Humble Orthodoxy

So often we falsely contrast truth and grace. I like this little film riff on Josh Harris' new book, Dug Down Deep. Words & visuals beautifully woven.

DugDownDeep_Shook.mov from Covenant Life Church on Vimeo.

Parenting with Peers

Parents of teens quickly discover that their children's attitudes become tied to the attitudes of the peers who surround those young people. So as your children enter the middle school years, it is not enough to set forth healthy goals and wonderful opportunities or to model a dynamic, God-centered lifestyle. You cannot raise teenagers in a vacuum. You must build a community of peers who enter into those attitudes and opportunities you want your children to embrace.

You will not find this in most church youth groups. You need a group that is less focused on entertaining youth in a generationally-segregated setting. You need a group that is more focused on training youth to harness the strength and freedom of their youth to tasks in the real world that are vital to building the Kingdom of Christ. You need to find ways to give them real opportunities, usable skills and a vertical network of mentors and proteges of their own in addition to the horizontal network of peers.

My newly released book, Coaching a Club: 7 Secrets of Coaching a Successful Speech & Debate Club, demonstrates how to build such a community. Although the second half of the book is devoted to forensics teaching and coaching techniques, the first half details the characteristics of this kind of extraordinary network of partnerships and how to craft one in any setting. It is crammed with real life examples from creative minds across the country in their combined experience over ten years of working together.

After reading Coaching a Club, you may decide that joining the Christian speech and debate network of clubs is for you. But you might just as easily create a community around Internet marketing, media production, science innovation, humanitarian aid, business, or political action. Really the horizon is limited only by your students' desires and your vision.

Excerpts from Coaching a Club

Commitment to Character

"We can readily see that studying speech and debate will improve intelligence in these more traditionally academic categories. But if that is all we see, we miss the most important possibilities in forensics training. Forensics offers young people the opportunity to exercise those academic skills in an emotionally-charged social setting very much like the real world. It offers coaches a nearly unparalleled opportunity to train students in interpersonal and intra-personal intelligence. Taken together, these two are called “emotional intelligence” or EQ, and they encompass the ability to understand one’s own and others’ feelings and to use that information to make fine distinctions and to guide actions. Maturity in emotional intelligence is characterized by altruism and empathy. In Biblical parlance, we are talking about developing wisdom and character."

Commitment to Community

"Collaboration is the concept of the moment. From Linux to “Wikinomics”, it is becoming ever clearer that the future belongs to those who successfully create communities of interest and influence by exploiting the networking opportunities at hand. So when you are trying to decide which of the many possible activities your teen will pursue during those swift, precious high school years, you’ll want to choose those that give your teen maximum connectivity for the long term. Homeschool forensics has to be among the top 3 choices. We are not just training young people; we are helping to establish the grassroots network that will energize and support the next generation of power brokers."

Commitment to Continuity

"Continuity. As we look ahead, we don’t actually have the continued existence of the particular club in view. We are considering instead the continuing relevance of the vision, the continuity of relationships and the long-range usefulness of the skills developed here and now. Sono Harris of Oregon’s Rainmakers admits that the longevity of the speech club was not a part of the planning. “We just jumped in and took it a year at a time.” The Harrises were looking for a challenge that would be a good fit for their children’s gifts and callings. Their passion as they built Rainmakers was to help the students “learn to use words well” (John Piper) for active service in the world. Competitive forensics in the NCFCA not only gave them skills with words, but many of the auxiliary resources they would need to launch out on their own as well: visionary peers, intergenerational networks, resume development and business connections, even scholarship opportunities. We may develop our skills inside the Christian homeschool bubble, but they are emphatically not meant to stay there!"

Parenting with Purpose

My friend, Julie Ferwerda, has just released a new book, One Million Arrows. In it she outlines a vision to inspire us to raise powerfully spiritual children and to aim them at the heartaches of the world.

The book began with the compassion of one man - a poor man in India - who gathered up orphans from the streets and began to nurture them in the name of Jesus. "Papa" Thomas in Kota, India has now raised over 16,000 throw-away children from the streets of India and set them loose to extend the love that rescued them to others who still do not know the Author of love, Jesus. Profits from the book will assist "Papa" Thomas's work Hopegivers International to continue the work of turning throw-away kids into arrows in the hand of God.

