I forget which book it was in (I’m guessing “A Circle of Quiet”), but Madeleine L’Engle said something that I read years ago that I took to heart and applied to my life. She said: “I am a not a writer because I have been published; I am a writer because I write.”

Grasping this bit of wisdom transformed my writing output from a drip into a torrent. Released of the obligation to be validated as that which I aspired to be, I recognized myself as already being that and proceeded from there.

I wrote, so I was already a writer.

It didn’t mean that my writing was any good yet, but as I grew into the identity that she gave me permission inhabit, it got better.

If you aspire to be something and are passionate about it, and if you are acting on that aspiration and that passion, then you already ARE  what you aspire to be.

If you write, you are a writer. If you run, you are a runner. And if you engineer music, you are a music engineer.

In most cases you can do yourself a favor by removing the words “aspiring” and “professional” from your vocabulary. Waiting to be recognized as a “professional” will hinder your journey towards actually becoming one.

Now go, be what you aspire to become. Go write something. Go for a run. Go engineer some music.

Maybe you don’t need more encouragement to be neurotic about the English language… but here it is anyway: (watch)

After watching Collision, I suspected that I might have found a new hero in Douglas Wilson, and indeed I have. Solid, opinionated, clever, and  intelligent, Wilson’s online writings are the ones I least frequently skip.

For example, here are 7 tips he recently offered other writers about reading. I’m sure that he would agree with me though that there is a danger of “Intellectual Obesity.”

Below are the highlights. Stroll on over to Blog & Mablog to read more.

1. The first thing is that writers should in fact be voracious readers.
We live in a narcisstic age, which means that many want to have the praise that comes from having written, without the antecedent labor of actually writing, or the antecedent labor before that of having read anything.

2. Read widely.
Reading shapes your voice, and if you want a wide, experienced voice, you have to get out more.

3. Read like a reader, and not like someone cramming for a test.
If you try to wring every book out like it was a washcloth full of information, all you will do is slow yourself down to a useless pace. Go for total tonnage, and read like someone who will forget most of it.

4. Read like a lover of books, and not like someone who wants to be seen as knowledgable, or well-read, or scholarly.
Read because you want to, not because you need to. Actually, you need to as well, but you need to want to. You also need to want to need to, but I am rapidly getting out of my depth.

5. Pace yourself in your reading.
A little bit every day really adds up. If you only read during sporadic reading jags, the fits and starts will not get you anywhere close to the amount of reading you will need to do.

6. As a general pattern, read quality, and go slumming occasionally to remind yourself why quality matters, and what quality is.

7. Read boring books on writing mechanics.
Read grammars, dictionaries, writers’ memoirs, books of proverbs, books of cliches, books on how to write dialogue, books on how not to write dialogue (“I dropped my toothpaste!” he said crestfallenly.), and books about finding good agents and how to blow away the readers of query letters. Writing is a vocation, and there is a body of professional literature out there — which is uneven in quality, just like every other kind of book. Read a lot of it anyway.

(Yes, Kevin Abell, this is aimed at you)

This week I reached a bit of a milestone. The appearance of a column entitled “Rescuing Worship” marks my first work published in a nation-wide publication – in this case, “Christian Week”. I will be doing a series of these posts throughout 2010 under the column heading “Worship Matters” (apologies to Bob Kauflin).

Here are the first few paragraphs. You can read the rest at the home page for my Worship Matters column here.

Rescuing Worship

Let’s reclaim “worship” as much more than a concert

By Michael Krahn  |  ChristianWeek Columnist

If you walk into almost any evangelical church and inquire about “worship,” you can expect to be directed to someone who leads music. “No, no,” you might say, “I’m looking for the people responsible for planning corporate worship at this church.” But it’s a lost cause.

In most churches, the battle is already over: music equals worship; worship equals music. The capacity to differentiate between the two is functionally non-existent. The “worship leader” is the person who leads the group of musicians we call the “worship team.” When these people are on the stage we’re worshipping; when they’re not we’re doing something else. Simple, right?

You may hear comments like, “After the worship, we’ll hear a sermon.” But if the sermon only begins after worship has left the building, we may as well head home before it starts.

This odd hegemony of music—not as one aspect of worship, but as worship itself—is a fairly recent construct. I believe it is a destructive trend in the modern church. What gave the music the right to demand so much?

Read the rest here.

A few weeks ago I collected some questions from readers here – feel free to go there and add a few more. Below is the second question answered… actually its a series of three questions from Michael Segui. The questions are:

1. What musicians or style of music originally inspired you to take up music?

2. Do you still listen to these artists or that style of music today?

3. Who do you find inspiration from now?

_________________________________________________

1. What musicians or style of music originally inspired you to take up music?

I was raised on Gospel and country, back when country WAS country, not starlets with a hat, boots, and a push-up bra. We listened to stuff like Charley Pride, George Jones, and The Oak Ridge Boys and later on Dwight Yoakam, and Highway 101. Johnny Cash was ever-present and my dad is a huge Cash fan to this day.

Those were my early formative influences. In between those and the artists that inspired me to start writing is a wasteland called CCM (Contemporary Christian Music). Believing this music to be a legitimate alternative to that “dangerous secular rock and roll”, I spent some years as a junkie – consuming as much as I could… buying, cataloging and even, in my lowest moments, lip-syncing.

