Hearing God: Living attentive to the God who speaks

At New Life Lincoln Park this Sunday we are starting a new teaching series called, HEARING GOD: Living attentively to the God who speaks. This is the gist of it:

We've all heard of angels and loud voices resounding from the heavens, but most of us have never actually heard God speak audibly or sat down and talked with an angel over nachos. It seems you can't turn three pages without seeing God talking to someone in the Bible, but does that kind of stuff still happen today? Often people describe the voice of God like a prompting or a whisper, but in a world that shouts for our attention how are we supposed to make out which "voice" belongs to God? In the next five weeks we will be talking about how God speaks into the world today and how we can tune our ears to listen.

If you're in the Chicago area, we'd love for you to join us this Sunday (or any Sunday!). We get together in the morning at 10am and again in the evening at 5pm. For the most part it is the same service at both times, so pick whichever time is best for you. The address is 1110 W. Lill Ave, near DePaul.

Hope to see you there!

Out of 61 books, these are my top reads from 2011

There is no shame in my heart to admit I'm a reading freak. I love stories. I love reading about long journeys and all the good and bad that characters experience as they trounce through them. Bookstores are dangerous for me, as I always want to leave with something. Used bookstores are the worst (or the best, depending on how you look at it.) 

Yesterday I listed out all of the books I read in 2011. My annual goal is 50, so 61 was pretty good. Of all on the list, these I would consider my top reads from the year:

And the 61 books I read last year were...

About 5 years ago I made the New Year's resolution to read 50 books in one year. Keeping track was just a list of authors and titles in a Word document. Since then I've kept 50 as my annual goal and have a Word document for each year. Whenever anyone asks me for reading suggestions I just skim those files.

2011 was a year of the series. Two years ago my friend Todd convinced me to read all of the Star Wars novels, so a bunch of those were gone through. Also discovered the Hunger Game books by Suzanne Collins and The Dresdin Files by Jim Butcher, both good fantasy series.

If the unintended theme of 2011 was "series." then I'm already seeing 2012's theme as being "reread." The 13th and final Wheel of Time book will be coming out this year (one of the greatest fantasy series since Lord of the Rings), so I've already begun reread that series. With a desire to get back to reading some classics, I have my sights on rereading "The Grapes of Wrath" and "The Brothers Karamazov" to start that off. I also find my heart moving toward books that have been really challenging and encouraging to me in the past: "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton, "The Pursuit of God" by Tozer, "The Confessions of St Augustine," and "The Divine Conspiracy" by Dallas Willard.

So many books, so little time. But here are the 61 from last year:

Top and favorite posts from 2011

Last year I posted 122x's in this blog, or a third of the year. Looking back over the 2011 entries, I've compiled a list of the top posts. Some of these are on the list because they were visited a huge number of times, some are on the list for the simple fact they were my favorites:

• Bono, the blind man, and the second commandment
  
• Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt's search for the myth
• Everyone Mad Libs
• Critiquing Criticism: a lesson from the Smurf movie
• My two year old and G.K. Chesterton
• "Daddy, can I listen to Justin Bieber?"
• Remember Snowmaggedon?
• "I want to be holded"
• No Slutty Halloweens
• Thank you Steve Jobs for being brilliant
• Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by?
• My answer to "What apps should I download?"

My goal is to blog more in 2012, at least 4-5 times a week. Why? Because this is a huge help to me. This morning I reread this old post from when I first started really getting into doing this:

T-shirt I bought around the time I started blogging.
It's a good reminder of perspective. =)

I had a conversation with a friend last night about blogging - the main point being, "Why do it?" The repeated phrase that we shared was, "processing life." Hence, the renaming of this blog. As I read books, watch movies, experience things with my family and friends, or whatever - I'm going to try and process it here as much as I can, should.
 

Most people I've met who blog fall into one of three categories
1. They think the entire world reads their blog.
2. They think no one reads their blog.
3. Starting out within either #1 or #2 they quickly forget that they have a blog.

I know those are huge exaggerations. Just the same, my goal is to avoid #'s 1 and 3 and just write as if #2 is true.

If someone decides to check back here periodically to read what I write...well, it's your internet bill.

But if you do decide to check back here, I hope it is an encouragement to you. 

Give me some feedback on things. What things that I write about do you enjoy most or are most helpful to you?

If you want to keep up to date with my blog, the easiest thing to do it click above on "Get emailed when I update"

Thanks!  

A New Year's Benediction

This is a New Year's benediction that Neil Gaiman, one of my favorite authors, gave a couple years ago at an event:

May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you’re wonderful, and don’t forget to make some art – write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. May your coming year be a wonderful thing in which you dream both dangerously and outrageously.

I hope you will make something that didn’t exist before you made it, that you will be loved and you will be liked and you will have people to love and to like in return. And most importantly, because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now – I hope that you will, when you need to, be wise and that you will always be kind. And I hope that somewhere in the next year you surprise yourself. 

May we draw closer to Jesus this year, and beg him to fulfill that prayer.

New Year's posts from last couple days:

• Week in Review #16-26 and/or Year in Review
• How to not fail at a New Year's Resolution