Author: drfrank Page 4 of 5

The Hectic/Productive Life

On February 20, 2018

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Sometimes life feels really full. Those aren’t bad times, in fact they can be very rewarding times. But it is a fine line that separates feeling productive and feeling like you are sinking under the weight of it all. This was one of those weekends where I stood precariously on that line.

Sharon and I poured on the steam to get the basement finished, at least functionally finished. That meant sanding all the drywall in the last room as well as in the stairwell, priming everything, and painting. I managed to finish up the sanding and move my chop saw out of the main room on Saturday (I’ll bring it back to finish up the trim this week). We had lots of other things on the go so the order of when we completed tasks is a bit of a blur. I managed to prime and caulk everything Sunday after church. I was also able to do a prime check which I would quickly prime this morning. Then I started in on the ceiling paint while Sharon sealed the stairwell, this was necessary because previous owners were heavy smokers and the last owners sealed the ceilings but not the walls so that now the nicotine in the walls is starting to emerge! Not pleasant. We did not want to have that happen in the new basement so all of the existing drywall has been sealed.

We had just enough ceiling paint for the game room (main area). We did not have enough wall paint to finish the walls in the game room, although I almost managed the second coat. I’m going to pick up some more paint tomorrow and finish the job, I think Robert is coming by to help me install trim. Oh and tomorrow is already packed with the car going in for repairs in the morning and a Skype call with my good friend Beth Stovell in the afternoon. But I am motivated to finish because I ordered the Kallax shelving which arrives Thursday Afternoon! Finally my games will have a new home.

So add to all of that preparing worship for our small group tonight, going to small group, visiting with my buddy Kadry to see his kitchen upgrades, Sharon taking in Les Miserables, and a surprise flat tire (not one, but two screws!). It was a pretty full long weekend.

In the picture my buddy Richard Dufault and I are battling my dark Jedi daughter Chelsea. This was from a photoshoot Richard did for us to promote a game Chelsea and I developed called Quack, Quack, Duck!

Videos

By drfrank

On February 18, 2018

In General

IMG_20180215_143805 You might have noticed that I recently produced my first maker video. I wanted to do this as a proof of concept, something that would give me an idea of the amount of work required to bring to life that part of my vision for this blog. In keeping with my eclectic nature I really want to do videos that dip into all the different aspects of my life: teaching, hobbies, spirituality, etc. So I wanted to see just how intrusive the process of filming a project can be. Even though I record videos for my courses, at home I do not have a producer watching the camera angles and making sure I get enough takes to convey my message effectively. At the end of the process I think adding regular videos is quite doable, although I will need to upgrade a few things.

The first video was shot with my phone and compiled quickly in lower resolution than I intend to work. The editing process took me about 2.5 hours to produce the video from the footage I had collected. I anticipate that it will take about double that amount of time if I’m using my Canon T5i to record. I also have access to microphones that will help with the audio. I’d eventually like to add a few go pro cameras to capture other angles, but more video footage means more work. I need to start by developing my skills with the tools I already own.

A carpentry video was a great place to start because I make lots of mistakes in carpentry. For example, I should have made the base of my transition 3/4″ wide (1/8th” wider), fortunately I did make the floors to accommodate this size which is what I need for better stability. That said, I am very much an amateur carpenter. But that fits with my vision because I want to produce video content that isn’t about getting it right all the time. I want to show the learning process as well as encourage people to try things on your own. Even though carpentry is really a hobby for me, I have good friends (like my buddy Robert) who are professional carpenters that can answer my questions and help me understand my mistake. This is invaluable in any of life’s endeavors.

Years ago I had the idea of a cooking show called My Messy Kitchen where sometimes the meals turn out, but it is always an adventure in real life with kids interrupting the cook. I will definitely do a few cooking videos along the way – I love cooking. This blog has the same philosophy. Let’s do some things, in real life, and see what happens. Sometimes you end up with an amazing testament to your growing capabilities and other times you learn from your mistakes. We’ll have to see if there is an audience for this approach, but I suspect that there is.

Transition Strip (part 2)

By drfrank

On February 16, 2018

In Carpentry

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67M–46FSIo]

Ultimately the transition strip I carved was too narrow, but I videoed the process and I’ll post some images when I install a slightly wider version tomorrow.

