Read in 2009 - Part 1, Nonfiction

Apparently I'm a bookaholic. Here's my list of books read in 2009. I starred a dozen that really stood out, though your list might be different; many of them were quite good. See what sounds appealing to you, get a library card, and enjoy! Use the search bar to read my comments about many of these if you're interested.

See also Read in 2009 - Part 2, Fiction and 2008 Book Blogging Roundup.

Nonfiction – History/Culture

• Kingdom Without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Christianity, by Miriam Adeney
• In the Valley of Mist - Kashmir: One Family in a Changing World, by Justine Hardy
• Outcasts United: A Refugee Team, an American Town, by Warren St. John *
  
• Geography of Bliss, by Eric Weiner *
  
• Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortensen and David Relin
  
• Museum: Behind the Scenes at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, by Danny Danziger *
  
• A History of the United States, by Philip Jenkins
• The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity, by Philip Jenkins
• The Lost History of Christianity, by Philip Jenkins *
  
• Behind the Scenes of the New Testament, by Paul Barnett
• 20 Most Asked Questions about the Amish and Mennonites, by Merle and Phyllis Good
• Mouse Tales: A Behind-the-Ears look at Disneyland, by David Koenig
• A Day of Pleasure: Stories of a Boy Growing Up in Warsaw, by Isaac Bashevis Singer
  
• Spirit of the Rainforest: A Yanomamo Shaman's Story, by Mark Richie

Nonfiction – Theology/Christian Life

• Crazy Love, by Francis Chan
• A Resilient Life, by Gordon MacDonald *
  
• Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World, by Henri Nouwen
• Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life, by Henri Nouwen*
• Champagne for the Soul: Celebrating God's Gift of Joy, by Mike Mason *
  

Nonfiction – Biographies

• Agape Leadership: Lessons in Spiritual Leadership from the Life of RC Chapman, by Robert Petersen and Alexander Strauch
• Filling Up the Afflictions of Christ: The Cost of Bringing the Gospel to the Nations in the Lives of William Tyndale, Adoniram Judson, and John Paton, by John Piper
• Walt Disney, An American Original, by Bob Thomas
• Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, by Barack Obama *
  
• The Invisible Wall: A Love Story that Broke Barriers, by Harry Bernstein
• We Two: Victoria and Albert: Rulers, Partners, Rivals, by Gillian Gill *
  
• The Summer of the Great Grandmother, by Madeleine L’Engle

Nonfiction – Christian/Mission, Misc.

• A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life, by Donald Miller *
  
• While You Were Micro-Sleeping: Fresh Insights on the Changing Face of North American Missions, by Steve Moore
• Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? by Philip Yancey *
  
• Voices of the Faithful, Book 2, ed Kim Davis and Beth Moore
• Ask A Missionary: Time-Tested Answers by Those Who Have Been There, ed. John McVay
  
• The Seven Faith Tribes: Who They Are, What They Believe, and Why They Matter, by George Barna
• Faces in the Crowd: Reaching Your International Neighbor for Christ, by Donna S Thomas
• Exploring the Land, by Shane Bennett and Kim Felder, with Steve Hawthorne

Nonfiction – Miscellaneous

• Gift from the Sea, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh *
  
• Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking, by Malcolm Gladwell
• Outliers: The Story of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell *
• What the Dog Saw, and Other Adventures, by Malcolm Gladwell
• Living with Questions, by Dale Fincher

Are Other People Interesting?

Malcolm Gladwell introduces his book of essays, What the Dog Saw, with what he calls the "other minds" problem - the discovery children make, at an early age, that what's in somebody else's head is not the same as what's in theirs.

"Why is a two-year-old so terrible? Because she is systematically testing the fascinating, and, to her, utterly novel notion that something that gives her pleasure might not actually give someone else pleasure."

Even as adults, he says, we never lose that fascination. We are curious about the lives and interior worlds of other people. Gladwell says this curiosity about what life is like for others is one of the most fundamental of human impulses, and it's the one that shapes his book: he's following his curiosity and giving his readers an inside scoop.

Then he says something that seems to be a contradiction:

"The trick of finding ideas is to convince yourself that everyone and everything has a story to tell. I say trick but what I really mean is challenge, because it's a very hard thing to do. Our instinct as humans, after all, is to assume that most things are not interesting. We flip through the channels on the television and reject ten before we settle on one. We go to a bookstore and look at twenty novels before we pick the one we want. We filter and rank and judge. We have to. There's just so much out there. But if you want to be a writer, you have to fight that instinct every day. ___________ doesn't seem interesting? Well, dammit, it must be, and if it isn't, I have to believe that it will ultimately lead me to something that is."

