Favorite Books I Read in 2014

Like last year, I'm somewhat disappointed with the amount of books I was able to get to this year. My pile of "can't wait to read" seems to get higher with each passing year. However, out of the ten books I got around to reading, I thought eight were good enough to mention on this list of my favorites. Hopefully that means I'm getting more efficient.

As is normally the case for my end of the year book list, the books below were all written before this year began. I rarely read current books as I feel that there are centuries of books yet to be explored. So here are my favorite books I read this year:

1. Common Ground by Gordon Bals (2012)

This is hands down the best marriage book I've ever read. When Lauren and I were in a difficult place in our marriage a couple of months into marriage, a counselor friend of mine recommended that we read this book. Time and time again, it proved to be so incredibly helpful as it laid out exactly what we were going through. In the book, Bals lays out a lot of wisdom about the lies we are tempted to believe, the unique struggles we face in the roles of husband and wife, and the unique ways we are called to love one another. I cannot recommend this book highly enough, to those of you are married, facing difficulty in relating to one another, but even to those who aren't.

Quote: "God burdened Adam with futility to frustrate his desire to have impact...He burdened Eve with disappointment in relationships to frustrate her desire to be connected...The burden of Genesis makes clear that the marriage relationship will be more vexing for the wife…The marital relationship is easier for the husband than it is for the wife...Marriage is more tenuous for a wife because she longs for more in marriage than her husband does, and she is wounded more deeply by marital pain.”

2. Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry (2001)

This is my fourth Berry book and my second that is written about the fictional town of Port William, a town loosely based on where Berry has lived for the past fifty years. This one is about the man who would become the barber of Port William. I love the way Berry writes and how he draws you in to the beauty of the rural life, a simple life centered around farming and community. It's hard to read this book and not want to give up on the hustle and bustle of our technology-saturated lives, to be immersed in a more restful existence, where "getting ahead" is rarely considered and where thoughts and experiences are real and important even though they aren't shared with the world.

Quote: "He was lonely because he could imagine himself as anything but himself and as anywhere but where he was. His competitiveness and self-centeredness cut him off from any thought of shared life. He wanted to have more because he thought that having more would make him able to live more, and he was lonely because he never thought of the sources, the places, where he was going to get what he wanted to have, or of what his having it might cost others."

3. Desire by John Eldredge (2007)

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed and resonated with what was in this book. Eldredge's main point is that we are generally scared to listen to and live out of our deep desires. It's easier to distract ourselves than to feel and be let down. However, desire is a key part of the Christian life as it humbles us and causes us to admit how desperate our situation really is.

Quote: “There is a secret within each of our hearts. It often goes unnoticed, we rarely can put words to it, and yet it guides us throughout the days of our lives. This secret remains hidden for the most part in our deepest selves. It is the desire for life as it was meant to be...The greatest human tragedy is to give up the search."

4. Men of Courage by Larry Crabb (2013)

This is an updated and expanded edition of Crabb's, The Silence of Adam, which I had never read. It's a great book for understanding the struggles men face and what our calling is. On one of the hardest nights my wife and I faced this year, as we struggled to believe truth two months into our marriage, I remember reading the quote below out loud with tears in my eyes. It nailed me and my desire to run away from conflict. Although, I'm sure I felt some shame in that moment, the tears seemed to come more from a place of hope, a hope that God had indeed called me to more and promised to give me strength to become more.

Quote: "Since Adam, every man has had a natural inclination to remain silent when he should speak. A man is most comfortable in situations in which he knows exactly what to do. When things get confusing and scary, his insides tighten and he backs away. When life frustrates him with its maddening unpredictability, he feels the anger rise within him. And then filled with terror and rage, he forgets God’s truth and looks out for himself. From then on, everything goes wrong. Committed only to himself, he scrambles to make his own life work.”

5. David & Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell (2013)

An interesting read from a great writer. Gladwell's basic premise is that weaknesses and disadvantages often create better situations than first imagined. He illustrates this through nine different stories that are intriguing and entertaining.

Quote: "There is a set of advantages that have to do with material resources, and there is a set that have to do with the absence of material resources - and the reason underdogs win as often as they do is that the latter is sometimes every bit the equal of the former.” 

