Coast to Coast

My dad is one of those crazy bikers who has biked coast to coast, not once, but twice.  The guy who had my bike before me biked coast to coast when he was 82.  So one of my ideas, dreams really, is to bike coast to coast as a family.  It is on my bucket list.  We have taken a 60 mile bike trip, and my oldest goes with my dad regularly on long bike rides.  I know that this will not happen in the next few years, but there is a chance.  My dad goes with a group called Wondering Wheels.  They are based out of Upland, Indiana.  They also have a family oriented ride this summer on July 21-22 if you are interested.  When I say coast to coast, I mean in the United States, but coast to coast in Puerto Rico would be quite different, as would coast to coast from St. Petersburg to the Pacific Ocean in Russia.  Coast to coast sub-saharan africa would seem tough, because I have been on some of those roads, but through the Sahara Desert - wow.
That makes me also think of my ironman idea.  It is called earth ironman.  You start by swimming from Manhattan to Africa.  You bike across Africa and Asia, and have a small transition swim across the Bering Strait (you want want to wait until the water is frozen and walk across - or ask Lynne Cox how she did it) and then run from Alaska back to Manhattan.  That would be an earth ironman.

Christian Summer Camp

I went to a christian summer camp in Pennsylvania called Summer's Best Two Weeks.  I started going there when I was about 11.  I went for about 7 years.  I got really excited about living for Jesus when I was at the Summer Camp because I was around so many college kids (the counselors) who were excited about living for Jesus.
Christian Summer Camp was a big part of my giving all of me to Jesus Christ.  Last summer my oldest son went to a Christian Summer Camp.  He also had a lot of fun.  A lot of kids in our church have went to this summer camp and are planning on going again.  It is called Bear Lake Camp.  They will experience a community of people who love Jesus in a way they don't in school very often.
A man I love at Summer's Best Two Weeks talked about when people make decisions for Christ.  Oftentimes it is when they are in their teens.  He said often kids make those decisions, the same decision I made many years ago, because of a christian summer camp.
So my christian family idea is send your kids to a christian summer camp.

Journaling

The first ever journal I got was from the man who discipled me when I was in high school.  He shared with me about his God-time, and how journaling was a big part of that time.  That was the beginnings of my journaling.  Then my mom sent me a journal while I was a counselor at a summer camp in Pennsylvania called Summer's Best Two Weeks.  She may have also sent a pen.  A fellow counselor and I started again the discipline of journaling, writing prayers, thoughts, conversations, yearnings with God.  Throughout the last 19 years of my life journaling has been a big part.  When I was disillusioned about the Christian University I was going to was not as Christian as I thought it should be, I journaled about it.  When I first saw my wife singing in a gospel choir I journaled about it.  When my mom died, and my whole life perspective shifted, I journaled about it.  When I would fail in the many ways that I fail, I would journal about it.  When my children began breathing air, I journaled about it.  When God told me to unite the body, I journaled about it.  When I lived among the Kuria, I journaled about it.  When I prayed for my son to be healed of his glaucoma, I journaled about it.
Journaling becomes a record of my life with God.
If you asked if you could read my journals I would give you the look if you asked if you could see me naked.
For me, and for many others journaling can be an instrument towards prayer, a tool to growth in prayer.  I also think it can be used by both beginners in prayer and masters in prayer.
It can also be something to teach kids about.
I am very grateful to the man who taught me to journal and to my mom who encouraged me to keep going.
They don't journal anymore. At least I don't think they do.  They communicate with Jesus Christ not with pen and ink, but face to face.  Someday I will see Him face to face too, but until then, I am going to journal.

Black Hole Coffee

I like coffee.  I drink it black.  I have heard that if you had a spoonful of a black hole, it would be so dense that it would contain the same matter as a large amount of the earth.  I use spoons to spoon my coffee into the coffeemaker.  I wonder what it would be like if there was a coffee galaxy where millions of planets produced naturally growing wild coffee, more coffee than anyone could imagine.  Then what if all of that coffee got sucked into a black hole that was itself only a black hole of coffee - one of those gifts of God.


Maybe someone should just market Kenya AA coffee from the highest parts of Kirinyaga possible for coffee growing, or at least near Nyeri, and market it as Black Hole Coffee.


