Category: books and films and articles

winter with wide eyes

“Wow. You’ve got pretty great balance!”

My cowboy boots had just come to a graceful rest at the end of a good, long slide across the snowy parking lot. Last night was the first real snow in Iowa that feels like winter and sliding with my boots just seemed appropriate.

“It’s really funny that you say that, because I actually fall down all the time,” as I am saying this, I realize I probably enjoy the impressive feeling of staying on my feet a little too much.

“Go ahead and get another good slide in,” my friend said.
I sealed my fate with a confident, “Yeah, okay!”

I think my arms flailed, but I’m not sure. The next thing I knew, my cheek was touching snow. I laughed for awhile, thinking about how I must look to someone passing by. I could see my students in Honduras shaking their heads, “Oh, typico Nichols!”

It’s strange how familiar I am with these types of mishaps, but it doesn’t make me want to slide on a snowy parking lot any less.

After I got the giggles out, I decided I needed to get one more slide in – because what else is there in winter, but chances to shake with shivers and breathe out smoke and run with frozen lungs? What else in winter but a more urgent joy, bundled up in mittens and stuffed into shuffled steps?

I wouldn’t choose winter when I’m standing in August, but every snowy season I rediscover with wonder the urgent stillness; the thrill of goosebumps and every hair standing on end. And something whispers to my deepest place, “Hurry, before it wakes!” Running from frozen car to frozen door at work in the morning, facing near-Narnian winter winds, I can choose to relish the taste of winter.

All this talk of winter is my re-visiting of a book I finished recently by N.D. Wilson, Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl. If ever I’m tempted to shake my fist at the cold, unforgiving winter skies, I think back to Chapter 4. I think about all the treasures God has hidden in fast-moving moments today and about how I want to discover each one. If I let myself, I get excited about God’s hidden treasures with the kind of abandon kids don’t know how to cover up.

I want to open my eyes extra wide today, at the chance I could take in more beauty.

Living really does make dying worth it.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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this & that

While you are picking up the toys strewn about and nibbling at the last of the holiday baking, check out these links!
  • Jonathan Edwards’s resolutions organized in seven categories– a good build up to all those things you will try to squeeze into this next year. A little preparation never hurt anyone. Maybe instead of making your own list of “shoulda, coulda, woulda”s, try checking out what Jonathan Edwards resolved and if it makes sense to you.
    Religious Affections

  • This collection is one of several “Top” lists of 2011 I really enjoyed. It’s from Qideas, highlighting articles from the past year. I also enjoyed Tim Challies Top 10 books and also his Top 10 List of Top 10s.
  • Speaking of Top 10, Tim Keller is regularly on mine as a pastor and author. Looks like I’ll need to find a copy of “The Meaning of Marriage” and dig in, based on the rave reviews. It’s not just the subject that interests me, it’s Keller’s approach to questions and controversy and Bible application.
  • This is a great clip of a child being heroic AND precocious. Check it out.
  • After reading Chesterton’s “Orthodoxy,” I considered him a kindred spirit and friend. His love of creativity was a direct reflection of his love for God. It might be one of few theological pieces that I laughed my way through. He did have a strong view against Calvinism, but that never bothered me. This article might explain why.
  • This might be my favorite article, as of recent. Russell Moore writes about a conversation he had with theologian Carl F.H. Henry before he died. Moore was lamenting the current state of Christianity and the direction it was surely headed, when Henry reminded him that our eyes for despair are not God’s eyes. What about Saul of Tarsus? C.S. Lewis? Charles Colson? The article ends with this:
    Jesus will be King, and his church will flourish. And he’ll do it in the way he chooses, by exalting the humble and humbling the exalted, and by transforming cowards and thieves and murderers into the cornerstones of his New City.
    So relax.
    And, be kind to that atheist in front of you on the highway, the one who just shot you an obscene gesture. He might be the one who evangelizes your grandchildren.
  • I read this NY Times article last week sometime and I’m still thinking about it. “The Joy of Quiet” explains a surprising trend in society these days. Or, maybe it’s not so surprising if you understand that what is luxury must also be rare. These days, quiet is rare, so people are starting to consider it a luxury. Unplug my hotel room? Sure, I’ll pay extra for that. People do! Anyway, it’s an interesting article.
  • If you aren’t really in to articles, but you love photographs, check out 24 hours in pictures from around the world. Fascinating! Here’s a sample (kids in India wait in the taxi for their family to return:

There is more, but I think Wednesday can only handle so much (I read the stats and you’re not going to click on all these, anyway!).

