Season of Saráyu, Something New

I love Colorado.
I love living in Colorado.
For those who don’t live in Colorado, I am truly sorry.

Colorado is the reason I walk to work each morning. OK, the main reason I walk is because we only have one car, but Colorado is the reason I love walking to work every day. Each morning, I breathe in the crisp air, enjoy the quiet before rush hour begins and I get to see the mountains stretched out in front of me. My iPhone is filled with pictures of flowers, trees, the nighttime landscape and especially Pikes Peak.

But the other morning, I experienced something that literally made me stop in my tracks. Something I had never experienced before, a sun rising. No, not a sunrise, a sun RISING. As I walked, the first light of morning struck the very top of Pikes Peak and lit it up like a flashlight against the dark sky. As I stood there dumbfounded by God’s incredible display unfurling in front of me, the orange light moved down the Peak, revealing more and more. In the middle of an empty parking lot, I watched God put on a light show and it felt like I was the only one in the audience.

As tears filled my eyes, a great hymn flooded into my head:

O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,

Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made;

I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,

Thy power throughout the universe displayed.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,

How great Thou art, How great Thou art.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,

How great Thou art, How great Thou art!

When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,

And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.

When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur

And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,

How great Thou art, How great Thou art.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,

How great Thou art, How great Thou art!

This Thanksgiving week, most of us will thank God for the blessings He has given to us. The majority of these prayers will probably be focused on the “big” things of our lives, like health, food, shelter, family and salvation. While these are definitely blessings for which we must be thankful, maybe we should also find of the “small” things in our lives that our loving Father has given us, like a sun rising? Take time this week to stop and ENJOY and THANK Him for something simple in your life.

Fun Facts, November 19

As we close in on the weekend, here are some fun facts that I hope you enjoy. Blessings!!!

• The most powerful laser in the world, the Nova laser at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, CA, USA, generates a pulse of energy equal to 100,000,000,000,000 watts of power for .000000001 second to a target the size of a grain of sand.

• Vincent van Gogh, the world’s most valued painter, sold only painting in his entire life – to his brother who owned an art gallery. The painting is titled “Red Vineyard at Arles.”

• An onion, apple and potato all have the same taste. The differences in flavour are caused by their smell.

• To win a gold disc, an album needs to sell 100,000 copies in Britain, and 500,000 in the United States.

• There are 6 versions of Franz Schubert’s “Die Forelle” (“The Trout”), simply because when friends asked him for copies of the song, he wrote out new copies to the best he could remember at the time.

• Julius Caesar was the first to encode communications, using what has become known as the Caesar Cipher.

• King Louis XIV of France established in his court the position of “Royal Chocolate Maker to the King.”

• Porcupines float in water.

• An ostrich’s eye is bigger that its brain.

• An iguana can stay under water for twenty-eight minutes.

Fun Facts, November 12

Here are some fun facts to make your week go a little quicker and to brighten your day. Have a great one!!!

• The highest temperature produced in a laboratory was 920,000,000 F (511,000,000 C) at the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor in Princeton, NJ, USA.

• The famous sculptor Auguste Rodin died of frostbite in 1917 when the French government refused him financial aid for a flat, yet they kept his statues warmly housed in museums.

• In the 1950’s some 80% of chickens in Europe and the US were free-ranging. By 1980, it was only 1%. Today, about 13% of chickens in the West are free-ranging.

• The candidate who ran for US President the most times was Norman Thomas. He ran six times from 1928 and didn’t win any. Thomas ran for presidency in 1928, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944 and 1948.

• Paul McCartney was the last bachelor Beatle when he married Linda Eastman in a civil ceremony in London, 1969. Paul’s brother Mike was his best man. No other Beatle attended the wedding.

• Accounts from Holland and Spain suggest that during the 1500s and 1600s urine was commonly used as a tooth-cleaning agent.

• The 17th-century French Cardinal Mazarin never traveled without his personal chocolate-maker.

• The longest recorded flight of a chicken is thirteen seconds.

• Emus and kangaroos cannot walk backwards.

• Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds, while dogs only have about ten.

Fun Facts, November 6

From a warm & sunny Colorado (cold & snowy last week), here are some fun facts that I hope you enjoy. Have a great and blessed day everyone!

• The tentacles of the giant Arctic jellyfish can reach 120 feet (36.6 meters) in length.

• When Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was stolen from the Louvre in 1912, 6 replicas were sold as the original, each at a huge price, in the 3 years before the original was recovered.

• Ice tea was introduced in 1904 at the World’s Fair in St. Louis.