Lent and the Crucified God

By drfrank

On February 15, 2018

In Spirituality, Theology

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Over at the Jürgen Moltmann Discussion Group on Facebook James Blackhall shared about his practice of reading through The Crucified God as a Lenten devotion. His post came as I have been trying to discern a healthy Lenten practice for myself for this season. I usually find giving up a food item might help my waistline, but it usually doesn’t translate into a devotional practice which is more fitting for the season. The years that I’ve found Lent most meaningful have been those when I’ve added a practice to my daily life. Last year I took on the daily office, which I do, albeit quite a bit more sporadically, otherwise. This year I wanted something different so I was inspired when James mentioned his use of The Crucified God.

The Crucified God was one of the first books by Moltmann that I read. My first read of the text was likely in the third year of my undergrad. I remember a conversation in the hall about it with Ken Melchin, he thought I should go back to the beginning and read Theology of Hope. I followed Ken’s advice after I finished The Crucified God and have read Theology of Hope many more times since. I had forgotten just how good The Crucified God is because even though I used much of it in my doctoral research, I hadn’t read the whole of The Crucified God since those early years of study.

Right from the get go, Moltmann confronts us with the arresting claim that “[t]he cross is not and cannot be loved.” (p.1) Then he draws us into the notion that any Christian theology of hope is in fact built upon “the resurrection of the crucified Christ.” (p.5) I am hooked. I’ve decided that I will post one or two quotes on Facebook every day, both as a way of keeping myself accountable to the practice and as a way of letting the text live in my real world context. I’m sure there will be commentary here as well.

May your Lenten reflections be rewarding.

Transition Strip (Part 1)

By drfrank

On February 14, 2018

In Carpentry

fctools

Time to break out the fine carpentry tools! We are having a bit of a Chinook the next two days so I thought it was a great opportunity to carve the transition strip for the new bathroom. When you have two types of flooring meet and they are not at the same level the only real option is to create some sort of transition. I love carving these from hardwood and this will be the fourth one I’ve carved, so I have a sense of what I’m doing. Most of the work will be done with the table saw, but there are a lot of steps to make the transition pretty.

IMG_20180214_095022 The picture to the right is the last transition strip that I carved. This is installed in our front entrance after I tiled the space. I still have a bit of finish work in the entrance, but I’m waiting for warmer weather to finish off the built in cabinet, I really do not want to spend the day on the tablesaw and router in below zero weather. For this transition I used a leftover piece of the maple floors that the previous owners had installed and carved it to fit into the gap between the tile and the existing wood floor. If you were to look at the transition piece before it was installed it was essentially a T shape with a little more material over the wood floor than the tiles (to account for the height difference). I simply installed this one with PL glue but in the past I’ve screwed transitions in and made plugs that I would smooth over. I prefer the finish with glue. This transition has been here for almost a year now and seems rock solid. This is the trajectory for my new bathroom transition.

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I meant to grab a piece of wood yesterday when I came home from lecturing. However I forgot. The wood was in the garage which is cold, so I need to let it warm up. I took some rough measurements and found another piece of maple flooring that will serve my purposes. They had a stack of this stuff in the rafters of the basement, I’ve been slowly using it up for little projects.

The bathroom door is only about 2′ wide, so I grabbed a piece that was about 26″ to give myself plenty to work with. I needed something at least 3/4″ thick, which this piece is. Worst case I might need to laminate a strip on the bottom, we’ll take care of that later if it is necessary. What I want to do first, after the piece acclimatizes, is carve a T so that the top will be level and no more than 1/8th” above the tile. Because the wood I chose has ridges on the bottom, I’ll need to carefully carve it so that the bottom of the T is right over a ridge, otherwise I’ll lose about an 1/8th” of material and definitely need to laminate something to the bottom. I’ll post my measurements when I get in there and some pics of my table saw setup for each cut.

*Just a note on the header picture, a few years back I made a book of the contents of my various tool boxes so that my wife might have a better idea where tools went when she was done with them (I do realize this is pure fantasy). This was my fine woodworking box at the time, it has changed quite a bit since then. Lots of measuring new measuring tools and even a pin nailer live in that box now. I need to update the photo, maybe do a comparison post. I do try to keep the list under the picture fairly up to date, but in the end it is more for my own curiosity than anything else.

