charlieDEAN’S Blog

His methods are quite strange to those of the ‘emergent’ generation, and yet I don’t know that I admire any Christian leader like I admire Billy Graham. As I’ve been following the news of his final American Crusade in NYC over the weekend, I’ve been formulating some thoughts. Here are three reasons that I love Billy Graham:
1. Is there anyone on the face of the planet more humble? Literally millions of people look to him as the Protestant version of the Pope, and yet Billy genuinely deflects all the attention that is paid to him. I read in Newsweek that this weekend, in NYC, one of Billy’s comments was something like, “You’re not here to listen to Billy Graham…” Well of course that’s why most of the people were in the stadium were there, but Billy is always pointing to Jesus.
2. Are there any Christian leaders who can genuinely profess to being a-political. Billy has had strong relationships with both the Bushes and Clintons. Because he has refused to enter into the political fray, Billy has earned the opportunity to speak to both sides. I wish more Christian leaders would follow his example. It seems that the more power that evangelical leaders get the more they seem to get behind political agendas. (My cynical interpretation is that it’s all a power trip — to be courted by political types…)
3. Billy’s commitment to being relevant. Today’s crusade is quite different than the one of yesteryear. I love that Billy has not taken the path of many churches who have decided that what worked in ‘57 will work today.

Watched The Aviator last night. I was underimpressed. I guess I had gotten myself hyped-up because of all the Oscar buzz about it. There was some cool stuff, but in the end, I think it failed to tell the story that I was interested in. As good as DiCaprio’s acting was, the storyline contented itself to depict Howard Hughes’ behavior without ever explaining the “whys” (except for one scene with Hughes as a boy interacting with his mother) which is what I was really interested in.

On Saturdays, on our local public radio station, there’s a program called Whad’ya Know? (at which the correct response is supposed to be, “not much, you?”). It’s a variety, “Garrison Keilor” type show with trivia, humor, and a jazz trio. They travel all over the United States, so a lot of the humor is regional, depending on where they are (this week they were in Trenton, NJ.)

Anyway…there IS a point coming soon…Michael Feldman, the host, was joking about some youngsters (from what I gathered, young teenagers) in his audience. Understand that this show is definitely geared towards adults and probably mid-life to older adults at that. (I understand that the fact that I like this show paints me as rather lame, but I’m okay with it.) Anyway, Feldman was joking about how these kids were obviously forced to come to the show and didn’t look like they were having much fun. And then Feldman said something like this: “It would be great if we could draw in a younger demographic. Of course, we aren’t going to change our format or anything, but it would be nice if they would just start showing up.” Of course this got a big laugh from the audience because of the obvious absurdity.

But sadly, this is the mantra of many dying churches in America today….”we won’t change anything, but it sure would be nice if the next generation would come out anyway!”

Ever since I got my Dell 20GB DJ in February I’ve been moving my music collection onto my computer and then working on organizing and getting them onto my DJ. Much of my music collection is just downright embarrassing, but these are the bands, if missing from my collection, would make me sad.

• Dave Matthews Band — Duh! Don’t think I need to say a whole lot here. This also includes Dave’s solo album and albums that Dave has done with Tim Reynolds.
• U2 — Again, not a shocker, don’t need to do much justification here.
• Toad the Wet Sprocket — a little obscure to many people. This was a “surfer band” out of SoCal that captured my attention throughout college. Sadly, they broke up a couple years ago…something about it was better to break up the band and remain friends than to keep going and hating each other.
• Counting Crows — great mellow music, and then they shock you by doing the title track for Shrek 2. Most of the Counting Crows music is “slit your wrist” kind of music.
• Sara McLachlan — since we’re in the “slit your wrist” category, I’ve gotta add Sarah. I mostly love her music on rainy days.
• David Crowder Band — most worship music is fairly predictable, Crowder is not!!
• Coldplay — although I only have 2 CD’s, my love of coldplay is growing.
• John Mayer — used to not like John so much, but his love of a good groove and songwriting ability has won me over!
• Van Halen — this was a hard choice, but in order to round out my list, I needed something hard for putting the windows down. I’ve been a closet VH fan for years…this excludes everything after Sammy Hagar left the band.
• Collective Soul — again, this lands in the rock band category.

I’m sure by tomorrow I’ll want to change this list…thoughts?

Ever have those days where self-doubt creeps in? Where you start to question everything. Did I say the right thing? Do I do the right thing? Do I have the right attitude? How do people perceive me?

On most days, I think people perceive me as confident and self-assured, and there are lots of days that I feel that way about myself.

And then, there are the days like this one, and I question everything and I feel small and very unsure.

Just the way I feel. No big deal. “This too shall pass.”

So, on this blog post that I read, the author listed 5 people that he had never met that he would have over for a BBQ, if he could. So I’ve been formulating my list in my head the last couple of days. Here’s where I’m at:

Brian McLaren [Christian author] — I could trust Brian not to embarrass me (not necessarily true of a lot of author Christian authors, I fear). I’ve met Brian once, but I’d love to have a conversation of importance.

Anna Quindlin [columnist, novelist] — Every week, Newsweek alternates between Anna Quindlin and George Will writing a column called “The Last Word.” Over the years, as I’ve read Newsweek, I find myself resonating with Anna. While our political views are pretty far apart, her keen insight and strong liberal leanings would make the BBQ conversation sizzle!

