The Long Saturday

Simon. Thomas. James. Andrew. Philip. Matthew. Bartholomew. Simon the Zealot. John. James son of Alphaeus. Thaddaeus.

Not yet household names, almost 2000 years ago, these men had just seen their lives go up in smoke. Their mentor, and for some, best friend, had been brutally and publicly tortured and killed the previous evening. With him had gone the dreams of freeing their people from Roman oppression, even as much as he had tried to dissuade them from those ideas.

No jobs to return to - they had quit them three years before. Wives, families, communities had all been deserted to follow a slightly kooky homeless man all around the countryside. If they returned, they would undoubtedly be the laughingstock of their towns at best, and at worst, arrested for sedition.

In the midst of an entire day and two of the longest nights of their lives, through a haze of dull despair and shattered hopes, they had to ask... what now?

It is always the darkest before the dawn.

2 months!

Wow! Time has flown since the last time I updated this thing.

A list of things that have happened in the last two months (I'll try elaborating on some of these in later posts)

• summer retreat
• USA basketball gold medal win in the Olympics
• Andrew/Andrea got married (and I acted in a live-action Korean drama)
• I moved out of Kittoe and back in with my folks for a few months prior to the wedding
• Castle Crashers became the video game of choice for a month
• began a fantasy football season where I've gotten super lucky so far
• went through a re-org at work, my job role has changed to be a bit more customer-facing
• had a nice dinner at Chez TJ w/ Shally
• began selecting leaders for Canaan next year
  

In terms of wedding planning:

• had to book a new sanctuary site
• booked the honeymoon
  
• selected slideshow pictures
• set up gift registries - a surprisingly enjoyable experience (zap! zap! zap!)
  
• ordered invitations
• reserved tuxes
• began premarital counseling

More later.

Great America

Looks like my daily blogging for August was more than a little ambitious... I'm now aiming for 15 posts for the month, or 1 every other day. Still a little behind... gotta get caught up!

On Wednesday, I got to experience a blast of nostalgia as my group at work went to Great America for a fun day. Some observations/memories:

• Tickets are $54 at the gate. Holy moly.
• It's probably a combination of being a weekday and the ticket price tag, but there aren't really any lines anywhere. I remember back in my elementary/jr high/high school days, you'd be able to get one ride on the popular coasters (Top Gun and Vortex) your entire day because the wait in line would be around an hour. On this day we walked right into the car, and some people just stayed in the coaster since no one was waiting in line.
• Speaking of which, I don't know when it happened, but GA is no longer "Paramount's Great America." Now it's just "California's Great America." I guess it lost corporate sponsorship? The most obvious impact of this in the park is seeing that Top Gun no longer exists - it's simply called "Flight Deck." None of the iconic music, no video clips... so sad.
• Rides ridden: Top Gu- I mean, "Flight Deck," Vortex, Demon, Grizzly, Whitewater Rapids. I think I used to enjoy roller coasters more than I do now. Plus, I lost my hat on Whitewater... doh.
• Neat part of the day: the company paid for an hour of free carnival games in about 9 booths next to the Drop Zone. For an hour there were around 200 engineers milling around trying their hand at shooting mini-basketballs through even mini-er hoops, throwing pitches against a radar gun, squirting water to fill up balloons, and winning prizes up the wazoo. I was able to pick up a stuffed Scooby-Doo for Shally by flinging a 63 mph "fastball" that was the fastest in my heat. The high speed for the day was 66 mph according to the game operator.
• That got me thinking - I feel like I'm in roughly average physical condition. I threw that ball just about as hard as I could, getting my whole body into it. I threw 2 pitches the whole day and felt it the rest of the day. Now, 63 mph is considered an extremely slow pitch in baseball. Maybe if I had some training and technique, I could get up to 70 mph by utilizing more leg drive. But all the same, just how ridiculously strong/genetically gifted do you have to be to throw 90+ on a regular basis, up to 100 times? How much of a toll does that take on your body?
• Fond childhood memory: coming to Great America for the 6th grade graduation field trip... and spending almost all day playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in one of the arcades with a few buddies. That's right, we paid money to get into the park... so we could put more money into video games. I was Raphael. I died a lot because his special move was to keep rolling into people.
• Remember when high school physics classes would have field trips to Great America to do physics studies in real life? Why can't all classes do that?
  

"Peace"

One of the reasons why these Olympics in particular are so fascinating is because of the diplomatic tensions that exist when two nation-states meet in sports competition (often used as an analogy for war) while their respective governments and armies may in fact be engaged in actual war. How can athletes from the former Soviet republic of Georgia compete against opponents from Russia while knowing of the invasion? What is going on in the minds of Israelis, Palestinians, Iraqis, Iranians, and Americans when they stare each other down across a swimming pool, ball field, or track? Will any big names come out in the press against the nations that are not doing anything about the genocide in Darfur?