Transparency and Leadership

By drfrank

On February 5, 2018

In Spirituality

vineyard with david

Two events have been occupying my thoughts early this morning. The first is from yesterday’s sermon. Towards the end of the sermon the elder preaching opened up about struggling with the fruits of the Spirit. That might not seem like a big confession and in the context it was the elder identifying with the self-disappointment we all often feel when we take the time to examine our lives. It is a big deal when juxtaposed with a recent conversation from a small church pastor’s forum. On that forum one pastor was lamenting that when they tried to open up and get help for some trivial struggle a congregant shut them down and told them that as a leader they should never confess weakness to the congregation. I remember reading that and feeling angry. Some of the strongest moments in my own ministry were also those where I was most transparent about my struggles. Here’s the rub, leaders are people too, lovely flawed people. We can all be idiots, we can and will let ourselves and the people we love down. The moment we pretend otherwise is the moment we start loving a fiction over the truth.

Now when our elder mentioned their own struggles the context was how they have been meditating on the fruits of the Spirit as a way of trying to be better. My instant thought was: keep talking like that and you will lose people. The sad thing is that many people do not go to church to be challenged in their own failings let alone want to follow someone they think of as being less than perfect. Often people prefer the willful lie over reality because facing reality means working on ourselves. It shouldn’t surprise us that churches which expect perfect leaders have a hard time dealing with leaders who do evil things and even cover up wickedness that should never be covered up.

My second thought was that any people you lose by being transparent are not the kind people who really want what is best for you anyway. We need to expect something better from the church. We need to be a place where we can come with all our warts and imperfections and call each other to the life God has for us. We need to love truth, especially the truth about ourselves. We need to love each other, especially when we are unlovable. And loving never means pretending everything is perfect, instead we have hope that one day we will be made perfect in the presence of God. Today we work together to help each other be better, a work that is made easier the more we are free to open up.

I don’t expect that this week’s sermon will chase off any of the people I’ve come to know and love in our church. In fact our elders have a good track record of living out their imperfections from the front. I think it is one of the biggest strengths of the new Vineyard here. I am encouraged greatly when I see it. But I also know that some people will not like giving up the illusion of perfect leaders. Hopefully we’ll have few instances where people push back against such transparency, I know I had a few in my time pastoring. My prayer for our elders (the two couples who pastor our church) is that they will be bold in the face of all resistance, continuing to live in such a way as to promote transparency and real growth.

Custom Basement Bathroom

By drfrank

On February 1, 2018

In Carpentry

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This summer we started in on our basement. We wanted to get things done fairly quickly so we hired my buddy Robert Sykes to be the general contractor onsite. I’ve worked with Robert on quite a few renovation projects, both in our old house and on historical restoration projects for his clients. He’s really a fantastic carpenter and I’ve learned tonnes working with him. Despite wanting to have things move along quickly, life through us a curve ball when my dad took sick and passed away. Since then we have been plugging away at the basement while trying to keep on top of rest of life that was all put on hold while we took care of family. Thankfully, we are on our last two rooms. I’ll post about what we did in other rooms later, but it is so incredible to be down to two rooms (even though we have a bit of finish work throughout)!

IMG_20180201_135236 The main area, our family room, will become my new gaming room. And we decided to put in a three piece bathroom which is what we were working on today. The room has been built, including plumbing, for a while now, what we’ve been putting off is all the tiling. The walls and ceiling are simple white tiles with an accent piece off center on the back wall. The glass you see in the picture is the sliding part of the shower door which we’ll reinstall tomorrow when we grout the floor.

Let me tell you a bit about the bathroom. We had a small space, around 5′ by 6 1/2′ to work with. We knew from the start that we’d be doing a custom shower. We tied into the existing powder-room rough ins which meant our location in the basement was fixed and we were stuck with the small footprint to work with. The shower is about half of the room (I think it is 3′ X 5′) which leaves enough space for a small sink (I’ll show pics when I get it installed) and a toilet. This also means we are making the door open out into the family room. We cut a new vent hole in the outside wall to run proper ventilation for the room. IMG_20180201_135242 I feel like we did everything right to make a great three piece. Now to make it pretty.

As usual, my lovely wife Sharon chose the tiles and hopefully will choose paint this week so that we can finish the whole bathroom by early next week. The floor mosaic tiles are a real pain because we made the floor so that it drains into the shower. We started with a soldier line under the shower door and liked things up from there. Unfortunately we redid a few fields of tiles that just didn’t lay the way we wanted. I’m glad Robert did this part, I like laying tile but it is murder on the knees. I was in charge of cuts which made the work go quickly. We did all the little tricky cuts today because it was warm enough to use a wet saw outside, I love my wet saw, I’m not so fond of using it in sub-zero weather.

