the ancient art of shalom » flipbook

Friday’s Flip Book (3/11/11): Some Cool Free Stuff and Pray for Japan

Jason — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 15:48:47 +0000

Here’s some free stuff for the week:

Gray Matter, a book chronicling Dr. David Levy’s experience in praying for patients before surgery. One day I’ll read it, but it’s only free this month.
A short booklet by Sam Storms entitled The Restoration of All Things, talking about some tough topics. Part of a series published by The Gospel Coalition.
Not sure if it’s still going this morning, but the cool folks at monocase are giving away one of their sweet M80 electric guitar gig bags (on twitter). They make awesome stuff–I’ve got a fresh-looking wallet myself.
menuism, started by some friends of mine, celebrates their recent fundraiser for the SF Food Bank, providing 15,000 meals for the hungry in the city of St. Francis. Awesome.
Lastly, breaking news this morning, an 8.9 quake hits Japan triggering a tsunami. Pray, pray, pray for the people of Japan.

Friday’s Flip Book – Teaching in House Churches and Photography Trends

Jason — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 15:43:16 +0000

Here’s a few things I’ve been reading in the past week…

Felicity Dale writes her job description of a teacher (according to gifting, not a position) in a house church.
Ed Waken provides some profound insight into a plague of our day (that I myself am certainly prone to): Spiritual Information Addiction–”What if instead of simply acquiring more and more Biblical information, we focus on distributing the spiritual resources deposited in our souls?”
Mike Kim puts out some challenging thoughts on why we should emphasize character formation over best practices in how we teach and disciple–”Everyone acknowledges that the bulk of Jesus’ teaching from the Sermon on the Mount is about personal character in the Kingdom, but, strangely, no one is teaching that.”
On an unrelated note, but of interest to photo people like me, Thom Hogan writes on the current state of camera technology (with a focus on Nikon stuff).

Friday’s Flip Book – Christmas Eve Edition (12/24/10)

Jason — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 17:24:24 +0000

‘Twas the day before Christmas 2010. Here are some links for you as you wind down from the year:

An article at CNN on why “Christian-famous” pastor Francis Chan left his church. “Even in my own church I heard the words, ‘Francis Chan’ more than I heard the words, ‘Holy Spirit.’”
A whole mess of free Christmas music at amazon. Nothing wrong with that.
An intriguing essay at the New York Times parenting blog written by a friend of a friend on an alternative way to view gifts and Christmas. Curious for your thoughts.
“Tentmaking,” or bi-vocational ministry, something I plan on writing about more here, is discussed at length in this three-part series (part 1, part 2, part 3) over at patheos.

Merry Christmas everyone. Shalom.

Friday’s Flip Book (10/22/10): Back Behind the Lens

Jason — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 00:07:33 +0000

In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve been trying to push myself back into art, which in my case is photography. For that reason, for this Friday’s collection of links, I wanted to highlight a few talented photographer friends of mine…check out their stuff!

I’ve known Lee for close to eight years now, and have always appreciated his eye for color and composition of landscape and outdoor stuff. We’ve got the same brand of tripod, and his version of a sanded and stained IKEA TV stand looks SO much better than mine. Probably representative of relative skills as a craftsman. See his work at Lee Ott Photography.

George I’ve known for just a little longer than that, and has some awesome humanitarian photography from around the world. I especially like his collection from Lisboa, Peru, from my favorite travel continent. He once loaned me a very large, very heavy television set that spontaneously turned off periodically. No remote. See more at George Hsia Photography.

Kenneth’s the third photographer friend I’ve known for about eight years, and I distinctly remember that he almost never fails to have a camera with him to capture an event or a moment in time. He’s pretty good with computers too, and can even fix dented bumpers on a Prius. See his stuff at Kenneth Chan Photography.

Friday’s Flip Book (9/17/2010): Teaching, Tools, and Poverty

Jason — Sat, 18 Sep 2010 04:10:14 +0000

Some links around the web for you this week that caught my eye:

Neil Cole writes and insightful piece on the role of the teacher in the church, reminding us that all teaching has to bring about a transformed life marked by obedience, and that the teacher is meant to equip and release more teachers (a la Ephesians 4). As he summarizes in his view of teaching: “(it is) facilitating the learning of others so that they know, do and pass on to others the relevant and meaningful truth.”
In the education realm, one of our local middle schools is part of a pilot iPad implementation program, to facilitate the learning of algebra. With technology, I’ve always struggled with tension of the “cool” factor of simply having a gadget versus actually seeing them as tools to help you do something better. I hope with the iPads it ends up being the latter.
For some of you Bible geeks out there, Bill Mounce has an intriguing starter piece on the question, “What is an ‘Accurate’ Translation?”
And in another, social justice/inequity realm, a sobering report emerges that 1 in 7 Americans lives in poverty, a total of 43.6 million people. This is not the way it was meant to be.

Friday’s Flip Book (2/19/2010): Is it February already?

Jason — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 15:46:05 +0000

Time flies! Now, to resume regularly scheduled program, I’m back to the blog:

One: Baylight Church Community started a “Read the Bible in Two Years” thing over at the blog, and you can track the conversation in the comments or on the Facebook page. I think it’ll be a great season for the church.
Two: Marcia wrote a great post about our journey to simplify. I’ll write more in the future too, but it’s been a great process for us.
Three: Want some more free Kindle books? You can pick up some Devotions for Lent or a biography of John Newton for, that’s right, zero bucks. And remember, there’s a Kindle reader for Windows, the iPhone/iPod Touch, or the Blackberry, so you don’t even have to have a Kindle!
Four: We now watch a fair bit of Sesame Street. Plus, Muppets are cool. So check out this awesome interactive page on the various Muppets over the years. I never knew Elmo was three and a half. So articulate!

Peace.

Saturday’s Flip Book (12/26/2009): The Day After Christmas

Jason — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 16:10:05 +0000

It’s the day after Christmas, the skies are a classic SF overcast, my stomach is still full from a night of feasting, and it’s great to be home. I hope you had a wonderful day resting, eating, traveling, or whatever you were up to. I’m particularly thankful for family and friends, and the huge blessing it is to be free to simply be together.

One: Some good friends introduced us to the music of Sara Groves, and her songwriting, themes, and sound are powerful and inspiring. And right now, you can download her latest album Fireflies And Songs for just five bucks.
Two: As we celebrate Christmas, one of the most striking words that comes to mind is “Immanuel,” meaning “With us, GOD.” At our church community gathering earlier in December, we were reading through the full lyrics of the song “O Come, O Come Emmanuel,” and we were struck by the depth of the words. Just this week, I got to the section in New Testament Theology where he discusses the connection between the Gospels and the Old Testament. He made a profound connection (for me) between the beginning and end of the gospel of Matthew: “We also see a theme that frames the entire book of Matthew. Jesus is Immanuel – God with us (Matt. 1:23) – and the book concludes with Jesus’ words, ‘I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ All that the OT teaches about God being with his people is fulfilled in Jesus as Immanuel.” (Schreiner, 73)
Three: Any Bible software geeks out there? Logos is running their Christmas Specials through the end of the year. Some pretty good stuff in there.
Four: My friend Leslie Kim has a timely thought about joy in the midst of chaos, in which she concludes, “joy overcomes the chaos, putting the flotsam and jetsam of my life in perspective. Peace, joy, blessedness reign.”

Indeed, may joy reign in your life as 2009 comes to a close.

Friday’s Flip Book (12/18/2009)