one reason i love the olympics

i was in the kitchen making some sticky buns for tomorrow morning, when I looked out and saw Elanor jumping on the couch, saying ...

"Go, United States! Go, Go, United States! YEAH!!! Mommy Mommy - our country just won the game! Yeah United States!"

wonderful. And all the athletes are household first-and-last names to Caroline with her impeccable diction. I love it.

a quick look

I thought I'd pause mid-year to share a few things I've read lately that have left a huge impression on me. So here they are!

The End of Memory by Miroslav Volf is one of the most amazing works I've read: rich, humble, personal, wise, and utterly hopeful. If you ever wonder about or struggle with issues related to forgiveness, justice, and painful memories: take and read. I don't want to sound like a sop, but I cried when I read the last page. That says something for a theology book!

More than any other book so far this year, Surprised by Hope (By N. T. Wright) has caught me firmly in its grasp. This book has fired my imagination. I have often felt that Christianity is not about going to heaven when you die but I haven't had the words or concepts to express what I want to say instead. I do now. Thanks, Tom - the energy and life you put into this exploration of the basic, historic Christian message is extraordinary.

Thank you, Jim Collins, thank you. I needed to read this short book right now. Your words at the bottom of page 14 and the top of page 30 rocked my world. I need to get to work.

Happy Reading!
grace and peace,
Andy

when faced with a choice...

Hypothetical situation: you take your children to SeaWorld and are trying to decide which Shamu show to take them to. Without knowing anything about them but the names, which one would you go to: "Believe" or "Shamu Rocks"?

I really hope you answered "Shamu Rocks". Because I can say with confidence that the other show is about the cheesiest thing I have ever ever EVER seen in my life. It is also mostly a video show, with very little actual animal performance. "Shamu Rocks", however, has got to be one of the most amazing things I have ever seen in my entire life. It's fun, it's exciting, and it's awe inspiring (the things these whales can do is just staggering, and to think that they can do it with timings and on command.... just amazing).

It's a night show, so I guess it would be a long day if you were there all day already, but it is one of the most amazing shows I have ever seen. Guess where the kids and I went yesterday?

pictures and words

I wanted to share some more pictures from my recent backpacking trip as well as give you a sense of what I was thinking the whole weekend. As we hiked out on Sunday, I hung back and just gazed at the world. These are the words that came to mind (with a nod toward GMH). Bear with me - it's been a while since I did any poetry.

Glory be to God for gray granite spires slicing the skies,
For rivers’ roaring rush into valleys spread wide in water-welcome,
For pinnacles that pitch into broken boulders scatter-strewn in streams.
He shines in radiant shafts of light slanting on the peaks,
In shadows and shades dancing darkly down couloirs and chutes,
In silver-shine reflections in the dusk-and-dawn hours on lakes.
He speaks in flaming flowers crazy with color,
In hushed hallways of barren bristlecone pines,
in foaming flows spilling silver into meadows and glens.
And all around sighs the singing speech of a world a-tremble,
strung with pleasure and passion and power,
whose ever-altered appearance only serves the Reality
from whom, in whom, and to whom are all things.

where i've been

 

Kearsarge Pinnacles and Kearsarge Lakes Basin, Kings Canyon National Park

poor piglet!

A lovely friend of mine offered to watch my kids for me this morning so I could have some "me" time, which was very exciting, both for me and for them. However, things just didn't quite turn out as planned.... after about 45 minutes or so (just enough time for me to order a cup of coffee and sit down with my strata at Bennett's), my cell phone rang with bad news... Elanor had fallen and gashed her chin. She and I spent the rest of the morning at the ER so she could get it glued back together. Once again, though, she was a total trooper. She didn't cry the entire time we waited and lay completely still while they swabbed out the gash (about an inch long). Interestingly enough, she burst into tears as soon as they were done. I think she had just had it emotionally at that point. She's a tough kid.

Of course, Andy won't know what happened until he gets home tomorrow as he is currently in Belize....

check it out!

I decided that I was ready for a website revamp. Yes, again. As I thought about what I wanted from the site and the current site usage, I realized that I wanted was a blog with a few extra pages on the side, instead of what I had, which was a few pages plus a blog on the side. The pages weren't that exciting anyway, so I thought, "Let's toss these altogether!" So I did.

You can check out the new site here.