Category: book club

Book reviews, thoughts and reflections

The Chronological Study Bible

A few weeks back I received a copy of Thomas Nelson’s Chronological Study Bible (NKJV).

New AMAZING COLORFUL study Bible

No lie – I was blown away!

Just skimming through the pages wowed me with the layout and the extensive use of color and imagery throughout the pages.

I’ve since used it several times in preparation for various studies and messages and will say that it’s a great companion for any study.

As a “study Bible” I haven’t been blown away by any particular insights included in the study notes and such but that doesn’t diminish my feelings at all. And to be fully honest and fair about it, I can’t say I’ve read this entire Bible all the way through yet (with our without the notes) — so there are likely countless things still waiting to be discovered.

New study Bible

I was thrown originally by the order of the Gospel letters (where I’ve spent most of my study time). As a Chronological Study Bible, I still expected the letters to remain intact, simply placed in the order they were historically (or at least believed to be) written. I have a copy of The Books of The Bible (TNIV) that’s organized more in that manner — and I’m certain this previous experience with a “chronological Bible” tainted how I expected this Bible to read.

(Side note :: The Books of The Bible focuses a lot more on readability than study — with no chapter or verse deviations and text formatted in one column per page rather than multiple columns),

In comparison to The Books of the Bible, the chronological order is that of the Biblical Narrative, not necessarily the order of the authorship. Like I said, this was a disappointment — at first — but I’ve come to appreciate it as an entirely different resource/tool as I delve further into the text. It helps me see the broader picture of where the various stories of Jesus line up and which authors included which stories, and which ones excluded others.

Along with ordering the text in narrative order, I’ve also come to really appreciate the time line that scrolls above each of the pages. This gives an even broader dimension to studying and helps the reader see a better picture of how various events/texts align themselves within the greater Biblical narrative.

Further study of the Bible showed how the editors worked to carry out the narrative order by intertwining texts like the story of David, with his poetry and songs in the book of Psalms. This gives the reader a better feeling of David’s narrative, with his feelings and thoughts and reflections wrapped around them. I’m looking forward to delving into the Psalms even further with this added resource.

Now if only they just had a version with Eugene Peterson’s translation. 🙂

New study Bible

Here are some additional notes/points from Thomas Nelson ::

  • The entire New King James Bible with translators’ notes, arranged in chronological order-the order in which the events and writings actually happened, for absorbing and effective Bible study
  • Full-color illustrations of places, artifacts, and cultural phenomena that give the reader a dramatic, “you are there” experience
  • Fascinating articles that connect the Bible text to world history and culture
    Daily Life Notes that explain how people lived in Bible times
  • Epoch Introductions and Historical Overviews that provide vivid chronological context
    Transition Comments that set the stage and prepare the reader for the biblical text that follows
  • “Time Capsules” of world history that accompany the Bible text
  • Time Panels and Charts that show the flow of Bible history
  • In-text and full-page color maps of the biblical world
  • A handy scripture finder index that provides rapid access to any passage
  • Topical Index and Glossary to facilitate study

World AIDS Day

Today is Dec. 1, 2008. Two big events take place today.

Rosa Parks in 1955 with Martin Luther King in the background (via Wikipedia)

The anniversary of Rosa Parks taking a stand, by taking a seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus in 1955, and World AIDS Day.

Two great movements/issues of our day — the civil rights movement and AIDS awareness/treatment/elimination.

I almost hate to compare the two movements (simply because I think they’re both worthy of their own attention and comprehension) but I think both are issues the church should be actively involved in and actively working to make change in. We’ve come a long way in both arenas but there’s still a long way to go as well.

I just started reading “On the Side of Angels” by Dr. Joseph D’Souza and Benedict Rogers. It talks right to this issue.

“Each person facing abuse of their own human rights is a fellow human being of eternal value, created by God in his image. Each one is our neighbor.”

For too long, we’ve delegated titles and stereotypes to people who are different than us. We’ve avoided people because of their different culture, or because of a disease that they might have contracted because of “immoral behavior.” And we’ve ignored the fact that each of us have contracted our own disease of sin that we DID contract because of our own immoral behavior.

Far too long we’ve said that you get what you deserve and you get what’s coming to you.

