• Why couldn't the disciples heal the demon-possessed boy? Did they really not even have "faith as small as a mustard seed"?

• Jesus' reprimand seems harsh. What, exactly, is he reprimanding them for?

• What role does our faith play in how God chooses to answer our prayers?

I've been similarly struck by the richness of Scripture in my small group this spring as we studied the Psalms using a method called manuscript study. With a print-out of our chosen psalm for the week in front of us, sans verse numbers and paragraph breaks, we'd spend some time marking it up individually: circling repeated words and phrases, underlining similes and metaphors, highlighting contrasts, writing down questions. And then we'd discuss, looking again and again at the text, answering questions as we could and drawing from other resources when we weren't sure, keeping in mind the historical and literary settings. And the psalms--at once seemingly self-evident ("How precious to me are your thoughts, God!") and yet full of interjections that seem to come out of nowhere ("If only you, God, would slay the wicked!")--came alive in new ways as we saw the implications for our lives.

Inductive Bible study--looking back at the text to make observations, to answer questions and interpret passages in their broader context, and to draw conclusions for our own lives--has long been a core element of IVP's publishing program. Of the many, many inductive Bible study guides we've published over the years (starting with Discovering the Gospel of Mark by InterVarsity Christian Fellowship staff worker Jane Hollingsworth in 1943), perhaps our best-known series is our LifeGuide Bible studies. The first seven were published in 1985. Today we have well over a hundred guides with over ten million sold, and we continue to publish new ones every year. They provide a fantastic inductive study for individuals or groups.

Because Scripture is so cohesive and often so confusing, so accessible and yet so complex, so simple and yet so multifaceted and many-layered, though, we wanted to offer inductive study plus--a resource that builds on our original LifeGuides to take people even deeper into the riches of Scripture by examining the same passage from multiple angles. And so our LifeGuides in Depth series has been born.

As the LifeGuide guru around here these days, I have the privilege of editing the inaugural volumes. I'm currently about two-thirds of the way through my first one, A Deeper Look at James. In addition to the original James LifeGuide, this new resource includes, for each study, an interactive "Connect" section that highlights other portions of Scripture James was drawing on in his letter, a short reading that gives space for deeper reflection, and a group discussion guide that allows for lively interaction regarding the first three sections as well as nitty-gritty practical application.

The result? Well, let's just say if you and James were Facebook friends before, after this guide you'll be BFFs. Or if he was, say, your sister's boyfriend or a distant second cousin--well, you'll know him like he's part of your immediate family. But you won't just know James and his teaching; as you'll learn in the guide, to hear (in this case, "read") in biblical times was to do. Our hope is that this new series will help us all in just that way--to become not just hearers of the word, but people who do it.

I realize that Christians tend to have a love/hate relationship with James. He does have some pretty hard things to say, after all (such as, "You adulterous people"; nice to be hit with that in your morning quiet time, huh?). But, as we see the historical context James is drawing from, starting right with verse 1 where he addresses his letter to "the twelve tribes scattered among the nations," his sometimes harsh words, though still challenging, make more sense and are a bit easier to absorb.

Editing this first study in the series is drawing on all my faculties--my knowledge of Scripture (Was James really drawing from the Old Testament when he said this? How would James's readers have interpreted this phrase? Is the connection to James clear in this exercise on Hosea?), my text-copyediting skills (Do these paragraphs in the reading flow together? Is the punctuation conformed to our house style? Will the reader be confused by this sentence?) and my Bible study-editing skills (Does this question make sense? Will it generate good discussion? Does it have the larger context of the passage in view? Are the most important points in the passage covered?). I'm being challenged in new ways as an editor--and as a studier of Scripture myself, as I learn new facts and, albeit somewhat subconsciously, take in and reflect on James's exhortations, even when I'm not working on the guide. Thankfully, seasoned Bible-study authors Andy and Phyllis Le Peau--longtime studiers and teachers and lovers of Scripture--have made my job easier by all the work they did (in their vast amounts of "spare" time between work and ministry and Very Cute grandkids) on this first draft.

Unfortunately for you, eager reader, the fact that I'm editing this great resource now means that it won't be available to you till next June. Consider this your sneak peek at the menu of the great "solid food" (not milk, to reference another New Testament great) to come. And this is just one of four; three other LifeGuides in Depth will be appearing in the spring as well: A Deeper Look at Daniel, A Deeper Look at the Fruit of the Spirit and A Deeper Look at the Sermon on the Mount. While you wait, you can decide which one you want to do first. And you can pray that God would deepen your love for him and his Word, and your love for others. That's been--and still is--our prayer for you. And I think I know James well enough to say that that would be his prayer too.

***

Related books you might like: How to Lead a LifeGuide Bible Study, Transforming Bible Study and The Bible Study Handbook (forthcoming).

Also check out Andy's post on our first inductive Bible study at Andy Unedited.

But I digress. I'm supposed to be appreciating Rebecca. So I'll start by introducing you to Rebecca Carhart, a former editorial intern here at InterVarsity Press who recently joined the staff as a part-time editorial assistant while she completes her graduate degree. She blogs here; you'll like her stuff.

She's not the only Rebecca in the vicinity of Strangely Dim, of course; until very recently we had a Rebecca among our cobloggers: Rebecca Larson, who served as IVP's web content and community manager for several years. She left IVP for a new job in March; fortunately for us, she works just down the road apiece, so we still get to see her every now and then. But you probably don't. So to make your National Rebecca Appreciation Month plans a little easier, here are some of Rebecca's greatest hits from Strangely Dim.

"The Unexpected Guest," a post about becoming a parent.

"Love Gets Smaller," a post about being a neighbor.

"Summer Madlib," a quick, playful diversion.

"The Gospel in Glee," a riff on how choir singing can be a spiritual practice.

And finally, "Bye, Bye, Miss American Pie," our bittersweet farewell to Rebecca post from a couple of months ago.

