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| My sister Angi had her baby last week. His name is Caden Jeffrey Johnson. He weighed 8'9" and was 21" long, and everyone seems to be doing well. | | |
| I realized that it's been a month since my last entry. The latest news is that I accepted a worship position yesterday with Journey Community Church across the state line in Camas, Washington. They're a six-year-old church plant that meets in a junior high school, all of which will be an exciting new experience for me. They also average two cover songs a week, an ambitious undertaking that should help keep me on my toes (last week we did one of my favorite songs: "Frail" by Jars of Clay). Since our long-term plan only includes one year in Portland, I'm technically an interim worship minister, meaning that if a long-term person comes along in the meantime, I'm out. But until that happens, I'm looking forward to new ministry opportunities.
Before Journey, I briefly held and then quit a job at Guitar Center. Hats off to Sarah Koutz for staying in their employ for two months. I couldn't take it. Just not a good fit. Besides, things were ramping up with Journey (that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it). Jeannette, meanwhile, continues to work very hard and very long hours, though we've taken some very nice day trips around the area the last few weekends. The weather here has definitely changed, and we've entered the rainy season, which I'm told should only last the next six months or so.
I've been listening to Jamie Cullum's new album "Catching Tales," which I highly recommend, and reading "Gilead," a Pulitzer prize winning novel written in the form of a letter from a dying pastor to his young son. So far, it's fantastic. That's about it for now. All the best. | | |
| Last week, while Jeannette was in San Francisco for business, I took a short trip to visit Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. It was a great trip: smooth connections, a good look at the campus, and an opportunity for a face-to-face visit with the professor of philosophical theology with whom I would be studying were I to attend Fuller. I even had the chance to share burgers and edit music with Matt Getz, who's studying at nearby Biola.
Saturday, Jeannette and I went to a Greek Festival at Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church. They had an incredible array of tents and booths selling all manner of Greek food. They also had some live music and children dancing in the authentic Greek manner. Most interesting, though, was a question-and-answer session in which the deacon (the order below priest in the Orthodox tradition) answered all manner of questions about the Orthodox church. It was fascinating stuff. Now if only they played rock music...
Sunday afternoon I went to a workshop for jazz piano trios, geared for pianists and led by my new piano teacher, Randy Porter (here's his website). It was great stuff, and he's a phenomenal player. The kinds of exercises that he led us through were amazing (playing polyrhythms across dozens of bars; having the bass player "drop the needle" to force you to find your place in the form, etc.). I was a little overwhelmed, especially since I was the worst player there by a considerable degree (including these unbelievable kids who were only 13 and 14). But everyone was really accepting and it's great to be challenged to grow as a musician.
Other than that, I'm enjoying the new David Crowder album, "A Collision," and the book "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius," which is hysterical (though not intended for younger or sensitive audiences). This should not to be construed as an official endorsement of the latter work. All the best. | | |
| It's been a great weekend. On Saturday, I took part in a service project of Imago Dei, the church Jeannette and I have been attending. The project was the first in a program called "sacred spaces," emphasizing the need we have to care for, and sometimes revitalize, God's creation.
The project took place in cooperation with St. Francis of Assisi church here in town, which operates a soup kitchen ministry to the homeless six days a week. The St. Francis park next door serves as a refuge for them. Unforunately, the parish hasn't had the funding to keep the park up, so recently it's attracted more unsavory elements (drugs, violence, etc.) and so has been closed by the city for the past several months. On Saturday, Imago, in conjunction with the St. Francis parish, sent about 200 people to renovate the park. It was incredible; people trimmed branches, cleared brush, spread mulch, planted flowers, stained playground equipment, swept walkways, constructed compost bins, painted murals, etc. By the end of the day, the transformation was astonishing. It was a fantastic thing, to see people working all over the park, restoring the beauty of the park together, working side-by-side with the homeless who are served by St. Francis. I genuinely believe it was a picture of God's intention for his people.
Sunday morning we went to Mosaic, a two-year old church plant on the Northeast side of Portland. In two years, they've grown to something like 700 people. Their worship minister left about two months ago, and I interviewed last week for the position. After attending Sunday, it seems like it would be a great fit. Still, I'm not sure where I stand in the process, so I'm trying not to get my hopes up.
To top it all off, the Simpsons was one of the best episodes I've seen in recent memory. The claymation couch gag with Gumby was awesome, and there were several great jokes. High marks. | | |
| So, the second post. Sophomore pressure. Life in Portland has been fantastic. The city has a great vibe, there are tons of things to do, but without the (in my opinion) intimidating aspects of a Chicago-sized city. We've done a lot of traveling and sight-seeing in the area, and the Northwest is breath-taking. One of my personal favorites was Oregon's Crater Lake, formerly a volcano, the caldera of which collapsed, leaving a pristine, brilliantly blue lake. Absolutely gorgeous.
From the personal interest angle, about a week ago I got locked *inside* our apartment, which was strange. It was a Saturday afternoon. I was about to go out for a run, but the door wouldn't open. While I evaluated my chances of scaling the fence down to the tennis court, a maintenance man came to help. We tried taking the door off the hinges, cutting the head off the offending screw with a hacksaw, and a variety of other techniques until finally, with me prying the door away from the jamb and him throwing his weight against it, it finally opened.
More recently, I've been doing a lot of reading. I just finished re-reading "Brave New World." I'd been coming across a lot of references, and I hadn't read it since high school. I just started Philip Roth's "Plot Against America," a work of historical fiction in which Charles Lindburgh, anti-Semite, wins the Republican nomination and then the presidency during WWII. Thus far it's been a great read. All the best. | | |
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