like a tree

I was so moved and humbled by these words of a much-missed friend's email today. It's pure God-centred gutsiness I tell you:

"maybe God is hindering things from happening because it's not the
most glorifying to Him... maybe He has greater miracles in store...or
maybe this is just something He wants us to go through with no
apparent redeeming qualities."

The honest, earnest faith of this family in the midst of an overseas relocation and bewildering circumstances makes me so proud to be called their friends, and so aware of our dependence on God's grace and mercy for them.

They are helping us understand what it means to be like this:

"But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose confidence is in him.

He will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit."
~Jeremiah 17:7-8

spring valentine

For you who are still waiting for spring--The Brooklyn Botanic Garden

(Know that it took patience and persistence to get that cherry blossom photo without mobs of umbrella-toting, trigger-happy Asians crowding out the view!)

going on 30

I thought I would have a lot figured out by the time I turned 30. 30 is about a month away from now, and let’s just say, there are many things still not figured out.

In my 20s I did quite a bit of angsting over the usual: what will I be when I grow up? Will I ever find that special (non-Chinese) guy who likes the same things I do? How can I help save the world? Cue the Michael W. Smith.

Well, I still don’t know what I’ll be when I grow up, and as you know, I did in fact, marry a Chinese guy. Which goes to show, who of us really knows anything about what we want? Which I admit, means that my current “Do we have to have children?” attitude is also subject to change. This is very scary to me right now. As for the saving of the world, yes—I’d still like to know how I can help.

I can’t tell you how many thirty-something women have told me that their 30s have been SO much better than their 20s. In my mid-20s, I smiled at these women pleasantly and assumed they all had a case of the sour-grapes. But with 30 just around the corner, and with some long-standing ambitions, hopes and plans still waiting--—I’m casting my lot in with these women after all. The best is yet to come!

Jin said today that maybe the idea of 30 being a big milestone in life is just a cultural construct. Maybe. But it still feels like kind of a big deal.

Here’s the deal: I will not draw up a 5 or 10-year plan. I can barely see 5 months into the future. But I’ll keep trying to do this, which I have been (in fits and starts) aiming for since I was 14:

“Let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:16

And then I need to move away from being mostly talk to mostly action on this:

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” James 1:27

And as we make more money, or at least have the potential to in this brave new decade, we need to not forget this:

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” Matthew 6:19-20

And finally, as often as I can remember:
"Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him." Psalm 34:8

cellphones save the world?

When I borrowed Ruth's Nokia for the Uganda trip--I remember thanking God there was a flashlight built into it during all the blackouts.

Here is a guy who roams the world trying to learn what would make a cellphone better. I covet most parts of his job. Here's a sample of what I'm talking about:

"Jan Chipchase and his user-research colleagues at Nokia can rattle off example upon example of the cellphone’s ability to increase people’s productivity and well-being, mostly because of the simple fact that they can be reached.

There’s the live-in housekeeper in China who was more or less an indentured servant until she got a cellphone so that new customers could call and book her services. Or the porter who spent his days hanging around outside of department stores and construction sites hoping to be hired to carry other people’s loads but now, with a cellphone, can go only where the jobs are.

Having a call-back number, Chipchase likes to say, is having a fixed identity point, which, inside of populations that are constantly on the move — displaced by war, floods, drought or faltering economies — can be immensely valuable both as a means of keeping in touch with home communities and as a business tool. Over several years, his research team has spoken to rickshaw drivers, prostitutes, shopkeepers, day laborers and farmers, and all of them say more or less the same thing: their income gets a big boost when they have access to a cellphone."

It's long. But very interesting. Read the article Can Cellphones Help End Global Poverty?

Art

Pardon one more Redeemer plug: April is Arts Month and I'm looking forward to my own version of Arts Month--

Irving Penn's Portraits at the Morgan Museum (Picasso below)





















The Whitney Biennial













And the film, "The Flight of the Red Balloon" at The Paris Theater















Something worth pondering for all the aspiring artists out there:

"As believers making art to the glory of God, goodness is not merely something to strive for in our morality, but is also something we should attempt to communicate through our aesthetic efforts.

Portraying "good" well, however is excruciatingly difficult. The efforts of most artists who attempt to present a picture of "good" tend toward dishonest, sugary sweet propaganda. They ignore the implications of the Fall and paint the world as a shiny, happy place. Usually "goodness" or "good" is ignored in favoring of pursuing negative themes or motifs.

...followers of Christ who labor in the arts must take up the subject of "good" or "goodness" to the glory of God. They need to struggle to understand it and to present it in such a way that a world--forgetful of true goodness since the Fall can be taught what the word means, and so be led to the only good One. This is a unique opportunity."

~Ned Bustard, "It was Good--Making Art to the Glory of God"

i love ny

I've been working on Redeemer's Summer Mini-Courses, and while the logistics sometimes border on being a pain in the butt, it's a pretty fun job overall.

This year, we'll be offering over 40 classes (up from 30 ish last year!) ranging from Investing 101 to Wagner's Ring Cycle to Summer Cocktails, to North Korea's Humanitarian Needs, Swing Dancing, Healthy Cooking, The Economics of Yankees Baseball and of course--singleness and relationships.

It's working on projects like these that make me really love New York and Redeemer.

There is just so much talent, passion and energy around. As my partner in crime WK and I get ready for these--we'll get to work with personal chefs, published writers, Saks' buyers, dance instructors, World Vision staff, Opera experts, and the list goes on and on.

If you're in NYC this summer--be sure to check out Redeemer Summer (which currently lists the offerings for 2007).

safari in tanzania

Wish I could have been there!