I eventually came out of the stupor of my CCM addiction only to realize that I have missed a lot of good rock and roll in the process. “What? That band sounds just like Petra!!!”  Sorry kid, other way around. Listening to CCM is like eating those foam marshmallow strawberries and being told that the real strawberries are the fakes. Of course, once you taste what you have been told is fake and the taste blows away what you’ve been told is “real”, you can imagine the shock outrage and lost time to be made up for.

But it was not all for naught. I had a front row seat to one of the most important things that happened in that subculture: the embracing of a new artistic ethic. Certain artists, who were Christians, refused to be part of the sub-culture, and these led me out of the wasteland. Which leads me to the second question…

2. What musicians or style of music originally inspired you to take up music?

The main reason I took up music, which would later be affirmed by both Mark Heard and Bill Mallonee, was this: it as a lot cheaper than therapy. I say that half in jest but I, like Heard and Mallonee, wrote with no ambitions to stardom. I wrote because I was depressed and cynical and was indwelt by a Spirit that wouldn’t allow me to fall completely into darkness. If that sounds a tad dramatic… it was at the time.

There are three main artists (and several lesser ones) that look large on the landscape during this time: Indigo Girls, Mark Heard, and Bill Mallonee.

I initially discovered Indigo Girls on a cassette tape in my friend Jacob’s little red Jetta, probably in 1989. They made a mild impression on me at the time, but my musical attention was focused elsewhere – on harder, more “manly” music. I’m not sure how I came back to checking them out but eventually I did somewhere around the time they put out the album “Swamp Ophelia”. This still ranks as my favorite album of theirs even though I have liked every one of them.

When I learned my first few chords, it was the G, Csus2, Dsus, D combination that makes up the musical signature of the song “Closer to Fine”. The chords for that song were the first ones I instructed my fingers to submit themselves to and play, and after many hours and much pain I played them pretty well.

The vocal melodies, harmonies, and counter-melodies brought to life by Amy Ray and Emily Saliers informs my work to this day.

Mark Heard was actually part of the CCM machine, but the kind of part that most of the machine wishes would go away. Possessed of enormous songwriting talent, Heard was by most accounts reclusive, cynical, and struggled with depression. And the songs, oh the songs… His album “Second Hand” contained songs that sustained me through a very pivotal time in my life (along with Indigo Girls’ “Swamp Ophelia” and Jan Krist’s “Decapitated Society” and “Wing and a Prayer”).

I was at the music festival at which Mark suffered what would turn out to be a fatal heart attack. When it happened I was about 100 feet away in another tent watching some CCM thrash punk band. Mark Heard? Hadn’t heard of him yet. My bad.

Bill Mallonee – wow, I started a book on him once that is still in progress. There is too much history between me, Mallonee’s music, and the man himself to do any justice here. Bill Mallonee is the reason I am a writer.  He was the pinnacle lyricist (during that time) that I had to emulate fully before I could branch off and do anything original. His influence is more important to me than Dylan, Cash, and anyone else I have or haven’t mentioned.

Ryan Adams came along at the tail end of my songwriting period and remains one of my treasured artists. I’m realizing this isn’t complete with Blue Rodeo, Counting Crows, Ron Sexsmith, Shawn Colvin, Steve Earle… and many others. This could turn into a full book of musical autobiography… maybe I’ll write that some day…

3. Who do you find inspiration from now?

Well, I don’t write many songs anymore. I hope to again someday but right now I am another kind of writer. I released two albums in 2000 and during the years of 1999-2003 I probably finished 100-150 songs and did good quality demos of 50-60 of them.

But I wouldn’t say I get that much inspiration anymore. I get moments of inspiration and aspiration when I listen to Connor Oberst (Bright Eyes)[picture above]. Adam Duritz (Counting Crows) has always given me the desire to write again. Brandi Carlile inspires me, but mostly amazes me.  Elvis Costello was a late find – I didn’t listen to him yet when I was a songwriter – who I aspire to write like. Jack White’s work with The Raconteurs always gives me a boost of ambition.

But I’m just not in that songwriter space right now. Who knows if I ever will be again…

2009 was a good year of writing for me:
- My blog traffic was up 135% over 2008

- Because of my liveblogging of the Renov8 church planting congress in Calgary, I received an offer to write for a national Christian paper (Christian Week). The first of my six columns for 2010 will appear later this month.

- I got a link from the grand master of theo-bloggers (Tim Challies) to my new Christmas song “Glory to God on High“. To give you some idea of the power of the Challies, one link in his daily “A La Carte” post will add anywhere from 700 to 2000 pageviews to your post, depending on the content.

Below is a table of the search terms that brought the most traffic to my blog this year:

I have no idea why Ryan Adams brings so much traffic to my blog, but this post I put up on a whim one day in February attracts a lot of views.

Here’s to another 135% increase in traffic for 2010, and to the beginnings of a book to be published in… ?

Thanks for reading.

A good writer is someone who, regardless of the topic, makes prose sound like poetry. Christopher Hitchens is one, and so is Conrad Black, but I am most often impressed by George Jonas‘ work in the National Post.

Take this piece from yesterday’s Post: “Goodbye to paper, death and faxes”. Jonas is writing about technology – the demise of the fax machine in particular – but listen to how he turns these phrases:

“There will be no “pages” in their lives. Paper is becoming outmoded in the 21st century. People still use it, but more for reasons of personal hygiene than for writing or reading.”

“As the medical arts turned into medical sciences, individuals became less restrained themselves, but handed more powers of restraint to governments.”

“After boldly overthrowing the emperor who had no clothes, people meekly submitted to the tyranny of his tailor.”

This is good, lively, entertaining, and informative writing – regardless of the subject.