6. Moby Dick by Herman Melville (1851)

In my quest for reading more and more classics, I knew I eventually needed to tackle this one. It was difficult at times, as I would sometimes grow tired of learning about the intricate details of the whale's anatomy, but overall, it was an interesting story, full of fascinating sentences like the quote below.

Quote: "All that most maddens and torments; all that stirs up the lees of things; all truth with malice in it; all that cracks the sinews and cakes the brain; all the subtle demonisms of life and thought; all evil, to crazy Ahab, were visibly personified, and made practically assailable in Moby Dick. He piled upon the whale's white hump the sum of all the general rage and hate felt by his whole race from Adam down; and then, as if his chest had been a mortar, he burst his hot heart's shell upon it."

7. The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective by Richard Rohr (2001)


I picked up this book in the summer of 2013 when I began to become interested in this model of personality based on nine types called the Enneagram. The book gives some history to personality models in general and some history to the Enneagram specifically. The bulk of the book is a break down of each of the nine personality types (1-9). One of the reasons I enjoyed this book and profited from learning more about my type (which is 9), is that I so identified with my type, and Rohr's description gave voice to the unique ways I struggle in life. It helped me know that I am not alone in those unique struggles and that there are unique ways that God is calling me to persevere and mature in light of those struggles.

Quote: "The Enneagram is more about 'unbelieving' the disguise that we all are. Ernest Becker called it 'our vital lie.' Merton called it the false self. The Enneagram gets right to the point and calls it our sin."

8. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard (2007)

This book is a nonfiction account of Dillard's year of retreat in Virginia's Roanoke Valley. I wonder if it would have been higher on the list if I had read it outdoors during the day, instead of in small 20 minutes chunks right before I went to bed. So much of her writing is beautiful and poetic. She spends a lot of time observing nature at a particular creek, and she often describes in detail what she is learning.


Quote: "I remember what the city has to offer: human companionship, major-league baseball, and a clatter of quickening stimulus like a rush from strong drugs that leaves you drained. I remember how you bide your time in the city, and think, if you stop to think, 'next year…I’ll start living; next year…I’ll start my life.' Innocence is a better world."

Nouwen on solitude, community, and ministry

A friend of mine recently suggested that I read an article by Henri Nouwen entitled, "Moving from Solitude to Community to Ministry". I'm glad she did. In the article, Nouwen is arguing that there are three major disciplines for the faithful disciple of Christ. As the title suggests, he believes that solitude, community, and ministry are those three disciplines and that they only work by starting with solitude and working up progressively. He sees Luke 6:12-19 as a prime example for this idea. In this passage Jesus spends the whole night in prayer, then calls the disciples, and then cures people of unclean spirits and disease.

Solitude is foundational to the other three disciplines because it is only here that we can dwell on how God views us. He says:

Why is it so important that you are with God and God alone on the mountain top? It’s important because it’s the place in which you can listen to the voice of the One who calls you the beloved. To pray is to listen to the One who calls you “my beloved daughter,” “my beloved son,” “my beloved child.” To pray is to let that voice speak to the center of your being, to your guts, and let that voice resound in your whole being.

He goes on to say that if we are not hearing this voice then we cannot walk freely in this world. Without hearing this voice, success and failures will equally wreck us because our identity will be tied up in those things. We will constantly be seeking affirmation and praise from others if we are not listening to God's voice and claiming our belovedness.

Community then is something that flows from solitude. But it is not because we are lonely. He explains:

...community is not loneliness grabbing onto loneliness: “I’m so lonely, and you’re so lonely.” It’s solitude grabbing onto solitude: “I am the beloved; you are the beloved; together we can build a home.”

He also talks about how forgiveness and celebration are two key components of community. Forgiveness is acknowledging that other people cannot love you perfectly. Forgiveness is allowing another person not to be God. If you can forgive others and stop demanding from them something that only God can give, then you can learn to celebrate that person's gifts.