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Posted on by Caroline 0

Let Us Not Forget

The story is not just about a babe in a manger.

This babe would pay it all – the price of our sin.
The babe would have crimson stains so that we would be washed as white as snow.

This is the babe we celebrate. This is the Christ child. This is Emmanuel, God with us.

Advent: God With Us from The Village Church on Vimeo.

Let us not forget, for He did not forget us. He engraved us on the palms of His hands.

let LOVE fly like CRAZY

Posted on by Caroline 1

let the winter come

A fan favorite
Tilt-A-Whirl

“Let the Winter come, for it is the only path to Spring.”

Still recovering from the intellectual and spiritual shock of One Thousand Gifts, I’ve jumped into another book where wide-eyed wonder has center stage.

When I read, “This book does not go straight,” in the preface of N.D. Wilson‘s book Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl, it was like meeting someone for the first time who also happens to love imagination stations, homemade musicals, and the back issues of Real Simple.

It was almost too good. Wilson writes, “This book is built on that pattern [a car on a Tilt-A-Whirl] – spinning small and spinning big – and follows the earth through the seasons of one orbit.”

YES!

Someone finally admits this is all craziness and we have no choice but to step in and delight in the madness that is music and look reverently for the Conductor of it all.

This morning as I sat in church and listened to the message from Luke 2:1-20, I marveled that God chose to make the birth of the Messiah known by a stunning display of musical genius.

Can you imagine how this announcement would put all our cute little refrigerator photos to shame? A celestial choir in perfect harmony filled the sky with a music too pure for words, too perfect for description.

But, the announcement never made it to all those houses and all those fridges who expected to know of such an event.

God orchestrated the single best (and only) opening night production of, “Messiah has come to earth!” for a group of humble shepherds out in the fields, away from the city and the noise. There was no billboard, just the heavens collaborating in great joy – an indescribable gift for every one of the senses.

We are wrapped up into this mad story of cosmic romance where nothing makes any sense. Unless, of course, we hear the song of the angels. Unless we believe that our filthy, desperate lives can be redeemed. Unless we allow our eyes to travel upward and focus in on the grand production of the universe, orchestrated by its Creator to announce the coming of Life and a way out from misery and into great joy.

If you have been audience to such a performance, to whom are you now declaring this message – this production that now lives inside your heart as a follower of Christ?

For we are surely singing in glory with the angels that Hope has come down. And this Hope will not [can not] disappoint.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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Posted on by Caroline 4

this & that

What a week.

So many thoughts. So many reasons to give thanks.

Here are some links for laughter and thinking and love.

Senior Citizen Flash Mob This is a group of elderly folks who think they can have fun, too. I gotta give ’em props for the effort. It reminds me of the documentary Young at Heart – but less cool. You should definitely watch the documentary if you haven’t seen it!

As sad as it sounds, how we googled in 2011 is an interesting litmus test of our priorities and it turns out we are all mixed up (big surprise).

Christopher Hitchens died. This outspoken atheist passed away from cancer in Houston and it just might be the perfect time to reflect on some of the beliefs (yes, atheists have beliefs too) he held onto so tightly.

Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens

The Gospel Coalition calls the Coming Catholic Ad Blitz “among the largest religious media blitzes in U.S. history.” This campaign is one calling Catholics to come “back home” – to find their local parish and learn (or re-learn) what it means to be Catholic. This fascinates me. I wonder what your thoughts are?

Its been said, “If you don’t expose your secret, your secret will expose you.” This article by Rebekah Lyons called, “What’s Your Secret?” is refreshing as it looks at the secrets we bury down deep and the relief when they are uncovered.

Well, it’s a short list and I’m processing so much these days – taking in the beauty of everyday, reading about grace and gratitude and moments. I’m trying to step in to every moment thankful, as I read through One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp.

It’s painting the world in beautiful hues.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Posted on by Caroline 2

spinning around inside a story

Not that long ago, I watched the film Tree of Life with some friends and promised myself that I would give it the mental attention it deserved. These are the notes I had to work with:

So… when I finally got around to writing about the film, it was too big to smoosh into a single blog post. I pushed it to the place cobwebs creep in my mind and agreed it was something to “come back to” when it didn’t feel like the philosophical dump truck unloaded on my brain’s front stoop.