Black Hole Coffee, in a way, represents what we want from everything.  When I bite into a cheeseburger, I want a fiesta in my mouth.  When I go on a 5 mile run, I want an orchestral dance party.  When I take the first sip of my morning coffee, I don't just want the day to start, I want it to sing.


What I am really looking for is ideas for the main marketing slogan for black hole coffee.  Got any ideas?


Wow.  I am not the first to think of Black Hole Coffee.  I just googled it and there is a Black Hole Coffee House in Houston Texas on 4504 Graustark Street.


Maybe I should just go to Java House in Nairobi instead.


What is your favorite coffee?

The 401(k) is my shepherd, I shall not want

Financial stewardship and saving and investing have been issues I have wondered about since I gave my life to Jesus and gave up my ideas on owning a Lamborghini.  I fully understand the benefits of saving money, saving for retirement, etc, etc.  But I like to play the devil's advocate.
Is having a 401(k) saying the Lord is not enough?
If the 401(k) is my shepherd, then what does that make the Lord?

No, no, spiritually, the Lord is our shepherd, but when it comes to my finances, the 401(k), pension, mutual fund, is what I look to.

I am so often reminded of the Israelites gathering more manna than they needed that day.  They were not giving God a chance to prove himself.

Are we not letting the Lord prove himself as a shepherd if we continually look to ourselves to provide for our own selves and family?

If God doesn't show up, we fail

This is a Christian family idea from the Baker family in Mozambique.  Then depend on miracles, and on Jesus Christ to do them.  They live among the poor and see the desperate need for God to heal people.
How much do I need God?
Do I think I can go on with this day without much help?
Read about Heidi and Rolland Baker in the May 2012 issue of Christianity Today.
If God doesn't show up, will I fail?
I hope so.
http://www.irismin.org/home

http://www.christianitytoday.com/

Don't Answer the Phone

Don't answer the phone.  Don't look at the text.  Don't check to see if your friend put up a facebook status or liked your facebook status.  Don't check your e-mail.  Don't answer your door.  Don't look when someone says, "Come here." 
So many things and people want your time.  You have 24 hours in each day, and if you answer every text, page, voice mail, and every person who knocks on your door, you could be running into a hurricane, and you may not survive. 
Who runs your day?  If someone says "Jump,"  do you always jump?  Do you run your day?  Does facbook run your day?  Does your blog run your day?  (oops, did I type that?) 

An idea:  before answering your phone, ask your Lord Jesus Christ if, out of all the things you could be doing, if he wants you to answer the call.  It may be that you have to let it go to voice mail and call them back if he so directs you.  In this way you are taking steps to let the Lord Jesus Christ run your day.  He is our master, and technology is not our master. 

ZRBTT

There are some of yo who already know what zrbtt spells.  This is an idea I got from a little girl named Rudy Huxtable.  She wanted to know what zrbtt spelled.  I am sure that I am not the only one who grew up giving and recieving zrbtts.  What is a zrbtt?
Watch this clip from the Cosby show to find out what zrbtt spells, and also what a zrbtt is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znDI9UpFYKE

Now go and give your kids a zrbtt.
The family that gives zrbtts together is the family that stays together.

Pouring "hoochi-fa" style

I pour milk very rarely for my kids.  When I do I like to give them options of how I will pour it.  Oh, you think that there is only one way to pour something - no, there are many ways.  If you go to the Moroccan restaurant in Denver like we did you will realize that pouring a drink can be like going to a circus, as the lady pouring our drinks set the glass on her horizontal forearm while pouring with the other hand and then grabbing the glass with  the hand whose arm was holding the cup.  I may never pour it that way but I pour it the "hoochi-fa" way sometimes.  The kids like the name as much as the style.  I pour the milk and then lower the glass so that the milk creates a long stream from jug to glass.  It makes eating and drinking milk fun.

To whom shall we go?

Puddleglum is one of my favorite Narnia characters.  When the witch says Narnia is all a dream he responds by saying the dream world licks the real world hollow, and even if Narnia is not real he will still live like a Narnian. Jesus Christ is my only option, and like Peter when faced with a hard teaching, I say, to whom shall we go?  When you have no other possible option, you realize that Christ is literally the only option.  As you search through the universe and yourself for a better option, let me know if you find one.  Not only have I not found a better option than Christ, I have not even found another option at all.  When Christ is your only option, then He is all you have, and when he is all you have, you are satisfied in Him.