Ministry comes after you know you are beloved and continue to forgive and celebrate one another. Nouwen says that part of our ministry is to help others let go of resentment, to discover that in the middle of your tears, "that's where the dance starts and joy is first felt." He continues:

Jesus says, “Cry over your pains, and you will discover that I’m right there in your tears, and you will be grateful for my presence in your weakness.” Ministry means to help people become grateful for life even with pain. That gratitude can send you into the world precisely to the places where people are in pain. The minister, the disciple of Jesus, goes where there is pain not because he is a masochist or she is a sadist, but because God is hidden in the pain.

When talking about ministry, many of us talk of the desire to see fruit. Nouwen reminds us that, "the fruits of your life are born often in your pain and in your vulnerability and in your losses. The fruits of your life come only after the plow has carved through your land."

I resonated with this article because I often shortcut this process. I desire to help people grow in the understanding of God's love for them in Christ, but I often do it out of a place where I am not resting that love myself. Because of that, I can use people and demand that they give me the love that I need. From there, I find myself unwilling to enter people's pain because it seems too heavy and messy.

I want to be the type of man who like Mary, sits at Jesus' feet often, who then can forgive others quickly, celebrate who they are, and move towards bearing one another's burdens and pointing to the One who bore ours.

I share, therefore I am: how technology is making us more lonely

"Connected, but alone?" was a TED talk given by Sherry Turkle last February. It's an excellent look at the ways in which we are isolating ourselves in and through technology. We have a desire to connect more with people, but the ways in which we are connecting are actually making us more lonely. Check it out:



And here are some of her quotes:

"We're getting used to a new way of being alone together. People want to be with each other, but also elsewhere, connected to all the different places they want to be. People want to customize their lives."

"We can end up hiding from each other even as we are all connected to each other." 

"Human relationships are rich, and they're messy, and they're demanding, and we clean them up with technology. And when we do, one of the things that we do is that we sacrifice conversation for mere connection." 

"We use conversations with each other to learn how to have conversations with ourselves, so a flight from conversation can really matter because it can compromise our capacity for self-reflection." 

"People get so used to being short-changed out of real conversation, so used to getting by with less, that they become almost willing to dispense with people all together." 

"That feeling that no one is listening to me is very important in our relationships with technology. That's why it's so appealing to have a Facebook page or a Twitter feed: so many automatic listeners. And the feeling that no one is listening to me makes us want to spend time with machines that seem to care about us." 

"Technology appeals to us most, where we are most vulnerable. And we are vulnerable. We're lonely, but we're afraid of intimacy." 

"We are designing technologies that will give us the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship." 

"I share, therefore I am." 

"You end up isolated if you don't cultivate the capacity for solitude. The ability to be separate, to gather yourself. Solitude is where you find yourself and where you can reach out to other people and form real attachments. When we don't have the capacity for solitude, we turn to other people in order to feel less anxious or in order to feel alive. When this happens, we're not able to appreciate who they are, it's as though we are using them as spare parts to support our fragile sense of self. We slip into thinking that always being connected is going to make us feel less alone. But we're at risk, because actually it's the opposite that's true. If we're not able to be alone, we're going to be more lonely."

True freedom vs. the freedom of affluence

Our present idea of freedom is only the freedom to do as we please: to sell ourselves for a high salary, a home in the suburbs, and idle weekend. But that is a freedom dependent upon affluence, which is in turn dependent upon the rapid consumption of exhaustible supplies. The other kind of freedom is the freedom to take care of ourselves and of each other. The freedom of affluence opposes and contradicts the freedom of community life.”

Wendell Berry, The Hidden Wound, pg. 135

Getting Settled

I don't do many personal updates on this blog (even though many have lovingly suggested that I do), so I thought now is as good a time as any to do that since I just moved across the country. Just over two weeks ago, I made the drive across the country from Atlanta to Pasadena. Here are some highlights of what has happened since then:

The drive took about thirty hours, spread out over three days. I really loved the experience and enjoyed all the different scenery. I think Arizona might have been my favorite. This picture is either from New Mexico or Arizona, not really sure.
Here are a couple of pics of what Brittany made for me in her apartment. It sure was good to see her!
Here is what my apartment looks like (before I bought any furniture). This is looking from my door, through the kitchen, into the living room. My bedroom is above the kitchen and is accessed by the stairs on the left.
Looking the opposite direction
Here's the living room with furniture. By the way, I packed my car up with some basic things, but the majority of my stuff has still not made it. They were originally supposed to deliver it between March 14 and 18. As of today the window is March 30 thru April 3. Seriously, don't use US-1 Van Lines.
The view from my living room. Part of Fuller's campus can be seen on the left.
Oh yeah, Brittany and I met my family in Breckenridge to do a little skiing last weekend.