Who are the writers that bring the page alive for you?

My 5-year-old daughter Olivia and I wrote a song today! It really was a co-writing effort. She came up with some of it and I came up with some of it. As a habit, I like to demo (which means roughly record) a song as soon after it’s written as possible, and we did that with this one. So what you’ll hear is a newborn song, about 10 minutes old, not completely formed but formed enough so that you get the idea. The lyrics might change a bit before it’s totally done but I think we have our melody.

It’s about two newborn baby birds and their mother. My favorite part (Olivia’s idea) is where the mother takes off to the roof of the Walmart for a party and stays out all night while her babies are hungry at home.

This is so exciting for me. Have a listen. Lyrics below if you want to follow along.

Download audio file (Something%20Good.mp3)

(right-click here to download the mp3)

Something Good
Written by Olivia Krahn and Michael Krahn (c) 2009

Mommy flew away to find some food
The babies stayed at home
The eggs were about to hatch
But mommy didn’t come back
Until the next morning

And when she came back two were waiting
Their mouths were open wide
Two new babies hatched in the nest
They had no food inside, and they said…

(chorus)
Give me berries, give me worms
Fill this empty tummy
Give me bugs, or give me twigs
I don’t care, just give me something good

Mommy filled their bellies, they felt so good
The babies felt at home
Mommy flew to Walmart
The party was about to start
She didn’t come back til morning

And when she came back two were waiting
Their mouths were open wide
Two new babies hatched in the nest
They had no food inside, and they said…

(chorus)
Give me berries, give me worms
Fill this empty tummy
Give me bugs, or give me twigs
I don’t care, just give me something good

Calvin, citing Augustine: “I count myself one of the number of those who write as they learn and learn as they write.”

John Piper: “Writing became the lever of my thinking and the outlet of my feelings. If I didn’t pull the lever, the wheel of thinking did not turn. It jerked and squeaked and halted. But once a pen was in hand, or a keyboard, the fog began to clear and the wheel of thought began to spin with clarity and insight.

Arthur Krystal: “Like most writers, I seem to be smarter in print than in person. In fact, I am smarter when I’m writing. I don’t claim this merely because there is usually no one around to observe the false starts and groan-inducing sentences that make a mockery of my presumed intelligence, but because when the work is going well, I’m expressing opinions that I’ve never uttered in conversation and that otherwise might never occur to me. Nor am I the first to have this thought, which, naturally, occurred to me while composing. According to Edgar Allan Poe, writing in Graham’s Magazine, ‘Some Frenchman—possibly Montaigne—says: ‘People talk about thinking, but for my part I never think except when I sit down to write.’ I can’t find these words in my copy of Montaigne, but I agree with the thought, whoever might have formed it. And it’s not because writing helps me to organize my ideas or reveals how I feel about something, but because it actually creates thought or, at least supplies a Petri dish for its genesis.”

HT: JT

I’m not entirely sure how to start this review. I could start by telling you that I have been aware of Kevin Abell for a long time. We went to the same high school. But that wouldn’t tell you very much about his book and you might think I am reviewing this book because we were old high school buddies. That was hardly the case.

Kevin was one of those guys I wasn’t going to go anywhere near. He was a little creepy. I remember a certain Alice Cooper lip sync performance that cemented my opinion of him at the time.

I didn’t reconnect – or should I say connect – with Kevin until a couple of years ago when we were at the same church. Somehow, I don’t remember exactly, we were connected by someone who knew that Kevin was a writer and that I was into writing as well. I asked Kevin if I could see his writing, fully expecting it to be a caliber of writing I could look over and then give some pointers to its author. That wasn’t the case.

In my arrogance I was surprised to learn that Kevin already was what I aspired to be – a real writer. How could HE (Alice Cooper guy) have surpassed ME (wasn’t allowed to listen to Alice Cooper guy) in a discipline that I have work pretty hard at?

But that’s kind of the point here. Kevin Abell has been given a gift, one in addition to the grace of God in his life. That gift is writing. I say this because the writing is good, and it’s not good because he spends time at writing conferences or at a booksellers conventions or even in bookstores for that matter.

Kevin is a mechanic. Kevin is a father of four. Most of his time is spent on those two things.

The genesis of The Edge Of His Cloak is a series of letters (in the form of email) written to his church youth group – and anyone else who was willing to read – a few years ago. In these letters he writes about a range of things, but they all have the common thread of an author whose life has been transformed by meeting and deciding to follow Jesus Christ. The letters are pep talks in a way, but not the type that ignore reality and always end with “Everything is going to be OK.” These pep talks go something like this: “Life is tough. And not just for you – FOR EVERYBODY! Here’s the only thing I’ve found that actually helps me get through life and gives me real joy.”

“And one request-” Abell asks, “if you don’t intend to live for Him, please don’t identify yourself with Him. There are few things as distasteful as a believer who insists on living a life of disobedience… Perhaps for some of us, the most spiritual thing we can do is tell our friends that we are serious idolaters.”

Abell possesses a strength of faith and a clarity of thought that is not only endearing, but also admirable. The book is a remarkable testament of a faith that is both simple and profound; it is a glimpse into the everyday life and extraordinary faith of a mechanic, father, writer, and ordinary Christ-follower. But most of all this is the glorious autobiography of someone who has seen the risen Savior, been wrecked in his gaze, and embraced the only source of true healing.

“I don’t hate myself anymore,” Abell says in a chapter titled “Ongoing Counseling”, “I’ve graduated from self loathing to merely having an inferiority complex. Who knows for sure? Perhaps in 20 years or so I might begin to toy with self confidence.”

