No, not another twilight zone reference.  Actual time displacement.  I’m sitting here typing with all haste against the inevitable waking of my son.  Nap time draws to a close, and since I’m on duty while Carrie makes a mainland run, time is on my mind.  I heard on the radio that the earthquake in Chile was so powerful (the equivalent of 1 million Hiroshima bombs – WOW!)  that it actually shifted the mass of the earth.  Earth’s axis has moved 3″.  This has cost us nearly two seconds of time.  It’s gone.  Unaccountably gone.  What would I do with 2 more seconds in my day?  Probably nothing except smile and talk about the beauty of science fiction moments.  That’s the nature of my life.  I have internal and external compulsions.  I am not free.   I’m driven by those things that demand I respond.  Two seconds wouldn’t actually make a discernible difference.

Strange connection?  Possible.  However, I just gave a lecture on the nature of addiction, and we have been deep in discussion for a couple of days now.  It turns out, that it may have resonated with people.  My lecture was not from a biological or chemical perspective, though I know that those things matter.  It wasn’t from a psychological or sociological perspective either, though they too are involved.  Addiction (or attachment of our desires) is a complex force.  Rather I looked at the same issue from a theological and teleological perspective.  Meaning, what where we made for (our creator’s perspective) and where are we going (our purpose, our end goal).  When asking the question between the garden of Eden and a renewed heaven and earth, creation and new creation, genesis and revelation, things look different.  The fall does not redefine everything even though it is the immediate context of our lives.

In this context NOW doesn’t dominate.  Away from the immediate, there might even be room to breath, take our glasses off and make sure the lenses are clean.  We were made for relationship; with God, creation, humanity, and ourselves.  God gave us desires that push us to live.  Just as pain and fear can (not always) protect us and signal that something is wrong, desire drives us to live.  Desire is a God given gift, with an intended purpose.  It is God’s call to come home and find fulfillment in right relationship to Him and his good gifts – creation, others, and ourselves.  As my son’s namesake has so famously said, “God has made us for himself, and our hearts are restless until the find their rest in him.”  When we attach our desires to something else, before God, we are not relating to it properly… our desires are disordered.  When our desires are wrongly attached (literally means “nailed down”) they no longer hear God’s call to come home.  They are not free.  We can attach them to both “good” or “bad” things.  Family can be just as disordering as harmful drugs.  Church can be just as wrongly placed as a slavish commitment to technology.  It isn’t the thing (obvious sin aside) as much as how we relate to it.  When it is a God replacement, a place to find identity and security, we are relating to it wrongly, it has become disordered.  When our desires are nailed down, our needs are not met and we feel the deep pain and questions of value, questions that only God can answer, because if we let something else answer those questions, our desires will be nailed to that thing.  Growing up, I nailed my desires to sports and school, because those gave me a sense of meaning and value.  When I lost both of them for a time, I was able (though very painfully) to restore them to their proper place.  Grace specializes in detachment and restoration.  Grace includes a cross and resurrection.  Grace is gift.  Only when our desires are primarily attached to God, are they free to be used for him.  Christ laid his life down freely.  I strive for that daily, but it is no easy thing.

As I think about my time, I am constantly being pushed to drop the “my”.  If life is a gift, and therefore time (minus those two missing seconds), perhaps it isn’t “mine” in the first place.  Only when I can stop seeing it as mine am I free to give of myself in loving response to God.  Free to be in proper relationship to time.  Yes, I still enjoy a walk by myself, but when that student drops by unexpectedly or Gabriel gets unexpectedly thrust into my arms, I can know that it was never my time to begin with.  I might lose another two seconds tomorrow, or perhaps the rest of what I assumed was mine.  My prayer is that whatever is left to me, that by God’s grace alone, I will increasingly know it as free.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’Abri

P.S.  Gabriel took his first steps three weeks ago, and we are thrilled… and horrified and what than now means:-)

It’s weird… I think I’ve been to the twilight zone.  That place where everything that seems normal isn’t, and reality seems to take on a whole new cast.  For me, it was an amazing experience, nothing like those creepy old shows where time stops, or you can never leave a town or something else.  Instead, I was famous for a weekend.

