Coffee Shop Journal

Aaron Dalyrmple, another blog author, contacted me about Third Place concepts, and what items he has on his list of “must haves” for a comofortable third place to work in. Go check out his blog HERE and let’s discuss what we think our list would contain. And have you ever found such a spot? Give me your secret hideaways!

Chapter 6 of In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy day is a call to action: get off your rear end and get out of the boat, like Peter walking on the water. There are two quotes that jumped out at me. I am going to give them to you, and then I am going to tell you why, in my opinion, the television show Eli Stone represents an important cultural milestone.

Quote One

Everything we change, changes everything.

Have you ever heard about the “Butterfly Effect?” This weather-forecasting principle states that even something as seemingly inconsequential as the flap of a butterfly’s wings can literally change a weather pattern. Faith is like that, too. Even the littlest moments of action or inaction on our part can initiate a chain of events with eternal significance.

Quote Two

Instead of complaining about the current state of affairs we need to offer better alternatives. We need to make better movies and better music. We need to write better books. We need to start better schools and better businesses.

So here is why I believe Eli Stone matters. This new television show is based on an up-and-coming lawyer suddenly seeing visions – usually of George Michael, oddly enough, singing in improbably situations. By following the impressions created by these visions, Eli alters the course of his life and the lives of people around them. He begins to fight for the underdog, create justice, and impact his world. Slowly – so slowly – Eli comes to understand that the visions are coming from God, and that he has a responsibility to act on them.

Eli Stone is one of the best examples of Hollywood treating faith with respect. Is it theologically correct? Probably not. Does it present the gospel in a four-step system? Nope. But it does represent an honest attempt to recognize that God is real, he works in this world, and he communicates to us. That makes Eli Stone a rare find indeed.

What I love about this show is that it doesn’t have the adjective “Christian” tagged on to make us watch it. It is well written, high quality, and totally entertaining. It exemplifies what Mark Batterson was saying in Quote Two above. When Christians step out and interact with culture in a meaningful way, like Paul in the marketplace of Athens, magic like Eli Stone can result. I don’t know who is behind the tv show Eli Stone. I don’t know if they are a believer or not. I do know that they have given us a great topic of discussion.

My latest book is “Predictably Irrational” by Dan Ariely. You could equally call this  a business book or a social sciences book. The major idea of this book is this: human beings will often make what appear to be irrational decisions, but they make them in predictable ways. There are many, many applications in this book, but I want to focus on one study and its application.

The researcher realized that there is a stereotype that says Asian-Americans are good in the math and sciences. There is also a stereotype that says that women are poor in math and sciences. What happens to Asian-American women? Do they buy into the pro-math stereotype or the anti-math stereotype? To find the answer to this question the researcher divided a group of Asian-American women into two groups. The first group was asked questions which called to mind their gender. They discussed co-ed dorms and other feminine perspectives. The second group discussed topics which called their ethnic background to mind. Researchers asked questions about what languages were spoken at  home, cultural traditions, etc. Following these discussions both groups of women were given a mathematical test. Can you predict the results?

The Asian-Americans who were reminded about their status as women performed far worse on the math test than the women who were reminded that they were Asian. Their state of mind and expectations created different results for them.

In a related study, young undergraduates at NYU were asked to put jumbled sentences together. One group had words relating to age, infirmity. Their words included things like Florida, ancient, cane, false teeth. The other group had age-neutral words to work with. Once the sentences were assembled, the participants were told their study was over, and they were free to walk down a long corridor to exit the building. Now here is the remarkable thing: the age-based sentence group walked out of that building slower, with a halting gait, as if they were old! Compared to the other group of comparable NYU undergrads, this group of students exited the building substantially slower! Wow… the powerful suggestion of just assembling sentences created a difference between the groups.

So how does that apply to us? Well, there are two questions we need to ask ourselves.

First of all, what are the expectations we have about ourselves that either inspire us or hold us back?

Second, what are the expectations of others that we communicate day in and day out?

These are profound questions. Are we holding ourselves or others back because of false expectations? Are we able to inspire others with our expectations? Do we truly tend to get what we expect?

What are we expecting?

Lately I’ve been researching the relationship between churches and Third Places. Many churches consciously strive to develop spaces and activities that invite the community into the church environment. As a result we are seeing many churches build coffee shops in their lobby and student centers that act as teen hangouts. On the other end of the spectrum are the churches and individuals who either establish a totally secular space out in the community, or else spend their time in the spaces that already exist. Both approaches have merit. Here are a few links I’ve discovered lately.