Practical as well as visionary, One Million Arrows tells dozens of stories of parents just like you who have stepped up to the challenge. Read it and get your parenting rejuvenation vitamin!

And today, you can join the party by buying One Million Arrows in concert with hundreds of other Christians in an Amazon Book Bomb. Let's see how much we can contribute to this work in just one day.

The Ultimate Brain Boost

When I was pregnant, the joke was that, of course, I'd be addled. "The first thing to go is the brain," I'd chuckle with my friends. In fact, one of my friends just this week quipped that a mom loses one-third of her brain with every birth. Let's see...that would make me a complete airhead!

However, the Bible urges us to have children as a vital part of exercising dominion in a complex, dangerous, broken world. So - from a scientific point of view, does childbearing and child-rearing help or hinder in the work of dominion?

Certainly the introduction of a new, totally dependent being into a marriage relationship increases the demands on the parents and on the relationship exponentially. Our baby's physical survival is completely dependent on how well we notice, nurture and protect that child. So are we as new moms adjusting to radically elevated and emotionally charged levels of responsibility or are we really getting dumber?

According to a recent book, The Mommy Brain: How Motherhood Makes Us Smarter, by Katherine Ellison, the possibility of getting dumber could not be farther from the truth. Ellison tracks changes in the female brain following pregnancy and the care-giving of early childhood. Her findings fly in the face of the conventional wisdom of feminism.

The Mommy Brain research shows that pregnant women actually gain brain cells - something thought to be impossible for human brains beyond the childhood growth curve. Those new cells tend to be in the sensory regions designated to hearing and smelling, which validates the older conventional wisdom marveling over the sensory acuity of moms. "Be careful, your mom has eyes in the back of her head," isn't far off. It's just that she has supercharged ears rather than a third eye.

Ellison also details an astonishing increase in hormones and neurotransmitters which promote hyper-awareness, altruism, emotional bonding, cheerfulness, empathy and social connectivity. This chemical cocktail is self-perpetuating. The more a person exercises the capabilities opened by these substances, the more the body makes. So the extra smarts become permanent.

Even more, the chemical changes are often echoed in an involved father. Science isn't certain how it happens, but it seems connected with pheromones given off by the mother, with skin-to-skin contact with the infant, and with exercising parental nurturing. So it seems parental smarts can be both contagious and cultivated!

Professor of neuroscience at the University of California, Michael Merzenich, contradicts me and my self-effacing friends. "I don't think there are a lot of better things you can do for your brain than have a child." Looks like God knows best, yet again. Parenting does indeed expand our capacity to exercise dominion.
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The Mommy Brain is part of my background research for Launch-Proof Legacy, a workshop and book combination about parenting during the transition from nuclear family to extending family, about letting go of children and maintaining vital intergenerational relationships. Preview the workshop in the audio lecture, Quests & Homecomings.

Trumpet Stars and Wise Men

According to the rich tradition of the Christian Church, Christmas doesn't just flash past in one day. Christmas is a season lasting twelve days, ending on Epiphany (Jan 6) when Christians have celebrated the visit of the Magi, the revelation of Jesus as the King of Kings, and the inclusion of the Gentiles en masse in God's Covenant people.

Our family has celebrated with a Magi Treasure Hunt, which is available to you at Celebration Books & Gifts (although, if you order it today, there are no guarantees when it will get to you. Denver continues to be hammered with the most ferocious snowstorm in a century.) The treasure hunt is both a physical hunt through the house, and a hunt through the Bible and Bible archaeology.

This year we have discovered during our treasure hunt, a DVD and website about the Bethlehem Star. The website will give you historical clues and details about archaeo-astronomy during Christ's lifetime that will blow you away. The way that God set up the skies to announce His purposes and plans from the beginning of time, convinces me that this is not Plan B.

The DVD is a visually stunning presentation of the Scriptural clues concerning the nature of the star:

1. It rises and sets
2. It was obvious at first only to the Magi. Herod hadn't noticed it.
3. It was connected to kingship.
4. It was connected to Israel.
5. It appeared, disappeared and reappeared.
6. It appeared to move against the fixed stars.
7. Specifically, it had to 'lead' the Magi west to Judah from Babylon, and then south from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.
8. It had to appear to stop over Bethlehem.

