Part of the Archer Fellows Program I’ll be doing in DC (starting next Tuesday the 5th!) is the classes that we take over the course of the semester. I’ll still be considered a full time student at UT and work a full-time internship with IJM. The Archer Fellows Program consists of 4 classes, one of which is technically my internship. We’ll have class two nights a week from professors that have worked in DC for many years, and then Dr. John Daly will fly in from UT-Austin three weekends over the course of the semester to teach our final class. I’ve had to do some pre-reading for my classes, and have given myself a “personal” reading list to supplement those as well. Here’s what I’ve been reading the last few weeks to prepare:
For my internship at International Justice Mission:
-“Good News About Injustice” by Gary Haugen, IJM founder
Advocacy in Applied Settings – Dr. John Daly
-“The Prince” by Machiavelli
-“Life’s a Campaign” by Chris Matthews
Beyond Congress and the White House – Dr. Joel Swerdlow
-“Being There” by Jerzy Kosinski
- watch “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”
Policy Making Process – Dr. Julie Donnelly
-Two articles: “Four Amendments & a Funeral” by Matt Taibbi and “What I Wish Political Scientists Would Teach about Congress” by Lee Hamilton
My “personal” reading list for DC:
- “The Reason for God” by Tim Keller
- “The Abolition of Man” by C.S. Lewis
-“Counterfit Gods” by Tim Keller
-“Bobos in Paradise” by David Books
- Most of the articles David Brooks cited in his “Sydney” awards
The books I had to read for class are all pretty interesting. I disagree with just about every premise from “The Prince,” as it is essentially the antithesis of Tim Keller’s “Counterfeit Gods.” I finally finished “Reason for God,” and really enjoyed it. If you can’t tell, I’m a big Keller fan, and going into an intense intellectual environment for the next few years (DC and then TFA), it was refreshing to hear such a strong academic engagement about faith. I haven’t finished “The Abolition of Man,” but chose it because it’s meant to argue for the importance and relevance of universal values in contemporary society. My time in Quincy has been a perfect break to be able to accomplish all of this, as Middle America doesn’t provide many physical “distractions” to waste my time on. I’m really looking forward to pulling in some of my personal readings into our class discussions over the required readings, I think they compliment (probably more like counteract) popular thought well. The nerd in me is giddy to start discussing these issues with my peers, who also happen to be my housemates for the next five months.
If you have any suggestions for readings that might compliment these, feel free to shoot them my way!
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Lessons in Leaving Part II: Coming Full Circle
My last semester in Austin was by far the best one. It was a season of rest, a season of healing, a season of celebration, and all around a season of delight for me. Most of all, it was a season to come full circle.
I say full circle because I had a lot to learn in my short time in Austin over the last four years. I came into UT with one foot in the world, and one foot trying to figure out this “faith” thing. My freshmen year is nothing short of a bad reality TV show for me to look back on, as I think most of ours tend to be. Then there was the spring semester where my world got rocked by Jesus, the book of Acts, and Shane Claiborne. Sophomore year was definitely my “feisty” phase, where I felt like I had brought back to Austin some spiritual golden ticket. I laugh when I look back on that time, how blunt I was in trying to talk to anyone who would listen to me about this idea of putting college students in East Austin. I laugh because I don’t like being that forthcoming about anything, but somehow I was talking off anyone’s ear that would lend it to me. What I had in that time, and for pretty much the next two years, was a lot of passion, vigor, and fight…but not a foundation. I always tell people I’m not sure how I got hired by the Austin Stone my sophomore year because I still didn’t like “mega” churches at the time, nor did I ever care to pick up a theology book. I was just flat out immature, and thought because I knew all the newest Christian lingo, I never really needed the gospel.
See that’s where this circle started coming around, but it was rough in the middle. I put way too much on my plate for two years. I wouldn’t let anyone help me for two years. I wanted to do things my way for two years. I only took seriously the parts of scripture that I wanted to hear. And yet God still granted me worthy to save me from myself. One night at an intern dinner this past fall, Stew made this statement about our time as interns that pretty much summed up my sanctification over the last two years. He said that the way God molds leaders at our age is never a matter of what he does through us, that is rare, and it will take 10-15 years before most of us get to see much fruit in ministry. But what He does do in this time, and what is most important, is what He does IN us. God is a carpenter, and rather than see us for the big block of wood that we are in the stupidity of our youth and flesh, he sees us exactly the way he made us. And to get to that piece of perfection, he just starts hammering away, sanding down our rough edges and stripping away everything that is keeping us from being the way he intended for us to be. Last spring was complete hell for me. I was absolutely miserable in just about every area of my life. And God brought me physically down with a medical condition all semester just to show me how much he cared about me. It may sound silly, but I truly believe that entire ordeal, going to a doctor everyday for three months, was purely a physical manifestation of my spiritual condition. I was bitter, I was frustrated, I was angry…and I was finding every outlet, person, and thing to attribute those feelings to. Everything but my own flesh, which was where the problem lay.