So, those are the Rebeccas we know. We hope you like them; National Rebecca Appreciation Month is as good an excuse as any to show them (and all the other Rebeccas, and really anyone who needs it) some love.

We've decided to celebrate April Fool's Month by trying our hand at writing Scripture, in the spirit of John's letters to seven churches in the book of Revelation and the recently released Letters to a Future Church. This is Lisa's entry. Feel free to respond and retweet (use the hashtag #letters2afuturechurch).

***

Dear Church,

I've got brides on my mind. Three in particular. One is a friend whose wedding is in a few weeks. About a year ago, while she was unassumedly going about her life, teaching college students and writing and singing in her church choir, God completely surprised her with a new relationship. I love to think about God's delight in getting to delight her and her soon-to-be husband in that way. Two weeks ago I got to see her in her wedding dress (and learned to bustle it--no small task, let me tell you!). Beautiful on ordinary days, she was stunning in the layers of white and beads and lace. I'm excited to celebrate at her wedding.

The second bride on my mind was seemingly surprised by God too. After many years of being on her own, she--a mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and surrogate grandmother to many--will be married in June. And her beauty also seems to have an added glow if you look closely.

The third bride I'm thinking of is us. You and me, the church. I know--it's not easy to picture ourselves as radiant and beautiful, dressed in white, in the midst of the muck and sadness and failure and shame and sin that we live in. Most days we do not feel very bride-like. At the very least, I think most of us would say we have a lot of scrubbing and cleaning up to do before we'd even think about showing up at someone else's wedding as a guest--much less as the bride.

But that's not what Jesus says (and, him being the groom and all, who are we to argue?). Jesus looks at us, sees all of our mess and the beauty it's hiding, and says "You are loved, you are loved, you are loved."

Our job, sweet Church, is not to clean ourselves up but rather to believe Jesus' words and accept his love. When we do that, crazy things begin happening. Jesus himself starts to clean us up, wiping away the dirt and grime, the lies and abuse, the lines on our face from fatigue and stress. And slowly, the beauty he has seen all along becomes visible to others, and we start to look more and more like what we are: a radiant bride on her wedding day.

If you've ever watched someone fall in love or observed someone starved for love begin to receive it, you know how love changes someone. You know that it changes everything. Which is why Jesus so badly wants us to accept his love for us, and live out of that place of security. In Show Me the Way, Henri Nouwen explains, "When Jesus talks about faith, he means first of all to trust unreservedly that you are loved." Why? Nouwen's answer is simply this: "So that you can abandon every false way of obtaining love." When we know and believe we are loved, we're set free to live and love fully, without reservation. Jealousy, judgment, objectification of others, perfectionism, materialism are all curbed because we feel affirmed and secure in God's love. Addictions, and all our unhealthy ways of coping with pain, are healed because we trust ourselves to the love and care of the One who created us, and who himself was "a man of suffering, and familiar with pain" (Isaiah 53:3). Knowing we're loved allows us to serve, celebrate, encourage and help others joyfully; there's no need to compete with them to prove our value, gossip about them or belittle them to make ourselves feel stronger, or lash out at them in anger when they disappoint us. Rooted in love, we live out that love toward others. True love makes us beautiful.

It should, of course, be the easiest thing in the world to accept how deeply and unconditionally we're loved by God. We want to be loved, after all; we crave it. To be told that we're loved as we are, right now, should cause us to sit in wonder in the "just-got-engaged-to-the-love-of-my-life" glow for the rest of our lives.

Yet somehow we've almost convinced ourselves that it can't be true that Jesus has chosen us as his bride, that he's making us clean and pure and white even as he sees our sin and filth. And it definitely can't be true that his love is unconditional--that there's nothing we can do to earn it or lose it. That kind of love doesn't fit into our finite, fallen framework. So we keep flailing our arms, floundering in the mud to find something that makes us feel valued. We rage against those who don't agree with us, feeling threatened by their beliefs. We exhaust ourselves, at the expense of our family, by serving in every ministry available to earn God's favor, or we work all day every day, at the expense of community, to earn our parents' (or boss's or neighbors' or children's) approval. We throw ourselves into codependent relationships or accept abuse as the price of love.

Meanwhile, Jesus keeps loving, keeps inviting us to come to him and rest in his love. I envision him weeping over us, sometimes, as he wept over Jerusalem because his chosen ones didn't realize or wouldn't accept the fact that Love, and the life that knowing we're loved brings, was right there among them, just waiting for them to take hold of his offer.

Love is in your midst too, Church, as near and accessible now as he was to the Jews in the first century. And I want you to know that he thinks you're beautiful. So do I. I have observed you and been part of you my whole life. As a pastor's kid, I saw much of your dirty sinfulness--the ugly anger and unforgiveness--and much of your beauty--the sacrificial acts of faith, the wobbly steps of growth. I still see those in you (myself included) today. But I also see you being transformed by love, slowly and steadily. I see the glow, the sparkle in your eyes, the beads and lace and yards of white being woven for your wedding day.

Until then, take every opportunity you have to be with your groom. Let him whisper words of love to your heart. Let them sink down deeply into the tired, shameful, sinful places of your soul. Let him show you the ways you're trying to obtain love apart from him. And let yourself consider the truth that he loves you. That truth will transform you--and the world.

With much love,

Lisa

***

In the Introduction to Letters of a Future Church, Andy Crouch observes that 

a letter, it seems to me, requires one crucial quality that few electronic messages attain: an old-fashioned word, consideration. Writing a letter is an act of considering. Letters require pausing, contemplating, stopping whatever else we are doing and making ourselves available to consider . . .

Pausing. Contemplating. Stopping.

Not the kind of thoughtful reflection most of us multi-tasking Americans are known for, but without which matters worthy of significant consideration--like the future of the church--simply pass us by.

In case you haven't been following along, in Letters to a Future Church, editor Chris Lewis and his friends pose a simple yet significant question: If you had one thing to say to the church, what would it be? We here at Strangely Dim are tipping our hand at actually answering it.