• Only Richard Nixon served two terms as Vice President and also was elected to two terms as President.

• The only guy without a beard in ZZ Top surname (last name) is Beard.

• Playing-cards were known in Persia and India as far back as the 12th century. A pack then consisted of 48 instead of 52 cards.

• Thomas Jefferson wrote his own epitaph without mentioning that he was US President.

• The average ocean floor is 12,000 feet.

• Chimps are the only animals that can recognize themselves in a mirror.

• Starfish don’t have brains.

• The greatest tide change on earth occurs in the Bay of Fundy. The difference between low tide and high tide can be as great as 54 ft. 6 in. (16.6 meters).

• When Auguste Rodin exhibited his first important work, The Bronze Period, in 1878 it was so realistic that people thought he had sacrificed a live model inside the cast.

• The tea bag was introduced in 1908 by Thomas Sullivan of New York.

• The US Presidential candidate with the highest popular vote ever was Ronald Reagan. In 1984 he secured 54,455,075 votes. Reagan was also the candidate with the highest electoral vote: 525, in 1984. In that year he equalled the 49 states that Nixon carried in 1972.

• Since its launch in 1981 the song Memory of the musical Cats has been played on radio more than a million times.

• Excavations from Egyptian tombs dating to 5,000 BC show that the ancient Egyptian kids played with toy hedgehogs.

• Winston Churchill was a stutterer. As a child, one of his teachers warned, “Because of his stuttering he should be discouraged from following in his father’s political footsteps.”

• The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

• Shrimp’s hearts are in their heads.

• Every time you lick a stamp, you’re consuming 1/10 of a calorie.

Forced Interaction, Bian Lian

Around 300 years ago, the Chinese Sichuan opera introduced a new form of art called bian lian. Telling the ancient story of a hero who stole from the rich and gave to the poor, the protagonist escaped his captors by changing his face. At the pinacle moment of the act, the actor would turn to a small box hidden on-stage, blow into it, which would release a cloud of colored powder that would stick to his oiled skin. As the art of bian lian evolved, actors learned to smear hidden paints across their faces and even layered thin masks of painted paper on their faces, removing them in a fraction of a second. Audiences learned to follow the moods of the characters with a swipe of the hand.

While most do not recognize it, we are experts at bian lian too. While we do not use paint or paper masks, we change our whole persona in a split second to fit each moment. In almost every aspect of our lives, we have different masks which we wear, but sadly one of the places we use them the most is at church. Choosing a specific outfit so we don’t look out of place. Acting like everything is great and good, hiding the enormous fight the family had in the mini-van on the way to church. Saying “the right thing” in our small group so everyone will think we have it together, when our lives are falling apart at home. We use our masks as protection so no one can know what is really happening in our “real lives” because those struggles and problems would prove we are failures.

But this is not a new problem to the church, we find them among Jesus’ closest followers. Judas wore the mask of a Jesus follower, all while hiding the reality of his selfishness and greed. Nearly the opposite, Peter used three different masks to hide his fear of being labeled ‘follower of Jesus’. Martha tried to wear the mask of efficiency and service while Mary removed hers before the Lord. In fact, it was not until after the death and resurrection of their Rabbi that their masks came off. When the Holy Spirit descended upon them, they themselves were transformed in a way that no mask could ever try to portray. This transformation can be most easily seen in the results of the early church in Jerusalem. Thousands of the same people who screamed for Christ’s execution were drawn by the Holy Spirit into a community of genuine Christians. No masks allowed.

Unfortunately, we all live in a mask-wearing world where authenticity is praised but not practiced. For our churches to attract a mask-wearing world, we must put down our paint and be different. We must create a place where people can come in whatever their condition. Whoever they are, they are loved. No matter what they are wearing, they are embraced. However they talk, they are accepted.

In other words, it is time for the church to be more like the local bar.

Making your way in the world today takes everything you’ve got.

Taking a break from all your worries, sure would help a lot.


Wouldn’t you like to get away? 



Sometimes you want to go



Where everybody knows your name, 

and they’re always glad you came.

You wanna be where you can see, 

our troubles are all the same

You wanna be where everybody knows 
Your name. 



You wanna go where people know, 

people are all the same, 

You wanna go where everybody knows 
your name.”

Fun Facts, October 29 (Teddy Edition)

OK, here’s your next installment of Thoughtless Trivia Thursday to impress your friends and belittle your enemies…. Enjoy!

This week’s trivia honors my personal hero, President Theodore Roosevelt (Born: October 27, 1858).

