So the brilliant union workers of the transit agency which provides my primary means of transport to downtown San Francisco have threatened to strike – if they are unable to come to a satisfactory contract arrangement with management in the next day or so.  While the contract expires at midnight tonight, they have said that they will provide sufficient notice before striking.

Naturally, the spokesman for said union stated that they had not yet defined what “sufficient notice” was on the late evening newscast.

While I would be the first to admit that the management of said transit agency does not necessarily consist of the brightest of public agency workers, the unions that make up the majority of the workforce don’t seem to understand that most private sector workers have:

1) Taken pay cuts ranging from 5 to 10 percent.

2) Or have been subject to workforce reductions.

3) Or have been subject to both.

In the meantime, these transit workers are focused on fighting the transit agency’s request to maintain current wages to help close a $100 million shortfall, and give up this year’s guaranteed 3.75% pay increase.

And lest I forget, as of July 1 said transit agency increased fares.

Suffice to say, there is very little public support in these parts for said workers.  I hope that:

1) There is no strike.

2) If there is a strike, that there will be no animosity.

Specifically, that I would act with no animosity towards said workers.

It will be quite difficult.

Some quick thoughts for a Tuesday…

1) Vote for Pablo.  He hit a grand slam in the Giants win over Florida last night, batting .332 with a .572 slugging percentage, 13 HR, 48 RBI.  Let’s send 3 Giants to the All Star Game in St. Louis next week.  Voting button below.

2)  My discipleship group met at a local Starbucks last Friday morning.  We decided to leave a $50 gift card at the counter to pay for coffee for other customers, along with cards which said, “Have a drink on us” with our church’s contact info on the reverse side.  Throughout the 2 hours we were there, several folks came up to us saying, “Cheers, thanks for the coffee.”

3) Just curious – if you are a Christian, do you find it easier to relate to someone of another faith or is it easier to relate to someone with little to no faith?  If you do, is it because someone of another faith (Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, etc.) at least believes in something other than the material world, and it becomes a starting point for discussion?

Have a good Tuesday.

It was an excellent 4th of July weekend…lots of bike riding, sleeping, reading, and most importantly, hanging out with good friends with good food.  From steamed mussels on Friday night to grilled sausages on Saturday, along with curbside “safe and sane” fireworks, it was the kind of weekend that we all should have – living in community, being active in our community, and being present with real people.

Since the end of my 40 day online social media fast, I’ve become more aware of the time I spend blogging, on Twitter, and on Facebook.  The time I now spend reading tweets is down…the time I spend reading Facebook updates is down slightly as well.  Blogging…well, the beauty of blogging is that unlike Facebook status updates or Twitter, I’m forced to really think about what I want to say or share.  It isn’t a 140 character update.  It is, for me, an outlet for writing, and if there’s someone who actually finds my writing engaging, that’s just simply a bonus.

So where am I going with this?

Quite simply, as I’ve observed interactions on Facebook and blogging in particular, I’ve noticed a couple of things:

1) We’ve created a sense of community in the blogosphere.  Whether it’s Will, or Randall, or AJ, or Dan, or Cindy, or Marcel, or Roy, or Donny – with the exception of Will (in my case), I’ve met you all online and know about you because of what you have written over these past few years.  In the case of Roy and Dan, blogging has led to real-life meetings.  In Donny’s case, we’ve spoken over the phone a few times.  With others, it’s been a mix of Facebook messages and emails – yet I feel like I’ve gotten to know all of you in some way because you share a lot of who you are through your writing.

2) With Facebook, I’m finding that as I have connected with old friends, whether elementary, high school or college, or even prior workplace associates, the sense of community that has formed is based on previous existing relationships.  Facebook has become a tool to enhance a previous offline relationship (ASIDE: isn’t it weird that we now must distinguish our relationships as “online” or “offline”?).  Facebook allows us to peer into the lives of all our friends, and I am finding that it jump starts many a conversation with our friends as we discuss a prior FB status update.

Is it “real” community?  I’m not convinced that FB is “real” community, but I do believe that it is a valuable tool to enhance existing relationships and to renew old relationships.  I’m convinced that FB is an efficient tool to connect us today.

So what’s this all mean for me and you?

Online social media will continue to become an important part of how we interact with each other.  As with any tool, it can be misused, and can become a replacement for real community if one isn’t careful.  But used correctly, it will serve to enhance the friendships and relationships we already have.