At first, the best I could come up with was this:

Dear Church,

Writing a letter to you seems awkward. And weird. 

Sincerely,

Suanne

But when I took Andy's words into consideration, I was surprised where my musings took me.

Stick with me here for just a moment. Back up twenty years to a high school gym. I was swapping sweat with a handful of girls whose skin color was virtually nonexistent in my small rural community when I was accused of spitting out a racial slur (which I didn't say) and was temporarily ejected from the game. My coach (who happened to be my dad) came to my defense; he knew that the accusation was completely out of character with who I actually was. While the incident was ultimately resolved, I was left with the sting of being falsely accused, reminding me in a small way (a very small way) of the pain Jesus endured when he "was killed even though he hadn't harmed anyone" (Isaiah 53:9 NIRV). It's the same prick I feel when people hurl insults at the church. 

And so, my mind fresh off this consideration, my letter would start something like this:

Dear Church,

Sometimes I wonder how it must feel to be you. I understand that you, like all of us, have your limitations. But the venom with which labels get plastered on your doors--hypocritical, judgmental, homophobic, sexist, racist, irrelevant--is, I think, sadly unfair. When I consider the authority with which your own Father commissioned you and yet the criticism you endure, I grieve. For these accusations are a reflection of neither who I've understood you to be or of what the Bible itself declares you to be.

While I admit that my perspective has its own limitations, I still find myself marveling at your beauty.

I've watched firsthand as you've adopted orphans, built schools and emptied out your pockets to help those in need. I've cheered you on as you've pushed yourself twenty-six excruciating miles so children you've never met could have clean water. I have cried over your commitment to rescuing the oppressed. I have stood in awe as you've rebuilt communities destroyed by catastrophe and served as a haven for those with nowhere else to go. I have admired how you've abandoned your own comforts to live in gun-riddled neighborhoods, war-infested countries and culture-shocking villages all in the name of love. I have sighed with relief as you've rocked my sleepless babies, overflowed with gratitude as you've brought food to my door, felt your companionship as I've walked through painful loneliness, and wept with indebtedness as you've extended to me the hand of God's amazing grace.

I believe a day is coming when your goodness and grace will overshadow whatever imperfections you may bear. A day when those who know you best will stand up and declare you for who you are: a beautiful picture of redemption and hope for a broken and hurting world, the true reflection of who your Father created you to be.

Alas, there's always more to say, but for today, that will have to be enough.

With love,

Suanne

***

Dear Future Church:

Hi! How are you? I am fine . . .

That's the essence of every letter I wrote as a child. I never really mastered the craft, quite honestly. I felt challenged by the task on two fronts:

• Front number one: The task was too great. To put together a proxy, something that could represent me to people I loved or respected or otherwise needed to be heard by, something that came close to being me in paper and ink, intimidated me to the point of wordlessness--even thoughtlessness. I would sit down to write and come up with nothing.
• Front number two: The task was too mundane. To write a letter is to communicate without a feedback loop, to do all the work of a conversation with none of the help. Writing a letter was like mowing the lawn or eating your brussels sprouts--except that at least with those chores you were getting some fresh air or some vitamins.

So, yeah, I wrote bad letters, if I wrote them at all. In case you got a letter from me (or in case I owed you a letter and never sent one), I feel bad about it, for whatever that's worth.

Getting a letter, that's a whole different thing. I loved getting letters, or cards, or even junk mail. There's an implicit affirmation of your existence in every letter sent to you: someone somewhere had you in mind for a message, or saw you as part of a larger community worth contacting. Letters let us know that we're not alone, that we're worth corresponding with.

Correspondence is a good thing. It implies connection and, well, correspondence. We are like one another--at least enough like one another to merit a conversation, no matter how remote. Letters may be filled with pain and vitriol, they may be soaked in sap or drenched in pandering. They may be saddled with misunderstanding; they may even conceal an attempt at manipulation. But at their essence they're an acknowledgment: you and I have something in common. More primally, they acknowledge (sometimes begrudgingly) that neither I nor you are its.

That statement--the acknowledgment of our mutual non-it-ness--might seem on the surface to be not worth the paper it's written on. Of course we're not its, you may be thinking. I don't need a letter to tell me that! I would suggest, however, that each of us needs exactly that--and not just once but over and over and over again.

We occupy a world where objectification is increasingly common--where people are regularly reduced to caricatures (the better to dismiss or demonize or proselytize you with). Corporations are counted as people even as human beings are referenced more often by number than by name. People are bundled together as aggregates, and their deepest concerns and desires are measured by statistics. In such a cold, calculating world, a simple letter affirming a person's non-it-ness is an act of Spirit-led defiance, an act of Spirit-prompted mercy and love.

Beyond that, in a world increasingly detached from itself--where people's understanding of history is limited to their own time and space, where generational injustice and chronological snobbery are real things, where we regularly doom ourselves to repeat history--letters are a countercultural act of faith. Letters are concrete and permanent; they reject abstraction and ephemera. They anchor ideas and intuitions to history by way of paper and ink. Our letters to one another appeal to our common apprehension of things--our language, our culture, the things surrounding us. Both explicitly (by what we write) and implicitly (by the act of writing) our letters declare that something (more primally, Someone) binds us to one another.

Christians have always understood ourselves to be, under the headship of Christ, one body with many members. We each are connected intimately to a great cloud of witnesses who came before us; we are connected by the Word and the Spirit and the Father to all the children of God across time and space. This conviction of connection has helped Christians, indidually and collectively, to endure martyrdom, even to fight it from afar. It has helped us hold fast to eternal truth even as the winds and whims of the world around us threaten to set us adrift. We have been graced by our mutuality with the ability to confess the sins of our forebears as our own sins, and to achieve reconciliation that eludes people not so connected. Once, Peter tells us in a letter, we were not a people, only mere atomized individuals; but by faith we confidently declare ourselves by the grace of God to be not its but a We--the people of God.