Signs of Christ

There are many types of signs of Christ.  There is the sign of reading Psalm 22 and Psalm 69 and Isaiah 53, and really the whole Old Testament and realizing that it points to Jesus Christ.  There are also the signs and miracles that Christ preformed like turning the water into wine, healing people, and raising people from the dead.  There was also the ultimate sign of the "temple" being destroyed, and him raising it up in three days.  There is also the signs that those who followed him gave, that this power was from God and not from us.  These signs continue even today, a child being healed of glaucoma, a little girl's heart being healed.  Divine protection for missionaries during an armed robbery.  So many signs that he is real, and many more signs to come.  Open up our eyes and see the signs.  The signs are our lives.

Indwelling of Christ

The indwelling of Christ means that Christ lives in us.  One of the best proofs that Christ lives is that he lives in us.  This is not limited to his living in us as individuals - actually, though that be true, it is not the most convincing indwelling of Christ.  In John 17 Jesus prays for the unity, the oneness, of his disciples - that they may be one so that the world may believe.  In the mind of Christ, the world will be convinced of Him when it sees Him in the Church.  Belief in the incarnation comes from seeing the incarnation in the body of Christ, the Church.
When you see two people who hated each other come to love each other - you wonder how that could be - and that wondering leads you to Christ, the only giver of true love, sacrificial love.

My kids can know that I am their father by looking at their DNA which is from me, and my appearance, quirks, habits, leanings in them.

Resurrection of Christ

There are at least three accounts of the Resurrection recorded in the Bible, and these traced to eyewitnesses of the Resurrection.  There are ten recorded appearances of Jesus to his disciples, and one was to 500 believers at once.  Jesus first appeared to a woman, who was in that culture less credible than a man.  If the Resurrection account was a fake, why not make it more verifiable?  There was an empty tomb and no one produced the body.  Many of the opponents of Jesus had much to gain by producing a dead body, but none was produced.  The disciples lives were changed and they were willing to die for their belief in Jesus' Resurrection.  People do not die for something that they know is a lie, especially not so many people.  It all hinges on this - did Christ raise from the dead?  It hinges on this because our raising is dependent on his raising.

What is the proof that I am my kid's dad?

That they exist.

History of Christ

Consider the historical documents of Christ.  Four Gospels from four different men or communities share the story of Jesus Christ with remarkable similarity.  Other documents in the New Testament refer to Jesus Christ and the reality of his physical life on earth.  The authors of those documents come from a variety of walks of life - fishermen, tax collectors, Pharisees, doctors, family members.  Within 70 years there were 5,500 documents (copies) of books or parts of books of the New Testament.  Other documents outside of the New Testament also refer to Jesus Christ.  With all that evidence it is very hard to deny the reality of Jesus of Nazareth - that he existed.
What is the historical evidence that I am my kid's father?  Their birth certificates is about it.  Their may be a few other documents I could round up, but I am at the advantage of being past the age of the printing press and into the digital age and also not 2,000 years ago.  And still I cannot find as much evidence for me being my kid's father as the evidence of Jesus Christ living on this earth.

Claims of Christ

Here are some of the claims of Christ I have seen in the Scriptures that point to him being "it."  He claims to be:
I AM (John 8).
the Resurrection and the Life (John 11).
the Light of the World (John 8).
assent to Thomas's declaration "my Lord and my God" (John 20).
This is not meant to exhaust or even represent all of Christ's claims, but to help us to pursue them.  Christ claimed to be God, and one with the Father, and there is really only a few things we can do with someone like that as Clive says in Mere Christianity.  We send them to the loony bin.  We say they are the Devil.  We say they are a liar.
The other choice is to worship Him as God.
My claim to my kids is that I am their father.  That is my claim and they must decide what to do with it.

Who does Christ claim to be?

Why C.H.R.I.S.T.?

Why C.H.R.I.S.T.?  Why should we believe in Jesus Christ as our Lord and our God?  I mean, how can I be sure that Jesus Christ is the One to follow.  I want to share an acronym and use various analogies to share with you some of the reasons why I follow Jesus Christ and have given my whole self to him.  Maybe it will help you and your Christian family.  I will share the acronym today and in the days to follow I will go into each one more in depth.
Claims of Christ
History of Christ
Resurrection of Christ
Indwelling of Christ
Signs of Christ

To whom shall we go?

