Borders

Here is an interesting article about Borders, books, publishing, and doing business in today's economy.

Storage Room

Our storage room is prone to disaster. The one thing you want is buried in the back, and once you have destroyed the room, putting it back is just too much trouble. We normally take an evening and rectify that room a couple times a year. Since I was off on Monday, I decided to tackle the room and add some shelving to help in the future.

Before:

(don't judge us ;-) )

I cleared out the area and built this shelf. For $100 at home depot, this shelf is nice. We have some particle board shelves. and the sagging always bothers me. These are rated for 600lbs each (3600lbs total for 6 shelves).

Shelf liners are a must with these wire shelves.

One think that always seems to get in the way is wrapping paper, so I built this little rig to hold it. Veronica made fun of it, but I figure she will be happy when the wrapping paper stays nice. Plus it is built Dad Evans style, so its not going anywhere.

Finished product.

Escher's Waterfall

This is great! I cannot stop watching.

Nineteen Eighty-Four

I just finished rereading George Orwell's 1984. I am fascinated at this book's ability to go from excitement and hope to utter despair in an instant. Of course stories that do not end well frustrate me (like Message in a Bottle), but of course the main message of the book is a social and political one. It is ashame that today's government is often called Big Brother because it really minimizes the point of Big Brother in the story.

A few weeks ago we were discussing this book with a young professional (early 20's) who had never read it. He was only familiar with the term Big Brother in reference to our police-state mentality, but Big Brother is so much more than that.

There is a part of the book where Winston is reading the contra-band book written by Goldstein where Orwell lays out some interesting notions which I ended up pondering a lot. In simple terms, the statement is made that machines could eliminate scarcity, but scarcity is required for hierarchical society, so war is needed to consume additional resources to keep scarcity a reality.

What is interesting to me is that while we have advanced to the point of amazing machinery capable of performing many tasks, and reducing costs for complex problems, we have failed at eliminating scarcity. Instead we have grown our personal need for more and better things requiring more resources. Instead of Orwell's war solution, our own personal greed is keeping us in a scarce society. It is unfortunate that we live this way. I am guilty. I long for the latest TV, tablet, dishes, cars, food, etc. while my fellow man starves on the other side of a shrinking planet.

Morally, I wonder if Jesus would see eliminating scarcity as a positive for society? Is that what we as the Church of Jesus should be striving for?

Is it even an attainable goal, or is man's morality so broken that any advances made to lower scarcity will be swallowed back into making the wealthy more so?

These are the questions that have been plaguing me recently. If you have never read 1984, and you are of age, go read it. It is a fascinating book about human sociology, politics and freedom.

Blogging restart

I am stepping up my blogging. Initial goal: two weeks straight, but hope for more.

Drink Coffee, Do good!

Coffee is wonderful. So wonderful in fact that for the last 500 years it has grown to be one of the largest agricultural commodities in the world despite having no intrinsic substantive value. You cannot live on it like you can rice or beans, but it would seem we cannot live without it.The process from the tree to your Venti Mocha Latte with a shot is a fairly complex one, (sometimes including some unique steps) and like all production challenges, complexity means cost to you. That is why coffee costs so much. Since most coffee grows near the equator, most of it is grown in countries with significantly lower living standards. Call them third world, call them low income, these folks live in utter poverty in many cases. So the cost of the actual beans ends up fairly cheap.

Unfortunately, it’s a little too cheap. Most of the coffee we consume is grown and harvested at rates that do not allow the farmer or harvester to make a living wage. As a commodity, the price is often set , and the farmer cannot argue. Enter the Fair Trade ideology. Fair trade is good in theory. Be sure you are paying what is fair. However in some cases, even fair trade goes through a middleman and the farmer still does not see is living wage. The fair trade that works is the one that bypasses the middleman, and trades directly with the grower, but that is not very scalable. I cannot imagine how a Folgers or Maxwell House would tackle that problem. Starbucks tried, but even they fall short with only part of their beans being fairly bought. We have to change our world small and steady.

Let me introduce you to Land of a Thousand Hills coffee. Their name comes from the nickname of Rwanda, the country where they buy their beans. If you are not familiar with Rwanda’s history, watch Hotel Rwanda for an overview. It is the worst human genocide in recent history, and their now fragile communities are trying to rebuild. Here is a video of the owner of LOTH.