God healed me of that illness right before I left to study abroad in Ghana. He did it by opening up the wound in my body all the way, so that all the fluid building up would come out whole…”my sin not in part, but in whole.” I went to Ghana for four weeks, fell in love with Jesus all over again, and then spent two weeks traveling around Europe by myself (who ever let me do that?!?) to just enjoy Jesus. I came back to Austin as myself, and everyone around me noticed. It carried into this fall as I got to spend a semester truly enjoying the gospel, enjoying community, enjoying my time at Stone, enjoying the simplicities in life. All of the frustrations I had vented about for most of college seemed to just dissipate this semester. The things that felt like thorns in my side became small joys to me. I learned that compassion is not reserved for the “least of these,” it is meant for everyone, rich and poor, young and old, seen and unseen. I learned I pass judgment on a lot of people, and none of it is holy. I learned that rest is not laziness, it is a gracious gift from the Lord. I learned that busyness just another form of materialism. I learned that sometimes, you just have to turn on Beyonce and dance in the living room with your roommates…
Most of all in this season, I learned how the gospel is what brings things full circle. The passion and fight I had when I was a reckless 19-year old trying to “change the world” is still very much alive in me. But I realize that the end I was seeking the entire time was not a radical lifestyle, it was the gospel, and that is about as radical as it gets in this world. What I learned in coming full circle is what C.S. Lewis calls the “intolerable compliment” that
“We are bidden to "put on Christ," to become like God. That is, whether we like it or not, God intends to give us what we need, not what we now think we want. Once more, we are embarrassed by the intolerable compliment, by too much love, not too little.”
I cannot express the gratitude I have in my heart for this last semester in Austin. Why God allowed me to heal wounds only I had made for myself, I can only describe as a love for his daughter that is too much for me to understand.
I say full circle because I had a lot to learn in my short time in Austin over the last four years. I came into UT with one foot in the world, and one foot trying to figure out this “faith” thing. My freshmen year is nothing short of a bad reality TV show for me to look back on, as I think most of ours tend to be. Then there was the spring semester where my world got rocked by Jesus, the book of Acts, and Shane Claiborne. Sophomore year was definitely my “feisty” phase, where I felt like I had brought back to Austin some spiritual golden ticket. I laugh when I look back on that time, how blunt I was in trying to talk to anyone who would listen to me about this idea of putting college students in East Austin. I laugh because I don’t like being that forthcoming about anything, but somehow I was talking off anyone’s ear that would lend it to me. What I had in that time, and for pretty much the next two years, was a lot of passion, vigor, and fight…but not a foundation. I always tell people I’m not sure how I got hired by the Austin Stone my sophomore year because I still didn’t like “mega” churches at the time, nor did I ever care to pick up a theology book. I was just flat out immature, and thought because I knew all the newest Christian lingo, I never really needed the gospel.
See that’s where this circle started coming around, but it was rough in the middle. I put way too much on my plate for two years. I wouldn’t let anyone help me for two years. I wanted to do things my way for two years. I only took seriously the parts of scripture that I wanted to hear. And yet God still granted me worthy to save me from myself. One night at an intern dinner this past fall, Stew made this statement about our time as interns that pretty much summed up my sanctification over the last two years. He said that the way God molds leaders at our age is never a matter of what he does through us, that is rare, and it will take 10-15 years before most of us get to see much fruit in ministry. But what He does do in this time, and what is most important, is what He does IN us. God is a carpenter, and rather than see us for the big block of wood that we are in the stupidity of our youth and flesh, he sees us exactly the way he made us. And to get to that piece of perfection, he just starts hammering away, sanding down our rough edges and stripping away everything that is keeping us from being the way he intended for us to be. Last spring was complete hell for me. I was absolutely miserable in just about every area of my life. And God brought me physically down with a medical condition all semester just to show me how much he cared about me. It may sound silly, but I truly believe that entire ordeal, going to a doctor everyday for three months, was purely a physical manifestation of my spiritual condition. I was bitter, I was frustrated, I was angry…and I was finding every outlet, person, and thing to attribute those feelings to. Everything but my own flesh, which was where the problem lay.
