Entries from January 2009 ↓
January 20th, 2009 — leadership, life
For those of you who are aware of my involvement with ACOM, I’d like to update you on the fact that as of December 31, 2008, I have stepped aside from a formal role with the college.
For the past couple of years, I have been assisting the college as the Regional Director for WA. I stepped into that role primarily to help reconnect the college with some of its historical main constituents here, and I think my long history with ACOM allowed me to assist in the transition from the previous Regional Director, Scott Vawser.
It’s been a busy couple of years with this extra load on top of my primary leadership role at Warnbro Church, and it became very apparent to me at the beginning of 2008 that the RD role was mostly an administrative position, something which I was keen to shift on because admin is not my passion or strength, and I am at a point in my life where I am becoming a lot more ruthless about ditching things which are not my passion or strength. Life is too short.
For me, this was always only a transitional role, so I’m glad to be moving on to the next thing. It’s actually been quite an interesting time, in many respects, and I have learnt a handful of very important things I take with me:
1. I am more convinced than ever that administrative/management/maintenance stuff is not my schtick, and need to remain vigilant about getting involved in such things. I can do them well when I have to but I’d rather not have to. I think I have other contributions to make.
2. There is a massive (and I can’t over-emphasize this point) dearth of excellent young leaders coming through, and there is a huge systemic problem with the identification, recruitment and nurture of future leaders for the church. Many colleges (ACOM included) are suffering the consequences of a much deeper problem in our churches.
3. I have been reminded over the past year how much I love teaching. I specifically spent my seminary time preparing to teach, something which has only been a side-light in my ministry to this point. I’d love to actually do more.
I am not entirely sure what ACOM’s plans are here in WA at this point. I have not really been part of the transitional discussions, mostly because I’m on annual leave until late January.
January 20th, 2009 — life, politics
This whole situation seems ridiculous in this day and age, but as someone who visits Thailand regularly for missional purposes, it’s a bit of a worry. And, could I even get in trouble for saying something negative from outside of Thailand, even here in a blog?! Crazy.
January 19th, 2009 — life
January 17th, 2009 — life
January 14th, 2009 — life
January 12th, 2009 — life, tech
Is it possible?
As someone who is vitally interested in all things communication oriented, especially regarding technology, I found this piece on IBM dude Luis Suarez very interesting, but also perhaps a little perplexing.
He has, apparently, shifted away from email as much as possible and focused most of his communication with colleagues to IM, and to me this is totally mystifying. IM, to me, is perhaps the most invasive and distracting piece of tech in existence, whereas at least with email you have the option to choose when and how to deal with stuff that comes your way. Whether you are driven by email or not is simply a matter of personal discipline and good work habits/systems. And, aside from this issue of interruptions, I wonder how it works with communicating across a bunch of different time zones, where email would definitely have an advantage of being less time-bound. Luis apparently lives in the Canary Islands, so you’d have to think time zones would become an issue now and then.
I dunno… perhaps some of you have had better experiences with IM, but to me it’s hard to justify… every time I tinker with it, I quickly turn it off because it is just such a disruptive thing to have, unless you specifically only turn it on when you schedule time for IM stuff, which seems to kill the interactive nature of it a bit. I watch young people get absolutely nothing done in a day because they’re just constantly involved in a variety of inane IM chats that keep dragging their focus away. Add the tech to a phone, and they’re done for when it comes to productivity!
As for Facebook, I’m quickly developing some strong thoughts about that which I will share in the next few days, my vacation permitting… :-)
January 10th, 2009 — life
What’s going on in Gaza?
I think the truth would have to be that no one really knows. War, it seems to me, is chaos, with the victor usually being the side with a slightly better view through the fog.
There is an awful lot of media handwringing going on about the Israeli offensive into Gaza, and I think it will be some time before we know (if ever) what is actually happening. You just can’t believe the media because spin is everything and everybody in the game knows it.
The Israelis know it, so they are working carefully to control media access (as the US has in many of its engagements), and Hamas knows it and is not immune to “staging” matters for maximum media impact. The media is simply a willing (unfortunately, but it has always been so) accomplice in playing the spin game. So, don’t count on the media for “the truth” because it doesn’t know the truth. There would be a very small group of people who actually know the truth, and they are the least likely to tell the media (except some specific version for some specific purpose).
This situation has been a long time brewing, but outright collision was always going to happen at some point with two groups so implacably opposed in such close proximity to each other, especially when one of them has a radical and unapologetic policy regarding the existence of the other. The stated extreme Hamas position regarding Israel is not negotiable, so discussion seems a little pointless. At some juncture, it was always going to end up in a fight.
And, after totally screwing up the action against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and the resultant dent in the IDF reputation for invincibility, I fear that the people of Gaza have both Hezbollah and Hamas to thank for their suffering at this point because the Israelis are unlikely to fiddle around this time. It will be “shock and awe” in spades.
And, of course, in the long run, no one will actually win this, even after the Israelis have totally ground Gaza back to the stone age. But, I suppose Israel can live with that in the short term. That’s the Middle East way.
January 9th, 2009 — life
January 9th, 2009 — life
This is nuts!
Originally uploaded by obrienmb1966.
It’s January 9!!!!!!
January 8th, 2009 — life