Fire Emergency Plan

Every family should have a fire emergency plan.  Does your family have a fire emergency plan?  Here are some questions to get you thinking:
How many smoke detectors do you have installed in your house?
How close are the smoke detectors to where you sleep?
Do the smoke detectors have batteries in them?
Have you tested the smoke detectors yet in 2012? or in May 2012?
Are there two escape routes in each bedroom in your house?
If you have a two or more story house, do you have a fire ladder?
If there was a fire, do your children know whether or not they should trust firemen and firewoman in suits and masks - the people whose specific purpose is to save your child?
If there is an emergency, does your child know that they should get out of the house?
Do you as a family have a meeting place if your house burns down?
Have you practiced your fire emergency plan?
Does your child know whether or not they should go back into the burning house for a pet or toy or other reasons?
Does your child know about smoke and its dangers?

Here are a few other websites to look at concerning fire safety:
http://www.redcross.org/portal/site/en/menuitem.d8aaecf214c576bf971e4cfe43181aa0/?vgnextoid=72c51a53f1c37110VgnVCM1000003481a10aRCRD

http://www.escapesafe.org/pdf/EN/evacuation_plan.pdf

http://www.disastercenter.com/guide/family.htm

Seminary

When we were in Kenya we felt the Lord calling us to Seminary.  We did not know much about Seminary, but we were trying to learn.  We looked into Trinity in Deerfield, IL, Southern in Lousiville, and Asbury in Wilmore, KY.  We chose Asbury mostly because it seemed the most family oriented for our family at least.  Going to Seminary was definitely a family experience, with daddy working crazy hours in the middle of the night and chanting Hebrew paradigms, qatal, qatalah, qataltah, qatalt. . .
So maybe your family is thinking of going to Seminary, maybe you should think and pray about it.
I used to think that Seminary is cemetary, that you go to Seminary to stop worshipping Jesus and stop believing in Him.  At Asbury and many other Seminaries across the world, I learned more about the great and wonderful love of God through Jesus.  Of course there are many different kind of Seminaries, so look closely. . .

Ice Cream

First of all, in the words of Don Kardong, without ice cream there would be darkness and chaos.  I will take it as a disclaimer that I assume your passionate love for ice cream and that I do not have to here convince you of its inherent goodness.  So I will list in my own mind some of my favorite ice cream experiences of my life, because ice cream is not just a food, but an experience.
10.  Snow-cream.  No this is not the real thing, but it is quite the experience and can be quite fun.
9.  Eating homemade ice cream, very makeshift, in a rural village in Kenya.  No, it was not that good at all, but it was better than nothing.  Some entrepreneur is missing out on the rural Africa ice cream truck market.
8.  Eating ice cream at the dining commons of the college I went to.  The best thing was I could eat ice cream every lunch and every dinner (soft serve).  Why did they not have it on for breakfast?  Good question, that's why I skipped breakfast.
7.  My second date with my now-wife was to an ice cream place, Ivanhoes.  It is probably the best ice cream place in the world.  I don't remember the ice cream much though because I was enamored with the woman across the table.  I am so glad she shares my love for ice cream.
6.  Any Cold Stone Creamery experience, and I confess that there have been too many to count on my phalanges.  I love Cold Stone Creamery.  My favorite there was Giardhellis Chocolate.
5.  Eating a Snicker's Ice Cream bar on the way to Nairobi.  There is nothing like going without ice cream that makes you appreciate it so much.
4.  Coffee ice cream in Florida when I was young.  Wow.  Two good things wrapped up into one.
3.  Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cakes - mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
2.  "I'll buy if you'll fly."  That is what my dad has said to me numerous times throughout my life, because he too loves ice cream (maybe even more than me if that is possible).  Free ice cream is hard to beat - all you gotta do is go get it. (If you are easily grossed out do not read #1).
1.  The TRAY.  This truly deserves its own post and I will try to remember to re-post this as its own Christian family idea because every Christian family should do a TRAY together.  Here is what a TRAY is:  Take a large tray and place it under a soft serve three way dispenser (you know, choc, vanilla, and in the middle a swirl).  Pull all three levers down for a very long time.  Load up every topping you can find - chocolate chips, crushed oreos, even sugar cones - on top of the ice cream so that the tray is one huge ice cream feast.  By the way I learned this in college.  Then gather the whole family around and everybody eat, but you cannot use your hands and no spoons either - just stick your face in it.

