Jonathan Herron

Sweet Dreams

Part of our adoption process involves putting together multiple scrapbooks that "tell your story" as a couple.  Prospective birth moms go through a handful of these scrapbooks from different couples and then choose who to place their newborn with. 

Amber & I are taking this very seriously and have spent hundreds of hours doing paperwork leading up to this point.  Monday we enlisted the aid of Sweet Dreams Photography - wow!  The staff was totally professional and very creative.  I loved how Emily (our photographer) had scouted out sites earlier and already had photo ideas ready to go.  I'd definitely recommend them for your special life moments.

More proofs from our shoot (click 'em for larger version):

Check out the rest here.

Reform & Resurge: Darrin Patrick

The Resurgence is posting audio & video from the recent Reform & Resurge Conference @ Mars Hill.  1st mp3 is from Darrin Patrick, VP of Acts 29 & pastor/planter of The Journey in St. Louis on "The Life and Death of the Missional Leader."  Wow:

Trials are anything that cause you to question your faith.  James doesn't say "If trials come," he says "WHEN trials come."

"Suffering is a beautiful hermeneutic." - Dr. John Piper

We come to know God not in the blessing, but in the breaking.

Trials "hyper-stand us;" they train us like a muscle to be stronger in the future.

Too often we focus on the pain of the trial, not the product of the trial.  If you focus on the pain, you will become disillusioned with God and the Church.

Tragedy introduces us to our own heart - Jeremiah 17.9.

Trials reveal not God's absence but His presence.  Theme of 2 Corinthians = ministry is death.  Chapter 1 = the comfort you recieve from God makes you compassionate toward others in pain.

Trials knock down the things that we trust other than God. Idolatry-killer.

Godless leadership is leading from our own strengths & gifts (i.e. Samson).
Godly leadership is leading from our weakness (i.e. Gideon - prunes the pretenders away).

The man that God uses mightily He wounds greatly. 
Why would God take away your weakness when that's the trigger for His power?

Overwhelm the World

"If we dare to live beyond self-concern, if we refused to shrink from being vulnerable, if we took nothing but a compassionate attitude toward the world, if we were counter-cultural to our nation’s lunatic lust for pride of place, power, and possessions, if we preferred to be faithful rather than successful, the wall of indifference to Christ would crumble.

A handful of us could be ignored by society, but hundreds, thousands, millions of such servants would overwhelm the world. Christians filled with authenticity, commitment, and generosity of Jesus would be the most spectacular sign in the history of the human race. The call of Jesus is revolutionary. If we implement it, we would change the world in a few months.
- Brennan Manning, The Signature of Jesus

Suburbia

In 8 and a half years of marriage, Amber & I have always been renters.

It started with getting married while still college students in Chicago.

(Side-note:  And I mean IN Chicago, not like the wannabes who say they lived in Chicago and you go, "Where at?" and they're like, "In Evanston"). 

We didn't even have a car until after our 1st year of marriage (getting groceries was a hoot, let me tell you).

But as of January of 2006, we are fully-fledged homeowners in Ohio.  This is our 1st ever spring with real, actual yard work like mowing, planting flowers, and strategically fertilizing the lawn with Juliet the Wonder Pug.

All this just to say that I have made a major discovery this evening in 92-degree heat: 
I LOVE WEED-WHACKING. 

Seriously, I believe I've found my calling in life now.  Weed-whacking is my destiny.  Give me a big green weed-whacker and I can kill a half hour (and kill a lot of other things in my yard while I'm at it). 

If there were a regional weed-whacking competition, I would totally train for it and whack some major butt.  I'd proudly display my "Fiercest Weed-Whacker" trophy on the fireplace mantle.

Suburbia - who knew I could fit in so well?

Mac Problem

Quick ?'s for Mac users (save me Obi Wan Rodriguez!) - having 2 minor issues w/my PowerBook G4:

Sometimes I'll be typing and the letters won't appear on the screen and I end up banging full force onto a single button over and over again (like the letters "z," "q", etc.).  What am I doing wrong?

Second ?:  Sometimes my arrow cursor stops working.  I'll go to push a virtual website button or something and instead of a familiar click and go, a little box giving different options appears next to my arrow.  Very frustrating.  How do I turn this dumb feature off?

Totally Random Poll

Which is worse when chewing gum:

1)  Biting the inside of your cheek right near your mouth?

OR

2)  Biting your stinkin' tongue?

Unplugged Pix

Way back in March I was in Columbus, Ohio for a week of training at the GBNAM church planting boot camp.  The final day Amber drove down for our 3 hour assessment (which went splendidly). 

Anyhoo, I just came across my GBNAM coach's blog with pix from that week and from Northwest Chapel, part of the Coalition of Churches supporting Catalyst. 

If you want to see unplugged pix of Amber & myself that we had no idea were being taken, check it out.

* UPDATE: After surfing on Ron's blog I found a whole page dedicated to Catalyst...

Juliet the Wonder Pug Saves the Day

Past our backyard we have a swamp that is home to a rather large beaver and about 30 geese & their goslings (the beaver is inconsequential to this story, but adds background drama if a movie version of these events were ever to be filmed).

Every day the geese lead their little families into our front & back yards to squawk and play... and to leave, um, goose gifts.

Said gifts aren't great presents.  They're more on the gooey side.

This past week, whenever geese were sighted, I would quickly leash up Juliet and we would chase the geese into the swamp waters. 

Upon reaching the safety of the waters, they would make faces at us knowing we wouldn't follow them into the murky abyss.

Until today.  Juliet was released into the backyard absent her leash.  Pent up fury against the cursed geese was focused on one tiny pug's mission.  And ran she did.  As fast as her little stubby legs would take her. 

The battle lines were drawn.  There would be no goose-mockery today.  Juliet the Wonder Pug saved the day as she routed the enemy geese and caused their retreat in haste to the swampy hideout.  Pug stood victor.

Stay tuned for the sequel.

Blog Quote of the Week: Josh Harris

“What we need is humble theology — theology which submits itself to the truth of God's Word. 'Liberal' theology — theology which does not view Scripture as finally trustworthy and authoritative  — is not humble before the Word. Churches which are tentative and decry dogmatism may sound humble, but it is not truly humble to do anything other than to submit to God's Word.

Christian humility is to simply accept whatever God has revealed in His Word. Humility is following God's Word wherever it goes, as far as it goes, neither going beyond it nor stopping short of it. The humility we want in our churches is to read the Bible and believe it — everything God has said, dogmatically, and humbly! It is not humble to be hesitant where God has been clear and plain.” - Josh Harris quoting Mark Dever

Death by Ministry

Mark Driscoll's Death by Ministry post is excellent - it's actually an excerpt from his Acts 29 Bootcamp-closing talk on Reverse-Engineering Your Life.  When the free mp3 from the Orlando conference goes online, I'll be sure to post the link (it's that good).  My favorite quote:

Sadly, most pastors and Christian leaders I know are woefully out of shape. Many of them pound their pulpits against rock music and alcohol while their huge gut jiggles in mockery of their own gluttony.