It’s a strange thing to be a celebrity, to have people excited to introduce you to their families, to be stopped in the hall and thanked profusely, to be credited with some major life epiphany.  Very strange.

In my normal life, nothing like this happens.  I spend a lot of time changing diapers, giving bottles, cleaning our home, fixing leaks and clogs, chopping wood, talking with students who seem to be tired of listening to me, and just creating space where people can be encountered by God.  All very good things, but certainly not celebrity status.

The annual L’abri conference is a whole different reality.  There, 700 or 800 people actually pay quite a bit of money to come hear you talk.  They are not only excited but grateful, and because you work at L’abri, your words hold weight.  I can remember my own experience as a conference goer just three years ago.  It was thrilling!  Though a bit like drinking from a fire hose, the rush of ideas and mingling with other folk who not only love God, but believe that the Christian faith is not something to believe in despite your mind, but it is in fact the best explanation of reality.  On top of that, to be given time – one on one – by these famous folk… wow.

Insert me.  I haven’t written anything.  Most of the time I’m more concerned that my fly is up or that there isn’t any dangling food particle attached to my beard.  Getting through the lecture coherently is a large success in itself.  I love to spend time one on one with people, and explaining what I love and what I do is a joy, not some sort of celebrity status.

Luckily that celebrity only lasts for a weekend, it can be intoxicating.  I returned home to a teething baby, who thinks the only thing I’m good for is helping him walk, getting things that he has dropped, and holding the bottle at the right angle.  It’s good to laugh at myself and to be reminded that in two days 11 people (not 700) will be here to find shelter in our home, ask questions about God, and most likely get tired of listening to me talk.

However, the conference was so much more than a nice pat on the back.  It was a chance to be reminded that this very real work of God is not something isolated on a small island in the pacific, but is a truly international thing.  I got to spend time with my colleagues from England, Holland, Brazil, and both of the US Branches of L’Abri.  What a joy to see how God is changing peoples lives all over the world.  What a privilege to spend time with people who have been doing this for years.  It is also wonderful to be given time, by the very people who inspired you in the first place, and who continue to show you what a life well lived looks like.  Perhaps I’m still that conference goer who first stumbled onto L’abri three years ago, just grateful that God has allowed me to be a part of this thing he has chosen to do.

If you support us in prayer, here are some things to ask God for.  Carrie, Gabriel and I are all sick.  We are making large adjustments this term, as the Scheibe’s (the other couple) have a brand new baby.  Figuring how to redivide everything is challenging.  Of course pray for the students, and our helpers.  May God be Glorified, and may we have the strength we need.

In terms of rejoicing with us, I made it to Minnesota and back safely – in February.  Driving to the airport we passed about 6 cars flipped over in the ditch from ice and high winds.  I am grateful.  Also we are scheduled to have a pretty full term, God has answered our prayers to send students.  We also have enough money in our account for this term as a branch.  God is good.

Well, because there is much to do, I must go.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’Abri

Aside from a “we made it” post, this little offering will be my first this year.  New Beginnings.  I immediately think of Gabriel, to whom everything is new.  He is pulling himself up now, and trying to walk.  His waking hours are marked not by the hands of a clock, but by tumbles and bumps as he learns to stand.  He still hasn’t done a proper crawl yet, and at this point he doesn’t seem interested.  The minute he sees me, he double times it (via army crawl) my way, tugging on my pants until I help him stand and walk around with him.  Nothing else will do, and he keeps us aware of this fact.  What happened to my sweet little boy, who never made a fuss… he discovered walking.  New beginnings.

We returned to Bowen for another year.  On one hand, its isolation, lack of suburban convenience, and status as “another country” sometimes wears on us.  However, I’m growing to realize something.  My world is enormous.  I used to think that unless I had traveled extensively, been exposed to the latest and newest, been immersed in culture or art, and looked askance at those who didn’t… that I lived in a small or provincial world.  Culture was king, knowledge was commerce, and being in the know was a social standing.  The more you knew, the more you could accept; the more you could accept the more you knew.   I no longer see it that way.  I now believe that it is depth, not width that makes the world large.  I still enjoy my awareness being expanded, but it is the depth of relationship and connection that makes me… bigger.  My dependence upon the other, rather than my collection of information, opinion, or the “latest” comes closer to defining the quality of my world.  Kierkegaard said it in the 19th Century, two things mark the quality of a person’s self – consciousness, the quality of their relationships to others, and the depth of the other to whom they relate.  In terms of appreciating the little community in which we live… New Beginnings.

