Phoenix Story

I'm not usually one to introduce myself to total strangers in public restrooms. And end up exchanging emails with them for that matter. But let me start at the beginning.

I mentioned in a prior post that my family has a history of going to a family camp / conference center in the Adirondacks called Camp Of The Woods. COTW is full of happy memories for my family, as Janie & I would, for several summers in a row, load the kids into the car and head there to spend a week with Janie's sisters and their respective families. The place was full of relaxation and cousin-ish fun and we adults would be able to hear daily chapel messages, so our souls were refreshed as well.

We did this for many summers until Janie's diagnosis of breast cancer back in 2004. Even after the surgery and treatments that would continue off and on for the next six years, Janie never felt up to going back to Camp. And frankly, after she died in May of 20120, I didn't really have the heart to spend a week there either. 

me on the left

Fast forward to this past summer, 2012. Becca had taken a full-time staff position at none other than Camp of the Woods for her summer break, so I knew this would be the year that I would try to stay for a few days for a visit. I should mention that I had been to COTW in the early 70's when I was little, so between my early childhood memories and my own family's history there, for me, Camp is a place soaked in memory and nostalgia. 

Now I had heard that Charles Price, whom I had known as a teen, (read what I said about him here) was going to be the speaker during a particular week in August, so I arranged a couple of days for Carly, Daniel and I to stay at a little cabin called Mohawk. Mohawk is, I think, the very last property at Camp still left un-renovated, so it still has the crooked, creaky floors and the tacky 1960's-ish lamps and furnishings and a certain musty-woody smell that easily transports me right back to 1971. It's wonderful and in a way I regret that Camp is renovating at all, though I understand that

10/11

On October 11th, back in 1965, the world became a better place. I know most folks think of the 60's as tumultuous times, and they were, but truly, the world became a better place because Janie-Lynn Brown was born October 11, 1965. It was a good life. She grew up and gave to the world around her. She gave and gave and gave. She loved God and gave His love to all she came in contact with. 

I know that I sound like I'm memorializing her all over again - we did that back in May of 2010 - but how does one talk about her and not praise her? She was the best of the best.

I thought it would be good, in light of this being her birthday, to post the text of what I shared at her memorial celebration. I hope as you read it, you catch a tone of joy that was there that day as we sent her on her way, so to speak. Yes, there was great sadness - we miss her so much! - but also joy. She was a joyous person...her joy being rooted and grounded in her life with God begun here on earth and now come to fruition as she has been with Christ 'face-to-face' for two and a half years now. 

Thanks to all of you who continue to pray for us - we are truly blessed. I pray you are blessed as we remember Janie this special day.

God In The Shutters

So at least we know who to blame. According to Hubpages.com, it was the Ancient Greeks who invented the window shutter, that HORRIBLE-TO-PAINT device that does nothing but 'decorate' modern houses and make teenaged boys of the 1980's miserable for their entire summer. Obviously, the Spartans had something to do with the invention - to aid in their austere, grueling, cruel training regimens. 

Spartan Drill Sergeant, very loudly: You are to scrape every last bit of paint soldier! I want to see absolutely NO PAINT left on even one louver on that shutter! I want to see two coats of oil base primer on them with absolutely NO DRIPS and I want two gleaming black finish coats of paint on ALL SIXTY FOUR SHUTTERS! Do you understand, maggot?!

Newbie Spartan cadet: Sir, yes sir! Thank you sir may I have another!

Nostalgia Is Great, Actually

When my cousin and best childhood friend, Erik, would come visit, we'd sleep in the living room on the pull-out bed stored in the sofa. You know, the bed with the bar that runs across your back like Ben Hur had when he got arrested and taken to the Roman slave ship. The bed with the bar that disfigures you like Quasimodo by morning. That bed. The cool feature of this particular model was that the head end could be locked in a semi-upright position so one could read a book like the people in those Craftmatic Adjustable Bed ads. I remember all of this very well because I spent hours - hours! - lying awake while Erik snoozed next to me, him having dropped off pretty much immediately. Children shouldn't be insomniacs. 

Gungor: When Death Dies

This Momentary Marriage

What an outstanding couple.

John Piper says about them, “I tremble with the glad responsibility of introducing you to Ian & Larissa Murphy in this video. Tremble, because it is their story and so personal. So delicate. So easily abused. So unfinished. Glad, because Christ is exalted over all things.”


You can read more of their story here, here and here. I would guess there may be even more from the Murphys, so you may want to subscribe at the Desiring God website.

Free

Time has traveled on since May 8, 2010. Today is the second anniversary of that awful, amazing day when Janie Booth's family ushered her into the waiting arms of her savior. It's weird trying to recall to my memory every aspect of the day. Parts are so vivid, and I'm sure I'll never forget them; other specifics and details have faded some, which I'm told is normal.

