Coach D's Personal Updates

Jarod Osborne--soon to be pastor in Vancouver Washington

2010-04-18T17:04:00.004-04:00

Jarod was one of those strong-silent-type students. He always seemed so strong to me—even before I knew him well. I later discovered why he came across this way—it was a mind set of a man with a black belt in martial arts and he was restrained in letting that power out. That’s how Jarod was intellectually too in my classes—he often knew the answers to questions and had deep thoughts yet he often kept them to himself while others filled up class discussion with shallower thoughts.

I got to know Jarod best after he spent his junior year overseas. Facing radical culture shock, other flourishing religions and personal grief he experienced a major crisis of faith. When he returned to IWU he was trying to find his way again and we met often. I admired Jarod deeply as I saw him work through recovering his faith again. He is one of my models for how to face and recover from such a faith crisis. His strength and perseverance makes him the go-to guy in my opinion for young men and woman facing such a collapse of faith.

Jarod worked as a youth outreach coordinator for the Salvation Army in Mansfield, Ohio, and has served in youth work for a United Methodist church in New Jersey and even served as a missionary to Uganda where he found his wife Esther. The last time I ran into Jarod was after hiking the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming with the Kinds. Sharon and I stopped by Yellowstone for chuch Sunday morning and Jarod was the summer park chaplain there—he preached a great sermon. (His pictiure that morning is above).

Jarod is about to graduate from seminary. In a month or so he’ll graduate from Princeton Theological seminary, my own alma mater. I found out this week that he has just accepted a call to be the solo-senior pastor of the Vancouver Wesleyan church, in Washington. District Superintendent Karl Westfall is building up quite a cadre of pastors in that district and Jarod will be a great addition. Jarod, I’m proud of you—you’ll make a great pastor!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

I'm proud of Chelo & Laura!

2010-04-11T13:18:00.006-04:00

Marcelo Santana came to IWU from Puerto Rico but I didn’t get to really know him until Paul Kind invited Marcelo along for a month of hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail.

What a wonderful guy he turned out to be. How I came to love and admire Marcelo! He was an intrepid hiker who never seemed to have a bad day--even though he often fell into rivers and streams while attempting too-long jumps across the rocks. He sang lustily on the trail so that I could hear him a half mile away, he remembered stories and jokes from his teen years and from campus and told (and retold) these stories until our sides split with laughter. (Picture of Marcelo and me below)

On the IWU campus he was a whirlwind of energy, riding his skateboard into right into the classroom or publishing a book of ideas for “Cheap Dates in Marion” which he sold to other students who had less creativity. His papers were always different from everyone else’s since he could dream up a dozen different way to do the assignment that the professor had never even never thought of.

I watched Marcelo flip for Laura Warner (who happened to be one of my favorite Christian Education students). Laura graduated in 2002 and Marcelo (AKA "Chelo") graduated in youth ministry a year later. When these two got married they moved to Ohio, Laura’s home state, where Laura taught at Head Start and Marcelo worked on a farm then later at a factory making electrical parts. But hat was not thei goal--they were praying together that God would lead them to a church.

In October 2003, a year after Chelo’s graduation they were called to work at Grant Wesleyan Church in Michigan. Ever since they have been at that same church—a great church with a great senior pastor. Laura substitute taught until their daughter Elena was born and they have recently added a scond child, Antonio, who is now about 6 months old. I think they bought a house there too.

Laura mentors youth and young adults in the Grant church and is a youth leader working with Marcelo who is the youth pastor/assistant pastor. Chelo is the consummate “connecter” with people—he is virtually "omnipresent" in the community. He coaches soccer, plays indoor soccer after school, hangs out at the skate parks, and even runs dodge ball tournaments in the high school gym to provide a safe place for kids on Friday nights.

Lately Chelo is really into training interns for service and ministry—mostly high school seniors. His high school interns speak at children’s rallies, help the elderly, do home repair projects, learn to play instruments, and help out with local church ministries. It is an incredible thing--he runs a program for high schoolers that rivals some post-college internship prgrams. In fact Chelo sends some students to IWU who have more ministerial experience when they get here than most other students have when they leave!

To connect with the Mexican community the Grant church runs a summer soccer league--getting the idea that Chelo likes soccer? Chelo is also a translator in the court system along with helping the volunteers learn Spanish. Can a Puerto Rican kid who married an Ohio girl be happy in northern Michigan? You betcha! They love their work and the people at Grant Wesleyan and their Senior Pastor loves them right back. I’m proud of you Chelo & Laura!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Dave Mierau --Pastor in Goshen

2010-04-04T17:33:00.002-04:00

Dave Mierau graduated from IWU in 2005 and is now pastor at LifeSpring Community Church, in Goshen, Indiana. It is a very relational, laid back church packed with mature leaders and a lot of diversity in age and occupations including quite a few students from Goshen college who attend. Dave’s church runs about a hundred people but he has five people on staff. How does he pull this off? There are five staffers each at about ten hours a week—most of them of course are bi-vocational. The staff is pretty diverse too in terms of people's ages. Dave feels this intergenerational-part-timers staff model has worked pretty well. He’s energized!

I recall that Dave had a series of solid practicum experiences in college and some great internship experiences after college before he returned to Indiana to pastor this church. About a year ago he got married (to Kim) and they are partners in ministry. I admire Dave’s creativity and leadership! I’m proud of you Dave!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Dustin Krantz--Apprentice Youth Minister

2010-03-28T16:07:00.002-04:00

Dustin graduated just last year (2009) with a CM degree. When he was here he was involved at College Wesleyan church and he especially focused on the college ministry of seven47. He was always active in classes and his ever-present smile in classes always made me want to continue teaching another year!

Dustin started looking for internships the summer before his final year. He wanted to serve as an intern before launching into a full ministry position. He found a church who said they were interested in his coming for a summer, but they wanted someone who would consider coming back after graduation for the possibility of filling a full time position—as a continuing full-year intern. He took that summer internship, and sure enough he then went on staff as an “apprentice” there after he graduated.

Dustin is at Crossroads Christian Church, a non-denominational Christian Church in Evansville, Indiana where the weekly attendance is about 3700. The high school ministry has 150 students at the Sunday night program and 200 students involved in house groups on a weekly basis. The church had been without a high school pastor for three years when Dustin joined the staff so the department head over student ministries had been fulfilling this role. That department head developed the plan of which he is now a part.

Dustin (with a second recent graduate of Johnson Bible College) are both in a 1 year apprenticeship where they are mentored under the counsel of the department head (who has thirty years of youth ministry experience). At the end of this year the church will decide if it wants to take one or the other or both of them on as high school pastors.

There are two high school campuses they work with so each of them takes one school. Dustin is in a school that is very open to ministries, so he is coaching the defensive line for the varsity football team where he makes vital contacts. Te church is seeing incredible growth in the youth ministry, and Dustin is excited. So am I. Dustin shows how a student can leverage a summer internship into a year-long apprenticeship which gets him wonderful experience that leads to full time full pay work there or elsewhere. I’m proud of you Dustin!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Tom Cochran--church Planter in Wabash

2010-03-21T17:23:00.004-04:00

I forgot exactly when Tom Cochran graduated from IWU but he and Sarah are making me proud==along with Matt Cox!

I knew Tom as a student and I remember that he was always a steady and hard-working student—he was always sparking his small group to work harder and can still picture him as a “nodder”—not the kind of nodder who nods to sleep but the kind who nods during a lecture affirming what the teacher is saying egging me on. (I always need at least one in class!).

Last month (2/2010) Tom bit off a huge challenge. He held his first service in a new Wesleyan church plant in Wabash, Indiana—the New Journey Community Church. There were 123 people attending his first service at the “Honeywell center” there. I’m thrilled! I’ve been involved with two church plants myself as a “layman” and getting more than a hundred people out for the first service is a gigantic accomplishment!

Kudos to Tom and Sarah—and to Matt Cox who is also helping out on staff! A number of people already become Christians as a result of their work in Wabash, several in the very first service. A lot of the students I teach want to plant churches so I’m especially happy to tell them about graduates like Tom Cochran who didn’t just dream but actually did it! If you want to hear Tom on this new church, see his video here. I’m proud of you Tom! People like you make teaching ministry student worth it all!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Eddie Smith--SWU

2010-03-14T18:08:00.002-04:00

Eddie Smith was impossible to miss when he was in a class. His energy, craziness and active participation made all his professors look forward to him. He was a fantastic note-taker. I remember one time his note-taking got him in trouble with Bud Bence. Dr. Bence noticed that one of his 7:50 classes had simply “gone dead.” Students seemed glazed over and few even took any notes. They listened but when he said something obviously important nobody wrote it down. It shook Bence—he thought maybe he had lost his magical touch. Then he discovered that Eddie Smith was taking perfect notes each day and emailing them to the rest of the class. Upon getting the notes the rest of the class realized they’d never be able to capture Bence as well as Eddie did so they just checked out and waited for their email from Eddie. (I think Bence talked him out of that, but if I recall correctly he persuaded Eddie to give HIM a copy of the notes—who knows, maybe he’s using Eddie’s notes now in his lectures!

Eddie graduated in 2001 and began his ministry as a sort of intern at the Wesleyan Headquarters in the Evangelism & Church Growth department under (now a General Superintendent) Jerry Pence. Then he spent two years as the youth pastor at Mt. Zion Wesleyan Church in North Carolina before moving to IWU’s sister school, Southern Wesleyan University where he has worked in admissions since 2004. I’ve always sort of seen Eddie as a church planter—he has just the sort of personality that attracts people and he has always been able to “call out” people, which is why he’s been good at admissions I bet. It has been nine years since Eddie graduated and every one of his profs still remember him well. That’s saying something—after all since Eddie graduated from IWU we have had more than a thousand students pass through the Religion Division (now “School of Theology and Ministry”). But if you know Eddie that’s not hard to imagine. Eddie we are all proud of you!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Kelsi Adkins, Pastor of Families with Children

2010-03-07T16:01:00.001-05:00

Kelsi Adkins had a double major at IWU (Christians Education & Worship) and was always alert and full of energy in her classes. We all missed her when she graduated in 2008. When she was in college she did her practicum work at Hanfield UM church and also worked in her home church over a couple summer in Chillicothe, Ohio. When she graduated she moved to Indianapolis where she got an apartment with Kelly Reynen. With her CE degree she passed the tests and becmae a teacher in Indianapolis Schools and also did some preaching on the side as she worked on her Master’s degree at Marian College in Indy and she juggled several options for her life’s calling.

When Kelsi moved to Indy she started attending Grace Pointe Church of the Nazarene on the west side. She had been attending there for a little over a year when the pastor preached a sermon where he mentioned about the need for our church to hire a children’s pastor. This church had never had one before, even though the church is a fairly good size. In that service Kelsi heard the Lord spoke to her about this opportunity. So she approached the pastor immediately after that service. So this CE-Worship graduate who was now a public school teacher interviewed with the board and got a unanimous vote.

That was last fall. She started in her full time church ministry job in December, 2009. Her title: “Pastor of Families with Children.” As soon as she finishes her Master’s degree this May she will begin the credentials process for ministry in the Church of the Nazarene

Kelsi is one of those students who finally settled her call to the ministry after graduation, though she sensed it before. As a single woman in ministry she has faced some challenges. Just six weeks after she took over as a pastor a family of seven left the church because the husband refused to be under her leadership in the children’s department since she was a woman. But she has an incredibly supportive and mentoring senior pastor who takes such things in stride. Here’s the way she puts it: “I won’t sugarcoat things, but I can say that denying the call would be much worse than braving the opposition.” Kelsi I’m proud of you!

Craig Coe & Pricilla in Colorado

2010-02-27T09:30:00.003-05:00

Craig Coe is the Executive Pastor at Cherry Creek Wesleyan Church in Colorado.

He graduated from IWU in 2002 and his first job was in Flatland Indiana with IWU Admissions. As a student he did all of his practicum courses at Lakeview Church in Marion —one each with the senior pastor, assistant pastor, college pastor and music pastor so he could see all aspects of the work—a great idea.

A year before Craig graduated he joined a church planting team planning to launch a church two years later, in 2004—also a great idea. Craig and his wife

He and his wife (Priscilla Ruder Coe) moved to Colorado in starting out as Pastor of Discipleship at the new “Summit Church.” He led the small groups, special classes and seminars, along with leading the marketing and technology aspects in the new church plant.

When the lead pastor of Summit church left in 2006 Craig took on the role of lead pastor. He’s a good example of someone who was happy to be a staff pastor and wasn’t that interested in taking on the mental and emotional challenges of being a lead pastor—but when God and the church called him to it, he stepped up for the next three years.

Later two Wesleyan churches merged (Summit Church and Cherry Creek) and Craig became the executive pastor of the merged church. As exec pastor he oversees the financial and organizational structures of the church and also leads the preschool-daycare. He coordinates the weekend service and is leads the church’s marketing too. Of course he does other things all pastors do, like leading a small group for young families.

I’m jealous of Craig because he lives in my favorite state. I’ve been trying to get IWU to move to Colorado but so far I’ve been unsuccessful—we’ve built too many new buildings in Indiana I guess. But I do visit Colorado! A few years ago Jeanie Argot, Burt & Mason Webb, and I hiked a section of the Continental Divide and Colorado Trail and Craig picked us up at the Denver airport and dropped us off up in the mountains for our three week trek. We almost persuaded Craig to just leave the car at the road and join us!

One of Craig’s good friends is Nathan Lamb—who now works at Wesley Seminary here in Marion. So every time I see Nathan I remember Craig and Priscilla. Craig and Priscilla have some kids but I forgot how many—they are great parents (I hear from Melissa “Rudy” who is always talking about her sister). I still remember Craig form classes—but more so, I picture him in Colorado where I always dreamed of planting a church myself! Thanks for living my dream for me! Craig, you bring great meaning to my life and I’m proud of you!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Steve & Amber Abel

2010-02-20T13:19:00.004-05:00

Steve Abel graduated almost five years ago, in 2005. I think maybe I was the first person he "interviewed" when he was decising to come to IWU. That was back when we were first founding the worship major--and I was teaching all the worship courses.

I loved having Steve in classes because he was always in tune with whatever was being taught—smiling, nodding, and “getting it.” It least he always looked like that to me! He was very active as a student in ministry—not waiting until he graduated to get involved. Steve did his practicum at Eagle Church in Indianapolis (where Ian Swyers is now--see entry below). Amber, his wife took a bunch of my classes too—she was always a happy student who reliably offered some clever and sometimes irreverent comment before, during and after classes. Wheneve I saw the printout of students and saw her name I knew it was going to be a fun class. Amber was always freezing at IWU—invaribly bringing a blanket to class to curl up in!

When they got married I expected Amber to persuade Steve to move someplace warm, but they went to serve at the Sidney Ohio First United Methodist Church. He worked there for almost 2 years when Heritage Wesleyan Church in the Quad cities snatched him . I think Mark Schmerse who worked at Heritage at the time contacted Steve first and linked up the church and Stave (more about Mark in a previous entry here). That reminds me how networking is important—you never know which of your former college buddies might hook you up with your next church. Steve is the worship pastor at Heritage church now. Steve and Amber now have a little boy, Lincoln.

I think Steve was instrumental in beginning the new Heritage "Bettendorf venue" (their 2nd Campus) initially, though now it is led by the campus pastor for Bettendorf. He still selects all music for the campuses except his youth worship leaders select their own music for youth programming. Steve is a genius at event planning and plays a major role in the creative planning process and stage design for the large Christmas and Easter events.

When Styeve was a student he led worship too—and that’s exactly what he does—leads others in worship. It is not a watch-Steve-sing performance but worshipping God together as Steve "prompts." Every time I have been in a service led by Steve he has helped me connect with God. I loved Steve and Amber when they were students and I was proud of them then. Still am! I’m proud of you Steve and Amber!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Ian Swyers & Danielle

2010-02-14T18:47:00.002-05:00

Ian Swyers and his wife Danielle graduated 2006. Ian was a doule major--Business Administarion and Christian Ministry. I had Ian as a freshman first, then several times later. As a student he worked at College Wesleyan Church during the school year and in the summers he worked at Skyline Wesleyan in California and Spring Lake Wesleyan in Michigan.

When Ian and Dannnielle graduated he went to Indianapolis to work with Clint Ussher as a Co-Student Pastor of 6-12 grades at Eagle Church (Christian & Missionary Alliance). Two years later Clint left for Princeton Seminary and Ian took over as the Student Pastor for grades 5-12 He’s been at Eagle Church for about 4 years now.

As “Student Ministry Pastor” Ian has about 130 students who regularly attend his various weekly programs. Danielle works with the youth ministry too as small group leader, program planning, game leader, retreat and trips leader, and speaker. She works a “day job” too as an executive assistant for H.C. Wilson in Wesleyan Global Partners

Ian was gifted high school student himself—he was known as a strong Christian in a public high school. Now he leads other teens to become this sort of witness in their own schools. He is creative, industrous and a great youth speaker. He cruises through our campus a few times a year interviewing students to join him as interns. I always urge stuents to link up—he is a master at youth ministry and has lots to teach. I’m proud of Ian and Danielle.

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Zach & Becca Coffin--Spring Lake Michigan

2010-02-07T15:17:00.007-05:00

Zach & Becca Coffin are a double-header couple that graduated in 2007—almost three years ago. I had each in numerous classes before they found each other and had them both in one class after they became a couple. Zach was a life-long Baptist and Becca was a Wesleyan from southern Ohio. They are one of those couples professors hope will find each other—and sometimes we “help” make that happen.

When Zach was a student he worked faithfull with the youth at a local Baptist church of 1200. I watched his wise approach to ministry even when he was a student and things didn’t go well in his church. The church of 1200 faced troubles that are not worthy of mentioning here but as a result its attendance dropped to 800 people, then to 600—it was not a pretty sight. As the church crumbled they turned to Zach to lead the children’s ministry then he became the interim youth pastor for a year holding things together. After he graduated the church eventually split.

Upon graduation Zach and his new wife Becca went south—to an independent Presbyterian-ish Community Church that was facing even worse complications that are beyond mentioning here. Yet as youth pastor he led the ministry from 15 to 50 in the following 2 ½ years. Zach and I emailed often while he was building a youth ministry in a “difficult situation.” Zach always had such a delightful attitude—never judgmental, never critical, and always took the long view for the sake of the church—not his own “career.”

So when I heard this fall that Zach and Becca were going to Spring Lake Wesleyan church in Michigan I knew they had got a winner. How well things turned out! Here was a mature guy getting a job at mature church. I like Spring Lake church almost as much as I like Zach and Becca! At Spring Lake Zach is th Pastor of Student Ministry and runs all middle school and high school ministries—about 150 students. He has two other paid staff members and about 40 volunteer leaders helping him. Zach is in a sense the “senior pastor of student ministries.”

About half of the students I teach are Wesleyans. The other half includes Methodists, Baptists, Nazarenes, Independents, Brethren, and even an occasional Roman Catholic. It is OK with me when these students return to their home denomination to serve and minister. But I am always delighted when a Baptist or Nazarene graduate winds up becoming a Wesleyan. I hope that’s not naughty of me but I admit it. I don’t try to “convert” them (Zach will testify to that) but when it happens I am always tickled inside.

Zach and Becca faced some pretty difficult ministry situations—situations that cold have made them quit or give up. But they persevered and kept pouring their time into their ministry and didn’t let the messy church situation deflate their motivation. They are examples to me and my students that they might not get an ideal church situation when they graduate… they might even get a really messy one… but here’s Zach and Becca’s take on it all: “We might find ourselves somewhere really messy but we can never find ourselves someplace where we can’t be used.” God has consistently used this couple who Love God and each other. I expect to hear lots more about them in the future. I’m Proud of Zach and Becca Coffin!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Austin Bonds--missionary in New York City

2010-01-31T14:28:00.004-05:00

Austin Bonds escaped a life of drug and alcohol abuse and overcame great odds to wind up today as a one of the leaders working with needy people in New York city.

Austin graduated almost ten years ago—in 2001 as a youth ministry & recreation Management major. After a short stint in Arkansas where his wife, Darcy got a job but Austin wasn’t able to find a church or job fit and simply did odd jobs while looking. Finally he took a volunteer youth Pastor position. Before long Austin and Darcy moved back to Marion where he volunteered at College Church. His specialty was picking up the "non-church kids," ministering to them then taking them back home. He then worked with Fairmount Wesleyan for a couple of years where Jason Denniston now works.

Finally, six year after graduation his chance to do what he dreamed of came. Austin linked up with New York City Relief (http://www.nycr.org/ ) where he is the Director of Outreach. NYCR is an interdenominational para-church ministry that utilizes an old school Bus to bring the good news and resources to the areas in most need in the metro NYC area. They have a budget of about a million dollars a year and serve 10 locations a week. On these visits Austin’s busses serve soup, bread, and hot chocolate to over 2,000 people weekly. The food brings the people in but actually they serve a do9uble portion: food and life transformation. They are a bridge to other helping ministries and agencies—more than 600 others—from food pantries to Christian based drug rehab.

Austin gets to do what he dreamed of doing—mobilizing the church for God's social justice system. He personally leads the outreach at two different locations each week along with serving as part of the leadership team that makes decisions for the organization.

Though Austin’s ministry is non-denominational he stays connected to his home denomination, the Wesleyan Church and some day I expect he will take a church again or maybe work in one of the many justice and mercy programs Wesleyan churches are now launching. If he does it would be our win—he is a great guy and Darcy and their three kids are a wonderful family. (I’m not trying to steal you away from NYCR, Austin… well, not right away ;-) Austin is one of the growing number of IWU grads who have a heart for the needy—like Jesus.

I like it that Austin didn’t give up. He is a great model of someone who had a hard time finding his place on graduation, cobbling together work as a home inspector, volunteer youth worker, pert time youth worker, before landing work in the NYCR. He never gave up on his calling and I admire him for that. I’m proud of you Austin!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Adam & Becky Thada--Bo-living

2010-01-24T19:55:00.004-05:00

Adam Thada

I never actually had Adam (or his wife Becky) in class, but I count Adam as one of my joys because we spent so many hours when he was a student drinking coffee together, reading all of Steinbeck’s East of Eden together and hiking the Knobstone Trail in Indiana . He reminds me of the joy I sometimes derive from students who never sit in any of my courses.