I have been stuck in my office, writing furiously, discarding even more furiously for the past week.  I have a deadline, and two papers to write.  Unfortunately, I seem to have nothing to say.  That is humbling.  I’m trying to explain how the greatest danger to Christianity in Modern Western Civilization is not primarily related to morality, other religions, church attendance, or any such thing.  Nor is it primarily a battle for truth, the bible, or some envisioned defeat of evolutionary ideas as some Christians often think.  The greatest current threat to Western Christianity is far more subtle, and thus nearly impossible to explain.  Many Christians I talk to don’t even have the categories which would put it on their radar.  This either makes me a champion or an idiot.  I assure you I am neither.  The greatest current threat to Western Christianity is practical atheism – we see and live in the world in such a way that there is absolutely no need for the existence of a God.  The ironic thing is that we are free to believe in any god, as long as it helps us with anxiety, the fear of loneliness or death, social networking, or personal fulfillment.  Evangelical Christians are concerned with fire insurance (avoiding hell), but have very little concept of Lordship or dependence.  If it turned out that God did not in fact exist (and thus no eternity to worry or rejoice about), how would the living of our lives change?  Aside from the embarrassment about being wrong, what would actually change?  What would be gone from my life?  What do I actually depend upon God for?  Would my actual identity significantly alter, or do my politics, economics, and consumer products actually give me all I need?  Would I merely switch brands from Christian music to secular and not skip a beat?  Does the existence of God really matter in the way I live my life?  I am continuing to write and discard, write and discard.  Another new beginning.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’Abri

P.S. Here is my son with some belated Christmas Cheer from our trip to Oregon

Well, at last we are again breathing that fresh mountain/ocean air.  We are home on Bowen Island.  I just wanted everyone to know that we got home safe, after nearly a month away.  The cats are fine.  Gabriel did exceptionally well in the car, and we are thrilled to be home.  I will post again soon, but for all those who are curious – we are home safely.

Jeff

I just wanted to take a quick minute and say Merry Christmas.  I’m writing during advent, a time of waiting.  Here on Bowen Island, we are quite literally waiting expectantly for the days to begin getting longer, for the light to return.  It is dark here in the winter.  But we know that Spring will in fact return, the days will get lighter.  Likewise, we know that the TRUE LIGHT of the world has already come, and that HE will come again.  Despite winter, and much of the darkness that is in our lives, we know that we do not wait in vain!  New life will come; the light of the World has come; Christ will come again.  We wait together in joyful expectation.

Carrie and I (and Gabriel) will leave for Oregon this Thursday, and will be gone for almost a month.  We look forward to some time relaxing, rejoicing, and celebrating our real hope together with family and friends.  We’ll be in Cottage Grove/Eugene and Portland, along with a side trip to see the sun.

As we look back on all that God has brought us through this year, we are thankful.  I survived pneumonia, we added a new life to our family, we moved (again), had a wonderful year ministering and sharing our lives in L’abri, spoke at a conference, and so many other things.  God has been faithful, and he will be faithful.  I’m looking forward to speaking at a couple of L’abri conferences this year, to spending time with family, to continuing to grow and learn here at L’abri, and to all those that God will bring through our doors this year.  We may even organize an “official” family vacation here on Bowen Island during August.  Get your passports ready.

The snow is already falling , Gabriel is chasing Nola (a slow army crawl) around the house, and we are preparing to say goodbye to another year of our lives.  We have exchanged a great deal for this one year.  What will we exchange for the next year?  As I reflect on it, the one thing I don’t really have to exchange is control.  We live by Grace, God’s and other people’s, and so as we are invited, tempted, and coerced into thinking that we control our lives; what gives us meaning, safety, protection, and the like.  Remember that what gives us meaning, safety, fulfillment is not going to show up on a ballot, a bank statement, or a store.  It won’t be a technique for self-improvement or self-satisfaction.  We wait for our king.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’abri

We made it.  Dragging, laughing, smiling, nearly crying… we made it.  Our term is over.  What a blessing, what a sad day.  We need to rest badly, but that is not the only part of the story.  We said goodbye to an amazing term on Monday.  The best term for asking questions, for sustained community, and for a full but intimate size.  There were many repeat visitors – students coming back for a second and third time – and we truly enjoyed building on these relationships.  We also had three parents come this term to see what it was that was changing their son or daughter.  What a gift.