Humor is prominent in the book and Abell’s sense and placement of it is good. Dry wit is a strength, both in real life and on the page. Like Donald Miller, he is more willing than most to recognize his own shortcomings and then make light of them. In Abell’s own words,

“I like being this mildly reclusive sarcastic individual who uses his sardonic wit to keep people at bay. Because if I tell people what I actually think and if I say it in a straightforward manner, they might not like what they see.”

From a professional publishing perspective, there are things about the book that need some work. The grammar is not always perfect; the punctuation is odd at times.  Despite those things, this is the most professional looking self-published book I’ve seen. In fact it doesn’t look self-published at all.

Despite these few shortcomings, Kevin’s book succeeds at this: (to paraphrase Jack Nicholson in As Good As It Gets) it “makes me want to be a better man” – and in this case, a better writer as well.

And just so you don’t think Kevin traded a free book for a good review… I paid my $15 bucks for this book, and so should you. It will be well worth your time. Buy it here: Amazon.

A couple of years ago I won a prize at a writing conference for writing the following story in about 10 minutes:

It didn’t jive: foxes and God? What had one to do with the other? Yet here was this brewer, regaling me with stories of how both God and foxes made numerous cameos in his life.

“What does God say in these cameos?” I asked – assuming the cameo foxes were not talking cameo foxes.

“Well, it usually happens during a nap, so it’s kind of a dream, but too real to be a dream,” he said.

“I’m sitting on the ice – I’m dry but I’m frozen, and I always need to pee, but I don’t think that’s part of the message from God. That just happens because I have a large glass of water before my nap.”

“Ok, so you’re sitting on the ice…” I say, trying to pull him back from his tangent.

“Right, right, I’m on the ice…” he continues, “Everything around me whitens and out of a large hive come large bees…”

At this point I wonder if all this actually happens unaided or is the result of some brandy-spiked chocolate fondue.

“So the bees print messages in the snow, they dab themselves on the pure white blanket and print words. I sit there watching until six bees – its always six – grab my ears and turn my head.”

This is getting weirder by the moment, and I wonder if he’d notice if I snuck out and left him there alone with his story. No such luck. He grits his teeth and looks me straight in the eye and says:

“Here’s the best part…”

Ok, here’s how the story was written. We were given a photo of a finished Scrabble game board and we had to use as many of the words on the board as possible to create a story on the spot.

Below is a picture of a finished Scrabble game board. It’s not the same one I used but it will work for the same type of contest. Try it out – use as many of the words on the board as possible, then email the story to me (michael.krahn@gmail.com) or leave it in the comment box below.

In The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible, Scot McKnight explores, explains, defends, and rebukes the various ways Christians read the Bible.

He spends the early pages of the book unfolding his hyper-conservative upbringing – the type that basks in phrases like “God said, I believe it, that settles it for me!” He, like many of us, was eventually shocked to discover that we all pick and choose some parts of the bible to believe literally and others that we don’t.

“What I discovered,” McKnight says, “is that we all pick and choose. I must confess this discovery did not discourage me as much as it disturbed me, and then it made me intensely curious… The discoveries and disturbances converged onto one big question: How, then, are we to live out the Bible today?”

After recounting his journey from a hyper- (and hypocritical) literalism to an admitted pick-and-choose method, McKnight explores the questions: – What is the Bible? What do I do with the Bible? and How do I benefit from the Bible? He then proceeds in the last third of the book to examine the issue of women in church ministries today using the methods of Biblical learning and perspective described in the first two-thirds of the book.

McKnight’s purpose in writing the book is well described in the following quotation:

“I believe there is an inner logic to our picking and choosing, but I believe we need to become aware of what it is.  Until we do, we will be open to accusations of hypocrisy. It’s that simple, and it’s that lethal. If you tell me you believe the Bible and seek to live every bit of it, and if I can find one spot that you don’t – especially if that spot is sensitive or politically incorrect or offensive – then we’ve all got a problem.”

I have challenged a few Christians this way myself over the years, the type whose logic is so skewed that – if followed to it’s logical end – would require them to stone a homosexual to death.  This is the type of dilema we create for ourselves if we claim that we don’t pick and choose.

If you’re a dedicated complimentarian, you’ll reject McKnight’s egalitarianism.
If you’re already convinced, this might add a bit of clarity.
If you’re on the fence, I’ll venture to say that McKnight will convince you of his position.

This is after all who the book is aimed at: the undecided.

I highly recommend this book. Even if you disagree with the application of McKnight’s ideas, the first 2/3 of the book should be required reading for anyone wishing to be thought of as an intelligent and informed Christian. I recommend putting this book into the hands of the youngest person you can find who will read it. Many an over-zealous, judgment –launching attitude may be changed by McKnight’s thesis.

Scot McKnight is a professor of religious studies at North Park College in Chicago, Illinois and the source of one of the most widely-read Christian blogs, The Jesus Creed.

Other book reviews on this site:

Tim Challies – The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment

William P. Young – The Shack

Rob Bell – Jesus Wants to Save Christians

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t begins like this: “Good is the enemy of great.” And I heartily agree, but it’s quite a paradox to be reading this book at this time in my life.