Get online.  Be social.

Looks like I had better enjoy my free weekends this summer.  Because when the fall rolls around, all my Saturdays are over.

Who am I?

A coach.

Not just a baseball coach now. You can also call me a soccer coach.

We took a call this evening from our local youth soccer organization, looking for volunteers to coach soccer…specifically for Under 12 girls.  They have 48 girls in that division, with no soccer coaches.

Well…now they have one.  And I’ll be coaching Margaret’s team

The thing about following the Spirit of God – sometimes the answer to the prayer that you were supposed to pray is already staring you in the face.  I was looking forward to having a relatively “free” Fall – no major commitments other than to my men’s small group and discipleship group.  I had backed away from taking on any major roles in the school PTO, so I had some time.  I knew eventually I’d fill it up with something…but soccer was nowhere on the radar.

Y’see, I haven’t played the game since about 6th grade and for P.E. in high school.  I don’t know all the rules, I don’t know strategy, other than what I’ve observed from Margaret’s coaches the last couple of years.  But I also know that while I think I’m not equipped, God knows that I am.  After all, I’ve coached baseball, so I know how to “coach” and motivate kids (most of the time).  I’ll be attending a coaching clinic in a few weeks, and I’ll make a point to read up on assorted soccer strategies and drills online as well.

No, I’m not concerned, because I knew it was something I was supposed to do. I didn’t think twice about accepting the challenge.

Indeed…who am I?

A coach who, come September, will have a brief coaching break in December before the next season of Little League begins in mid-January with tryouts and the draft.

Should be fun!

11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

Exodus 3:11 NIV

6 But who is able to build a temple for him, since the heavens, even the highest heavens, cannot contain him? Who then am I to build a temple for him, except as a place to burn sacrifices before him?

2 Chronicles 2:6 NIV

Indeed…who am I that God should use me? It’s the same question that both Moses and Solomon asked.

Lest you think that I have sunk into the depths of despair, fear not.  It’s just that there are times when I wonder why it is that God chooses to use me.

A couple of weeks ago I received an email from an editor at Bluefish TV -a firm that produces small group curriculum for churches and ministries.  She had found my blog via Google search, and inviting me to contribute an article or two for a relatively new website that her firm had developed called “The Small Group Exchange“.  This is a site where folks involved in small group ministry can share ideas, purchase resources, and gain insight on how to start and improve their small groups.

My first thought was, “Why me? Who am I that I should contribute to this site?”

I took a look at the website and the various contributors.  I was a bit nervous, given that many of the contributors are well known Christian authors and writers and pastors at large churches and ministries, with substantially more experience that I have had with small groups.  Who am I to contribute even two cents worth?

But thanks to the encouragement of my wife and my brothers in my small group, I decided to go for it and find out the next steps in becoming a contributing writer.   My editor emailed back some instructions and ideas, and encouraged me to contribute given that my focus in small groups are with men – an area of small group ministry lacking in resources on their site.

A day later I had my topic approved, with the article written and submitted shortly thereafter. Earlier today it was published on the site – you can find it here.

It’s a pretty humbling feeling, honestly.  Who am I that God should use me in this way?

I am a son of the Almighty. That’s reason enough.

I still remember the mocking that occurred as a sixth grader when I carried a guitar case to school for my weekly afterschool guitar lesson.  My dad had purchased, a few years prior, a Yamaha classical guitar.  He intended to learn how to play it, but never got around to it.  But when I expressed interest in taking lessons from one of the 4th grade teachers, my parents let me use it.

However, my friends were pretty un-enlightened in the ways of music lessons.  Most didn’t play a musical instrument, so when I (who was already taking piano lessons on Friday afternoons) came to school carrying a guitar, I was mocked, mainly because they thought I looked weird.  “Hey Andrew…what’s in there, a machine gun?”  Indeed, they were hardly original insults, but being an awkward, nerdy 6th grader, I was simply self-conscious of it.

The lessons themselves were not difficult – but I did have a tough time getting my hands around the fretboard, given the wider neck of the classical guitar and my relatively small hands.  I remembered learning some basic chords, and the very first song I learned was “Tom Dooley”.  I stuck with guitar for a mere few months, then didn’t pick it back up until several years later in college.  I re-taught myself the chords, and started to experiment with various fingerpicking.  I became decent enough to play in my fraternity’s Greek Week band, playing rhythm guitar on “Hotel California”.