Adam was a Biology & International & Community Development major so he had most of his classes with my friends, Burt Webb, Norman Wilson, Steve Pettis, and Ken Schenck. I got to know him best when I helped run support when he and a few other students tried to hike the 44 mile Knobstone Trail (20,000’ of elevation gain/loss) in one 24 hour period—and he made it in less than 18 hours!

Adam and Becky are so committed to helping the needy they bring conviction to me. When Adam graduated he and Becky moved to the inner city of Marion and worked at St Martin Community Center where he worked in the food pantry, soup kitchen, thrift store for more than a year. He became the assistant director of this widely known caring ministry.

Adam is not only sensitive to the poor but is committed to careful stewardship of the environment too. One time we had Adam and Becky over for dinner and afterward he gently corrected my extravagant waste of using incandescent lights—even offering to buy some on his meager salary for me to replace my bulbs. “Coach, I’m disappointed, you should know better.” Rightly subdued, I went out and replaced all my bulbs the following week. In a way Adam was my mentor in reducing my carbon footprint.

It was no surprise to me last summer when Adam and Becky joined up with Word-made-flesh and went to Al Alto, Bolivia http://www.wordmadeflesh.org/bolivia/about/ They now work in a hospitality center for women in prostitution. They visit the brothels regularly and invite women to the center, where they offer a doctor, serve meals, along with therapy/counseling. Soon they will be launching an exporting business making purses as an alternative employment. I follow Adam and Beck on their blog: http://boliving.blogspot.com/

Adam now lives at a higher elevation than I have ever climbed in my life! (I understand he now has zero-degree sleeping bag even--probably a low-footprint one!) They live in an ecumenical community that "is called and committed to serve Jesus among the most vulnerable of the world’s poor. This calling is realized as a prophetic ministry for, and an incarnational, holistic mission among the poor. We focus our energy to make Jesus known among the poor while reconciling the church with the poor."

I admire Adam and Becky and am proud to consider him as one of my great joys. They are making a difference among the poor and abused in the world—like Jesus did. I’m proud of you Adam and Becky!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Julie Collins--Church Planter

2010-01-17T15:45:00.003-05:00

Julie Collins was one of those stand-out ministerial students every professor knew was going to make an impact. I had her in the first introductory ministerial course and a bunch of courses after that. She was brilliant and could have gotten a free ride to just about any grad school or seminary in the country. But Julie felt too called to the local church to go one just yet for further education—she wanted to be in local church ministry—and right away. Julie was a Methodist when she came to IWU but when she graduated she became a Wesleyan and went on staff at Spring Lake Wesleyan Church (Michigan) where she became a model of what a woman can do as a youth pastor. Being a woman youth pastor is sometimes a harder glass ceiling” to break than becoming a woman senior pastor or General Superintendent. There are few areas of ministry where women ministers have a harder time “breaking in” than youth ministry. But she did it and did it well—even though she hardly appeared to be much older than the teens she led.

After several years as a youth pastor Julie felt led to enter what some of us had expected all along she would do—she became a single-woman-church planter! Julie moved to Ft. Collins, Colorado last summer and is now planting a new Wesleyan church there. She has assembled a team including Joel Stone, Brandon and Kristen Vanderkolk and maybe Katie and Jamie Fuller. Everyone on the team are all getting jobs so they can integrate into the community and pour money back into the church.

She hasn’t started public services yet but in November she launched her “party strategy” of holding weekly parties every Tuesday for the sole purpose of developing community and enjoying life with people they are collecting. Next she started a weekly Bible Study. The “party strategy” intrigues me… and it really fits what many younger folk (and some of us older folk) see as the need in the church for more intimacy and friendship. I bet it is easier for non-churched people to accept an invitation to a “party” than to a church service. How clever!
A larger core group is now developing out of those parties. At this point Julie’s team is looking toward a starting with a house church model which they feel better fits the Ft. Collins culture. She is developing then a monthly gathering of all the house churches. Her philosophical approach is heavily rooted in Ephesians 4—the ministerial team’s job is to equip the people to be ministers. As you might expect form her generation the approach is hyper-relational as hope to become a church that “does life together.”

About 40% of the students I teach are women called to ministry. They are passionate about the church and feel a clear call to the ministry. Yet they hear from some that because they are a woman they are deceived—for a woman cannot be called to the ministry. Yet they persevere hoping there will be a place for them some day. Julie’s example gives them hope. I am full of joy because of people like Julie Collins—a model church planter for a generation! I'm proud of you Julie!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

I admire Aaron Cloud

2010-01-12T09:01:00.004-05:00

Aaron Cloud was one of those quiet students who gently participated in class and seldom attracted attention to himself. I had Aaron in three classes, LCE, Adult CE and leadership. He graduated in 2008 and is now in IWU's seminary program.

Aaron spent his first year after graduation as an isolated unmarried solo pastor at Davis Wesleyan Church here in Indiana. I trembled a bit when he went because I know solo pastoring can be isolated and lonely work even for a young married couple, let alone for a single guy. But Aaron stuck with developing friendships and loving the people. Aaron has a great heart of compassion and developed quite an effective ministry at Davis Wesleyan to the poor and to widows. That is the kind of thing Aaron does--love people like Jesus loved.

Taking a small church right out of college dumps a graduate into the deep end of the pool. Aaron discovered that in his first year. No college course can fully prepare a 22 year old to minister to a Father who just lost his son in a tragic train accident. Aaron survived and that man actually eventually became a Christian and Aaron baptized him.

Aaron has always had a burden for the poor, neglected and marginalized. I remember in his leadership class there were small groups who designed church plants—as an example of the sort of leadership-management things a minister would do. His group designed a church for the poor in Marion—Aaron was even tempted at the time to launch out and actually plant that church! So it is no surprise to me that Aaron (with his new wife—they get married in a few weeks) are headed off soon to pour their lives into work with abused, neglected, and abandoned children in Chicago. On weekends he will be preaching around the Chicago area so if you are nearby I hope you will invite him to your church—you won’t be disappointed with his compassionate and tender sermons that will bring a tear to your eye and a lump in your throat.
Aaron is one of the increasing numbers of the young people I get to teach who are willing to put their life where their mouth is. It is easy to say you have compassion for the poor, or even open a food pantry at a subburban church. But Aaron plans to do mroe than that--he plans to live with the poor. Rather than just tossing a few coins to Dives while passing by, or just taking a one-week tourist-ministry trip to take pictures of himself with the poor, Aaron is willing to go down in the gutter and live with the poor and anguished—learning from them and loving them where they are.

I admire Aaron because he reminds me of Jesus. It is what makes my teaching worthwhile. —Aaron is my joy and crown. I'm proud of you Aaron!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Christy Hontz Lipscomb: Co-Pastor

2010-01-03T16:55:00.005-05:00

Christy Hontz Lipscomb graduated in 1998—a bit more than a decade ago but I can never forget her participation in my classes. She was always one of those students who clearly registered the effectiveness (or failure) of my teaching on her face--and right away! When I was making sense I got nods and a smile; when I was garbled, I saw confused frowns and I would try to teach my way out of the ditch until I got a nod again! Christy made me a better teacher—she was an instant visual monitoring device in my classroom--if Christy was nodding I knew was on track.

Christy graduated from IWU, married Adam Lipscomb and after a stint at a church in Michigan they went to Asbury Seminary together then planted city-view Wesleyan church in Grand Rapids Michigan together where they carry on an extensive city ministry as co-pastors.

Christy and Adam are my model for ministry couples in my classes who are looking toward co-pastoring. They each work about 30 hours a week. They share parenting responsibilities and pastoring responsibilities so for them, "co-pastoring means co-parenting." This shared schedule allows them ample time to be home with their two sons, Jude, 3 and Elijah, 1.

Christy preaches about 75% of the time, leads the Sunday morning system (preaching, schedule, topics, preachers, overseeing the worship leader). She also heads up the Discipleship, Ministry, Leadership system and Administration. Adam leads other “systems” including the Strategic, Evangelism, Assimilation, and Stewardship systems

In a nutshell, Christy focuses mostly on running the inner life of the church & Adam does more of the visionary/apostolic/evangelism work of connecting with the community. They’ve even explored the idea of Christy taking on more responsibility at City Life and Adam moving away from City Life a bit to plant another church elsewhere in our city. But that’s not an immediate possibility.

Christy is a disciplined minister who runs her life on a schedule. I saw this in college and see it now in her weekly routine. On Mondays she does initial sermon prep, administrative clean-up & delegation for the coming week and meets with her worship leader. On Tuesdays she digs in for the really heavy sermon prep then prepared Wednesday for their midweek Bible study and meets again with the worship leader. Thursdays is given to additional sermon prep and a staff meeting along with miscellaneous projects (which includes serving part time (10 hours per month) at the West Michigan District Office as an Assistant DS). As an assistant DS her job is to bring attention to social justice efforts in the district, and to women in ministry. Friday is her day off and both Adam and Christy observe their day off “legalistically” by denying (for that day) any church problems. On Saturday night by 6 p.m. they both shut themselves off to focus on Sunday.

I love it that Christy loves to preach. Anyone who heard Christy at the last Wesleyan General Conference understands how good she is. I love it especially because preaching is a Waterloo of sorts for many of my women ministerial students. They want to go into the ministry and do church work as a life’s calling, but when it comes to preaching they sometimes demur—preferring the “let the guys do it.” In my opinion this is one of the greatest barriers for these women in ministry, and Christy is a great model here so I often tell about her in my classes.

Christy serves an inner city congregation where she focuses on the marginal in society. She prepares sermons just as she would if she were speaking to a thousand suburbanites. I love it that Christy and Adam love the church. I doubt they will ever enter a para-church ministry even though it would be far more comfortable for them. They are just too in love with local church ministry for that.

Christy is the sort of past student I rejoice in—even more then ten years after she graduated from IWU. —Christy is my joy and crown. I'm proud of you Christy!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Jared Bell -- Youth Pastor

2009-12-20T17:10:00.002-05:00

When Jared Bell was a student a few years back he helped lead the college service at Lakeview Church, and wound up in his senior year doing his preaching practicum at Westminster Presbyterian here in Marion. He graduated from IWU in 2005. Jared is now a youth pastor in a Wesleyan Church in Kernersville, North Carolina. He is married to Becky Sievers Bell and they just had their baby girl this week.

While Jared is from San Diego, he has adapted well to the land of sweet tea and biscuits. He’s one of those youth pastors with strict office hours every morning. He spends the afternoons making phone calls, visiting people, and teaching free guitar lessons. Jared is a master at connecting with people. He is no one-man-show though—he has built a strong team of volunteers that releases him to build relationships, preach & teach and develop the team.

I fondly remember how hard Jared worked in my classes and I’m proud of how he works so hard in ministry today—Jared is my joy and crown. I'm proud of you Jared!

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Lynn Payne--Children's Minister

2009-12-13T12:49:00.002-05:00

Lynn Payne was an atheist for the first 16 years of her life. She had never been to church until a friend invited her to youth group at Lakeview Church in Marion, Indiana. As she attended youth group for the next several months the youth pastor and his wife (Brandon and Jennifer Bruce) invested in Lynn’s life and she hungered to know Jesus. She was saved at a youth group event. The Bruces mentored Lynn for several years. Lynn was a senior in high school when she felt the Lord calling her into full time ministry as a children's minister. Lynn came to IWU to get a degree in children's ministry. She knew how to work hard as a student and how to connect with professors as mentors. I was one of those professors who had the privilege of having Lynn in class.

Lynn is a can-do person. When she was flying for an interview at First Wesleyan Church in Tuscaloosa, Alabama her flight was cancelled half way there. Lynn didn’t whine or blame the airlines. She simply searched for and found another stranded flyer and rented a car together and showed up on time for her interview anyway! That’s the sort of can-do spirit one expects of a job applicant.

She got the job and has been in charge of Children’s ministries at the church for about a year and a half already. Four of the seven pastors are IWU grads so she gets to work with other IWU alums. Lynn always did “above and beyond” work in every class I had her in…and she is still doing that in her work at the Tuscaloosa. She’s doing a great job and I’m proud of her. She is my “joy and crown.”

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

Mark & Jess Schmerse

2009-12-05T10:08:00.004-05:00

I’ve walked more miles with Mark Schmerse than anyone else--including my wife or Burt Webb. We've hiked from a few days on Indiana’s 40 mile Knobstone Trail all the way to several months hiking together 1100 miles on the Pacific Crest Trail from Canada to Mt Shasta in California. Mark is a great friend and fellow backpacker.

But what makes me rejoice the most about Mark is not the miles we’ve logged together but Mark’s more important trek as pastor of the Mountain View Wesleyan Church in Aumsville, Oregon.

It’s a nice twist that the church he now pastors is called “Mountain View.” Mark preaches there every week and sometimes I ask him what he preached about. I love hearing about sermons my former students preached. When I read them they minister to me and I am strengthened spiritually. Mark’s church is a solid congregation committed to love God and reach others and I love hearing about his church—maybe because it reminds me of the happy years when Sharon and I were pastor of “ordinary churches” in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. I’m so proud of Mark & Jess! Nothing brings me greater joy than to hear of former students slugging it out on the Long Trail of pastoring a church. Mark & Jess are my joy and crown.

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 1 Thessalonians 2:19 (NIV)

My Oldest Friend --Harry Wood

2009-11-27T14:39:00.004-05:00

Last week I had lunch with Harry Wood, the oldest friend I have. I have friends who are older but none who have been friends longer. Harry Wood and I were raised in the same local church in McKeesport, Pennsylvania—a church of about 150 on its highest days. Harry has been a friend of mine for more then 50 years.

As for our home church it was an unusual church. I sometimes wonder why some churches produce more ministers and leaders than others. I don’t know why, but McKeesport Pilgrim Holiness Church produced a lot of leaders—even before they started working with Harry Wood and me as children.

According to Harry’s count at least 33 sons and daughters of the church entered full-time ministry as pastors, ministry leaders, spouses of pastors, and missionaries. It produced denominational leaders too. From the members and pastors of this church came four General Superintendents: William Neff, R. G. Flexon, P. F. Elliot, and my friend, Harry F. Wood.

Besides GS’s the church also yielded General Officers to lead the denomination’s Youth work, Sunday Schools, and World Missions. And the McKeesport church also produced 9 District Superintendents, a traveling Song Evangelist, 15 local pastors and 7 pastoral spouses. They sent out two missionaries to the Oriental Missionary Society plus a host of other ministers serving in music ministry, prison ministry, US Military Chaplain, T.V. Ministry, and college professors.
Though I was raised in this church it had a more important affect on my life even before I was born. Mrs. Jalosky who was in her 80's when the church closed remembered her parents picking up two Methodist teen boys—Leonard and Elmer Drury and bringing them to this church. Soon the McKeesport church planted a sister church in Elizabeth, Pennsylvania and my father, Leonard Drury (and his father Walter Drury) both Methodists, came into the Wesleyan Church.

The McKeesport church was laid to rest in 2002 at age 88. Churches often die before age 100. But the people they’ve influenced live on—here or in heaven. Perhaps the church took a wrong turn in the road. They were eyeing a delightful new property for expansion but instead they chose to stay put. That property now is the location of another congregation that runs over 1,000 and now includes many of the former members of the old church. Just like individuals, congregations face forks in their road that affect their future. Once a leading church and ahead of the times they gradually in drifted to the back of the pack and eventually closed. But the building is now being used by an African-American congregation… people are still getting saved at the altar where I first went forward as a little child. A church building (and a denomination) is just a container for the real and lasting work of carrying forward the kingdom of God. Containers come and go, but the real work always continues in new wineskins. I loved that old church building, but I loved even more the people in it—like Willard Kleppinger, the my Children’s church leader who taught Harry and me to love the Bible. Eventually congregations fizzle and buildings crumble—but the work of the gospel remains forever.

keith drury

A sermon on "and"

2009-11-17T15:11:00.001-05:00

One of the most memorable sermons I ever heard was based on one three-letter word, “and.” I heard Bernard Phaup preach in Virginia when I was in my twenties. He used three passages where he emphasized only one word:

Luke 1:67—“His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied.”

Acts 2:4—“All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

Acts 4:3—“…they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”

I don’t recall anything else he said except one line he kept repeating: “When you are filled with the Holy Spirit there is always an and.”

Kyle Ray at College Wesleyan today

2009-11-15T16:11:00.002-05:00

Kyle Ray preached this morning at my church (College Wesleyan). Kyle will be the new Senior Pastor at the Wesleyan church in Kentwood Michigan, Kentwood Community Church when their founding pastor, Wayne Schmidt becomes the head of IWU’s seminary after Christmas.

Kyle preached on Mark 6 -- that intriguing story of the dancing girl asking for John the Baptist’s head on a platter instead of “half the kingdom.” He focused on how Herod gave in partly because he was worried about how he would look to the crowd if he defaulted on his promise. Kyle did a clever thing by adding two other scriptures on the topic from the gospel of Mark (ch 15 where Pilate also feared the crowd) and Jesus in Mark 1 (who resisted the pressures of fame and the crowd). His point—instead of worrying about pleasing the people worry more about pleasing an audience of one—God.

Kyle’s narrative-practical approach got me thinking all afternoon about the gruesome story, even beyond anything he raised directly in the sermon. I’ve been pondering…
• What would make a guy offer up to half of his kingdom? (a sexy dance?)
• What would make a girl ignore getting half-a-kingdom and choose instead some guy’s head (revenge?)
• What are the motivations that are even greater than wealth (Sex? Revenge?)
• How culpable was the girl—for obeying her mother?
• What were the cultural conventions of that world in such an offer—was it expected the girl would merely say, “Naaahhh I did it all for you?”
• How does this dancing girl compare to Ester in a similar situation?
• Are there vows and promises one shouldn’t keep—e.g. “The first thing that comes through that door I will offer up as a sacrifice to you Lord.”
• When is peer pressure a good thing—like a a Christian college?
• If we parents and professors train our children to “yield to the crowd” when it comes to church and family rules and expectations how will they respond when their crowd changes and yielding takes them the wrong way.
• To what extent should parents allow (encourage?) their children to reject some conventional rules on the idea that “a little rebellion is a good thing.”
• What do I do (or not do) that is mostly a result of fear of what others might think?
• In a democratically organized church, to what extent should a pastor “cater to the crowd” to survive and when should a pastor simply defy the crowd?

Connecting the dots

2009-11-09T16:58:00.001-05:00

This semester I’ve been connecting dots… and they are beginning to make a shape.

I’m in a group-read of James K. A. Smith’s (Calvin College) Desiring the Kingdom. In another group I’m reading Newberg & Waldman’s How God Changes your Brain. Steve Rennick, pastor of The Church at the Crossing sent me a book on the Holy Spirit, Forgotten God by Frances Chan. I recently read the Emerging Nazarene's White Paper. I heard Charlie Alcock preach this past Sunday. Read stuff by and about Shane Claiborne. I talked to several younger pastors last weekend and also heard Leonard Sweet talk. I heard at lunch today a report about Steve Lennox’s recent string of local church meetings. I just answered a ton of email that had been piling up in my in-box. These and a dozen other dots have all connected to say a similar thing: “There is something wrong with the level of Christianity as we know it now.”

What do these dots mean? What’s up?

The conversations and writings sound strangely familiar, like echoes from the past. Sometimes they sound like the ancient desert fathers describing conventional Christians. They often sound like medieval monks intent on creating a new monastic order. They sound like the Puritans of the 1600’s. They remind me at times of early radical Protestants complaining about the Roman Catholic church. They sound similar to early Methodists complaining about the Anglican church. They are often reminiscent of the 18th century American holiness movement talking about mainline Methodism. They sound strangely similar to 20th Century Pentecostals describing nominal Christianity. They even sound a lot like radical holiness splinter groups who complained about “mainline holiness denominations.” The issues are different but the language, tone and complaints are similar. The dots are not isolated but they repeat a similar patter and the shape always says, : “There is something wrong with the level of Christianity as we know it now.”

I’m pondering these dots and wondering what’s up...

Downhill side of the semester!

2009-11-08T16:27:00.003-05:00

Downhill side of the semester

In a school semester there is a week when you “just feel it.” You know you are now headed in for a landing and Christmas is on the way. Last week was that week for me. Here is how I noticed.

LOCAL CHURCH EUCATION –the students start Monday writing their final three chapters of their Christian Education books—the Spiritual Formation of Children, Youth and Adults. By now they are functioning smoothly as writing teams and the magic has taken over—they have quit doing assignments for me and have become totally absorbed with writing their own books. I could even skip a class and they’d meet on their own, organize the work, assign each other research and writing, and get it done even if I didn’t show up. It is an amazing thing to watch. (I do still go to class—but sometimes go late on purpose just to see this wonder of self-motivation at work.

CURRICULUM THEORY AND WRITING – this is a smaller writing class and we’ve conquered curriculum theory, designed from scratch our own curriculum plan, and are writing furiously to put together a weeklong VBS Missional curriculum focused on the world. Our evening class is set up as a simulation and operates exactly like actual curriculum committees function—outlining, writing, reviewing, debating, assigning, and rewriting (and rewriting and rewriting again). This class is intent on actually publishing their final curriculum with Amazon’s CreateSpace Print-on-demand publishing. I thInk they might actually pull that off but they have LOTS of rewriting to do first ;-)

INTRODUCTION TO PASTORAL MINISTRY
I got this class back this semester and love teaching freshmen—they are wonderful! The church is gonna’ be in good hands in the future! On Monday we are learning about dating, marriage and the ministry. This is the week they do the “Joshua and Caleb” activity of visiting the upper level classes to spy on them and interview upper division students on what these classes are like and how to do well in them. Man these students are hard workers!

PRACTICUMS
And, of course I supervise practicum experiences in two of these courses… I am more convinced than ever that requiring local church experience and exposure is critical in either confirming their call to ministry or reminding those who “Love Jesus but hate the church” that other majors are where they belong.

I love teaching!

Norm Wilson is ecstatic

2009-10-12T18:15:00.004-04:00

It is fun for me to work with Norman Wilson. Norm is one of those guys who is so focused on one or two issues that when something breaks loose in his focused area he walks around the building like he is high on something. Today was such a day.

Your Friendship and my Wife

2009-09-15T13:23:00.000-04:00

This is where I stand on my friendships and my wife.

1. I can be your friend if you don’t know my wife.
I can be your friend if you have never met my wife. Indeed when I am friends with people who don’t know her, I hope I can introduce them to her because when they meet her I think they will like her and become her friend too. But even if they never meet her, I can still be their friend, though our friendship goes only part way. I am always hoping they will meet and like my wife too because she’s that important to me.

