For her 10th birthday this month, my middle daughter received this cool book from her Aunt Jenny. It’s called Good and Evil, and it’s a retelling of the Bible story in comic book form. Not a Bible in comic book form, this is a comic book telling the Bible story as written by Michael Pearl.

Before there was a beginning; before the first man was created; before the earth, the sun, the stars, even before light and time were created, there was God. He alone existed without beginning, but he was not lonely. He communed with himself in a perfect trinity of love. But God wanted to share his life. He wanted friends and neighbors. The Bible tells us in eternity past God created numerous kinds of angelic beings to offer praise around his throne but this is not their story.
This is the story of God working with mankind.(From the back cover.)

It’s true to the form of a comic book and has beautiful (if sometimes graphic) art drawn by a former Marvel Comics artist. Why Bible comic book? Well, the comic book format is popular around the world and especially in areas of the world with little knowledge of the Bible. As a comic book, rather than a religious text, it has access to markets that a Bible can’t get to.

We have created a product that will sell itself on an roadside stand in Thailand or India. It will find acceptance in countries otherwise closed to Christians. A box of them can be given to a Moslem or Hindu vendor, and he will put them on his stand for sale. They will go where no Bible is allowed, but will carry the same message. (From the Introduction.)

It’s not the Bible, it’s one man’s retelling of the Bible story. As such, there will be embellishments and disagreements on the content (I wish he hadn’t omitted the David and Goliath story and the disconnection of baptism and forgiveness is unfortunate in my view). I haven’t read the whole thing yet, but it comes across as a cool book that portrays God’s story in a unique and attractive way. I really appreciate the passion both for the comic cook genre and for getting the Bible story into hands that may not otherwise have the chance to read it.
What’s more, in the first 3 days Emily had already read 20 pages. That’s good enough for me.

On my Monday drive to work, I’m listening to NPR as usual and I hear the following.
First, is a short news story from the local station about how Michelle Incanno from Springboro OH is boycotting Starbucks Coffee. Why? Well, I guess Starbucks has been printing little sayings from customers on their cups and Michelle got one where a customer calls God a “figment of our imagination” and that didn’t sit right with her. (There’s no online story from the NPR affiliate, so here’s the story from the Dayton Daily News.)
From the local news to Morning Edition and this story about the Pope’s visit to Brazil and his conflict with a Brazilian Catholic movement called Liberation Theology.

Brazil’s Catholic clergy is actively, at times defiantly, pursuing the struggle for social justice on behalf of the poor: Catholic bishops stage hunger strikes to halt dam projects that they say put profits of big business above the needs of the people. They broker deals with banks to build housing for the homeless. And priests take to the airwaves to denounce the growing footprint of agro-business that has cut down the rainforest to make way for cattle and much-in-demand soy.

The contrast of this was striking to me.
In America, a woman ‘sacrifices’ a $3 cup of coffee in the name of God.
In Brazil, Catholic clergy face down governments for the sake of the poor, in the name of God.
Now, in some respects I applaud Michelle’s convictions and her taking a stand against a business that she sees as opposed to God. I also don’t buy Starbucks’ response that the views aren’t their own. Sure, a customer submitted it, but Starbucks chose to print it. It’s not some rogue employee speaking out of turn, it’s a corporate decision with deliberation and forethought. That conscious choice makes it their words too in my book.
I can also see questioning whether it’s the church’s role to oppose dams and save the rainforest. I’d say, you bet it is, if those actions trample on the voiceless and discarded. Comforting and serving them after the damage is done is less valuable then standing up for them to prevent it.
Regardless, the juxtaposition of the two stories together was interesting.

From David Burchett via The Requiest:

I related a story in my book, “Bring’em Back Alive”, about a little boy with a terrible temper. His father gave him a big bag of nails and instructed him to hammer a nail into the fence every time he lost his temper. After the first day over three dozen nails were hammered into the fence. But as the days went by the little boy began to control his temper more and more. One day the boy realized that he was no longer driving nails into the fence. When he proudly told his father he was given the new task of pulling out one nail for every day he continued to hold his temper. Finally all of the nails were removed. The father took his son out to the fence. “You have done a great job, son. But look at the holes in the fence. This fence will never be like it was before. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can stick a knife in a person and no matter how many times you say I’m sorry, the wound is still there. A verbal wound is just as bad as a physical one.”

Wow, that hurts. I’ve said too may a hurtful things in my day and left far too many holes in the fence.

