Since I’ve been on the topic of getting rid of clutter and getting things done, here is a list of to-do guidelines I scratched out a year or so ago to transfer to my computer. Ironically, I found it in a pile on my desk. Most of these had some form of their origin in Getting Things Done, by David Allen.

• Don’t put broad general items on your to-do list. If something can’t be “completed” then it isn’t a to-do…it’s a project. (see below)
• Everything on your list should be a single task that can be completed and checked off. This can be hard to do sometimes, but break the larger projects down into single tasks. Don’t put down “Buy gas for mower and cut grass”. Separate it into two tasks.
• Create a projects category for bigger projects without a due date. This breaks the rules above, but it’s designed to help you follow them. I have a project category for which sits at the bottom of my task list. In the notes section for each project, I breakdown the tasks for that project and move them into the main todo list as necessary. Because “Projects” is the bottom category on my task list, I only see it when I need to manage it.
• Store information along with where you will need it. If you get an email with directions to an appointment, cut and paste that info in the notes section on your calendar. If you get an email with instructions on something you need to do, paste it in the notes in your task program.
• Use start dates on tasks so you don’t have to see them until they are relevant. I filter all my tasks in Outlook so that I don’t see something with a future start date.
• Don’t let anything go overdue! Sometimes you don’t get things done by the due date you assigned yourself, but change the due dates to current dates. Don’t fill your task list with a bunch of red overdue items or your due dates won’t be meaningful anymore.

Now I can finally throw away this paper with scribbled task list notes on it.

My weekly summary of links added at inbreaking.com has missed a few weeks due to our vacation, but here goes:

• Tim Keller audio | Preaching the Gospel
• The Nativity Story - Movie Trailer - just a teaser for another mainstream movie based on part of Jesus’ life
• Book Summaries from David Mays
• The Calvary Chapel Statement on the Emergent Church | TheResurgence - it’s troubling to me how much generalizing is done in this statement
• The Leadership Blog Interview - Erwin Raphael McManus
• Christianity Gets a Reality Check - another mass media article on Rob Bell’s speaking tour
• Tim Keller Audio | Doing Justice - absolutely fantastic
• Steve Jobs and iPod Land in Religious Flyer
• Catalyst Podcast: Rob Bell, part two

Note…this only includes links I post…there are a few (too few!) links posted by others there as well. You can find more information about inbreaking.com here.

This morning, I tossed three empty shampoo bottles out of the shower. (Sorry if I woke you up Sherri.) Though I am kapable of telling when a shampoo bottle is empty, I never seem to remember that fakt by the end of the shower, so they build up in there.

That kind of signifies life right now. I’m surrounded with little things set aside for a later that bekame already a long time ago.

A year and a half ago, we said good-bye to the ministry we had been at for over a dekade to set out on our kurrent adventure. Between the two, we had almost a six month window, and though there was sertainly some work to be done, I tried to use some of that time to polish myself up in some areas, one of them being personal organization. I’ve always been pretty good at keeping a to-do list, but I wanted to do it better, so after reading Getting Things Done, I did a little bit of dekonstrukting and retooling my systems.

After that six months, life has kiked bak into gear this past year — moving to a new house in a new state, having a baby, planting Pathways, going bakk to skhool. In spite of all this, I feel like I’ve managed pretty well, but there are so many little things to katkh up on — a half of a garage I kan’t even park in, a stak of unread Wired magazines, a reading hair that has turned into a shelf, a slowly growing list of non-urgent tasks on my to-do list, a desktop I kan’t see, an unpainted room.

It’s time to retool again. For the most part, I feel like I’m managing most of the bigger projekts, but it some of these day to day things that kreate stress and distraktion. August is a slower month, and though I will definitely be spending some time preparing for things koming in the fall, I hope to both katkh up and refine my system.

Wish me luk… (Dangit where is my ’see’ key?)

I also finished The Parables: Jewish Tradition and Christian Interpretation by Brad Young while on vacation. I’ll just say that this is an important book for anyone interested in studying Jesus’ parables and leave it at that.

I do want to offer one quote. In the quote below, I think he offers one of the most helpful descriptions for understanding what the “kingdom of heaven” is that I have seen:

In its most fundamental meaning, the kingdom of heaven in the teachings of Jesus denotes the reign of God, which is experienced as a present force for healing, wholeness, and salvation in people’s lives. The kingdom is never defined as identical with the coming of the Son of man. The final judgment, or course, is another display of divine sovereignty, which rewards the righteous and punishes the wicked. Though the judgment may be an expression of God’s kingly power, it should not be equated with the definition of the kingdom of heaven.