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However, I ended up using a diamond wheel on a rotary tool. I was going to use it for cutting out the openings for the shower head and handle, but found it was easy to use so rather than setting up the wet saw and going up and down the stairs a million times I went the rotary tool route. I simply filled a roller tray with a bit of water and kept dipping the tile in the water while cutting. This worked quite well and didn’t get water everywhere which my wet saw is prone to do. For all of the other cuts I used the manual cutter that my friend Kadry added to my tile tools last time he borrowed them! Kadry is the best.

The results so far are great. But we have yet to tile the inside door frame (after we install the shower door), grout everything, paint the rest of the walls, install the fixtures, and carve a transition from the laminate floor to the tiled floor. No more really hard parts, just lots of jobs that you need to wait until dry before continuing.

When I was editing my post I noticed that one of the ceiling tiles had slipped a bit! Saw it in the first picture. I went immediately in to re-set that tile and propped it up with a shim until it dries. Maybe that’s another perk of blogging.

Trying Out a New Game

By drfrank

On January 30, 2018

In Gaming

With creatures and cunning, you'll rule a fantastic forest kingdom in the ultimate asymmetric game of adventure and war.

I have a couple of regular gaming groups, one that is primarily role playing and the other that mixes things up. Our mix it up group got together tonight to try out a print-and-play version of Root: A Game of Woodland Might and Right which my friend Richard backed on KickStarter. Root pits various woodland critters (armies of them) against each other in a quest for points. The game is asymmetric in nature meaning that each race (cats, birds, little critters, vagabonds) has different mechanics for how it generates points. Asymmetric games are great fun when they are balanced, and with only one play through I’m skeptical about the balance in Root but I need to try it a few more times to really make that call.

I really liked the art and the theme, those make the game super interesting. Even the different ways that each race operated proved interesting. Each player fights over clearings which are assigned to the factions of bunny, fox, and mouse (the bird faction is a wildcard). Having clearings of specific factions helps you to be able to perform actions. I played cats so started with units all over the board, but being spread out left me deceptively vulnerable, especially when the birds really got going. The combat is fairly elegant, roll two four-sided dice and the defender inflicts the lower number of damage and the attacker the higher. There are a few other rules around combat, but it is fairly quick. I think this game has real potential, although my first play through was not that satisfying.

I disliked two aspects of Root. The first aspect is the inclusion of special victory condition cards. These cards change up the dynamic fairly quickly, but choosing the wrong card is devastating. I ended up in a no-win situation early on in the game. I spent the majority of the game knowing I couldn’t win and trying to find some other meaning in the game play. This was my mistake, but for a game to have such a costly mistake potential right at the beginning of the game might require some tweaking (either seed them deeper in the deck or remove them altogether).

The other thing I disliked was the potential for analysis paralysis with the races. This is especially evident with the birds. The other races start off with a fairly simple action, but the birds need to make a decision that will effect their whole turn. I think it is a cool mechanic but the result is that whenever we hit the bird player the game ground to a halt. The birds easily took 3 or 4 times the amount of time the rest of the players together spent each turn. And this was not even with our slowest gamer present (he missed the game tonight). So while it is a very interesting mechanic, there needs to be a way to streamline it.

Maybe things will improve now that we know the game. We’ll have to see. I must say that I am dreading a play through with our slowest player. Often we get to play a couple small games in an evening as well a longer game, not tonight. I’m keen to see the production values of the final game. Root has some real potential. I’ll let you know if things improve next time we play it.

Percussion and Getting Out of the Way

By drfrank

On January 28, 2018

In Music, Spirituality

I’m not sure why I’m making a goofy face in this photo, but my buddy Andrew took it at a Vineyard pastor’s retreat a few years back. I believe I was just getting into percussion at that point. Sharon had bought me a djembe for Christmas and it is such a different dynamic than guitar or even keys. One of my favourite ways to play percussion is in concert with a full drum kit.

I was playing percussion today at church, playing with a kit drummer, and the sermon was on the value of team leadership. That got me thinking about some of the dynamics of playing on a team.

When you have a full kit in the mix, unless you are trying to bolster something the kit is already doing I find it better to simply get out of the way. It is not always possible with my hand drums which is why I bring various shakers and my harmonicas with me. For our first song there was a nice groove that I could play off the kit fairly easily, add the odd accent here and there but mostly to give is some texture with the highs from my djembe. I usually have my cajon as well, but I use the cajon to keep something of the beat steady and to enhance the boom of the kick on the kit (it needs a bit of push and the mic on my cajon usually gives an excellent boom). When we went into the second song ,Jason on the kit had a nice tight beat that I felt I’d just muddy up if I played along. So I grabbed my harp and echoed some of the lyrical lines, sustaining a root when I felt a nice drone might be appropriate. I ended up harping on about half the songs this morning and adding some shaker on another. The object is to not stand out, but to also to be adding something to the overall mix. It is a great dynamic, really challenging, but when the music comes together this way then it is magical.