Personally, I have never been stretched this far in a term.  It was very good for me, and very revealing.  That is a hard thing at times.  I’ve said it before, community is a mirror, and it is not always easy (though always good) to see yourself reflected back to you.  Knowing God and truly knowing ourselves is the heart of spiritual development.  Living in community will always bring laughter, new ideas, tears, and misunderstanding.  But new creation brings hope, healing, understanding, and transformation.  We are all being made new into the image of the Son.  I’m learning where my boundaries should be, where my strength comes from, when I need to rest, and when I need to enter in more than I have been.  Yet, I am looking forward to the break.

This week, I will try to rest, and hopefully read some fiction.  Next week I am helping Clarke and Julia build a new wall, and thus a baby’s room in their home.  They are due at Christmas.  After that, and the other repairs that L’Abri needs, I will start working on my two lectures for the coming conference in February.  I need to get one finished before we go home for a couple weeks.  It will be good to be in Oregon for a while, and another un-named surprise location for a few days (to get some sun).  After that it will be back to work, preparing my second lecture for the conference, and preparing for the new term.  Hopefully this year will not be accompanied by Pneumonia.

Gabriel is doing really well.  We both received our H1N1 shots a week ago.  I had a horribly sore shoulder for a day (with accompanying lack of sleep) but nothing any worse than that.  Gabriel gave one little yell, and had no other side effects.  As soon is Carrie is well enough she will get hers to.  It is quite prevalent on the island right now, and we want to protect Gabriel as best we can, especially with all the upcoming holiday travel.  Gabriel is very mobile.  He rolls all over the house, pulls open bottom drawers and chairs, and pulls himself along with his hands.  I think it will only be a very short time now before he starts crawling.

We had a very lovely visit from Carrie’s parents over the weekend (they just left this morning), and yesterday we went out with them into the woods on our property and cut down a Christmas tree.  We decorated it last night, had hot chocolate, mulled wine, roast chicken, Christmas music and good conversation.  It was a blessing… and our family holiday until Christmas itself.  We will be with good friends tomorrow for Thanksgiving, but we won’t see family until Christmas.

Here are a couple pictures for the road.  I’m not sure how often I will post out of term, but I’ll try, and I’ll definitely start up regularly again after the holidays and term begins.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishop’s Hill

Canadian

 

Goodbye Fall Term

our back yard

It is a rainy, gray November day – about what I would expect.  Perhaps it is the weather, or perhaps not, but yesterday it hit me – I am ready for this term to be over.  It’s an accurate measure for how tired I am.  That and how much I have left to give – very little at this point.  Yesterday, after sleeping only two hours the night before (being up with Gabriel) I realized that I have been running on pure adrenaline for the last couple of weeks.  I realized it because when I sat down after lunch, I wasn’t able to relax – this may have been a first for me.  There was a looming sense of “do something productive”, “get something done”, “surely there is more that you can do”.  I literally couldn’t relax.  It was a most unpleasant feeling, because I knew that what I really needed was to sleep, but I couldn’t convince my psyche.  This has been a very emotional and draining term, even though it has been my favorite.  We are ready for the holidays:-)

Gabriel is sick, Carrie is getting sick, and I am working quite hard to care for the three of us and students.  Two more weeks to go.  We are hosting high-tea tonight, and it will be good.  There will be 12 of us, and the theme is “Picnic in the 100 acre woods.”  We will have a very fancy picnic and do a theatrical reading of Winnie the Pooh.  The students love it.  There will also be poetry reading, tea of course, and time for relaxing (for the students anyway).

