Watching the One Who´s Worthy

If you ever come to our church, don't watch the worship group.

Oh don't get me wrong! I think that Beth and her team do a great job, as do Brad & Sandy, or Sally and Lucy. It's not that at all.

Watch as the gal at the front of the church plays “air guitar” during the worship choruses. In fact, she plays every other instrument the team at the front plays too – air drums, air organ, air shaker or egg, air violin, air piano.
==

Here we are, here we are*
the broken and used, mistreated, abused
Here we are
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Something is not right. She is homeless, I believe. Her shock of black hair, self-cut it appears. Her green polyester, stretch slacks and the home-made, padded vest. It is the same. The instruments change; the clothes are pretty much the same. My wife leans over and says, “I want to give her a pair of shoes; those have had it.”

But something is also very right. She worships freely, abandoning inhibitions about what others may think. I recall a Sunday we sang about That Day –one day in the future of all who follow Jesus -- when we shall find our completeness in Him. I watched our air musician and rejoiced. She has as much available in eternity as I do. And she may be better practiced at freely worshipping the One who deserves all of us – mind, emotion, body, and will.

Here You are, here You are
The beautiful One who came like a Son
Here You are

Someday, she will not seek overnight shelter in our hospital nor desire to live on the streets. In Christ, there is hope for something better. Something glorious.

But there is more than just hope for a future Kingdom. There is hope on Earth, although all solutions won't appear here. In Air Musician's home country of Indonesia, our organization has assisted in the start-up of a couple dozen radio stations. Our brothers and sisters press on with the message of salvation as the world watches. Their eyes are fixed on the beautiful One who came like a Son.

Their faith encourages me. Our friend, Ty,** knows the price that some of our Indonesian brothers and sisters pay for their faith in Christ.

Here we are, here we are
Bandaged and bruised, awaiting a cure
Here we are

Here You are, here You are
Our beautiful King, bringing relief
here You are with us

So we lift up our voices, and open our hands
Let go of the things, that have kept us from Him

Things. They can be thought patterns, habits. And then again, things. Just all the stuff that we think we want. I know I do. Maybe someday I can be satisfied with just an air guitar, instead of a collection of guitars.

In May in a rural field near La Cygne, Kansas, more than 3,000 students gathered for “Paradise”, an event to worship Jesus through Scripture, prayer and singing. Erin Roach*** wrote about it for Baptist Press. She said, “much effort was made to ensure that all attention would be on Jesus, the only name promoted at the gathering. Nothing was sold or advertised, no one made money, and no agenda was advanced.”

Kinda reminds me of the late Keith Green, so passionate that people would hear that he instituted a “whatever you can afford to pay” policy on his LPs. Here's the after-concert agenda for Casting Crowns: “Melodee DeVevo prays for marriages, Chrs Huffman for those who are in ministry, Megan Garrett for mothers, Andy Williams for those who battle addictions, Juan DeVevo for fathers and families, Hector Cervantes for men to walk with God, and Mark Hall for those who are “still on the outside looking in.” ****

Don't look at the worshippers, whether they're on stage or in the front pew. But listen to the words, as they sing:

You are the one who has come
and is coming again,
to make it alright
You're the remedy
Oh, in us You're the remedy

Let us be the remedy
Let us bring the remedy

*song lyrics by David Crowder Band. The link is http://www.davidcrowderband.com/
***see full story here http://www.baptistmessenger.com/a/search/author/Erin%20Roach
****see full story here http://charismamag.com/cms/printPage.php?id=17191

50 Years of Care at the Edge of the Amazon

Thanks for taking nine minutes of your time to view a video we have put out celebrating the 50th Anniversary of our hospital in Shell.

This hospital has been a major catalyst for sharing the gospel on the edge of the Amazon in Ecuador.
(Thanks to Duane for putting this together.)
http://www.youtube.com/v/FUpUBODssBw&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0">

Cobblestone, Cheering Crowds, Lighted Churches

And a few live bands in a really fun 10K run though the historic downtown. I rode down to the Start with Dale, along with Stu, Ben, Loren, Janelle, Sharon and Steve and his family.
I wish I could say lightning quick legs made none of my shots of the live music turn out. But no, I have to blame my camera's shutter delay instead.

Brass bands and drum corps played, and in between those musical interludes, groups of military men chanted cadence as they jogged along. Their voices echoed up and down the narrow streets.
As Stu told me before we began,
"Nothing really opens up" during the race through those streets from centuries ago.

You might gain a few steps here or there, but it's mostly wall to wall runners. People stood on the quaint balconies this city's old town is known for, and others watch from doorways or the sidewalk.



Besides the encouragement I gleaned as the soldiers shouted "Latacunga! step, step, step, step, Loja! step, step, step, step, Quito ! . . .

I also enjoyed seeing the wheelchair participants. A fella got a little help from a friend as he wheeled his way up a 30 degree grade early in the race.