Then the DVD proceeds to use the same software we use to analyse and demonstrate stellar and planetary motions at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, together with the ancient historians Tacitus, Josephus and others to establish the correct dates for these events. The result is a sky window that dances with meaning, beauty and wonder.

And yes, there is a series of phenomena that exactly matches the clues! We are the first generation in twenty centuries to have the opportunity to review these signs and wonders firsthand, because of the speed and power of computer calculations.

But the DVD (and website) goes farther, it analyses the end of the dance - the signs and wonders at Christ's death. Just as the sky trumpeted His arrival, it danced His requiem, His dirge. You will weep.

The website: www.bethlehemstar.net
The DVD: The Bethlehem Star
The software: Starry Night

Go. Read. Worship! Come, let us adore Him, Christ the Lord!

Visit the first Anniversary Carnival of Homeschooling at Why Homeschool? which links to this post.

Reviewing Cultural Cruelty

Meso-American archaeology has been something of an avocation since my childhood. I read everything I could find about Aztecs, Incas, Toltecs, Olmecs and Mayas. So Apocalypto's premise was particularly intriguing.

In Apocalypto, Jaguar Paw, a father from a less-powerful tribe is separated from his pregnant wife and child when a Mayan (though the art, fashions and temples really look more Aztec) raiding party burns his village and takes the healthy adults captive. Jaguar Paw hides his family in a dry well, promising to return for them. The movie follows the captives to the city, where the women are sold as slaves and the men are marked for sacrifice in the city center. (Skip to the next paragraph if you don't want to spoil the ending.) Jaguar Paw is stretched over the altar under the priest's obsidian blade, when the mass sacrifices are halted by the end of a solar eclipse. He escapes the raiders' human hunt game to rescue his family, killing nearly all of the raiders one by one in the process. As the final raiders run Jaguar Paw to ground on the beach, the Spanish land. Jaguar Paw returns to the jungle, while the Mayan raiders receive the Spanish (in real life, the Aztec did this first).

The movie is very violent - on a par with Saving Private Ryan. There are beheadings, battles, a mass grave of headless victims, the sacrificed heads on pikes, etc. But even at that, the violence and cruelty is soft-pedalled from what the Codices, written at the time of the Spanish contact, describe. The most disturbing images, though don't come from the on-screen violence, but from the callous abandonment of the village children, the utter rejection of the old and infirm, the power-politics conducted from the top of the bloody temple, the cultural obsession with death...

We should welcome this realism as a relief from the saccharine treatment of American tribal life in movies like Dances with Wolves. This is especially true in view of the newest craze for naively resurrecting ancient Aztec religious dance traditions - right along with the rest of the religion. We need to remember what we have been rescued from, however deficient the rescuers themselves might have been.

The Spanish don't particularly look like heroes here. When they turn up on the beach, we realize that this internecine warfare which we have been following for the last two hours has just become completely irrelevant. Judgement is at hand. But Jaguar Paw's refusal to greet or to know the Spanish, shows his preference to use the Creation as a springboard to his 'new beginning' over the men who were coming. At least in the jungle, Jaguar Paw would fall into the hands of God rather than the hands of men.

As a child, I was glad that the Spanish stopped the practice of human sacrifice, but was enraged at them for destroying so much of Meso-American civilization. As I grew older, and was able to read more detailed studies, I realized how much of a mercy to future generations that destruction had been. But those mercies are lost to twentieth-century TV-addicts who get their history from the silver screen.

Apocalypto shows us the seamy side of Meso-American life, and has garnered plenty of criticism for doing so. Critics argue that the violence implies that Pre-Columbian native Americans were stupid brutes. How could such vile people also build incredibly accurate astronomical observatories, acoustically sophisticated public buildings; how could they have invented the idea of zero, and developed a calendar more accurate in some ways than ours, etc?