For every 130 bags of coffee sold through LOTH, a Rwandan farmer can feed, clothe and shelter his family for a year. A YEAR! We all love coffee. We all drink it. Why not know what you are supporting, and where your money is being spent when you purchase coffee. You can buy LOTH coffee on their website, or if you ask V or I, we can pick some up at Windows Cafe' in Bethel.

Drink Coffee, do good.

A citizen of...

Last Sunday, the sermon centered around leadership, but one point dealt with Johnathon Edwards' comments on patriotism. With much respect for our Pastor, after finding this article, it soundes like Edwards held some crazy ideas. In fact, he wouldn't fit well into today's political groupings at all from what I can tell, wanting government funded Christianity; state welfare were laziness is not allowed, etc. However, some of the points made are still valid.

In particular, the idea that patriotism is not that important in the grand scheme of things was convicting. A lot of mental energy gets put toward politics, and much of the news we consume is centered around Washington. As Christians we need to make sure we are finding the right balance.

I do not want to rehash the article linked above but instead to consider a few thoughts on the very nature of government in America as it relates to the Christians' subjection to it.

Romans 13 is pretty explicit. Christians are to obey their government. However, I think there is a fascinating dynamic here in America that changes the picture unlike any other time in history. When Roman's was written, the ruling body was, well, Rome. While Rome was a republic, the very rule of law was still embodied in the consuls. All civilizations have been based on this model, where a person or persons is at the top. Even today's representative governments like England are still centered around a royal family. Always the central figure is a person. Until a pesky group of revolutionaries decided to try something new. Instead of a person being the center of the governmental structure, a document was. This government was designed to operate as a government by the people and for the people, with no person at its head, but a document. This is why what we refer to as the highest office is simply that, an office whose express goal is to uphold and defend the constitution of this nation.

Take now, for instance, the idea of Paul writing to a group of believers challenging them to subject themselves to the rule of Rome. This is a heavy request. The leader of Rome at most points in history, and certainly Nero during this period was a heavy handed dictator. Christians were made to suffer under his rule, and yet they were requested to be an example of good in their community by subjecting to the atrocities committed by Nero.

What happens then when a document is the ruler, not a person? When a person is in rule, they can set and change rules as they see fit. In America today, a document is our ruler. Our governmental body is there simply to carry out that constitution's directives. We have the unique privilege to be governed by no man. We govern ourselves. We elect for ourselves representatives to serve us. We impeach those who fail in their duty to obey its directives. America in theory is a nation ruled by the people's own desires as detailed in the constitution, amendable as needed.

So when scripture tells us to be subject to our rulers, we are not under the same obligation as 1st century Christians, or even the 21st century English. We are not subjects; neither to a monarch nor a dictator. The men with badges or the ladies in office are not our rulers. They have been asked to perform a service, at our request. We are bound to obey and follow one document (two really depending on your state). So if a police officer asks to enter your house for an inspection (as happened in Danbury a few years ago), you should say NO. This is not being insubordinate; it is obeying our ruler, the constitution. If a police officer asks you to answer some questions, and you do not want to, you don't have to. This is obeying the rule of law. When a corporation makes a major mistake, and spills millions of gallons of crude oil into the ocean, we should not sit quietly as the President informs us that he is forcing a foreign owned company to do anything, not because we do not agree with the principle, but because such action is completely outside of his given authority.

As the American experiment continues to change, there may well come a time when the decision is made that men are not capable of ruling themselves under the guide of our constitution. At that point (and we seem to be on that path) we as Christians will be subject to the rulers put in place. Until that time, I believe we should do as much as is in our power to keep our freedom and liberty. For out of this model has come the most successful society in the history of the world. And I believe that with our success, we can do more good for the kingdom of heaven then we could without it. Freedom for freedom's sake is not valuable to the Christian. Perhaps in God's economy we would be better off without our freedom; certainly there is biblical support for the work of God thriving under oppression. But I think we have greater abilities to do good for the kingdom in freedom, and therefore, I believe it to be a cause worth investing in.

So yes, we are citizens of heaven, first and foremost. We should not take too seriously our national pride as it often comes in conflict with out heavenly pride. However, I believe we have a duty as a part of this particular nation to be active and involved in the governmental process, to invest in maintaining our freedoms, and to know follow and uphold the constitution.