I lectured on Friday night about Sanctification – our journey towards Christ-likeness.  The process itself was Sanctifying, and all along through my time of preparation, there was ample opportunity for being Sanctified.  When our awareness is raised about ourselves, how do we respond?  When we are faced with truth about who we are, how we treat people, what we are doing – how do we respond to this grace?  Do we participate and receive life as a Grace driven, Spirit led journey towards Christ-likeness, or do we respond in anger, frustration, jealousy, etc because “our” life isn’t going like we want.  When we take a real good look at our relationships, how are treating God, others, ourselves, his creation?  What lies do we tell ourselves, choose to believe, participate in or simply ignore?  All of these things are God calling us into Sanctification, all of these are to be received and participated in for our own transformation.  God loves us too much to leave us as we are.  If we have been justified, then we will be sanctified, and glorified when we see him face to face.  Nothing less than this can masquerade as the word Salvation.  Where is God’s grace pressing into our lives, calling us to be transformed?  Well, right now, its how I respond to everything in my life when I am this tired?  It is grace.  Your prayers would be grace also.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishop’s Hill

Canadian L’Abri

Another Sunday is here.  It has brought us some old friends (our three helpers from last term are up from Portland for the weekend), some rain, and a chance to catch our breath.  We are at the point in the term where, like New Jersey, only the strong survive.  Our term ends on November 23rd, just under a month away.  God has been faithful, very present, and active in the lives of the students.  But we are tired.  Very tired at this point.  We have made a real effort this term to invite people over to our home from the community.  It has been good, but perhaps a bit ambitious.  This term was also much harder, without the Beairds or Jeannie cooking and sharing the load.  We have missed them as friends even more than as fellow workers.  And, this term, we’ve done twice as many lectures.  Actually I will have done 7 instead of 2.  We would appreciate your prayers for health and endurance.

Gabriel has gotten his first immunizations, and responded very well.  We are grateful, because we were being told many horror stories.  I spent quite a while talking with a public health nurse before I was ready.  Sunday always throws off our schedules because Church begins about half an hour into Gabriel’s scheduled nap.  Hopefully we will all get a decent nap today. The other things that came up at his check-up are: Gabriel is 17lbs 11oz.  He is slightly taller than average, and his head is much larger than average.  Also, unfortunately, the doctor picked up that he in fact does have crossed-eyes.  We will need to go and see a specialist on the mainland.  Obviously it is much better than mine were when I was born, but it is still discouraging for me to hear.  Please pray with us about this.  He is the sweetest little boy.

Aside from Oregon winning big at the hated (but largely irrelevant Washington Huskies) and Liverpool beating ManU (very hated and very relevant), it has been a quite sports weekend.  I lead work crew on Saturdays, and I have to sneak over to my computer on tea break to check the scores.  We have had a very nice fall for work projects.  The deck was finished, the cabin has been re-roofed, the barn is full of wood, and we are reviving (clearing, repairing, and pruning) the old orchard (which has been ignored for about 5 years).  The students have bought curtains for the main house, painted a lot of stuff, and been thoroughly excited about sprucing up Salal House.  We are grateful for their enthusiasm and efforts.

Our church is in the middle of finding a new “teaching elder (pastor)” and our interim pastor/change coach has been fantastic.  A lot of really good (and some difficult) stuff is coming up, and we are both hopeful and excited to see who God brings, and what God does in this period of change.  We definitely know what we would like (as does everyone else), but we pray that God will send the right person.  Well, that is it for now; we love to hear your feedback, and look forward to being in Oregon for Christmas.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’Abri

Gabriel has been on solid food (once a day) for a week now.  As I’m typing, I can hear Carrie saying, “oh my gosh” over and over again.  Gabriel is laughing, and must feel significantly better.  It’s funny what food does for digestion.  As to the joys of eating, Gabriel is thoroughly enjoying his cereal and is quite quick to let us know exactly how he wants to be fed.  Woe to the person that lets the food bowl get within his reach.

We have had two very busy weekends, with another one coming up.  We had fourteen at our table yesterday, and it was a delight.  This past friday night we had a lecture on Food and Sabbath.  How we view food has startling insights into how we view the world, ourselves, and our place in it.  There was much lively discussion afterwards.  The students who come here care very deeply about the world, and want desperately to be active in justice and reconciliation.  It is beautiful to see.  We were also blessed by a visit from Vicki and Nate, last weekend.  They were gracious enough to make the 6 hour drive for just a weekend.  It was great to see them, and their generosity and care was a true blessing.