Snowmass

I had the opportunity of a lifetime when I was a sophomore in high school to go on spring break with one of my friends and his family to Snowmass, Colorado.  Downhill skiing on a mountain, as opposed to a hill, is a truly amazing experience.  Once at the top it was about 4 miles to the bottom.  I have had a lot of amazing experiences in my life so far - skiing at snowmass is high up on the list.  Also, there is the bonding of a long road trip with a family that I loved and came to love even more over that week and again in my senior year when they took me again.  So here is my idea for your family and mine, to take note of what that family did for me.  They introduced me to downhill skiing, and they also took me along on their family vacation.  That family, in a very real sense, is my family.  I am forever connected to them.  I love them.  They love me.
Oh yes, it is quite a risk to take in a child for another family for a week of spring break vacation.  High risk, high rewards, much like skiing down the mountain.  As they say on the slopes, to turn is to admit defeat.
So if you have not, consider sownhill skiing as a family vacation idea.  Also, consider taking another child with you on your vacation.  It could shape that child's life forever.

Circle of Love

I got one of my best Christian family ideas at college from a room in the dorm above me.  The dorm above my was called the brotherhood, and it had a phuBBBBs, a pope, and a snake, and other various a sundry people.   But one dorm room had a circle of love.  What is a circle of love?  It is a circle of couches in which a group of people can sit and talk and be with each other, without TV or whatever modern "entertainment" comes.  So my roommate and I decided to also make a circle of love, and at one point we had 4 couches in our room, with one of them being a fold out sleeper couch.  There was lots of room to sit.  The only down side of this was when a creature named fozzy bear let in a dog that slept in the circle of love and then peed on the couch.  So in our house today we have 3 couches in which people can sit and talk and be with each other.  Sadly, I have let creep in a TV.  So how many couches do you have in your circle of love?  Is your home a place where people can sit and talk and be with each other?

World Map

When I graduated from college my fiance's parents got me a graduation gift they knew I wanted.  A world map.  We had a backing put on it and we have put it, or a map like it, up wherever we lived.  We have in fact lived in various places of the world.  But even if we only lived in one small town, like say Nazareth, with a world map we can know so many other towns, cities, countries, oceans.  Our kids get to see the world even day, even if only subliminally.  Of course world maps change.  Africa has been divided up many different ways, and even the way it is divided up now makes little sense to the tribe it divides.  You can see Australia and the source of iocane powder.  You can see that it truly is a bad idea to get involved in a land war in Asia.  You want to see the rivers of the world - the Amazon, the Nile, the Mississippi, and so many others - look.  Feast your eyes on this world we live in, from Kazakhstan to Western Sahara, from Walla Walla, Washington to Mombassa, Kenya, from Mount Everest to Lake Tanganyika.  So many places to go.  And it shows us what many times we need so desperately to know - we are so so so small, no matter how big we think we are.

Indoor Basketball

Do you have an indoor basketball hoop?  Remember Theo's room in the cosby show - it had a basketball hoop.  A basketball hoop inside is fun.  Okay, okay, maybe you do not like basketball.  First thing, just because it doesn't fit on that door right doesn't mean you can't have a basketball hoop.  Use packing tape and tape in to the door.  One of our children likes the basketball hoop more than the others.  He plays on it all the time.  But it really provides endless fun.  Don't get me wrong, an indoor basketball hoop does not replace an outdoor basketball hoop by any means - NO, NO, a thousand times no.  That's like saying the inside fort make out of cushions is a replacement for camping - of course not.  So play a game on your indoor basketball hoop - and if you don't have one, tell their grandparents to get them one for their birthday.

Reading Books

When I was a kid television was called books - says the grandpa in The Princess Bride.  I heard it said once that just having books in your house makes you smarter - you don't even have to read them.  But reading them is a good thing.  So what books to read as a christian family?  I could give you lots of ideas that I like but you might not like.  For instance, there are kids books on a lot of adult-ish subjects that you as parents may want to share with your kids.  I like astronomy, so when my kids were very little I got them a cool kids book about the constellations, the big dipper, orion, the bull, pegasus, etc.  So what do you like?  My wife was searching for this one sunflower book for a long time and finally found it.  It is called The Sunflower Garden by Janice May Udry.  One of my all time favorite children's books is Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Suess.  We are currently reading Little House on the Prairie, which I have mixed feelings about.  One time we usually read is right when the kids get in bed for the night.  We read and their imaginations swirl with the words coming from the book.  They have taken adventures with Lucy and Edmund, Eustace and Jill, and we can't forget Shasta and Avaris (I think that's her name) in the Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis.  They have cried (okay, they saw me cry) over Thorin Oakenshield in The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein.  Another great book to read is the Bible, all sixty six books of it.  So what books do you like?  What are your favorite books to read to your kids?