God healed me of that illness right before I left to study abroad in Ghana. He did it by opening up the wound in my body all the way, so that all the fluid building up would come out whole…”my sin not in part, but in whole.” I went to Ghana for four weeks, fell in love with Jesus all over again, and then spent two weeks traveling around Europe by myself (who ever let me do that?!?) to just enjoy Jesus. I came back to Austin as myself, and everyone around me noticed. It carried into this fall as I got to spend a semester truly enjoying the gospel, enjoying community, enjoying my time at Stone, enjoying the simplicities in life. All of the frustrations I had vented about for most of college seemed to just dissipate this semester. The things that felt like thorns in my side became small joys to me. I learned that compassion is not reserved for the “least of these,” it is meant for everyone, rich and poor, young and old, seen and unseen. I learned I pass judgment on a lot of people, and none of it is holy. I learned that rest is not laziness, it is a gracious gift from the Lord. I learned that busyness just another form of materialism. I learned that sometimes, you just have to turn on Beyonce and dance in the living room with your roommates…
Most of all in this season, I learned how the gospel is what brings things full circle. The passion and fight I had when I was a reckless 19-year old trying to “change the world” is still very much alive in me. But I realize that the end I was seeking the entire time was not a radical lifestyle, it was the gospel, and that is about as radical as it gets in this world. What I learned in coming full circle is what C.S. Lewis calls the “intolerable compliment” that
“We are bidden to "put on Christ," to become like God. That is, whether we like it or not, God intends to give us what we need, not what we now think we want. Once more, we are embarrassed by the intolerable compliment, by too much love, not too little.”
I cannot express the gratitude I have in my heart for this last semester in Austin. Why God allowed me to heal wounds only I had made for myself, I can only describe as a love for his daughter that is too much for me to understand.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Lessons in Leaving Part I: The Places I'll Miss Most
It’s officially happened, I can no longer call Austin, TX “home.” This past Saturday my parents packed me up and moved me up to their house in Quincy, IL for the next three weeks. I’ll fly to Washington, DC on January 5th, but until then I’m stuck in the epitome of “Middle America.” The final week in Austin was bittersweet; actually, the entire fall semester was bittersweet. It was a week filled with many memories, laughs, good food, good friends, and goodbyes. By the time my going away party at the Stewart’s came on Friday night, I was almost too exhausted from having to say “goodbye” all week. The night was beautiful though, and I'll go into more detail on that in another post.
Although I may never be able to call Austin my physical “home” again, it will forever be where my “family” resides. I’ve lived a lot of places in my life, moving throughout the Midwest my entire childhood, but no place has treated me quite like Austin, TX. Here are a few parts of the city I will miss most:
-Driving down I-35 (as long as there isn’t any traffic!) and seeing the skyline, particularly the UT Tower
-Hearing ice cream trucks drive by my house in St. John’s late at night, and even in cold weather
-Running at Town Lake
-Hyde Park eateries (particularly Quack’s Bakery and Dolce Vita)
-Whole Foods
-The UT campus
-“Treasure hunting” at all the Goodwills around town
-Half Price Books
-The Gingerman (more for the people I shared a drink with there)
There are, of course, many people I will miss way more than these landmarks. But that is for another entry. If you’re reading this and still in Austin, please enjoy a few of these places for me. I know I’ll find my favorite spots in DC, and even Mississippi, but for now, these are the places I’ll daydream about when I want to feel “home” again…
Although I may never be able to call Austin my physical “home” again, it will forever be where my “family” resides. I’ve lived a lot of places in my life, moving throughout the Midwest my entire childhood, but no place has treated me quite like Austin, TX. Here are a few parts of the city I will miss most:
-Driving down I-35 (as long as there isn’t any traffic!) and seeing the skyline, particularly the UT Tower
-Hearing ice cream trucks drive by my house in St. John’s late at night, and even in cold weather
-Running at Town Lake
-Hyde Park eateries (particularly Quack’s Bakery and Dolce Vita)
-Whole Foods
-The UT campus
-“Treasure hunting” at all the Goodwills around town
-Half Price Books
-The Gingerman (more for the people I shared a drink with there)
There are, of course, many people I will miss way more than these landmarks. But that is for another entry. If you’re reading this and still in Austin, please enjoy a few of these places for me. I know I’ll find my favorite spots in DC, and even Mississippi, but for now, these are the places I’ll daydream about when I want to feel “home” again…
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Provision for my Sudanese Brother
*As you read this, please prayerfully consider providing for this request on behalf of my Sudanese brother Joshua
The day after Thanksgiving, I received an urgent email from my Colleen who is serving as a missionary in Nagishot. William and Eunice's son Joshua, who lives with them on the compound and suffers from Epilepsy and Schizophrenic episodes, had an accident the day after Thanksgiving and accidentally drank battery acid that was lying around the compound. He immediately threw it up, burning this mouth and throat. Eunice treated him immediately, having him drink lots of milk, water, and eggs throughout the day. You can assume how dangerous this is, and as Joshua began to urinate the acid out, it literally burned holes through his underwear and pants.