I hope that you will continue to acknowledge your We-ness, dear future church. I hope you retain those connections not only to my present church and the church that came before me, but to the church that will come after you into remotest futurity. And not only this church of the past and the future, but also the church that extends from where you find yourself as you read this letter to the ends of the earth. We are none of us its, after all; we have letters from apostles and prophets and from the author and finisher of our faith who tell us as much. We have never been its; we are--though many throughout the earth and throughout the ages--one body in this one Lord.

Now we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in order to put the issue where it is supposed to be--and force everybody to see that there are thirteen hundred of God's children here suffering, sometimes going hungry, going through dark and dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come out. That's the issue. And we've got to say to the nation: We know how it's coming out. For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory. . . .

It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preacher must talk about the new New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do. . . .

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

One day later, on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King was shot dead. But on April 3 he told the crowd, "I'm not worried about anything," because "mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!" That's as worthy of reflection as his earlier speech about the content of our character and his letter about the arc of justice. To anticipate one's death and yet to not worry is remarkable, and particularly poignant in years like this one, when the anniversary of MLK's death overlaps with Holy Week and Jesus' atonement on the cross.

The scriptures tell us that Jesus endured the cross, with all its pain and humiliation and injustice, in joy. He was able to do so because his sights were set on the kingdom of God, which no worldly power could overcome. The greater good may seem far from reality, Holy Week reminds us, but it is God's dream, and so it will ultimately prevail.

We often lose sight of that reality--or, maybe more to the point, we outsource the dream of God to exotic people of faith like Martin Luther King or Moses or Jesus. We far too easily settle for a safe life. We wouldn't say it out loud--we wouldn't even allow ourselves to think it--but we see God's kingdom as not worthy of our personal risk.

So it's good to have reminders every now and then that God's dream is (or ought to be) the dream of all of God's people as well--not just the ancients (like Moses) and the superstars of the contemporary Christian stage (like MLK)--and that God's dream for the world is not exotic but everyday, touching our daily decisions and our most mundane interactions with people and institutions and other matters of God's concern. So today, of all days, and this week, of all weeks, it's good to reflect on safety, risk and a kingdom imagination. Leroy Barber, CEO of Mission Year, is an appropriate choice to lead us in that reflection, in this passage from his new book Everyday Missions: How Ordinary People Can Change the World.

Safety drives many of our decisions, such as where we live, where our kids go to school, even where we will go to do something as insignificant as watching a movie. "Is it safe?" This question rings in our psyche over and over again. Of course, the reality is that what we mean by being safe is only what feels safe. While there are ways of minimizing our risk, there is nothing that can guarantee our protection and well-being. There are only gadgets and choices that make us think we are safe.

Meanwhile, when safety becomes a priority measure in our lives, I believe it traps us in the ordinary. Our kingdom imagination is limited when we stop risking for the gospel. The question for me is this: Are we willing to knowingly take risks? Are we prepared to turn over our fears and insatiable need to feel safe to God as an offering? Are we willing, for the sake of the kingdom, to face dangers head on, knowing that we cannot even pretend to protect ourselves from the consequences? . . .

What then is risk? It is not wild, indiscriminate actions, but rather the ability to count the cost of an action. Risk in a theological sense is understanding the reality of a given situation--its capacity to cause us inconvenience or even harm--and then surrendering that given reality to the larger reality that our kingdom imagination and our God-confidence offer us. Our personal risk is then placed in the context of the greater good--God's dream for the world we find ourselves in. Any risk is (or ought to be) acceptable if it is in service to the greater good, and if we trust that the greater good will establish itself regardless of the circumstances, then risk becomes functionally irrelevant.

And yet the idea of taking up pen or pixel and the apostolic task is an intriguing exercise. What would you write, given the chance, to set the table for future fellowship? What convictions have you cultivated in your own discipleship, what lessons learned, that warrant bequeathing them to a future generation? As Annie Dillard put it in The Writing Life, "What would you begin writing if you knew you would die soon? What could you say to a dying person that would not enrage by its triviality?"

John's letters from exile inspired the 2010 Eighth Letter conference, where people from all walks of life and levels of notoriety picked up where John left off and wrote to people of faith who will come after them. The Epiphaneia Network, who convened that conference, went on to collect several of those letters (along with some new ones) into the book Letters to a Future Church, recently published in our Likewise line. Such an undertaking shows moxie, and we respect moxie. So we thought we'd honor their effort by trying our own hands at it.

Over the next few weeks we'll be drafting our letters and posting them here, for your enjoyment and response. We hope you will respond, and if the muse strikes you to draft your own letters, we hope you'll share them with us by posting your links in our comments. If you're so inclined, you can even tweet links to our letters and yours with the hashtag #letters2afuturechurch. If nothing else, tweets and hashtags will remind us that we're not actually writing Scripture or anything crazy like that. It's been done: John's letters--not to mention Peter's, James's, Paul's and whoever wrote Hebrews--have served the church well over millennia, and they don't need any supplementing from us. But that doesn't invalidate our campaign; it simply puts our effort in a proper context. Who knows, after all, how God might use our words, our letters, to transform his church for the sake of the world he loves?

I guess we'll find out.

It was a ridiculous suggestion. In fifteen years of marriage, we'd negotiated some pretty rough waters, but never once had we agreed on the toppings that would adorn a communal pizza. So when he stepped out of line toward the restroom and casually tossed "Order whatever you want" over his shoulder, I was momentarily paralyzed. Then elated. Spinach and mushroom with goat cheese. Mmmmm.

But then I thought of Mother Teresa and the quote that had been worming its way through my brain for the last several months.

I hadn't fully read Margot Starbuck's third release, Small Things with Great Love, but the title (which stems from Mother Teresa's famous words, "We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love") had infiltrated much of my day. The idea of counting small things as valuable in the midst of a hectic life season was deliciously appealing. Maybe I couldn't volunteer in the mentoring program in downtown Chicago like I wanted to or jet off to teach leadership development in Rwanda with my church, but loving people in small ways? Now that I could handle.