How indeed? Surely that is the whole point of Mel Gibson's effort: intellectual and cultural sophistication is no innocualtion against corruption. And his refusal to glorify the European explorers prompts us to look at our own intellectually, culturally, technologically sophisticated society. Don't we abandon and kill our children? Don't we find newer and better ways to reject the old and the infirm? Aren't we becomming increasingly skillful at manipulating masses whom we deliberately keep ignorant and dependent? Aren't we becomming increasingly pitiless in our pursuit of scapegoats?

I give Apocalypto a guarded recommendation. There is crude humor, National Geographic-type lack of clothing (not-quite nudity), lots of gore. But the message is an antidote to a lot of the twaddle that passes for historical revisionism. There is a lot of food for thought here.

He Still Comes

As part of our Advent celebrations, my family is reading aloud The End of the Spear, the account of how Jesus' coming to the Waodani people of the Amazon is transforming their culture.

Steve Saint, the son of one of the five missionaries killed by the Waodani in the Through Gates of Splendor massacre in the '50's, tells how his second-generation family was invited by the Waodani to help them learn how to interface with the modern world. Though Saint's style is unsentimental, the tale is incredibly moving.

I was struck with his concern to encourage the Waodani to take up responsibility for themselves and to take initiative to produce their own economy, to provide their own tribal leadership, etc. He walked the fine line of showing them the way and then getting out of the way, lest they become just another exploitable welfare-state waif tribe.

I found it very encouraging for times when I feel deserted by God, who could make everything alright for me. Isn't this what God is doing for us? He has shown us the way to holiness, to sanctification, to becomming more and more conformed to His image, and then He has left us with the subtle 'radio contact' of the Holy Spirit - so that we won't become Heaven's welfare cases. So that we will be able to take our places among the strong, shining ones we admire among His saints.

(I-TEC is the "Indigenous Peoples' Technology and Education Center", an organization creatied by Steve Saint and the Waodani to help other tribal peoples enter the 21st century without entering a slave-like dependency on first-world peoples.)

Holiday reading recommendations

For some leisure-time relaxation, try the blogs at Christian Women Online. My favorites include And I Shall Yet Praise Him, Deo Volente, Holy Experience, Whippoorwill Chronicles...

Not only are there some truly gifted writers there, but until tomorrow, you will have the opportunity to nominate your favorite reads for awards in several categories:

Best Friend Award
Someone that you deem as friendly--reaching out to those around her.

Most Joyful Among Us Award
Illuminates joy through her posts. Has a "glass-half-full" attitude.

Best Home Maker Award
Exhibits above average homemaking skills, with a love for the work she does in her home.

The Better Half Award
Shows a reverent respect for her husband, and delights in her marriage.

Most Humorous Award
Has a knack for wit, and the ability to find humor in her everyday life.

Best Group Blog
Has the best team of bloggers who inspire us with their words

Best Mommy Award
A mommy who joys in the job of raising little ones for the Lord.

Best Home School Award
Makes homeschooling something to be desired.

Best Scrapbooker Award
Designs and exhibits beautiful scrapbooking lo's.

Artistic Blog Skin Award
Has a blog design that stands out as unique from the rest.

And, our most favored award will be:

The Unified Heart Award
One who strives to unify the body of Christ through love, encouragement, and an always open heart. She is unto God a sweet savor of Christ.

There are 650 of us on the blog roll, but you can find the CWO blog roll by clicking here

Please send your nominations to:
editor@christianwomenonline.net

Exonerating the End of the Spear

Hurrah for our side! Randy Alcorn at Eternal Perspectives has done what someone with access to the folks at Every Tribe Entertainment should have done long ago. He has actually talked to the Christian brothers at ETE to ask for their perspective and rationale behind hiring Chad Allen for the major role in End of the Spear.

I could rehash it again, but you can read it from the original source. He has posted his interview and an excellent commentary at Eternal Perspectives.

Suffice it to say that most of the reports that ETE knowingly hired a homosexual to play Nate and Steve Saint were echoes of the Sharper Iron blog, which quoted what the homosexual magazine the Advocate said about the hiring. I had been part of spreading that story. I want to be part of setting it straight, as the author of Sharper Iron, Jason Janz, is currently working to do.