The Search for Meaning (P208)

Collins writes about “the search for meaning, or more precisely, the search for meaningful work,” and tells the story of someone who went to school for economics and had great job prospects but chose something else because “she just didn’t care enough about those endeavors to want to make them great.” This is the same situation I find myself in, and one of the reasons I’m exiting my current job. Making great product is a goal, but it’s not one that I get genuinely excited about. I may have at one time, but for numerous reasons I don’t anymore. We won’t get into the laundry here…

He goes on to recommend getting involved in “something that you care so much about that you want to make it the greatest it can possibly be, not because of what you will get, but just because it can be done.” I wonder how many people can say with great honesty that that’s why they’re working where they are. “We should only do those things that we can get passionate about,” he says on P109.
 

“Level 5″ Leaders

These are found, says Collins, in situations where they are “doing something they really care about, about which they have great passion.”  In the pull-quote on the same page it says

“Indeed, the real question is not, ‘Why greatness?’ but ‘What work makes you feel compelled to try to create greatness?’ If you have to ask the question, ‘Why should we try to make it great? Isn’t success enough?’ then you’re probably engaged in the wrong line of work.”

Well, I’m asking: how many people are engaged in work that makes them feel “compelled to try to create greatness”? Maybe more people than I think.

This book, as I see it, may be useful to higher level executives who possess the ability to tinker with organizational structures.  Too often though, the mid-level manager and the shop floor employee are at the mercy of this tinkering – or, on occasion, are restricted by nepotism.

If you are a business owner or someone in the higher levels of authority where you work, I recommend this book. Read it, do what it says, and I’m sure you’ll find some success.  Click here to view it on Amazon.com.

When it comes to television, I’m a bit of a Luddite – and I like it that way.  We have rabbit ears, that’s it – no cable, no satellite.  There are only two shows we keep current on: 24 and LOST.

The West Wing is a show we’ve been watching recently and we just finished season two. This is a show that went seven or eight seasons and is already wrapped up.  The writing is superb and so is the acting. It stars Martin Sheen as a Democratic President and chronicles the life of a US President inside and outside the White House.

There have been a few touching moments, more than a few humorous moments, and some sad moments as well, but the finale of season two is something I’ve been thinking about for a few days now since I watched it.  I just went and grabbed the clip below off of YouTube and got a chill again as I watched it.

You have to know some of the backstory to understand this fully, but this is President Bartlett (Martin Sheen) at a low point emotionally and spiritually. He is in a cathedral for the funeral of a loved-one, he is about to announce to the American public that he has a degenerative disease, and he refers to a couple of tragic incidents from the past two years,  and because of these things he feels completely betrayed by God.

My question: is this a legitimate wrestling with God or is this blasphemy?

(I think it’s the Latin that gives me the chills…)

Let’s hear your opinions first and then I’ll post the text of this monologue and some thoughts from series creator Aaron Sorkin.

Here is the finished product (as a PDF or Word Doc) of the project I started with this post.

Enjoy, critque, ignore… your choice.

This is a re-post of an article I published ay Digital Journal in the summer of 2007.  It still seems timely considering the numer of attacks I’ve heard by “real” journalists on bloggers.

 Triumph In Waiting: The Rise of Digital Journalism

July 28, 2007

One week ago I sent a letter to the editor of the National Post that wasn’t published. 48 hours later I posted the same letter as an article at Digital Journal. I now have readers, new intellectual sparring partners, and money in the bank.

Twentieth century media prophet Marshall McLuhan observed that new technology decentralizes power. Apply that observation to the newspaper business model and you’ll see why, unless you are a full-time professional with a regular gig, it probably makes more sense to write online.

Face this near-universal truth: all media content serves the goal of selling advertising. It was true of terrestrial radio; it is true of newspapers; it is even true of Digital Journal.

But this is where the idea of decentralization comes into play. When you post an article at Digital Journal, advertising revenue is generated. How much? It depends on how good your article is and therefore how many people view it. But whatever revenue it does generate, Digital Journal acknowledges that you assisted in the generation of that revenue and they share it with you.

Compare this with a typical letter to the editor: When you send a letter to the editor, the editor decides whether or not it will be published. This decision is based at least in part on how much advertising revenue your letter creates. It may be indirect, and it may not be much, but the fact is that you provide the paper with free content that they publish for profit. To add insult to injury, if your comment is published you still need to buy the paper the next day to see your letter in print.

Unfortunately, that is the end of the line for your letter unless, of course, you are the subject of a letter to the editor about your letter to the editor. Here is how the system works:

On Saturday a feature article is published. On Monday the first letters to the editor about the feature article are published. Reasonable enough so far, but then it gets a bit strange. On Tuesday the first letters to the editor about other letters to the editor appear under titles like (real example) “Re: Who’s Really Doing The Fear-Mongering? letter to the editor, July 26; Anti-Muslim Fear Mongering, letter to the editor, July 21; At War With Radical Islam, letter to the editor, July 19.”

These letters often make eloquent refutations of letters published earlier in the week, but what’s the point?

There is some generational divide between those who read newspapers and those who read online, but such anonymous or semi-anonymous activity in the online world is known as “drive-by commenting” and is looked down upon. This is why many blogs and most online news sites will not allow you to leave a comment without you first providing valid contact information. To be clear, I am not saying that all letter to the editor writers are cowardly, only that they would probably be perceived as such in the online world if they provided no avenue for contact or follow-up.

Of course where accountability is absent, bad behavior flourishes.

The convenience of the anonymity of being published in the letters section of a newspaper is second only to the convenience of the same anonymity afforded to those who comment on others’ comments. If that sentence sounds convoluted, try following a thread of “conversation” as it happens in a newspaper.

