Smooth Criminal

I'm not sure how I've neglected posting this video for so long. During my time in Africa, I became good friends with a dancer from Zimbabwe named Tawanda (although I nicknamed him "Taekwondo"). Tawanda and I became friends when he joined me on a mission trip that I led into inner-city Johannesburg in July. It didn't take long for me to realize two things about Tawanda: He loves dancing and he LOVES Jesus. That made for a pretty cool combo, and Tawanda was able to lead our team in some incredible dance ministry during our week in one of Joburg's roughest neighborhoods. Not only is Tawanda an amazing dancer himself, but he is the choreographer for Zimbabwe's leading dance group. He's just an all-around great guy, and he loves to use his passion, dance, to share Christ with others.

Anyway, enough of the mushy stuff. During our mission trip, I shot this video of Tawanda free-styling to Michael Jackson's Smooth Criminal. I repeat: THIS WAS NOT CHOREOGRAPHED! This is just Tawanda being Tawanda. Enjoy.

God Bless America (and don't forget to curse all the other nations!!!)

I don't know if you caught any of Obama's State of the Union Address the other week. In case you missed it, here's a 10-minute clip of his speech, which lasted well over an hour (seriously, do they need to clap after everything the guy says?!). I'll be focusing in specifically on what Obama had to say in the first three or so minutes of this clip.



I must admit, after having spent significant time overseas these past few years, I see and understand things a bit differently than I did before. For example, growing up, if I had heard someone talk about "advancing industry" and "dominating the global economy," my response probably would have been, "Amen!" followed by a hearty, "God Bless America!"

But now, when I hear this kind of talk, I'm forced to wonder, "Dominate the global economy?...at whose expense?" I mean, for America to be #1, who do we have to trample on? Which nations or groups of people at the bottom of the food chain do we have to exploit to stay on top? Or, at the expense of sounding utterly unpatriotic, consider this: For all America has generously done in the public limelight to offer help to poverty-stricken Haiti in this time of crisis, how many other countries have we held captive in poverty so that our ideals, the American Dream, might be preserved? How many brutal African dictators did America bankroll during the Cold War, simply because they promised to spread "democracy" and fight off the evil Commies? Meanwhile, the people of these nations remained as oppressed, abused and mistreated as ever--sometimes even worse off than they were before America came in and "saved the day."* Something is definitely wrong here...

In conclusion, I certainly don't expect our American political system to ever reflect the politics of Jesus, but I do expect American Christians to view politics (and every other aspect of life) through a KINGDOM perspective. Otherwise, I think we've entirely missed the point.

What sparked these thoughts? Well, today I received an email from a friend of mine in South Africa. As a joke, she attached this picture:


It's okay to laugh when you see this (at least I hope so because I did!). It's quite the caricature of the average American's perspective on the rest of the world, but like most caricatures, there's definitely some element of truth involved here. And, I believe this way of viewing the rest of the world starts at the top, with our President. When Obama (or Bush or every other President before them) makes statements about America being #1, I believe what he is really saying is: "America should be #1...no matter who we have to trample on to get there." And when the average American uses a phrase like "God Bless America," I believe what we are essentially saying (whether we realize it or not) is: "God, Bless America...even if You have to curse all the other nations for us to remain 'blessed.'"

Thoughts?

*If you don't believe this, check out Martin Meredith's book The Fate of Africa. It's one of the best books I've read in recent years, and it will give you a perspective on American foreign policy that you most likely didn't get in your American History class!

Five Stack: The Books

These are the books that I'm currently reading:

Spirituality
The Great Omission, Dallas Willard

Besides the Bible, this just might be the best book I have ever read. Seriously. If you've never read any Dallas Willard before, he's phenomenal. This book takes a deep look at what it truly means to be a disciple of Christ, as well as what practically we can be doing to develop our own personal character and spiritual formation. If you're looking for a challenging book, this is it. You can order it on Amazon here.