2. I can be your friend if you know my wife and accept her.
I can be even better friends with people who know my wife and like her. In fact, my very best friends are people who know both of us and accept and like us both.

3. But I cannot be your friend if you have known my wife and now reject her.
But if you are a friend who knew my wife and were her friend once but then later rejected her, I cannot be your friend. We can be acquaintances and have an occasional contact, but we cannot be friends if you reject my wife. If you reject her you de facto rejecting me. If you say, “Well, can we still be friends, can’t we even though I reject your wife” I will say that I cannot. My relationship with my wife is not that casual. If you reject her, you reject me.

---------
But, of course I am not talking here about my wife. I am speaking about my God.

My Volunteer Pumpkin is getting fat

2009-08-14T20:06:00.003-04:00

Internet Radio discusses "Common Ground"

2009-07-08T11:16:00.002-04:00

These Wesleyan guys in South Carolina have a neat Internet radio show that I listen to... it is a cool idea... Recently they discussed my book "Common Ground." Thanks guys!

Finshed the White Pine Trail

2009-07-07T10:12:00.001-04:00

I'm so happy...

2009-06-25T10:17:00.001-04:00

Boy! I am so happy with how IWU's new seminary is coming along.

Here is a series of YouTube videos explaining the idea. This is really going to be good!

GREAT Cycling trip!

2009-05-19T07:36:00.010-04:00

Just returned from a GREAT cycling trip with two friends--biology professor Burt Webb and political science professor Kris Pence. We started in Pittsburg on the Great Alleghany Passage—a rails-to-trails route—to Cumberland Maryland. The GAP is a gravel route that never rises above 1 ½% grade, but it does rise a couple thousand feet to the Laurel Highlands over 50 or so miles. In Cumberland Maryland we got on the C&O canal towpath, a National Park route that is mostly dirt & puddles, and rode that right down into Georgetown-DC, 335 miles in all.

This was a test trip for me—last year I hammered my knees on 500 miles of the Appalachian Trail in may—they never recovered. I tried cycling to see if it would have less stress on my knees. Sure enough my knees are fine, thanks mostly to an awesome bicycle—the “Salsa Fargo” whose designers had a mission of “designing a bike to ride the Continental Divide Route, which is my real dream—and something I’ll probably start to tackle next summer—a route right down the backbone of the Continental Divide from Canada to Mexico paralleling the Continental Divide Trail.

I’m returning to the GAP-C&O in July to ride it again, that time with Sharon. Until then I’m looking at re-riding with Sharon some of the off-road trails radiating from Xenia, Ohio and maybe the White Pine Trail in Michigan. I love cycling!

Click here for a video of our recent trip.

Who Reads the Tuesday Column?

2009-03-15T18:13:00.003-04:00

I don’t chase after visits to my Tuesday Column site—I know that some online writers monitor their traffic daily and write more of whatever gets them the greatest number of visits. As for me I write whatever I’m thinking about regardless of readership and frankly I have all the readers I need to satisfy me.

However, writing on the web gets one fewer responses than preaching at a church (well most churches at least ;-). When preaching I can see the crowd and know for sure they at least listened to some of what I preached. On the web most folk read but never comment—I have learned to live with that. (Those who DO comment get read by about 350-400 people each week so the commenters have a following too.)

Yet, sometimes I wonder if anyone is reading. That’s when I check the data. Today I had an extra half hour so I looked at the data. Here is what I saw concerning the last two weeks.

-825 of you visited this week’s column on homosexuality--thanks for coming by!
-657 visited the column last week on Grandparenting--thanks (even though it applied to few)

The vast majority of the rest of the readers these last two weeks came directly from a Google search that brought them to one of the past columns. The most popular past columns by the family (besides the weekly Tuesday Column) are invariably the same:

-My own most visited past column was my speed-reading article
-David’s past column on Leadership Movies
-John’s past article on How to Write an Exegesis Paper
-Sharon’s booklet on Leadership Theory for Pastors

In total 13,692 unique visits occurred the past two weeks, which is about the average for the year (900-1000 per day). In the last two weeks readers visited from 92 countries--so it is nice to "see" you guys from other countries too.

Well, I don’t suppose these figures mean anything to anyone but me—but I thought I'd resport them to myself here anyway. ;-)

Just Kidding--it's more like this

2009-01-30T14:28:00.002-05:00

Just Kidding--it's more like this (Teaching the Bible to adults-Thursday evenings)

My Inspiring students

2009-01-30T11:06:00.002-05:00

This is what being a college professor looks like from up front.

IWU approved for M.Div degree

2009-01-08T13:30:00.001-05:00

Just heard we were approved for an M.Div degree.... so seminary here we come... Ken Schenck describes it best here.

I like Google Chrome

2008-12-30T12:37:00.002-05:00

I already use several browsers from Firefox to Mac... but I've kept IE on one old PC... I even downloaded IE8 Beta to give Bill Gates' a fair try... YUCK! It crashes contnually and worse, once I downloaded it Microsoft boxed me in and I can;t revert to the old browser.

Today I downloaded Google Chrome and boy it is crisp and clean, fast as pretty stable even...

Bye Bye Bill Gates..I'm outa Microsoft!

Windows is next to go.

Cutting myself

2008-12-17T14:23:00.003-05:00

I've been rewriting Holiness for Ordinary people for the 25th anniversary edition (third edition ) coming out this summer. The book has four new chapters and the style and tone of the rest is being changed significantly. I've been working on it all semester and have dedicated my Christmas break to finishing the work to send it in by the January 9 due date.

So the last three days I've been doing the painful work of cutting --getting a 60,000 word manuscript down to 55,000 words. that means cutting 5000 precious words out of what I've written... OUCH! I just finished the third trip through the mss. "cutting myself" and have got it trimmed below 55,000... so I'm taking the rest of the day off...I think I'll go do something sweaty.

Here is my latest word count after self-cutting. (red chapters are new)

words
1003 Preface ..... to 1st, 2nd and 3rds editions
4361 Chapter 1 Sanctification Overview
3587 Chapter 2 It’s Everywhere
2679 Chapter 3 Seven Approaches to Holiness
1783 Chapter 4 Sanctification and Sex
1758 Chapter 5 Sanctification and healing
3577 Chapter 6 Images of Sanctification
4443 Chapter 7 Growing toward Entire Sanctification
3551 Chapter 8 God’s Part in Sanctification
3373 Chapter 9 Our Part In Sanctification
3106 Chapter 10 How to Know You Are Sanctified
2372 Chapter 11 Continual Cleansing
3349 Chapter 12 Understanding the Sanctified Life
2945 Chapter 13 Sidetracks from Holiness
3632 Chapter 14 A sanctified Church
5206 Chapter 15 Personal Testimonies
1040 Afterword
1427 Glossary of Terms
-------------
53,192 TOTAL WORDS (target word budget = 55,000)

OK I knmow this is irrelevant to whomever stumbled across it... but I needed to tell someone ..so I told my personal blog ;-)

Graduation Dec '08

2008-12-13T12:16:00.003-05:00

I just finished up the semester at Graduation... In December we have a few graduates from our division. This year from our division we had 17 graduates from what I could count in the march. That included these:

CM: Johnnie Blair, Greg Boland, Alan Downing, Jess (Manglos) Hamlet, Jonathan Hicks, Brian Morton,
YOUTH: Brandon Faust, Chris Tabone
SPORTS MIN: Rachel Horner, Josh Miller, Paul Knight,
CHILDREN'S MIN: Megan Kiami, Katie Martin, Aubrie Rovenstein, Heather Tharp

I'm about to leave my office for Christmas break. All my grades are in and syllabi are done so I'm not omcing back until next year.
BIL: Tom Davis, Sarah Smith,

Grading LCE books

2008-12-06T08:44:00.004-05:00

I've been grading all weekend... mostly the Local Church Ed. "papers" (which turn out to be somewhere around a hundred pages each--single spaced.) Grading is hard work but so gratifying. Man these students can work hard!

Grandson Sam

2008-11-26T23:01:00.003-05:00

Steinbeck Reading Plans

2008-11-19T17:22:00.004-05:00

I like Steinbeck's writing and have been through East of Eden several times with reading groups of faculty and students. Now I've decided to read through all the rest of John Steinbeck's writings --sort of in the general order of his writing... I'm just getting started but here is the order I'm going to read them:

1 Cup of Gold (1929) (over Christmas break)
2 The Pastures of Heaven (1932) DONE: (Great short stories of the people in one valley--many sad stories with great insight on human nature)
3 The Red Pony (1933) (over Christmas break)
4 To a God Unknown (1933) DONE: (Probably the deepest writing [after East of Eden] for religion readers--about a nominal Christian's reverting to paganism)
5 Tortilla Flat (1935)
6 The Harvest Gypsies: On the Road to the Grapes of Wrath (1936)
7 In Dubious Battle (1936)
8 Of Mice and Men (1937)
9 The Long Valley (1938)
10 The Grapes of Wrath (1939)
11 Forgotten Village (1941)
12 Sea of Cortez: A Leisurely Journal of Travel and Research (1941)
13 The Moon Is Down (1942)
14 Bombs Away: The Story of a Bomber Team (1942)
15 Cannery Row (1945)
16 The Wayward Bus (1947)
17 The Pearl (1947)
18 A Russian Journal (1948)
19 Burning Bright (1950)
20 The Log from the Sea of Cortez (1951)
21 East of Eden (1952) DONE --several times--can't wait for the next trip through... are there 'moral monsters' born with no conscience?)
22 Sweet Thursday (1954)
23 The Short Reign of Pippin IV: A Fabrication (1957)
24 Once There Was A War (1958)
25 The Winter of Our Discontent (1961)
26 Travels with Charley: In Search of America (1962) DONE --a wonderful tale of travel--my first Steinbeck writing..can;t wait tor ead it again!
27 America and Americans (1966)

Posthumous
28. Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters (1969) DONE--for a writer a must to read near East of Eden!
29 Viva Zapata! (1975)
30 The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights (1976)
31 Workings Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath (1989)

Best Little add-on I've seen... (Morning Coffee-for Firefox)

2008-11-18T16:20:00.003-05:00

I don't swoon over computers or programs--I treat them like automobiles: they just need to get me there. I have four different computers with three different operating systems and I have not fallen for any of them (including my MacBook Paul H Hontz!).

BUT I'VE TOTALLY GONE BONKERS OVER A TINY ADD-ON program that cost me nothing Morning coffee for Firefox. (I don't particularly like Firefox but I use Firefox simply so I can have my Morning Coffee)

Each morning (say Tuesdays, for instance) I can click my little cup of coffee in the bar and the program loads in tabs every single web page I've picked ahead of time for Tuesaday (and any other day, or just weekends, or weekdays etc).

BAM I have before me the blogs and web pages I've decided to read that day and I can then work my way through them one at a time.

I have fallen head over heels in love with Morning Coffee... {swoon!}

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2677

First Snow from my new office

2008-11-18T08:52:00.002-05:00

Today was the first snow in Marion... this is what I saw from my new office window upstairs in the CM building...

Headed for Christmas

2008-11-14T11:35:00.002-05:00

I thought I'd update my classes this semester...

CURRICULUM: I'm really feeling like Christmas is just around the corner. Last night in my Curriculum class we all realized there are only two classes left... next Thursday (when their projects are due) then the Thursday after Thanksgiving when they take their exam..whew... two more classes 'til Christmas! Next week I get their curriculum projects--each has done something different... and they look good so far.

LOCAL CHURCH EDUCATION: This course is awesome... it is the best course I have...and every semester that is true. They are writing their final chapter for their book next week--Adult CE. Most of the students have written about 80 single spaced pages so far and they are incredible. Every semester I show the best work from last semester and the students seem to climb right up on the shoulders of last semester's students and make something even better. When can this stop? I am so impressed at the hard work of these students... senior pastors who complain that new graduates are lazy just don't know the key to motivation. I have never seen such hard workers!

CE CAPSTONE: A new course for me called "leading Christian Education." First time through for me as these CE seniors work through managing a CE program in the local church. It is pretty good for the first time through--sorta' a Church leadership for CE people."

CHURCH LEADERSHIP. We are in the "personal life of a minister" section now--their books are almost done. Yesterday they brought in the email responses from past graduates on what to expect in transitioning from college life to adult life/church life. They merged the feedback from last year's graduates like this:

I. Advice about preparing for adult life
Make a budget
Pay your bills
Value free time
Get support from others
Expect feeling lonely< find a "drinking buddy"
Find a friend
You have to be disciplined and responsible
Expect to not get poured into spiritually

II. Preparing church ministry
You will be trusted and expected to know what to do
The prof’s grade on knowledge…the congregation grades on everything else
You always have to be ready to be relational, to smile, to make conversations, and portray Christ in a positive light
Learn to work as a team
Don’t be afraid to be vulnerable
Need for balance. Flexible yet leave time for sermon prep
You will always be a pastor, its not a hat you can take off
Other people are depending on you to get the job done

III Things I can look forward to after graduation
These aren’t practicums, they are yourflock and your youth group
Freedom…the sky is the limit
You get to impact other peoples lives
Putting passion into action
Ministry is hard but also very rewarding and amazing
Constantly growing, learning, and being ready
Freedom-you can create, come into your own, choose your time (within reason)
You get to do what you are passionate about-ministry
Separating people from the problems they cause and enjoying the people
Prioritizing relationships w/family, students, their parents, and staff
Peace about being where you are called

Where's Bobby Schuller?

2008-10-26T08:06:00.004-04:00

I usually listen to Bobby Schuller every Sunday morning to "prime" myself for Sunday worship (which is reliably better preaching than Bobby's, but reliably worse music) I have my differences with Bobby, but he was at least more biblical and orthodox that daddy Schuller.

This morning I discovered from Wes McCallum what's up. Son Bobby had a new vision from Dad Schuller. So Dad swooped back in after Bobbys two year rein and fired Bobby.

The whole famly fuss is interesting and representative of some of the emergent-Boomer church-for-the-curch vs. church-for-the-world debates. Bu it has changes my Sunday morning habit. Now my TV offers a few Televanglists I can;t stomach... so this morning I'm listening to the radio. Radio? I will have to explain this to my students--they don't know what a "radio" is.

Keith Drury

Fall Break Bike Trip

2008-10-20T19:14:00.004-04:00

Sharon and I are testing out biking together. Over fall break we went to KaFor fall break we went to Kalamazoo Michigan and rode the the 34.5 miles from Kalamazoo to the lake in South Haven.

It was a great trail-- almost all in the shade, for us falling leaves. the surface is crushed limestone and slag which does gum up sprockets. had the wonderful “hungry Man’s breakfast” at the Trailside Cafe in Gobles about milepost 12 or so. There were plenty of old fashioned hand pumps on trail for water and lots of Job-Johnnie restrooms and benches for sitting. Sharon and I parked at the Kalamazoo end and rode to South Haven where we spent the night at the Comfort Inn after eating at the famous Clementine’s restaurant The next morning we rode back (mostly uphill) to the car and got home to Marion before dark.

now my Quads are sore but it was a great Fall break!

I've gone open source

2008-09-07T16:05:00.003-04:00

On my latest computer (a tiny one the size of a paperback book which I plan to take on whatever new summer adventure I choose) I've decided to try to use only open source stuff on this nifty computer... so I have the Linux operating system, Firefox as the browser, the Sun programs for word processing and spreadsheets etc...

So far I am FAR more impressed with the open source programs that I am with Bill Gates' stuff.. it is leaner, meaner, faster and easily used. Why have I PAID for stuff that is worse than this free stuff? I may change all my computers over...

P.S. Just in case you are tempted to download Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8. (Beta) like they keep tempting us to do... I'd say WAIT as long as you can... On one of my other computers installed it and at least half the time it doesn't present most pages right.. then to boot when I tried to revert to 7.0 it wouldn't let me go back.... typical of the sort of Microsoft arrogance that makes me want to go completely open source.

I'm ready for a career change.

2008-08-18T19:49:00.007-04:00

On Closing Doors... A personal reflection

1. On June 3, 1967 I stood before a church in Pennsylvania and closed the door on dating and romance with the women still available at my college. But that closed door enabled me to walk through the door of a superb marriage to Sharon for the rest of my life. Closing one door opened another.

2. In 1969 I closed the door at my first pastorate by resigning and numerous folk thought I was making a mistake closing the door on that that church. But I could then walk through the open door to being a full time student at Princeton Seminary. Closing one door enabled me to walk through another door.

3. After seminary I closed the door on a developing career running camping programs for the Salvation Army in New York where I had my first ministry after seminary. I could not be both a Salvation Army leader and a Wesleyan pastor—closing the Salvation Army door made it possible to walk through Wesleyan ministry doorway.

4. In 1971-72 I wandered the country with Sharon living in a VW camping, backpacking, and living like the hippies of that day. To the disappointment of that hippie generation we closed the door on our care-free wandering life in 1972. But that closed door opened another one: to work at my denomination’s headquarters in Children’s ministries for the next six years.

5. In the 1970’s everyone was talking about over population and I even went to a doctor to get an operation guaranteeing we would not contribute to the world’s “Population Bomb.” (The doctor talked me out of it.) In the late 70’s we I closed the door to our happy “just you and me” life together and opened the door to parenting when we decided to have our first child—one door had to be closed before the other could be opened.

6. In 1976 I closed the door to children’s work in the youth department and walked through the open door to become my denominations executive editor of curriculum. A General Superintendent called me on the carpet and said, “You have made a terrible mistake—you belonged in the youth department and now you’ve gone and ruined your chances of election to be in charge of youth forever.” Right or wrong I had to close the children’s ministry door in order to walk through the open door to leading my denomination’s curriculum the next two years.

7. In 1980 my denomination shut the door to my curriculum work when it ignored the opinion of the GS and elected me to lead my denomination’s youth work for the next eight years. The curriculum door shut and youth work door opened.

8. By 1988 I was worn out on youth work and announced I would close the door on that era of life against my mentor’s advice. At the summer general conference I closed the door on yet another opportunity and went to IWU to teach Christian Education. Those closed doors enabled me to be present in my son’s lives instead of traveling every weekend in denominational work—one door closed, another opened.

9. Even though I loved teaching college, I closed the door on it in 1990 when I felt prompted to accept leading my denomination’s Christian Education department. If I had not closed the door on teaching I could not have walked through the door to six important years of learning in my life.

10. In the Fall of 1995 I sensed that it was time to close the doors on denominational service forever, even though many friends and advisors urged me to stay put. It is the only time I have ever “put out a fleece” for a decision. I wrote one Tuesday on a Day Alone with God, “The first Wesleyan College that offers me a position teaching without my applying I will accept it immediately.” I got an unexpected call Thursday and by Tuesday I had a contract—I was willing to close one door in order to walk through another door and retired from denominational work in 1996. Teaching college again also opened the door to a new summer avocation—backpacking. I started that summer trying to finish the Appalachian Trail, a childhood dream of mine.

11. In the next 12 years of summer backpacking I have been able to take students or other professors into the mountains and I have had wonderful times. I’ve been able to finish the Southern Upland Way and the West Highland Way in Scotland, complete the entire 2160 mile Appalachian Trail, and 2600 mile Pacific Crest Trail along with completing the Colorado Trail. The last few years I’ve actually been repeating miles on these trails, including re-hiking the bottom 500 miles of the Appalachian Trail this past May. In total I’ve had the privilege of backpacking more than 10,000 miles of trails the last 12 summers. Now I’m closing that door. I have six summers left before I’m 70 years old, 16 summers before I’m 80. There are other summer adventures I want to experience. As I close the door on backpacking I can walk through the door to other things—like canoeing, bicycle-trekking, and whatever other adventures open up. I will still do some walking in the woods and mountains, but I am closing the door on backpacking as my primary summer career, and pondering several open doors to other adventures.

So, I need a career change. Not a change in my day job as professor but a change in my summer avocation of backpacking. I'm wearing out on long-mile backpacking.

I hiked more than 600 miles this summer but this came to me most clearly in August while I was hiking the Colorado trail with three other guys, We were doing a moderate 15 mile a day with three or four thousand feet of elevation gain. The trail beat me and I dropped out before the end of our planned 100 mile hike. I was "surviving" each day only by using up all my reserves… and all my Advil (16 per day) to enable my knees to carry me. It took the fun out of hiking. I turned down a jeep road near Silverton Colorado and eventually got a hitch with a 4WD jeep 60 miles back to our starting point where I retrieved our car to meet my hiking buddies when they ended their hike in Durango. Now I'm pondering next summer....

Some options for my new [summer] career are:

Reading/writing. Maybe I should forget trekking altogether and get a cabin in the mountains each summer and read and write for four months. I love reading and just to read all the books I’ve already purchased would use up the first five years. Maybe my treks in the future should be through books and my output should be words not miles. Maybe I’ll settle down in one cabin that has a great view of mountains and read-and-write all summer. I could switch to a reading-writing career.

Motorcycling. Or, maybe I could move into motorized trekking. I could buy a motorcycle and wander around the nation (and the world) like the guys did in “Motorcycle diaries.” I could write a daily travel blog on the road. Or maybe I could buy an off-road motorcycle and explore the 200,000 miles of 4WD forest service roads in the national forests I met two guys in Yellowstone park this summer riding from Canada to Mexico on these 4WD roads. I once rode my moped along the 600 mile Blue Ridge Parkway/Skyline Drive and It was fun—maybe I could adopt a motorized trekking career next.

Canoeing/kayaking. I left a canoeing career for backpacking. I had canoed nearly a thousand miles even before I did the entire Missouri River in 1999. I was planning a canoe trip down the Yukon River in 2000 when Paul Kind talked me into doing the PCT with him instead. He used the argument, “Coach, you can canoe when you get old.” Maybe now I’m old enough to go back to canoeing. I still have all the maps and research done for both the Yukon and Mackenzie Rivers along with books and guides to 14 other great rivers of America. Maybe I could switch back to a canoeing/Kayaking career.

Bicycling. I could switch to a biking career too. Biking is easier on the knees than backpacking. I might start by doing the Rails-to-Trails treks including the Great-Alleghany-Passage/C&O trail from Pittsburg to Washington DC. And there are other long off-road bike trails. I might even try to tackle the Great Divide Mountain Bike Trail from Canada to Mexico which parallels the Continental Divide backpacking Trail. I have far more friends willing to bike than backpack and Sharon likes biking better too since one can sleep in motels each night. Maybe I should switch to a biking career.

