Entries Tagged 'thehighcalling.org' ↓

The first HighCallingBlogs.com meme is spreading around the net. We’ve got people reflecting on lessons from some really odd jobs - a BBQ busboy, a Venus Fry Cook (not really), a sorter of phone cords (phones have cords?), and one really frightening picture of gas masks.

Drop by our main page to read some of these fun articles and insights.

And if you’ve ever had an odd job, write about it! Then shoot me an email so I can include you in the group. My Editor-in-Chief for TheHighCalling.org has tentatively agreed to let us publish the best meme entry on TheHighCalling.org. It could be you!

A few months ago, I had the opportunity to interview Francis Collins for TheHighCalling.org. (You can read part one here.) Dr. Collins is the author of the New York Times hardback and paperback bestseller, The Language of God.

As far as I’m concerned, this book should be required reading for all Christians.

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At Laity Lodge, we’ve had a close connection to J. I. Packer for many years. Every year, I get the chance to hear this man speak and open the Scripture. At first, his style seemed dry to me, but gradually I came to appreciate the incredible wisdom he has. One Laity Lodge director described listening to Packer as being something akin to drinking from a firehose.

In the first ever posted Laity Lodge video, here’s J. I. Packer describing his calling to write. (I’d be curious what you think of the video, too.)

50,000 words each week. That’s how much people are writing as participants of HighCallingBlogs.com. A new draft of a nonfiction book about faith and work–each week! How awesome is that?

Gordon and I are slowly getting a handle on the gargantuan task of managing the network of HighCallingBlogs.com.

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Does that make me a bad father? The children’s ministry told me about it kindly on Sunday morning. “Your son taught us  a new song,” they said.

My son broke out into song right there…

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For Christmas, the Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy Folks are featuring the second issue of the ezine Wayfarer’s Journal. The journal has had a bit of a slow start, only publishing two issues last year, but there are a few stories and poems to browse through.

My favorite elements of the site are nonfiction. For example, Brandon Barr’s discussion of Christian themes in Cordwainer Smith or Terri Main’s article on Luke Skywalker vs. St. Luke (great title). Terri Main concludes, “In all literature a character’s Christianity should set him or her apart from non-Christian characters. They must not only believe differently, they must also act differently. That means that they cannot use carnal weapons, either figuratively or literally, to win a spiritual war. They cannot confuse the agents of the enemy for the enemy himself.”

Now, that makes me think. I agree with the sentiment, but I wonder what kind of advice that becomes for someone who is sitting down to tell a ripping good yarn.

On their home page, Wayfarer’s Journal states that their mission is to “publish and review science fiction with a spiritual dimension.” Although that mission only implies that they are looking for ripping good yarns, focusing on the spiritual dimension is still a worthy, ambitious goal.

And it raises an important question for writers of Christian science fiction–or Christian fantasy, Christian fiction, Christian poetry, Christian drama, even good old fashioned Christian nonfiction.

What makes something spiritual?

(Keep reading, and I promise I’ll get to the picture of the fishheads.)

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Mary has already traced this meme to the fifth generation. Impressive! I’m a delayed first generation post. The rules are self-explanatory, but you can read the details at Mary’s original post.

Quick: What were you doing ten, twenty and thirty years ago?

Do you want to know my answers?

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Reading Craver’s post about insane soccer parents, I got to thinking about competitive sports.

This weekend, I went to a preseason Spurs game against the Houston Rockets. It was the last game of preseason, and I’ve never seen anything like a preseason game.

Early in the game, the players were giving encouragement to <i>the opposing team</i> after good plays. Coach Popovitch gave one Houston player a big hug during an early timeout.

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Donna Novitsky of Big Tent says her motto is “Go Big or Don’t Go.” But she also offers some interesting advice for working people with families in the Stanford Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Seminar. (Click on this link to stream or download the one hour podcast, “From Venture Capitalist to Entrepreneur.”)

The moderator says she has a different worklife balance between her business and her career than most people he knows. Then, he asks her to explain to the students how she finds balance between her work and her family (which consists of a husband, two kids, and a cat).

Here’s Novitsky’s response:

Finding balance is probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do… When you have kids, everything changes. No longer is it solely your agenda, and they move at their own pace, and you need to adapt yourself to their pace. And so that’s just incredibly challenging because I’m used to being able to put in whatever hours it takes to get the A, whatever hours it takes to get another customer. Whatever hours. And now I can’t do that anymore.

One thing I discovered is that you’ve got to think of balance not in terms of a day or a week or maybe even a month. But balance takes place over a long period of time.

For instance, in 2006, I worked only a couple of days a week, spent a lot of time at home, got involved with the kids’ school, got them to make their beds when they go to school, got them to set the dinner table on a regular basis. Some little goals that I had for our family that take time and focus. Building that base allowed me to go at Big Tent, which is basically a 7 am to 7 pm role.

Between my husband and I, John now pretty much is home… So while I work really hard during the week, I also find some balance on the weekends, and I’m a dedicated world class soccer mom out there with the kids. You learn to juggle. You need to change the equation now and then, but who your life partner is is also a key part of that. And understanding yourself and your priorities is an important thing as you make those choices.

I don’t know Novitsky’s faith. But I think there is some real wisdom in this statement: Balance takes place over a long period of time.

Don’t try to balance your day. Don’t try to schedule your work and your relationships into a legalistic regimen of scheduled activities, duties, and obligations. No one needs another ten commandments of parenting.

After all, the law and the prophets come down to two commands. Love God. Love others. That’s it.

I love Monday mornings because now I can get to work. (Just like I love Monday evenings because then I get to be with my family.)

As long as it has taken us to get this blog network started, I could just as easily call this post “The Boy Who Cried Blog!” But you know, we wanted to get as many kinks worked out as possible.

Listen.

There is a time for everything under the sun. A time to blog, and a time to comment. A time to write code, and a time to write poetry. A time to build a network, and a time to launch a network.

This is a time to launch.

AND I NEED YOUR HELP.

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