Pastor Dave told me that when you lose a loved one, it seems to take two of all the special days of the year before you really begin to feel more like a normal person again: two birthdays, two wedding anniversaries, two Thanksgivings, two Christmases, and, perhaps most significantly, two anniversaries of the day of their death. I'm not sure how normal I am (I'll leave that to you all to decide haha), but I thought it would be good here on this second anniversary of Janie's home-going, to make a special post.

Matt Chandler - God Is For God

I wanted to say that this is the best Matt Chandler Sermon ever...but really, it's just typical Matt Chandler. Strap on your seat belt and click play!

A Song In The Night

I predict that in about 11 seconds, you are going to say, "wow, Chris, that's heavy."

Have you ever had a night where a heaviness is so near and the phantoms of fear come up so close that the darkness is almost tangible? You toss and turn. A panic comes on. You get up and pace and try to shake it off, but you're just plain afraid.

I would guess that everyone has had a night panic at least once.

There seems to be something extra scary about being afraid in the middle of the night. Maybe it's because lacking a visual connection to the stuff around us, we have a frightful capacity to fill in the blackness with all kinds of phantasms conjured by our fearful brains.

There is a powerful weapon against the terrors of the night. Janie used to wield this weapon a lot. She utilized it to get settled when fears seeped in from behind the window shades and from under the dresser. Her fears about cancer. Her fears about the welfare of the kids and me when she would eventually die.

And the weapon's name?

What Did Jesus Christ Look Like?

What did Jesus Christ look like?

Well, first of all, he was white, or black, had blue eyes, was skinny and had good hair. He walked around in a white bathrobe with a blue prom sash over his shoulder and wore epic screen-printed tee-shirts and Birkenstock sandals and, evidently, glowed. He carried a lamb around and placed his hand on the tops of little children's heads. I understand He also played baseball and football in the backyard with some of the kids in the 'hood.

If I spend too much time thinking about

Don’t Rent That Clown Suit Just Yet…

This is from The Blazing Center blog, which is maintained by a father-son pastor duo from Pennsylvania.

Don’t Rent That Clown Suit Just Yet… 

by Mark Altrogge

We’re funny creatures, us humans.  We ask our heavenly Father to provide for us then we try to figure out how he’s going to do it.

We pray, then our wheels begin to turn.  Let’s see, I could get a second job.  I could sell my signed Justin Bieber poster on eBay.  I could rent a clown suit and do kids’ parties…

And when we can’t see how he will be able to answer our prayers, we worry.  Our fertile imaginations construct all kinds of “what if’s” in our mind.  What if I don’t have the money to pay my tuition?  Then what if I can’t get a loan?  And I have to get a job flipping burgers?  And what if I don’t make enough doing that and I have to start living under a bridge and turn to a life of crime?  And then get caught and put in prison next to an axe murderer?

Worry is essentially us trying to figure out the future.  Or how God will work in the future.  And when we don’t see how God can do it, we get fearful.  If we can’t see exactly how he’ll provide, or deliver or heal us,

The Walk

Now that the Janie's Christmas Stocking project is done, I thought I'd add one more thing from Food For The Hungry. 
The Walk from Food for the Hungry on Vimeo.

"If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit." Galatians 5:25

You don't need to wait till the next Janie's Christmas Stocking project to bless needy people in the world. You can make a change all through the year by sponsoring a child...or giving to one of FH's many ministries. I don't want to "guilt" anyone into doing anything, but I am asking those who are feeling the tug, who are tired of resisting and are ready to follow God in this way, to follow through and commit to parting with some of your money. I know the video said that throwing money at the problem may just kick it down the road, but, well, if we can't personally go and walk with the needy, why can't we financially back those like FH that are?

This passage jolted me this morning, though I've read it a thousand times: "Sell your possessions and give to charity; make yourselves money belts which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near nor moth destroys.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Jesus is calling us to invest in non-material things - peoples' hearts and souls - by spending a material thing: money. Have you ever sold something of yours so you could give it's "value" to charity? I haven't.


I think I'm going to give it a try...I'm starting with my kids' old gaming systems and I'm only half-way kidding! I wonder what else in my basement I can free myself of?

Janie's Stocking 2.0 Final Whizbang Wowie

Don't you hate it when your kids are in the position to be able to say, "I told you so?" Well, that's me right now. Back in November when we were deciding on what item from the Food For The Hungry "Gift" Catalog we wanted to select for Janie's Christmas Stocking, I wondered about the idea of being so ambitious as to choose the largest gift in there. We'd seen God do amazing things last year, when over $1700 came in when we had hoped to "reach" $500. But still, this year I expressed a little reservation. It went kind of like this:

Me: "I have some reservations this year."