But as D’Souza and Rogers write, “Unless and until Christian life and witness actually becomes involved in individual lives and society, we cannot authentically carry out kingdom mission in this world.”

So here’s to my creed and the prayer that I live it out both today, and all the days to come ::

rather than seeking revenge, i will seek reconciliation
rather than repaying violence with violence, i will seek creative transforming nonviolent alternatives
rather than focusing on external conformity to moral codes, i will be internally transformed by love
rather than loving insiders and hating outsiders, i will welcome outsiders into a new “us” and “we”
rather than anxiety about money or security or pleasure, i will trust myself to the care of God
rather than living for wealth, i will live for God who loves all people, including our enemies
rather than hating our enemies and competitors, i will them and do unto them not as they have done unto me – or before they do unto me – but as i wish they would do for me

And to the mission of Jesus the Christ, the Messiah ::

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

resources ::
National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)

Drug abuse by any route can put a person at risk for getting HIV. This is because drug and alcohol intoxication affect judgment and can lead to unsafe sexual practices, which put people at risk for getting HIV or transmitting it to someone else. NIDA has developed the following resources to help educate, share and increase awareness of the AIDS issue.

NIDA’s Learn the Link Campaign ::

More Resources ::

AIDS.gov

The Federal government has developed a wealth of HIV/AIDS testing, prevention, treatment and research information. In addition, the following are some of the many resources you can use to help response to HIV/AIDS.

St. Peter’s Brewery :: #Nanowrimo comes to an end

Yup, that’s it. My month long challenge of writing a novel has come to an end – a full day early. M$ Word says I finished with a 50,737 word count. Nanowrimo says I finished with an official 50,849 word count and Google Docs says I finished with a 51,716 word count.

I’ll be honest, I like Google’s number better, but Nanowrimo is the official score, so I’ll stick with that for now.

At times it was much harder than I imagined (aka writers block) but at other times it was as if the words just jumped off pages. It was an enjoyable process none the less and depending on how the editing process goes, I may just do a followup next year – we’ll just see if Laurie lets me :-).

As for now, I’m putting my writing on hold and plan to spend the month of December catching up on sleep and enjoying some books I’ve been putting off.

Jan 2, 2009 I plan to start the horrible process of editing the book and then we’ll go from there. I’m looking to self-publish the book either with Lulu or CreateSpace and depending on the editing process, I’d love to have it ready to go by March? We’ll see how it goes.

(BTW if you’re glutton for punishment – I might be looking for some copy editors in 2009 :-))

I’ll end this post with another passage from the book. I haven’t decided if I absolutely love it, or if I’m scared of it yet (that probably makes no sense to anyone else) ::

“You know, I realize this week has been rough for various folks in our group,” Matt began. “But as I was reading this weekend and then talking with Julie about politics and other random malarkey, I began to think how different the Kingdom of God is, compared to the kingdom of man. It’s this upside down, twisted kingdom that I don’t know if we’ll ever really wrap our minds around.”

Jimmy looked up from his plate and listened carefully as Matt continued.

“I hope that no matter what happens politically, no matter what happens in the world around us, it can be said that I serve the king of an upside down kingdom. A kingdom where the meek shall inherit the earth, where those who morn are comforted, where the last are first, where the oppressed shall be freed. Where rather than appearing in a palace to lead his kingdom with a sword, my king came and appeared in a lowly manager — surrounded by animals.”

Matt continued strumming his guitar as Julie opened a Bible and began reading a passage that Jimmy was surprised sounded very familiar to him.

“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.

You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.

You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat…”

As Julie continued reading, Jimmy leaned over and whispered to Kim, “What is that she’s reading, it sounds familiar.”

“It’s from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew’s Gospel,” Kim replied with a smile. “I think the beginning of the fifth chapter.”

As Julie finished her reading, Matt continued telling his story.

“So as I’m thinking about this upside down kingdom and reading this passage in Scripture it brought me hope to know that when we’re at the end of our rope, that’s when God can really go to work. And when we lose what’s really dear to us, that’s when we’ll be embraced by God. Because God loves us all, especially those who suffer and mourn, in fact he says he will comfort them.”