• The Teddy Bear is named after Teddy Roosevelt. While hunting in Mississippi during his presidency, a few of the men in Roosevelt’s party treed a small black bear and summoned Roosevelt so that he could take the shot. Roosevelt decided that killing the young, trapped bear was not sporting, and spared it. A New York toymaker heard the story, and asked Roosevelt’s permission before styling a child’s stuffed toy bear as the “Teddy Bear”. Roosevelt gave his permission, noting that he did not expect many sales.

• Once while preparing to give a speech in the Milwaukee during a 1912 campaign, a crazed man attempted to assassinate Roosevelt, and shot him with a pistol at nearly point blank range. Roosevelt declared “it will take more than that to kill a bull moose!” and finished the lengthy speech before visiting a hospital.

• After Roosevelt retired from politics, he led an expedition in South America to find the source of a river known as “the River of Doubt”. Most of the party died, and Roosevelt caught the fever yet survived. The river is now named “Rio Roosevelt.”

• Roosevelt won the Nobel Peace prize for mediating the Russo-Japanese war. Although an aggressive president when it came to military matters, he is the only president to have been awarded the honor while President of the United States.

• After he left office in 1909, Roosevelt went on an African safari that netted many of the specimens that now stock the Smithsonian Institute.

• Roosevelt welcomed “the strenuous life”–engaging in daunting physical tests and venturing into hostile locations, even though, taking inflation into account, he was likely the richest president in history due to his family’s estate.

• Most of the original National Parks and the National Park system were created by Roosevelt.

• Roosevelt was the first to dub the executive mansion “The White House”.

• Roosevelt authored over 25 books.

• Roosevelt garnered a larger portion of the popular vote as a third-party candidate (the Bull Moose Party) than anyone in U.S. history.

• Roosevelt wanted the motto “In God We Trust” removed from the new $20 gold coin designed in 1907. Roosevelt felt it was blasphemous to use the Lord’s name on coins that were so often used to buy “worldly” goods and services. After a huge public outcry, Congress passed a law requiring “In God We Trust” be returned to all United States coinage at once.

• He was the first President to ride in an airplane. He flew for four minutes in a plane built by the Wright Brothers on October 11, 1910.

• Theodore Roosevelt was our youngest president (He was younger than Kennedy at the time that McKinley was shot and he was inaugurated).

• In 1912, Roosevelt took a drink of coffee and exclaimed, “That coffee tastes good, even to the last drop!” Maxwell House got their motto from this.

• Roosevelt was the first president to leave the continental U.S. while in office. He went to Panama in 1906.

• Roosevelt’s wife and mother died on the same day, February 14, 1884.

• He wore a ring containing a lock of Abe Lincoln’s hair to his inauguration.

• Teddy Roosevelt was a third cousin twice removed of Martin Van Buren, a fifth cousin of Franklin D. Roosevelt, an uncle of Eleanor Roosevelt, and a great-uncle of Joseph and Stuart Alsop.

• Roosevelt was blind in his left eye. He lost his eyesight when he was boxing.

• His favorite word was “bully” meaning great.

• Roosevelt had a photographic memory. He could read a page in the time it took anyone else to read a sentence.

• He was the first president to be popularly referred to by his initials, TR.

• He was named after his father.

• On New Year’s Day, 1907, Theodore Roosevelt shook hands with 8,513 people.

Fun Facts, October 23

Sorry I have not posted this week. To make it up to you, here is a double batch of fun facts to start your weekend on a fun note. Have a GREAT weekend everyone!

• Armadillos, opossums, and sloth’s spend about 80% of their lives sleeping.

• The first novel sold through a vending machine – at the Paris Metro – was Murder on the Orient Express.

• Tea is said to have been discovered in 2737 BC by a Chinese emperor when some tea leaves accidentally blew into a pot of boiling water.

• 14 of the 45 vice presidents have become president: 5 vice presidents have been elected to the presidency: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, Richard Nixon, and George Bush.

• Themes from movies Unforgiven, A Perfect World, The Bridges of Madison County, and Absolute Power were all written by Clint Eastwood.

• A dog was the first in space and a sheep, a duck and a rooster the first to fly in a hot air balloon.

• Until he was 18, Woody Allen read virtually nothing but comic books but did show his writing skills. He sold one-liners for ten cents each to gossip columnists.

• The highest temperature on Earth was 136°F (58°C) in Libya in 1922.

• The lowest temperature on Earth was -128.6°F (-89.6°C) in Antarctica in 1983.

• Sunlight can penetrate clean ocean water to a depth of 240 feet.