Stations of the Cross

Many of you have already heard of the stations of the cross but I want to share them with you now.  First of all, there are the traditional stations of the cross, the biblical stations of the cross, and in my mind there could be the gospel of John stations of the cross, etc, etc.  The stations of the cross are for us to contemplate, to meditate on, to dwell on - Jesus path to suffering for us.  Setting our minds on Jesus suffering helps us to also pick up our cross to follow him.  I personally like the stations of the cross with pictures.  Here is the list of the traditional stations of the cross.

1. Jesus is condemned to death.
2. Jesus carries his cross
3. Jesus falls the first time
4. Jesus meets his mother
5. Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus to carry the cross
6. Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
7. Jesus falls the second time
8. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
9. Jesus falls the third time
10. Jesus is stripped of his garments
11. Jesus is nailed to the cross
12. Jesus dies on the cross
13. Jesus is taken down from the cross
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb.

    15.  Jesus rises from the dead.

The scriptural, or biblical, stations of the cross are as follows.

1. Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane,
2. Jesus is betrayed by Judas and arrested,
3. Jesus is condemned by the Sanhedrin
4. Jesus is denied by Peter
5. Jesus is judged by Pilate,
6. Jesus is scourged and crowned with thorns,
7. Jesus takes up His cross,
8. Jesus is helped by Simon to carry His cross,
9. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem,
10. Jesus is crucified,
11. Jesus promises His kingdom to the repentant thief,
12. Jesus entrusts Mary and John to each other,
13. Jesus dies on the cross,
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb.
15. Jesus rises from the dead.

Here are some samples of pictures you can use, of course children love to draw pictures, so your kids could draw out these stations of the cross to put up in your house or church.

Jesus receives his cross

Jesus falls downthe stations on postage stamps Jesus taken down from the cross

Used Car No Nos

Here are a few things not to do when buying a used car.  I have not figured out what to do yet, but here are a few things not to do.
1.  Don't give out your credit card number, social security number, or banking account number to people on the internet.
2.  Don't pay money when the title will not be in your name.
3.  Don't wire money to someone else's bank account.
4.  Don't agree to buy the car until you know the title will be in your name.
5.  Don't buy a car on e-bay from someone in North Korea - shipping is crazy expensive!
6.  Don't buy a car that you don't want.
7.  Don't buy a car that is worse than the one you have.
8.  Don't buy a car from the Dread Pirate Roberts - he is immune to iocane powder.
9.  Don't buy a car for a lot of money when it is only a highly detailed matchbox car, even if it has a flip down dvd movie screen (7millimeter).
10.  Don't spend more that 21 hours a day researching cars.com, ebay, craigslist, usedcars.com, autotrader, kelly blue book, consumer reports, edmunds, etc.

El Dia de la Batalla de Puebla

Rafael Moreno Valle is the governor of Puebla state in Mexico.  He probably knows what Cinco de Mayo signifies.  Or does he?  Maybe Ignacio did not even know what would come after the events of that day 150 years ago when the French lost even though they were outnumbered.  Why celebrate this day and not September 16?  Who knows?  Some people like to drink;  some people like to dress up;  some people like to sing "ayer por primero vez yo te conoci y me vida cambio cuando te recibi, en mi alma en mi corazon ev mi vida. . . . "  
Celebrate cinco de mayo today by. . . .
saying a prayer for Rafael Valle
saying a prayer for Mexico

instead of saying a prayer, talking to God about Mexico, about celebrations.

what will you do today?