Classes started today and I'm excited to be taking courses on the Pentateuch, Church History, and Christology/Pneumatology/Soteriology. Thanks to all of you who have been praying for me and keeping in touch. Though I am enjoying it here, I've been realizing more and more what a great community I left behind. Those of you in that community, you are greatly missed.

Looking at The Social Network

I saw The Social Network early last week. It is definitely worth seeing, both for the fast paced, intriguing plot line as well as for the deeper messages being conveyed. I won't ruin anything, but it's amazing to watch how utterly inept Facebook's founder Mark Zuckerburg is at connecting with real people. He is so consumed with being part of exclusive groups and being successful that he is unable to make and keep real friends.

There is so much in the film that should cause us all to reflect on the ways we engage in community today. With the world of Facebook and social media only growing stronger, we ought to be considering how to keep fostering face to face interactions with our friends, as opposed to merely scanning statuses and pictures with an occasional note or comment.

I like the way Brett McCracken said it in the conclusion of his recent review of the film. He basically gives a summary of why Facebook is so dominant:

In this new age, punk geniuses like Mark Zuckerberg come out on top because they’ve learned how to use technology to break down the previously impenetrable boundaries of class and power. They’ve learned how to take the aristocrat’s most prized possession–networking, exclusive connections–and make it an accessible, populist pastime for the masses. Facebook is a revolution because it harnesses the universal human longing to know and be known, while slowly eroding the old guard’s stratified systems of cultural hierarchy and power. Facebook is about leveling. Ironically, anyone can be a part of it, even while it feeds on our desire for exclusive membership and the performance/proclamation of unique identity. The paradox of this is why 600 million people are on Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg is the world’s youngest billionaire.

Alternate Atlanta

I'm very proud of my friends that played a part in creating this video. And I'm excited to play a small part in creating an Alternate Atlanta. Check this out to see what I mean:

ALT from James Christerson on Vimeo.

If you're a young adult in the North Atlanta area, be sure to check out the young adult ministry at Perimeter Church: Alternate Atlanta

Moving Toward People

From the latest CCEF article by Ed Welch:

God moves toward us. By the time we get to the New Testament, we are no longer guided by the sometime inscrutable laws of the Old Testament. Human life changes after Jesus died for sins, rose from the dead and sent the Spirit. Now, the law of love simplifies and captures the intention of the Torah. And when we want to understand what love looks like, we look to the character of God in Jesus.

For this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. (Ezekiel 34:11)

For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost. (Luke 19:10)

The triune God pursued people when they were suffering in bondage in Egypt. He pursued people when they were hardened in their own sin. God’s people reject him and hold him in contempt, he responds by moving toward them and guiding them through the wilderness...

God always moves toward us.

And as his servants, we do the same. We move toward others too. Because we are relentlessly pursued, especially when we not are worthy of such pursuit, we also become pursuers. We turn toward others and move in their direction. That is how the kingdom of heaven works. Sin scatters people, grace draws us toward each other. The possibilities in that grace are endless.

Read the whole thing

The Importance of Good Friends

Roy posted some great thoughts concerning what he has learned about men and women:

When men do not connect/hang/love other men they:

• don’t lead
• their aspirations fizzle
• they stare at porn
• they get fat and watch reality TV with their wife or girlfriend
• we never meet expectations, not even our own

When women do not connect/hang/love other women they;

• become nags
• they crave control, if they lose it they become more of #1
• they hate both men and women
• their expectations get higher, no-one can ever meet them

In the end this boils down to where the gospel is meeting you….and if you are meeting with the gospel I believe it eventually leads to healthy same-sex relationships.

**the presupposition is that you have good friends...

Virtual Life Creating Private Worlds

The latest Adbusters article reveals how the Japanese are being affected by growing technology of virtual, private worlds. The article looks at recent killing sprees as well as general public interaction to illustrate how "privacy is not simply sustained, it’s thrust upon you." And I don't think the U.S. is too far behind...