Maybe there are other summer careers too—but I sense my knees are saying it is time to switch careers. It is time to lay down my backpack. So if you are reading this personal blog you must be one of my friends... So what do your think? After dropping my backpack what do you think I should pick up?

keith drury

Home for a quick turnaround

2008-08-09T08:06:00.003-04:00

No important or interesting news here but I probably should say that our vacation dribbled out to an unimpressive close as we coasted back into Marion this week after exploring several bike trails in Iowa, Nebraska & Illinois.

Sharon is back for graduation today (Saturday) while I am packing for the faculty backpacking trip to Colorado --we leave Monday morning at 5AM for that trip --with Dave Ward, Kerry Kind, and Phil Woodbury.

Besides repacking I need to organize my new office today... my stuff was moved into the newly renovated CM building last week... it is still stacked in boxes and I need to unpack and organize for the first week of classes which will happen soon after I return from the Colorado Trail.

Wandering Colorado (Aug 4)

2008-08-04T11:02:00.004-04:00

one of the ways we define "vacation" is not getting boxed in--that is, not being a slave to a schedule, even scheduled vacation. Thus, whenever we start planning to go somewhere we find we tend to change our plans--as if that freedom to "not show up" is what vacation is all about. This as soon as we started planning to go to to the Durango-Silverton trainride we began thinking of alternatives and rebelled against the schedule we were starting to make.

This is how we wound up in Rocky Mountain National Park the last few days... Grand lake, over the divide, CDT at Berthold pass, Big Thompson canyon and finally here at GROUP publishing's lavish headquarters. (Pictures below).

Stopping at GROUP is fun for me--I remember when Thom Shultz had just moved GROUP out of his bedroom and into the first office... and I recall before Thom was married (eventually to his favorite editor). Sharon recalls our last visit here when the whole affair was sorta in a house. The company has become huge since then. Soon it will become like the gigantic companies (D C Cook, Gospel Light, Scripture press) it took on and found a niche.

Now we're thinking of headed to Nebraska to look at a bike trail there--but now that I mentioned it we will probably change the plans!

On the road again
Just can't wait to get on the road again
The life I love is makin' music with my friends
And I can't wait to get on the road again

On the road again Goin' places that I've never been
Seein' things that I may never see again,
And I can't wait to get on the road again.

On the road again
Like a band of gypsies we go down the highway
We're the best of friends Insisting that the world be turnin' our way
And our way Is on the road again
Just can't wait to get on the road again
The life I love is makin' music with my friends
And I can't wait to get on the road again

On the road again
Like a band of gypsies we go down the highway
We're the best of friends Insisting that the world be turnin' our way
And our way Is on the road again
Just can't wait to get on the road again
The life I love is makin' music with my friends
And I can't wait to get on the road again
And I can't wait to get on the road again

--------------------

How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
Yes, 'n' how many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, 'n' how many times must the cannon balls fly
Before they're forever banned?

The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

How many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
Yes, 'n' how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, 'n' how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

How many years can a mountain exist
Before it's washed to the sea?
Yes, 'n' how many years can some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
Yes, 'n' how many times can a man turn his head,
Pretending he just doesn't see?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind.

keith drury

Great Divide Bike Trail

2008-08-01T22:53:00.008-04:00

Recently I’ve been getting more interested in biking—partly because Sharon likes biking and I like doing outdoor things with her.

A month or so ago I discovered the Great Divide Bike Trail—roughly paralleling the 2600 mile Continental Divide Trail from Canada to Mexico but all on forest service roads and open to trail bikes. Just last week I met two guys from Minnesota who were actually driving their off-road motorcycles down the Montana-Wyoming section.

So while I was out here I dropped in on the headquarters of Adventure Cycling in Missoula, Montana last week and picked up the entire set of maps for this bike trail. (I also got the meet the founder of Adventure Cycling, formerly Bikecentenial whom I had connected with in 1976 when I was leading a cross country bicycle touring program called Ezekiel’s Wheels.

Anyway, I am sorta’ entranced by this trail—and doing it on some kind of bike. So we drove to the little town on the Canadian border where it begins, Roosville (icture me beside the road at the border crossing) , then drove in our car the first 40-50 miles. Our Toyota is not really designed for four-wheeling, but driving slowly we were able to make it up to the first pass and get a feel for the route.

I’m letting the idea marinate a while, and looking over the maps for a few months yet, but I might do this route on a trail bike (or even do it first on a motorized trail bike to check it out further). Who knows, maybe I’ll find someone around who wants to do the route too-or at least the top two states.

Posted from Salt Lake City, Utah... as we coast southward down the Rocky mountains to wherever....

--keith drury

Glacier National Park—July 30-31

2008-07-31T20:22:00.003-04:00

We spent the last two days in Glacier national Park right on the border with Canada. It is still called “Glacier” though we’ll need a new name in the future since the 150 glaciers (1850) shrunk to 50 (1968). Today there are only 26 and they are melting fast. I think perhaps we might rename it for President George Bush—for his quick recognition of global warming and his defeat with his keen mind all those who deny there is any such thing happening.

The “Going to the sun” road (West side) is certainly one of the three finest roads I’ve ever driven. Impressive, even though the glaciers themselves are more like large snow patches. Seeing two bighorn sheep and a Mountain goat was this morning’s highlight though our hike across the snowfields back to Hidden Lake perched on the top of the divide was a close second.

On recommendation of Ross & Karen Hoffman we also drove up the other road in the park, the “many Glacier” road which also was beautiful. After several nights in our tent we are camping tonight at the Quality Inn at Helena Montana… we are sorta’ headed south down the Continental Divide for the time being… don’t know where we’ll end up.

Keith Drury

Bozeman Break —July 28-29

2008-07-29T09:32:00.005-04:00

Montana is smoky from several local forest fires and also from the clockwise rotating of California’s smoke into Montana. As we were passing through Bozeman MT on our way north we were totally captivated by this University town and decided to stay a few nights as a "vacation fom our vacation."

I guessed the town had a population of maybe 125,000-150,000 to which Sharon (who likes to look such things up) announced it was about the size of our hometown Marion. These Western towns look so much bigger than they really are. Bozeman is booming.

Thus I spent my birthday preparing for one of my fall classes until dinner which we ate in the local park. There we discovered Bozeman was not booming for everyone—we ate beside three homeless folk who had lost their jobs and were down on their luck complaining that “the government” did not provide them with jobs. One was quick to say, however, that he was against Obama, “who is a Muslim and those ragheads will be dancing in the streets if we elect a Muslim President.”

The night before we had totally wasted our money watching “Hancock.” However perhaps some sort of age things was goign on since the theater was full of pimply-faced yuk-yukking teen boys who obviously thought the movie deserved at least an oscar. We chose not to bet any more money on movies tonight instead watching the history channel for our evening entertainment.

Today we continue heading north toward Glacier National Park but we don’t have to get there, or anywhere else, for several weeks yet, so we’re just moseying along as if we are on vacation.

keith drury

Yellowstone - July 26-27

2008-07-27T16:31:00.005-04:00

We’re mountain-lovers and Yellowtone has some mountains, but mostly it has wildlife and steaming natural features like geysers, boiling mud pools and steaming holes and boiling springs. We wandered the park from dawn to dark the last several days including two visits to ‘Old Faithful,’ ’hiking the length of the ‘Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, circumnavigating Yellowstone Lake, reading the constant spin from the park service on how good the 1988 fires were, but mostly seeing wildlife: bear, moose, elk, deer, coyotes, wolves and buffalo and several kinds of rare birds. Yellowstone is not a zoo, but it almost seems like one of those drive-through safari parks…wild animals were everywhere!

The highlight of Yellowstone for me though was not the wildlife but the church life. We attended 8AM Sunday morning service at the Old Faithful Inn where Jarod Osborne is serving as the summer chaplain. We had a wonderful service and Jarod preached a great sermon to the gathered group. We got to visit with Jarod and his wife Esther after the service. Jarod was one of my students at IWU several years ago and he is now in Princeton seminary and this summer national parks chaplaincy is one of his two required internships.

Since we have finished the overnight backpacking stage of our vacation we did not do all of the 1,000 miles of trails in Yellowstone but we did exhaust every road in Yellowstone before biding it farewell and heading north to wherever this road takes us…

Traveling the Tetons July 25

2008-07-27T16:14:00.002-04:00

I was here in the Tetons for a Curriculum Conference back in 1989 and I recall calling Sharon saying, “I promise to come back here with you some day.” Well, 19 years later here we are…promise kept. (as a side note, I now believe I have at this point now fulfilled every “I’ promise to come back here with you.” except one—the Austrian Alps….I’m getting out of debt. [and, likewise Sharon has paid on all her promise-to-come-back-here-with-you vows except one—New Orleans.] Maybe we can get a plane to Austria that stops over in New Orleans some day!

Since we are worn out from backpacking, and since we are not up to a technical climb with ropes, we simply drove on every available road in the Tetons before leaving it headed North. What beautiful mountains! If I were younger I'd make a try on the Grand teton!

-- Keith Drury

My entire day in one picture (July 24)

2008-07-24T19:31:00.002-04:00

One picture describes this entire vacation day...

July 22-23. Pinedale WY

2008-07-23T11:20:00.004-04:00

July 22-23.

We fell into bed at 8PM after leaving Brooke & Paul and squandered $110 for a night in a partially-updated 1950’a ma & pa motel in Pinedale, WY. Sharon woke up at 4:30 am fully rested which meant I also got up. We waited a few hours until the German ma & pa who own the motel got around to walking up themselves and putting out the stuff they called breakfast then checked out and went shopping for FOOD!

After packing our trunk with food we headed back up into the wind river mountains by car this time, to 9100’ and the Elkhart Trail head perched high above the valley and with delicious views of the snowcapped winds where we have been hiking. (The picture abovve shows part of the range we walked through last week). We pitched our tent at one of eight national forest campsites at this “trails End” campsite and sat in our camp chairs and read books all day. By supper huge clouds and lightning strikes approached and Sharon said “I saw a movie down in Pinedale—let’s go see a movie while it rains on our tent” so we drovw the hour back down to the valley to discover the movies in Pinedale only are open on weekends and they prominently displayed on the door “no move will be shown unless ten people attend.”

So we walked around the small cowboy town under our huge IWU umbrellas for our evening program as rain poured on us. Walking around the town park’s “health walkway” we ran into a moose family—skinny antlered dad, a fat momma and two little baby moose and watched them for a half hour as the mother sat nervously looking at us as if to say, “one more step and I’m gonna’ get up and knock you into the next county.”

Sharon, who is gifted at finding ice cream stores seduced me into eating more ice cream than I knew I could consume than we drove back to 9100’ elevation and crawled into our tent for a chilly night complete with frost this morning.

We are now (July 23, morning) sitting outside a hotel parking lot back down in Pinedale mooching their Internet connection to post this and answer email. Funny isn’t it? There was once a time when folk “went on vacation” which meant they were actually gone from all work-related things for several weeks. Now, with Internet access work goes on vacation with us. That’s one big advantage of the backpacking trip last week—there isn’t even a possibility of cell phones or Internet access for a long week in the mountains. On the other hand we get to share with family and friends while we’re on vacation. And of course we can check out hotel prices in Jackson WY where we are headed next to see the Tetons…whoops, we’re not up to paying $200 per night for a simple hotel room…so Sharon just went in and grabbed the final room available tonight at this hotel for “only” a hundred bucks. Returning to the car she simply said, “I need a hot tub.” So do I.

--Keith Drury

Just finished our Wind River Hile

2008-07-23T10:47:00.004-04:00

July 21.

Sharon and I just came out of the Wind River Mountain Range… a wonderful foursome hike with Paul & Brooke Kind the last seven days. We had such a great time talking and walking and slapping mosquitoes.

The Winds had a big snowfall year so we still had LOTS of walking on snow and a few tricky places since we didn’t bring our ice axes. Starting at big Sandy Trailhead in the south we went all the way to the Northern end to Green River lakes. We are all 100% advocates of 100% DEET which was the only way to keep the swarms of mosquitoes at bay.

Today (July 21) we got to Paul & Brooke’s “drop car” and they returned us to our car at the starting point. We’re now headed to the biggest town in the region, Pinedale WY (pop 1400), for a night in a motel. Paul & Brooke are headed now to Rapid City where they will pack their moving van tonight and head out tomorrow for Princeton, New Jersey.

I will post this as soon as we get in range of WiFi.

As for us, we have several more weeks here in Wyoming… wandering the Wind River mountains by car, then the Tetons, then Yellowstone and who knows what else will strike our fancy.

A women's right to bare arms

2008-07-03T10:31:00.005-04:00

Every day I look forward to getting on my porch my Marion, Indiana small-town newspaper (the Chronicle Tribune). Not because I get much news there (I don’t) but I get a great chuckle almost daily at their junior high spelling and grammar. Today’s editorial affirmed our “right to bare arms” in the headline. I wonder if the editor even knows the difference between baring arms and bearing arms?

If the editorial had been written by Ken Schenck or Bob Black I would have guessed it was one of their clever turnings of a phrase…

I thought it would be a GREAT headline for conservative holiness people if I were writing columns in the summer.

For instance I’d trace the history of how conservative holiness women used to be expected to wear long sleeves (as late as the 1950’s). But even in the 1950’s women started pushing against this “collective conviction.” The more racy women (often “song evangelist’s” wives) started wearing long sleeves of material that was see-though so that men could ogle their skin peaking out through the material.

By the end of the 50’s these racy women moved to “¾ length sleeves” and bared their lower arms for others to see—it was getting sexy.

Sure enough the women’s “right to bare arms” continued so that at Sunday school picnics in the 1960’s some came in “short sleeve” dresses showing off to the public the skin on their arms from the wrist all the way up to within 4” of their shoulders. It was stimulating to the men who had never seen so much skin of their church women!

Of course it wasn’t long until women took their "right to bare arms" all the way. Some started wearing “sleeveless blouses” to regular church services! Yikes—full appendage nudity! I recall sitting in Lakeview church (Marion) with my 75 year old mother in the 1980’s when a girl came into the service late and plopped down in front of us wearing a slinky blouse and only spaghetti straps—my mother was as shocked as if she had come in topless. By now I had accepted the women’s right to bare arms but she was so distracted that she talked about it the rest of the afternoon. She angrily responded when I just chuckled at her conservative standards but she argued back with this: “If things change as much in your lifetime as they have in mine, women will be coming to church completely naked by the time you're 75.”

I turn 75 in 2020… ;-)

. --keith drury

My Big Fat SUV

2008-06-25T16:43:00.005-04:00

My
Big
Fat
SUV

Four dollar a gallon gas along with reducing my carbon footprint, has got me thinking about my own carbon footprint sins—I own a Big Fat SUV, a 1992 Chevy Suburban. I did some calculating this morning as I considered full repentance for my sins. Here are my notes:

800 miles driven per year—all in-town
11 miles per gallon in town mileage
72 gallons of gas used per year
@ $4.20 per gallon gas
----------
$302 annual cost of gas

Really, shouldn’t a person with pro-environment leanings drive around town in a Toyota Prius like my nifty colleagues Steve Lennox and Todd Voss do? Better yet maybe I ought to get one of those cool plug-ins and disconnect forever from middle eastern oil.

So I calculated a trade. I paid $10,000 for the used Suburban when it had about 100,000 miles on it. I could now get maybe $5,500 if I sell it outright—I could put that toward a lower emission car maybe. So I checked the cost of the cheapest used Prius within 500 miles of my home. I found a “clunker” for just over $17,000. (A true plug-in was far more than that so I dropped the plug-in idea altogether.) So if I sell my Suburban for five grand and add just $12,000 to that money, I too could be a cool low-carbon guy. How much would that investment of twelve grand save me on gas?

TOYOTA PRIUS
800 miles driven per year—all in-town
44 miles per gallon (in town mileage)
18 gallons of gas used per year
@ $4.20 per gallon gas
----------
$226 annual savings in gas

In short, if I fork out just $12,000 extra for the used Prius, I could save $226 every year at the gas pump and “it would pay for itself” in just 53 years—in time for my 115th birthday.

I need a quicker payback.

So I guess for a while yet, you’ll still see me running around town in “my Big Fat SUV.”

(Of course more commonly you’ll see be around town on my bicycle).

Ready for Fall semester

2008-06-20T10:50:00.004-04:00

All week I have been preparing for Fall semester and my last syllabus is now done and all the first week's classes are prepared. My office is all packed up and in boxes for the move back into the newly renovated CM building August 1--but I'll be long gone so I will come back at the end of August for classes with these boxes all moved into my new office...so I had to prepare for fall early this year.

Now I'm thinking about the rest of summer.

I have three weeks here in Marion to
-Pack for the rest of the summer, and
-Do all the little chores professors say "I'll do that this summer."
...Today I'm painting kitchen cabinets and hardware
...cutting grass and caring for the garden-I-won't-be-here-to- harvest
...just being summer-lazy a bit
...I've got a bunch of other little things to repair, fix, organize, and throw away
...visiting with my local grandkids..

To be honest I'm blogging here just to delay finishing the kitchen painting.

I leave July 13 for the rest of the summer...
--Hiking in Wyoming with Paul & Brooke Kind
--Wandering Wyoming three extra weeks with Sharon
--returning in August just time to leave the next day for Colorado with Kerry Kind, Dave Ward and Phil Woodbury for an end-of-summer hike on the CT.

OK I better get back to painting before Sharon comes home to find me having done nothing at all today...

Family Reunion @ General Conference

2008-06-17T15:34:00.004-04:00

Perhaps the best highlight of the Wesleyan General Conference for me personally was the reunion of all my family.

Left to right are

-David, Kathy, (College church ex pastor)

-Sharon and me, (IWU)

-Amanda and John, (Princeton)

-my late brother Elmer's son Scott & Elizabeth (World Hope) whom I consider like a son

All are members of my own denomination (Wesleyan), Dave, John and Amanda are ordained, and Scott is pursuing it now.

We all sat together on the front seat of the observers section and whispered, chuckled, sighed, cheered and grunted through every minute of every session. We do not claim to have a perfect denomination but we are all in this one and it is ours and we love it.

In 1988 at the General Conference I made a big bet on a family/career decision.

At this General Conference, twenty years later it reminded me that it paid off in spades.

--Keith Drury June 17, 2008

Back Home from General Conference

2008-06-12T11:41:00.002-04:00

We flew back from Orlando last night and I’m in General Conference detox now. It was a GREAT conference and I loved every moment. Here are a few personal notes the morning-after.

- I shaved off my beard for this week. Most of the folk at CG know me clean-shaven and I didn’t want every single interchange with people to start with remarks about my beard or the “have you become Amish?” question. The only folk who mentioned facial hair were people I already see every week—and that didn’t matter since I merely explained the above to them and they understood. The beard starts growing back today.

- I am in relational detox now. Crowds recharge some people’s batteries (most of my family); constant relationships exhaust me so I must plan alone-time to recharge my batteries. I love so many people I saw this week, yet I get exhausted “relating” from 7 AM to midnight every day without alone time.

- I was reminded how much I love these guys. Man do I have great friends in this church. I skipped “The Gathering” last January due to a wedding (one that never happened it turned out) and regretted it. I’ll not skip the next one—or general Conference either. I got to see bunches of former students and youth workers.

- The highlight for me was being able to sit with my two sons in the front seat of the observer’s section and comment to each other on things like those guys on Mystery Theater or the guys in the Muppets. I represented the old folk and they the younger ones.

- I was suprised at how many 20-30somethings care about General Conference and showed up at their own expense. The boomers like to pretend it is all irrelevant. They are out of sync with the coming generation who really cares about stuff like this.

- I blogged real-time from my cell phone live reports on the conference…they are here. http://wesleyanstuff.blogspot.com/

- NEXT FOR ME: After resting up with alone time a while I am making all my Fall semester syllabi before leaving for the rest of the summer in 3 weeks.

-- Keith Drury June 12, 2008

Sharon's new pack

2008-06-05T09:58:00.004-04:00

Sharon got a new pack--Golite's LiteSpeed

It weighs a bit over 2 pounds which is too much so we are adapting it now (removing the alum stays etc) to get it under 2# but it is a sweet pack.

She is "moving beyond" her trusty Golite "Breeze" 15 oz pack because she wanted 1) waist straps, and 2) a cooler looking pack ;-)

Sharon has endlessly long legs but is short-waisted so she actually fits a woman's small pack--her pack holds about 2000 cubit (cubic). inches which will be enough for about any long distance hike as a lite-packer.

I think this may be a revision of the old "speed" pack that Paul Kind (and maybe Mark Schmerse) used once... she liked that one so I think she'll like this one too

Ok gotta go register freshman... just wanted to report a new pack in the family ;-)

Finished 500 miles of Applachian Trail

2008-06-02T11:17:00.008-04:00

On Thursday at nine o'clock we rolled into Damascus, Virginia... about 500 miles from our starting point at Springer Mountain Georgia on the Appalachian Trail. I had only hoped for 350 miles at the best but we rolled along quite nicely with light packs and long walks. In the final week we were doing 20-even 25--miles a day....

In Damascus we went out for supper with a half dozen other hikers we've been running with for the last week or so... they are celebrating our finish and their entry into the second quarter of the trail for themselves....

Ethan Lennox was my partner for the whole hike--all 500 miles. he is faster than I am but I can walk long. We were counting up and discovered we passed more then 150 long distance hikers (thru hikers going to Maine or those hiking 500+ miles).... only two have passed us which was quite a feat for someone who has never backpacked before the first night on Springer mountain (Ethan) and an old guy in his 60's... (me). Light packs and long walking were the secret. Burt Webb joined us for two weeks and Phil Woodbury for Three weeks of this hike

We got back to Marion by Midnight Friday and I had a "normal" weekend here at home preparing to leave for General Conference.

I am now experiencing PTTSS.... "Post Trail Traumatic Stress Syndrome"... my mind won't settle back into noisy town life... it seems like I don't belong here but have snuck away from where I "belong." Happens every year.... and I am exausted...I think I'll go back to bed and sleep until August!

Actually I head to general conference Friday, then I will start planning for the Continential Divide hike in July... Sharon will join me in the Wind River Mountains where we're be double-date-hiking with Paul & Brooke Kind... that will be great...a bit slower pace and more beautiful mountains..(and since Sharon is going) we'll take one of those "jet boil" stoves and make coffee daily!!!! After that hike Sharon and I will stay out in the Tetons and in Yellowstone for three more weeks before returning here to marion the day or so before I leave with Kerry Kind, Dave Ward, Phil Woodbury (& maybe Chris Bounds too) for our annual before-faculty-retreat hike on the Colorado Trail--this year form Creede to Durango...