In the years since I mess around on the guitar, but have never become particularly good.  I know the basic chords, know a couple of basic songs, can play a blues progression, but that’s about it.

Until…a few days ago I decided to take lessons for the first time since 6th grade.  My instructor deems me to be better than my own claims and has already challenged me to break some poorly learned techniques.

It will be good to get back into the habit of playing an instrument.

It will be good to have another outlet outside of writing.

It will be good just to play.

I’m enjoying this outlet.

I was 6 years old, just 3 months shy of my 7th birthday, and my family and I were on a vacation down the central California coast to check out Hearst Castle.  We were driving from our home in San Francisco in our 1969 Buick Skylark coupe, listening to the AM band, when the news came over the radio that Elvis had died.

The quintessential pop icon of my parents’ generation had gone.

Twenty years later, over Labor Day weekend, I was in Las Vegas with Will and a cast of other young twenty-something men for a bachelor party weekend.  We had piled into 2 cars that Saturday morning to tour Hoover Dam, and upon our return, after a dinner at a nearby In ‘N Out Burger joint, we got ready for a night of gaming at the Hard Rock Hotel.  Television tuned to CNN, we saw the breaking news…Princess Diana had been killed in an auto accident.

The princess who’d had the storybook royal wedding when I was 10 years old had gone.

Twelve years later, sitting in a cubicle high above downtown San Francisco, I learned that Farrah Fawcett, one of the blonde bombshells whose beauty marked my childhood and adolescence, passed on after a battle with cancer.

Jill Munroe, an original Angel, had gone.

And on that same day, sitting in that same cubicle high above downtown San Francisco, following the Twitter feed of a couple of friends, I learned that the King of Pop, Michael Jackson had died.

The “Thriller” will thrill no more.

Four pop icons, whose lives have left their mark on global pop culture, have passed within a 32 year span.  Who could forget the royal wedding in 1981?  Who could forget Jill, Sabrina, Kelly, and later Kris, in various syndicated repeats?  Who could forget the moonwalk, the lighted sidewalk in the Billie Jean video, the Eddie Van Halen solo in Beat It?

A large piece of my generation’s pop culture history passed today.

Farewell.

I admit it.

I watched it on Monday night.

In fact, it’s been a show that our family has watched, on and off, since it first aired.

My kids, in particular, have enjoyed watching the antics of the sextuplets as they’ve grown up from crawling babies to curious 5 year olds.  But now…all we feel for the sextuplets and their twin older sisters, is nothing but sadness.

For all the flaunting of their Christian faith in the early years of their reality show (they took a trip sans kids to speak to a large church in Fresno, and Kate’s book tour last year took her to a variety of churches across the country, nevermind that their book was published by a major Christian publisher and can be found in the Christian book section), the fact is that it appears, at least from the 30 minute episodes we’ve seen, that it wasn’t as large a part of their life as we’d been led to believe.  Admittedly, some of that is editing, of course, but the pattern of behavior that we’ve seen on the show between the two parents has not been healthy for a long time. On Monday night, Jon, the father, admitted as much when he shared that he had allowed his wife to boss him around while he reacted passively (although I would argue rather passive aggressively) and that he’d finally had enough.  There was truth in that statement, as we could see that pattern throughout the life of the show.  We saw a time when Kate flipped out when Jon dressed the kids in clothes other than what she set out (because they matched) rather than accept the fact that he got them dressed and out the door for a family outing (which is what would happen in most healthy marriages).  The level of criticism she has leveled at her husband, on screen, to his face, during those love seat interviews, probably wasn’t fair much of the time.  And he should have stepped up to work through those rather than accept them the way he did.

That said, he’s a coward.  For all the criticism that I can level at the wife, I reserve my harshest for him – because as a father and a husband, he is called to more.  If he truly believed in his vow of marriage, if he truly loved his wife the way he is supposed to, he would have stepped up – would “man up” – and be the Ephesians 5 husband that God has called all husbands to be.

25-28Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ’s love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They’re really doing themselves a favor—since they’re already “one” in marriage.

