Ben Wright lives on (Hope Street)

For the last several weeks the name, “Mogadishu” has been running through my head. Until just now I had no idea it was the capital of Somalia (secretly I thought it was a Japanese dumpling). I’m praying for Mogadishu but I have no idea why…

Jonah will be two years old next month. One of the very cool things about an almost-two-year-old is his lightning fast speech development. Lately, he’s been repeating everything. Which means…it’s time.

Over the last while I’ve totally lost control of my mouth. I blame the makers of Call of Duty. My mom always told me, “Video games are from the devil”, and I tend to agree. That’s why they’re so damn fun.

So dang fun.

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Everything Must Change (Brian McLaren)
His Needs, Her Needs (Willard Harley, Jr.)
Battlefield of the Mind (Joyce Myers)
Love Wins (Rob Bell) 
Violent Grace (Michael Card) 
Four Views on Hell (Walvoord, Crockett, Hayes & Pinnock) 
Things Might Go Terribly, Horribly Wrong (Kelly Wilson)
Soul Cravings (Erwin McManus) 
Every Man’s Battle (Aterburn, Stoeker & Yorkey) 
Healing the Masculine Soul (Gordon Dalbey)
The Power of Now (Eckhart Tolle) 
Becoming Human (Jean Vanier) 
Finding Our Way Again (Brian McLaren) 

My list did not go as planned this year, at all. Nevertheless, I managed to squeeze in some stimulating reads. My faves were Becoming Human and Things Might Go Terribly, Horrible Wrong. I wasn’t a fan of: The Power of Now, Battlefiled of the Mind or His Needs, Her Needs.

2012 is already off to a good start. I’m currently reading Renovation of the Heart (Dallas Willard) and Introducing the New Testament (Achtemeier, Green & Thomson).

1. Aftermath, Hillsong United
2. Sigh No More, Mumford & Sons
3. Hope, Foy Vance
4. Torches, Foster the People
5. Mylo Xyloto, Coldplay
6. Bon Iver, Bon Iver
7. Yahweh, Hillsong Chapel

1. Once (2007) - John Carney (writer/director), Martina Niland (producer), staring Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova. 

2. Away We Go (2009) - Sam Mendes (director), Dave Eggers/Vandela Vida (writers), starring John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph.

3. Dan in Real Life (2007) - Peter Hedges (writer/director), Jonathan Sheestak (producer), staring Steve Carell

If there were only two songs left in the world…

1. Gabriel & the Vagabond (Foy Vance)

2. Indiscriminate Act of Kindness (Foy Vance)

1. The Horse and His Boy, C. S. Lewis

“There was only one lion … I was the lion … who forced you to join Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.”

2. Surprised by Hope, N. T. Wright

“The point of the resurrection…is that the present bodily life is not valueless just because it will die…What you do with your body in the present matters because God has a great future in store for it…What you do in the present—by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neighbor as yourself—will last into God’s future. These activities are not simply ways of making the present life a little less beastly, a little more bearable, until the day when we leave it behind altogether (as the hymn so mistakenly puts it…). They are part of what we may call building for God’s kingdom.” 

3. Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis

“My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?”

4. The Bible 

Let the just rejoice,
for their justifier is born.
Let the sick and infirm rejoice,
For their saviour is born.
Let the captives rejoice,
For their Redeemer is born.
Let slaves rejoice,
for their Master is born.
Let free men rejoice,
For their Liberator is born.

St. Augustine of Hippo (AD 354-440)