I wanted to give an update for those who are praying for Mat (One ‘T’, I had that wrong before.)
First, thank you to those across the country praying for him. It’s been encouraging, as was this news from Mat, through his fiance, Jess:

Mat has said this week that Christ is evident in our church. His family members have noticed as well. This would be much harder if it wasn’t for all of your support. Thank you for being such a great family and for showing your love in actions and truth.

Second, however, I must ask you to please keep praying. He’s gone into ICU since my first post. He’s having trouble breathing, his fever is spiking and they’re still searching for answers as to what exactly is happening.
So, if I may indulge you a bit more, please continue to pray for Mat and for Jess, his fiance, and of course the family. It fills my heart with anguish to see this young man who surrendered to Jesus and righted the course of his relationship with his girlfriend, so that she was baptised too and they were engaged, in what may be a fight for his life.
It doesn’t seem fair, so I ask you to continue to pray with me.

I haven’t written much of substance around here of late, aside from my on going Quiet Time Journal study of Ezekiel. That’s been a surprisingly enjoyable study thus far and your encouraging words on it are appreciated. I’m at a point where I enjoy my reading and look forward to it, a place I haven’t been in a long time.
But aside from that, and my Blogwalking posts, not much of substance has happened around here. I’ve found myself in a low spot lately. It seems that life has been conspiring against me of late. The ongoing issues with my car (still unresolved), lots of things around the house to fix and deal with, it’s time to get the T’bird out and I again didn’t get any projects on it done over the winter, etc. They seem trivial, but somehow they all add up to a feeling of hopelessness that hangs over me. It seems like I’m always chasing problems and issues.
Welcome to life, right?
What I’ve begun to understand is how I’ve bought into the idea that things can be perfect and right. There’s a right way, the right way, and I should seek it and obtain it. So, I think somehow that if I wash my car enough, keep the salt off, change the oil at the proper time, etc it will be shiny, new and perfect forever. If I study enough, read enough, pray enough and think enough I’ll achieve spiritual perfection. I’ll know how to do church, which church is the church and who’s a Christian and who isn’t. If I finish this and that project around the house, put up that last piece of trim, pain that wall and get the patio done, I won’t have to work on the house any more, it’ll be right.
Ingrained in me in my upbringing & our culture of the past few decades is this idea that problems have individual, absolute and final solutions. It’s the American ‘can do’ spirit, a Bob The Builder attitude (“Can we fix it? Yes we can!”) that believes inherently that we are able to find all the answers and fix anything.
This pursuit of perfection, more over the belief that we can obtain and sustain it, is ultimately a lie. Worse yet, is once you’ve bought into it, even when you discover the lie, the mindset still lives in you, pushing you toward The Answer, even though you know it does not exist. I’ve long understood that things break, people fail, truth can be elusive and ‘fuzzy’ and that questions pile up faster than the answers. Yet, I still act as if that weren’t true. In my heart, I want it all just so, just perfect, just right.
I’ve come to understand that this pursuit of perfection is oppressive to the core. It drags my soul down. Why? Well, for one, it is unobtainable. Things rot and decay. A freshly washed car immediately starts gathering dirt. (In fact, just washing the car reveals all the latest scratches and dings that the layer of grime was hiding!) Problems multiply. Questions abound. But the real reason that it’s oppressive is because the heart behind it is inherently selfish. The reason to pursue perfection is to free time that would have been spent on problems for me and my plans. I’m not pursuing some high minded standard, I’m pursuing my own leisure, what I think will make me happy.
I think that by avoiding work and making more time for fun, I will be happy or fulfilled. The work is in the way, a necessary evil in life that must be endured to get to what I want to do. The cold truth is the opposite – God is a worker and He created us to work too. There is satisfaction in the work invoved to complete tasks and meet needs. When I seek to fix all the problems and find all the answers and put it all to bed for good, what I’m really saying is I want to avoid God’s plan for me – to work and serve – and follow my plan – to relax and indulge.
God is at work, He created me to be at at work too. There will always be work to do. Rather than seeking to empty my to do list so I can get to the good stuff, I need to embrace the idea of the work being the good stuff. It’s not the means to an end, in many ways it is the end itself.

Here, at the close of this Easter Sunday, home from a weekend trip to Mom and Dad’s, I encourage you to go read Codepoke’s (yes, thank goodness, he’s blogging again) Easter Thanks. Here’s the quote that got me:

He clothed Himself with the body of my struggles, and labored under the needs that overwhelm me.

Wow. Praise God.
It’s short, but powerful, so go give it a read.

Today darkness reigned.
Today evil thought it had won.
Today all hope appeared to have been lost.
But they did not know …
Sunday’s Comin’.
(Thanks to Patrick Mead for the link to the video.)