I love summers!

--Keith Drury 6/2/08

Headed out hikin'

2008-04-24T06:36:00.004-04:00

I've turned in my grades and been drying food and packing stuff to head off for the summer... I will sleep on the Appalachian Trail near Springer mountain Georgia this Sunday evening (April 27). Then on Monday I should have gotten on top of Springer Mtn and the official start of the Appalachian Trail. Sharon and I were here in March, 1972 on a wet wet rainly day. (see Sharon here in "pauncho"--the latest rain gear at the time... We started north from here to do the bottom thousand miles of the AT.

I won't get that far this time--I only have a month or so... 300-350 would be a good total.

I will return from the AT in time to go to the Wesleyan General Conference June 7-11. I should check my email next that week.

--Keith Drury (April 24)

I'm under the porch

2008-02-06T16:58:00.001-05:00

My grandfather Anderson described his way of recovering from sickness this way, "You don't see a dog going to the doctor when he's sick--he just crawls under the porch and waits..and sure enough time almost always heals him."

I go under the porch every winter--usually from Christmas until Spring break. I generally get the flu or cold or whatever other bug is passing by in January which "settles" (my mother's word) in my chest and I hack all night requiring my emigration to our guest bedroom for the rest of the night so Sharon can sleep. I wake up exhausted, drag myself to classes, and barely keep up with my email--basically I just crawl under the porch and wait for time to heal.

So if you've written to me recently and have not heard back... I'm under the porch waiting for time to do its work.
--Keith Drury

UPDATE FEB 11
I see improvement and am grateful to the Lord for it...all healing comes from God--fast or slow.... still no voice--it has been 7 days without a voice, which makes "lecturing" difficult ;-) the other day in LCE I typed my lecture into a PowerPoint while they took notes... funny, they still asked me to slow down..I could type faster then many could take notes ;-) I probably waste many words anyway--that made me be more economical ... one student said it was "the best class this year": hmmmmmmmmmmmmm....

UPDATE AFTER SPRING BREAK
Like a miracle I Slowly have recovered. lost my hacking couch over break... but like a curse I got it back again within 24 hours of returning to work. Turns out the leaks in our offices in Old College church had gotten my officemate's books all soaked in January... and they were sitting unpacked all this time growing mold... when Chris unpacked them over break they were covered with black mold. A HA! They moved me to a temporary office in the World Impact section of OCC and within a week I was fine...

Second Semester begins tomorrow

2008-01-07T17:43:00.000-05:00

OK..I'm all moved into one of the Sunday school classrooms at OCC--"Old College Church"... I share an office with Chris Bounds (who likes the average temp about 85 degrees) and classes begin tomorrow.

The inside of noggle is being gutted... the "staging area" is on the (former) lawn by the Jesus-patting-students statue. We have a bunch of classes all outfitted in OCC and the famous leather coaches in the hallways. Tomorrow students will start swarming in the building and we'll see if we treat it as a temporary wandering in the wilderness or we actually like it better than 'ol Noggle... Pictures later on...

Good year to apply to grad school

2007-12-15T09:53:00.000-05:00

If you are a graduate that went directly into the local church intending to go to seminary/Grad school later on...this is a good year to do it.

It is no secret that many of the top grad schools (Princeton, Duke etc) informally "reserve" a spot or two for IWU grads each year. Well, they don't exactly have an official quota system, but it often works out that way.

Why is this year a good year to apply? Because hardly anyone from this year's senior class is applying. It's funny--some years we have several dozen applicants and other years we have few. In a quick check last week I discovered that only five recommendations for grad school have been written so far by our REL profs... last year we had written maybe 25-30 by now. More students seems to plan to go to a local church first then later go to grad school. This provides a special opportunity to people like you, if you graduated, went to a church, and plan to later go to seminary.

There should be a number of "semi-reserved spots" available this year and the competition for them will be considerably reduced... so if you are thinking of seminary--this could be year when you could get a handsome scholarship at a school you never dreamed you'd get into.

TIPS ON GETTING REFERENCES
Reminders about grad school rreferrences

1. Ask a prof first if they will write a reference for you. You don’t want a prof filling out a reference saying, “I don’t really know much about this student.” Who to ask? You should already know which prof has already expressed confidence in you. If none have then you are in deep trouble when applying for grad school. Usually you ought to tell the reference which schools you are applying to if there are several. As for me I even want to know what they are in order of preference. There are only a few stellar references a professor can write each year and they certainly don’t want to waste them on a student who really prefers another school. Students often see a reference as an extension of their own relationship. But a prof also has a relationship with the school for which he or she is writing a reference. A prof doesn’t want to waste their “reference clout” on a student who really wants to go to another school. Most profs are interested in how you rank the schools to which you are applying.

2. Waive the right to see references. Somewhere on your own application you will get a chance to waive your right to read the references or you can refuse to waive it and insist on the rights to see whatever the prof puts in your file. Profs with any brains or legal sense never write a reference for a student who does not waive this right. Profs can be sued for the tiniest little statement in response to the “weaknesses Question” expected in most references. So wise profs simply do not write references when they find out the student has not waived this right. One alternative for profs is this: they simply write a bland reference with nothing good or bad—e.g. “I had this student in several of my classes and they attended regularly” like an HR department now does to protect their assets from suit. What’s a prof to do? We must assume either (a)the student is sloppy and did not even notice the waiver checkbox, or (b) the student actually intends to insist on reading all the recommendations in their file. In either case the prof gets bad vibes about this student. So check the box if you expect a good reference.

3. Apply early. The quicker you apply the better off you’ll be. Early acceptance can also mean more money. Something else occurs here too. Many profs have a personal quota system for references to certain schools. I do. I will write only two strong references a year for my alma mater, PTS and also for Duke. I usually write those by Christmas, or sometimes by January. Glowing references are like printing money—the more you write the less they are worth. So, I only write two really strong references a year per school. I can’t say five students are “one of our best students in the last ten years.” I can say that for one, or at the most two. And when I write two one of them is usually stronger than the other—I have to be honest. If you dilly dally around and ask for a reference in March many profs have already “used up” their glowing recommendations quota. And it should be like that—any person who fiddles around and waits until March shouldn’t get a glowing recommendation anyway—they probably would fiddle around and do their papers the night before they’re due—and this kind of student would fail in grad school anyway.

4. Remind your reference people. Most schools now use an online reference company like applyyourself.com . Writing a rec through these online companies is a royal pain in the neck for your prof. Like most IT people they program everything to make it hard for the person submitting and easy for themselves. For instance to upload a reference letter recently the letter would not load... next I had to strip out of the letter the jpg letterhead symbol and it still woul dnot load, finally I had to re-title the letter describing the year-edition of Word then it loaded and I had to then review the letter as an Adobe file. All this is easier for the company collecting the references but harder for the prof who used to scribble on a prepared form and drop these references into to a pre-stamped envelope in 5 minutes. Since we hate wrestling with complicated online references with newly assigned passwords and sign-ins for each student most professors put off doing their references until they have to. Theoretically I do references on Fridays, but I often skip a week--I'd even rather grade papers than write references online. The student who shows up Tuesday telling me their reference is due Wednesday gets no reference. Also, at the end of the semester when profs are grading a bezillion papers and are crabby don’t expect the prof to be in a good mood when writing your reference. All the new pain-in-the-neck online reference procedures have made profs delay even more, so sending a short cheerful email reminding them is a good idea. Your original email to them, and the email from the computer assigning a password and sign-in for your rec can get buried behind a hundred emails in less than a week and might soon be forgotten if you don’t give a soft reminder.

5. Thank your reference people. Getting a reference is not an entitlement--you did not purchace a good reference when you paid tuition. References are a generous gift of time a professor gives an outstanding student. Thanking her for that time is only proper.

6. Keep the prof up to date on news. I wrote a glowing reference for a student a few years ago and the student got into an ivy league grad program especially because I went out on a limb for him in my reference letter. He never told me he was accepted, never told me he was also accepted in another prestigious school, and never contacted me to tell me where he decided to go. Once he went to the final grad school he has not once written a note telling me where he was and how it was going. All he did was use me as a rung on the ladder of his educational career. I was a reference to toss away like Kleenex. So if you ask your prof to take an hour to craft a recommendation letter for you, at least give that hour back to her or him by writing some notes in the future about what you decide to do and how you did once you got into the school they helped you get into.

Noggle CM Graffiti wall--as we leave

2007-12-11T21:07:00.000-05:00

I posted some of the graffiti from the Noggle CM wall during its final week of occupancy...

Grading & exams now...

2007-12-09T16:34:00.000-05:00

I had my last class of the semester Friday at 3:30…the last class period of the semester… now it is to grading….

I love and hate grading at the same time. I love it in seeing the wonderful work student do on their “papers” which are really “books.” (In LCE the average pages was 117—single spaced.) I Hate it in that I can’t give everyone an “A” and keep my job. That means I have to give B’s and lower to students who did far better work than five years ago got an “A.”

I know how that happened. I generally ask a few students who did superb jobs to let me have a copy of their paper. When each new unit starts I casually give a copy of their “chapter” to each small group ‘as an example of what some past students did in this course.” They finger through it and decide to meet or exceed their example. BAM! When I get the papers in from that group they often do stand on the shoulders of past students and do even better! Where this ends I don’t know! All I know is I gave B’s to students this weekend that would have gotten a perfect A five years ago. And I hate that.

But I’m done with LCE. Tomorrow they have their exam. They’ll be writing for two hours straight answering “interview questions” from a local church on Christian education and Spiritual Formation/discipleship. In two hours many of them can write 4000 words. This means that starting tomorrow I have start reading (and grading) a total of 120,000 words—the equivalent of two paperback books. {sigh} BUT this is motivating for me—because all they really learned is what they can write out of their heads… so I get to see what is really in there. I’ll be veeeeery tired tomorrow by the time I go to bed… but it will be a “good tired.”

Then Tuesday I grade CLPL “papers” and on Wednesday CLPL students take “the hardest exam I ever took” and I have to grieve for those who only “got exposed” to things and didn’t learn them. Oh well, I always curve that exam so there is some mercy in the system ;-)

If any of you former students out there took the CLPL exam and have any tips or hints to current students go ahead and post your hints here… I made a new exam but it might help some to know what to expect anyway.

My First "Wicked Woman"

2007-11-20T08:47:00.000-05:00

Clara was the first “wicked woman” I knew. By “wicked” I mean she wore scarlet lipstick that left a blood-red stains on her Kool brand cigarettes in the various ashtrays around her house. She went to the “beer garden” with her husband Wes, and talked quite a bit louder than any polite Christian woman I knew.

Clara was my aunt and, having no kids of her own, she adopted me as her “favorite nephew.” When she found me at family gatherings she encircled me with her arms, pulled me close and kissed me square on the lips, introducing me for the first time to the thrilling yet waxy taste of lipstick. She constantly laughed and giggled between cigarettes and sometimes said “damn” in front of me before immediately covering her lips with her hand and giggling an apology for her language “in front of my little preacher-boy.”

If Clara had not been my aunt I would not have been allowed around her. Like most families we were more broad-minded about our relatives. Clara got more religious after she retired from her job as secretary at U S Steel. Or maybe the standard of “religious” dropped to then include her, I'm not sure. I do know that we let women who wear lipstick go to heaven now. As a retired woman, Clara attended a Methodist church , prayed daily and read every book I ever wrote. Occasionnally she’d call me on my wife's cell phone and she'd laugh so loud I sometimes had to pull the receiver away from my ear. Even after I turned 60 she continued to call me “My little Wesley” (I'm named after her late husband, Wesley).

I think Clara was my first crush--at age 8. I remember praying often for her so she would stop wearing lipstick, smoking and drinking beer so she too could go to heaven. We've changed some of those understandings now of course, but as a child that's how I understood things.

I moved away from Clara when I was twelve. Now she’s moved away from me—they buried her this morning and I found out too late to attend the funeral, so I’m sad today. I expect to meet her again... lipstick or not.

Coming in for a landing!

2007-11-12T16:36:00.000-05:00

The semester is almost over..or at least it feels like it. Today we began out last chapter in LCE (Spiritual formation of Adults)... their "book" will be done by Thanksgiving.

As you former students know--my courses are front-loaded. We're in the soft landing stage soon...

Just in time... I've found students aren;t in the mood for "taking in" much after Thanksgiving. They will, however, "give back" (papers, presentations) and they'll reflect (reflection on what they've learned, integration of the course material with the meta-learning of other courses etc.).

As for me soon I begin my own "cramming" --that is cramming my days and nights with grading "papers"

as to early reflection on my courses this semester:

LCE--It is like Sharon... I Love it better as the years go by.

CLPL--I likes this course best of all..I "lectured" a lot (which means I told lots of stories too) and I think students liked it better actually... we'll see, they evaluated me this last week.

TEACHING ADULTS IN THE CHURCH. This is the old adult ed renewed into a cross-listed course (Bible or CE)... Superb evening course... they have their exam this Thursday night.. then a soft landing for them too.

PRACTICUMS. I have 5 hours... I THINK they are ok, but I often kick myself that they are not better.. mostly out of my hands though in in the hands of the local church.

-----------
WRITING. I'm working on a manuscript due Jan 10... after 25 years of writing I'm finally writing on writing--"A brief guide for writers." Did the outline today...

Miss you all... know what I ought to do some summer? Get in the car and go visit you all. can I sleep on your couch?

Quotes on Writing

2007-11-11T15:10:00.000-05:00

I spoke at a writer's conference last week and a number of writers there asked for a copy of my collection of quotes on writing so i put them together and thought I'd post them here for whomever might want to find one they like and want to keep.
(I also put these quotes here)

Here's the secret to finishing that first book. Don't rewrite as you go. --Laurell K. Hamilton

I revise, rewrite, edit and delete more than ever before, so much so that, ever since Koko, I see self-editing as crucial to the process as the initial writing. --Peter Straub

I make an index of my notes and then get to the writing as soon as I can. I do a rough draft, and then I rewrite and rewrite. --Tracy Kidder

But all my other novels - before Freya - I wrote at a rate of five thousand words every day for around twenty days, at the end of which I'd have a 100k manuscript - and feel wrecked. Then I leave it for a while and come back a month or so later and edit, cut, rewrite. --Eric Brown

I try to write every day. I do that much better over here than when I'm teaching. I always rewrite, usually fairly close-on which is to say first draft, then put it aside for 24 hours then more drafts. --Marilyn Hacker

To this day, I get rewrite offers where they say: 'We feel this script needs work with character, dialogue, plot and tone,' and when you ask what's left, they say: 'Well, the typing is very good.' --John Sayles

“The dream is a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the pshche, opening into that cosmic night which was psyche long before there was any ego.” --Carl Jung

“Poetry is going on all the time inside, an underground stream. One can let down one’s bucket and bring the poem up.” -- John Ashbery

“ I always use what remains of my dreams of the night before.” --Eugene Ionesco

“ Many characters have come to me…in a dream, and then I’ll elaborate from there.” --John Burroughs

The time to begin writing an article is when you have finished it to your satisfaction. By that time you begin to clearly and logically perceive what it is you really want to say. --Mark Twain

Writing a book is an adventure. To begin with, it is a toy and an amusement; then it becomes a mistress, and then it becomes a master, and then a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster, and fling him out to the public. –Winston Churchill

Our admiration of fine writing will always be in proportion to its real difficulty and its apparent ease. –Charles Caleb ColtonWriting is the only thing that, when I do it, I don't feel I should be doing something else. –Gloria Steinem

The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it. –Jules Renard

Writing is the only profession where no one considers you ridiculous if you earn no money. –Jules Renard

Writing books is the closest men ever come to childbearing. –Norman Mailer

Writing is easy. All you do is stare at a blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead. –Gene Fowler

Writing an informative yet compact thriller is a lot like making maple sugar candy. You have to tap hundreds of trees - boil vats and vats of raw sap - evaporate the water - and keep boiling until you've distilled a tiny nugget that encapsulates the essence. –Dan Brown

The art of writing is the art of discovering what you believe. –Gustave Flaubert

Talent is helpful in writing, but guts are absolutely necessary. –Jessamyn West

If you are writing about baloney, don't try and make it Cornish hen, because that's the worst kind of baloney there is. Just make it darn good baloney. –Leo Burnett

Writing a novel is like making love, but it's also like having a tooth pulled. Pleasure and pain. Sometimes it's like making love while having a tooth pulled. –Dean Koontz

Hard writing makes easy reading. –Wallace Stegner

To me, all writing is like music. And especially dialogue. I studied music in college; that is what I wanted to be, a composer. Acting got me sidetracked. –Dirk Benedict

Writing is manual labor of the mind: a job, like laying pipe. –John Gregory Dunne

Writing became such a process of discovery that I couldn't wait to get to work in the morning: I wanted to know what I was going to say. –Sharon O'Brien

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. –William Strunk, Jr

Now the writing in the head, I definitely do every day, thinking about how I want to phrase something or how I'd like to rephrase something I've already written. –Stanley Crouch

Writing the last page of the first draft is the most enjoyable moment in writing. It's one of the most enjoyable moments in life, period. –Nicholas Sparks

"I can write better than anybody who can write faster, and I can write faster than anybody who can write better." –A. J. Liebling

Ouch review…"This book fills a much‑needed gap." –Moses Hadas

Ouch review…"Thank you for sending me a copy of your book ‑ I'll waste no time reading it." –Moses Hadas Ouch review…"I have read your book and much like it." – Moses Hadas

Ouch reviews…"The covers of this book are too far apart." –Ambrose Bierce

Memorable quotes by writers about writing
Collected by Keith Drury,
Associate Professor, Indiana Wesleyan University

100 books to read

2007-11-05T16:59:00.000-05:00

This post is also located in nicer format here

Indiana Wesleyan University Religion Department
Recommended Reading List , Fall 2007

Procedure in compiling this list. In the fall of 2006 Religion Professors were asked by student Jason Farrell to recommend books all graduates should have read or should read in their early years of ministry. Professors could list any number of books they desired to list. A combined list of books was produced that year. In the fall of 2007 William Shelor took up the list again. With assistance from Michael Berens and Keith Drury as advisor Will took that combined list to 17 of the 19 religion professors at the time (the group included Steve Lennox, Dean of the chapel and Bud Bence, VPAA). The 17 professors were given the entire list of books and asked to assign 30 points to various books on the list showing their preferences for reading these books (maximum 3 points per book). The results were collected and the values were compiled to produce this list.

Title Author Number of Points

5-Star Books
Foster, Richard Celebration of Discipline 29
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich The Cost of Discipleship 25.5
Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity 19.5
Brother Lawrence Practicing the Presence of God 15.5
Nouwen, Henri J.M. The Return of the Prodigal Son 15
Outler, Albert C. John Wesley's Sermons 14
Tozer, A. W. The Pursuit of God 14
Augustine of Hippio The Confessions 11.5
Barth, Karl Dogmatics in Outline 11
Chambers, Oswald My Utmost for His Highest 11
Niebuhr, H. Richard Christ and Culture 11

4-Star Books
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich Life Together 9.5
Collins, Kenneth A Real Christian- The Life of John Wesley 9.5
Phillips, J. B. Your God is Too Small 9.5
Kempis, Thomas a The Imitation of Christ 9
Dayton, Donald Discovering an Evangelical Heratige 7.5
Drury, Keith There is no I in Church 7.5
Smith, Hannah Whitall The Christian Secret of a Happy Life 7.5
Bounds, E. M. Power through Prayer 7
Nouwen, Henri J.M. The Road to Daybreak 7
Wesley, John The Journal of John Wesley 7
Chesterton, G. K. Orthodoxy 6.5
Law, William A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life 6.5
Lewis, C. S. The Screwtape Letters 6.5

3-Star Books
Bunyan, John The Pilgrim's Progress 6
Luther, Martin The Bondage of the Will 6
Packer, J.I. Knowing God 6
Calvin, John Institutes of the Christian Religion 5.5
Gonzales, Justo L. The History of the Church 5.5
Kierkegaard, Soren Fear and Trembling 5.5
Lewis, C. S. Miracles 5.5
Peterson, Eugene A Long Obedience in the Same Direction 5.5
Willard, Dallas The Spirit of the Disciplines 5.5
Athanasius Treatise on the Incarnation 5
Edwards, Gene A Tale of Three Kings: A Study in Brokenness 5
Taylor, Richard The Disciplined Life 5
Trueblood, D. Elton Company of the Committed 5
Willard, Dallas The Divine Conspiracy 5
Bruegermann, Walter Theology of the Old Testament 4.5
Hauerwas, Stanley Resident Aliens 4.5
King, Martin Luther Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail 4.5
Lewis, C. S. The Great Divorce 4.5
Lewis, C. S. A Grief Observed 4.5
Lewis, C. S. The Problem of Pain 4.5
Pascal, Blaise Pensees 4.5
Sheldon, Charles M. In His Steps 4.5

2-Star Books
Baillie, John A Diary of Private Prayer 4
Finney, Charles G Lectures on Revival 4
John of the Cross Dark Night of the Soul 4
Tozer, A. W. A Treasury of A. W. Tozer 4
Wesley, Charles A song for the Poor: Hymns by Charles Wesley 4
Lewis, C. S. The Chronicles of Narnia 3.5
Stott, John Christian Basics: Invitation to Discipleship 3.5
Anonymous The Way of a Pilgrim 3
Bruce, A. B. The Training of the Twelve 3
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor The Brother Karamazov 3
Ignatius of Loyola The Spiritual Exercises 3
MacDonald, George The Gifts of the Child Christ 3
Marshall, Catherine Something More 3
Nee, Watchman The Normal Christian Life 3
Spurgeon, Charles Morning by Morning 3
Peterson, Eugene Eat This Book 3
Tozer, A. W. Knowledge of the Holy 3
The Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church 3
1 star books
Drury, Keith With Unveiled Faces 2.5
Kierkegaard, Soren Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing 2.5
Paton, Alan Cry the Beloved Country 2.5
Taylor, Jeremy Holy Living and Holy Dying 2.5
Bettenson, Henry Documents of the Christian Church 2
Gonzales, Justo L. Essential Theological Terms 2
MacDonald, George Discovering the Character of God 2
MacDonald, Gordon Ordering your Private World 2
Milton, John Paradise Lost/Paradise Regained 2
Murray, Andrew With Christ in the School of Prayer 2
Andrews, Lancelot Private Devotions 2
Augustine The Enchiridion 2
Emil Brunnen The Mediator 2
Hugo, Victor Les Miserables 2
John of Damascus On the Orthodox Faith 2
Nanzianzas, Gregory 5 Theological Orations 2
Hauerwas, Stanley Theology Without Foundations 1.5
Jones, E. Stanley The Christ of Every Road 1.5
Buttrick, George Prayer 1
Chesterton, G. K. Poetry 1
Chrysostom, John On the Priesthood 1
Dante Alighieri The Divine Comedy 1
Day, Dorothy The Long Loneliness 1
Edwards, Jonathan A Treatise on Religious Affections 1
Edwards, Jonathan The End for which God Created the Earth 1
Luther, Martin Freedom of a Christian 1
Merton, Thomas The Sign of Jonas 1
Murray, Andrew Abide in Christ 1
Schaeffer, Francis True Spirituality 1
Schleiermacher, Friedrich Speeches on Religion to its Cultured Despisers 1
Staff, Frank Polarities of Human Existance in Biblical Perspective 1
Bainton, Roland There I stand 1
Chesterton, G. K. Francis of Assisi 1
Cyprian On the Unity of the Church 1
Dayton, Donald Theological Roots of Pentecostalism 1
Platcher, William Callings 1

Ideas for future iterations of this list. A future student might consider using these results to have each professor re-rate the books on the list. For instance, two professors have already remarked, “Celebration of Discipline is a good book, but of all the books a student might read perhaps should not be at the very top of the list.” A future re-rating by professors may improve this sort of valuing.