• The starfish species, Porcellanaster ivanovi, has been found to live in water as deep as 24,881 feet (7,584 meters).

• Jean-Dominique Bauby, a French journalist suffering from “locked-in” syndrome, wrote the book “The Driving Bell and the Butterfly” by blinking his left eyelid – the only part of his body that could move.

• The first European to encounter tea was the Portuguese Jesuit Jasper de Cruz in 1560.

• 4 vice presidents assumed the presidency after the president was assassinated: Andrew Johnson, Chester Authur, Theodore Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson.

• 4 vice presidents assumed the presidency after the president died of natural causes: John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Calvin Coolidge, and Harry Truman.

• The US share of the world music market is 31.3%.

• Beer was the first trademarked product – British beer Bass Pale Ale received its trademark in 1876.

• In the 18th century Dr Monsey of Chelsea, England tied a piece of catgut around a patient’s tooth, threaded the other through a hole drilled in a bullet, loaded the bullet into his revolver and pulled the trigger.

• The temperature can be determined by counting the number of cricket chirps in fourteen seconds and adding 40.

• House flies have a lifespan of two weeks.

Forced Interaction, Blow

WWJD. It was a popular saying years ago but it seemed to pop up on everything. The slogan appeared on T-shirts, hats, posters, bumper stickers and most popularly bracelets. It seemed to be a phrase that was embraced by most of the Christian population and it sounded really good. But, as popular as the WWJD campaign was, I think most people missed a critical part of the message. What Would Jesus DO?

And we know that our society is tired of us TELLING them what to do and that we need to model it by doing it.
- We are good at telling the world not to give up in marriage, but our divorce rates tell them we can’t do it.
- We are good at telling the world not to be selfish, but our struggling church finances tell them something different.
- We are good at telling the world about the love of Jesus, but our condemnation of others tells them we are hypocrites.

Last year, nearly everyone was shocked by how popular Barack Obama was in this last Presidential election and how blindly people embraced his programs of spending. Even now, as his administration’s spends billions of dollars on programs, people call him a savior. Meanwhile, churches are closing their doors across the country. Why? Because the bottom line theme for the President’s programs is one thing: to help people. Regardless of whether his programs will work or not, He is DOING something, while the world sees our churches as only SAYING something. When faced with that difference, is it any wonder why the world has turned to a government leader for their salvation? It is true that it is time for our churches to DO more, reaching out to the world around us by helping them. But, some would object by pointing out that many churches are reaching out and not seeing their communities respond.

Maybe it is time for the church to try a different approach? Not by adding more outreach programs or by a series of convicting sermons on what we are doing wrong. Instead, we should look at how we see our Heavenly Father before we try to be His representatives on this earth. Like me, so many Christians today see our Father as a big, bad enforcer, waiting to punish us when we step out of line. We feel we must perform better and do more for Him to be happy with us. As a result, we may do “acts of kindness” in our communities, but they are a duty, not a joy. And the world can see it. In a world filled with dishonest people looking to serve themselves at any cost, we have become highly sensitive to anything fake. When they see our insincere actions, whether good or not, they write us off as just another group trying to lure them into a trap. It should be no surprise then when the Gospel message is not immediately accepted. It does not fall on deaf ears, it falls on skeptical ones.

I struggle with this too. I feel guilty for not doing more and my first reaction is to examine what actions I should take. I think about signing up to feed the homeless. I wonder if I should sign up for every work group that our church has each weekend. I wonder if I should tithe more so the church can be more effective. I even worry whether I am raising my children wrong because we are not more active in “Christian work.” But, in the end, I don’t do anything. Why? Because it is a sense of obligation that is driving those thoughts, not a overflowing of joyful service. Instead asking the Lord to help me DO more, I am asking the Lord to help me do less and learn more. To learn who He is. To learn how to love others unconditionally. To learn to see others through the eyes of Christ. Then, and only then, will my actions be a reflection of Christ that people will believe.

I have heard Christians speak of the working of the Holy Spirit as a “wind that blows through us.” If so, then let the world see His work in me, not my work to others. Or, as my wife said the other day, “They don’t want to see the wind, they want to see the effects of the wind. So, blow!”

Fun Facts, October 8

Two more days to go! Here are some fun facts to put a smile on your face, brighten your day and push you through to the weekend! Have a great day everyone!

• The largest flying animal was the pterosaur which lived 70 million years ago. This reptile had a wing span of 36-39 feet (11-11.9 meters) and weighed 190-250 pounds (86-113.5 kilograms).