While on vacation, I read, or perhams I should say skimmed, Better Together. This is a follow up to the more well-known Bowling Alone. It is filled with stories of communities of people who are creating the social capital that Bowling Alone says is diminishing in our culture.

I didn’t really enjoy the book much, though some of the stories were a bit intriguing. As a pastor, it was interesting to read a chapter on Saddleback from a nonreligious perspective. There was one quote in the summary chapter at the end of the book that made the whole thing worth my time:

We are struck, however, that many of our success stories involve organizations that work hard to avoid demonizing “the enemy,” even in tense and conflict-ridden situations.

Creating an enemy and rallying against that enemy is a common battle cry in our culture of fear, but something about it strikes me as unhealthy and dangerous. I especially think there is an important message in this for the church. When we define ourselves by what we are against, both those inside and outside our community might wonder what we are actually for. That’s not to say there aren’t things we should not agree with, or that there isn’t an enemy, but the church should be known by what it is for.

Being in the Pacific NW doesn’t mean we get to bypass a national heatwave. I’m still trying to figure out how the 90s here is so much hotter than the 110s in Arizona. We were away for a week in the mountains of Colorado with my family, and when we returned late on Friday, it was 88 in our house. We don’t have a/c, and I don’t think the house has dropped below 82 or so during the daytime hours.

I’m sure I have some thoughts to share from being away, but right now my mind can’t seem to get past the energy drain. It probably doesn’t help that I’m trying to watch Aeon Flux right now and it is killing millions of brain cells each second.

This weekend, Pathways had a booth at the Mill Creek Town Festival. We knew this would be a great way to introduce Pathways to others in our community, but we also didn’t just want to have a booth that was all about us. We are passionate about the fact that our community and our world have to be better because Pathways exists, or we aren’t being true to our calling.

We decided to hold a silent auction to raise funds for both a local and a global cause with all of high bids being split evenly between them. Locally, we raised money for HopeLink, and globally, we raised money for WaterAid. We were able to raise $2942 to be split between these two worthy causes. A number of people from Pathways went above and beyond by donating items for the auction, manning the booth, and bidding up the prices! I think we made a great statement both to our church community and to our neighbors about who we are, and I was proud to be a part of it.

If you want to see some pictures, you can find a slideshow here.

“Contextualization happens when we give God’s answers to the questions that people in our culture are asking.” - Tim Keller (or at least a mostly accurate quote of him)

A few months ago, I posted a favorable review of Leadership and Self-Deception, by the Arbinger Institute. Someone from the Arbinger Institute read my entry, and they were gracious enough to send me a pre-release copy of The Anatomy of Peace. This book is a prequel to Leadership and Self-Deception, and is another great read.

Though it is a prequel to the story of Leadership and Self-Deception, The Anatomy of Peace can also be considered a sequel in that it furthers develops many of the ideas found in the first book. It takes them out of the context of just a leadership setting, and shows how being “out of the box” is important for all of our relationships.

Again, I appreciated the narrative form that the ideas were presented in, although this one has more characters, so it took a little more work to follow along. Though the narrative form is an easy read, the reader shouldn’t be too quick to fly through this book as they would a work of fiction. The concepts presented are worthy of a lot of reflection, and they should be granted that.

The book is due to be released later this month, but it looks like Amazon is already shipping it. I’d recommend both of these books for individuals who are serious about growing relationally, as well as for teams that are working intimately alongside each other.

My weekly summary of links added at inbreaking.com:

• _awakening: The Myth of Expository Preaching
• Vintage Faith: Another One Bites The Dust - Dan Kimball weighs in on the demise of the Axis service at Willow Creek
• Lady Liberty Trades In Some Trappings
• Being the Church in our Culture | TheResurgence - Tim Keller audio
• Center Stage for a Pastor Where It’s Rock That Usually Rules - article in the New York Times on Rob Bell
• Men Are from Mars Hill - article by Mark Driscoll…it’s typical Driscoll
• Cyber-Savvy Pastors Blog When the Spirit Moves Them

You can find more information about inbreaking.com here.