FOR COMMENTING..... what book would YOU add?

Midterm hump

2007-10-14T19:12:00.000-04:00

I'm doing midterms... papers and exams... grading them, that is.

I like midterm.
It is like Wednesdays...
Hump day.

From here on it is counting DOWN to Christmas...

As for my courses...

LCE is very impressive... what hard workers these students are!!!

CLPL has insightful students... they just did their church planting proposals... I wrote about it in my column this week

TEACHING THE BIBLE TO ADULTS is a first time new course... 90% eager beavers in there... man, in one week they did what I was hoping to get done in 3 (bot don't tell them that!)

PRACTICUMS are going good--except I have a ton of grading to do on them this coming week.

AS FOR FALL BREAK... Sharon and I are headed south in Indiana... reading and resting and snuggling in front of a fireplace.

I'm Swamped

2007-09-20T16:55:00.000-04:00

If you have sent an email to me and not heard back it is because I'm swamped. It happens every fall so it is not new, but somehow I always feel surprised by it anyway. I've got a stack of grading to do and this weekend is already committed to paper-grading, and my schedule of appointments with students (posted on my door) is jammed... I feel "trapped" by a trap of my own making...

When I get swamped like this I usually go through several stages:

1. Work faster. I try to work my way back above water first. That always fails eventually.
2. Work slower. Then I get depressed and do nothing for a while--which makes matters worse.

3. Kill stuff. Finally I see the house burning down and I act-- I cancel engagements, do a sloppy job of giving feedback on papers, delete all the email in the in-box and just don't show up to committees.

4. Fresh start. After all that I pretend I am caught up even though I actually just buried the overload.

I'm at stage 2 today.

What I'm teaching this Fall

2007-09-15T09:28:00.000-04:00

I'm coaching several repeat courses and two new courses this fall.

1. Local church Education. My best course and the one I always love the most. I've got about 30 sophomores in this course and they are impressive. We focus on the Spiritual Formation of the congregation as a whole and the students "write a book" in the course. Every time I've taught it it has been my favorite. It is a five-hour course in loading since there are two practicum sections beyond the course that go along with the course.

2. Church Leadership. Graduates always write back to tell me this is actually my best course. I never feel that way. It is packed with the practical stuff of leading, administration and management in the church. I always dislike having to 'tell them the truth" about how "real life" operates and I dread the crestfallen looks and sighs when students who live in dorms supported by loans and family find out what real life in a real local church is going to be like. But I stick to it since I get so many responses after they're in the local church. I have about 25 in this course. It too has a practicum so it is another 5-hour course for me.

3. Teaching the Bible to Adults. This is a brand new course cross-listed as either a Bible course or a CE course... I have 16 in this evening course and they are awesome--it could compete with LCE as my favorite this semester. It replaces the old Adult Education course and includes some of that content but more geared to Bible teaching.

4. UNV180 Breakout. I offered to lead a UNV180 breakout if it was filled with REL students--so I could build relationships with frosh right off the bat. My section is at 3:30 Friday, which is a checkoutville time slot... but as it turned out the group is not all REL students after all, so I'm doing this one out of duty and for the last time probably.

IWU: a Premier Academic Institution?

2007-09-15T09:24:00.000-04:00

“If Indiana Wesleyan University Were a Premier Institution,
What Would It Look Like? “

I have been asked to answer the question, “If IWU were a premier institution, what would it look like?” I have chosen to describe what a premier institution would be academically—since this is, after all, the faculty asking this question. There are other areas for excellence, but I shall focus in this short address on being premier academically.

Here is what I predict. By saying “predict” I mean that I fully expect these things to happen. The die is cast. Our sails are already set. IWU will become a premier institution during the next ten years. Some faculty will be dragged along kicking and screaming. Others will feel out of place and will go underground, or go elsewhere. But, I fully believe that within ten years we will be considered a premier academic institution not just by our peers in the CCCU but in the larger academy and beyond. Here are my five predictions:

1. We will increasingly become a reading faculty

• We will not only be constantly reading to keep current in our own field but we will become voracious readers in other fields as we become the renaissance women and men who are examples of integrating ideas from all fields into our own discipline. The liberal arts will be more than a few courses in the general education requirements—it will pervade the curriculum.
• Faculty reading groups will continue to spread over our campus during the next ten years so that virtually every faculty member will be in at least once of the cross-discipline groups every year.
• The real test of this reading faculty will be this: When a future IWU faculty member completes a dissertation virtually every member of that person’s division will read their dissertation—because they are interested in the findings and do not make light of dissertations as if they are meaningless hoops to jump through.
• In the very near future our faculty will schedule reading days on their door just like they now offer student appointments. When students see faculty in their office reading a book and will never say, “I see you’re not busy-can we talk.” They will know that this is our work.

2. We will increasingly become a presenting faculty

• IWU faculty will start showing up in force at conferences and conventions. Rather than one delegate (or, sometimes none) we will send three and eventually a dozen. We will start overrunning some conferences—IWU faculty will be everywhere. Rather than our absence being noticed, they will notice our presence. We cannot expect to present if we are not present.
• This mass of faculty will attend scores of presentations. We will sometimes walk away delightfully challenged. At other times we will leave knowing we could have done better, and we will make several proposals for the next year and the excellent work we are not kidding under the bushel will come out on the open to the benefit of others.
• With an army of bright (and increasingly young) IWU faculty at conferences other institutions will begin to take notice. Presidents will try to recruit our best faculty away and they will get some of course. But the process is reversible too—we will recruit all kinds of sharp faculty from other institutions who want to be a part of the ethos of IWU. Properly planned conference attendance will become our best means of faculty recruitment.
• Within a half decade IWU faculty will begin rising to lead many of these conferences sponsoring many here on our campus.
• In ten years the IWU faculty will be widely known for its interesting, well prepared, provocative presentations. Old-timers like you will then be telling stories about how we once actually only had $400 a year to attend conferences!

3. We will increasingly become a writing faculty

• By 2017 there will be a virtual flood of writing coming from the IWU faculty. Our faculty will be publishing textbooks, readers, teaching strategies, instructional videos and scores of articles in professional journals. It is already started. Just watch as it escalates!
• Our faculty will become the editors of some professional journals and IWU will found several new journals where there are gaps now.
• In ten years when you open a textbook written collaboratively that there will almost always be one member of the IWU faculty represented.
• Yet, with all this academic writing we will not ignore the common person in our fields—we will also continue to produce popular writers who will stand on solid academic research and “translate” it for average readers—pastors, nurses, business leaders, or educators. In the future when our students go into hospitals, schools systems or local churches they will meet people who have already read the popular and helpful books by the faculty they studied with the last four years.

4. We will become a researching faculty

• Of course, to do the writing above we will have to do our research, but in the next ten years we will increasingly become a place where significant research happens that contributes to our fields. All of us may not do this kind of top-drawer research but some of us will and we all will be known for the work of these researchers among us.
• But our students will do research too. When faculty are constantly asking questions and constantly wondering about the relationship things they infect their students with curiosity. Curious students will want to research what their faculty are wondering about. In ten years our students will be doing research more advanced than anything our faculty are doing today—just watch!

5. We will increasingly practice faculty scholarship-as-the-whole

• However, to make IWU a lively haven for the life of the mind we will have to move beyond the individual scholarship mentioned above into collective scholarship-as-a-whole… the scholarship of the gathered faculty. Soon we will not be satisfied with faculty meetings to hear progress reports and gather information about policies but we will have faculty gatherings typified by thoughtful presentations, serious deliberative discussions, heated yet temperate debate, pondering various positions, asking penetrating questions, and making up our minds on substantive issues. If a student slips into a faculty meeting of the future they would not see children being lectured or informed, but a family of adult scholars deliberating on serious issues.
• We will see a parade of celebrated scholars coming to deliver lectures on our campus as we are already seeing sponsored by Dr. Pattengale’s office and the Honors College. A large number of faculty will turn out to listen and respond, not just a few. We will attend because we have entered fully the life of thinking and learning—the very life we wish to replicate in our students.
• Students will daily see faculty members eating lunch together in Baldwin as they argue about politics, academics, learning theories, or theology. Neighboring tables of students will end their chatter as a hush falls over their table as they listen in. they will be inspired to read and think and explore—like their faculty members do at lunch.
• While faculty retreats will probably still offer getting-to-know-you type games and other youth retreat activities increasingly they will become venues for serious academic presentations. Our late-night sessions will be typified by deep and significant discussions about global issues. We will play together but we will increasingly think together. “Building relationships” does not have to be shallow—the deepest relationships are often built around the interchange of great academic ideas.
• All this will attract new bright faculty members who will want to be a part of the kind of learning community we are becoming here. They will be attracted to IWU more for this academic ethos than the 90th percentile CCCU salaries which we will no doubt have in 10 years.

-------------------
These are my five predictions. They will happen but we can slow them down or hurry them along. How can we hurry them along?

Prioritizing the Life of the Mind at IWU

Primarily, we will have to make time for the life of the mind. This is already happening—we just need to hurry it along. Here is how we’ll make time for the life of the mind.

We will increasingly schedule time for reading and writing and attending lectures. We’ll schedule it because we value it. And we will not feel guilty about our temporary unavailability for student chats about dating life or frustrations with their mother.

We will have to quit teaching so many overloads. We have already passed a sense-of-the-body resolution stating our intention of significantly curtailing overloads when the administration initiated a significant salary increase. Our President said these two are related so in our resolution we sort of said, “You first.” Well, the administration did go first, and has initiated a three-year phase in of a significant salary adjustment. Now it is incumbent upon us to reply in kind—phasing in over the coming three years some sort of self-limiting overload policy during the regular semesters to free up time to read and write and present and to practice the life of the mind.

We will have to use our summers. Our contracts read from the end of August to the end of April—but to become a premier institution we will have to quit taking four months off. Summers will have to increasingly become a time for scholarship—especially writing.

We will have to cease our self-talk about busy-ness. We have gotten hooked on the frantic life. We have too often excused ourselves from hard academic work while pleading the hopeless frantic pace of our institution. But, we are changing—I can see it. We need to simply do what we value. As we value scholarship we will make time for it. We will quit hypnotizing each other into believing we are too busy to read and write and present and practice scholarship. If we are too busy to write we are too busy. We always have time to do what we want to do.

Of course, we’ll need money. While money is mostly in the administration’s court, the faculty must be ready with an aggressive plan to spend more cash with better stewardship. More money for conferences or released time for writing or a sabbatical is not a job perk. We must leverage this money and time for greater contribution to our constituency and the academy—it is simply part of our job.

As for our students we will bring greater academic rigor to our classrooms. We will quit complaining about the fun and game atmosphere in residence halls and simply assign the kind of work that will remind our students quickly that they are in college and not attending a year round youth camp. ( Such an informal initiative is already under way by some faculty with the recent “Academic Rigor Weeks Initiative” where students are imprinted in the first two weeks of a semester with the importance of academic pursuits by a) requiring one entire book be read, b)one major test to be taken and 3) using a significant amount of small group work inside and outside of class so that primary relationships can be developed in an academic setting pursuing learning not just building cardboard boats. These kind of bottom-up initiatives will sprout up every year as the academic ethos changes over the next ten years

These are my predictions. None are really radical or extravagant. If anything they are the moderate extending of the lines begun in the last few years. Imply predictions.

I started teaching as an adjunct at IWU in 1974. I’ve seen lots of changes—most of them could never have been dreamed of ten years before. These are predictions not hopes or goals but they are a straight line extension of trends in the last two years. The momentum is already with this future. If you don’t want to read, write or think you’ll want to hide soon! However, if you hunger for a greater life of the mind IWU is going to be one exciting place over the next ten years!

Keith Drury, IWU Professor of Religion IWU Faculty retreat, August 27, 2007, Invited Essay for Full Faculty

Year's end writing inventory

2007-08-14T17:15:00.000-04:00

My Year in Writing
2006-2007 School Year

Some of my Tuesday Column readers don’t know that it is my practice writing... most past students know that. To me, writing is like playing the piano—one gets better by practice. When you read my columns here (or on one of my other blogs) ..when people read my Tuesday Column or blogs they are peeking into my practice room. I make mistakes, write and revise even after they are posted. I’m often simply “doing runs” to keep my writing fingers nimble. All this is practice is for my serious “concert performance” –writing for books and curriculum.

I’ve just wrapped up another year of writing (September through August). I’ve completed my own inventory of the year’s writing and publishing and it is here I do an annual inventory mostly to keep myself motivated, like looking back at the grass you’ve already cut to know you’re getting something done. I know some budding writers read this column so I’m also being accountable to you. So, in case you are still reading this, here are some of the “concerts” I’ve written or published this year:
(the original inventory has books pictured --it is located here

1. Walking the Trail of Death
Published summer ‘07. During the spring I finished up my journal of last summer’s walk from Indiana to Kansas. It is a recounting of the story of the original journey of the "removal" of the Potawatomi Indians from Indiana to Kansas while blending in my own story as a white man’s re-tracing every foot of the 660 mile journey—I was the first white man to do so since 1838. Studying the original journals and letters as I walked, and often sleeping at their actual campsites I pondered larger issues of injustice, sin, restitution, and penance. I didn’t think this book was good enough to publish the regular route so I self-published it through LULU.com and it is available there if you want to know what I did last summer—click the picture to see the Lulu page.

2. Knowing God
This neat booklet came out this year. My publisher has a cool series for churches to hand out to people—sort of “evangelistic tracts” but done with real class—something you’d be proud to give a friend, not those cheap newsprint tracts that holler at unbelievers with a turn-or-burn style. Writing an easy-going friendly pocket booklet that would nudge an unbeliever toward God without beating them over the head was a cool challenge. I had a manuscript from 21 years ago that was still sitting in “inventory” so I got it out and reworked it for this booklet. My friend Chris Bounds was not real happy with it (it was too Quaker-ish for him) but no matter, I was happy with it, the publisher was happy, and the churches who are buying them in quantity seem happy so here it is—“what is written is written.”

3. Listening to God through Romans
This was a typical “writing assignment” someone gets who is faithful to do what the Publisher asks, does it fairly well, and delivers the manuscript on time. The project is part of a new series of Bible studies designed along the lectio divina format and I enjoyed writing it. Romans came out last summer and missed my last year’s inventory list. Of course, I’m not a Bible expert, let alone a Romans expert. What I did was go to lunch with Ken Schenck (who is both a Bible expert and a Romans expert) for several weeks and pulled his trigger and let him talk for an hour while I scribbled furiously. Then I went and wrote that week’s assignment and scheduled another lunch before writing the next one. So blame Schenck for anything you don’t like in there and thank me for whatever you agree with ;-) Lectio Divina is a sort of fad in Bible study recently so if you are into Bible studies you might like this. It came out this year.

4. D-Series: Baptism and Communion
This was a fun write… part of a new discipleship series coming out by my publisher. About 7500 words… four “lessons.” I like curriculum writing. They tell you exactly what to write (e.g. “a 5-7 word title followed by 125-150 word introduction” or “50-175 word “to think about” paragraph” etc.) This sort of writing is “writing on demand.” You sit down and follow the directions… your “creativity” comes is in the way you write things, not in the design or format—that’s already done and you are expected to rigidly follow the format. This will be published in this coming year.

5. Light From the Word
Another write-on-demand assignment—a week’s worth of devotionals, all very short. The hard part of this kind of writing is writing so few words (only about 200-250 a day) and packing in something to “haunt” the reader all day (who often reads this in the morning during…well, in the morning). I enjoy this sort of writing and “my week” in Light from the Word will appear this coming December 13-19. (It will also appear online here)

6. Chapter—Classic Holiness Writings
Jeremy Summers and some other emerging ministers are putting together a book like Foster’s, only of classic holiness writings. I had William Law in this book and selected a section from Law’s A serious Call to a devout and Holy Life and wrote a short introduction to it. This was an easy assignment but it will be a neat book (Wesleyan Publishing House—this coming year). I forget the name of the book, but I’ll mention it when it comes out.

7. Chapter 3: the Church Jesus Builds
Wesleyan educators (VIA Kerry Kind, head of education for Wesleyans) and the Wesleyan Publishing House do one book a year written by Wesleyan educators to help and support pastors. Joe Coleson edits them (Nazarene Theological seminary). The first book focused on preaching. This second one was on ecclesiology and it came out this year. I did chapter 3 in this book—The Church is Holy. This is a neat book…and after the disastrous tragedy of Barna’s Revolution, a good ecclesiology cannot come too soon. It is now available, though I wrote my chapter last summer.

8. Chapter: new Holiness book
Part of the same series as above—this one comes out June ’08 in time for General Conference and the related colloquium on holiness at that time. Done by Wesleyan educators, I wrote the chapter this summer on Receiving holiness in this book.

9. Chapter: new Worship book.
A group of evangelical Worship educators are putting together this book that will be published by Abingdon this October under the title The Message in the Music(Amazon page). This book is edited by Robert H. Woods & Brian D. Walrath (Spring Arbor). It takes the most popular songs used in worship today (from CCLI license data) and asks what these teach. I wrote chapter 3 in this book— I’m Desperate for You: Male Perception of Romantic Lyrics in Contemporary Worship Music. With a qualitative study of young adult males, I studied how contemporary “love songs to Jesus” come across to young adult males. My chapter follows a wonderful chapter (I wish I had written it!) by Jenell Williams Paris on how worship songs tend to follow the model of God as the “leading man” and humans as the “leading lady,” all consummated by God scooping up the worshipper and “riding off together into the sunset.” When I read Janell’s chapter I gave up and tried to get out of this assignment…she said everything I wanted to say. However, Robert Woods suggested I test the effect on young adult males so I did the qualitative study. This book will rock the worship world when it arrives.

10. New book: Common Ground—where all Christians agree
My major writing this year has focused on this new book. I spent most every week writing on this new book (about 12 hours per week) and turned in draft 16 in August. It focuses on the unified doctrines that all Christians at all times and in places agree on—the Apostle’s Creed. Last year I read and researched all year and I did the writing this year. While it won’t come out for another year the writing is done. Now the editor does his work and the publisher decides what to call it and designs the cover etc. I’ll have to go over the edits and galleys through this coming year but the hardest work is done on this one now. It should be out by next summer. I’m really happy with it. It may be the most important book I’ve written (which doesn’t automatically transfer to making it the best selling, of course). I’ll keep you posted on its progress.

Well, I think that wraps up another year of writing. Of course it is not may “day job.” I do writing on the side… mostly from time I save from not watching TV, raising children or having any hobbies and free time through the school year. That is why I don’t write the Tuesday Column in the summers. I need summers to waste going backpacking, watching movies and fiddling around in my garage and garden. Summer is about to close and playtime is over… thus this inventory of the last years writing and publishing… now its time to get back to work.
--Keith Drury
August, 2007

Paul & Brooke Kind Wedding Sermon

2007-08-11T15:17:00.000-04:00

Lasting love

Paul and Brooke, from the beginning of scripture God has had plenty to say about the union of a man and woman in marriage. Marriage was established by God and God blesses marriage. Later on in this ceremony as your minister I will bless your marriage… Your parents have already blessed it and the entire body of friends and relatives have traveled here today to bless your marriage. Most of all in this ceremony today though, we will ask GOD to bless your union of love. It is love that will keep you together.

Back in 1975 when I was only married a half dozen years or so the number one hit song was by the Captain and Tennille “Love will keep us together.” They were right—it is love that will keeps your marriage together. But, what kind of love? That is my first question--what sort of love will keep you together?

It is not just chemistry-love. Recent science has shown there really is a chemical reaction in people “in love.” The chemical is adrenaline. It gives a jolt, a high, and makes the heart speed up and flutter. However. those same studies show that after about a year and a half the adrenaline quits spiking—what then? This kind of infatuation we call “Romantic love” or “puppy love” Lasting love is more than this chemical reaction producing attraction or desire. Passion passes—at least this initial kind of passion. Love is more than passionate feelings. So, what kind of love will keep you together all your lives.

The answer is in the Bible, but first, let's consider some lines from “The Fiddler on the Roof” on the same subject. I’m sure you recall the story of the philosophical Russian milkman Tevya. Times were changing and that affected Tevya’s Jewish family traditions. Rather than using the traditional matchmaker’s arrangements, young people were now getting married out of love, including Tevya’s own daughters. It was a new idea—marrying out of love. The notion challenges Tevya and causes him to reflect on his own marriage.