Ephesians 5:25-28 The Message

Unfortunately Jon’s actions in recent months, clubbing with another woman, is worse than anything that his wife might have done to him in the past. He should be loving his wife, faults and all, the way Jesus loves us – the sacrifical love, the love that brings the best out of us.  As a husband that’s what I want to do, to love my wife in such a way so as to bring the best out of her.  I don’t always succeed, but I’m not about to take the “easy” route and run away from the problem.  Besides, doesn’t it make sense that it would be easier for the wife to respect her husband when he is loving her the way that Jesus loves His church?

There is so much more that could be said, including the materialism that both parents seem to enjoy from the income from the show, but that’s a discussion for another day.  The sad truth is that eight more children will become victims of divorce, victims of two selfish parents, one of whom has a highly critical streak in her personality, and one who is unable to rise up to the challenge of becoming a real man…a man who should be loving sacrificially, the way Jesus loves us, the way that He commanded us to love.

“Hi there…we’d like to give you this gift card today as a simple way of showing that God loves you.”

With those few words on Saturday, a neighborhood in our coastal town was blessed as folks received Starbucks cards, Shell gas cards, Chevron gas cards, and gift cards to the local Dollar Tree store.  A few other folks received $2 bags of quarters for their wash at laundromats throughout our city.

Men from our Thursday morning small group, and a few others, met for breakfast at our local Denny’s on Saturday morning, as we typically do each week.  Over pancakes, bacon, sausage, eggs and coffee, we plotted out our strategy.  A couple of us brought our kids along, too, and around 10 am on Saturday, we simply showed God’s love to our community – a big deal to a couple of these guys, as it was their first time as servolutionaries.

What is a Servolution?

A Servolution is not an event; it is a culture. Infusing this culture into the DNA of your church will change the view of the world and your perspective of the needs of those around you. This movement is rumbling throughout the body of Christ – a revolutionary army of people ready to take up this mandate. We are actively pursuing the lost, the forgotten, and the poor to show them a God who is passionately in love with them. We stand ready with one heart, saying, “I will serve others and show them the hope they can have in Jesus.”

From Servolution.org

After completing our breakfasts, we headed out to the strip mall where the servolution was to take place. We met in front of Starbucks, passed out the cards to the members of our Servolution team, and prayed…for boldness in our actions, for lives to be touched, for seeds to be planted, for God to be present.

And present He was.  The cards for the dollar store ($5 each) were passed out quickly.  The Starbucks cards ($5) moved a little more slowly as we waited for additional foot traffic.  The gas cards, for the nearby Chevron station and Shell station, went more quickly – and at each station, customers who received the cards, especially those who were about to pay at the pump, were blown away at the gift of $25 towards their gas purchase.  In the case of one man to whom I handed a card, he grabbed me as I walked by after handing out a subsequent card, just to shake my hand and thank me as he intently read the business card we gave with the gas card…”This is our simple way of showing that God loves you…let us know if we can be of service.”

Two other men headed out to the laundromats around the city.  Armed with 30 bags of $2 in quarters, they actually had a difficult time finding people to give money to…not that folks weren’t accepting the money, but Saturday morning isn’t exactly “rush hour” at the local laundromats.  One of our gents shared that he only had one instance in which the money was rejected…it was a woman who told him that she owned the laundromat!

But she said she would take several bags of the quarters, and pass them onto her customers.  As he shared with us, “We didn’t pray for workers – but God gave us workers!”  He also still has 13 bags of quarters to hand out, and shared that he will be handing them out this week to unsuspecting customers at our local laundromats.

And finally, at original Starbucks location, when all the cards had been distributed, one of our guys went in to buy a mocha.  The worker at the counter said, “Hey…you’re one of them…one of the guys handing out the cards out front!”

“Yeah, I am…”

“Well, that’s a really cool thing that you guys did.  Are you with a church?”

“That’s right…we’re with New Life.”

“Awesome…what’ll you have?  It’s on me.”

My fellow brother got a free mocha simply because he had listened to Jesus’ call for service on Saturday.

All this is just the start to something more as we reach out to our community.  Ideas are forming as to what we’ll do next.  How can we reach the elderly in our community?  Who are the struggling families in our city and how can we help them?  Where can we find the single mothers?

How can we continue to love our neighbor and to show Jesus’ love for them in a practical way – and make it part of the DNA of our church community?

We took a few simple steps forward yesterday.  And we’re going to keep going.