charlieDEAN’S Blog

Last night I was given the opportunity to speak at our New Community service on James 3, where James is talking about how our tongues continually get us in trouble. I think that when I prep a message like that, it often turns out that I am more impacted by it than anyone else. I can’t think of something that gets me in trouble in my life more than my tongue. The last couple days, as I’ve prepped have been a great reminder to look for ways to encourage other people and to shut my mouth more!!

On a lighter note, if you have a few minutes, check out this site. It’s called The Veracity Project. I really like what they do. You can click on each of the individual links to watch these short films.

I’m slowly but surely learning how to make this blog more functional, which has required a little bit of HTML learning, but I seem to be getting it! Anyway, I’ve added a “Links” section that has links to some of the sites that I frequent frequently. (I think this is a textbook case of being redundant but I thought it funny, so it stands!)

Anyway, some explanation…

Tim Keel was a guy I didn’t know very well in Seminary (he was finishing his last year, as I was starting my first)…but he’s my blog model…he’s insightful, and blogs frequently.
Rob Wondergem was my next-door-neighbor at seminary. Check out his blog for hilarious news of his softball team (they’re not very good, but they’re getting better!).
Dave Matthews Band Website — Duh!
Nexus — the ministry at Northwoods Community Church that I’m responsible for…please don’t judge us by our website (we’re working on it)!

I’ll add other links as I deem necessary!

Next addition for my blog…my lists of favorite books, DVD’s and CD’s

I’m not a rabid sports fan. I like watching sports, but I’d rather be playing them than watching. But every year I really do get caught up in the excitement of March Madness and this year has been quite remarkable. For those of you not from Central Illinois, we’re pretty pumped about the Illini! (By the way, if you’re reading this looking for an important insight, you’ve come to the wrong place today.) I’ll admit, when they were down by 15 points with less than 5 minutes to go the other night, I mentally gave up…but good thing it doesn’t depend on me!
So, to conclude this meaningless musing…I’ll just let you know that this Saturday night at 5:00…I’ll be camped in front of the TV, acting like a rabid sports fan!

Last weekend our church had Lincoln Brewster come for a concert. To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t excited about him coming…it wasn’t that I disliked him or anything, but the CD’s that I had heard were pretty vanilla, and I was expecting the usual lame Christian music.But Lincoln surprised me! He is a fabulous guitar player! Apparently about ten years ago when Steve Perry from Journey did his solo CD, Lincoln had a big part in writing/playing/producing. So I left the concert Friday night pretty pumped up and excited…I probably won’t buy his CD’s though, unless he releases something live that has a lot of his improvisations on guitar!PS…does anyone know anything about Rufus Wainwright? Lincoln did a song written by Rufus Wainwright called “Hallelujah” that I really dig (it was also on the Shrek soundtrack).

Last night I started reading a great book by Marcus Gladwell. (His other book The Tipping Point, was also a huge hit with me.) Anyway, in this book he looks at how great leaders make decisions intuitively. He basically argues, in the introduction that when we usually talk about leadership it’s in the macro sense, talking about making big decisions. But he argues, that great leaders are effective at making hundreds of small decisions at a gut level, and often, if you probe them as to why they chose a particular thing, they could only describe it as, “it just felt right.” Gladwell is a psychologist and so he tend to write from the viewpoint, and it just really charges me up!

Okay…so I posted that I was getting better, and then I descended into a pit of coughing…so I finally humbled myself and went to the doctor. He gave me a Z-Pac (antibiotics) and some anti-coughing pills…that was 2 days ago. I really am feeling much better…hopefully this will extend beyond one day!

I grew up in a dispensationalist environment (if you don’t understand this terminology, it would be directly analogous to the Left Behind book series), where I remember as a child being afraid that Jesus was going to break through the clouds at any moment and rescue us from the world that was clearly going to hell (more and more so every day). The emphasis always seemed to be on what God had done in the past and at the same time a resignation when looking towards the future.
As I have grown in my theological studies and understandings, I have begun to recognize how this has lead both in my life (and in the conservative evangelical church at-large) to a general apathy when it comes to the world around me. I mean, why spend your time and resources in this world, when Jesus is just going to take us out of it an anytime (and in fact I remember being taught as a child that he would for sure came back by the year 2000 — AT THE LATEST)?

I was finishing a book today by one of my favorite authors and he was talking about a new eschatology, and this really charged me up…

“Jesus went everywhere preaching, ‘The kingdom of God is at hand,’ loosely paraphrased, he was saying, ‘The kingdom of God is ahead in the road.’ It isn’t behind us, back in ‘Bible times,’ as I thought in Sunday school. It is ahead of us. It is not here fully yet, though it is in some way among us…Few things could change the church…as much as putting the weight on the future rather than the past…Leaning forward in this way, we will be filled with hope, not dread; energy, not nostalgia…We will assume that God is still building and working — and will not become tired or distracted from his plans.”

That feels so much better to me…and gives me such more more reason and excitement about living in the world today!

I don’t handle being sick very well, so this 3-week bout I’ve been having with a cold/fever/cough/sinus congestion has been kicking my butt! Every time I think I should go to the doctor, it seems like I start getting better and so I don’t go, and then I get worse…oh well! Yesterday, I started to feel like myself again, and today makes two days in a row…so maybe the end is finally here!
God bless my wife who puts up with a such a whiny husband when he’s sick!

I had scheduled a lunch with a former student of mine, who is now a student at Bradley U. for monday. Since I was sick, we moved the meeting to today. We have a mutual love for Monte Cristo sandwiches (I like to refer to it as a hunk of fried heaven with raspberry jam), so we decided to meet at Bennigan’s in downtown Peoria because they serve up a good Monte Cristo.

I forgot that today is St. Patrick’s Day and that there is a huge parade downtown and a big party in the Holiday Inn…but everything was cool, once we found places to park (I only had to walk 3 or 4 blocks…I think he walked 6 or 7). So the cool part of all this, is that just as we were finishing up with our lunches and conversation, a group of bagpipers came into the restaurant, which was really cool, except that 10 bagpipers w/ a percussion accompaniment, tends to leave one’s ears ringing hours later!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you Irish folk…and from those who aren’t, we’ll make sure we hoist a (insert favorite Irish beer here) in your honor tonight!

Sorry that there’s nothing new…I’ve had a 101 degree fever the last couple of days. I did haul the old TV up to our bedroom, so I finally got around to watching Lord of the Rings extended edition (and you thought the theatrical release was long!) I’ve also watched Lethal Weapon 4, Ladder 49 (felt more like propaganda for a career in fire-fighting than a movie), A Supernatural Evening with Santana, The Simpsons, etc., etc. When you don’t have cable, the options are very slim during daytime!
Hopefully, I’ll be up and blogging again either by the end of the week, or the first of next week.