John Adams

My bud Rick Lindholtz sent me a message:

I am reading David McCullough's brilliant "John Adams" - wonderful book - saw the HBO mini series (bought the DVD set) - also brilliant...

but thought of you immediately when I noted the reference to the family name of John Adams' mother. She was a Boylston. Adams was the great nephew of Zabdiel, who introduced the concept of inoculation to America, having gotten the idea from a slave that was owned by Cotton Mather... the salve relating how they had done things in the African bush.

Boylston is the alternative spelling of Boydston. Thomas Boylston/Boydston came to the US from Scotland in 1656.

Now I'm going to have to pick-up the book to see how our DNA helped shape America.

John Adams was one of the more influential founding fathers of the US. He was the second president and father of John Quincy Adams, the sixth American president.

Thanks, Rick!!!

Random

~ We've finally heard from Peter, our PIBC colleague who is back in the Netherlands going to school at Tyndale Theological Seminary.

~ Betsy has an early flight out tomorrow morning :( and will be in Turlock :) for a few days next week. Cheryl and I will be back to just the two of us -- out here in the middle of nowhere -- thousands of miles from family. (You've got to play the sympathy card at least occasionally.)

The picture is of Betsy snorkeling this afternoon. Eric who took her and his son, Christian, to Ypao Beach this afternoon also took the picture.

~ Mark Galli has an interview with Bob Roberts. In a nutshell Bob is saying that the world is now flat enough that the key operatives in the global development of God's kingdom are not professional missionaries but laypeople who take their expertise out into the world beyond their homelands. Thus all local churches are hands-on global churches. What he says isn't true, yet. But it has the potential to be so in the not so distant future. Let's hope so.

~ Google's ad-supported mobile phones could change the rules of the game. One more reason to avoid locking in on a new cell phone contract.

~ Virtual pastors please picky church-goers. Yes, I know, it's from LarkNews.com but...

~ John Piper commenting on the Minnesota bridge collapse. His monergistic Calvinism comes through -- "...God had a purpose for not holding up that bridge, knowing all that would happen, and he is infinitely wise in all that he wills..."

I'd be content to say that in his sovereignty God will work out his plan -- weaving together the mundane, the tragic, and the joyous into his great tapestry. It's not that he willed people to die in a tragedy but that he takes the things which naturally happen because we individually and collectively live too independently of him -- the tragedies -- and recycles them so that ultimately they become a part of his glorious plan for the world and his people. "...we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good." (The Message, Romans 8:29)

~ Disney plans to produce the rest of the Chronicles of Narnia.

Random

~ Come on down! Drew has a new gig hosting The Price is Right. Oh, great! Now there will be grandmas stopping me on the street asking me if I'm him. He's the real reason I grew the facial hair and moved to Guam. I just tell people that he's my evil twin. In fact, though, he is a lot younger than I am. :-)

~ Isla61 AM (KUAM) is now Isla63 AM -- moving up in the world -- but not much. Their online streaming signal (which was never very good) has totally disappeared. But if you want to get a sense for how Guam thinks listen in to the streaming chatter on K-57.

~ Congratulations to the University of Guam! WASC has continued their accreditation in spite of the severe throbbing fiscal headache that GovGuam has given to the school. If UOG hadn't made so many strides in other areas I wonder whether they would have received this kind of glowing affirmation. Guam should take real pride in the university.

~ Those Chilean sailors marching in the Liberation Day parade on Saturday were from the Esmeralda. We're planning to take the tour tomorrow.

~ Move over My Space, Today's Christian Woman, a Christianity Today publication, has started a social networking site -- TCW Neighborhood.

~ Dave & Joyce Owen have put their PIBC "missionary slideshow" up on YouTube.

~ I don't understand how it is that so many people feel so overwhelmed by the email thing. It's not nearly as bad as things were before they started filtering for spam. I teach an online class, work with colleagues at several sites, and administer a few email lists -- so I process several hundred emails a day (actually, my filters do a lot of the processing). There are two simple rules for dealing with it all.
1. Have a filtering or labeling system of some sort that will organize things for you.
2. Triage -- dealing with the most important things first -- neglecting some good but less important stuff. It's okay if you can't do everything.