Africa
A Time for Machetes, Jean Hatzfield

This book combines two things that I love: Africa and history. However, this book is certainly not for the faint of heart. Hatzfield tracks down ten friends who are currently in prison for the atrocities they committed during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Through numerous interviews, the killers speak out about their experiences of slaughtering men, women, and children, many of whom had been their own neighbors and acquaintances. Some parts of this book make my stomach churn, but I think it's important not to sweep the parts of history that we don't like under the rug. This book teaches us a lot about the human condition and the sin nature that dwells in each one of us.

Philosophy
The God Who is There, Francis Schaeffer

This book comes from The Complete Works of Francis Schaeffer, Vol. I: A Christian View of Philosophy and Culture. It's the first book in the five volume set, which contains all twenty-two of Schaeffer's published works. This specific book, The God Who is There, is dealing with the degeneration of moral absolutes in society. Schaeffer outlines the historical reasoning for society's shift in abandoning moral absolutes and turning to the modern view of truth: relativism. He contends that this shift began in philosophy, then sifted down to art, music, general culture, and finally, theology.

Finances
The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy, Thomas J. Stanley, Ph.D. & William D. Danko, Ph.D.

This is a fun and enlightening read. The authors have really done their research in searching out what kind of people are really wealthy in America. Interestingly enough, America's millionaires are not exactly what you might expect. As the book's title suggests, the majority of America's millionaires are living among us, among the "middle" or "working class" Americans. Generally, these people are first-generation millionaires, entrepreneurs who accumulated wealth through good old-fashioned hard work, smart investing, frugal living, and saving. What I really like about this book is the way that it critiques/criticizes the mentality in American culture that "you are what you own." According to these authors, lavish lifestyles and over-consumption are just downright foolish and irresponsible. Those who are truly wealthy understand this--and that simple understanding is a huge reason why they are wealthy!

Missionary Biographies
Brother Bakht Singh of India, T.E. Koshy

To be honest, before opening up this book I had never heard of Bakht Singh before. A few years back George Verwer, founder of Operation Moblilization, was speaking at a missions conference at Bethel College. He brought a bunch of books with him and gave them out to students for free. So, I snagged as many books as I could get my hands on, and this was one of them. It was actually published and printed in India by OM. I'm only about 60 pages into this 600 page biography so far, but it's downright inspirational. Singh came to know Christ in the late 1920's and then spent the next 70 years of his life literally pouring out his life to the people of India, sharing Christ wherever he went. He truly considered his own life worth nothing, and he allowed the Spirit to lead every aspect of his life. Encouraging. Challenging. Inspiring!

Hopefully as time allows I will be able to share more about what I'm learning through these various readings.

So, what good books are you reading these days?

The Five Stack: 5 Categories

For my first Five Stack, I've chosen the following five different fields of study:

1. Spirituality. I almost called this category "Soul-Feeding," but right away that made me think of Chicken Soup for the Soul and self-help books. That's not what I'm going for here. Mostly, this category is for books that will stretch and challenge me in my personal life and in my walk with Christ.
2. Africa. I brought a handful of books back with me from Africa. Some of these are about African history, while others are novels written by African authors about Africa. This section might eventually morph into something like "Multicultural Literature," but for the time being I'm content to focus in specifically on Africa.
3. Philosophy. I fell in love with philosophy in college, thanks to a couple really great professors. This is a bit heavier reading than what comes naturally to me, which is good for my mind. Philosophy forces me to really think, to engage my mind on a deeper level than I normally would. If the Spirituality section is my "soul-food," then this is my "brain-food."
4. Finances. Ever since I was a little kid, I have been interested in personal finances. I suppose I owe a lot of that to my dad, who has worked in the field of personal finances for over 30 years. He taught me a lot growing up about budgeting and saving, and he even helped me buy my first savings bond when I was 12 years old! But, I recognize that I still have lots more to learn, so for now I'm devoting a category to finances. Sooner or later this section might change into something simple like "Personal Interests."
5. Missionary Biographies. This category is all about inspiration. As I seek to become more and more selfless, more and more like Christ, I want to learn from and be inspired by others who have faithfully poured out their lives for Him. As I pursue God's missional calling for my life, I'm asking God to teach me through the lives and the stories of those saints who have gone before me.
   