Matt continued strumming his guitar as he sat looking at the various faces in the room. Jimmy tried to focus on his food again, hoping not to make eye contact with anyone else in the room.

“And so for those of you who have had your kingdom and your world collapse recently, I want you to know that God offers a different kind of kingdom for us all,” Matt said. “And I want you each to know that not only does God suffer with you, but each of us suffer with you as well.”

St. Peter’s Brewery :: the 40k word mark

1506
44
lab.drwicked.com

I passed the 40,000 word marker tonight. WOOT!

On the downward slope for sure! 40,018 words total (or 80%) and less than 10,000 words left! Only seven days to go! Finish line here we come!

And with another word/mile-marker – I’ll share another brief segment of the book ::

G.T. explained that even after changing his major and transferring to the Baptist college, he still struggled with his decision.

“I just wasn’t content or happy,” G.T. said. “It was like something was still missing. But I figured I’d better stick with it now. I’d spent too much time and money to back out by that time.”

After he graduated college, he began seminary and went to work as a youth pastor for a congregation with roughly 150 members.

“Seminary was just ‘what you do’ if you want to go into full time ministry,” G.T. said. “It didn’t always make much sense to me, but I guess I learned a lot along the way. It was all classroom and book knowledge that was just poured into your head and there wasn’t much practical examples or training to prepare you for real world ministry.”

G.T. stopped his story with a rather loud laugh. He tried to continue on with his story in between laughs.

“I remember after I graduated seminary I got a job as a pastor at a slightly larger church than before,” he said. “A month after I took over the position I was asked to perform a funeral for an older member in the church and I was absolutely clueless as to what I should do. I had to scour all of my books for examples of how to perform a funeral. Finally I called up the pastor from my old church and asked for his advice. He was able to give me enough notes to make it through that first funeral. I’m sure that family thought, ‘What is wrong with this guy?!’”

G.T. paused while he took several bites of food. Jimmy thought through G.T.’s retelling of his story.
“So basically you decided to go into the ministry because some dude in your past said you should?” Jimmy asked. “And then you spent a couple years getting a Master’s degree simply because it was the thing to do?”

G.T. finished chewing his food.

“Yup,” he replied. “Pretty good summary. I thought it was the right thing to do and figured if my pastor thought I should do it, he must have a pretty good insight from God.”

“So then what?” Jimmy asked.

“Well as I was at this first church I began to really study Scripture in preparation for each week’s sermon,” G.T. said. “And the more I read and studied the more I began to realize that I was supposed to have a relationship with God on my own, not dependent upon a pastor or an elder or even my parents. So I really started encouraging the congregation to start reading their Bibles on their own. And I started suggesting that they shouldn’t depend on me to hear from God. They weren’t all too receptive to that idea. The deacons and the elders met and basically told me, ‘We don’t pay you to tell us we’re supposed to hear from God on our own. You’re supposed to tell us what God says.’ So that was the end of church number one.”

St. Peter’s Brewery :: a sneak peak

I’m at roughly 70% of the way done with my nanowrimo novel. I’m wondering now if I can wrap things up in 15,000 words or not. Maybe it will leave room for a sequel for 2009 :-).

Either way, thought I’d share a passage I’m working on right now. As always, the comments are open so feel free to critique, give suggestions and so forth. I won’t be making any changes to the text as of now – editing comes later – but I’ll take the suggestions into consideration when that process begins.

So here ya go ::

Jimmy was startled that he had revealed so much. He had only revealed that part of the story a few times before. And those folks had always ended up leaving him as well.

“Wow! That’s tough stuff,” Josh said. “It sounds like you’re beginning to understand your mom’s perspective. I’ve found that it’s so easy to cast judgment on someone when we just look at surface issues. It’s like we see a flesh wound and ignore everything that might be going on underneath. We either cast them away or try to fix the surface issue, never dealing with the disease or root of the problem that might be growing underneath the skin.”

“Hmmm,” Jimmy thought. “Explain that a bit more.”

“Well, let’s take prostitution as an example,” Josh continued. “We all want to be angry at the prostitute or the women who are sold into the sex trade industry. We want to cast them out and say they’re in the wrong. We don’t want to be around them. It’s like they have a contagious disease that we might catch if we spend too much time with them. Yet rather than being angry at the women, we should be mad at the men or women who likely abused them in their past and made them turn to prostitution. We should be mad at the people and companies who make between five billion and nine billion dollars a year encouraging and trafficking these women around the world.”