This blog seems to be a “road trip” to explore up and coming trends in college ministries. One of these trends is, as noted, the development of Third Spaces. This blog explores an article that analyzes this trend, but also mentions a study which looks at church design from the “outsider” perspective.

http://exploringcollegeministry.wordpress.com/2008/04/22/they-want-authentage/

This is the original article which presents the original research.

http://www.lifeway.com/lwc/article_main_page/0%2C1703%2CA%25253D167438%252526M%25253D200906%2C00.html?&emid=383

Blog about creating co-working spaces in local coffee shops:

http://fullyarticulated.typepad.com/sprawledout/2008/04/third-place-cof.html

Tryst, a cool coffee shop in Washington DC…the picture above is from Tryst.
http://www.cooltownstudios.com/mt/archives/000063.html

Finally, this blog is my latest favorite. I share a lot of the same perspectives as Jim, the author. The link below takes you to the first of several posts where Jim explores the pros and cons of building third place spaces. Go check him out.

http://jimsthirdspace.wordpress.com/2008/04/16/building-a-coffeehouse-instead-of-a-church/

I’m sure there is some button to post on my page if I could ever figure out how to do such a thing, but I joined Facebook lately (thank you, Jillian). Request to be my friend!

Sunday afternoons on my back porch are the best time of the week!

We just returned from Christ Fellowship’s City Place campus. Jillian (our youngest daughter) is headed to Costa Rica with the City Place mission’s team next week, so we went to see the commissioning service. I love City Place campus: where else do you find a Starbucks, Macy’s, Cheesecake Factory and Anthropologie outside your church door? The worship is great, the setting is more intimate and the serendipitous element to the crowd keeps things from getting bland.

John Poitevent spoke today about Phillip walking on the desert road on God’s orders. Phillip, said John, was in the middle of a city-wide revival when God interrupted him and sent him out the desert road, where he met the eunuch riding in a carriage. The eunuch was an interruption. Phillip noticed what the eunuch was reading, and asked him a question about his understanding of the scripture. The eunuch invited Phillip to sit beside him and explain the scriptures. You now the story, and it ends with Phillip getting whisked away to his next interruption.

Well John had  couple of really great points that jumped out at me today.

• Phillip noticed what the other guy was reading. In other words, he connected with what the guy was doing. We talked about that last week: don’t be buried in your own stuff at the coffee shop. Notice what’s going on around you, because God might have something for you.
• Phillip asked a question about the passage the eunuch was reading. He didn’t jump in and begin preaching. He didn’t say, “I know the guy who wrote that book.” He took the time to understand where the eunuch was coming from by asking questions.
• The eunuch responded by asking Phillip to join him in his carriage. Or, as John put it this morning, “Come on up here and do life with me.” We only get invited to “do life” when we’ve connected first.
• Phillip never even got where he was headed. First he was interrupted by the main point of his day, and then he was whisked off elsewhere. By having a heart that was constantly tuned to God’s voice, Phillip made sure he didn’t miss the main event.

In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day Chapter 5

Presumptuous blog title, no? How to live with uncertainty. Nevertheless, that’s what Chapter Five of In a Pit is teaching in no uncertain terms. Uncertainty is a part of life…maybe even the best part of life. Benaiah had no clue he was going to chase a lion the morning he woke up and changed his destiny. And once the chase was on, Benaiah had no guarantee of a checkmark in the win column. And neither do we. So how do we embrace the uncertainty that God has built into life?

1. Tolerate interruptions. 90% of the time it is the unexpected, unimagined twist on our day and on our life that reveals God’s fingerprint. Yesterday it was the unexpected moment in the bar that gave me the framework to evaluate the whole crazy patchwork of my day. Viewing those 15 minutes cooling my heals waiting for food as an interruption in my plan would have robbed me of that insight. I am not particularly good at this process, by the way. In fact, one of the ironies of this post is that as I was writing a college friend of mine was instant messaging with me while he sat in an (apparently) uninspiring class, my computer froze necessitating a conversation with a mac-using neighbor at the next table, my husband called wanting to meet me at a different coffee shop, and the barista at the second coffee shop sat down for an extended conversation with us about life, faith, what he wants to do with his life and how to get there. Yes, they were interruptions to this post, but they were the point of my day!
2. Be counterintuitive. The way God works in one life or church is seldom the way he works in another. If your mental map of “how God works” is modeled on someone else, you need to break that mold. Batterson writes, “Regardless of your vocational calling or relational status you have to do something counterintuitive if you want to reach your God-given potential and fulfill your God-given destiny. Sometimes you have to run away from security and chase uncertainty.” My life is filled with uncertainties, as is yours. I am going to cultivate the discipline of looking at them as opportunities, trying to find the counterintuitive approach.
3. Prepare. Batterson uses the example of the Day of Pentecost. The disciples didn’t plan Pentecost; they weren’t even aware that it was coming. All of it was an interruption, an uncertainty. But they had prepared themselves for Pentecost by fasting, praying, being where God needed them. The chapter asks us what would happen if instead of spending all our energy planning events for God and telling him how we need him to work, if instead we spent that energy seeking after God. You can’t plan Pentecost, but you can be prepared.
4.  View complications as blessings. While sometimes the complications in our lives can come as a result of wrong choices, most of the time they arise as a result of the good things we do in our lives. My complications come from my elderly mother, my growing kids or having too many great choices of activity in my life. These are blessings, all. Remember the parable of the talents? The reward for doing your work well was…more work. And so it is today. I was frustrated by the complications of arranging my family’s summer travel schedule last week, until I remembered what a blessing it is to have three nieces and nephews who love me and are getting happily and wonderfully married this summer.
5. Rest. Above all I am trying to remember that God has a plan, and he is working his plan. I can rest in that. Mark Batterson tells the story of the untimely death of his father-in-law. In the aftermath of that grief, he would often find himself sighing with a grieving, overwhelmed heart. During this time he took to heart the verse in Psalms which says, “Give hear to my words, O Lord. Consider my sighing.” God hears our sighing – those moments of overwhelming burden – and interprets them as prayers. That thought has helped me a lot as a sigh escapes me. I know that my sigh represents all the uncertainty in my life: the knowledge that I have no idea what the right course to take is, the worry over my famiy’s choices, the unknown variables that my job sometimes means I must plan for. My sigh represents the unknown regarding all these things, and God hears it as a prayer. This is good.