Some friends and I are putting together a group/study/blog to read through The Great Omission, by Dallas Willard. You can find the blog at TheGreatOmission.com.

This is an open invitation for anyone who would like to join us. We won’t be starting the study until the first full week of August, so there is plenty of time for you to get the book. We will read a few chapters each week, and dialogue about them as we go.

You can either register on the site, or leave a comment below if you’d like to paricipate. Right now, we are heavy on the testosterone, so I’d especially like to have some female voices included.

I feel bad for even posting this, because it is pretty obvious that Stephen Baldwin is just trying to generate some press to help sell an upcoming book. He is criticizing Bono’s work in Africa: Actor STEPHEN BALDWIN has criticised BONO’s crusade against poverty in Africa, insisting the U2 singer should preach Christianity instead.

So basically, Steve-o, you want Bono to quit living out the gospel, and to just talk about it? Since Jesus said that he had been “annointed to proclaim good news to the poor” (Luke 4:18), does that mean Bono should fly to Africa, preach to cold, sick, starving young children whose parents have died of AIDS, and baptize them in stagnant, disease-infested water (since helping them get clean drinking water apparently isn’t important) as quickly as possible before they die?

UPDATE: Zach originally sent me this story this afternoon, and I was surprised that he hadn’t posted anything on it. Well, he has now, and he obviously spent more time on his than I did on mine, so be sure to go read what he said.

Blogging has suffered of late because of life, but I’d rather have it that way than the other way around. Here’s what’s keeping me busy:

• Enjoying the weather with my family. It’s actually raining today, but the last few weeks have been beautiful, and we’ve taken advantage of it.
• This weekend, Pathways is hosting a booth at the Mill Creek Town Festival. It is right in downtown Mill Creek and thousands of people come through. We are holding a silent auction to raise money for WaterAid on a global level and HopeLink on the local level. Hopefully I’ll have enough energy left after the weekend to give a report on how it went.
• A Mariners/Angels game on Monday night with a bunch of gents from Pathways. Jered Weaver pitched the Angels to victory extending his career record to 5-0. (Yippee! He and Colon are gonna turn this team around. I predict a second half surge for the Angels.)
• A latenight viewing of Superman Returns last week. I loved it. (Now I gotta figure out how to squeeze Pirates in.)
• Some template updates to Inbreaking and the initial steps of another collaborative site that I’ll announce soon.
• School. An intensive last week, and an exegetical paper for my Old Testament class due next week.

A family vacation is on the near horizon…giddyup.

My weekly summary of links added at inbreaking.com:

• Humble Orthodoxy | TheResurgence Podcast - weekly audio from the Resurgence podcast
• Desiring God conference speaker interviews - some great clips with Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll and John Piper
• Donald Miller “Blue Like Jazz” interview
• The Austin Chronicle: News: Church Fight
• Mustard Seed Associates | Conversation with a Scottish Church Planter
• emergesque: are there emerging church shibboleths?
• Religious Imagery in Culture
• Jesus Creed » Goodbye to Willow’s Axis

I installed a sharp new template at Inbreaking. I’ll be cleaning it up some as I have down time over the next few weeks months. Let me know if you find any bugs.

It’s been nice to see traffic and activity slowly building at Inbreaking, although I’m still the primary one providing links. I hope others will find the site useful and begin contributing more links. You can find more information about inbreaking.com here.

As of yesterday, our house is now HD equipped. Comcast is really friendly toward satellite customers, so we made the jump…for now at least.

I can’t believe how much I already want to ditch any channel or show that isn’t in HD. I watched some World Cup today and it looked great — condolences to my friends in England…I was pulling for you. Football season can’t come soon enough!

Comcast has their own PVR unit that is “Microsoft Enabled”. I’ll definitely miss Tivo…they just have a very friendly navigation system. I have two gripes about the Comcast PVR and then I’ll turn on an HD show and be content. First, sometimes it seems like the decoder can’t keep up with the data and the screen gets jumpy. I especially notice this when watching one thing while recording another. That never happened on the Tivo box, but in defense of the new box, it seems to record at a higher resolution.

I’m not sure who is responsible for my second gripe — many shows in the listings aren’t indicating whether or not they are new or repeats, so it doesn’t always work to ask it to only new showings. I set it to record any new episodes of Mythbusters, and it’s already recorded three old repeats. I never had this problem with Tivo, so somehow they were able to read the listings properly.