Everyone who posts to the Digital Journal knows exactly how many times their article has been viewed and how many comments it has generated. In the last four days, my article (The Dawkins Defeat) has had almost 900 views and generated 87 comments.

How many people read your last letter to the editor?

I hadn’t planned on doing this… in fact, I’ve never live-blogged anything before.  And also, I kind of forgot the debate was going to be on so I didn’t prepare at all, but I found myself at the computer, watching TV and figured “Why not?”.

So I live micro-blogged via Twitter.  Here’s the transcript, including a few comments I received along the way:

Dion on the attack…. ooooooooo, it’s like being hit by a little girl.via Twitter - 9:07pm

Kim C. -Oh – so fast and swift and taken down unexpectantly? LOL

I like Layton… too bad he wants a socialist dictatorship.viaTwitter - 9:09pm

Go Harper… he’s mentoring them.via Twitter - 9:13pm 

Oh here we go… May is talking with about “rich people” – defined as “people with investments”. Woohoo – I guess I’m rich, I have an RRSP.via Twitter - 9:14pm

AnneMarie Krahn – If you’re rich why don’t I know about it?

Layton attacks Dion. Not nice Jack… shouldn’t pick on little girls.via Twitter - 9:20pm

Duceppe just asked about “reimborasabull” for “da turd time” – must be important.via Twitter - 9:23pm

Patrick F:

“Duceppe is doing it for the terd time”

Those jobs ARE going elsewhere Jack… but we’ve gained 100,000 new jobs… where’s the problem?via Twitter - 9:29pm

Marc M at 9:30pm October 2 -
We really need to abandon our senses and fully embrace Euro-liberalism. Pot, abortions, teen sex, gay sex, porn, gambling, draining taxes from hard-working citizens to fund nanny-state government schemes, violence and depravity in media, persecuting Christians, global-warming-Chicken-Little…all things that traditionally make the… the world a better place. Get a lobotomy, vote liberal like a good Canucklehead.

Dion: “Where… am I?”.via Twitter - 9:30pm

Duceppe, you’re not a party.. you’re a killjoy.via Twitter -9:34pm -

Harper sounds sane… but that haircut has to go.via Twitter -9:35pm -

May – Sweden, Germany, the Green Party, sounds like she lives on the wrong continent.via Twitter - 9:39pm 

Quick poll for those listening: Who will the new Liberal leader be after the election? Rae or Iggy?via Twitter - 9:42pm

May spoke and didn’t mention Sweden or Germany… progress.via Twitter - 9:44pm

Switch Dion and May… they’re heading the wrong parties.viaTwitter - 9:46pm

Layton is playing “Weekend at Bernie’s” with the corpse of Tommy Douglas. Psssst, Jack, we know…via Twitter - 9:52pm

Stephane “Afterthought” Dion – they wait for him to finish, and then move on.via Twitter - 9:55pm

May agrees with Harper about Jack using the private clinic.viaTwitter - 9:56pm

Deceppe def’n: The number of people in a country is that country’s “bobalashun”.via Twitter - 9:58pm

May, the “Creative Class”… mmmmmmm, elitism anyone?viaTwitter - 10:00pm

Layton: “The arts is important to I.”.via Twitter - 10:03pm

AnneMarie Krahn
I think that education should be important to him…specifically the grammar part.

Dion: “Its not the job of politicians to decide who will be helped by the government.” What? Really?via Twitter - 10:05pm

May: “mean-spirited cuts to artists.” When it involves artists, there are no other kind.via Twitter - 10:07pm

How can you accuse someone of making decisions based on their ideology? Is there any other way?via Twitter - 10:09pm

I may have to add a Green lawn sign beside my Conservative one. Is that allowed?via Twitter - 10:13pm 

Dion – Gotta get tough on the causes of crime: poverty, addiction, and mental illness.via Twitter - 10:14pm

Another cause of violence: competent leaders waiting in the wings watching current leader flush party down toilet.via Twitter -10:15pm -

May: literacy = no crime. Tell that to the white-collar criminals.via Twitter - 10:17pm

Layton is too patronizing sometimes… a little cheezy.via Twitter -10:19pm -

Layton: $400 per child per year will help families “get the right start in life.” That’s some frugal people.via Twitter - 10:19pm

Pete O
we get more than that right now with the conservatives

Harper is explaining the following to Dion: “Politics for Dummies”.via Twitter - 10:20pm -

Duceppe shouldn’t be allowed to speak on any issues that don’t involve Quebec.via Twitter - 10:29pm

I repeat: Steve Pakin is very good.via Twitter - 10:36pm

Layton wants Harper to guarantee that no one will lose their house or job. Can YOU promise that, Jack?via Twitter - 10:39pm

May on politics: spoken like someone who’s never been in power. Great aspirations but significantly more complicated than that.via Twitter - 10:50pm

I like May… it was the right decision to have her on… performing much better than Dion, Layton, and that guy who wants to leave the country …via Twitter - 10:54pm

Dion is so easily pushed around.. they’re toying with him.viaTwitter - 10:57pm

Good debate… I make a lot of fun of Dion but a person of his many weaknesses should not be the leader of a national party.via Twitter- 10:59pm -

CBC television just spent time analyzing Twitter updates during the debate. Interesting.via Twitter - 11:44pm

Follow me on Twitter.
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***You might want to read part1, part 2, and part 3 first***PART 4:

I also want you to know that I believe what Don says about Jesus giving us the ability to love the things we should because I have experienced the transformation.  I could have written, word-for-word what Don says next:

“I tried to love the right things without God’s help, and it was impossible.  I tried to go one week without thinking a negative thought about another human being, and I couldn’t do it.  Before I tried that experiment, I thought I was a nice person, but after trying it, I realized I thought bad things about people all day long, and that, like Tony says, my natural desire was to love darkness.”