Small things, I thought.

But it's just a pizza.

With great love,it echoed. Seriously Suanne, it's just a pizza.

Dangnabbit. Before I could change my mind, I stepped to the counter and, in one dying-to-self breath, I ordered the barbeque chicken pizza smothered with caramelized onions, to the shock and delight of my husband when he came back to our booth.

I almost broke my arm patting myself on the back. For weeks. Then one afternoon I was sitting in my office, cozied up with Margot's book, and I blushed at how drastically I missed the point.

In chapter four (titled "Our Own"), Margot shares her own passionate amore for her husband and kids, but then she adds what should be obvious: "Sacrificing for my own isn't really so noble. . . . I'm not knocking it," she says, "I just don't think it's the end of the story."

Hmph. I guess my pizza thing wasn't such a big deal after all.

Margot continues:

"It ain't so hard at all to sacrifice for these, our own. The real kicker is that when we are entirely identified with the triune God, the ones who are God's own become our own. The orphan, wherever he is found, becomes our own in exactly the same way that he is God's own. The widow, the one who's been left alone, becomes our own just the way that she is God's own. The hungry neighbor, across town and across the globe, becomes our own in the same way that he or she is God's own. The sick, the ones who suffer, become our own in the same way that they are God's own. The prisoner, the one who has been forgotten, becomes our own in exactly the same manner that he is God's own."

Reading Margot's words left me with the same prickly conviction I feel anytime I read Jesus' words in the Sermon on the Mount: "If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even the pagans do that." What I love about Small Things with Great Love is that Margot challenges our complacency at the same time she extends us grace. She recognizes the unique and varying stages of life we find ourselves in and encourages us to love our neighbors from wherever we are. In a world that's obsessed with the big and the grand, Margot, like Mother Teresa, encourages us to do the small things that display God's extravagant love to those we encounter (or maybe need to encounter) every day.

But not just to the ones we naturally consider our own -- and this really is the point-- the ones we uncomfortably consider as well. The ones that Jesus moved towards and lived among and feasted amidst and healed from within -- the poor, the prisoner and the brokenhearted. The ones, as Margot points out, that dwelled in the center of his Father's heart. "In this," says Margot, "his Father's own became his own."

May it be true of us as well.

• Jim Sire, the emeritus editorial director, occasional diplomat and famous author of books like The Universe Next Door
• Andy Le Peau, future emeritus editorial director, blogger at Andy Unedited and coauthor of the official anecdotal history of InterVarsity Press, Heart. Soul. Mind. Strength.
• Al Hsu, associate editor with the standing record for most offices occupied, world traveler, penner of the most informative birthday greetings on Facebook and author of books like The Suburban Christian
• Adrianna Wright, improvisational comedian, equestrian, online publicity manager and resident extrovert
• Bob Fryling, publisher of InterVarsity Press with a decades-long tenure as leader and mentor to IVP staff and InterVarsity Christian Fellowship campus ministers alike, and author of The Leadership Ellipse and every goo-goo-eyed pair's favorite resource, A Handbook for Engaged Couples

You might say these folks, but you'd be wrong. The IVP employee you know best is Rebecca Larson, web content and community manager, occasional cover designer and Mad Lib guru. You know Rebecca because she's behind a big chunk of the stuff about IVP that you find yourself coming into contact with.

Rebecca oversees our social media presence and writes our Likewise Notebook (the occasional e-newsletter you would receive if you would only click here and sign up for it). She's managed many of our reader surveys over the years and designed, among other things, the cover for the fourth edition of Jim Sire's The Universe Next Door (see above) and the logo for a currently gestating line of books. (More on that to come.) She's been the face of our occasional Whiteboard video communiques and a regular anonymous player in our occasional in-house-generated book promotional videos. And maybe most importantly, she's been contributing to Strangely Dim for two and half years. And now she's leaving.

Rebecca's been with IVP for thirteen years, which is hard to believe. We've been coworkers and friends through any number of life transitions, from her wedding (my first and last failed attempt at DJing) to her move across the country and eventual return to Chicago, to the birth last year of her son, who through an accident of timing became the first visitor in IVP's history to be required to sign in and wear a nametag. Rebecca is as iconic an IVP employee as all those folks you thought you knew so well. She's proven herself omnicompetent and omnipleasant(tm), to the point that it's hard to imagine IVP without her.

Turns out she's taken a job just down the road apiece, which is nice for the occasional lunch or whatnot, but as pertains to ad hoc Mad Libs and shared playlists on iTunes, we're all out of luck. Please pray for us, and please add your comments below to wish Rebecca the best.

In the almost two years we’ve been in our condo, my husband and I have gotten to know our three neighbors pretty well. There’s Judy, an elderly woman who lives with her miniature poodle and sometimes shares her small space with her divorced son and his two children. And there’s Jon, who’s in his fifties and has cerebral palsy. Despite his disability he lives a very independent life, working for the county convalescence home and creating elaborate landscapes for his extensive model train collection. And then there’s Christa. She’s also living alone (her faithful dog, Joey, died last fall) and in her seventies. She still loves to paint and sculpt, and she’s full of fascinating stories of her youth in Germany, where she played in the Black Forest, took boat cruises down the Rhine river and lost her brother in World War II (he fought on the German side).

Lately I’ve been reading two books that have been shaping the way I view my relationship to these neighbors: The Wisdom of Stability by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove and Small Things with Great Love by Margot Starbuck. The first asks us to consider the power of staying in one place. The second challenges us to consider the power of doing small, manageable things to show God’s love. Here’s a video of Margot talking about the concept.