One metaphor from this chapter encouraged a new attitude in my daily life this week. I am going to write my life in pencil, and make sure it has a good eraser. How about you?

Still stuck on that phrase…the whispers of Eden. If I learn nothing else from Static (by Ron Martoia), it was worth it for that one phrase.

So here are the moments that surprised me today.

• David and I were shopping for new suits for him today. Suits just aren’t required attire anywhere in our life except funerals, which we rarely go to! But we had an event tonight that required one, an event Sunday, three family weddings this summer and one daughter graduating high school. Time for a new suit. While David was dutifully getting is pants altered I was visiting with an elderly gentleman who has sold me many nice dress shirts in the past. From previous conversations, I knew this friend had many health issues, and I asked him the latest today. It was not good news. The doctor gave him no hope of relief or longevity, with a liver that is slowly closing down and a heart that is nearing its end. My friend is 75, but he is not ready to finish his time here. We hugged, he teared up, we talked. At one point in the conversation I shared my “whispers of Eden” with him. His eyes filled with tears, and he began telling me all the whispers in his life: the time he sang at Carnegie hall and watched the curtain rise for the first time, the years he spent singing in a choir on North Labrador (where IS that?), the young family he has met (from my church — I know them though he doesn’t know that!) who have given him a new definition of the word family. He has led a long life, filled with some regrets and some high points. He wants to please God; he wants to honor the life God has given him; he wants family. He is also gay. My sweet friend who sells amazing shirts cried today as he thought about God’s fingerprints in HIS messy life. I don’t know how to evaluate it all, but there is power there.

• David and I spent our evening listening to Ron Blue, one of the Christian world’s best-known and respected financial planners. He was speaking on wealth transfer and estate planning to just a few of us invited to a dessert buffet high above the city of Palm Beach tonight. As he spoke about all these complicated future matters, I was enveloped with a sense of love and peace. Why? Because my dad cared enough to teach these principles to me; because he put them into practice in his own life without ever having read any books or attended any seminars; because God knows how to send a whisper of love right when we need it the most.
• I ended my evening in a bar, where I felt an amazingly peaceful sense of community. Now right away alarm bells are ringing: we were there to order take-out food to bring home (remember…it was a dessert buffet. No food. My kind of night, though…dessert first!). We sat chatting with the bartender while he poured us a hot tea and a cold tea, with an orange cut into a cute triangle. He didn’t seem to care that we didn’t order anything much. People were happy, chatting, the lights were funky and fun. Another whisper of Eden — the place you go where everybody knows your name.

So there you have a surprising tapestry woven together for me today: I got to experience a shopping ministry (finally!!), I saw a brave man looking at his very short future, I benefited from a man who planned for the future, and I found a few moments of peace in the last place I expected it.

I’ve been reading a book called “Static” lately, by Ron Martoia. I’ll be writing about it more, later when I’ve finished it. But for now I want to share one thought from it, and one story that happened to me today because of it.