Yesterday, the Tree of Life found it’s way through the cobwebs by way of another film – a bookumentary. Notes from a Tilt-A-Whirl has been on my “to do” list for an impressive long while. My motivation to see this “idea film” greatly increased when the time on my iTunes rental was running out. Last night, I finally found some kindred spirits who would commit 51 minutes to run after an author’s ramblings. With the storytelling fervor of Donald Miller and cinematography resembling Rob Bell, N. D. Wilson takes you through each chapter of his book, “Notes From a Tilt-A-Whirl” in a way that simultaneously appeals to your mind and your heart. With Creation as his backdrop, Wilson wrestles through topics like philosophy, academia, suffering, and why every person should view life as an art appreciator.

Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl Movie Trailer from Gorilla Poet Productions on Vimeo.

In the hours after Wilson closed his last chapter, I realized why I appreciated the Tree of Life. It wasn’t for it’s overt declaration of Truth or it’s objective dealing with the meaning of life. The most valuable message was one of beauty.

The world is a beautiful place. Scarred, true, but oh-so-beautiful.

Once one makes this admission of beauty, there are more questions to answer.
Where does it come from? Does it always win? Why does it lose? Do we control it? Who decides what beauty is? How many beauties are there – just one kind?
(C.S. Lewis dealt with this subject masterfully in his book, “Abolition of Man” when he discusses the miseducation of children)

All these questions, bound together by the tension in the nature vs. grace conflict, demand resolution. Whether Tree of Life sufficiently answers these questions never concerned me, because I was too busy being impressed by the way beauty and tragedy were communicated so clearly.

But, last night, as we watched Notes From a Tilt-A-Whirl around my 13 inch Mac laptop screen, I marveled that there is more beauty. We were never meant to be satisfied merely admiring the beauty of the Ultimate Artist. We are meant to live the beauty – to interact and understand and breathe the beauty. We are meant to do what is impossible through the One who makes impossible things happen (see Ephesians).

We are meant to look at what has baffled philosophers and tormented academicians and take in all the beauty of Truth with the humble reverence of a child in the dreamiest of castles.

The castle is very much real – there is no use arguing otherwise. We waste much time and miss much beauty by arguing its existence.

More to come… meanwhile, watch the film so I have more people with who I can process its merits!

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the precious mystery

Dietrict Bonhoeffer Stained Glass,St Johannes ...

“The lack of mystery in our modern life is our downfall and our poverty.” – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

I am more than a little inspired by the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Last year, I dove into the pages of his biography by Eric Metaxas and started referring to him as “my friend Dietrich” (see posts here and here and here). Okay, it did get a little out of control, but it’s hard not to be affected by this man’s life.

Fast forward to yesterday, when this book appeared on my bed – right smack dab in the middle of Advent season (an early Christmas gift from my aunt and housemate).

I flipped frantically through the pages last night – not wanting to miss anything, but wanting to get on track with the advent calendar days.

Week Two: Day One is titled, “Respect for the Mystery.”

I suppose my fascination with mystery has something to do with my reflection on Chesterton recently, or maybe Klosterman’s observation that the mystery of faith makes people nervous.

I love mystery.

Bonhoeffer writes,

“We destroy the mystery because we sense that here we reach the boundary of our being, because we want to be lord over everything and have it at our disposal, and that’s just what we cannot do with the mystery.”

mystery…
there we reach beyond the boundary of our being
there we traverse in lands where our control holds no power
there we sojourn as mere mortals in a place overflowing with otherness

Mystery lies hidden amidst the grid of everyday traffic and underneath the steady steps of time. Where we are constrained by our senses, mystery breaks rhythm and sets a new pace of possibilities.

Ah, yes. Mystery holds the beautiful, unexplainable, impossible story of God being
born.

The I AM of the days of Moses became a babe in a lowly manger.
The God who will one day ride on the clouds, shining like the sun at the trumpets call was ushered into the world with the sound of farm animals accompanying His humble arrival.
The Messiah, our only hope of salvation, emerged from a womb and filled His little lungs with earth air.

This is not science fiction – this is Truth, wrapped in mystery.

Oh, beautiful mystery!

In a letter to Bonhoeffer, Maria von Wedemeyer penned these words in 1943,

All that is Christmas originates in heaven and comes from there to us all, to you and me alike, and forms a stronger bond between us than we could ever forge ourselves.”

