I Love McGreevey

This from Bob Novak's column on Townsquare.com about our not brilliant Governor's endorsement of Howard Dean.

GUESSING WRONG

New Jersey Gov. James McGreevey, who many have guessed wrong in endorsing former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean for president, may find himself challenged for renomination as governor in 2005 by Sen. Jon Corzine.

While McGreevey became the first sitting governor to back Dean shortly before he lost in the Iowa caucuses, Corzine came out for Sen. John Kerry just before he won the New Hampshire primary. New Jersey Democrats say Corzine, a multi-millionaire investment banker who is new to politics, is getting bored with the Senate and is interested in becoming governor.

The wisecrack around the state capitol in Trenton is that McGreevey, with a 34 percent approval rating in New Jersey, is bringing Dean down to his low level of popularity.

In Memory of a Great Friend

On Sunday night I got a call from Billy Elias of my that shook my world. "Pastor Bill, Jamie's died." I could not believe the words I was hearing. "What?" Again those terrible words, "Jamie died. He died in Tommy Boyd's arms." My heart sank to a depth of pain and grief that I haven't experience in many, many years. Immediately Matt Jacopec and who had come over our house to watch "Bend It Like Bechem" and Christine began to cry and call out to God for Ellen, for the kids, for me, for the church.

Jamie Chaney was a great man. That is the only words I can use to describe him, especially after the overwhelming expressions of love I witnessed over the past few days. He was a very humble guy from a simple little house on the beach in the Seaside. He never was into power plays or politics, but his great heart toward people eventually landed him as the chief of police at Seaside Heights, NJ. He ministered the love of Jesus to that department after a terrible tragedy that hobbled the chief that preceeded Jamie. But that is not surprising because Jamie ministered the love of Jesus to everyone, everywhere he went.

Jamie and Ellen became part of our church within the first weeks of our new church plant while we were still doing informational meetings at the Girl Scout building in Toms River. There was an immediate heart connection. Although we both had been believers for most of our lives or at least raised in the evangelical sub-culture or hearts had been recently ignited by the renewal that swept through the church in the late 90's. Jamie and Ellen had been touched by God at the Toronto Airport Vineyard in the first few months of that renewal and I had been touched by God during the move of the spirit that took place at King of Kings Community Church in Manahawkin. The move at King of Kings was a couple of generations removed from the move at Toronto and I always felt Jamie and Ellen got a stronger dose of the stuff than I did. Because of what God did for Jamie and Ellen they brought an inpartation to our church that was very unique. They brought to us a blessing of peace and wholness that we have been able to give away to many hurting people. Jamie had a strong gift of healing. When he prayed for people they would come away changed. Unlike many of the TV healing ministries, there was nothing phoney or worked up about anything that Jamie did. It was very real.

Jamie was retiring from the force in about two months and had begun studies at the King of Kings School of ministry. He was going to become more involved in the pastoral ministry of our church upon his retirement. I am trying to sort out what God is doing in this whole thing.
I experiencing deep grief mixed with deep peace that God is incontrol and that his providence is a work in this whole very bad situation.


We had set the Jamie Chaney Memorial Forum for people to post their thoughts about Jamie's home-going. Maybe you stumbled by this page looking for something on the web about Jamie. If so, here's the link to the forum: jamie forum. 

Bye-bye, Blue Bus

Praise God that my son is OK! However is '74 Baby Blue VW Bus in not. Yesterday in a new driver's error in judgement, he swerved into oncoming traffic in order to miss rear-ending a car in front of him. He side swiped a landscaper's truck and slammed careened into the woods stopping inches in front of a large tree.

I am so thankful to God. When I arrived home from doing my hospice visits yesterday, my youngest son greeted me at the door with the news that Rob had been in an accident and was at the hospital. A few minutes later my wife arrived home. She was on her way home from the scene. Rob had called her on her cell as soon as it happened. When she came home she described the accident, said Rob was covered with blood and was brought the hospital in an ambulence.