So what does that look like in my life? I work full time, and currently my husband is working out of town and coming home on the weekends, so I have my hands full taking care of my nine-month-old son (you single parents out there deserve a medal for what you do each day!), doing laundry, paying bills, making food, shopping for groceries and generally keeping the home fires burning. In this busy season of life, it’s easy to get bogged down by all my responsibilities and feel as though doing anything to show God’s love to a world in need is simply beyond my abilities, much less my inclinations. How can I possibly show love to anyone, and does anything I can do really matter?

As I’ve prayed over these questions, Margot’s encouragement has been so refreshing. Instead of making me feel guilty because I can’t run off and solve all the world’s problems, she has empowered me to look for ways I can give to those around me in the life he’s given me. God has reminded me that I don’t have to go far to find people who need his love—in fact there are three of them living less than twenty feet from me who I see on an almost daily basis. Together we’ve already gone through a major flooding of our neighborhood, losing power and huddling by an emergency lamp under the staircase during a storm and fighting three feet of snow last winter.

In these times and smaller daily interactions, God has already been bringing along opportunities to do small things to show love like:

• Hugging Christa and praying with her when we met in the hall on the day after her sister died in Germany. She was so sad that she couldn’t afford to return home for the funeral.
• Inviting Judy and Christa to our church’s Christmas tea.
• Promptly fixing the bathroom drain in our shower that was leaking into Jon’s bedroom below.
• Visiting Christa as a family every few weeks so she can see the baby. Sometimes we share a meal with her.
• Helping to chase down Judy’s poodle when she escaped and Judy couldn’t look for her because she had to go to work.
• Chatting with Jon about politics, work and his new remodeling projects.
• Offering a reassuring squeeze of the hand and reminder of God’s providence when Christa is worrying about her future (it’s a good reminder for me too!).

Sometimes I wonder what impact these small things have on our neighbors’ lives, really. I mean, I’m not helping Christa with her financial stresses. I can’t pay for her to go back to Germany. I don’t have more room to offer Judy when she’s got her son and his kids crammed into her place with her. I can’t do any heavy lifting for Jon or somehow take away his disability.

Recently we thought we might have to move again, and we let our “community” know about our impending change. That’s when I realized that all these little things do add up to something. Christa’s eyes filled with tears at the news. “Oh, I really wish you didn’t have to move,” she said looking away. “It means so much to me, knowing you’re here …”

I will admit that there are plenty of times I don’t feel like even doing small things for these folks. I have a lot on my plate, and it takes energy to think of others after I’ve already thought of myself, much less to put them first! But when I remember the look on Christa’s face, I know why I do it. Because showing her love is a way of communicating the love I receive from Christ. Because being a friend to an older person who is lonely is one way I can give just a bit of that love back to Jesus. Because maybe one day I’ll have built enough trust and relationship capital to share directly with Jon, Judy or Christa about the God I know and love, and invite them to come further into his agape. It’s my small way of working to bring about God’s kingdom of love on earth.

It looks like we won’t be moving anytime soon after all, thankfully, so there’s still time to cultivate these relationships. I think I’ll take a bowl of chili down to Christa tonight. In one way it’s not much. In another, it’s everything.

What about you? How can you do a small thing with great love for those God has placed in your life?

Truth be told, for several years now I've wanted to be involved in some type of justice work--work that says to the most abused and abandoned: You are a precious child of God, worth fighting for with all the resources we've got, until justice is won. I've done the small, seemingly easy things like giving money to organizations working for justice and doing some reading to become more informed about particular issues. My work at IVP on books like Welcoming Justice, Just Courage, Daughters of Hope and Following Jesus Through the Eye of the Needle has also kept me connected to the pulse of justice work. But often, as I sit in my safe little cubicle, I wonder if the small things (read: anything less than quitting my job, getting a more "useful" degree like law, medicine or social work, and living among the poor) really matter in the incredibly huge pool of justice work that needs to be done.

In Small Things with Great Love, Margot emphatically says yes, the attempts we make at loving others that seem so small to us do in fact make a difference in the world. She writes:

Is God scowling in judgment because we're changing the batteries in our smoke detectors instead of going door to door collecting eyeglasses to send to Haiti? Is God looking down from heaven feeling sort of resentful that we're using the "look inside" function on Amazon.com instead of visiting prisoners? . . . I simply don't think [that's] the case. Here's why: God's love for you and God's love for the world in need cannot be separated. God's longing to see you liberated for life that really is life can't be neatly pulled apart from God's longing to see the poor liberated for life that really is life. . . . Can you see what great news it is that this serendipitous double liberation isn't something extra we do? . . . . The regular stuff of our lives--the commute to work and the potlucks and home improvement projects and errands and play dates--are the exact places in which we express and experience God's love for a world in need.

Yes, Margot, I can see what great news that is! But it's not just great news for little ol' proofreading, copyediting, cubicle-dwelling me. The truth is that she also wrote this book for you, sweet wanting-to-make-a-difference-in-the-world-by-loving-others-with-the-love-of-Christ Strangely Dim reader. Yes, you. Whether you're married or not; male or female; young or old; or living in the city, the suburbs or the nice, quiet, beautiful countryside waking up to the sounds of cows mooing, there's a chapter specifically for your age and stage of life that's chock-full of small ways you can engage the world around you with real love. "Small things happen when I learn the name of my daughter's school bus driver," Margot writes. "Small things happen when I listen to the dreams of a woman who lives in a group home on my block. Small things happen when I risk crossing a language barrier even though I look really stupid doing it." Her life and her observations of the lives of others have led her to this simple conclusion: "Embracing the adventure of loving a world in need is--at its best--about giving Jesus, in us, access, through us, to the ones already around us he already loves."

Feeling inspired? And maybe even free to stay in your current non-slum work/home situation without guilt, trusting that God can use you in the places he's called you to? Us too. For the month of February, Dave, Suanne, Rebecca and I will be blogging about our attempts to do small things with great love as we walk through our ordinary, pay-the-bills, change diapers, go-grocery-shopping days. And we would love to have you join us in learning to love the people around you--family and strangers, friends and enemies, neighbors and garbage collectors--more intentionally. Then leave us a comment telling us your story so that we can celebrate together God's work in us, through us, around us.

