Merry Christmas, everyone!
I love what my friend Randy Elrod wrote about in his blog today. He's been polling his followers on twitter with the question: "What is the greater miracle: the resurrection or the incarnation?" His blog discussion today is wonderful discoursce on the incredible mystery that was brought to us by the birth of Jesus. "God with skin on," as my pastor has said many times in the past year. Anyway, he talked about how somehow there has been a message presented that we should focus on the cross at Christmas, which kind of misses the mark. The miracle of the incarnation is so incredibly profound. God can truly empathize with man, because He bacame one.
Randy has also written a new book, called Beauty Is Calling, which features several (36) original watercolor paintings and quotes both modern and ancient. Very tasteful and, dare I say it, beautiful. One quote I like is his:
"In our face,
there are minutes and there are moments.
Minutes fade away,
but moments live forever."
Randy was one of the bloggers that went to Uganda with the bloggers group that brought myself and 15 others to touch and see the work that Compassion does there. I love how he described servant leaders in one of his post-trip blogs to describe how enabling and empowering this kind of risk-taking leadership embodies, as expressed in that innovative trip.
Another cool quote is related:
"It's not just about art and leadership,
it's the ripple effect that should be hoped for."
(this is facing a page with a neat water color of a small john boat in the water.)
A cool thing about the book is that all the proceeds from its sale go to an organization called Kalein, a Center for Creative Studies.
Posted by Doug Van Pelt at December 25, 2008 07:53 PM