Randy Greenwald

My guess is that not many of us have neighbors who are Olympic athletes. In our first home in Wyoming, Ohio, a Cincinnati suburb, the family home of a former swimming gold medal winner was just down the street from us, but that is as close as we’ve ever come.

At our BBQ on July 3, we spoke with one of our neighbors, Paul Schulte, who is on, we discovered, the US Paralympics basketball team. Paul is a paraplegic who has competed for a number of years at the highest level of wheelchair basketball, primarily with the Dallas Mavericks affiliated team.

Paul (with his wife, the former Meghan Greenwald – no relation, we think) will be heading for Beijing the end of August. The paralympics begin the week after the regular olympics end.

I’m excited by this. In previous neighborhoods, we rarely got to know our neighbors well enough to know who was living down the street. We have been intentional in this hoping that we could bless others. So far, the blessing has come our way.

We plan to have Paul and his wife over for dinner sometime soon. Paul is one of the world’s elite athletes. He just can’t walk.

Technorati Tags: Sports

Thirty years ago today a woman spoke two words which changed my life forever. Those words were, “I do.”

Wow. What an inconceivable thing, that someone would make a commitment to me and then keep that commitment not for five or ten years, but for thirty.

I thank God for Barb and her love for me and for her faithfulness to the commitments she makes. I have no question, on the basis of those two words, that this woman will be with me until death.

***

Due to the kindness of a friend and due to the willing commitment of our younger daughters to care for our young son, we are able to celebrate this milestone with a week in Chicago.

***

The song that was sung at our wedding continues to be our prayer for our relationship together. We share it with you here:

May the mind of Christ our Savior
live in us from day to day,
by his love and pow’r controlling all we do and say.

May the Word of God dwell richly
in our hearts from hour to hour,
so that all may see we triumph only through his pow’r.

May the peace of God our Father
rule our life in everything,
that we may be calm to comfort sick and sorrowing.

May the love of Jesus fill us
as the waters fill the sea;
him exalting, self abasing, this is victory.

May his beauty rest upon us
as we seek the lost to win,
and may they forget the channel, seeing only him.

On July 3, 2004, my wife and I decided that one way to build community in our neighborhood and to get to know our neighbors was to invite the entire neighborhood to our house for burgers the evening before Independence Day.

This year, (July 3, 2008 – coincidentally, this always seems to occur on July 3), was our fifth BBQ, and it was, in our opinion, a great success. There are 120 homes in our neighborhood, and we have found over the years that generally there are a pool of people who attend every year. But that is okay. It gives at least a yearly chance to connect with those whom we’ve come to know.

This year, I placed by the front door 50 name tags, thinking that that was a good estimate of how many would come. Those disappeared very quickly. I’m guessing there were between 60 and 70 folks in our home (it was, of course, raining outside).

This year our BBQ was enhanced and greatly aided by members of the small group that we are a part of in our church. Members came, mingled, and engaged in conversation with our neighbors. The great thing about this was that they were able to help make our neighbors feel welcomed, and should any of these neighbors ever want to visit the church, there will be others there beside Barb and I with whom they will be acquainted.

Also, members of the small group did a great job of helping us prepare and clean up. This year’s event, though always a lot of work, was significantly less this year. Our hats off to our small group, and our appreciation to our neighbors who are ALL great neighbors.

Technorati Tags: Ministry, Outreach

Last Sunday morning I was reading Psalm 2 for my early morning ‘get ready for worship’ devotions. I was drawn to a phrase that has both puzzled and enthralled me all week as I have reflected on its implications. In verse 11 the kings of the earth are told to ‘rejoice with trembling’. I was stunned by that. How do you rejoice and tremble? The trembling seems to be a response of fear. Can one rejoice and experience fear at the same time?

I was also reminded that the puritan Jeremiah Burroughs wrote his classic Gospel Worship based upon Isaiah 66:2 reminding his readers that God shows favor to those who ‘tremble at his word’.

Here is the question: we come as Christians to worship the same God as David and all the saints before Christ. We come as those who have been brought into God’s favor by the loving sacrifice of the Son of God. We come as those with ample cause to rejoice (and to rejoice together as Geoff Henderson reminds us). But does the gospel remove any cause for trembling? Are we to tremble yet in the presence of God? And what does it mean to rejoice with trembling?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on that. I’d at least like us to ponder it as we come to worship, wherever that might be.