~ The American Bible Society is working even more closely with some Eastern Orthodox bodies.

~ Our children have always been over-achievers. So we're not surprised to learn that Kirk is the "customer of the week" at the Peet's Coffee right by his work place in the City. Alright Kirk -- a Polaroid picture and free coffee for a week! You can relax now.

~ Apparently Dobson and Colson aren't big Potter fans. However, probably more in tune to good writing are Smietana and Gilmore -- who both seem to find a lot to like about Harry Potter.

Random

~ Climate change means that malaria is spreading into new areas of Africa.

~ Bookmark for leaders of more established churches: Changing the Conversation: Nurturing a Third Way for Congregations by Anthony B Robinson. This could be a great discussion starter for a church council. Fodder to begin a re-visioning retreat?

~ US Roman Catholic bishops have launched a campaign to strengthen marriages. They've got to do something! But they're between a rock and a hard place because they are perceived, for a number of legitimate reasons, as being the least credible of all people on this issue.

~ Betsy arrived from California this evening for two weeks with us -- yeah! She came bearing gifts -- including Sees' candy, Hershey's dark chocolate syrup, and dark chocolate dipped mint cinnamon Altoids (Are you seeing a pattern here?). Oh my, things are progressing on the mainland without us! The Altoids are definitely a winner.

~ Kent is in the air over the Pacific today, too. He's en route to Korea for his two week study program.

~ One of our PIBC students received his new passport in the mail today from the Bangladeshi embassy in Washington, DC. Mohammad had sent his old passport in two weeks ago. Meanwhile, thousands of US citizens in a very developed country are stranded at home waiting months and months for their government to produce passports.

~ The Bank of Guam is in hot water with the FDIC.

~ John Stott has now officially retired from public ministry. That's okay, perhaps I can now catch up on reading his books. He cranked good books out faster than I could read them.

~ The Taliban is holding 23 Korean "missionaries" in Afghanistan.

Most Americans are probably less surprised by the Taliban's tactics than that there are Korean missionaries in Afghanistan. South Korea is the second largest Christian missionary sending country in the world -- right behind the US. They may soon pass the Americans by. And the Koreans are all over the place -- Africa, Japan, Europe, Latin America, Guam... and obviously Afghanistan.

We pray for the safety and release of these Christians who had gone to Afghanistan as aid workers.

Random

~~ In the pipes -- a whole new city in California to be constructed on Tejon Ranch, north of LA, south of Bakersfield. Tejon Ranch, as most Californians know, is huge (426 square miles). It was established in 1842, through a land grant, when California was more a part of Mexico than it is now. Construction on Centennial, California is expected to begin in 2008.

~~ Kent is back in California after his winter quarter internship through UCDC in Washington, DC. He'll be staying with Kirk in San Francisco for a few days -- visiting in Turlock for a bit -- and then heading south for the spring quarter at UC Irvine. I'm sure he's ready to be back there after spending the fall quarter in Chile. One of the necessary tasks before heading to SoCal is to find a car for him. Dale and Amy Phillips are helping us with that. Bless them!

~~ The Guam haze, which looks a lot like LA in the 70's, finally blew out to sea this afternoon and we were able to get in a walk around the university campus. One NWS forcaster says that we should expect the haze to become a regular seasonal phenomena because of slash and burn practices in Indonesia and the increasing pollution levels in China. There's nowhere on the planet to hide!

~~ Speaking of haze, unable to take "no" for an answer in the last election, a gambling initiative will probably be on the ballot again next time -- for the third time. The idea of a quick-fix short-cut to economic development is so appealing to some Guamanians that they're like a boonie dog with a bone.

People may be more predisposed to vote for such nonsense this time because of the dismal financial situation the government is in (Mismanagement or corruption? Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between the two.). I don't know, though. This island doesn't even have a lottery. And the Catholic churches don't run Bingo operations here. Gambling, unlike its twin, alcohol, is a hard sell here.

~~ Generally speaking, I work from the home office on Mondays. Today I got the sermon evaluations done for preaching class and did the more in depth class plan for tomorrow's soteriology class. We're going to be talking about conversion -- comparing and contrasting Calvinism and Arminianism. Should be fun. I'm still new at this teaching thing so the novelty of the academic routine hasn't worn off, yet.