Riffing on Richard’s message on leadership, I love the healthy sense that our Vineyard has about not having everything focus on a personality. He is right that so many churches rely on a cult of personality because this is the norm for church growth philosophies. I get that some people like to attend a church where they can be spectators more than participants, but I’m not like that. I want to add a note or a beat here and there that makes the music fuller.

When I was pastoring Freedom Vineyard, as I was when this picture was taken, I often did what we called the Frank show. I didn’t terribly like the Frank show, but in the latter years of our church that was the norm. The Frank show was when I was running all the aspects of the service, from worship to teaching. What we discovered, the hard way, was that once this pattern was the norm unless I was part of events they generally were unsustainable. So while I am fairly confident in just about any role within the church, I am really hesitant about another Frank show.

When Freedom was at its best we had a great sense of team. We failed however to recognize team play as something to make into a non-negotiable. Much as people seemed to want the Frank show it was not the healthiest approach to ministry. So I applaud the new Ottawa Vineyard for making that a central value. I believe it will serve them well. I am hoping that they continue to make space for me to add accents and notes that make a the music of our church fuller.

Must mean a little more

By drfrank

On January 28, 2018

In Spirituality, Theology

Image result for jesus face palm

Recently a friend of mine, a guy named Bob who likes to stir up trouble, posted this little conversation starter:

“The power of His church is in the pew, not necessarily in the Pulpit.”

My initial response was to think that this statement (which is a very Bob statement) has the power dynamic backwards. I get that he’s concerned about a Christianity that is all formalism and no action. When I read though I immediately thought that the real power is the Holy Spirit and I responded in such a manner. And while I think that is true, Bob’s statement has been running around in my head during conversations I’ve had since. I want to reflect a bit in what I think Bob was pointing to.

If you claim to be a Christian and that makes no difference in how you live your life in this world then something is definitely wrong.

Watching the debates around evangelicalism unfold in the US this past week leave me struggling to find Christ in what is going on. Compound this with a conversation I had this morning with an old friend whose interactions with a very dogmatic Christian leave him wondering where the relationship with God is for the guy peddling a strict form of neo-Calvinism. My own observation is that the people who are the most uptight about their faith, the most dogmatic and hardnosed, also tend to be assholes in real life. I know there are exceptions, at least I hope there are exceptions, but this is sadly the case I’ve run into over and over again. Please prove me wrong.

I feel like I’ve been there too. I remember an incident years and years ago when I found myself reaming out a parishioner for not wanting to be part of our evangelistic outreach. I was a real asshole to him. And he wasn’t the only one. When my faith was built on a tenuous structure of hardnosed beliefs I found myself defending that faith by belittling others. I’m sure I can still get that way although I try my best not to. Even Jesus’ disciples got that way from time to time – which is why I think Jesus took them to have the encounter with the syrophoenician woman. (Take a look at what happens to the miracles before and after that encounter, then look at how the disciples behaved.) The point though is that Jesus did things to show his disciples how they were acting, I worry that we are not always listening to what Jesus might be showing us about our actions.

What I really find troubling is when through our self-righteous attitudes we treat others like crap. Especially those who we do not think know that we are claiming to be Christ followers. Being a Christ follower doesn’t mean you are perfect, but it does mean you probably should stop being an asshole. My friend was telling me stories of his crew (not Christians) who go into the homes of Christians to do work and find that they are some of the worst of the people out there. Why is this the case? What makes us think that being a Christian makes no difference in how we treat others, especially when we think they might not realize we are Christians? Why does it not disturb us more that as soon as they see our Jesus bumper sticker they have that aha moment as to why we’ve been an asshole to them?

I get that not everyone will care to hear this. I hope some will. I myself am trying to be a good witness in all I do, and yes part of that is carefully choosing my words in this post. The bottom line is that claiming to have had a life changing encounter with someone like Jesus must mean more than just walking around feeling like you have one up on everyone else. Following Christ is costly, it will cost you your right to be an asshole.

Thanks Bob for the food for thought.