My students don’t know yet, but the announcement was made to my co-workers today, so I can officially announce it here as well: For the second time in a decade, I am leaving a teaching job at Hauser to enter missionary work.  I am just as confident of God’s call and just as scared by the prospect as the first time around. Melissa and I are staying put in Columbus, Indiana, but I will be joining the staff of Missions Resource International in January. In short, MRI makes microloans possible in struggling communities overseas.  I have 11 school days left…

My honor students just finished reading Fahrenheit 451. Each time I read this book, I appreciate and value it more.  HBO made a movie out of the book a couple of years ago and, of course, my students are begging to see it. So I just finished watching it to see if it was usable or not. Of course the writers had to sprinkle a few f-bombs throughout but I think I can censor it as we go to make it “school appropriate”. (Which is totally ironic, but you gotta do what you gotta do.)   The bigger issue is what…

Now and then a friend from Haiti will contact me with a request for some money. I know life is difficult there – especially these days – and so I usually comply with a bit of cash.  It doesn’t take much. Sometimes the need is just for some money to make it until the end of the month. Fifty dollars can be the difference between a friend and his family going several days without food or … having their daily rice and beans. Fifty dollars might enable a family to keep a child in school for the next month or…

Although extremely difficult to live up to, the Golden Rule is beautiful in its straightforward simplicity: “In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 7:12)  Beyond its simplicity, there is another aspect of the Golden Rule that had never occurred to me until I read The Good Works Reader by Thomas Oden: it demonstrates that we are without excuse. Oden quotes early church Father, John Chrysostom: “In this statement Jesus briefly sums up all that is required. He shows that the definition of virtue is…

Although extremely difficult to live up to, the Golden Rule is beautiful in its straightforward simplicity: “In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 7:12)  Beyond its simplicity, there is another aspect of the Golden Rule that had never occurred to me until I read The Good Works Reader by Thomas Oden: it demonstrates that we are without excuse. Oden quotes early church Father, John Chrysostom: “In this statement Jesus briefly sums up all that is required. He shows that the definition of virtue is…

We know so little about each other and what goes on “behind closed doors”. This evening Melissa and I walked through our neighborhood in the dark, critiquing our neighbors’ Christmas decorations. As we passed a particular two story brick house, I pointed and said, “That’s the house.” Through a wide window we could see a large, beautiful Christmas tree. The house was peaceful. It seemed warm and inviting. But yesterday morning I was running Ginger through this same neighborhood in the dark of 6:00 am.  And as I passed this same house, I heard a loud and angry teenage voice…

This morning I was watching a video an old friend recently posted on YouTube, and at one point I had to rewind it a few seconds to see if I had heard him correctly. You see, he’s a pastor. But some of the things he talks about on his videos have generated a whole lot of questions in my mind. For example, he speaks of “Gnosticism” in a positive light. I don’t know much about Gnosticism, outside of the fact that the term is usually preceded by three words: “the heresy of” and that the gnostics valued their own mysterious…

I had to take a personal day from school to write a paper for my class, Sacramental Spirituality and Disciple-Making Leadership. So I am “all written out” this evening. But it is done.  It was difficult … before it became impossible … to find the self-discipline to write a six page comparative book review over Thanksgiving weekend while all the kids were home from college. (And neither book was super easy!)   Maybe once I get back into the flow of being a student again, I will remember how time-consuming papers can be. Next time I will break the process into…

In a world full of uncertainty, you would think you could at least trust your five senses unequivocally, wouldn’t you? Have you ever heard of the McGurk Effect? The McGurk Effect describes the way your sense of sight will overrule your hearing if the two are ever in conflict. There’s a great little video (just two minutes long) that illustrates this phenomenon: McGurk Effect Video on YouTube In the video, a man’s face is shown in close-up as he repeats the sound “Bah!” The film then retains the sound but now superimposes the same man clearly moving his lips to…