Polio

I just finished reading, Polio: An American Story, by David M. Oshinsky. It was my first book I read on my new Amazon Kindle DX. So in reality I have two things to report on, the book's content as well as the medium in which I read it.

1. The book was very good. It is easy to see why it was the winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for history. The book chronicles the story of polio in America, primarily in terms of the fight for a vaccine and the bitter feud that developed between Albert Sabin and Jonas Salk. We do not often think about polio today because of its eradication due to the efforts of those two men, but the reality is the disease consumed the minds of Americans and made a celebrity out of the scientist Salk. Perhaps the most interesting part of the book is the divide in accolades received by both men. Whereas Sabin was highly regarded within the fields of science and medicine, Salk received his regard from the public in need of a hero. Salk was never given much if any credit from his field of study. Which begs the question: if given the choice would you take the recognition of the general public OR the recognition of your paricular avenue of study/work?

2. As far as the Kindle DX goes, I have to say I really enjoyed my reading experience on it. It was easy to use, easy to read off of, and I really enjoyed using the dictionary that was already downloaded onto it. My only concern with the entire thing was/is the inability to skip from chapter to chapter. Perhaps this is something I still need to learn on it usage. Other then that though, I really liked it. Looking forward to more reading...

Three Minutes

"The average American spends three minutes a day reading a book."

"The typical American spends an average of about nine and a half hours a day consuming media."

Dick Meyer, Why We Hate Us: American Discontent In The New Millennium, (New York: Crown Publishers, 2008), 87.

I believe we are facing a crisis with the above statistics. The elimination of reading from the diet of input consumption in Americans is alarming. We are literally setting ourselves on the path of ineptitude. It will not be long before the vast majority of the leadership of the United States will be non-readers. They will be heavy consumers of technology & media - but with little regard for reading & knowledge development. That is another way of spelling doom. The worst part of it all is that the majority of Americans do not blink an eye at these statistics. They might feign shock or awe - but the reality is they don't care.

It takes a certain amount of discipline to read. I understand that not everyone enjoys it - but there is something to reading words on paper. There is something to creating your own images, pictures, and ideas instead of having a screen show them to you. There is something to thinking about what might a book be communicating instead of just consuming & beliving whatever screen it is you get your info from. It doesn't take any effort to consume media. It takes no brain power or ability. It is just given to you. It is beyond crystal clear that the lack of reading in America will destroy our power to think, reason, struggle, and be well-rounded citizens. Unfortunately, it seems we just don't care enough to change.

Try Something

"Must the country remain hungry and jobless while raw materials stand unused and factories idle?" he [FDR] asked. "The country needs, the country demands, bold, persistent experimentation. Take a method and try it. If it fails admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something."

Jean Edward Smith, FDR, (New York: Random House, 2007), 263.

This question has been proposed to me numerous times since I decided to move: "But isn't the job market for history teachers pretty bleak?" Now I don't think anyone is trying to discourage me or predict doom for my family, but I do believe people (myself included) often get caught up in fear. We need bold, persistent experimentation - and yet we constantly take the easy route. We love to quote Robert Frost and his ideal of the road not taken - but the truth is we always take the path more traveled upon. Its not a lack of desire that forces our hand on this - but a lack of faith. Like the Israelites, we just don't trust that God can part the Red Sea.

So the answer to that question is yes the job market for high school history teachers is probably pretty bleak. The entire US economy is struggling right now so why would this sector be any different? But the road not taken still makes all the difference. FDR's command of "But above all, try something" rings daily in my ears. This could fail in some ways but the reality is I know I could not stay doing something I did not feel like God was calling me to do anymore. It would have been more safe and yet detrimental for my development as a person. I have no clue how things will turn out, where I will end up, or what kind of journey it will be like. But my choice is to succumb to the fear or be invigorated by the challenge that lies ahead. I choose the latter.

Into The Great Wide Open

"The missionary work of the non-professional missionary is to live his daily life in Christ, and therefore with a difference, and to be able to state the reason and cause of the difference to men who see it. His preaching is essentially private conversation, and has at the back of it a life which explains and illustrates and enforces his words. It is such a missionary work that the world needs today. Everybody, Christian and pagan alike, respects such work. When it is so done, men wonder, and inquire into the secret of a life which they instinctively admire and covet for themselves." -Roland Allen-

...Discerning and following God's calling on our lives is both the primary mission of the individual Christian as well as the most significant step we can take toward bringing healing to the body of Christ. Said another way, God knits together the body in His wisdom and sovereignty. That which is most healthy for the individual members is necessarily that which is most needful for the body.

Warren Cole Smith, A Lover's Quarrel With The Evangelical Church, (Colorado Springs: Authentic Publishing, 2008), 221.

I am stepping down. With those four words I began the process of liberating myself from the world of fulltime vocational ministry. I must be careful to help people understand that I am not leaving in anger, frustration, hurt, or bitterness. Truth be told I have experienced all of those in my tenure at the church but they aren't the driving force of my departure. It is best to never leave a place guns blazing. I don't believe I am doing that.

The reality is that I feel I can be more effective outside of the walls of vocational church ministry. I will come in contact with more non-churched people in the world of education than I could ever dream of inside the church. Being the light of the world doesn't matter if that light remains hidden safely within the walls of the church. No, its time to step beyond the boundaries and make a difference. That isn't to say that church staff members do not serve a purpose or don't have an impact on the world. Its just for me - I see the potential outside instead of inside.

