The Weekly Wrap-Up: September 19-23, 2016

Did you know you can make forms in Google Drive? I sort of maybe had a general idea that it was possible.

Now I've made six. I told you before that the landing page would inevitably change, and sure enough, I made a few more changes this week, mostly with the forms. Instead of creating separate web pages for the various contact points, I just made forms that people can fill out. It's really nice to do it this way, actually, because the responses go directly to the contact email address, which I'm already manning. Womaning. Overseeing.

Anyway, I showed my progress to our Information Services guy, and he told me he liked my work. He doesn't just tell people that if he doesn't think it, so I'm quite happy with that result. Just a few more tweaks, I think.

I also brainstormed, proofed, and recorded a new radio ad. That all came together in about two days. Please don't think that this is normal. We got lucky this time because the idea just sparked, and I used some personal experience to inform the opening, which segued nicely into the rest. You can listen to that here.

Finally, I received some files from our London friend to work on. I'm finalizing the first Estonian proof. Estonian looks very Dutch or German, so it's actually pretty easy to do. No crazy characters or weird spacing. It'll still take me a while, but it means we're finally moving forward with translations.

Also, it would stand to reason that, in the week I have a ton of stuff to do that requires incredible concentration, I would get interrupted a million times with impromptu meetings. Go figure.

I'll be off next week, so unless I do another rambling post about dodgy doctrine (that's catchy!), you won't hear from me for a bit.

Hüvasti 

John Wesley and Prayer: Lunacy or Perfection?

"God does nothing except in response to believing prayer."

Take a long hard gander at that. Really read it. Ruminate on it. Mull it over.

I certainly did. And I didn't like it at all.

Now I'm not going to tell you where I found this quote (OMS), nor how often I see it (all the time). But I was curious about its origin, because surely such an inflammatory statement had to be heretical, or at the very least, misquoted.

You know what I found? You know who the miscreant is?

John Wesley.

Sweet baby Jesus in the manger.

Now I like John Wesley as much as the next Protestant. You can't say a bad word about him (especially when you work for a holiness mission agency.)

But I had to wonder if even he had overstepped his bounds a little with this statement.

I did what I always do when I come across something suspect. I Googled it. A lot. Here's what I found:

• Just about every Wesleyan thing (college, church, mission) has this quote on their website. Usually without qualification or corresponding text, other than to say that prayer is very important.

• A few books have quoted Wesley, again to emphasize the importance of prayer. They usually mention that Wesley spent two hours a day or more in persistent prayer.

• A Methodist church in Iowa produced a 14-page document on the proper posture, type, wording, time, and place of prayer.

• One link sent me to a page written by someone at serveOK.org, which I figured had something to do with Oklahoma, but I thought also might be the slacker's response to missions. We'll serve, but only OK. Also, they offered me free decals, but when I clicked the link, they said too many people had ordered them.

Okay.

• I knew Patheos wouldn't fail me, and sure enough, on the atheist channel I saw an article entitled "Nothing Fails Like Prayer."

It's possible we've moved a bit too far in the other direction. (Incidentally, if you get curious and decide to read the article, let me know what conclusions you come to. I know how I'd answer him, but I'm curious about your own experiences with this kind of argument.)

Finally, I found something that offered context for the quote. It comes from "A Plain Account of Christian Perfection," written by Wesley somewhere between 1725 and 1777.

I skimmed through the document and found much of interest. (Notably that Wesley apparently did not  originally like the term Methodist.) Honestly, the thing is long, and it takes a while before he says the above quote. He includes a lot of hymns, too. I think it's supposed to be like the Methodist Manifesto.

Anyway, his main gist is that it's totally possible for Christians to achieve perfection in this life. He defines perfection as "loving God with all our heart, and mind, and soul" and that this means any "inward sin is taken away."

(I happen to agree with Wesley that it's possible to achieve perfection in this life. However, like him I also believe that few, if any, have actually done this.)

Finally, we get to the infamous quote. (Which actually reads "God does nothing but in response to prayer." Is it very different? No. But I believe in accuracy.) I was not assuaged by what I read. It wasn't an error.

Here's what he says immediately before: "God hardly gives his Spirit even to those whom he has established in grace, if they do not pray for it on all occasions, not only once, but many times."

And immediately after: "Even they who have been converted to God without praying for it themselves, (which exceeding rare,) were not without the prayers of others. Every new victory which a soul gains is the effect of a new prayer."

Wow.

Confession time: I may have blurted out "This man is a lunatic!" in the middle of the office.