The last time my family and I went to Disney, I was struck by the yearning we all have for the real version of the Disney experience. You can read about that here (afterwards!). Today while reading Static I found the scriptural, theological basis for that yearning. According to the author, it is the yearning we all have to return to the Garden…to be restored to the perfect place of fellowship and beauty that we had in the Garden of Eden. And those peak moments of aching beauty and longing in this world? They are “whispers of Eden.” I was so taken with that phrase today, and played it around in my head all day long. Whispers of Eden. Those moments when the South Florida breeze blows cool and the sun is perfect on the back porch, the smell of the grass after the rain, the sound of David Cook singing “Music of the Night” this week — all of these are whispers of Eden. They are the reminders that life here is good, and that it will be restored to the amazing state God originally designed. Whispers of Eden: God’s fingerprints all over my messy life. Wow.

Here’s one quick quote to tide you over until I review the whole book!

Whenever and wherever God reigns, there is a return to the original intention he had for all of creation. That is why in these [scripture] passages we so often see reversals — from desert to streams of water, from thistles (another reference to the curse of the Garden) to myrtle, from blindness to sight, and from lameness to leaping for joy. In short, salvation isn’t an escape from this place to some invisible somewhere out there; it is the transformation of this world as a result of God’s invasion of it.

Now the story of the day. I was reading Static while eating a quick lunch at California Pizza Kitchen today (gotta love that hummus!). When the waiter came to give me my check I turned the book upside down on the table to fish for my credit card. While I was doing so, he leaned over and read the front cover, which says “Tune out the ‘Christian noise’ and experience the real message of Jesus.” This began a conversation that started with the way people often react poorly to “Christian” words like sin or salvation even though they are searching for a real relationship. It turns out that my waiter is a Christ follower with a passionate heart for the world around him. He can’t understand why Christians can ignore many of the hurting people in the world, like the children of Haiti who are starving. I didn’t have any great answers for him, even though of course I could name missionaries to Haiti and agencies that want to work there. I couldn’t answer him because I hadn’t thought all that much about Haiti myself. But we did begin to discuss how God puts different missions on different hearts.

The conversation wasn’t long: just a few minutes of two very unalike people making a connection in the middle of a busy day. Did you notice how the conversation began? By having a book with me with a distinctive dustjacket that caught his eye. Now that’s following my own advice! It makes me wonder what God has up his sleeve for tomorrow…

Maybe staying up until 4 AM last night was a mistake. I’ve been sick all day, and I can’t string two words together. So I decided to share some links to some of the cool friends I’ve met lately, and fun sites I’ve explored. I know…kind of lame, but I’m a dragging puppy.

This is Big John’s blog. John was the official bouncer at Q, and he took the time to read so many of our blogs and make great comments. I love reading about his church, and his latest post on his trip to Orlando was very interesting for those of us who live in South Florida.

My friend LT is an American-born Chinese pastor. His blog is really interesting to read since he is working in such a unique culture. He was at my first table during Q, and we had a great time sharing ministry stories and insights.

Everybody in the blogosphere (it seems) knows Ragamuffin Soul, aka Carlos Whittaker, a worship pastor at Northpoint. Lately he had some issues with Enterprise Rent-A-Car, and he wants us all to link to him and get his message out. Whatever you think about his rental car experience, his blog never ever fails to entertain and educate. With 4000 readers + a day, Carlos is a superstar.

Scott Hodge is a pastor in Illinois. Go to his site and read the story of how his church got going. It was amazing. I know him best as a fellow blogger at Q, and now at other conferences. You follow these guys enough and you begin to feel like you’ve been to the conference!

My friend Jenni Catron has a great blog where you never know if you will find her guest bedroom wallpaper or an insight into women in ministry that makes you stop and think. I love seeing her link in my google reader go live because I never know what she will have for me!

If you are following my blog you know I really enjoyed Pop Goes the Church. Follow author (and pastor) Tim Steven’s blog here.

Now we need some fun stuff…

Collide Magazine deals with culture and the church. Sometimes irreverent and always interesting, they are great late-night reading. Check them out.

decor8 is a fun site devoted to…ta da…decorating. As you know, I enjoy thinking about the interaction between our environments and how we view the world. On decor8’s site, i get to view the world as pretty colored, hip, and always clean. A little fantasy can’t hurt!

These guys at Third Place Consulting don’t update their blog as often as I would like, but when they do I enjoy hearing their perspectives on life in the third place. Check them out.

Terry is lead pastor at a church in Pittsburgh (remember my Bill Strickland, Manchester Bidwell post?) He has some great perspectives on life in the community, and I’m enjoying getting to know him over his blog, Thinking Out Loud.

Finally, welcome a new entry to the blogosphere, my husband David. He is writing a blog called OfficeCafe…about working and thinking away from the office. Kind of works with Coffee Shop Journal, huh? Go give him a comment and make him feel at home.

So that’s it for tonight, folks. I’m going to risk it all and go to bed early tonight. Wish me luck on that one! If you want to know why that’s a risky statement, head on over to Dancing Thru Her Daddy’s World to see our family in action. I’ll be back tomorrow!