Malcolm Gladwell, What the Dog Saw, pp. x, xiii.

Learning through Teaching

The other thing that appeals to me about the idea of the reverse internship is what the instructor – the younger person – could get out of it. Haven’t we all experienced how much you learn and grow when you are teaching others? Both asking someone to teach you from an area of their expertise and asking them to study up on and teach something they don’t already know have tremendous value.

Think about it:

Remember your fourth grade class, when everybody had to pick an animal to study, checking out encyclopedia articles, cutting out pictures, maybe building a model of a habitat? Or what about sixth grade, when everyone in your class did a report on one of the US states? Or the high school literature class where each student presented about a different author?

You can name the animal, the state, the author, and probably tell me quite a bit about them, can't you?

I bet you remember what you taught (however awkwardly) better than you remember things that were taught to you by a professional.

The stress and adrenaline of standing up in front of your peers and presenting what you’d learned may have helped seal in the experience; strong emotion has a way of doing that.

This suggests to me that if we all need to learn more, maybe we all need to teach more.

After 30 days, students remember:

10% of what they hear
15% of what they see
20% of what they hear and see
40% of what they discuss
80% of what they do
90% of what they teach to others

From a study by the University of Indiana, quoted in the Thom and Joanie Shultz book The Dirt on Learning, p. 155.

Sunny days in the NW - in December?!

My dad has a camera - OK, probably half a dozen cameras - much nicer than mine. (He's always been a gadget guy!) See some recent pictures here. These are from a walk several of us took on Fidalgo Island where much of my stepmom's family lives.

This Christmas the weather has been chilly, but unusually clear and lovely.

I go back to Denver on Wednesday.

Reverse Internships: “Hire a Whippersnapper to Teach You New Skills”

“Reverse Internships” read the headline in the in-flight magazine. “Jay Heinrichs recommends letting the students do the teaching in the office.” He opens with a tribute to his young-adult daughter and describes all he has learned from her, quickly reaching his thesis: Instead of hiring young people as interns at our offices, we older types should try interning with them. Kids simply do some things better. Why not invite them to guide us through the latest big thing, the latest tech trend, the world of social media?

In his profession, like many, getting a degree doesn’t prepare you for a job nearly as well as getting a degree and serving an internship. “Education only takes kids so far; after that, it’ a matter of learning by doing, of imitating one’s betters.”

Handy as it is to have a few interns around, the one who benefits the most from a good internship is the intern, right? “Which makes me want to be one,” he says.

Why shouldn’t each of us, regardless of age or status, look around for someone who knows something we’d like to learn and try to persuade them to set up a training time, or take us on as an ongoing student? Then, don’t just take go away with a few tips, but really treat it like an internship. Commit yourself to being guided by and learning from someone else. I like that idea.

Read more in Reverse Internships, Spirit Magazine, Southwest Airlines, December 2009

Weaving a Relational Net: Strategies, Barriers

Some good friends of mine are exploring possibilities to be part of ministry efforts in a certain country. Another family I know plan to move to the same part of the world to lead a ministry to orphans in that region. I want to encourage them, I want to help, and I’ve tried to send resources and ideas their way. But I feel like I’ve hit a bit of a wall, and I’m trying to figure out why.

Neither family has been involved much in “missions” – this world I know so much about. Both families sparkle when I affirm what their interests and efforts. Their bright eyes begin to glaze over, though, as I talk about how they can learn more, connect with others, and tap into the tremendous relational networks that exist in the world of Christian ministry. Am I being too pushy? Answering questions they haven’t asked yet? Maybe, if I stop and think it through, I can figure out what it is that’s holding them back from wanting to know more.

On one level, it makes little sense. If you were launching out into the unknown, wouldn’t you jump at the chance to learn from those who had gone before and to meet those travelling the same trail?

On the other hand, anyone just getting started with something big and impossible can reach saturation very quickly. Any more “you should talk to [this person], you should read [that book], you should go to [a certain event]” may come across as critique and burden instead of encouragement and assistance. Perhaps it’s that word “should,” spoken or implied. A slight adjustment in my approach to making these suggestions might make a significant difference. I love being a resource-connector, but could use some polish on my people skills, I know!

I’ve felt myself on the other side of such conversations often enough, including recently as I’ve begun talking to various friends about the disbanding of our ministry and what the implications might be for me. “[Our organization] could really use someone like you,” said one good friend. “When’s the right time for [my ministry] to extend the gold-plated invitation?” asked another.