So here we go: Into the Great Wide Open. I am sure it will be weird, different, thrilling, exciting, and potentially even scary. The reality is I haven't felt like that in years. I am excited to teach. I am excited to be around people for the majority of my job instead of the minority of it. I am excited to see what God has in store. Most of all I am excited that instead of just sitting, I am doing something. Good or bad, sometimes we just need to make headway in life.

Gambler's Heart

...Yamamoto possessed the rank, prestige, and administrative skill to do something about it. In the Navy he was known as a bold, original thinker and an inveterate gambler. He thrived on all night poker games, testing his opponents' nerves, endurance, and patience - just as he tested himself. "In all games, Yamamoto loved to take chances just as he did in naval strategy," explained his administrative aide, Captain Yasuji Watanabe. "He had a gambler's heart."

Yamamoto's decision to attack the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor not only was breathtakingly bold but involved a revolutionary, hitherto untried use of naval airpower - an experimental concept untested in the crucible of battle. "What a strange position I find myself in," Yamamoto wrote to his friend Rear Admiral Teikichi Hori on the eve of the fleet's departure, "-having to pursue with full determination a course of action which is diametrically opposed to my best judgment and firmest conviction. That, too, perhaps is fate."

Jean Edward Smith, FDR, (New York: Random House, 2007), 532-534.

Isoroku Yamamoto was Naval General of the Japanese Navy at the time of Pearl Harbor. Although attacking America was not his favored position, he took upon himself to do it in a creative way that was built upon risk. He used an untested method to fight the battle while putting everything - including his best judgment - on the line. The attack on Pearl Harbor was breathtaking for its incredible destruction & success. It was a gambler's strategy & it worked to nearly flawless perfection. Of course we can look back and judge Japan for helping the United States enter the war - which would lead to the downfall of the Axis powers. However, at the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, all that was known was that Japan needed a big W on the board to help boost morale and nail the US where it counted. The gambler's heart of Yamamoto lead to the plan that accomplished that.

I admire the gambler's heart. I admire the courage. I admire taking chances and putting experimental concepts into practice. It certainly must lead to a fair share of mistakes, accidents, and disaters. But as they say in Vegas - you have to bet big to win big. My life doesn't resemble that of Yamamoto. I do not have the gambler's heart or the desire to risk it all. I like to think I do. I like to talk like I do. But the reality is I almost always play it safe. But why not risk? Life is so short and you only get one shot at it. Your untested plans, goals, dreams, and strategies are waiting to be used. Double check to make sure the convictions and judgment that holds you back is not based upon fear. Just go.

Bet it all. Take that chance. The gambler's heart leads to the big reward.

A Spirit of Charity

"Liberty requires opportunity to make a living - a living which gives man not only enough to live by, but something to live for. For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality. A small group had concentrated into their own hands and almost complete control over other people's property, other people's money, and other people's labor - other people's lives. These economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America. What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power. In vain they seek to hide behind the Flag and the Constitution. Governments can err. Presidents do make mistakes. But the immortal Dante tells us that divine justice weighs the sins of the cold-blooded and the sins of the warm-hearted in different scales. Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference." -Franklin D. Roosevelt

Jean Edward Smith, FDR, (New York: Random House, 2007), 368.

The Constituted Means

"A revival of religion is not a miracle, nor dependent on a miracle in any sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means - as much so as any other effect produced by the application of means." - Charles Finney- "With this statement, Finney not only rejected salvation by grace but also opened the door to the use of emotionalism and technique to produce a high body count when it came time to sing the hymn of invitation at the close of the service...And Sproul stated plainly the problems with body-count evangelism when he said, "Everyone who has faith is called to profess faith, but not everybody who professes faith has faith. We are not saved by a profession of faith. A lot of people, it seems to me, in the evangelical world, believe that if they have walked the walk, raised the hand, signed the card - that is, made some kind of methodological profession of faith - that they're saved."

Warren Cole Smith, A Lover's Quarrel With The Evangelical Church, (Colorado Springs, Authentic Publishing, 2008), 139-140.

Emotions. Nothing about a person impacts their decisions more than their emotions. Every day people make choices that are born out of emotional moment. It can be as simple as buying a beer because it was a stressful day at work or as complicated as making a "profession" of faith at a church service because the circumstances were set up to lead to that. Advertisers play upon the impulses & emotions of people to sell products, and often the evangelical church plays upon the same emotions to "sell" Jesus, offering, and serving. With the right lighting, music, words, and set-up, any church can make an effective decision weekend. As Charles Finney, 'the Father of Modern Revivialism', clearly stated it - the "right use of the consituted means" can produce a revival. People can make decisions that they feel like are changing their lives without realizing what they are doing or why they are doing it. The consequence (unintended as it might be) is that people make a decision for Jesus or put money in an offering bin without ever really choosing to do so. Their lives don't change. Their faith doesn't exist. They simply have a memory of an emotional moment and less cash in their wallet.

The hard part comes in the lack of trust that Warren Cole Smith gives to God in the process. Can God still use the moments that churches play upon emotionalism & technique? Could God not still change lives despite the clear manipulation being done to people? After all God is the one who remains sovereign - despite the mess people make in the world and in His church. My personal belief is that God can still use these "revival-like" moments BUT that a lot of the decisions made in these moments are not as deep as the church would like to believe they are. The number of decisions look good on paper & help us feel like we are accomplishing The Great Commission, but the reality is that if all of these emotionalism techniques being used across the evangelical church in America were truly 100% effective - we would see more "fruit" from the decisions. Instead - it seems the evangelical church contributes to the notion of a nation that claims to be 83% Christian and yet displays very little of the love & life of Jesus Christ.