Here's the conclusion:

"Committing to a relationship or the achievement of an ambition is usually a lot more challenging than creating a sudden buzz on the internet, posting a blog entry, tweeting 140 characters or adding new friends to your Facebook, Mixi or digital address pages. But a retreat from reality poses its own set of risks: newly emerging anxieties and uncertainties that we are only now beginning to recognize and understand...

Divorced from the very human responsibility to contact and interact directly with other living beings, we may feel hollowed out, emptied of the sense of an evolving self that can make existence worth its painful bouts of adversity and growth. A life spent lurking too long in the shadows of the virtual world might turn out to be no life at all."

Solidarity of the past vs. Individualism of today

Brett McCracken recently wrote an interesting article entitled "Could Woodstock Happen Again?" In it he briefly analyzes the cultural environment of 1969, pointing out how 500,000 united for this epic event. If his analysis is right, it's pretty amazing how our culture today is so utterly different than it was just 40 years ago regarding community. The whole article is good, but his conclusion pretty much sums it up:

There was a lot going on, and, importantly, it was all coinciding with the heyday of mass culture. The news of the world was now everywhere, the trends proliferated, the horrors unshielded from the public eye. And it was all on a limited number of media channels. Everyone saw and experienced the same stuff. This made it possible for so many people of the same age to be on the same cultural and spiritual page. They’d all grown up in the same Campbell’s soup post-war America. They were all equally nervous about Vietnam.

These days, there is still a lot going on, but by now we are used to a constant barrage of shocking news and earth-shattering events. Nothing riles us up anymore. Plus, there are far too many channels with which to receive information. Everyone gets a different story. Our music and cultural tastes are infinitely more disparate than that of our parents’ generation. Everything about culture is personal and fragmented rather than public and cohesive. Aside from the YouTube viral video of the week, nothing is really shared anymore.

Something like Woodstock simply could not happen. 500,000 young people in this era would never be able to agree on a motivating cause, let alone a lineup of bands.

But that’s okay. It’s not like Woodstock changed much of anything anyway. Its lasting importance is mainly that of an American cultural artifact—a nostalgic celebration of a revolution that nearly happened but didn’t. That, and an amazing 4-hour concert DVD.

Understanding my gifting just a little bit more

The Resurgence blog has been doing a series on spiritual gifts over the last couple of months. The gift highlighted on June 10 was the gift of administration. They defined it this way:

"The gift of administration is the God-given ability to give direction and make decisions on behalf of others that result in efficient operation and accomplishment of goals. Administration includes the ability to organize people, things, information, finances, etc. Often the mark of an administrator is the ability to accomplish things in a "fitting and orderly way" (1 Corinthians 14:40)."

I've known for a while that I enjoy doing this kind of thing. I think only until recently have I understood that it is truly a gift and is beneficial to the body of Christ. In the past, I've looked at the list of spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12 and for some reason elevated gifts like teaching and others as more spiritual or something. Organizing just didn't seem all that important compared to healing, miracle-working, and prophecy.

I lost my job at the bank back in March. For about ten weeks I was jobless and during that time was really trying to figure out what I'm passionate about and what I'm gifted at. As I began to see my love for, and gifting in, administration, I also began to see a host of people who were terrible at it, yet a large part of their job required them to do it. I began to see how I loved administration even more as it fit with these people who didn't like it at all. I saw how working together could free them up to be more successful and do what they love and are gifted at.

Three weeks ago, I was hired by the owner of a couple hardwood flooring companies for this very fit. My job is to make him more successful by getting all the details off his plate, because he's visionary and really hates the details. And I love what I'm doing!

I am very glad God has finally given me the ability to appreciate a little bit more how he has wired me. And I am very thankful that He has provided me an opportunity to serve someone by doing what I love. I hope this encourages you to appreciate the gift of God in you, whatever it might be, however unhelpful you THINK it might be.

Is Twitter Worth the Time?

You might have seen (based on the right side bar of this blog) that I've joined Twitter. My roommate Roy was a big influence in that decision. I wrestled with doing it for a while because I already have this blog and wondered about the temptation to fuel narcissistic thought or to have one more way to be in a virtual community rather than an actual one. While I'm still trying to figure out how I want to use it, I do think I want to stick to it and use it redemptively.