“Or here’s another issue close to my heart,” Julie spoke up. “Let’s look at abortion. My mom almost aborted me because she was dirt poor, living on the street and had no help. She couldn’t support and care for herself, let alone another human being. She didn’t want to abort me simply because she’s was an evil person, she just didn’t know what other options she had.”

“So what happened,” Jimmy asked.

“Well, obviously she didn’t abort me,” Julie said with a grin. “My mom ran into a lady who found out about her situation and agreed to adopt both my mom and ultimately me into her family. She cared for my mom all during the pregnancy and then cared for me like I was her own daughter or granddaughter. She helped my mom get her GED and then get an associate’s degree at Austin Community College. She even set up a college fund for me along the way. It was the ultimate example of getting to the root of the problem and not just dealing with one individual symptom. I think it’s provided a great example to me as to how we should treat issues systematically rather than just treating individual systems.”

Jimmy was genuinely stunned at how open Julie was.

“I found out later that that’s very similar to what Mother Theresa did in India,” Julie added. “She offered grace to those who really needed it. And rather than condemning someone for their mistake – or the mistake of others – she offered grace and would adopt numerous mothers and their unborn babies. She would welcome them into her home and care for them till they could make it on their own.”
The group mulled these ideas over with several other questions, explanations and ideas. Jimmy had never been a part of a group as open and sharing about their lives, their pasts and their faith. They simply had no qualms telling someone else where they may have messed up, or where someone else might have hurt them, or where they might have hurt someone else.

This struck Jimmy as something totally different than anything he knew about so called Christians. He saw glimpses of it in Capt. Matthie and his wife, but found it easy to question the authenticity and genuineness of their kids. Perhaps like Jimmy, they were simply drug somewhere they didn’t feel a connection with or a desire to be at.

The other Christians he knew growing up all came across as living a plastic religion. It wasn’t very solid. It looked great on the inside but was usually hollow or weak when tested. They made a big deal about attending church on Sunday, Wednesday and Fifth Quarter Celebrations on Friday nights but many times their lives just didn’t match up with what they claimed to believe in. Other times they may have done everything possible to do what was good and right, but it was obvious their heart was never in it.

It was just repetitive actions done out of duty. They were always trying to add more good deeds to some magical scale that God holds somewhere in heaven – like Lady Justice. The good deeds were added to one side of the scale with the hopes that they would be able to outweigh the bad deeds on the other side.

These new friends seemed to be living for something more.

St. Peter’s Brewery :: 25k words

Don’t worry, this won’t be a 25,000 word post. I now know that would take 58 pages in a word document.

I have crossed the halfway mark for #nanowrimo on Nov 18! WOOT! (25,298 words to be exact as of 10:12 p.m.)

Now in all seriousness, the challenge is to reach 30k by tomorrow night at midnight. I’m doubtful that I’ll be able to get a 5,000 word streak going tomorrow, but if I keep punching out at least 2,100 words a day over the next 12 days – I’ll be done with time to spare.

So as a “teaser” for those who keep asking, and I keep shrugging off, here’s the rough synopsis of the book ::

A twenty-something moves to a small town to try and run from the troubles he’s had in his past. Along the way he meets up with a community of quirky friends who show him that real life is not life lived alone – but lived in community with others.

You knew it would have something to do with community now didn’t you?

So now the struggle begins. I’ve reached the halfway point. Have I put too much into the story so far that I won’t have enough storyline left to reach the end? Am I still still trying to squeeze too much into the storyline? Are my characters developed enough? Does it matter?

Time to stop thinking and worrying about it…..

As a side note – I’ve heard two different strategies on writing/publishing/selling books. One strategy says all you need to do is sell one book to one fan. The fan will take care of selling the rest (as he tells their friends, who tell their friends, who tell their friends.) The other strategy says that if you can’t sell 100 books, you need a different book.

Which strategy to you subscribe to? Maybe I can get 100 people to say they’ll commit to buying the book for say — $12 (or less hopefully) — and then it won’t really matter will it 🙂