• The words “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” were penned in the 17th century by English philospher John Locke.

• George Washington was inaugurated for his first term, on 30 April 1789, at Federal Hall in New York City. His second inauguration took place in Philadelphia. Thomas Jefferson was the first to be inaugurated in Washington DC. Jefferson also was the only one to walk to and from his inauguration.

• The term “disc jockey” was first used in 1937.

• Thomas Cook, the world’s first travel agency in the world, was founded in 1850.

• Queen Isabella of Castile, who dispatched Christopher Columbus to find the Americas, boasted that she had only two baths in her life – at her birth and before she got married.

• The average distance between the Earth & the Moon is 238,857 miles (384,392 km).

• The moon is 27% the size of the Earth.

• The Earth weighs 6.6 sextillion tons, or 5.97 x 1024kg.

• The Atlantic Giant Squid’s eye can be as large as 15.75 inches (40 centimeters) wide.

• To save costs, the body of Shakespeare’s friend and fellow dramatist, Ben Jonson, was buried standing up in Westminister Abbey, London in 1637.

• Maria Ann Smith introduced the Granny Smith apple in 1838.

• The 16th century Escorial palace of King Phillip II of Spain had 1,200 doors.

• Leonardo da Vinci could write with the one hand and draw with the other simultaneously.

• Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the Universe (75%).

• The center of the Sun is about 27 million degrees Fahrenheit (15 million °C).

• Sunlight takes about 8 minutes & 20 seconds to reach the Earth at 186,282 miles/sec (299,792 Km/sec).

Forced Interaction, Yellow Card

Phone, notepads, laptop computer, monitor, notebooks, etc. At my desk at work, you will find the normal assortment of work tools. But, typically when someone walks into my cubicle for the first time, there is one thing that they almost always comment on, my television. Yes, I have a television at my desk. It is small TV that sits on the corner of my desk and usually is tuned to ESPN or ESPN with the volume silenced. The reason I have it at my desk is that I fall into the part of the population that works better with a bit of noise in the background. I also find it serves as a good distraction when I finish working on a difficult project or with a trying client. While it may raise some eyebrows, I find that it really does help my productivity. Last year, after finishing a particularly frustrating project, I turned to my TV for a little cool down time. After scanning through the channels, I settled on an European Champions League soccer game on ESPN2.

I have to admit that, for years, I have felt that soccer (or football for my friends outside the U.S.) was a waste of time. I saw it as a game where people ran around a huge field, kicking a ball and flopping around when they are touched, all while their crazed fans tried to kill each other in the stands. But this time, I sat there and watched a little of the match. Two days later, another match aired and I watched some of it as well. To my surprise, I began to enjoy the game as I learned the rules and saw that the game involved strategy and extreme skill by the players. But in that second match, I saw something that confused me. As one player brought the ball up the field, another player tried to stop him and ended up knocking him to the ground. As the player rolled around on the ground like he had been stabbed, the referee blew his whistle, reached into his pocket and held up a dreaded yellow card. The crowd erupted, the players protested and I figured out that this was the similar to an NFL referee calling a personal foul in American football. Recently, I have seen that I have received yellow cards in my life, and in a place you would not normally expect them.

I have shared before that I have always associated the church with a deep sense of guilt. I always felt that there was a high standard of roles and responsibilities that came with being “a good Christian” and I did not meet them.
- I “must” be in church or I am sinning – YELLOW CARD
- I “must” serve or I am sinning – YELLOW CARD
- I “must” be a certain way or I am not a real Christian – YELLOW CARD
- I “must” enjoy church or there is something wrong with me – YELLOW CARD

In church, I always felt like I was doing something wrong or not living up to be the Christian I should be. My yellow cards piled up and soon I simply gave up. If every Sunday meant getting a yellow card from God, then it was not worth it. So, I gave up. I stopped going to church and quickly my Christian walk became a solo act. I still felt guilt for not going to church, but at least I did not get “the yellow card” from others. Looking back, I wonder where did that guilt come from? In Romans 8:1 it says, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” So obviously this guilt did not come from the Lord, so it must have come from someone else, ME. Like the Pharisees before me, I found it easier to believe in a God with rules and regulations than in one who loves me unconditionally. In fact, I still struggle with this lie. When I miss church, or do not tithe faithfully, I am haunted by guilt and a sense that God somehow is angry with me.

But, thanks to the Lord, this is changing. I am trying to give myself less yellow cards. Or, as my daughter just told me, “We should blow the whistle, hold up a green card and tell everyone, ‘It is time to PLAY!’” I think the Lord just smiled.