A quote from the above article:

The Beijing Olympics have morphed into the anxiety games. Beneath the veneer of architectural miracles and omnipresent smiles and the "one world, one dream" slogan, there is unease, exacerbated by a secretive Communist regime that rations information. No info, no closure. There are 100,000 Chinese security troops patrolling Beijing, all standing as still as scarecrows, many with the young, porcelain faces of toy soldiers. They are stationed on every street corner, ubiquitous under newly planted trees that line the sidewalks. They are numerically impressive but not especially comforting.

I think this further illustrates the difference between what the world defines as peace, and what the God of the Bible defines as peace.

The former declares that peace exists as long as no shots are being fired. The absence of conflict. We smile awkwardly at each other, dampening down anxiety repeatedly while little glimpses of the resentment and uneasiness simmering underneath will peek through during times of stress. This happens in sports, it happens in workplaces, in marriages, in churches.

God desires peace to be so much more than the absence of conflict, but rather the presence of justice, wholeness, and acceptance. "Blessed are the peacemakers" - peace is something that needs to be worked at, not just achieved by having no conflict.

As a person who is non-confrontational by nature, it's often easy for me to settle for the first kind of peace - as long as there's no conflict, between Shally and myself, in church, in leadership, at work, at home, then things are "cool." However, I've been learning that it's not enough to just avoid confrontation - I need to actively work for wholeness, with heavy doses of grace, in order to bring all of my relationships into the kind of peace God has his heart set on for his people.

Thoughts on the Olympic Opening Ceremony

Observations, bullet-style:

• The sheer number of people involved powering all of the spectacles in the "history of China" is awe-inspiring. Who needs fancy technology when you can train people to supply your power?
• It's kind of neat to be reminded of the scope of China's ancient history and all the contributions to the world in the areas of culture, technology, etc.
  
• There are a lot of countries that I don't even recognize in the parade...
• "Chinese Taipei"?
• Yao walking in with the little boy who not only survived the Szechuan earthquake but saved the lives of a few of his classmates... that's a heartwarming story. If an athlete can be a significant public figure to drive change or be a symbol in a nation (like Muhammad Ali in the US), I think Yao is a good candidate for China.
• These fireworks probably aren't going to help the air quality...
• That was a pretty inventive torch lighting. Although, the whole way I was thinking for the guy, "Don't drop the torch... don't drop the torch..."

On asking for help

I've helped out at a lot of people's weddings.

Off the top of my head, I've been a best man, groomsman, special music, worship leader, sound tech, audio/visual setup, head usher, regular usher, candlelighter, gift mover, stagehand, getaway car driver, and slideshow narrator. Granted, I've never had to coordinate anything (that seems to be a female dominated role), but I basically know my way around the ins and outs.

My parents joke that for my wedding, I have a lot of favors to call in... but now that we're in the midst of trying to think of helpers, there's that familiar feeling of "bu yao ma fan" that comes up. During planning I joked that I could turn around on stage, pick up a guitar and lead worship... and I think I was only half joking.

I think I like to help out people I care about. I'm still learning how to ask for help from those same people.

China in the Olympics

The upcoming Olympic games hosted by China will give the rest of the world perhaps its first "in-depth" look into life there. It'll be interesting to see whether the unseemlier parts of China will get brought to the fore in the international media, like the smog (check out the pics here and here).

Yes, it would look really bad if athletes wear masks to compete outside, and some teams have apparently contemplated doing so over the objections from Chinese officials... but at some point a person's health takes priority over losing face, right? Maybe not in a nation that doesn't put a high value on individual human rights.

Apparently China also hasn't done well at following through on its promises that won them the Games in the first place - rather than cleaning things up from the root level, they've instead spent money on gorgeous new sporting facilities and giving behavior booklets to the locals.

I'm wondering whether China will attempt to censor any type of unflattering news that gets broadcast out of the country, and whether the worldwide media will comply. Should be a fascinating month.

Pre-Olympics Team USA thoughts

Aside: In case you didn't notice, dear reader, that my August output for posts is already an infinite multiple more than July with 0, I am trying an exercise for this month where I try to post once per day, or at least one post for each day. So, I should have at least 31 posts by the end of August. I can't promise that every, or any, will be that entertaining

Couple of short thoughts from watching Team USA take on a few other countries in exhibition games:

• Deron Williams may be the most effective player out there. He seems to make the right pass, right cut, right drive to the hoop, right decision nearly every possession - plus he is physically capable of going anywhere he wants to on the floor.
• While Chris Paul impressed me greatly in the NBA playoffs, he hasn't been able to do much in international play because he is getting bumped a lot more (refs are allowing more contact)
• The team already has problems rebounding - several teams, in and of themselves not that talented, have been able to get several extra possessions simply by stationing 2-3 big men in the paint and batting the ball up in the air. Leaving Tyson Chandler behind in favor of Boozer may end up biting the team in the butt.
• LeBron and Carmelo are not able to defend the PF position - not that they are that much smaller or less physically imposing than the guys they guard, but they're not smart enough to know when to reach, when to body up, and most problematically, when to slide over to provide help defense when a guard gets beat off the dribble.
• Given the short three-point line, it is imperative that the guards put in extra effort to prevent penetration because a kick-out results in a mid-range jumper for 3.
• What's with the weird pattern on the back of the jerseys?
• The coaching staff has clearly put the team through some drills on breaking the zone defense - sliding a forward to the free throw line in the middle of the zone, and having a big man lurking on the baseline for a dumpoff pass.
• Michael Redd is still the only deadeye shooter. Here's hoping 2-3 other guys will get hot each game.
• AK47 is a lot more versatile/crafty/aggressive when he's leading the Russia team than when he's playing 3rd/4th banana to Deron, Boozer, and Okur.
• So begins Lebron's quest to be the first basketball billionaire - by taking over China.

Other Olympics thoughts...
Did anyone see the news item a few weeks ago that China was trying to restrict the Olympic teams from bringing their own food items in order to stimulate traffic to local restaurants? Can you imagine being a world-class athlete deprived of your Gatorade and Powerbars in exchange for local food that might give you the runs?
Also, Bill sent me a link to an amusing article about how China has been legislating behavior and hygiene "improvements" for local residents - things like learning how to stand in line, no public spitting, no bare chests or rolling up pant legs, all for the purpose of presenting the best public image to the world.

On hope management

I read an article on leadership a while ago on Christianity Today where the writer, John Ortberg from Menlo Park Pres, makes the argument that while leaders need to do many things involving their followers in the process of leading - identifying gifts, putting people into positions to succeed, delegating their weaknesses - it is necessary that the leader never delegate optimism and hope. Leaders need to be experts in "Hope Management."

He writes this about former President Franklin Roosevelt, who was apparently a man with a "second-rate intelligence but had a first-rate temperament":

In the middle of a Great Depression, or World War II, or a capital campaign, or a staff crisis, people inevitably wonder: "Can we get through this? Is it worth all the effort and confusion? Can we really overcome this challenge?" They inevitably look to the person at the core; the man or woman leading the charge, the one who sees the big picture. When people see a leader with this kind of vital optimism, who radiates a sense that together we can do what needs to be done, then people tend to decide not to waste their energy wondering about "if" but focus their energy going after "how."

On the other hand, when Eeyore is at the helm, the whole ship is in trouble. Eeyore may be the most intelligent, gifted, attractive, educated, credentialed person in the room. But if he or she is easily deflated, sensitive to defeat and criticism, and de-motivated by setbacks, the whole community begins the long slow spiral downward.

He then mentions how his journals as a leader tend to be full of chronicles of failure - not confessions of shortcomings, but vague discouragements that don't allow him to feel forgiveness or grace from God and in fact would cause him to spiral deeper into discouragement. As he put it, instead of "encouraging himself in the Lord" like King David writes about in the Scriptures, he was "discouraging himself in the Lord."

This hits me deeply because I have been, through choice or necessity, been trying to take on greater leadership roles in several areas of my life. The challenge for me is that I've evolved to a point where I am generally optimistic and encouraging with other people, but generally negative and pessimistic about myself. In other words, I think or act like others are awesome ("You/we can do it!") perhaps more than is warranted, in the hope that they can exceed their capability; yet I will consciously or unconsciously degrade myself ("Bob, you failed before, and you're going to fail again, why not give up?").

I'm finding now how important it is to have, and to be, leaders who are not just competent, trustworthy, and possessing integrity, but if there is no hope, no belief that a goal can be accomplished, then every follower's spirit will be broken. I've seen this positively and negatively reinforced in my workplace, in church, and in my relationship - as a follower in some cases and as a leader in others. Even though it is sometimes exhausting to try and cling to an existing hope, or generate a new hope, I'm hoping that God will be able to supersede my natural cynicism to believe in spite of myself.

The end of one era

About 3 years ago, after living at home for nearly 5 years, I moved out to Mountain View with Chris and Hanlin in the "Kittoe House." It's been a blast... living with two Godly guys, being centrally located for small group and social events, cutting my commute in half, late night video games, potlucks, birthdays, barbeques, gearing up for hoops, date nights, movie nights, NBA games (including the Warriors playoff run), TV shows ranging from Lost to Iron Chef, conversations galore, and a million more memories.

As I get ready to move on to the next stage of my life with Shally in January, I've decided to move back to my parents' home at the end of August to spend some time with my current family before I begin my own. At some point I'll also need to begin finding a place for Shally and me to live as well. There are a good number of logistics to work out this month, but more than that, as a nostalgic person by nature, I'm still coming to terms with the end of this stage of my life. It's been a great 3 years with 2 great roommates - I believe we've been able to bless each other and bless others, which was our stated goal when we moved in together. I don't know who will be taking my place, especially considering Hanlin's own impending move-out, but I hope that the spirit of the Kittoe House tradition will live on somehow.