That paragraph threw me into a period of self-examination, with periodic recurrences ever since.  And this is not just changing the way I think about other people, it’s also having a profound effect on the way I think about myself.  It’s changing me from being a receiver to being a giver.  It’s helping me to see that I have a lot in the bank when it comes to having things to offer.  Things I haven’t attained entirely on my own, but stored up through a great childhood and a lot of years of experience making mistakes in my life as a Christian. 

Instead of always looking for the next opportunity to consume I’m looking for ways to serve others. So, for example, the next time a Promise Keepers event comes to town, rather than bashing it as being of no use to me (which I have to say it is not), because I see that it really IS of use to a great number of men, I’m going to volunteer to pray or counsel or run security.  I’m putting legs to the idea that “it is better to give than to receive”.

Of course really putting legs to this idea means living it in the place where I spend the most of my waking hours: at work.  It’s the toughest place for me to successfully NOT think bad thoughts about people for an entire day.  But I like challenges.  I think working a normal job should be a prerequisite for every person who wants to have a full-time church job.  I think one decade is a nice qualifying number.  You need to spend ten years, one decade, working a normal job before you can work in the church. 

How many Bible college students would drop out with that prerequisite in place?  And from the ones who saw it through, how many would go on to be far more mature and effective leaders in their churches and, just as importantly, in their non-church communities?  (Ok, so this is an easy requirement for me because I’ve already fulfilled it – I’ve worked for 13 years and am now contemplating a career move into ministry.)

But in keeping with my “I AM THE PROBLEM” line of thought, I want to tell you about the a response I gave to some questions I was asked while I was reading this book. The questions were about the format of the Sunday morning services at the church I attend.  Things like “How do you like the music?” and “What could we do to enhance your worship experience?”  I started to answer as I normally would but then found myself writing in response:

I am an elitist.  

I want the world to revolve around me.  

I want friends who are like me in every way.  

I want to change people who are not like me so that they are like me.  

I want to be efficient about friendship.  

I want people to meet my criteria if I’m going to spend my precious time on them. 

I am selfish. 

So, what do I want in a church service?  I’m not sure you should care.

Now I should point out that the “I AM THE PROBLEM” philosophy was still in trickledown mode at this point and after a bit more conversation I did back off from the extreme but still, this was a very uncharacteristic response for me.  I have a lot of opinions about everything. Find someone who knows me, even a little, and they’ll confirm that for you.  I have enough trouble thinking overly well of myself without someone encouraging me to think about myself a bit more yet.  I am a recovering self-addict, and like an alcoholic I’ll always be recovering.

go to part 5

Getting information from the internet, someone said, is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant. The flow of information is overwhelming and it’s more than anyone can possibly consume.  Appropriate use of the internet then involves trying to get what you need from the torrent of information without getting completely soaked.

The mass of information can be equal blessing and curse.  If you haven’t experienced this yet, you probably will since, as novelist William Gibson states, “There’s a big cinder block stuck on the technology accelerator pedal, and we’re only gonna go faster and faster, never stopping.”

There are others who believe, like humorist Andy Rooney that, “Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don’t need to be done.” I do not share this opinion.

I am, admittedly, a voracious user of the internet, and I work hard at getting the drink I need from the hydrant without being knocked over by the force of the pressure. I don’t always succeed, which is why I chose to fast from the internet for a week.

My internet usage is rarely, in my opinion, frivolous. I read a lot of theology blogs, do research for articles like this one, answer numerous emails every day, arrange recording sessions, write notes, listen to podcasts – these are all things that I consider necessary; what is at issue here is determining how much of each I can afford to consume without it being detrimental to my spiritual well-being.

FASTING

The purpose of any fast is to focus more fully on God by abstaining from something that is not a bad thing in itself, but can become a binding habit if left unchecked.  When we experience intentional lack we can objectively study the effect of the absence of the thing we are fasting from.  Abstaining from an activity is not necessarily an indication that there is something wrong with it.  It is, rather, a step back from something that is precious to you in order to examine it more objectively.  Perhaps some of the time spent on the thing you’re abstaining from would be better spent in prayer and reading God’s word, or talking to a friend.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981), pastor of Westminster Chapel in London, believed that

“Fasting if we conceive of it truly, must not . . . be confined to the question of food and drink; fasting should really be made to include abstinence from anything which is legitimate in and of itself for the sake of some special spiritual purpose.”

Anything that threatens the level of our dependence on God as the source of our joy is fair game as the target of a fast.  Food is one example of course, but equally valid is a fast from sports, television, or the internet.  A fast will reveal the extent to which we have allowed ourselves to be enslaved by something otherwise good.

“The greatest enemy of hunger for God,” John Piper says in his book A Hunger for God, “is not poison but apple pie. It is not the banquet of the wicked that dulls our appetite for heaven, but endless nibbling at the table of the world. It is not the X-rated video, but the prime-time dribble of triviality we drink in every night.” This “prime-time dribble” – or “constant dribble” of the internet – is a problem we don’t often consider; but is it possible to deny that our diet – physical and intellectual – will determine the shape of both our bodies and our thinking?

If we feast on triviality yet only occasionally find time to spend with God, should we expect to enjoy spiritual depth?  If we regularly gorge at McDonald’s and only occasionally eat a spear of broccoli, should we expect to enjoy good health?