Dave Matthews [musician] — yeah, no shocker for those of you that know me at all. I racked my brain on this one trying to think about an artisan to have at my BBQ, and the numerous “God references” in Dave’s songwriting tipped the scale in his favor. Bono is a close second here…it would really depend on my mood when I sent out the invites!

Charlie Rose [journalist] — on the local PBS station, they air Charlie’s show at 11pm, I believe. No commercials, interviews range from 15 min to a full hour, none of the arguing crap that you see on network and cable news, just earnest discussion and a desire to really understand. To me, Charlie is a master interviewer, because instead of trying to trap those he interviews, he seems to earnestly seek to understand.

Will Smith [actor] — up to this point, it’s a pretty heavy dinner party. Will is there to lighten the mood, provide the laughs, but at the same time, in the interviews I’ve seen, it seems that Will would be able to hang with the intellect of the others (unlike somebody like Robin Williams or Jim Carey who would be uncontrollable.)

I’m really not married to this list…I would love to hear yours!

A friend said to me last night that in the year and a half that he’s known me, it seems that I’ve always had a cough or something. He’s probably right and I was wondering why it seems that I’m sick all the time…I’ve come up with the following theories because prior to the last couple years, I’m not ususally sick very often.

• with building the house and stuff…I’ve been living at my extremes which always makes one more susceptible to every virus, but really theory #2 is the main culpret
• 2 kids…age 2 and 4….pretty much, this is the main reason…almost every bug that’s gone around this winter has been brought home by one of us and then in true, loving devotion to each other we’ve passed it around…sometimes twice…after talking to other parents of young children, this is pretty normal, I guess. But it still sucks!

So, this time it’s a dry cough with mild congestion. ARGHHHHHHHH!

Found these two quotes on a blog that I keep in my RSS reader…link provided at the bottom:

“This idea that somebody we disagree with on economic or social policy or something we have to turn into some kind of ogre or demon, I think, is a mistake. I mean, it’s like telling the American people or half the American people that don’t agree with you they’re all fools. That’s just not true.” [from an interview on CNN]

“If two people have good minds and they’re looking at problems, if they agree all the time it means one of them is not thinking. If they disagree all the time, it means one of them is not thinking. They’re just allowing their political position to dictate their position on an issue. And I think that’s unhealthy. And the public knows better.” [from an interview on FOX News]

The above quotations were both from former President Clinton in his recent media tour to promote the paperback edition of his book. I didn’t tell you that befobecausease I was afraid that some of you might not read the quotes. Here’s the blog that I got these from. I don’t care what you think of Clinton, I think these quotes are AWESOME! Too bad the current state of the media is so partisan and shallow…but oh well…

I’ve been ruminating the last day or two on what it means to be a “peacemaker.” I think that when we read the Sermon on the Mount, we often think of “peace” as opposed to war. Duh. But what I’ve been processing is the idea of being a peacemaker in all of life particularly in my personal relationships. I guess I see that that are lots of people who like to escalate situations — make them a bigger deal, get people all riled up, fight for a cause, etc. But I wonder if the greater call of being a “peacemaker” is in my personal and work relationships to “de-escalate” situations, to seek win-win situations, to sacrifice my own personal interests in order to keep things “peaceful.”

I don’t know…thoughts?

Yes, this is me going through a section called “The Stairs” on the Chubb Trail, just west of St. Louis. After not biking at all last summer, due to a little project called “building my own house,” I’m back on the bike again. I’ve probably been out about 15 times or so this year, mostly at Jubilee State Park. Here are some thoughts.

1. No matter what the PAMBA people say, Jubilee is NOT Indepedence or Dirksen. There are only three things I miss about living in Pekin — they have a good city park for my boys, and they have the BEST mountain biking in the area. Mad props to the guys from Little Ades (they’re the third thing I miss about living in Pekin).
2. Never, ever, ever eat pancakes at 8am and then go for an intense ride at 9am, no matter how good the pancakes are. Pancakes tend to sit in your gut like a brick that weighs at least 10 times more than when it went in…also, when you have a big climb you tend to throw- up pancakes.
3. I’m really out of shape…I’m pretty sure I’d be a wicked rider if I was carrying about 20lbs. less — enough said!
4. My bike has been performing well considering that it is a $300 entry-level bike that I’ve upgraded wheelsets, bottom bracket, cranks, tires, sprockets, and seat. However, every day I think and dream about a new bike someday…specifically the Kona Hoss Dee-Lux.
5. There’s still nobody I’d rather ride with than my brother-in-law Josh. We have a blast pushing each other and laughing our butts off when somebody wipes (like when I went hard over the handlebars at Indy on Memorial Day while trying to negotiate a log pile).

WARNING: If you don’t like getting sweaty and muddy while you workout with a decided element of danger, don’t waste your time and/or money…instead, you can donate to my new bike fund!

A word about the pancakes…I took some chopped pecans, lightly toasted them in a skillet and then added some sugar, so that I now had candied pecans. I put about half the pecans in the pancake mixture and then used the rest as a topping…crunchy and delicious…although beware of note #2!