Technorati Tags: Worship

Strangely, there has been a mega-shift in the world of coffee shops, and no one is making a big notice of it, at least not that I can tell. So, I’ve taken it upon myself to make the announcement here. If you are the press and would like to interview me on the matter, talk to my people.

So, here it is: Starbucks in the US now has “FREE” internet access. I’ve put the word ‘free’ in quotation marks, because there are some conditions, but they are conditions that for me are no bother. This is a great boon for those of us who like to be able to work on the go.

Up until very recently, you could only access the web at a Starbucks if you were a T-Mobile subscriber. Now, under certain conditions, you can gain free access through ATT. The only requirement is that you buy something at least once every thirty days, and then your access time is limited to two-hours each day. Those conditions are no barrier to me.

Interested? Here is what you need to do:

1) Purchase a Starbucks card at a Starbucks or on-line. This is like a gift card you give to yourself. You load it up with $10 or $20 or whatever. Pretty easy to do.

2) Use this card every time you purchase something at Starbucks. There are a lot of perks to encourage this. If you use the card, you get free refills on coffee, and free syrups and shots and the like. It is worth it for me to have the card apart from the wifi access.

3) Register your card on-line. When you do this, you will see some information regarding signing up for WiFi. Do this. It is all free.

4) Then, at Starbucks, log on to the ATTWifi network, and open up your browser. You will be taken to an ATT login page where you enter your user name and password, and you are in.

All you need to do is buy a cup of coffee once/month and you are good to go. I’ve not tested the two hour limit yet. I’m not sure if I’ll get booted off, or what. But the two hours is enough for me to get a lot done between meetings or while I wait to pick up my daughter from work or the gym.

What is amazing is that Starbucks is not advertising this yet. They are in the stores pushing the cards, but in their promo for the cards, they are saying nothing about WiFi. But I can tell you that it works. Yeah!

Technorati Tags: Computing, Work

Freddy, if you do not know, is a very special pig. He himself has said so, in so many words. In explaining to a rabbit named Twenty-One (rabbits being far to prolific to have individual names) why he was too busy to accompany him into the frightening Big Woods, Freddy said this:

“I’ve got this poem to finish today. You see, Twenty-One, I’m writing a Book.”

The man who has chronicled Freddy’s adventures, Walter R. Brooks, who also introduced the world to a horse named Mr. Ed, goes on to explain:

“He said it like that, with a capital letter, and I don’t know that you can blame him for there are very few books in the world the authors of which are pigs.”

And I would add, to update Freddy’s special status, there are probably very few Wikipedia entries in the world the subjects of which are pigs. But Freddy’s got one. He’s even got his own web site.

Freddy has held a special place in my heart from the time I remember my older sister reading the books about him to me as a child. And now, having a young son, I have the excuse to read them again. If you don’t have such an excuse, go find one. Freddy is a lot of fun.

And it is with that in mind, mere fun, that I share the following. I make no spiritual application and draw no truth from it. I have no agenda in mind other than to share my delight. In Freddy and the Ignormus, Freddy is speaking with a frog named Theodore, who is really quite a clever frog, with a fine bass voice, but fairly reclusive. About Theodore, we read this:

“Theodore was handsome for a frog. At least, other frogs said he was, though as Mrs. Wiggins, the cow, said, he could be a whole lot handsomer than the whole frog tribe and still be pretty near the homeliest critter under he sun. And after all if your face is green, and you have a huge mouth, and bulging eyes, and nothing much in the way of a nose, you have to admit yourself that you are pretty homely.”

That made me laugh.

Any other Freddy fans out there?

Technorati Tags: Literature

When I expressed to a friend not too long ago that I was reading Jonathan Edwards’ treatise On the Religious Affections (yes, I’m still plodding through), he quipped, “So are you unsaved yet?”

If you have read Edwards, or one of his disciples such as John Piper, you will understand my friend’s comment. There is a sad truth to this: a deep contemplation of Edwards (or of his disciples) can have the tendency to unseat one’s confidence and assurance of his relationship with God.

