Have a Happy New Year!

Believing that next year will be better than this last. Happy New Year friends!

Familial Reflections on a Christmas Night

Christmas brings to the surface those affections for our family and friends that may go unexpressed a lot of the time throughout the year. We dare to show people the love we hold for them, following the example of God Himself. Of course, the interesting thing about acts of love is that they tend to stoke our affections to heights that we were not aware existed.

I am my father's son, and the result of my mother's patience and constant love. I am the product of a handful of mentors and teachers who did not merely punch a clock when they came to school...but who chose to invest in me their time, wisdom, care, concern, discipline, and knowledge of God and His universe. I have been marked and defined by the friends that I have been honored to develop relationships with, over years and across the world. I am the man I am today in large part because of the woman I fell in love with, and the son that we share.

All these are the gifts of God...unquantifiable, immeasurable, and priceless.

This Christmas has been different for us. This Christmas, we went no-where. We invested in some few, larger, family oriented gifts (such as Odysseus), and ultimately, I had exactly one present with my name under the tree (my dear wife feels bad about this...I don't mention it to suggest that I feel unloved or overlooked, as I will explain in a moment...and besides, as the keeper of the check-book, it is difficult to avoid the feeling that I am buying myself a present--even though she makes more than I do!). I opened exactly two presents, allowing my wife to open the other couple of presents we received jointly as a family.

I cannot express how blessed I feel this Christmas.

This, perhaps, sounds cheesy and forced. I am not putting on a show. I have not always regarded actual presents under the tree with nonchalance; I love toys, I have a list of expensive ones I'd love to get, and we'd be better off if I cared less about stuff. I enjoy the whole gifting process: the getting, the giving, the receiving, the enjoying; it is ALL good.

I say this because I believe God, in His grace, has allowed me to transition into a fuller part of Dad-hood gracefully this past year. I used to wonder how my Dad could endure getting so few really good presents for his birthday and Christmas...let's face it, there are only so many times you can get cheese, or salami, or socks, or a home-made "whatever" before the gifts start to lose their novelty, right? My dad never seemed to mind, and I could never really understand it. Even when I pretended not to care about how good the haul was, I cared.

Until now. I cannot explain it...it sounds too cheesy, and a little prideful. Suffice to say...I am actually, surprisingly, content.

Why this tangent about gifts and Christmas? Glad you asked. See, one of the realities that has impressed itself upon me this Christmas is the great joy of giving gifts to those that we love. It is those people we love that I have been thinking about.

What I am thinking about, more than anything else, is the not so subtle ache that has been building since last night for friends and family that I have not seen, and perhaps won't really get to see again. Fortunately, that doesn't include most of my family...but too many friends to count are "gone" and I miss them. The missing is, if anything, punctuated by the occasional presence of those friends who are on the fringes (all too common at this time of the year), slipping out of regular contact, and becoming members of that class of friend that it takes real effort to be connected to.

Friendship is a difficult and important thing...but, oddly, missing friends and family is a good part of life. It is natural, it is appropriate...and it keeps us hoping for tomorrow, when maybe, just maybe, our old friends will once again be by our sides. It is the call of Heaven, when there will be no more goodbyes.

Until then, Christmas stirs in our hearts the need to show those that we can how important they are to us. To give as we have received to those that we have with us, to cherish them with the time that we have been given, and to reflect on how our temporal relationships are but images of the love that abides between our Creator and us.

Merry Christmas.

Santa Barbara Pt 1

The High Country

This is a momentous Spring.

This is the Spring my wife graduates from Biola, with her BSN.

This is the Spring our life changes…again.

And I have resolved that this is the Spring we begin to live as people not perpetually striving to gain degrees. Oh, I do still hope to proceed (soon) towards getting the next level of my education…but it is well past time to do something other than exist while we try to survive the trench warfare that is the Undergraduate years, while being married and parents.

This Spring, we will begin hiking to the high places of SoCal. Old Baldy. San Gorgonio. 7 Falls. Half Dome. Eventually, I hope to include Mt Whitney & the Grand Canyon in our list…but we may have missed the window this year, as there are not enough passes for all the people that want to make the trek.

April 5th is the first step. As part of a training course, we’re doing El Moro Canyon; just short of 7 miles, no real altitude, but a good stretch of the legs. We have about 10 people that have decided to take on this endeavor together, and I am putting the calendar together. It’s very exciting!

My first inclination is to go buy new equipment…having no money makes fighting this impulse easier…

My friend Phil

Phil Wright is a man of the highest order. He's been my friend from childhood...which is saying something, since we haven't lived near one another since I was 11. That didn't prevent him from flying across the country to be at my wedding nearly 10 years later. I could say many things about why he's a great guy--reasons you should all try to move to Virginia and get to know him better...though that might be creepy...so nevermind that...

But right now, I want to highlight the latest reason for thinking highly of Phil; he's currently using his much deserved Summer break doing ministry in Argentina. And you can read about it here.

Phil...our prayers are with you. Thanks for being the man you are.