I've interacted with a several people who question the benefit of Twitter and whether or not it will last. I ran across this article entitled "Twitter Quitters Just Don't Get It." Among other things, it states what Nielsen online research found that 60% of new users leave within the first month. Here's a couple paragraphs better explaining the uses of Twitter:

"In my opinion, the most commonly heard complaints about Twitter stem from a misunderstanding of it. Chief among these complaints is the utterly bunk assertion that it's just a whole bunch of people heralding the trivial events of their daily lives into the void. (i.e., "I'm going to the bathroom now!" or "Eating a yummy ham sandwich!") Frankly, if that's how you're using Twitter, you're doing it wrong, and you should stop without subjecting your friends to a full week of that rubbish, let alone a full month.

Another prevailing myth about Twitter is that it's just an expression of our collective narcissism, and that we're all just tweeting to hear ourselves tweet. In reality, though, the overwhelming majority of users follow far more people than follow them. And if you're tweeting more than you're reading, there's a good chance nobody's following you."

Escaping Anonymity

Tim Challies wrote a great article for TableTalk recently about the increased level of anonymity these days. He points to technology as playing a big role in this (centered around the Internet) and looks to the danger of life with decreasing levels of accountability. At one point in the article he says that "We are anonymous, impersonal people in a largely anonymous, impersonal world." Here's a key paragraph:

"In days past, anonymity was both rare and difficult. People tended to live in close-knit communities where every face was familiar and every action visible to the community. Travel was rare and the majority of people lived a whole lifetime in the same small geographic area. Os Guinness remarks that in the past 'those who did right and those who did not do wrong often acted as they did because they knew they were seen by others. Their morality was accountability through visibility.' While anonymity is certainly not a new phenomenon, the degree of anonymity we can and often do enjoy in our society is unparalleled in history."

Read the whole thing

Will the Church be the Church for Homosexual Christians?

This article, entitled “A Few Like You”: Will the Church be the Church for Homosexual Christians?, is written by a guy named Wesley Hill. It is a great look into what it's like to be a Christian who struggles with same-sex desires. At one point, he says this:

"If it weren’t for other people, I don’t think I’d make it. For me to live faithfully before God as a sexually-abstinent homosexual Christian must be to trust that God in Christ can meet me in my loneliness not simply with God’s own love but with God’s love mediated through the human faces and arms of my fellow believers."

(HT:Justin Taylor)

The beginning and impact of Facebook

Yesterday marked the 5th anniversary of the beginning of Facebook. And if you've never looked in to how it started, it's worth checking out. Al Mohler shares his thoughts:

"Today's student generation, the "Digital Natives," know of no existence before cell phones, the Internet, e-mail, and text messaging. Social networking perfectly fits their lifestyle and worldview. They assume 24/7 social contact -- or at least access to this contact just a few clicks away.

Social networking is like any new technology. It must be evaluated on the basis of its moral impact as well as its technological utility. Social networking sites offer unprecedented opportunities for communication and contact -- and that is both the promise and the peril of the technology."

We need each other to really know one another and to really know God

As I was listening to Tim Keller a couple of days ago, he pointed out this amazing quote regarding community. It comes from C.S. Lewis's The Four Loves. For context, it's important to point out that Lewis is referring to community within the Inklings, a small group of men who met weekly for almost 20 years. Lewis's closest friends seemed to be in this group, and Charles and Ronald were both members (see Arnold's comment for more insight).

"In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity...Now that Charles is dead, I shall never again see Ronald's reaction to a specifically Caroline joke. Far from having more of Ronald, having him 'to myself' now that Charles is away, I have less of Ronald...we possess each friend not less but more as the number of those with whom we share him increases. In this, Friendship exhibits a glorious 'nearness by resemblance' to Heaven itself where the very multitude of the blessed (which no man can number) increases the fruition which each has of God. For every soul, seeing Him in her own way, doubtless communicates that unique vision to all the rest. That, says an old author, is why the Seraphim in Isaiah's vision are crying 'Holy, Holy, Holy' to one another. The more we thus share the Heavenly Bread between us, the more we shall all have."