Mystery.

How are you watching this mystery thread through your life this Advent season?

let LOVE fly like cRazY

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this & that

How was your thanksgiving?

I could barely catch my breath, I was so thankful. Every time I turned around, there was a new reason.

Whew. Now, I’m back in the swing (if you call couch hopping and random working and disorganized packing for a move a “swing”) and I wanted to give you a few things to read.

  • C.S. Lewis was born yesterday. One of the most amazing people I never knew… well, except in a literary sense. I imagine I’ll hang out with him one day in heaven, though. Here’s a little article about the man over at Desiring God.
  • I’m sure I’ve talked about Ann Voskamp before, no? Well, now you are officially introduced. She has a book “a thousand gifts” that I’ve started and it is beautiful! She also has a blog and this showed up a couple days ago – like words I might pen about Losing our Language. Check it out (and also her book)!
  • I don’t ever feel the need to make to make the topics of “Christians” and “Alcohol” the center of debate, but if it finds its way there on its own – I’ll bite. This article, “Christians and Alcohol” by Challies is an interesting take.
  • This last one isn’t a link as much as an idea that I can’t wait to see develop. It’s not a new idea, just one I shared with my good friend Alejandra over Thanksgiving and she is equally excited about it. We had some of the most amazing conversations about how we can encourage men to be real men – those who pursue after God with their whole heart. Since we parted, we’ve been updating on new ways that have opened for us to do just that. I’m pumped to see how God will send us opportunities for encouragement!

I know this isn’t extensive, but I had to get SOMETHING up before the piles in my mind didn’t make any sense.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Posted on by Caroline 0

this & that

Another lovely list for a bunch of lovely folks.

  • This is just plain, good sense from Paul David Tripp about how Anger is Essential.
  • I referred to David Schrock yesterday, but if you didn’t jet over to see his series on Gospel Logic, then you should DEFINITELY check it out!
  • I keep loving the excerpts I am reading from Jared Wilson’s new book “Gospel Wakefulness,” so I keep sending you to check it out for yourself. Here’s another snapshot from DesiringGod.org and Crossway that seems to connect to my recent thoughts on Occupying Life!
  • Do you like music? Do you think about music a lot? Do you analyze why you like certain music and not other certain music? There is a great article (Zombies, Wine, and Christian Music) written at the gungor (that’s a band, by the way) website that I hope will prompt a lot of discussion about music… specifically Christian music. They just put out a new album, by the way, “Ghosts Upon the Earth.”
Hm. Well, that’s about it for now.
Oh, and I’m still listening to this:
Posted on by Caroline 0

this & that

Well, happy Monday to you all!

This is kind of a heavy “this & that” post, but I’ll try to throw something lighter in the mix.

  • This article over at The Gospel Coalition caught my eye for two reason – it’s about apologetics (which I love) and it’s for “the rest of us” (which is definitely referring to my layman-trained mind). Appropriately titled, “Apologetics for the Rest of Us,” it’s worth your time.
  • Remember what I was going nutso over last Spring? I’ll give you a hint: The Gospel Coalition National Conference. That’s not really a hint, it’s the whole answer. If I’d been there, I would have heard this message by Mike Bullmore. I’m so thankful I wasn’t, because I was in Honduras watching the Lord work like crazy.
  • I’m a little (A LOT) obsessed with this post, “Fiction for the Common Good,” at Qideas. I willingly followed the little rabbit trail that led me to “wish listing” a whole bunch of books on Amazon. If you like fiction, but are snobby and must always qualify it by saying, “I like good fiction,” then please read this article. And then conspire with me about how we can inspire classic book clubs.
  • Although I think qualifiers like nominal and mediocre are unnecessary to put in front of our identity as Christians, I do think we can benefit from skillfully re-packaged Biblical truth. I think that will be the case with Jared Wilson’s idea of gospel wakefulness. Go ahead and read this little plug over at Desiring God and let me know what you think.
  • Thanks to Tim Challies, I found this little collection of Jonathan Edwards‘ quotes, True Excellency. Not an Edwards fan? Read ’em anyway and see what you think! 🙂
  • Something lighter… Well, you know I like rap, right? I wonder if rap will have this effect on my kids someday. 🙂

That’s a wrap, my friends. I hope you don’t have the case of the Mahndays as you read this. The tried and true solution I’ve always found is to

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

so maybe try that! 🙂 

Posted on by Caroline 0