One day Tevya asks his wife, “Golda, do you love me?”
Golda replies: “Do I what?”
T: “Do you love me?”
G: “Do I love you? With our daughters getting married and this trouble in the town, you’re upset, you’re worn out, go inside, go lie down, maybe its indigestion.”
T: “Oh, No Golda, “I’m asking you a question. Do you love me?”
G: “You’re a fool.”
T: “I know, but do you love me?”
G: “Do I love you? Well . . For twenty-five years I washed your clothes, cooked your meals, cleaned your house, given you children, milked your cow. After twenty-five years why talk about love right now?”
T: “Golda, the first time I met you it was on our wedding day. I was scared.”
G: “I was shy.”
T:“I was nervous.”
G: “So was I.”
T: “But my father and mother said we’d learn to love each other and now I’m asking, Golda, ‘Do you love me?’”
G: “I’m your wife.”
T: “I know, but do you love me?”
G: “Do I love him? For twenty five years I lived with him, fought with him, starved with him, twenty-five years my bed is his, If that’s not love, what is?”
T: “Then you love me.”
G: “I suppose I do.”
T: “And I suppose I love you too. It doesn’t change a thing, but even so, after twenty-five years it’s nice to know.”
__________________
Golda’s kind of love is often dismissed by today’s feeling oriented, adrenaline-addicted world. We think she needs a lesson in loving. But Golda was actually closer to the Bible’s view of love than we think. IN the Bible loving is action. It is put this way in 1 Corinthians 13…

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (1 Corinthians 13: 4-6)

The Bible agrees with Golda’s view: love is more than a feeling—it is action. Love is a commitment to act lovingly. Love might begin with feelings of attraction and pulsating bursts of adrenaline but it continues by commitment and loving actions. Lasting love involves making meals, washing the dishes, repairing the car and taking out the garbage. It has periods of passion but it also sometimes has periods of routine. Marital love of the lasting variety is a commitment to love another person in this way for life. The way you will put that in the vows you wrote to say in a moment is, “wherever our journey takes us; in plenty and in want, in joy and in sorrow; in sickness and in health; as long as we both shall live.”

Too many believe romantic love automatically brings the lasting kind of love the Bible speaks of. It opens the doorway to it, but does not make it happen automatically. Lasting love requires work. And it works only as you work it. Real love takes effort.

Paul and Brooke, we pray that you will work at being patient and kind, not being envious or rude or arrogant. We pray you will daily work to not insist on your own way, to not to be irritable or resentful. Some days you will have to work harder than others, but we pray you will make this Job #1 for the rest of your lives.
This kind of love—lasting love—will keep you together in the future. Your commitment today is not just about your past or present feelings. It is a commitment to action in the future—a commitment to work at really loving and to keep doing those kinds of things wherever your journey takes you. That is my first point: today you are committing to working at loving --really loving, the lasting kind of love that will keep you together...and keep working at it throughout all your entire lives.

My second point is to remind you where you will get this kind of love. There is only one way to have a marriage made in heaven. That is to draw on God’s power for loving. God is the Source of lasting love. Your love for each other—real love—is but a reflection of God’s great love for each of you. The writer of I John said it this way: My dear friends, let us love one another,because the source of love is God.This is what love really is: not that we have loved God,but that God loved us first.

Your love is not self-created—not real love. Real lasting love comes from God who first loved us—with real love, of the lasting variety. The vows you exchange today are not just between the two of you, or even between you, the state, and this gathered group. You have made God a witness and your view are made in the presence of the God who will enble you to keep on loving.

All of us here today want you to be more in love in ten and 20 and 40 years from now than you are today The Captain and Tennille still are together in their 60’s… and they are still singing love songs to each other (though I don’t expect people under to 40 to know this). We here expect Godly love—the lasting kind—to be even more true of you, Paul and Brooke in the future as your love grows. We know you are committed not only to each other but to God the Source of lasting love. This is the kind of loving marriage God blesses. Your lifelong commitment tis what we come here today to bless along with God.

Paul and Brooke… we all love you. And our prayer for you today and throughout your marriage is found in Paul’s words in 1 Thessalonians 3: 12
"May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you."

Keith Drury
August 10, 2007

Family update

2007-08-08T14:48:00.000-04:00

A bit of family news from my family this summer:

DAVID
Dave is now executive pastor at College Wesleyan in Marion. They are living in a rental while they build a new house. We'll get to see Dave and Kathy (and their kids--Max, Karina and Lauren) more now.

JOHN
John and Mandy are pregnant with a little boy, due just before Christmas. Both of them are now in the PhD program at Princeton--he is in theology she is in youth ministry.

SHARON
Sharon loves he new "dream job" teaching in the doctoral program in leadership at IWU...and to boot she has most of July and August off... which is why we're heading our next week for a hundred miles of hiking on the Colorado Trail before school starts again.

Bourne made me sick

2007-08-04T11:35:00.000-04:00

The Bourne Ultimatum made me sick—literally. It was a great movie I think--but the hand-held herky-jerky camera style and the constant out-of-focus panning of the camera r(especially during the action shots--which are 95% of the movie) was actually nauseating to me—I almost used the popcorn bag as an air sickness bag. I sat too far up front for this movie. I finally had to start closing my eyes periodically to get reoriented (which made me realize there was virtually no dialogue to listen to).

If you go to Bourne show up early and get seats in the back row if you have any tendencies at all to get carsick. Or maybe take a Dramamine before you show up.

If they do a Bourne IV I hope they drop the Buffy-style camera work… I want to watch Bourne be disoriented, not get disoriented myself!

After the movie I started the book which I got for my birthday from my son, John... and the book is superb. Indeed, the plot of the whole series is great--I discover "who I am'" from looking to the past... "identity is found in memory." What a great truth for the "holiness movement" who has apparently gone through a similar experience as Bourne. Great book. I bet I would have loved the movie more if I had sat in the back seat.

Wind River Mountains

2007-07-13T10:25:00.001-04:00

(CLICK ANY PICTURE FOR LARGER VIEW)

I just returned last night from a week of backpacking in the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming, on the Continental Divide Trail. What a grand hike it was. I walked with two great hiking companions: Burt Webb is a biology prof here at IWU and has hiked with me almost every summer somewhere or another for a week—he is the guy who often just shows up and joins me for a week somewhere along the trail so we are long time hiking friends. Also along this time was Mason, Burt’s son who is in High School. Mason had pity on my old age and carried 6 pounds of my weight for me which made the trek much easier for me (and also made him wait less time for me to catch up at the tops of high mountains passes!).

We started at the Big Sandy Trailhead at the Southern end of the Winds and spent almost all of our time above the timberline, which in the Wind River Mountains is often below 10,000 feet. The Winds give that High Sierra feeling without having to go much above 11,000’ so we had no elevation sickness this time.

We followed various trails (mostly the Highline Trail and the Freemont Trail) which the CDT is proposed to follow some day when the CDT actually becomes the CDT. The only evidence of the CDT we actually found was a tiny CDT carved into one of the signs by a thru-hiker though. The Continental Divide Trail is still a concept in many places—a trail-to-become. But with Mason’s good map-reading and trail-finding skills we only got “lost” a few times. On one of these “lost” episodes we “simply followed a creek” to where we were supposed to be—which meant scaling a 40’ high wall which brought back memories of my 1960’s rock-climbing days—but Burt scrambled up declaring it was a “piece of cake’ so I dutifully followed (it was only a 5.6 or 5.7 cliff BUT it dropped directly into a raging river rapids at the bottom which made it seem worse.) Burt was right—and we got back on the trail again.

We saw a bunch of wildlife including moose but no actual bears, (though we saw their tracks and hung our food each night). The biggest joy for me was hiking above timberline so much—I love high mountains. Of course, since the snowmelt was right at its end the Mosquitoes were right at their zenith.

After the Winds we entered a section of more conventional CDT running up toward Yellowstone. I was less excited about this section of CDT—it was more like much of the CDT I’ve already experienced—which is “Where’s the Trail?” hiking—we traversed miles and miles of open sagebrush with nary a sign or path (can YOU find the path in after clicking this picture?). That’s bugs me about the CDT…somehow I prefer hiking a trail that is an actual trail not merely a “route.”

When we got to the big re-supply city in the area (Dubois, Wyoming population 991) on Tuesday we ate a huge breakfast then thumbed for a few hours before a guy let us ride in the back of his pickup over the mountains three hours to the Jackson Hole airport where we rented a car for a day (and the 300 mile round trip) back to our car at the south end of the Winds. Hitching all the way back to our car was not likely since we had parked it at a dead end dirt road several hours up in remote mountain. We got the car and Burt and Mason followed me back to the airport to drop off the one-day rental then drive the 1500 miles back to Indiana with happy memories of the Wind River Mountains.

The Thru-hikers on the CDT consider the Winds the highlight of the CDT (like the PCT hikers consider the High Sierras the highlight of that trail). So I have cherry-picked the CDT now—the Colorado section and the Winds are the brightest “Cherries” on the CDT tree (which has plenty of barren branches).

I had three goals for this hike. 1)To enjoy Burt and Mason’s company—hiking with people you like makes a hike good (accomplished: Burt is always a pleasant companion and Mason is an unusually likable and mature teenager and he took all these pictures too). 2) Finish the Wind River range, considered one of the “ten best hikes in America (Accomplished and I agree-they are equivalent to the High Sierras, in some ways better) 3)Decide if I want to consider hiking the whole CDT (Accomplished: I do not want to do the CDT except the cherry-picking areas like the Winds and Colorado. I’ve decided to cherry-pick the best hiking sections of trails until I’m 70.

Next week Sharon and I are going to Hawaii for the rest of the month. Then in August we’re both going to join Phil Woodbury and Kerry Kind for a week on the CDT in Colorado (Salida to Creede) then back to school.

Next year I will probably return and do the Wind River Mountains over again, this time with Sharon and we’ll walk slower. Now I’m feeling that we did too many 20+ mile days this time—Sharon and I will do 10-12 mile days next summer I think, and take time to drink in more of the views, and cook delicious meals—I “ate shakes” this time and didn’t cook. We’ll enjoy cooking again I think, though we’ll have to do that away from camp due to the bears.

I’ve got the “triple crown” off my back now. I do not plan to add the CDT to the AT and PCT. Rather, I’ll return to the “best hikes in America” list and finish that off. I still want to do the “cross the Great Divide” in the Canadian Rockies near Banff. And there is that section of the Superior Trail I need to get under my belt too. As far as the Appalachian Trail I already did a re-hike of all of New Hampshire with Phil, Josh Jackson and Justin Johnson a few years ago though I need to return and do the Kathdin section with Sharon some time soon. I’d like to return to the High Sierras and do the John Muir section of the PCT again, along with doing the Cascades again in snow (Canada south thru Northern Washington state—the section I did with Mark and Rudy). And there are some trails in South America to do, and Sharon has been wanting to do the West Highland Way in Scotland—so I might do that again with her this time.

A new factor for me is Sharon’s now job teaching in the Doctoral program where she gets July and August off each year. She is not a long distance hiker (though she did one hike of 1000 miles with me on the AT). Now, she prefers a week at a time—and I find that at the same time I am now preferring that length hike too—just a hundred miles or so at a whack. So I’m gonna’ make a new list and pick all the cherries I can until I’m 70. What then? Well, there’s always canoeing and kayaking—you can do that until you’re 90!

Great Hike Burt & Mason--thanks for being such good hiking companions!

Back from Turkey

2007-06-23T08:33:00.000-04:00

I'm Back from Turkey now where I wandered Paul's missionary journeys and the sites of the first seven councils of the church with my two sins, Dave and John. Our bags never arrived so we did the trip with our carry-on stuff and no sleeping bags. After 3000 Kilometers on a rental car (with $10 gal gas) we returned to Istanbul and flew home to America labeling this father-sons trip our best ever. (We go every other year on some sort of father-sons trip) .

Right now I'm doing rewrite on the Apostle's Creed book--I'm on draft 7 today and plan to get a few more drafts in before next week when I leave for two weeks in Wyoming's Wind River Mountains with But and Mason Webb. While I'm gone a dozen "manuscript readers" (Lay person, Bible scholars, young person etc) will read draft 10.

When I return form the Wind River mountains we head out the next day for Hawaii and our 30th anniversary celebration.

The first week of August I complete the last 5 drafts of the Creed book and send it in, then head out to Paul Kind and Brook's wedding on our way to the end-of-summer faculty backpacking trip on the Colorado trail then back in time for Faculty retreat.

I'm leaving for Turkey

2007-05-30T13:03:00.000-04:00

After attending the Wesleyan conference in Indy this weekend I'll be in Turkey with my two sons for the next 10 days... following the path of St Paul and visiting the sites of the ancient Christian church. We take these father-son trips every other year.

Last time we backpacked in the high Sierras in the snow and made (an unsuccessful) attempt on Mt. Whitney--snows too deep. Before that we went to Scotland and we also went to Austria for some mountainclimbing. The first time we went we canoed the Swaunee river in Georgia-Flordia.

ON all these trips we realized that biggest feature was the drive-time. Dave and Jon are bright guys and the conversations in the car were the best memories..which is good since we're crosscrossing Turkey this time--600 miles from Istanbal to Antioch and then wandering around to the rest of the sites between... Perga, Antioch-Pisidia, Derbe. Lystra, along with the more frequently visited sites like Ephesus and the seven chruches of Asia...

For now I'm putting my Apostle's Creed book to rest... I'll get back to rewrite when I return mid-month.

I love summers!

Changing World Changers

2007-05-26T09:25:00.000-04:00

While doing some manual labor all week I’ve been thinking about words and how they are often containers into which we can pour new meaning.

Take “world changers” for instance. Ten years ago or so when Indiana Wesleyan University launched the new World Changer emphasis the meaning of the term was clear. Every faculty and student was expected to read Briner’s book—Roaring Lambs which has terrible ecclesiology but interesting ideas on the role Christians in the world. Briner represented the best of the boomer thinking—Christians didn’t have to be second class at anything but we can be just as successful in business, just as good a coach, just as rich and just as famous as anyone else in the world.

So IWU brought in examples of world-changers to speak in chapel: famous actors who had made it in Hollywood, writers who had made the New York Times bestselling list, rich businessmen, renowned surgeons or prominent politicians. These were “world changer models.” Missionaries, social workers, elementary teachers and nurses were not invited. We even started a hall of fame inducting famous world-changers and placed their bronze head in the library to remind students of what they were to try to become. The message so popular with boomer parents was: Be successful like these people.

We started the UNV 180-world changers course where we tried to convince freshmen students to go for the gold and change the world. While we never said so directly but the implication was clear: make it big time in the world. We were saying you should grab the gold ring of worldly success so some day you too might have a triumphal return to IWU as a true world-changer. For more than ten years this is what “World-changer” has meant.

But words do not have fixed meanings. The people of God have an uncanny way of pouring new meaning into old words. When you alums return to IWU in the future be prepared for this shift in what “world-changer” means. It may not mean what it meant when you were here. We now have a new generation of students and parents (and evangelicals) and this is changing world changers.

So, how is “world-changer” changing? It is coming to mean “making a difference where you live—one by one.” A world changer is coming to mean a person who works as a nurse serving others out of love even if you never get famous for it or write a best-selling book. A world changer is coming to mean a teacher who purposely chooses to go to a third-rate inner city school to make a difference in the lives of poverty stricken students. It is increasingly coming to mean doing something to address AIDS in Africa, stop sexual slavery, starting feeding programs for the poor, and developing the personal discipline of recycling and reducing one’s energy footprint. It has less to do with becoming rich or famous and more to do with serving and loving. You can be a world-changer now by serving as a youth pastor in South Dakota or by running a homeless shelter in Atlanta. The success content of the term is being gradually displaced with a new moral content.

Nowhere is this so clear as in the new book the UNV180 students now read calling for Christian action on behalf of the poor and needy (more on that book in September). I expect sooner or later we will induct someone into the WC hall of fame like this—some non-famous servant who loves and serves quietly.

Of course REL alums all recognize this is all about theology. Not just Briner’s poor ecclesiology, but good solid pneumatology. The church is guided by the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is constantly prompting change and correction among the people of God. And, sometimes He does this by prompting us to pour new and better meaning into old words. That’s what seems to be happening right now with the term “World-changer.” My hunch is most of my former students thought this is what it should have meant all along.

Spiritual Formation course for M.Div

2007-05-21T09:10:00.000-04:00

I've been thinking this morning of what a spiritual formation course would look like for the new M.Div program IWU is considering offering in the future.

WHAT WOULD SUCH A COURSE LOOK LIE?

The first issue is to face what the SF course is about—become a “better monk” personally by doing more fasting and praying, or is the course going to reflect more recent developments in spiritual formation where the focus is on the spiritual formation of the body of Christ—that is Paul’s original use of the term -- groaning as in childbirth until Christ if formed in you (plural you).

If we personalize spiritual formation it may be more popular to Americans already absorbed with themselves and it becomes like the spiritual gifts tests—another way to think about me and my preferences and my modes of personal spirituality. But if we consider that the pastor’s profession is to form Christ in the community of Christ then we have another matter. Should we do both—yes, but what many pastors lack is the knowledge and skills to form Christ in persons and people.

If a dentist was as random about her work as pastors are their SF work the dentist would give me a sermon on Chemistry when I went to him with a toothache. There are proven methods of spiritual formation of a group (and they are almost always group experiences in the body of Christ, not just privatized "devotions" or fasting or other private disciplines.) This second kind of SF is what pastors need better equipping for. The reason why we have churches full of shallow and immature Christian is the “dentist” does not know how to do the dentistry but knows mostly how to explain chemsitry based on their Bible courses. They need to know the proven means of using the Bible to bring about life change.

Many pastors assume “to know is to do.” So they lead bible studies (or proclaim in preaching) the Bible assuming that once it is clear what god wants the people will live it. They don’t, of course. If we were a Calvinist school ths would work too-for we would teach and proclaim and wait for God to do the transformation of whomever He has pre-slected to enliven. But we are Weslayen. Transformation occasinally happens through understanding but more often through proven methods of Bible study and preaching.

So “curriculum people” like Norm Wilson and me might see a course like this including things like this:

1. History & theology of the Bible as a Spiritual Formation tool. (History of the Bible’s use as a tool for spiritual formation including various methods used in the past; Theological underpinnings using the Bible as a SF tool including the role of the Holy Spirit, the body of Christ along with individual revelation; current approaches to transformation using the Bible text.)

2. How people change. (How do people change in response to the Bible? What are the sociological, spiritual, pedagogical, theological and psychological “change factors” that are ingredients besides the actual text of the Bible that must be considered in using the Bible as a tool for prompting life change? Exploring various theories of how God changes persons [and a people] by meeting them in the Word. Examining my own methods of SF in my leadership of the church and discovering areas where I need to develop.)

3. Bible outcomes. (Discovering the multi-level outcomes in the Bible—primary and secondary, corporate and individual—for describing a godly person and a people for God… cognitively, affectively, behaviorally—what are we trying to “make” when we make disciples? Developing, sorting and prioritizing the Bible’s expected corporate and individual outcomes then mapping outcomes to the generalized needs of today’s church and also the specific needs of my own local church, producing a schedule or curriculum or plan for preaching and teaching—a “curriculum” of sorts for the spiritual formation using the Bible.)

4. Personal spiritual formation. (Rather than addressing this first as if corporate SF springs from personal life [as Americans assume] put it last since personal spiritual formation more often springs from the corporate experience as above; focus on habits and attitudes especially those of a local shepherd.)

..at least those are my [summertime] breakfast thoughts....

Book & Bulbs

2007-05-15T13:57:00.000-04:00

This week I’ve been doing two things:

1. WRITING ON THE CREED BOOK. I am taking a break right now half way through the next to last chapters---after today I should only have one more chapter to finish my first draft. I send these drafts to Chris Bounds so he can set me straight where I’ve missed something or gotten my doctrine wrong. Chris specialized in orthodoxy—so I should be safe in what I’m saying. (However, the book will spark controversy nonetheless since many “Sunday school Christians” depart from orthodoxy at points like the full divinity and humanity of Jesus, the equality of Jesus with the Father and Holy Spirit, and the resurrection of the body. I am writing on the resurrection and ascension of Christ today—half done now at 2PM.

2. I’VE BEEN REPLACING INCANDESCENT BULBS IN MY HOUSE thanks to Adam Thada’s “witnessing” to me. We actually did this in the early 1990s—maybe about 12 years ago but over time we switched out those bulbs for incandescent bulbs for various reasons. They didn’t fit in lamps under the hoops, they were too large to put in enclosed globes in this older house (we bought them for a new house in Indy), and they were so dull we could not read by them. However the newer bulbs are great. They are small enough to fit almost anywhere. They are brighter—even some the equivalent of 100 or 150 watt incandescent bulbs—yet using far fewer watts. And the best news is they are cheaper. The dull-big-bulbs we bought in the early 1990s cost us about $20 per bulb (they all still work) but these newer bulbs cost only a few bucks each—and given their almost-eternal life the cost per year is actually lower. I am only part way finished, having to replace the rheostat switches with flip switches here and there, but I’m happy. IN some cases we have MORE light for LESS wattage. Thanks Adam for the witness.

Knobstone hike

2007-05-04T15:26:00.000-04:00

I just finished my "Graduation afterglow hiking" on Indiana’s Knobstone Trail—a carefully designed trail that figures to offer the maximum amount of knee pain for the maximum amount of effort.

We started at Deam lake (South end) Monday afternoon and walked about 5 miles in blazing sun (the oak trees were just coming out so the sun came thru strongly giving us both a pink tint now). We did slow walking @ 1MPH, but that looked good to others since we forgot the walking sticks and had stopped at a CVS and bought Sharon a cane--thus other hikers would see this old couple—“One even was walking with a cane!” making 1mph look pretty good. (Alas, we only we only saw two other sets of hikers--and one of them passed us while seated so the effect was lost on 50% of the hikers ...and it turned out we already knew the other set). My foot muscle (I call it a heal spur but I don't think it really is) and Sharon’s catching up for the last 10 years of administration are the causes of the reduced pace). We camped about five miles into the trail in a never-before-used stealth campsite

On Tuesday we walked again all day in the sun. On this evening we passed Southbound Hikers Adam & Becky Thada, just graduated from IWU who were headed south. We had hidden a key to our car behind one of our tires and they agreed to take our car back to the north end of the trail and drop it off where they had left their car --meaning neither of us had to hitch-hike back to our cars. Nice break, though we will miss riding with the toothless chewin' locals now. We made about ten miles in nine hours this day—nothing to brag about to fastpackers, but "hey, we're out here!."

