bad so treating it has made the photo look a little washed-out)