Trailer Bike (Kid's Tandem)

A few years ago we bought a trailer bike, or a kid's tandem, from a local bike shop.  Our kids could bike, but it was very slow going at their pace.  So we thought if we could attach them to us it would be better.  The investment of that trailer bike was a very good one.  We have taken long bike trips with the kids.  How does a trailer bike work, you ask?  The trailer bike attaches to an adult bike, and the child can pedal all (s)he wants.  The child can not brake.  When the child pedals, it helps the adult in front in the effort of moving, especially up hills.  Does it help the child learn balance?  I don't think it does.  But you and your child get a workout and enjoy the outside world.  The child does not have to pedal, so if the child has her/his feet on the pedals not moving, the adult can still pedal away.
The one issue to be aware of is that when coming to a stop the child needs to stop pedaling.  A child pedaling excessively can make both of them go into a dangerous intersection.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trailer_bike

The Dowry

Before I asked my wife to marry me I lived in Kenya for 4 months, and there the prospective husband gives the wife’s family a dowry.  Many times in America the Bride’s family gets nothing from the Groom.  I decided to give my wife’s family a dowry.  I write this in hindsight of being connected to my new family for almost 13 years.  Now I see that dowry I gave as even more important than I did then.  Why?  A marriage is often seen as the marriage between two people.  But it is more than that.  It is the marriage between two families (I got that idea from an Indian Christian talking about arranged marriages).  I am FULLY invested in my wife’s family.  By marrying her, I was marrying them.  My wife has two younger sisters and the next in line’s groom also gave the family a dowry.  So when the baby gets married we will have to tell him the dowry requirement.

So what is a dowry anyway?  In Kenya a dowry was cows.  That was and is the most valuable thing to the people of Kenya.  It may not be the most valuable thing to you, but it is to people in Kenya.  So they give cows.  Maybe one cow, maybe ten cows, maybe a hundred cows.

I did not give my wife’s family cows, but I did give them things that were important to me.  I am not going to tell you all of the things I gave them, but I will share a few.  I gave them articles of clothing that meant something to me, sentimental value not marketable value.  I gave them Dave’s Insanity Limited Edition Sauce.  It is the hottest marketed sauce in the world.  Only so many a made each year and it comes in a coffin type box with a warning label.  That may not mean a lot to you, but it means a lot to me.  I also took them all out to eat at Olive Garden (she is the oldest of five kids).  I also gave them a lion figurine I got from Kenya, and who knows, maybe inside that lion is a hundred cows.

So are you thinking of asking a woman to marry you?  Are you planning on giving her family a dowry?  If you do, it may help you and her family to realize that you are marrying into her family.  I can say that my wife’s parents are truly like my own parents, and both of them are my heroes.  I can also say that my wife’s brothers and sisters - and their spouses and children. . . are like my own brothers and sisters and children.  Many the dowry was one small idea that helped continue to foster the idea that when two people get married, two families get married.

So thank you to Chebet Ruto for giving me this idea of giving a dowry to my wife’s family, and in her own words – “It’s Biblical.”

Tea(Coke Zero) Party

My daughter had an idea of having a tea party.  My wife doesn't really like tea so she said, "Can we have Coke Zero?"  So we are having Coke Zero, brownies, cheese on crackers, etc.  Also we had to sign our name in a book saying we were coming.  We also have to dress up to come to the tea party.  And here are my daughter's comments regarding the tea party:  "I asked my mom if we should, um, have my tea party set.  She said no we should not.  Because mine were too little.  And they were only one sip.  Mom got us our own big cups.  That's all I can think of.  I like that, I like what you typed.  That's funny."  Anything else you want to say or explain about the tea party?  "Write NO and then write Nah.  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha h aha hahahahhahahah.  Write that again and again and again and again and again . . . .. "

Vacations to Friends

Since my wife and I have been married, we have taken vacations to various parts of the country and world.  One of the best ways we have found to take vacations is to spend time at friends houses living with them.  This goes a little bit with the previous post "Communal Living" but on a much more short term basis.  We have vacationed to friends in Colorado, North Carolina, Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Ohio, and Alabama.  We even vacationed to friends in Nakuru, Kenya, but we were also in Kenya.  Here are some reasons why vacationing to friends is a good possibility.
1.  Save $1000 in housing.
2.  Develop deeper friendships.
3.  With locals who know the place way better than you do.
4.  Could get you thinking about communal living.
5.  You can spend extra money on food - in our family we like food.
6.  Did I mention that you save a lot of money?
7.  Your kids have other kids to play with if your friends have kids.
8.  Usually the friends you go and visit would absolutely love to have you stay with them.
9.  If you want to vacation in Indiana, give us a call.

10.  Building the church is building relationships.