Truck

Thursday afternoon marked my return from Seattle. In journaling about the trip, I realized that too much happened and I met too many people to fully relate the experience on this blog, even if only for the sake of both your time and mine. However, I’ll fill you in on a few things.

1. I’m moving there in a couple weeks.
2. At the Navigators National b2g Conference, I met people who are living in community and focused on spreading the gospel through communities with which they are involved, like art houses, music, piano classes, sports, etc.  Michael Frost, the speaker for the event, spoke to the fact that God is everywhere, and we need not fear being somewhere where He is not, because He is there. He also spoke at length about the missional church. At times, I lose sight of this fact about God, that He is preparing and ordering everything before we arrive. Though I am wary of being missional to the neglect of those within the church, the call to go live out the gospel and God’s love among the lost is one that God has given us, and it’s something in which we get the privilege of living.
3. Also, in staying with some friends of Natalie (thanks again Natalie for arranging that!) I was connected with christian guys who provided me with abundant hospitality, and in the future I hope will be dear friends and brothers.
4. The poetry community is tight and also “off the chain”. Some people use the latter phrase to describe something that is ridiculously awesome.
5. Through the tangible experience of going there, seeing some of the church, and getting some semblance of my potential normal life, God showed me that it is good (the move).
6. I know that there were a lot of people praying for me this week, and I can’t fully express my thanks to you here. Truly. I wish you could have seen how fluid some of the conversations with people were and how little I had to work to arrange meetings with all the people I needed to. I wish normal life were like that. Thank you.

On point 5 – tonight the decision to move started to sit more heavily on my heart and mind. Four years of life – with all its close relationships, struggles, failures, crushes, heartaches, victories, stupid decisions, and so on –  has drawn me into dear friendships which seem to whisper “stay” louder and even louder still, only amplified by my natural affinity for people.  Something as simple as hearing Matt, a young neighborhood friend, ask, “Why are you moving?” in a non-business-suit way made me re-evaluate my reasons for going. “To join a Bible study?”  Praise God for whatever pieces of truth He has planted in Matt’s mind this year, but I desire so much to see him come to faith, to know the love of God, and selfishly, I want to be here when it happens, but I have to come back to this – I got to be used even this last week as an encouragement and defender of the truth of God within the church in Seattle, and the opportunities for growth in my walk with God, and it is good. I know it will be hard, probably harder than I know, but with all the tools He’s given me to see, it is what God has shown me is next, so it is the best, and it’ll be awesome! With that said, if you are interested in my life enough to keep up with this, chances are that we’re close, and there’s no probability except for 1 (100%) that I’ll miss you. Let’s talk in the same room before I leave.

Also, a few pictures from the trip, mostly from this week’s poetry slam – Youth Speaks Seattle vs. Seattle Poetry Slam:

Danny Sherrard performing.

One of four emcees in a hip hop group that closed up the night.

He was making things easy and fun for the camera!

I got to serve with Chris and Amanda Millheisler in Seattle this past March, and they graciously made time to hang out with me one afternoon on the trip. They're awesome!

I’m not quite done writing publicly about this whole moving thing yet, so expect to see more. Do give me a call if you’re inclined to do so.

Leaving on a jet plane

…And I am officially the 1,425,872,301st person to use that as a title for a blog. Thank you, John Denver.

But in all seriousness, tomorrow I am taking a plane to Seattle, and contrary to the afore-quoted song, I do know when I’ll be coming back again. It’s in 8 days. I don’t have a ton of time to post about recent thoughts or communicate recent events anecdotally, but I will say this:

This week I will attend a Navigators conference and two Seattle Poetry Slams (check link to the right), as well as visit friends and follow the Lord’s leading regarding my location of residence for the next however-long-of-time. Year. That sounds nice and defined. Please pray as I and others have done (thank you) that God would show me where and what He wants me to be this year, and that I would be excited about wherever and whatever that is. It might be Seattle, in fact it’s highly possible that it’s Seattle, but it also could not be Seattle. The universals are in place – discipleship, ministry, art, looking at graduate education, etc. – but the specifics seem to be masked, much like the Phantom in one of my favorite musicals, the Phantom of the Opera…just without the unhealthy love life and murderous tendencies. I expect that this week will be awesome by itself, but also want to be submissive to and drawing near to God; to not do things purely out of my desires or my incomprehensibly limited wisdom about futures and what makes them the most glorifying to Him. This decision seems like a right and left decision (not one where there is a clear right or wrong), and God is glorified in all things, but I want to be as closely in line with His will as possible given that this includes a location. So, in short, please pray for me. Thank you. I will report back  with my findings after a trip which looks on paper and in my heart thoughts like magnificence.

Steven

By the way – check out this field of mathematics that I didn’t know about until a few weeks ago – biomathematics. It’s one I’m thinking about pursuing in the next year or two. I love biology. Seems pretty awesome! And I quote from the NCSU site:

“Biomathematics is the use of mathematical models to help understand phenomena in biology.

Modern experimental biology is very good at taking biological systems apart (at all levels of organization, from genome to global nutrient cycling), into components simple enough that their structure and function can be studied in isolation. Dynamic models are a way to put the pieces back together, with equations that represent the system’s components, processes, and the structure of their interactions.

Mathematical models are important tools in basic scientific research in many areas of biology, including physiology, ecology, evolution, toxicology, immunology, natural resource management, and conservation biology. The result obtained from analysis and simulation of system models are used to test and extend biological theory, and to suggest new hypotheses or experiments. Models are also widely used to synthesize available information and provide quantitative answers to practical questions. What measures can be used to reverse the decline in sea turtle populations, and how soon can we tell if they are working? How can laboratory experiments on chemical carcinogenicity be scaled up to set safe exposure limits on humans? For questions like these, where it is desirable to predict the outcome accurately before action is taken, quantitative modeling is essential.

Thus, while mathematical biology may sound like a narrow discipline, in fact it encompasses all of biology and virtually all of the mathematical sciences, including statistics, operations research, and scientific computing.

Within the biomathematics program at N. C. State, faculty and student research areas include immunology, biomechanics, neurobiology, wildlife and agricultural management, conservation biology, population genetics and ecology, environmental toxicology, and pharmacokinetics. Research on specific applications is complemented by fundamental work on mathematical, statistical, and computational methods for fitting models to data and deriving their properties. The research interests of biomathematics faculty and current students are described elsewhere on this website.”

See(attle) ya later!

Agrarian mind scape

Normally, I try not to post too frequently. However, without the time to process through anything too  substantial in words, I wanted to bring another poet to your attention. This poet’s name is Taylor Mali. His work warrants a post to itself, and thus I will proceed. This first poem convicted me (pun intended, you’ll see…) about the way I speak to others in general, and especially about faith. It is relevant to our society, and I urge you to watch it, as it would be a benefit to you regardless of your background. The second is a passionate, humorous, but still deliberate poem about teaching and the care of children. Mali is himself, a teacher. Lastly, I finish with a section of something I just started regarding this ’season’ of life. There is change in the air, and though change is a weighted two sided coin, heads still comes up occasionally; a face I’m coming to grips with more every day.

August halls this year are lined with bitter butter.
Each day is a plastic too-narrow slide down greased pans
seasoned with just-inside-the-locker-door cut-outs of
Rolling Stone, phone number trophies, friends, and laughter.
Whatever it is, I like what’s cooking, I like to think that there’s
nothing hotter than what’s about to happen.
A season’s start dwarfs the former’s failing heart.
Yet in transit my sides keep sticking to
“I love you”s buried in silence,
and the people who live where my five two-cents sidewalk dimes went.
I ascend these taste bud stairwells with theirs in pocket,
savoring what remains of where I’ve been.