I'm trying not to be derailed by those statements. I think they are utterly wrong, and I have no idea what he was thinking when he wrote them, but this post is about prayer, so he's getting a pass.

I'm trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, here. I'm trying to remember that he wrote/lived in a different time, that he doesn't really define what he means by prayer, and that I may actually be way off base here.

I'll also be the first to admit that I have a tenuous relationship with prayer. I tend to think the benefit is to the pray-er more than the pray-ee. I'm less inclined to see a direct link between my prayer and the subsequent action. I try to attribute those actions to their actual source, which is God.

Do I think God prompts us to pray for certain things? Yes. In His time, when He's ready to move, He puts things on people's hearts so that they are prepared for the work ahead.

Do I also think God tells us to stop praying for things? Yes. And we would do well to listen. A 'no' is still an answer, and we can waste a lot of time chasing after things that are never going to happen.

Wesley obviously believed prayer was important. I mentioned that this quote is mainly used next to a subsequent sentence about him praying for two hours every day. And I can't really argue about prayer being important. It's mentioned a lot in the Bible, Jesus taught how us to pray, and he told us to do it without ceasing.

But I think people can overemphasize the power of prayer. It becomes a work, something we have to do to be saved, and that is totally contrary to the Christian faith. There are so many times I have to bite my tongue before I say something that will undoubtedly get me in trouble.

I just can't get behind the idea that it is our prayers that prompt God to act, and that without them, He can do nothing. Because that's what I think is implied in this quote. I refuse to limit God that way. He does what He wills, whether we've prayed for it or not. His actions are not contingent on my faith.

(Rabbit trail: This was a storyline on Stargate: SG-1. These aliens had created a religion and had enslaved millions of people because their powers were fed by people. So the more people who believed, the more powerful they became, and the more people they could enslave. Actually, I think this was the plot of the TV movie about Merlin, too. And now I've totally lost you.)

Ironically (is this actual irony or am I being American and not getting the concept of irony?), I'm going to leave you with a verse about prayer. This is one I fully support and practice as often as I can.

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Philippians 4:6-7

The Weekly Wrap-Up: September 12-16, 2016

I feel very accomplished this week.

I love weeks like that.

On Monday and Tuesday, I was able to upload new files without watermarks to our download app. If it sounds like something I've done before, you're partially correct. A few weeks ago, I was securing ESP files. ESP stands for something really technical, but really just means the single page files instead of booklet-style pages. We don't let people print those (not sure why, and I've asked, but I'm not dying on that hill), so we have to securify them.

This week, I had to do something similar to the A4 and Letter size booklet files. These we do need to print, but we also need to make sure nothing can be changed in the file. So I created the macro to process them as a batch without any help! (Seriously, it's the little things in life.) Macros make life easier, but there were still hundreds of files, so it took some time to securify them, upload, and zip them up.

I'm also working on the new landing page for T&M. This is something I've been working on for a while in the background while I learned the program, but I felt I had a pretty good grasp of things, so I gave it a whirl.

Not bad, if I do say so myself. There are still a lot of things that need to be sorted, but this is the first thing people will see in the future when they are introduced to T&M (minus the yellow lightning boxes), so it has to be pretty. I imagine it will change quite a bit in the future, but I think it's a decent first effort. 

That pretty much took the rest of the week. I'm good. But I'm also thorough. Good work takes time. 

I'm doing double duty today. My mom is in town running a garage sale for some folks on campus, including me. She's a lovely lady, so I'm making sure she has everything she needs. 

Because I'm a good daughter. 

Fifteen Years Ago

I was fifteen, a sophomore at Lakewood Park Christian School. We had just switched periods, either from homeroom to first or first to second. I was settling in for one of my favorite classes, history with Mr. Weaver.

There was a delay. This was before cell phones were a ubiquitous device, but there was still a current of something in the room. "Did you hear...?" Some parents were pulling kids out of school. Finally, Mr. Weaver came in and said that something had happened in New York. I can't remember what he said exactly.

Everyone ended up in the cafeteria. The technically-minded kids were working on the TV to get reception. I think both planes had crashed into the towers by then. We got it working in time to see the plane hit the Pentagon. We watched everything burn, people jumping out of windows, ash and smoke billowing in great plumes.

Then the south tower fell.

It was quiet in the cafeteria. Everyone was straining to hear the TV. Some whispered to their friends. I was sitting with Christine. She asked me what this would mean.

I honestly didn't know. I told her something about how the towers held a lot of economic power, but I really had no clue. This was unheard of. Nothing like this had ever happened before. What would it mean?