As we drove through the hospital, not sure if Rob had been seriously injured or was OK, all kinds of thoughts were racing through my head and Christine and I began to talk about what we were both thinking. How would get through it if God chose to take one or more of our kids home? Would we be able to cope? How could we go on living? Being in the ministry and doing Hospice chaplancy work, I meet people all the time who are facing the end of life for themselves or their loved one. It is very hard to see a person in their 20's, 30's or 40's struggle with cancer or some other terminal illness and watch the impact on the family. I have witnessed the suffering of other and tried offer them comfort and provide some spiritual care. But faced the the possiblity of a seriously injured son I realize that coping with loss is an even more complicated process than I thought.

Anyway, to make a long story short, we got the hospital. It turns all the cuts and bruises are minor for both Rob and the friend he was driving. He is doing fine.

He is bus however, seems like a total loss. All the driver side window exploded out, as well as the front and rear. The driver side door and front panel suffered extensive damage, sheering off part of the roof and the side pillars. Both front seats came unbolted and flew around the cab. Looking at the car, I know it is a miracle he walked away. 

Bible 'Zine?

I just got back from my weekly breakfast with two guys from church. One of them was reading the new york times magazine article on a new format for the Bible called revolve. This new is a new format for the Bible targeted for teenage girls that has the look and feel of something like Seventeen Magazine. The publishers must have struck a cord because the 'zine ranks #68 today on the Amazon.com sales rank list. That's pretty amazing. It was kind of interesting. I was just telling my kids the other day about how every respectable Jesus Person had a copy of the Way . . . a soft cover edition of the Living Bible with pictures of Hippies in it. That what I had in High School. Maybe "Revolve" will be the Way for this generation's girls. Now they need to come up with something like it for the guys.

The NYT Magazine interview is interesting read by the way. I think the most priceless exchange, betraying the fundamental ignorance that our culture has of the gospel story is this:

But Mary Magdalene, who was Christ's girlfriend, favored low necklines
and loads of jewelry.

Mary was a friend of Christ. From the Bible, we have no indication that there
was any sexual relationship with her.

You could argue that Christ was drawn to her precisely because of her
flamboyant clothing.

Christ was drawn to everyone. I think he loved Mary regardless of her
clothing.

But he does not love girls who call boys, at least according to
''Revolve''! It's positively regressive for ''Revolve'' to suggest that God made
men to be the leaders in romance.

There's no indication from Scripture that Mary Magdalene ever picked up the
phone and called Christ.

There is a Christianity Today review entitled ten things you should know about the new girls' biblezine that is a pretty interesting read as well. The author is upset at the conservative orientation of the writers of the side bars, especially in regards to their traditional slant on gender roles. The author is also upset at the embedded marketing in the 'zine.

It will be interesting to see if 'zine is a trend or just a flash in the pan. 

Hurricane Watch

Well, sometime around 2 PM tomorrow we should be experiencing what for us will be Tropical Storm Isabel. Being an almost life long shore resident, either for the summers or for the past ten years year round, I have lived through many Tropical Storms and Hurricanes. I kind of find them exciting and love to drive up to the beach and watch the awesome power of nature. It reminds me of how small we really are when I see 10 to 15 foot high swells crashing into the jetties and piers. Of course the fact that I live on the bay side rather than the ocean front gives allows me to view the impending weather with excitement rather than fear. Earlier this week my wife and were walking at the beach and folks were scrambling to nail up their 25 dollar a pop sheets of plywood to their ocean side windows.

The worst storm I lived through was a few years back. It was actually not a hurricane but a nor'easter. In fact it was the storm that was written in the book, The Perfect Storm. I was staying for a few days at my folks place in Avon-by the-Sea. The ocean had come up so far that it was washing on their front lawn which was a block west of the boardwalk. That storm depostit the beach on the road that runs along the Ocean for most of our area. It took out he Ocean Grove fishing pier and the Belmar boardwalk. 

