Today is Pentecost Sunday. Today we celebrate the Holy Spirit breaking into the apostles’ lives and the incredible events of that day. Our church has been encouraged to wear red because Pentecost is a celebration. And even though EA, Jim, and I will be leaving this morning to begin training our summer staff, we’ll be wearing red. But I confess I feel like I’m celebrating the party of a friend I only kind of know.

Growing up in a Baptist church, we didn’t talk about the Holy Spirit much save for a shout out right before we submerged a new Christian. It kind of seems like we don’t give much thought to the Spirit in our Western churches outside of Pentecostalism.

I sort of understand that. God the Creator and Jesus we get. They have a well-defined place. The Spirit is a little bit harder to nail down. It is very esoteric and we don’t like esoteric. It’s not empirical. The Spirit can seem a bit New Age-y. Then we hear about speaking in tongues and it sort of scares us at times.

I sometimes think of the Spirit as this distant relative that walks the line between unbelievably brilliant and crazy. I interact with the Spirit, but it’s like it is on a wavelength that I can’t quite grasp. It’s running around the house like Doc Brown with crazy hair and screaming, “You’re not thinking fourth dimensionally, Marty!”

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Up (2009)

I have a knack for falling in love with low-rated, critically-beloved TV shows. These shows bring me so much enjoyment, but they are watched by so few people that there’s this constant fear they’ll get the ax at any moment. This started with Sports Night during my teens and continues today with my two favorite shows: Community and Parks & Recreation. Thankfully those two shows are coming back in the fall, but the former is coming back without its creator Dan Harmon. This is a bit disconcerting.

I’ve said before that while Community is not as consistently excellent as Parks, it has a higher ceiling because of its go-for-broke, absolutely anything can happen nature. You could have a relatively normal episode or you could go inside an 8-bit video game, a paintball war could break out, you could venture into multiple timelines, zombies could invade, or it could be a more subdued character study. It is one of the few utterly unpredictable shows on TV. That’s possibly why it’s low-rated and definitely part of why I love it so much. By accounts of the cast and crew, the lion’s share of that comes from Harmon’s vision.

This isn’t to beatify Harmon. He himself has said that he can be a incredibly difficult man with which to work. No doubt that is one of the reasons why Sony decided to hand the keys of his kingdom to someone else. However much has also been said that the studio is hoping that the new showrunners will broaden the appeal of the show. The word “broaden” basically means “to make it more like the other shows that are on TV.” In other words, to dilute the creativity, to make it more predictable, to make Community less like what is quintessentially Community.

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Jim,
I thought about writing you a physical letter, but by the time you would be somewhat interested in reading it that piece of paper would have inevitably gotten lost. So I’m putting it on here. This is my blog. Who knows what they’ll be in 10 or 20 years. I realize that by directing you to this one day, I am taking a bit of a risk. You’re going to discover that in addition to writing about matters of faith and raising you that I’ll occasionally waste over 2,800 words pitching sequels to cheesy movies from the 1990s. Your dad can be a bit of a nerd sometimes. I’m sorry about that.

It’s hard to believe that you are already two years old. It doesn’t seem that long ago since we were in that hospital room. That entire day was a blur. But I still remember how small and fragile you were. You may have opened your eyes once that first day. Everyone was so excited to see you. Your mom and I felt blessed beyond anything to have such a healthy, handsome baby boy.

We feel infinitely more blessed today. You are no longer that tiny, fragile baby. You are definitely a tough little guy. You are constantly moving. You shoot balls into a laundry basket. You climb up and down off the couch. You trip and spring back up. When you run, your shoulders and arms curl up like you’re a cannonball about to shoot off. You give really good hugs even though sometimes your version of a hug is looking to the side and just saying “Awwww.”

Two years ago, the only sounds you really made were crying and cooing. Today it seems like you add another section of the dictionary to your vocabulary every week. When we drive through town, you point out the cars, the flags, the names of restaurants, and animals. The other day when I was trying to get Obie into the car, you told him to “Hop in.” We can carry on some conversations with you. One of the coolest things about being your dad has been getting to watch you discover the world around you. I hope you never lose that sense of awe.