We sometimes use electronic media to anesthetize ourselves, to dull our senses, or worse to escape reality for extended periods.  This feasting on triviality and escaping from reality inevitably leads to a crisis of meaning, which in turn is both the result and the cause of our hunger for triviality. This cyclical pattern ensures its survival.  Meaninglessness, as G. K. Chesterton said, does not come from being weary of pain; meaningless comes from being weary of pleasure.

GRAVEYARDS OF INFORMATION

I am a gatherer, a collector, of items both digital and physical. As the number of information sources expands, so does my desire to monitor them; I am constantly attempting to consume more than I can process.

Futurist and philosopher John Naisbitt, in his recent book MindSet, proposes a solution to this scenario: when you begin to monitor something new, you must drop something else.  To continue to monitor an ever-increasing pool of information is to create, in Naisbitt’s words, “a graveyard of information”– stuff we collect but never use.

My own information graveyard is pretty big. I have tried to apply Naisbitt’s principle to both my physical and digital life, ruthlessly discarding or selling off things I keep but never use.  But in the digital realm there is less incentive to do this since  storage costs almost nothing and takes up no more physical space when it’s 250 gigabytes of information than when it’s one.

The questions I keep asking myself are: What am I afraid I’m going to miss?  What am I going to miss?  What am I really going to miss?

SUMMARY

Will I do this again?  Yes.  Do I want to?  Not really, no.  There was a price to pay and it did cause some distress.  The communication aspect of my life is so intertwined with the internet that a week offline took some time to recover from.  I spent a lot of time the following week trying to catch up on all the reading I missed.  I went to bed too late, worried about email I STILL hadn’t answered, and spent a lot more face-time with screens than I did with human beings.

With an internet fast, unlike a food fast, there is an opportunity to catch up on what you missed.   Unlike a stack of unread books, the internet is an inexhaustible and constantly expanding source of information.  You can never finish it, put it down, and feel satisfied that you’ve finished reading it.

You can never, as was attempted by the pointy-haired boss in the Dilbert comic strip, ask someone to bring you a hard-copy of the internet, spend a few days reading it, and then feel satisfied with having finished it.

But still, I would never shun the internet.  For me it is a technological conduit for spiritual growth; one that I hope never stops expanding.  At the same time, I need to be wary of its endless offerings of trivial pursuits and their potential for spiritual poisoning.

I haven’t completely figured out how much is enough and, like food, there will always be the temptation to over-indulge.  But as long as I can see this use of my time like all other uses, that is, as opportunities to strengthen my relationship with God and with others, I’ll continue with periodic re-evaluations, making adjustments as necessary.

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Practice Safe Internet Usage

It’s difficult to estimate the ill effects online pornography has had on the spiritual well-being of millions of men and a growing number of women.

While pornography was once primarily available only behind the counter of select stores, it is now accessible anywhere and any time via an internet connection. At the same time, the cost to obtain it has dwindled to almost nothing.

In the online world the temptation is constant.  In pre-internet terms, the temptation is roughly equivalent to being locked in a private room with millions of pornographic magazines.  Resistance is not futile, but constant exposure to the temptation will eventually yield a failure to resist.

No wise person would intentionally put themselves into such a situation, but if you have an unfiltered internet connection in your home this is essentially what you are exposing yourself to, which is why no one should be ashamed to have a content filter installed on all of their internet access points.

In our home we use free filtering software called “K9 Web Protection”. With this software you can restrict access to all websites except those that you approve.  There are many “pay for” services and software packages that do a much poorer job of filtering content than this free service.

Visit http://www1.k9webprotection.com/ to download the free software.

“And that’s the tricky thing about life, really, that the things we want most will kill us.” This statement follows 13 illustrated pages of a story about sexy carrots. You really need to look at the book to understand, but this is another good reason I never would have found this book in the Christian bookstores of my youth. Cartoons about sexy carrots?! Way too edgy!

Miller relays a lot of his stories through the eyes and actions of his friends – characters (non-fiction characters but certainly characters) like Tony the Beat Poet and Mark the Cussing Pastor (more on this one later) and Andrew the Protester and other real-life friends whom he calls by their real names like Laura and Penny and Rick.

The point of the sexy carrot episode was that, “Tony the Beat Poet read me this ancient scripture recently that talked about loving either darkness or light, and how hard it is to love light and how easy it is to love darkness. I think that is true. Ultimately, we do what we love to do.”

Miller expands on this, delineating his philosophy of humanity that includes common, if rarely talked about, Christian ideas like sin, self-addiction, and living in the wreckage of “the fall” and saying that because of these “my body, my heart, and my affections are prone to love the things that kill me.”

“Tony says Jesus gives us the ability to love the things we should love, the things of heaven. Tony says that when people who follow Jesus love the right things, they help create God’s kingdom on earth, and that is something beautiful.”

This is the crux of another misconception about Christians: that we are ever increasingly rule-bound automatons, taking orders from our Pastors to tell everyone that we meet to “Turn or Burn!” or wear t-shirts that say things like “Eternity: Smoking or Non-Smoking?” or, to put slogans on out church’s marquee like one I saw recently during a period of very hot weather: “Smile. We know of hotter places.”

You may have been accosted by Christians like that and if you have I’m sorry. But I also want to tell you that there are great changes happening in the Christian community, and that even though we’ll never rid the world of sloganeering salvation warriors I think there is more of a counter-effort to that than there has ever been before.

Go to Part 4