As Colleen corresponded with a doctor in the states about the incident, he told her to seek serious medical attention for Joshua as soon as possible, seeing as his chance of surviving this in the states would be low, much less in a remote African village. For weeks we have prayed for sweet Joshua, and the Lord has provided along the way. I can now report that Joshua is recovering at a hospital in Kampala, surrounded by his family and in good hands medically. We are still waiting to hear back from the test results that will determine what long term damage Joshua has suffered from this. We at least know from an X-Ray that there appears to be a hole in his stomach from the acid.
Many have joined us in prayer for Joshua, William, Eunice, and their entire family. Joshua brings a smile to my face every time I think of him. Since the first time I met him he has reminded me of Boo Radley from "To Kill a Mockingbird," my favorite book. He is a gentle giant, and a gift from God. His spirit is so in tuned with that land, and William and Eunice believe this is why God has chosen to use his illnesses in the way he has, because it brings much reliance on HIM and glory to HIS name. The Laku's are relying on God's provision again in this, as they wonder how they will cover the medical expenses. The Laku's are missionaries in Nagishot. Even though they are both Sudanese, they gave up wealth and much prosperity to answer God's call to the Didinga, an unreached people group. I am so passionate that it is in these times when we are HONORED and PRIVILEGED to serve such heroes of the faith with our finances. Truly, truly, I know no two people in this world whom I believe in the mission of God more because of the example they set. Below is information on how you can donate to Joshua's medical fund. Every little bit counts. Even giving up the price of a Starbuck's for today would help tremendously. Even though I don't know the total needed yet to cover the costs, I can at least tell you that the plane ride out of Nagishot was $1200, and this needs to be covered ASAP. Please join me in providing for our family in Christ:
For online giving:
https://my.efca.org/NetCommunity/SSLPage.aspx?pid=359
Designation: Sudan Field Ministries #22059-011
Tribute information: NAME: Joshua Laku; DESCRIPTION: Medical fund for Joshua Laku
To mail a check:
Make checks out to EFCA Reach Global
Please put project # 22059-011 in the memo line
Mail to:
EFCA Reach Global
901 East 78th St.
Minneapolis, MN 55420
The day after Thanksgiving, I received an urgent email from my Colleen who is serving as a missionary in Nagishot. William and Eunice's son Joshua, who lives with them on the compound and suffers from Epilepsy and Schizophrenic episodes, had an accident the day after Thanksgiving and accidentally drank battery acid that was lying around the compound. He immediately threw it up, burning this mouth and throat. Eunice treated him immediately, having him drink lots of milk, water, and eggs throughout the day. You can assume how dangerous this is, and as Joshua began to urinate the acid out, it literally burned holes through his underwear and pants.
As Colleen corresponded with a doctor in the states about the incident, he told her to seek serious medical attention for Joshua as soon as possible, seeing as his chance of surviving this in the states would be low, much less in a remote African village. For weeks we have prayed for sweet Joshua, and the Lord has provided along the way. I can now report that Joshua is recovering at a hospital in Kampala, surrounded by his family and in good hands medically. We are still waiting to hear back from the test results that will determine what long term damage Joshua has suffered from this. We at least know from an X-Ray that there appears to be a hole in his stomach from the acid.
Many have joined us in prayer for Joshua, William, Eunice, and their entire family. Joshua brings a smile to my face every time I think of him. Since the first time I met him he has reminded me of Boo Radley from "To Kill a Mockingbird," my favorite book. He is a gentle giant, and a gift from God. His spirit is so in tuned with that land, and William and Eunice believe this is why God has chosen to use his illnesses in the way he has, because it brings much reliance on HIM and glory to HIS name. The Laku's are relying on God's provision again in this, as they wonder how they will cover the medical expenses. The Laku's are missionaries in Nagishot. Even though they are both Sudanese, they gave up wealth and much prosperity to answer God's call to the Didinga, an unreached people group. I am so passionate that it is in these times when we are HONORED and PRIVILEGED to serve such heroes of the faith with our finances. Truly, truly, I know no two people in this world whom I believe in the mission of God more because of the example they set. Below is information on how you can donate to Joshua's medical fund. Every little bit counts. Even giving up the price of a Starbuck's for today would help tremendously. Even though I don't know the total needed yet to cover the costs, I can at least tell you that the plane ride out of Nagishot was $1200, and this needs to be covered ASAP. Please join me in providing for our family in Christ:
For online giving:
https://my.efca.org/NetCommunity/SSLPage.aspx?pid=359
Designation: Sudan Field Ministries #22059-011
Tribute information: NAME: Joshua Laku; DESCRIPTION: Medical fund for Joshua Laku
To mail a check:
Make checks out to EFCA Reach Global
Please put project # 22059-011 in the memo line
Mail to:
EFCA Reach Global
901 East 78th St.
Minneapolis, MN 55420
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