On Wednesday the sun disappeared and we trudged all day under cloudy skies--up and down and up and down the irritating and terribly-built Knobstone trail (Indiana does not deserve to have a hiking trail!) Sharon loved her cane and decided to never use walking sticks again. We negotiated the infamous Knobstone "steps" built by trail-design-challenged Indiana DNR people. At 4:30 the huge front came through with banging thunder and huge raindrops and we pitched our Henry Shires Tarptent just as the thunder bursts broke loose. Alas, in the rush we pitched the TarpTent on a major runoff drainage and the water flowed right under our tent--about an inch deep. You could pat the floor of the tent and there was a nice cushion of water there. You could also pat the INSIDE of the tarp tent and get wet too—having failed to maintain the “interior bathtub” carefully in the rush. We got a bit wet but not seriously so, bailing out the water like a cnoe, and re-establishing the “bathtub” correctly so the water stayed OUTSIDE the tub, the rest of the night was sorta dry. We lay in the tent the rest of the evening and watched "24" in our imaginations (we just started on “24” and are up to 4AM on day one of the California primary now) but the mental reruns got boring soon. The tremendous rainstorm continued all night. After a restless night with 2" puddles surrounding the tent, and a 1” runoff running underneath us all night, we awoke to a fine drizzle the next morning and packed up our damp everythings and walked in the drizzle.

Thursday we walked in muck--the several-inch rain had turned the trail into a mudpie. The creeks were 6-10' wide or mroe and we gave up jumping them all and simply splashed through them We made our self-assigned 10 miles in the dripping rain by suppertime to "the Favorite IWU campsite" at mile 36--the one by the creek. As I was about to get the tarptent out, Sharon suggested 'Let's keep walking--after all, all we can do is sit here in the tent bored" (I'm not very interesting, actually, and we had re-watched all the 24 episodes) so we walked on and did another 3-4 miles, camping in a pine tree forest at mile 40--the one where Woodbury-Kind & Schmerse-to-be camped last.

Awaking at first light this morning Sharon led us in drizzle to the end on that final easy leg of the Knobber arriving at the car (nicely placed there by Adam and Becky) by 11AM this morning. We tossed our wet stuff into he trunk, cranked up the heater full speed and drove home with all our windows open. Arriving in Marion by 2PM, we unloaded the car into the washer and/or drier and are now headed for a delightful evening watching the next few hours of "24".

I almost always need to get away right after graduation—to not think about school for a while and this worked. This time I was able to do the runaway trip with Sharon which was a real treat. This hike was also a test hike of sorts--to see how we'll fare on the Colo. Trail with the faculty hiking club this coming August. The Knobber maxim "ten will get you 15" (10 miles on the Knobber will get you 15 out West) means we will be able to survive the Colo Trail—at least in the “stay-back group” on that hike. We’ll let the Marathon runners and youngsters go ahead and we'll bring up the rear an go for 75 instead of 100 miles. That will work since Jeanie Argot plans to take that hike on her worn out knees--she needs knee replacements but plans to wear out her birth-knees on that hike. She can do 15 on broken knees she thinks. We also decided to "do more cooking" on that hike, nudging the hike more toward "camping along the Colorado Trail" than just "long distance fast packing."

Also, this hike once again reminded of Sharon's indomitable spirit—she is not a natural hiker and never hiked oververnight when she married me. But when you toss at her a thousand stairs and several days of rain and she just sticks with it and gets stronger every day. I remembered this week why we stuck it out and finished that thousand mile AT hike back in ‘72--you "just do it." (then you take a shower and watch a few more hours of "24.")

Mark & Jess & Paul—we knocked over a tree each for you and remembered the “Platypus prank” and the Maundy Thursday and Easter services at the appropriate places. Remembered places where Burt, & Kerry & Phil and others did this or that--many memories tied to places on that trail.

WELCOME TO NEXT FALL'S COURSES!

2007-04-22T16:14:00.000-04:00

I doubt anyone is really interested much in this--but I just sent an email to all the students in NEXT FALL's classes welcoming them to the course... The trhee main courses I wrote to so far have
...Local Church Education-- 27 students
...Church Leadership-- 27 students
...Teaching the Bible to Adults--8 students

More will sign up later but here is what I said to those already registered:

WELCOME to next Fall's Teaching the Bible to Adults class!!! You'll love this class...

It is a comfy group who DOES Bible study each week as well as learns HOW to do Bible studies for all adults--from college age through older adults.

I have a major passion for this class so you'’ll get "Drury at his best" I hope. The class includes both ministry majors and others--people who want to learn how to teach people for life change. The course is not really named right--we don't actually teach the Bible -- we teach PEOPLE... using the Bible in a way that inspires people to become Christ-like. It will be a wonderful Thursday evening and you'll look forward to it every week I bet.

We will first explore the stages of adult life and the characteristics of college students through older folk, then most of our time will focus on teaching methods...the ways people interact with the Bible that produces spiritual growth. We'll "learn by doing" often--actually having a Bible study as a way of learning how to lead one. If the course works well we will all come away having grown ourselves by our own study. The course assumes the Bible is not just a book that should be studied like one sticks a corpse on the table to do a post-mortem, but is a powerful living word of God that (if approached right) changes people. We'll learn how this process works and "how people change."

Usually we'll meet around one table (in the religion division conference room) but sometimes we'll move to a "home setting" to experience Bible study like small groups do in homes or residence halls. I have not finalized the syllabus yet but I'm thinking it would be cool if we could all lead several Bible studies ourselves--some in class and some in the residence halls or at church to practice our skills.

The group itself will become a Bible study group--of loving, caring people committed to our own growth--sort of a mentoring group under the leadership of the Holy Spirit. While we will care about the content of the Bible our primary focus is on how the Holy Spirit uses the Bible in a group to change people--to help us (and others) grow and develop. It will be exciting!

TO DO OVER SUMMER: Nothing particularly you need to do to prepare other than think of where you might hold several Bible studies yourself next year…in a church or on campus. Otherwise just get the texts before the first night of class.

SEE YOU ALL THURSDAY EVENINGS NEXT FALL! cool!
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WELCOME to the Fall semester’s Church Leadership class! This is a “senior course” (though occasionally a junior takes it) You must be accepted into the major to take it—so if you aren’t accepted by Sept 1 you’ll be kicked out of the course by Bonita the first week of school—so apply before you leave for summer if you’re not accepted yet!

Be prepared for:
1. Small group work—you pick two others to make a group of three and this group will be vital to your success in the course—in many ways your grade will depend on who you get with—you get to arrange your own group. Many assignments are group-created—you work together and can borrow each other’s work. If you see names above of people you want to be with—go ahead and arrange it before hand if you want to.
2. Problem based learning. Some of the work in the course is just like “real life” -- you only get a problem that you have to go and dig out the solution for. For instance sometimes we simply assign the group to make a plan for planting a church in Marion—and you have to figure out what kind of church, where to meet, how to budget for it, and even go check what renting places to meet cost. One of the groups this semester planned a church and it looks like one of our seniors will actually stay in Marion next year and plant the church they dreamed up. Another PBL assignment just gives you a bunch of terms written down in a church finances meeting for you to figure out what they mean. This PBL approach is “Like life” in that you have to find out where the answers are and how to check them to see if they are reliable.
3. Practicum learning. You’ll need a local church where you can interview a pastor, meet with the Treasurer, sit in on a board meeting, and other exposure to the administration of a church. Most churches won’t let you “lead” the church so this experience is more about the administration of a church than leading it.
4. Uncle Keith stuff. This is the course where I “tell it like it really is” the most. Most students like the stories as much as the hard content of this course. Here is where you get “the real truth” about what happens in the very-human organism of the church.
5. Units of study Here is what we usually deal with: (may change based on this semester’s final input—I’ve not opened that yet)
-People—how to recruit, motivate, inspire, remove people.
-Leadership theory—a unit on formal leadership theory and the “Strategetics” wisdom of leading and working with people.
-Conflict—managing it and resolving it—between others and yourself and the church or other ministers.
-Church finances—budgeting and church finances terms
-Leading meetings—the course is sometimes nicknamed CLPL—meaning Church Leadership and “Parliamentary Law” --we have a short unit on deliberative meetings.
(The following is the closing personal leadership unit)
-Personal finances—personal budgeting and ministers’ income taxes and housing.
-Integrity matters—avoiding sexual sin, financial ethics, honesty and ethics in the ministry.

See you next Fall!!!!

coach d
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WELCOME to the Fall semester’s Local Church Education class! This is an awesome course—probably the best course I teach—so we’ll have a great time!

Be prepared for:
1. Lots of writing—a chapter a week for your “book.”
2. Small group work—you pick two others to make a group of three and this group will be vital to your success in the course—the better the group the better your paper and grade. If you see some names above you want t like up with now go ahead and set it up—you get to arrange your own group.
3. Student teaching. The practicum requires you to do “student teaching” in Sunday school—any age group, so be planning to attend Sunday school next semester and working with a “master teacher” who will let you teach twice and meet with you after to help you improve your teaching.

I think you’ll love this course. It is a major milestone for CM-YM students (along with Rec Management majors who have an alternative option). The group you establish often becomes so bonded that you will forget the rest of those in class—so pick your group carefully.
See you next Fall!!!!

coach d
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I'll also be teaching the related practicums for these courses plus one breakout section of UNV180--we're trying a new thing this semester--a breakout section of all the Religion division students togeter with a REL prof as their breakout leader--I'm doing one of those sections on Friday afternoons... total load for the semester for me will be about 15 hours, better than this year!

I'm getting a raise!

2007-04-15T16:25:00.000-04:00

Our President held a meeting Friday and announced all the faculty at IWU were getting raises. Not cost-of-living raises (we already got that) but an actual bump in salary on top of that. In fact we're getting a bump for each of the next three years in a row beyond COLAs. We are all quite happy here of course. The biggest raises will go to full professors with earned Doctorates of course, and the rest will get smaller raises but that is consistent with the current effort to push all faculty to finish their "terminal degrees."

IWU is already a great place to teach but this will make it even nicer--especially for the younger profs with kids-who-need-sneakers. It is not just nice for those already teaching but it will make us vastly more attractive to professors from other schools to come here. Not that they'd come for the money--but a bigger salary will make it easier to move for sure.

Oh yeah--Jim Lo is returning too--he'll be the professor of Spiritual Formation--not because of the salary, he just loves us all!

When all this is finished a full professor might still be able to earn more money at a few CCCU schools--like schools in California where housing costs a tad more than Marion. In this town a family of four can still buy a four bedroom house for $80,000... merely a down payment in some of the towns where CCU Universities have higher salaries.

And to boot the new Pres has figured out how to do this without adding it on to tuition. So, the faculty is in a big KUDOs mood right now, and might remain there for the next three years. Best of all I bet more will jump in and finish their PhDs.

It comes at a nice time for us all. Faculty get crabby at the end of the year. We get tired of the grind, tired of other faculty, tired of meetings and even tired of [some] students. This is a nice boost--like a Christmas present in summer!

As for me I think I will wait until I retire to do my PhD. I've always admired George Failing who started a PhD in his late 60's..or was it 70s? When people were astonished and asked why, he replied "I want to learn." Interesting notion!

I like Rick Warren but this bugs me

2007-04-13T08:57:00.000-04:00

I like Rick Warren a lot--he is one of my favorites. But one thing bugs me about Rick. He keeps sending me emails as if he is writing just to me when I know he has sent the email to the whole list.

Here is what I got this morning:
Just wanted you to know that the Holy Spirit led me to pray for you and your Easter services several times this past weekend. I also gathered a group of local pastors on Good Friday morning to pray for all the pastors we know and their services. I’d love you hear how your Easter went if you have time to write.
We’re in this together friend.
Rick Warren

This sort of mailing is too fake-ish for me. I'd rather Rick send something to his entire list saying something like "I have been thinking of the 10,000 pastors on my mailing list this morning and I picked several to pray for by name." Or some other way of admitting he was not writing a personal letter to me but this was a mass mailing to his whole list masking as a burden for me.

Oh well, I still like Rick Warren. I just wish he'd be more authentic in his mailings. Maybe I've hung around with young people too much.

Grading papers

2007-04-03T15:49:00.000-04:00

OK my first papers (AKA "books") are turned in and I'm in grading mode now.

This is one of the most happy times of a professor's career. I hate grading yet at the same time I love seeing the work students do. I have the "Church Leadership" books now and am grading them. It was a course that I was not satisfied with this semester. It never seemed to take off. Last semester it was my best course. This semester it just didn't seem to get traction. BUT now that I am looking at "papers" I'm feeling much better. It is something like preaching--you leave the pulpit whipped thinking you blew it, then somebody tells you God really spoke through the sermon you thought you flubbed. That's how these books are--when I see them (well, most of them) I feel like I did in fact earn my keep this semester. Even when I know that some (many?) think it was "just an assignment" I know that they have gathered stuff that is vital to their future ministry and I'm delighted. The remainder of the semester in CLPL we're doing "the personal life of the minister" and that comes in a separate paper--a smaller one: finances, taxes, advice from grads about the first year in the church, and ethics and morals for ministers. It is an easy section for me and provides a "soft landing" in the course. Today I taught 5 students--all the rest were Wesleyen students off touring the Headquarters today. They missed the "Minister's taxes" lecture... poor students--I always put some tough questions on that on the final exam ;-)

The rest of my courses... maybe I will say asomething about them later. My fav this semester is LCE--it is an incredible collection of 38 people! Whew! Tell you later more.

Summer's Here!

2007-03-27T15:29:00.000-04:00

All this week it has been near 80 degrees here in Marion and that triggered something inside my students--"SNAP" they now believe Summer's here. They are all over campus sprawled out on blankets "studying" and the art students are painting and drawing this and that. Students (when the professor is talking) have this vacant gaze on their faces and professors tell each other, "Man I'm getting nowhere."

It isn't just students. I've been riding my bike to classes, and I take detours on the way home. I've been cutting flowers and bringing them in to my wife, and I've started my "To the Finish Line" countdown sheets in every course... It isn't long now.
1. The rest of this week.
2. Partial week next week (no Friday classes)
3. Partial week the following week (no Monday classes)
4. Then the final full week of classes.

Whew--summer IS almost here. My first set of "Books" comes in Tuesday in CLPL. So I'm in final grading mode already. Which is right timing... by now most faculty are tired and crabby. We're tired of school, tired of students, tired of being tired. So it comes none too soon.

As for my life. I am heading out for Michigan Thursday for a multi-district "Leadership day." I'm starting off with "Strategetics" (The last time I did this live was 19 years agi--so no minister under 30 has ever heard it direct) Then I'm doing an address on "Membership Matters" and after lunch finishing up with "Changes in the church and the ministry over the last 50 years which ends with 25 characteristics I see in my students which could indicate future changes coming (or not).

As for the Creed book, it is on hold in March--the yellow flag came out in march and I will re-start my engines in April.

As for Sharon she begins teaching full time in the doctoral program (he dream job) April 2.

As for summer plans... so far I'm going to Turkey with my two sons in June and to the Colorado Trail with faculty (including Sharon) in August... I'm meditating on taking a nibble at the CDT a bit again in July...but not sure yet.

As for the Potawatomi Trail of Death book...it should come off the presses in a week or so--I'll update you and post the picture on by ww.tuesdaycolumn.com site.

As for right now...I think I'll go get a blanket and sprawl on the grass....

I'm hiding in the grass

2007-03-23T10:10:00.000-04:00

Sorry if some of you have written me and not gotten a response...or perhaps got a two word response to a long email. I'm buried right now... this semester is catching up to me... 18 hour teach load. trying to write this creed book, 10-15 hours of committees last week...and now advising arrives. A few days ago I was busy for a few days and got 300 emails behind... Ugh!

What I've learned to do in those situations is to take a few hours early in the morning to catch up what I can...then I drag all the rest into a folder titled "See me someday" and start fresh. So if you asked me something really important and I missed it doing my morning cruise before dragging... send another... after having done the drag-out I now feel I am "up to date" again. ;-)

coach d

Spring Break Wheeeeeeeeeeee!

2007-03-01T17:24:00.000-05:00

I'm on spring break. Well, actually it doesn't start for another day--but I've been mentally on break for about two days--no, make that all week. Spring break is one of those wonderful gifts of being a college professor. Right when things start getting really wild BOOM you get a week off. According to a recent survey of IWU faculty the average work week is 60-70 hours per week during the school year. Spring break helps balance that out.

As for us, we are going to a sweet Amish-built log cabin off in the woods in Northern Indiana for a quiet week. When we tell people that they often ask, "What is there to "do" around there?" I just laugh. I already have enough to "do" around here. That's the idea--go somewhere where there ISN'T anything to "do!"

So don't come and visit me--I'll be busy doing nothing.

Back in a week or so.... not until after I'm done doing nothing ;-)

***********************************************************************

Ahhhhhh just returned home ... I did pretty good doing nothing... only failed to do it some of the time when I slipped and did some grading and wrote a column.. but I did achieve these "goals:"

-Slept about 10 hours every night

-Watched the today show every day on a little TV with rabbit ears.

-Baked bread twice a day and ate it all (Sharon helped)

-Went to a video store that was selling out their old Video Cassettes and bought 20 at 80 cents each and watched half of them.

-Played video games until I got stuck at the second level (or fourth).

-Read a few books that were not serious.

-Took a few walks in the snow.

-Sat in the sunshine in the afternoons on the cabin's porch.

-Thought up wonderful ideas and never wrote any of them down.

-Took several naps in the afternoons

-Had a dozen or so of those "chats" women like their husbands to have with them.

-Drove to the nearby Mennonite-Amish town's library and browsed unseriously.

-Cooked every meal alongside Sharon then ate it all, leaving no leftovers.

-Came home wound down almost as much as I come home from backpacking.

-Got a serious case of "Spring Fever" that I plan to retain until summer.

ahhhhhhh... the joy of accomplishing one's goals!

Snow day #2

2007-02-14T10:03:00.000-05:00

OK, now we have about 14" of snow, which essentially shuts Marion Indiana down... though it is a normal day in Minneapolis or the UP of Michigan. School is called off again today. I kinda feel bad for Steve Moore, speaker at the "Missions week" all week--he came and did his get-ready-get-set talk Monday and now we all just stay in the starting block for two days. Sorta like getting dressed up for a date then staying home and watching the news.

We do have snow drifting though. The picture is of my street this morning... the footprints are Dave Ward's (who came down to help me shovel out my driveway).

I'll be headed over to the prisoners-in-Baldwin at noon to eat lunch with Steve Moore, then I'm coming home to start entering my taxes into the computer--these two days are like a free gift of grace--now I don't have to use Saturdays to do taxes... I can spend them on finishing up my "Walking the Trail of Death" book--which is 95% done now (the final 5% is half the work though).

Tomorrow we return to school (unless the Indiana snowwimps prevail again).

Snow Day today

2007-02-13T08:38:00.000-05:00

IWU called off all classes today. That is news... I think the last time all classes were cancelled was in the late 1970's. We have even less "commuters" now... most of our students must only walk a hundred yards to classes..and they already have to walk that far today anyway to eat. But classes are cancelled today anyway. Why? What has changed?Here are my guesses.

First, more faculty are long commuters. Our faculty used to live in Marion--they were almost 'required" to do so. Now many live in Indianapolis--more than 100 yards from classrooms. You can have class without a few students, but not as easily without a faculty member.

Second, the workaholic ethos is changing. IWU has always been famous for producing graduates who "just do it." they don't make excuses: "I was sick," "I slept in," or "it snowed." IWU does not even have such a thing as a "nurse's office excuse" any more for missing classes (except for dangerous communicable diseases). The school expected faculty and students to simply "show up and do their job" ignoring everything but the job. This has made graduates very popular with employers, but it might be also establish workaholic habits that are not mentally healthy--so there is an attempt to soften this now--and a snow day is an example of how to soften this hard-work-cafe ethos.

Finally, the rest of Indiana are ALL snow-wimps. We have not had a big (big=10" ;-) snow storm in years--so this was news before it happened. Some faculty members cancelled classes personally yesterday--before a single flake of snow! It is as if we need an emergency and dog-gone it we will have one even if it is only for a foot of snow. Of course people in Minneapolis and Buffalo laugh at us--but Indiana is something like north Carolina when it comes to snow. They freak out. In fact, in Indiana the snowplows go home at ten o'clock at night and go to bed like everybody else--really!!!!

OK, I think I'll do my taxes today...

I'm on my spring writing schedule

2007-01-15T21:17:00.000-05:00

I’ve started my spring writing schedule for the Apostle’s Creed book.. it goes like this:

WEDNESDAY –I research all morning reading the chapter in other books related to the phrase in the creed I’m studying. Here are the writers I find the most helpful:

Alister McGrath (I believe)
Luke Timothy Johnson (the Creed)
Wolfhart Pannenberg (The Apostle’s Creed)
Hans Urs von Balthasar (Credo)
William Barclay (Aposle’s Creed)
Martin Luther (Large Catechism)
Emil Brunner (Sermons on the creed)
Karl Barth (Dogmatics in outline—Creed)
Thomas Aquinas (last sermons-on the creed)
Augustine (Enchiridion)
Plus several other littler dogs (Roger Van Harn, Pritchard etc)

By noon I have taken all my notes on 3X5 cards. I have read all these books already—last year I read them all, this time I am extracting ideas to ponder before writing myself.

THURSDAY-SUNDAY –I carry my 3X5 cards with me everywhere and let my mind “write in background” for these four days, often flipping though the notes to refresh the ideas and adding new ones as they develop ex nihilo, or at least it seems that way. As the weekend approaches the dots start to connect and an “outline” of sorts begins to emerge in my head. During this time I also pray for inspiration…seeking the Lord’s guidance on what should come to the front for my readers and what needs to be left on the cutting room floor.

MONDAY –Is my writing day.
Before going to sleep I refresh my mind once again with the cards so as to program my overnight thinking with the ideas.
-I get up at the normal time and have coffee.
-I get a bath, put on my “writing coat” (a magical corduroy coat that helps ;-) and polish my shoes.
-I spread the cards out all across the floor beside my computer and organize them into a passable outline
-I type the outline into my chapter document.
-I launch into writing and don’t back up even to correct errors.
-After writing 2000 words I eat potatoes & eggs for breakfast as a reward
-I return and finish by noon
-Then I go to lunch where I meet with fellow profs in a Barth reading group.

AFTER MONDAY
I let the manuscript marinate and move on to other chapters. After a couple weeks of the above I start rewrite on old drafts “in the cracks” of my week’s schedule

IN MAY I will start rewrite of the whole manuscript—editing the “book” as one whole—this is a totally separate process of 15 separate drafts and will take a couple months of daily work after school is out.

If everything goes right the manuscript will be ready to turn in “for editing” in mid July.

Thanks for any prayers you can send up for me this spring.

--coach d