Before we start our adventure together, though, let me offer one word of caution for you and for us here: Doing small things with great love, however more feasible and less overwhelming it might feel than having to single-handedly wipe out AIDS/HIV in Africa, is not easy. It takes intention. It might, for example, involve some sacrifice and hard choices, such as creating a bit more margin in your life so that you have space to listen to and watch for the opportunities God brings your way. It also takes faith--faith to trust that the One who made us with certain gifts and called us to the particular place we are will use us there to love the others he loves. And faith to trust that the One who did miracles with small things like a few fish and a bit of bread or an almost-empty flour pot in a time of drought can still do big things through our small offerings--even an offering of faith as small as a mustard seed.

Ready?

We also made well-known bookstore owner Byron Borger's lists (part one and part two) of his favorite books of the year. Several times, in fact. Here's what he says about just a few:

For the ever-popular Practicing the Way of Jesus: "It covers so many topics and, without being pushy, it does offer very good guidance on how to initiate and move towards greater faithfulness in daily living in the ways of Christ."

For The Story of God, the Story of Us (he starts to gush a little with this one): "Oh my, how I resonated with this, how I loved his creative retelling of the stories of Israel and church [and] how he offered this edgy, energetic vision of how getting lost in this story is the way to life." He also wants to nominate author Sean Gladding for an Oscar ("Gladding should get an award for best screen play").

For Jamie Arpin-Ricci's The Cost of Community: "There are lots of good stories of [Arpin-Ricci and his community's] journey (and the dramatic stuff that happens in urban ministry) and there are upbeat examples of great joy in the journey. But, too, this is serious stuff, inviting us--challenging us--to take Christ seriously, as Francis did. . . . Three cheers."

For The Theological Turn in Youth Ministry by Andrew Root and Kenda Creasy Dean (one of my favorites of the year as well): "If the thesis of Christian Smith's important work (Soul Searching, upon which Dean built her famous book Almost Christian) is true--namely that churches are not doing a very good job helping youth name their spiritual yearnings or giving them categories to think theologically about life and discipleship--then this is a rich and vital answer, to that strong critique of our thin approaches. . . . I'm telling you, this is one of the best books of the year. If you are not in youth ministry, buy it for somebody who is."

And then, for Small Things with Great Love by Margot Starbuck (another favorite of mine; check back soon for much more to come on this book at Strangely Dim): "It pushes us, calls us, invites us, teaches us, shows us, how to reach out to others, how to see the alienation and poverty and sadness around us and to take up the vocation of being Christ's hands and feet in this world of need. There is literally something for everyone."

Byron also highlights several Formatio and IVP Academic books. (And no, he really is not a paid employee of IVP.)

So if you need something intellectually stimulating, spiritually challenging and potentially life-transforming to do to pass the time until the best-of-2011 movies are announced on Oscar night, pick up one or two IVP favorites from 2011 and let us know what you think. (On the other hand, if you don't want to be spiritually or intellectually challenged or to change anyone's life--yours or others'--feel free to keep playing video games and watching The Bachelor while your brain cells die off, one by one, and your perception of reality gets more and more twisted. Just don't ever say we never did anything to help you . . .)

It's one of my favorite quotes, and the one that keeps running through my head as I try to put an objective spin on my favorite IVP books of 2011. Honestly, it's a ridiculous idea. We label things like books and movies and music and art as "favorites" not solely for what they are (for their transporting melodies or poetic prose) but for how they make us feel, and for what they reveal about our own souls. Remaining objective requires that we leave behind that which is uniquely us--our biases and idiosyncrasies, our experiences and baggage--that which has shaped us and formed us and leaves us longing for more. Objective is boring. And, I'd argue, impossible.

And so favorites, like opinions, are as subjective as they come. If not, we'd all run off and get new ones. With that epiphany, here's my Subjective Best of 2011.

Publishers Weekly called Invitations from God by Adele Calhoun "a persistent critique of modern culture and of status quo Christianity." Hearts and Minds Books called it "a treasure" that requires us to take inventory of that which we accept and reject, and to examine how it shapes who we are.

It also happens to be written by a friend of mine. I met Adele six years ago when my husband accepted a job at the church where Adele worked. I knew her first as pastor, then as mentor and now as friend. During pseudo-therapy sessions on her sofa or muddy hikes through the woods, our conversations dripped with both the anticipation and the anxiety (mostly mine) of hearing and responding to God's invitations.

I wasn't alone. I watched hundreds of women flock to sit at her feet, to soak in her teaching, to sop up her wisdom. To pretend I don't bring the knowledge of who she is and the difference her words have made in the lives of others, including my own, to the pages of this book is, well, ridiculous. "Invitations shape who we know, where we go, what we do and who we become," says Adele.  Both her words and her actions have done the same for me. Subjective Favorite #1 goes to her.

I fell in love with God Behaving Badly the moment I read the subtitle: Is the God of the Old Testament Angry, Sexist and Racist? What a seriously fantastic question! It represents countless conversations with my own father, a man of deep faith who has struggled, like so many of us, to understand how a loving God could seemingly be (and these are my words now) so dang mean. More often than not, those conversations found me bumbling along until I'd finally shrug my shoulders and concede, "Honestly Dad, I don't really get it either."

And so when I cracked open this book and found the conversational style with which David Lamb answers some of our hardest questions, I was overflowing with thanks. (Later, when I realized Lamb is an Old Testament professor who actually has the gift of teaching, I was smitten. My parents, both retired school teachers, remain the best teachers I've ever known.) When Christmas rolled around, I eagerly wrapped up this book and gave it to my dad, a reflection of the bond we've shared as we've earnestly pursued our Creator. God Behaving Badly wins Subjective Favorite #2.