Using Facebook Redemptively

Justin Buzzard has written about using discernment with using social sites online, namely Facebook. He gives some advice on how not to use Facebook. Here are just a few:

1. Don’t use status updates to complain. For many, complaining has become a trend on Facebook. With their status updates, many people broadcast consistent grumbles, like: “Joe is bored,” “Joe can’t wait to leave his stupid job,” or “Joe is exhausted.” By all means, be real, be honest and authentic, but beware of the culture of complaint.

2. Don’t measure your worth/identity by the number of your Facebook friends and interactions. Facebook measurements are the opposite of gospel measurements. Facebook tells you that the more Facebook friends and interactions you have, the more important, loved, and accepted you are. The gospel tells sinners an opposite message: no matter how lonely, unpopular, or unnoticed you might feel, in Jesus you are more loved, accepted, and noticed than you can imagine.

3. Don’t value forming Facebook (virtual) friendships more than real world friendships.

4. Don’t diminish your face-to-face time with people to check what’s going on in your Facebook world. If you’ve ever been out to dinner with friends and found yourself anxious to pull away and check out what’s happening on Facebook, you know what I’m talking about.

5. Don’t be someone online you’d never be in person. Let Facebook reflect the real you, not some pseudo-personality that emerges when you’re alone with your computer.

9. Don’t let Facebook cause you to think about yourself more than you already do. You were created to look outside yourself toward God, other people, and the wonder-filled world he has made for you to enjoy and cultivate.

And then he gives some advice on how to use Facebook redemptively:

1. Use Facebook to get back in touch with far-away friends, showing them how Jesus has changed you. As Facebook has reconnected me with friends from my past, a number have been struck by how much I’ve changed. High school friends from Sacramento regularly express shock at learning that I’m a pastor.

2. Use Facebook as an extension of face-to-face relationships and to enhance time with people. Get to know people and love and care for them better when you’re with them because, through Facebook, you know more about who they are and what’s going on in their lives.

3. Use Facebook to take the focus off of yourself. Facebook can actually help you get outside of yourself and your problems. Next time you login, use the time to focus on creatively listening to, loving, and encouraging others. Approach Facebook thinking about what you can give.

4. Use Facebook to sharpen and discipline what you do with your time. Facebook status updates can serve as a form of built-in accountability. Just knowing that my Facebook community can read my updates provides additional motivation to stay on task and actually do what I say I’m doing.

5. Use Facebook to quickly announce and facilitate great face-to-face gatherings. Instead of taking 45 minutes to call 10 people to come over for a spontaneous evening, use Facebook.

6. Use Facebook to influence other people for Jesus. Create a new culture with your status updates. Use them to love, encourage, teach, and challenge people.

(HT:Justin Taylor)

Reproof and Forgiveness

I really wish I had more of this going on in my life. Both with the humility to receive it and the boldness to give it.

Community

With a couple of different issues going on recently, I have been forced to deal with some hurt. And because of the way I am wired, I guess, I often turn inward to deal with these things. I might even be able to preach truth to myself and ask God to help me deal with it, but it usually stops there, without really involving anyone else, at least for a little while. The interesting thing is, I want and almost expect guys in my discipleship group as well as my other friends to invite me in immediately so they won't be alone. Well, last night, as a friend and I were discussing some things, I became very convicted of my own inability to invite others in to share in my struggles.

I share these thoughts after being stirred by this blog entry written by my roommate and good friend Roy. I wholeheartedly agree with him as he talks about our generation and the lack of wisdom and counsel that we are receiving from others. I am so often that "dumb ass, fighting the flight to self absorption and personal study." And I pray with God's help and my friends' help that I can move on and truly be doing life together in community.

A couple of weeks ago I did a study on how the book of Proverbs deals with this issue (I think perhaps God was trying to get my attention with all these things). And there are at least 25 verses that deal with this issue directly. A verse that really stuck out to me, Proverbs 18:1, has this to say:

"Whoever isolates himself seeks his own desire; he breaks out against all sound judgement."

And finally I can't resist a final quote from an amazing book on this subject, Life Together:

“The Christ in his own heart is weaker than the Christ in the word of his brother; his own heart is uncertain, his brother’s is sure.”