The Five Stack

I know it sounds like a new option on McDonald's "heart-attack-guaranteed" menu, but the Five Stack has nothing to do with feeding the stomach. It does, however, have everything to do with feeding the mind. (Cheesy, I know, but stay with me. Haha, get it? "Cheesy"...it's like a five-stack with cheese!).

Wow...

Anyway, so the other day I was lamenting to my brother, Dave, that there are so many different topics that I want to study, but I don't have a good system for studying them. I love reading books, but I'm not very purposeful in the way that I read. I sort of just read whatever good book seems to be laying around at the time, without any systematic approach to what I'm reading or learning, if that makes sense. So, I wondered out loud to my brother if I should just choose a field of study, spend a few months reading all the books I could get my hands on surrounding that topic, and then move on to the next thing. For example, I really enjoy philosophy of religion. Should I just spend the next several months only reading that genre of books?

The immediate problem I saw with this idea was that it seemed like by adopting that method I would be forced to neglect other necessary areas of study, such as personal growth. Well, in the midst of my confusion, my bro dropped a knowledge bomb on me.

(A paraphrase)

Dave: What if you chose five different books from five different fields of study and read them concurrently?

MaxAC: Wait, you mean read them all at the same time? (I'm a little slow...)

Dave: Yeah, just stack them up. Read a few chapters from the first book, and then put it on the bottom of the stack. Next time you want to read, take the next book off the top of the stack and read a few chapters from that one. Then repeat the cycle until you've read all the books, at which point you can choose five more.

MaxAC: So, I'm just clarifying...read FIVE BOOKS AT ONCE?!?!

Dave: Uh, yeah.

Brilliant.

Thus, the Five Stack was born! To be honest, I've never done anything like this before. I'm the kind of guy who really has a hard time focusing on more than one thing at a time (I guess that just makes me a guy, huh?), but I'm trying this out as an experiment, testing my own ability to multi-task read. Just a few days in, I'm realizing that it's not so hard to keep these readings separate because they are all vastly different topics.

There's actually a lot more that I'd like to say, but this post is already reaching "too-long status." More to come soon...

On the prowl...

This is probably one of my favorite videos that I took while in South Africa. Unlike the other lion video, which was taken at a lion park (more or less a glorified zoo), this lion was actually spotted out in the wild, in its natural habitat, at Kruger National Park. We actually spotted two lions at the time this video was shot. This lioness was keeping watch and blocking the escape route as another lioness was circling around to make a kill for dinner. Pretty sweet stuff.

Anyway, I think you'll enjoy this video. Notice that the lion is only a few feet from our car, and WE ROLLED THE WINDOW DOWN! Not only that, but at some point in the video I start whistling to provoke the lion. What can I say...I'm a big dumb animal, folks!

One of those weeks...

You ever have a week like this? You know, one of those weeks where you just want to bury your head in a tree? This was one of those weeks for me. I think the best word to describe this past week is stressful. It was one of those weeks where several stressful situations collided at once to form an atomic stress-bomb. It all started with three days in a row in which three different close friends of mine came to me so that I might bear their heavy burdens with them. Combo that with some stress-filled situations in my own life, not the least of which is that I'm still deeply wrestling through my immediate and not-so-immediate future plans. All that to say, it was just one of those weeks.

I'm not the type of guy to lose sleep over anything. Seriously, I could be placed in a war zone with live ammunition flying everywhere, but when it was bedtime, I'd lay my head on a pile of hand grenades and fall asleep. That's partly just the way I'm wired, and partly I just really love sleep. Anyway, this week I had multiple nights of little to no sleep, which is EXTREMELY uncommon for me. My prayer this morning was just for the Spirit of peace to come over me, even in the midst of the chaos that is life right now. For those of you who have been praying for me this past year, I ask that you continue to pray that the Lord would guide and direct my steps. And, if anyone out there is experiencing a week like I just described, simply take a look at this picture...it makes me feel better every time!!!