The north tower fell. There was a hole in the sky, Manhattan was an island of dust. There were rumors of other planes that had been hijacked, as it was now clear that this was definitely a deliberate act. At some point, we heard a plane had crashed in Pennsylvania.

There was a fifth plane missing. Then there wasn't. People were streaming across bridges. Boats filled the harbors.

The videos just kept playing.

I think we must have dismissed early that day. I can't imagine we would have gotten anything done. I remember my dad picking me up. He was very calm. He said there would be a war for sure. He said he needed to get gas, but it would probably be a madhouse.

He was right. There were long lines at every station. The price had shot up. I remember being irrationally angry with everyone else. My dad actually needed gas that day. He wasn't just doing it because he was scared.

I watched TV the rest of the day. My mom was at work. I don't remember if my dad watched with me or not.

I was reminded of the Oklahoma City bombing. That was my only frame of reference. Except no one could get close enough to where the towers were to really see anything.

Another building collapsed later in the day. That night, President Bush gave an address.

I was reading the transcript of it the other day. I can't remember any of it. I was in a fog. All I could think was that nothing would ever be the same again.

Memory is a funny thing. There are things that stand out clearly. Some things I can infer based on those memories and the logical course of events. When I think about life before September 11, 2001, it seems almost wrong. I remember my sister sitting with us at the gate before we went to Jamaica. But surely not, because people can't sit at the gate if they don't have a ticket now. I remember news broadcasts that said little to nothing about things happening anywhere but in the U.S. I remember watching planes in the sky and not having a worm of doubt in my mind about whether or not they'd reach their intended destination.

The months that followed have similar flashes of stark memories surrounded by fog. My mom had to fly somewhere shortly after the attack. Our car was searched going into the airport parking lot. Police were everywhere. We had to watch her go through security alone (with her shoes on!) and wonder if she'd make it back.

A few weeks later, a plane crashed in Queens. I listened to the news in the yearbook room and prayed that it wasn't another attack.

For weeks after, I would hear Enya's Only Time on the radio. It was interspersed with broadcasts of the event. I've never been able to find a copy of that. I can't listen to the song now without thinking of it.

Somewhere in the middle of all this, a boy in the school died in an ATV accident. I can't remember at all when it happened. I don't know if it was before the attack, shortly after, or months later. I just remember that I had been friends with the boy's sister. We sat next to each other in Geometry and joked around. She was a year below me. After her brother died, I felt it was important that I go to the viewing to support her. My dad drove me there and waited in the car. I went in on my own, and when she saw me, she hugged me. And she held on for what seemed like hours. We didn't say anything. We just hugged. As we drove home, I remember looking out the window and crying. I didn't see much of her after that. I didn't know what to say.

A year later, we had a concert of sorts at the WWII museum in town. It was a remembrance gathering, a chance for people to prove they hadn't been beaten. For some reason, I was asked to sing with the kids from LPCS. We sang "For Such a Time As This." I did the verses. They sang the chorus. It was a big event. I had no idea at the time. I was terrified I'd forget the words. I haven't sung that song since.

Ultimately, I was proved right. Nothing was ever the same.

I developed a kind of mental block regarding 9/11. First off, I hated calling it that. It was September 11th. (I hated when people called it 911. Still do.) I avoided video or photos of it, but I saved every newspaper for a week following the attack. I bought the LIFE magazine issue about it. I bought both movies that were eventually made, and I never watched them. After YouTube became a thing, I had a depressive episode (not because of a video-sharing site) and binged every video I could find about the attack. I watched the towers fall for hours. I created a playlist, and I've never watched it since then, but I can't bring myself to delete it.

I feel like I was there, but at the same time, I feel like I have no right to be so upset or moved by everything. I live in Indiana. No one wants to attack Indiana. I'd been to New York once, but it hadn't meant anything. I thought it was a noisy, crowded place.

We went to New York later for our senior trip. Two and a half years after the attack. We spent a morning at the site. I remember looking at it and trying to figure out how such large buildings fit into that itty bitty space. It was giant hole in the ground, fenced off. The surrounding buildings still had damage in places. There was a church just down the street. I couldn't reconcile the two images in my head.

I don't know that I'll ever get over it. I don't know that I'll ever fully understand how I feel about it. I don't know that I'll ever remember everything about that day. I don't know that I'll ever be able to see a photo or video without flinching (and they are everywhere, and show up at unexpected moments). I don't know that I'll ever be able to watch the movies. I doubt I'll ever get rid of them, though.