Well, since this storm is supposed to make landfall in South Carolina, far south of New Jersey, we will just experience lots of wind, rain and big waves. I'll be driving to the beach later to take a look. Here are a couple of beach cams to keep an eye on things from the safety of the house:

• Bahr's Landing
• Belmar Beach
• Avalon
• Long Beach Island
• Monmouth Beach
• Point Pleasant

I'm Back

I'm back. Well it has been a long summer and I have completely neglected my blog. Two of my most loyal readers, Marc Richter and Jake Rinard probably think I'm dead.

Actual Marc knows I am still alive since I go to church with him every Sunday.

Speaking of which, an exciting thing that happened over the summer was Marc's talk he gave in church on Christianity in the Matrix. He talked about using online communities forming around online games as a way of developing relationships for Christ. So far only one person in our church has church has declared him a heretic.

Speaking of which, I am waiting with great anticipation for the release of Middle Earth Online. I am going to play a kind of maverick Hobbit named Olo Brambleburr. Can't wait.

Now to more serious matters. Over the past two days I had conversations with two different groups of people that were quite striking in their similarity. Aesthete I met with two guys who I fellowship with on a monthly basis who are in my church and collegaues in ministry. Today I spoke with the pastor from the local YUCCA church who is part of the Greater Toms River Ministerial association to which I belong. The common thread to both these conversations was about clergy and their need for spiritual friendships. It amazed me because my two friends from yesterday are of a clearly evangelical bent (although pretty progressive) and the person I was with today self identified herself as very liberal however to Christian to be a Unitarian universalist. So it is amazing to me about how this needs transcends theological and denominational orientation. 

These conversations are leading me to reflect on the question of what is the point of fellowship for clergy of various denominational and theological orientation. I believe issue also goes to the question of how the church is to do ministry and mission in a post-modern culture. At our clergy association meeting this morning one of the questions that was asked is what is the point of our being together and related to that -- why those clergy from a more conservative theological orientation find no value in being together with other clergy from our community. I have to believe that based on these two conversations that a common experience of pastors is need for other pastors to be their spiritual friend.

Anyway, a pretty blog in response to a pretty random two days.

Rediscovering the Joy of Gardening

For years my house has looked like the house that Malcome lives in in Malcome In the Middle. . . overgrown, underepaired, shutters hanging off the windows, etc. However, we have been slowly chipping away at stuff inside the house, making it a warm and cozy place for our family to come home to. We have finally reached the point where we can start paying attention to the exterior and so we have been having fun putting in shrubs, planting flowers and vegetables and all the rest.

Things really started to get serious when we put a lawn in. I used to watch my across the street neighbor sitting on his front steps, watching his lawn grow, putting down fertilizer, watering and mowing and laugh under my breath that I was not in such bondage. However, I have now become a slave to the lawn. We put in sod, just a small patch, because we didn't want to have to irrigate our entire 75x100 lot. The landscaper instructed me to water it deeply everyday for two weeks, give it its first mowing, and then fertilize it. Now, about a month since the installation, I understand the subltle joy of looking out your front window or from your front steps at a lush, living carpet of green. I get excited that the lawn is so healthy it needs to be cut once a week. I get thrilled when the stipes my lawn mower leaves in the grass remind me of Yankee Stadium. I breath deeply as walk up the front path and take in the pleasant aroma of growing things and good dirt.

From the lawn my interests turned to putting in shurbs around the house. I have made a little border of birds nest spruce and seasonal flowers up the path. I have made a little woodland on the grassless side of the path of Rhodadendrons and Hostas. I have started putting foundations plantings on the grass side the sweeps along the house climaxing in a arch around a new Dogwood I put in. It is taking shape beautifully. I've now started making a little utility garden in the back yard of fruit bushes, herbs and vegetables.

Yesterday my wife commented to me over breakfast, "Remember how when we first moved down here all we would do is watch our Senior Citizen neighbors work together on their yard? I wonder if that means we are becoming Senior Citizens".

I wonder