And of course the churches. It's called
Ruta de las Iglesias or loosely translated the Church Run. If you're interested, here's the list:
La Basilica, La Merced, San Francisco, La Compania, El Sagrario, La Catedral, La Concepcion, San Agustin, Santo Domingo, Santa Catalina and San Blas.

It's well organized, with a chip supplied when you register and chip return booths after the finish line. Your personal time is sent to the e-mail address that you provided upon registration. The only precaution is that plastic water bags by the hundreds are discarded at water stops and that can get a little slippery sometimes.




Watch your step at times, expect lots of other runners and not too wide of track, anticipate the altitude (Quito is about 2,800 meters).

And don't go too fast. You might miss the scenery.

Death Upon Death and New Life from a Citizen Journalist

On September 8, 2004, the CBS program 60 Minutes aired an investigation by Dan Rather offering typed information as proof President George W. Bush had evaded the draft. Later that evening Harry MacDougald, posting on FreeRepublic.com, challenged the validity of the documents based on the style of typeface. Other bloggers picked up the post and searched for examples of 1970s typewriters.* -Clyde H. Bentley, Ph.D., Assoc. Professor, University of Missouri School of Journalism

Dr. Bentley goes on to tell how the thread was picked up by popular blogs the DrudgeReport.com, and then the mainstream media. The documents on 60 Minutes were proven to have been forged and CBS apologized.

“"The pajamahadeen reduced Mr Rather" was the e-mail forward in my Inbox. (See story here.)
But in September 2004 I didn’t foresee how a diffused form of gathering and dispersing news would forever change journalism.

I was grieving our cuts to English-language programming on international shortwave, including newscasts that were global in scope. I was also convinced that international broadcasters had arranged their own “we- -no-longer-have-an-audience” self-fulfilling prophecies by cutting broadcasts. (Late 2003 story here.)

Our newswire contract ended; I closed down our newsroom, then translated copy from Spanish for English newscasts on our local FM. The “death of shortwave” discussion continued, but my time in shortwave broadcasting had ended. I held out hope, for my predessor in public relations had written, “The future of shortwave and AM radio has arrived. It is called DRM or Digital Radio Mondial . . . “

The FM newscasts continued for 18 months before my predecessor moved to other things and I shifted to public relations myself. My heart is still in news and so it isn’t easy four years later to read bleak reports about newspapers and their future.

Steven Rattner summarizes in his Wall Street Journal commentary Red All Over, “the news about newspapers could hardly be more dismal: falling circulation, repeated rounds of layoffs, disappearing ads and a chain of bad earning reports.” (The full story is found here.)

Eric Alterman's article in The New Yorker looks about as gloomy: “Out of Print – The death and life of the American newspaper.” (The full story is here.)

On occasion my work feels like news. And it feels good, in spite of that fact we're dealing with natural catastrophes and human suffering. When our disaster response teams have gone to places such as the quake zone of Nias Island, Indonesia and northern Pakistan, we have often used the traditional journalist/interviewee approach via phone calls.

We have since handed that coverage to “citizen journalist” Steve, who by the way, also happens to be our family physician.




He interviews on either side of a microphone. From flooded Ecuador, he did a stand-up report for GlobalHarry (a citizen journalist in his own right) and you may view that here.

His photos –especially of children – are filled with pathos even as they reflect people’s resilience amid tragedy. He knows how to offer genuine empathy and gain people's trust, and before long he and his wife, Dorothy, have people telling their stories before the microphone.

And Steve is dedicated, staying up nights after he has worked throughout the day in order to upload interviews and photos. In the response to the tsunami in the Solomon Islands, he and Brad slept on the floor of a radio station with Internet service. Intermittently they woke up so Steve could start another upload to the ftp site (file transfer protocol.) They put up a 100 megabyte video (you may see it here.)

One time he wrote me from India, “The dang thing finally went at 5am on the day we were leaving Faridpur Enjoy." I smiled because Steve never wastes time dropping down into the e-mail window to tell you what's on his mind. No, he crams it all into the subject line. I still smile at that.




I worked with him on the ground just once, in flooded Tabasco state in Mexico. In the van ride back from the flooded ranchlands around Villahermosa, he shot picture after picture of the Mexican sunset with his Canon. This was how he and Dorothy had spent their 30th wedding anniversary – helping people with their health needs and providing a listening ear.



I can see arguments both for and against the new form of journalism (Alterman's conclusion on articles that would disappear with the passing of the traditional media is excellent, if not alarming).

But my argument in favor of doctors doing journalism from disaster zones . . . is Steve.



*Discussion paper prepared for the Carnegie-Knight Conference on the Future of Journalism, Cambridge, MA June, 2008

A-nimals at the Z-oo from A to Z

More information at the Henry Doorly Zoo site