Edwards pursues a noble, and in many respects necessary, path. What signs accurately distinguish a true and genuine profession of Christian faith from one spurious or casual? The distinction is critical since it is possible to rest upon works or culture or background for salvation when such comes only by the work of new birth wrought by the Holy Spirit in the heart. Are there clear evidences by which one might judge himself to be truly born again?

Edwards looks at the religious affections as the basis for our convictions. For him, the affections are akin to what we consider to be our emotions. With true religious conviction there will be a deep response of the heart, a deep seated and expressive love for the things of God which can only be produced by the work of God in the heart.

However, an emphasis upon our uncontrollable emotional response may leave one wondering if he has faith, and what he might need to do to get faith. Reading of Edwards’ signs of true grace can cause a reader to doubt his salvation. As much as I am inspired by Edwards, Piper, and others, this does concern me. I don’t wish to leave any child of God without hope.

And yet, if we fail to consider the signs of a work of God, if we don’t long to see evidence of God’s presence, is there not the corresponding danger of leaving the unconverted falsely in hope? Yes, there is. James Montgomery Boice once spoke at the church I pastor and cautioned us to consider that a good number of those in worship on any given Sunday may not at all have been converted.

There is a great deal of complacency in the Christian church, people who believe they have been saved, but are truly unacquainted with the work of God’s spirit. Edwards describes the fruit of a true conversion as having

“…a conviction, so clear, and evident, and assuring, as to be sufficient to induce them, with boldness, to sell all, confidently and fearlessly to run the venture of the loss of all things, and of enduring the most exquisite and long-continued torments, and to trample the world under foot, and count all things but dung, for Christ….” [page 303]

So many in our pews seem to lack such a conviction. We are happy to have a church to go to and songs to make us happy, but is there an inner conviction so deep that we would for Christ venture the loss of all things? If there is not, can we really claim to have been born anew? That is the question that Edwards and others rightfully forces us to ponder.

There is therefore a challenge to light a fire beneathe the nominal and complacent, and to do so without wounding the sheep. That indeed is a challenge.

Technorati Tags: Christian Life, Church, Edwards, Grace

Yes there are more important things in the world, but this graphic clipped from the ESPN website may explain why we who love baseball are having fun in Tampa Bay these days. It is not just that the Rays are winning, but they are doing it all the right way, with speed and defense and pitching, and without ego. It’s just fun.

Technorati Tags: Baseball

When we left for our annual family camping trip ten days ago, I entitled my post ‘Magic‘. A good number of you probably wrote me out of the book of the faithful with my use of such language. So be it.

We are back now, and whatever you call it, we are grateful. God was so good to us. At one point my wife and I stood back in wonder that not only all six children, one grandchild, and three ‘children-in-law’ were there – and that in itself speaks of the riches God has given us – but that also they all WANTED to be there. They all LIKE each other. That is not our doing, but is a gift of God, for which we are deeply grateful.

The trip (to the Cataloochee group campsite in the Great Smoky Mountains) was full of wonder. The isolation was marvelous, the beauty astounding, and the calamities bonding. Spent nearly all of one afternoon trying to fix an oil leak in my son’s car without the benefit of the proper tools. My grandson was off and on sick, and once fell into the fire pit. Ice was a two hour trip away. The listed ‘comfort station’ was not the expected sink and flush toilet, but four infrequently cleaned portables. And so on.

Barb and I once attended a seminar by marriage guru Gary Smalley. He said that the one constant he found among happy families was camping. His theory was that shared calamity unites us, and camping guarantees calamity. I can’t speak for the accuracy of his research or the validity of his conclusions, but my experience says that there is truth in it. We are not always a happy family and there are times we don’t all like each other. But we share some precious memories, often having to do with broken vehicles, excessive rain, poor trail map reading, or inadequate toilet facilities. After the fact, we laugh, and long to ‘do it again’.

My advice to families? Buy a tent and head for the hills. Works magic for us!

Technorati Tags: Family

No one likes to be caught napping. But, napping may be one of the smartest things we could do. I’ve often thought that a good 20 minutes asleep is better than 2 hours nodding off and being distracted. But I don’t do it. I’m too embarrassed that someone will walk in and find me asleep. “What are paying him for, anyway?”

I’m not planning on starting any new habits. I somehow think that walking would do me better in the long run. However, I did find this page in the Boston Globe intriguing. Read it, and then go take a good nap.

Technorati Tags: Work