It’s great to know so many people care about me and value me. Really encouraging. Gives me hope. But sometimes overwhelming; a bit of a burden, really, at times. Something in me wants to run. It’s similar to my response to matchmaking efforts. I’m certainly not opposed to finding the love of my life – or a great job/team – but it seems best to receive each suggestion with caution. Cultivating a peaceful and content heart is the harder, better thing.

Various friends have encouraged me to really be deliberate in this season of ministry/career reassessment: to be open to all the options, to really do my research, not to just follow the path of least resistance or do what is expected of me. It’s good advice. I might be tempted to keep my blinders on, to make a quick or safe decision when a more thoughtful, intentional approach would be better – even if the end result is the same. It’s a chance to “reaffirm” my calling.

On the other hand, there is a time to gently shut the door to input and options and just rest and be still, listen to one’s heart. Other things can wait.

But back to my friends exploring compassion ministries. One of the families, when they came to me for advice, were asking questions I could not answer – they wanted to know more about the people and cultures of a specific region of a certain country, and I came up with nothing. So what I gave them was more of a strategy for finding what they would need, a way of thinking.

Learning, listening, networking, and collaboration are all really more about attitude and approach than anything else, aren’t they? I encouraged my friend to contact a wide variety of people involved in related work – others who have set up orphanages, others who have worked in various parts of that country and region (locals and expatriates); government, education, and religious leaders, etc. To approach everyone as if they have something to teach you, you know? I didn’t make a list of people she should talk to; I didn’t offer introductions. I just made a list of questions she should ask. Questions like these:

- What are some of the things you think we need to do or learn about to prepare for this kind of work?

- What kinds of things that have made you effective in this kind of work?

- What suggestions do you give people who are just getting started?

- What do you wish you had known when you began?

- What are some of the common mistakes you see people making?

- That’s really interesting. Can you tell us more about that?

- What do you think we should do first?

- Who else should we be talking to?

Isn’t it amazing how seldom we ask those kinds of questions, listen carefully to the answers, and really hold onto what we hear? I need to listen to my own advice!

The Guy Who Played Guitar

I knew a guy who could play the guitar but refused to do so. He said it was because it was such an easy way to impress women. Don't get me wrong, Sam really liked women. But all the more reason, he said, not to be THAT guy, the one who picks up the guitar to impress women.

Sam was in his thirties before he found a girl who would marry him. I never asked him whether he ever played for her, or if he won her without plucking those heartstrings.

Reluctant as I am to admit it, I am one of THOSE women, the ones who might swoon over the worship leader, the campfire strummer, the man who takes you out on the lake in the rowboat on a summer evening and plays a song for you that he wrote himself... My friend Dave proposed to his wife that way; it can happen. But for most of us it's pure fantasy.

My clear-thinking friends will say, why does it have to be the guy? Why can't you learn how to play the guitar for yourself?

Sadly, I seem to lack the knack. I earned an "A" in a college guitar class for learning all the thory and 30+ chords, but I couldn't get fingering, strumming, and singing at the same time - or even two out of three. Finally, a few years ago, I gave my guitar away to a houseguest who showed more promise.

Do you think I should ask the roommate if I can give her autoharp a try? Yes, she has an one! I'd need to get it some new strings but could probably learn to play the thing without too much trouble. And it's much less, ah, penetrating, than my current collection of musical instruments - a small collection of wooden and plastic recorders and the nice silver trumpet I play from time to time.

* * *

Singing is really what I like best. Used to be that group singing was practically a daily experience for me. I was part of a young adult ministry that went in for long worship sets every Tuesday night... Thursdays was choir. We had singing in church on Sundays, and most mornings at the office as well. I finally outgrew the Y.A. ministry, choir has been on and off, and we've had less and less music at the office as the years have gone by. As our office team disperses, over the next few months, gone are my hopes of seeing a revival of music for mornings prayers.

So where am I going to find people to sing with? Our church choir is just starting to pick up steam and we're not very good, even though Cecile and Angela and I joked about going on the road as "The Three Altos." And I'm not really talented/skilled enough for a community choir or orchestra.

Well, technology is a wonderful thing. I may not be able to go to morning prayer any more, or find that guy who plays guitar, but musical companionship can be had for the asking. Guys like Rich Mullins are alive and well on my MP3 player, on my computer, in my car. In a few minutes I'm on my way to the rec center to work out, and James Taylor is coming with me.