Carly (scoffing a bit): "Of course we'll reach $2500, Dad. You'll see. Have a little faith."

Me: *wince*

And with that, we decided to

The Authoritative, Indespensable Year-End Roundup of EarnestlyICQ

The Authoritative, Indespensable Year-End Roundup of EarnestlyICQ

Heh, I enjoyed that post title. Any guesses where I ripped that off from?

Anyway, I've never done a year-end roundup of the most popular posts of this (obscure) blog...and I'm not about to start now. However, I thought it might be fun(ny?) to put up some of the posts that I most enjoyed typing (or were most meaningful for me at the time) from the ENTIRE  HISTORY (since July 2009 haha) of this blog....for your year-end reading enjoyment. So both of you reading this blog can

Book Roundup 2011

It's year-end-roundup time, and the blogosphere feels different for a week or so. We give our "funniest posts roundup," our "most popular posts," our thoughts on the turn of the year and......*pensive pause*   ha! you thought I was going to give you my list of books I read this year, didn't you! Nope, I'm turning the tables....you tell me what books you read this year instead! Thanks to The Blainemonster for the idea. I'm always nervous about asking people to comment though...what if they don't? I'll feel silly gosh darn it. At least you'll comment, Blaine....won't you?

Creepiest Piggy Bank Ever 2.0

Long-time subscribers to this blog (bwa-haha that's funny) may recall that last year when we did the first-ever Janie's Christmas Stocking fund raiser, my friends Steve and Ruth Hall contributed the contents of their spare-change piggy bank. Well, they've dropped off the bank again this year too, God bless them. It's a wonderful way to be a part of the fun, but they gave it with a few caveats:

1) I have to return the bank. No Problem...the thing gives me nightmares. This year, they dressed it up with some false eyelashes and a big red bow on the top of it's head. Yeah, that makes it much less chilling. Remember that awful shower scene in Psycho when the shadow falls on the shower curtain and the lady knows she's about to get it? "Reeee! Reee! Reee!" "Screeeeaamm!!" I wake up in a cold sweat having seen this pig, pretty eyelashes and all, appearing in the mirror when I closed the medicine cabinet. Or I get in the car and reach up to adjust the rear view mirror and there it is....slightly grinning. Or pushing me out of an airplane. Go ahead, click the picture. I dare you.

2) We have to remove the change ourselves from the

Janie's Stocking Is Going Great

Janie's Stocking is cranking right along! Thank you so much for giving. People you will probably never meet, people like this, will have a tangible evidence of your loving them because you gave to the project! Thank you! Don't stop spreading the word and thanks again!

Anti-Facebook Snobbery

Wait, let me explain. I'm sorry. I don't really mean to hate on you, Facebook, it just seems to happen. I just blurt stuff out without thinking. I'm really sorry. I hope you can forgive me. It's just, well, I've seen how you have changed things so much, and I feel like not all of it is for the better, honestly. It just seems to me that the last thing our already narcissistic culture needed was more stuff about me, me, me...us, us, us. Here's my list of reasons why I've hesitated to get a Facebook account for so long:

Beautiful Things

Beautiful Things by Gungor

Another word for what they are artfully saying is the word redemption.
"He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit." Galatians 3:14

And that's the nature of the Christmas story, isn't it?

Koyaanisqatsi And Me

When I was a senior in high school, I saw a film called, Koyaanisqatsi. That's a Hopi word which means, "life out of balance."

***

I lay awake the other night, thinking, like I sometimes do. I know, melancholies are weird like that.

I was in Boston, staying at a swanky hotel. If you know me at all, I'm pretty sure you would know that "swanky" is not really my style. I was there because the company I work for got hired to photograph the Christmas party of a very large, swanky  company. I promise I will not us the word swanky anymore in this post. These people, virtually all 800 of them, were young, beautiful professionals. The party was at the absolutely gorgeous Boston Public Library. I brought Carly along so we could do some of the Boston-at-Christmas thing the next day.

The company put us up in a, um, fancy hotel, called The Colonnade, and it was very euro-sleek and stylish. It had a view to the North - right toward the 50-story Prudential Center. Fabulous.

The next day, Carly & I took a stroll through the mall in the Pru, walking past the Anne Taylor store with the eight-foot tall posters of Demi Moore wearing (presumably) Anne Taylor's clothes in the store windows. We moved along to Copley Square and ended up, inevitably, on Newbury Street, aka the Rodeo Drive of the East. Everyone (that's not hyperbole -it's really everyone) on Newbury Street was beautiful. Their stylish clothes, their up-to-the-knee boots, their carefully managed handsome/pretty faces, and especially their silky and properly product-ed hair, was beautiful. I'm not troubled by the beauty - that's not what I was