I pray that it never happens again. And I know that it probably will. If it does, I don't know if it will affect me the same way. Recent events have numbed me to the point of apathy. More people died? That's terrible. What should we do for lunch?

I don't want to feel that way. But I'm tired of living in a broken world. I'm tired of feeling like nothing we do changes anything.

I don't have a nice way to end this. Like all things, it just...

Is. 

The Weekly Wrap-Up: September 7-9, 2016

Short week.

Not gonna lie.

I like short weeks.

This week felt even shorter than it would normally. Sure, we got Monday off for Labor Day. And I took Tuesday off for the drive back and to take care of some things you can't do on weekends. But Wednesday was the half day of prayer, so automatically, that's another three hours that isn't spent working. (Sure, prayer is part of our work. A big part. But it's hard to see things being accomplished.)

I was going to use Wednesday afternoon to get caught up with email and the usual maintenance stuff on regular projects. But then I got called into a meeting last-minute. Not a last-minute meeting, mind. This was a regularly scheduled program. I just wasn't scheduled to be in it until five minutes before it started. Unlike many meetings, I felt that this one actually accomplished something. Which is good, because it lasted three hours. I stayed late to make sure some of the more pressing stuff would be done.

I finally cleared out the jetsam Thursday morning before I went to a Lunch & Learn meeting. It's exactly what it sounds like: we eat lunch and learn things. Specifically, we were learning more about the Grip-Birkman personality report. Not sure if I've mentioned this before. It's a personality test that all OMS applicants take. It's not a psych test or anything, and it's more in-depth than Meyers-Briggs or others. I took a course last year on how to coach someone through their report. I find it fascinating, and you really learn a lot about yourself. Maybe I'll do a post about it and explain some of the more interesting facets of my personality.

Anyway, immediately after that, I helped Carolyn with the church history stuff again. It's Orientation week, and we had ten-ish people here learning about OMS and how we operate. Once again, I drew the timeline while she gave the presentation. I still don't know why as I still can't draw. But I have fun. And I sneak in pop culture references.

I worked on an interesting project yesterday. I was trying to determine the exact number of countries in which T&M is used. This is not an easy task as the whole point of T&M is to pass it on, and we've trained several mission agencies that work in many different countries. But I can approximate based on correspondence, license agreements, partnerships, and such. 

I was surprised at the results. Sure, we bat around the "more than 40 countries" language, but I didn't realize that it was more like 87. I can confidently state that you will find Train & Multiply materials in at least 87 countries. And it's not just the ones we always hear about. 

Of course, there were 226 countries on that list. Way I see it, we've got 139 countries left.

Will you help?

The Weekly Wrap-Up: August 29 - September 1, 2016

This has been a weird week, though more for personal reasons than professional. I've felt very off kilter. It's a good phrase, that. Off kilter. I wonder where it came from.

::a little sleuthing later::

Apparently, you can also use the phrase 'out of kilter.' Kilter, of course, means good form, order, spirits or condition. I guess no one uses it in a positive manner anymore. As for its origin, no one seems to know, though most agree it has nothing to do with Scotsmen.

I have a great desire to describe good things as 'in kilter' now.

Anyway.

Like I said. Weird week. I was without hot water for much of it. My water heater decided to burn out, once with little fanfare, and a second time with a nice little POP and scorch marks. I was boiling water in order to do dishes, though I thought it best to not do that for washing hair. Cold showers are mighty unpleasant.

I had a huge headache Tuesday and Wednesday. Bordering on migraine territory, which meant I had to fight not to throw up.

I guess that could throw me off my game.

Anyway, we spent a lot of time on the app this week. We have a really great useable product. Now we need to market it. (And stop changing things!) I'm really proud of what we've created, though. I hope lots of people use this.

I processed more test files. Yay! Once approved, we can move forward with languages. It's nice to actually get this part of the job. I think back to two years ago when I started working with ECC, and I had no idea what I was in for! I thought I'd never learn the process, but here we are! I have more to learn, true, but I know enough that we can start divvying up the workload.

We had a seminar today on possible new tech for us. I learned a lot, but it wouldn't surprise me if it's another couple of years before we see it implemented. (If stakeholders decide to go this route.) I wish it wasn't so, but money talks in missions. The more money, the more we can do. I think we steward funds pretty well at OMS, but it's disheartening to see a really great idea die because we have no way to fund it. (Or missionaries leave because they have no more funding.)

Ah, well.

I'm writing this on Thursday this week because I am outta here for the weekend! Woohoo! I have a lot of vacation time left, and I intend to use it well. Have an excellent weekend, and enjoy your day off!