Now I don’t want you to think that you were perfect during this time period. On occasion, you throw a wicked temper tantrum and during those you have a knack for hitting me in the windpipe. You haven’t quite learned that the world doesn’t revolve around you. Of course, you are two. You also have a pretty thorough addiction to watching Curious George on television. Most mornings the first thing you say to me is “Watch George.” Don’t get me wrong, I’ll probably prefer that to a lot of shows you’ll end up watching in the future, but good grief, we watch George a lot.

But those are just little things. On the whole? My gosh, you’re amazing. I cannot adequately describe to you how lucky your mom and I feel to have you as a part of our lives. By being your parents, I think that each of us have become better people. We’ve become more patient, more caring. I cannot adequately put into words how much we both love you. And the fact of the matter is that love is only going to grow.

In a way, you have been one of the things that has kept me tethered to God these last few years. The world, sometimes the church, and mainly folks on the internet make it really hard sometimes to continue following Jesus. But I look at you and I want to keep going. I want you to love and trust Jesus. I want you to be a Christian that loves people and makes a true difference in the world. I don’t want you to have a house of cards faith like so many people do where if you remove an inconsequential thing then everything else comes falling down. And so there are times when I’m not sure if I want to press on and you’re one of the reasons that I still do.

It’s weird to think about you reading this in the future. A lot of things are going to change. For starters, you’ll be able to read. I realize we’re going to hit a point where I suddenly will become exponentially less cool to you. We’ll grow apart some because that’s how life works. Your capacity for disobeying us is going to increase one day and we’ll have to discipline you. You’re going to mess up. We’re going to mess up. My hope and prayer is that we can make it through all of that. I hope we do a good job teaching you right from wrong and about loving God in a way that doesn’t self-destruct when you hit adulthood. I hope I don’t screw things up because I believe you can do so many wonderful things. 

I promise you that I will do whatever I can to protect you and guide you through life. Know that I am always here for you. Know that you can ask me absolutely anything no matter what. Know that I will always be proud to call you my son. Know that I love you more than you’ll ever know.

And know that one of the very best things that happens to me everyday right now is when you look up at me, smile, and say “Daddy.”

So Happy Birthday Jim. I love you with all my heart and I really do believe you are the most amazing kid in the world.

Love,
Your Dad 

It has been a frantic last couple of weeks. We’re in the last half month before we head off to run conferences for the summer. I have a four day Bible study that needs to be finished, a 30+ page program book that I need to lay out, and vast array of other things on deck. This time of year is normally stressful.

Yet things have started piling.

My sister is getting married on Saturday, which is exciting and wonderful. But anyone who has been in a wedding of the non-Elvis-presiding variety knows that there is a lot to do in preparation. So this means that I’m having to watch Jim more as my mom helps my sister with wedding stuff. Jim is not very conducive to all that work that needs to be done especially when he is sick.

This past weekend, Jim came down with a virus. It started with him running a high fever, waking up every couple of hours at night, and being fairly lethargic during the day. He is back to a fairly normal schedule, but still feels under the weather. He’s almost two and this has created a perfect storm in which he is having epic meltdowns unlike any we’ve ever seen. He just screams and cries and there is nothing that any of us can do to console him. It is the absolute worst feeling I have ever experienced. I am completely powerless. I don’t know what demented scenario would exist in which this would take place, but if I could sacrifice my arm for him to feel better, I gladly would.

I was finally starting to get a handle on our hectic, present normal, when late last night a monster storm tore through our area. Lightning, wind, thunder, hail, cats, dogs, and perhaps a turtle or two. I pulled back our living room curtains this morning to find that one of the trees in our front yard had split in the storm. A massive chunk was lying in front of our house; a house we are trying to sell. So we’ve got to get rid of this tree in the next 9 days before leave and that is going to take a good chunk of money that we need for things like food and paying bills.

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