Choosing only two favorites doesn't seem like nearly enough, especially when I scan the plethora of passionate, insightful, transformational books here at IVP. But favorites, unlike opinions, do have a limit.

What's yours?

***

I used to bemoan the fact that I wasn't alive during the 1950s or '60s, when injustice seemed so much more overt and movements seemed so much more robust. At that time there was no way to ignore the suffocating discrimination of Jim Crow segregation in the South. The task of realizing justice in our contemporary context often seems more difficult because injustice and inequality have become mutated genes that seem more invisible. The Goliaths of economic injustice and inequality may be more covert and institutionalized but are still pernicious. Goliaths are still embedded in systems and structures that subjugate and oppress. . . .

Trying to tackle injustice based on our own limited abilities means playing small. Instead we must tap into the renewing power of faith to overcome the barriers that get in the way of transformed nonconformism.

The first and most common barrier is inertia. Particularly in this Internet age, we are barraged and inundated with constant information and marketing campaigns enticing us to do or buy something. This information makes it more difficult to grab people's attention and solicit their commitment. After a while, we either start shutting out this information overload or become increasingly jaded about solicitations for our time and attention. Inertia becomes our fallback and the keeper of the status quo.

. . . The second barrier is fear, which includes the fear of real or perceived risks associated with getting in the way of injustice. We may fear fallout from colleagues, family or even friends, particularly if the issues we are getting involved in are controversial. Living a countercultural life of activism can involve persecution, particularly in countries that don't enjoy the same degree of protections for free speech and assembly as the United States.

. . . A third barrier is apathy. We can easily become desensitized to the pain and suffering in the world. Apathy is often fed by cynicism, the belief that nothing will really change regardless of our actions.

. . . As people of faith, we are often uneasy about power and blind to the power we possess. While it is important to remember Lord Acton's dictum that "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely," we are often overly timid and passive about using our God-given power because power takes on an overly negative connotation. But power can be used for life-affirming or life-denying purposes. Dr. King said it best: "power without love is reckless and abusive. Love without power is shallow and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice."

. . . The last barrier is a feeling of isolation, which makes people feel alone and alienated from people who share similar interests and values. In any campus, workplace, church, and so on, are countless people who are waiting for the right call to action to be drawn out of their isolation. Without an invitation we often fail to realize the degree to which other people share our values and desire to build a better community and world.

. . . Activism can be intimidating, particularly when you think about the complexity and seeming intractability of many of the injustices in the world. Where does one start? What are the best entry points? . . . Creative maladjustment involves a broad range of daily-life commitments. At its core, it requires making a daily commitment to what Gandhi described as "being the change you want to see in the world." Our actions must become a mirror image of our core values and convictions. . . . We are called to be good stewards not simply of our money but also of our time and our talents. Creative maladjustment . . . a more holistic and radical stewardship of our time and resources . . . is at the very heart of discipleship.

Early estimates put Haiti's death toll at 230,001 (Kent adds the one as a reminder that these were people, not estimates), and while those estimates have since been revised lower, more than a half-million people are still living without homes amid the rubble two years later.

Kent wrote his second book, After Shock, to wrestle with the goodness of God in the shadow of this already-struggling country, now defined in the global imagination by death and dislocation. To contribute to Haiti Partners' work in rebuilding the country and specifically the education of its children, click here. To grapple with Kent's insightful witness, read on.

***

If you're over thirty years old and have relative health, regular food and secure shelter, how can you not feel some survivor's guilt in this world? (And if you don't, that's a problem too.)

Then there's posttraumatic stress disorder. . . . Part of the definition in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (the standard guide on these things) is that a person faces a physical trauma (themselves or as witnesses) and that their response involves "intense fear, helplessness, or horror." . . . Not to minimize the extreme nature of what people in Haiti (or soldiers coming back from combat, for another example), are facing, but I'm struck by how, in a less acute way, this definition applies to almost everyone alive. Granted, some people can experience traumas and, through the difficulty, flourish. But others are crushed. Suffering becomes the sole arbiter of truth. And many of us, I think, are tempted to respond by walling off our hearts or ideals. 

. . . Being shell-shocked by the traumas of life is a right response. Guilt is often a right response to being alive too, when we fail to love as generously as we should. But guilt and trauma shouldn't close us down. Being open to life is also the right response to life. It's what survivors should do as long as we can.

***

The church is a pile of rubble. Nothing left. The school beside it is damaged but standing. Nobody had been in the church when it collapsed, but one teacher died in the church school when the roof partially collapsed in his classroom. . . .

Andre pulls out the Communion wafers. The only part of the building or furniture in the church that wasn't smashed to pieces, which I hadn't noticed when I'd been here before, was where they kept the Communion wafers. . . . We line up to go forward and receive. In front of me is a grandmother. She's lost everything and sees her family and community devastated. She's frail. She moves forward without hesitation in the line. A young man behind me. What dreams can he dream now? He keeps moving forward for the bread.

"This is my body broken for you."

I arrive and the jagged Communion wafer--Christ's presence, yes, Christ's presence that did not stop the church from falling, that did not protect the teacher in the school or the dad on the porch, but Christ's presence here in the pile of rubble and here in this group of people in a sun-struck yard--is placed on my tongue.

For the rest of the service I sit on some rocks, still without shade, next to Jean, whose legs are atrophied and folded under him. He can't walk. He's led a tough life with his disability. Before the earthquake, he always sat on the aisle in one of the front rows. When the first chord of the Communion song was struck, the song signaling we could come up front to receive the bread, the song whose chorus is "Vinn jwenn Jezi, Vinn jwenn Jezi," Come find Jesus, Come find Jesus, Jean would swing out and, using his hands and arms to propel himself, be first in line. He was always the first to come find Jesus.

And here in the rubble, come find Jesus. . . .

Here, week after week, people come to find Jesus. The rubble may make him harder to find, but maybe, like the wafers in the center of this leveled church, he never left and never will.