Learning to Crawl

I took this video of Cullen crawling, giving us a rare action shot of the little boy.

As you can see at the beginning of this video, Cullen took the opportunity to say "hi" to his grandparents, aunts and uncles, and all his friends.

Yep, Cullen's learning to crawl. We have another video of Cullen crawling right out of his pants - you have to be careful!

I guess things get easier now. Now that he can crawl and fetch the remote himself, he should be pretty self-sufficient, right?

The Lion in Particular; also, the Witch and the Wardrobe

One of my more dis-respectable sins as a pastor is that I've never read C.S. Lewis's Narnia books. I've seen the play twice, and I've seen the movie, of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but that's it. Oh, and I just saw Prince Caspian, which I understand is quite unlike the book.

So I'm finally doing it. I'm halfway through Lion Witch now. Ahhh, it feels good. I so rarely read fiction at all, though I used to long ago (and I used to write it as well) -- heck, I could be a character in Narnia! "You see that poor boy over there? He never reads fiction, only nonfiction. He's ever reading, and never imagining." And so forth.

Here are two great little passages from Lion Witch. The first is about Aslan the Lion, who represents Christ. This passage has been used in so many sermons that churchgoers are likely to recognize it -- we'll reward these readers with a different passage in a moment.

"Ooh!" said Susan, "I'd thought he was a man. Is he--quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion."

"That you will, dearie, and make no mistake," said Mrs. Beaver; "if there's anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they're either braver than most or just silly."

"Then he isn't safe?" said Lucy.

"Safe?" said Mr. Beaver; "don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you."

And the second passage, concerning Edmund and the Turkish Delight:

He had eaten his share of the dinner, but he hadn't really enjoyed it because he was thinking all the time about Turking Delight--there's nothing that spoils the taste of good ordinary food half so much as the memory of bad magic food.

Okay, back to reading. Just don't ask me to confess my even more grievous sin concerning The Return of the King.

* * *

NOTE: The author of this post, however, did read all three books of the Hitchhikers' Trilogy.

Lovin' the Packaging

Thought he would love the blocks... the pictures tell a different story :-)

Twenty Years Ago

Something extraordinary occurred on May 20, 1988.

On that day, I stopped running from God. He had been after me for a while, but I didn't want him to have any say in my life. I wanted to live as I pleased, and perhaps have Jesus in my back pocket in case of emergency.

But in the early morning hours of May 20, 1988, I prayed a prayer of surrender. I don't remember the words, but it was bound up with Jesus Christ and his salvation and his Lordship. It took place in a Denny's restaurant, for what it's worth.

After I prayed that prayer, I knew something had happened - and indeed it had. Over the next weeks, I had a thirst to know God that had never been there before. I began devouring the gospels (the first four books of the New Testament), whereas in the past the Bible was just an inconvenient book on the shelf.

In time, it was clear I was a changed person. Changed on the inside. My attitudes and desires changed. Along with that, the plans for my future changed as well.

One thing I am convinced of -- Jesus changes us on the inside. The gospel is not simply about forgiveness ("Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven"). It's about transformation. It's about God rewiring you back to code, on the inside, so that parts of you begin to function that had previously been disconnected.

I did not "become a Christian" in the sense that I decided I believed something and tried hard to live accordingly. Rather, Jesus grabbed hold of me and made me his own.

I had done all sorts of hurtful things to others, and to myself, previous to that day. However, I wasn't experiencing turmoil in my life (the stereotypical time people might cry out to God for help); I was actually enjoying my life. And the fact that Jesus saved me did not mean that I was suddenly free of all sin and pride, unfortunately. But a process of repentance began, which meant that the pride and self-love had to slowly die -- and these were steadily replaced with worship and love for God.

For a more sophisticated presentation of what I've tried feebly to communicate here, I would encourage you to explore here.

In the Garden

Yesterday Cheryl, Cullen, and I were treated to a visit to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, VA (an hour away, but allow for traffic jams). Busch Gardens has five roller coasters and various other rides, but a host of other things to do -- various attractions divided into groups by European nationality. There's a England section, an Italy section, a Germany section, etc.

Cullen and I enjoyed riding on a roller coaster called The Griffon:


Just kidding, Cullen didn't ride this time around... But we'll be monitoring that height reqirement real close!

It was a great time, but a rainy afternoon, so you'll have to come see the park for yourself sometime when you visit us.

Senior Pastor Joe gave us the grand tour of the park. Here's Joe with Cullen and the Clydesdales.


And here's Cullen, eating my chin. Don't ask why.

Boyhood

I really like this picture of Cullen. He's getting in a battalion of teeth right now, and you can see them if you look really, really close. He's also beginning to talk ("ba-ba-ba"), to eat buffer solid foods, and crawling isn't far off.

The other day we had this conversation:

Cullen: Screeetch, eeeeeeep, ba-ba-ba!! (Or something like that.)

Me: Hahaha!

Cullen: Hahaha!

Cheryl: Ken, don't play with him during mealtime!

Me: He started it!

Ahhh, good times.

Speaking of good times, I recorded the 1976 version of "King Kong" that was playing on TV the other night...


This was a favorite boyhood movie. I think I may have even seen it in the theater (I would've been 6 years old); I definitely owned the King Kong lunch box. As I watched the ending of it the other day, I thought to myself - "Hey, that's just a guy in a big ape suit!" And there were a few unrealistic moments (just a few) in which Kong climbed up the World Trade Center, balancing his weight on the same arm with which he was carrying Faye Dunaway, and yet she was unharmed. But my disappointment gave way to emotion as King Kong was filled with bullet holes by the US military helicopters. Very, very sad.

Happy Mother's Day!

Last year at this time, we celebrated Mother's Day when Cullen was still "TBA" to the world at large... Through his link to the outside world, he gave his mom a nice card with a little apology inside for making her a wee bit uncomfortable. This year, Cullen was able to celebrate with mom in style!


What a great mommy! Happy Mother's Day, Cheryl!

Morning Ritual

Like his dad, Cullen enjoys reading the newspaper while he eats.

As you can see, he's still learning how to open it to the right page.


Okay, Dad, maybe you can turn the page for me...

First Landing State Park

Not content to sit quietly in the backyard grass, Cullen convinced us to take a more substantial outing - to First Landing State Park.

Here's Cullen, ready to roll:


He prefers not to actually wear the hat, as you can see.

Now we know our hiking friends would rather see that Cullen was able to actually hike the trails. Well, hike them he did! He was not about to be left in his stroller... that would have made this a "stroll through the park," whereas this was a bona fide outdoor adventure.


No one was happier than Smarty, who not only enjoyed the forest but also her good friends Joel and Elizabeth. Happy Birthday, Joel! And thanks for the three pictures above, too.


We only experienced a scoche of the park, but there are miles and miles of trails, a lake, and even an ocean. Not many state parks have their own ocean!

Want to join our next expedition?

Field Representative

Here's Cullen checking out how things are going "on the ground"!