If you read my post, Falling on Our Own Spears, please be sure to read Randy's healing articles at Eternal Perspectives. And please pray for the families who have been hurt by the controversy.

Falling on Our Own Spears

“If the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?" (I Cor.14:8)

My thanks to Spunky for pointing me to the controversy surrounding The End of the Spear. Spunky wrote in a comment to my post:

I was all excited about seeing this movie until I heard that Chad Allan is gay
and an outspoken advocate for the gay lifestyle. He is using his noteriety from
this film to promote his gay lifestyle. I am now very conflicted. I want to see
this movie but the idea of watching him play Nate and Steve Saint clouds it for
me greatly. I don't know that I can sit through the movie without wondering what
Nate would be thinking about who played him.

It’s true. Far from giving Christians an opportunity to join together to celebrate the victory of Christ in the Waodani culture, and to make a statement concerning their preference for wholesome entertainment, Every Tribe Entertainment has handed us yet another opportunity to appear contentious and narrow-minded on the one hand or welcoming to the gay agenda on the other. (Of course there is always the clueless option, which was mine last week.)

In casting a gay actor to play Nate Saint and his grown son, Steve, Every Tribe Entertainment not only knew of the actor’s sexual preference, but also knew of his activism. So apparently, ETE wanted this controversy, mistakenly equating the reconciliation between the missionary families and the Waodani killers with a reconciliation between the Christian and the homosexual communities.

This equation cheapens Christ’s victory in the Waodani tribe, because while homosexuals take pride in flauting God’s ways, the Waodani had repented and renounced their destructive ways. So the reconciliation between Steve Saint and Mincayani was a reflection of their true reconciliation to God. But a “reconciliation” between Christians and unrepentant homosexuals would only be an accommodation of sin.

The message is not the messenger. If we insist on only considering art produced by stainless artists, we will have to live in the wilderness. However, from this vantage point, I am very conflicted about recommending this movie. It is a powerful story of the triumph of God’s love over a savage, hopeless people. And it is beautifully, intriguingly executed. But ETE has courted this controversy rather than fleeing unnecessary conflict.

If you need more information to make your own decision, try these links:
Albert Mohler

Cutting Edge Culture

Chloe over at CatchWord has a good suggestion for this weekend: go see a movie. Actually, go see a particular movie, one that was produced and promoted completely outside of Hollywood, but promises to be a Christian blockbuster.

End of the Spear is the feature film about the Jim Elliot/Nate Saint effect among the Waodani Indians of the Amazon. It focuses on the incredible personal and cultural reconciliation brought about by the missionaries' sacrifice on the banks of the Amazon. See the preview trailers here.

The issues of nudity and violence have been tastefully handled, but the story is quite intense, so the film deserves its PG-13 rating. Your young teens will be inspired, but your younger ones may be overwhelmed.

So thumb your nose at Hollywood. Go see End of the Spear this weekend. Show the Hollywood establishment that a HUGE population of movie-goers would rather see a powerfully wholesome film made by wholesome folks. But, most of all - Enjoy!

Digesting

We could spend hours looking for mentors, comrades and encouragement in the blogosphere - or you could just check out some of these creative, Christian digests.

Mark over at the Best God Blogs combs the blogosphere for the best Christian posts in any category. He posts his digest several times a week, with little teasers about the articles to which he links. He also takes recommendations from readers.

Every Sunday, The Rebelution selects their "post of the week" for your weekend delight.

And then there are the Carnivals. These moveable feasts are hosted from week to week by different bloggers, but their traveling location can always be found at their instigators' site. The Carnivals usually post a weekly digest of the most fascinating articles on a focused set of subjects. Carnivals usually post on the midweek internet doldrum day: Wednesday.

For a respite from the ugly and frenetic, try the Carnival of Beauty sponsored by Two Talent Living. Dying for some advice or company as a homeschooler? Try the Carnival of Homeschooling intitiated by Why Homeschool. And then there is the Barnum & Bailey of internet carnivals, the Christian Carnival organized by the Wittenberg Gate (look in the sidebar for carnival information). This enormous forum sports Christian opinion from across the theological spectrum.

So bring your appetite and try some of these digests. There's plenty to chew on.