For those of you familiar with our cats, they are loving their new indoor/outdoor status.  Nola has brought us three mice, and three birds already.  The downside (from their point of view) is that they get less lap time when they are dirty, and Cleo at least feels rather neglected (see picture below).  The funny thing is that they still run inside to use the litter box, and then run back outside.  They have yet to understand the enormous litter box at their disposal.  Oh well.

There is a ton going on in my world, both with all the lectures I’m doing, and what God is putting on my heart.  I feel that this season truly is a spring/summer in my life.  There is fruit on the vine, and I can prayerfully see it ripening.  I wont go into all of that, and I’m not even sure where I’d start.  The one theme that will not go away is the Kingdom of God.  I guess I’ll keep listening.  Let me just express gratitude for the work of God, that I both see and experience on a day-to-day basis – it is astounding.  This is a beautiful term, the students are amazing, and God is being glorified in all our lives.  But before I go, I’ll leave you with a picture of my son… learning to eat.  Is there ever a time when we are not learning to receive something new from God.  I hope that I have as much fun in doing it as Gabriel does in eating, because I know that I’m at least that messy.

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’Abri

What do you mean no lap time?!

I love when daddy posts

Food good

Today was a hallmark for me at L’Abri.  It marked the first time in a long time that a student saw the beauty of the Church – The Bride of Christ.  Most students who come here are so wounded by the church (their local, or Christians in the Media), that they are looking for a reason to be done with it.  Consequently nearly all of my time is spent admitting the failures of the Church (historic), while trying to turn their vision (rather ineffectively) to the beauty of the Church (historic).

Today we had a lunch discussion about missions, again the question was asked from a position of bewilderment, disappointment and anger.  So much of the missionary movement in the past 250 years has been accompanied by a very disembodied spirituality.  In fact, a gnostic dualism has informed much of their work.  If we are only concerned about souls not going to hell, we end up justifying just about anything for this end.  In a nut shell, this means that somehow the soul is all that matters, and the body (or culture 0r clean water) doesn’t matter.  This just isn’t true.   Missions was viewed largely in terms of conversions, which meant sinners prayer.  This hasn’t always produced good results, even when procuring many “conversions”.  Discipleship has not often been the focus.  And the kingdom (think – “the reign”) of God has been even less of a focus.  Instead of asking “how many conversions”, maybe we should ask what would it look like if the reign of God was established here?  For that matter we should ask that about our own politics, economics, etc. and the reign of God.

Early on in the Church apologetics wasn’t about Theology in the same way that we think of it today.  The church did some of that for sure, but there was less… “this is what we believe and why” when it came to giving a defense of the Church to outsiders.  Rather, and especially in Rome, there where letters written “giving a defense” that looked completely different.  It looked something more like this, “Not only are the Christians radically different because they care for and take care of their own, but because they take care of the ones who persecute them as well.”  Letters written between Roman officials admitted to “losing” the war with Christians, because despite them not defending themselves (dying willingly) they wouldn’t stop loving those who hated them.  They sold themselves into slavery to minister to the slaves.  They adopted the babies left out on the streets to die.  They gave women a place of dignity.  This was the power of the gospel that changed an entire culture.  Nor was it an isolated incident.

Though our Lord’s bride is very human, and ugly at times, she is where God has chosen to work in the world.  In fact, when the church is called the temple, we are meant to show the face of God to the world.  Not simply by offering up an altar call, but by offering up our lives.  In pouring out our lives, the gospel transforms everything it touches.  The world was not ready for the early Christians.  They had no defence for that kind of self-less love.  I’m not sure what to say of the North American Church today.  What letters do the non-christians write about us now.

I left the table today without being saddened about the current state of things; rather, I was  in awe of God’s Bride (historic).  When the church has lived into its calling, the world has been altered, like nothing else can possible do.  The Gospel has changed the world, and can do so again.  Are we willing to be changed by the gospel, or would we rather change it?

Jeff Adams

Cedar House, Bishops Hill

Canadian L’abri.