Over Christmas

Taking lots of great pictures, but don't have any means of getting them to the computer right now. So, there will be a pile of pictures in January.

In the meantime I'm doing some interesting reading. Bonhoeffer is one of my favorites and Mom and Dad have a copy of his letters from prison, so I've been working my way through that for the last few days. The book starts with a section of theological writing which is just amazing. Here's a section on folly:

"Folly is a more dangerous enemy to the good than evil. One can protest against evil; it can be unmasked and, if need be, prevented by force. Evil always carries the seeds of its own destruction, as it makes people, at the least, uncomfortable. Against folly we have no defence. Neither protests nor force can touch it; reasoning is no use; facts that contradict personal prejudices can simply be disbelieve - indeed, the fool can counter by criticizing them, and if they are undeniable, they can just be pushed aside as trivial exceptions. So the fool, as distinct from the scoundrel, is completely self-satisfied; in fact, he can easily become dangerous, as it does not take much to make him aggressive. A fool must therefore be treated more cautiously than a scoundrel; we shall never again try to convince a fool by reason, for it both useless and dangerous."

One more day before I begin leg 2 of the journey and then off to OneThing.

Top Twenty Books

A blog I regularly read had a top list of their favorite Christian books. It got me thinking. I don't have the brainpower to completely rank them, but here's a list:

1. Red Moon Rising - Pete Greig
2. The Vision/The Vow - Pete Greig
3. The Divine Conspiracy - Dallas Willard
4. The Cost of Discipleship - Dietrich Bonhoeffer
5. Velvet Elvis - Rob Bell
6. The Barbarian Way - Erwin McManus
7. Captivating - John and Stasi Eldredge
8. Kingdoms in Conflict - Charles Colson
9. Bono: In Conversation with Michka Assayas
10. Life Together - Dietrich Bonhoeffer
11. The Way I Was Made - Chris Tomlin
12. I Am Not but I Know I AM - Louis Giglio
13. Too Busy Not to Pray - Bill Hybels
14. Wild at Heart - John Eldredge
15. Making Life Work - Bill Hybels
16-20. clearly I need to be doing more reading.....

Please note that this list is severely limited because it only contains books that I've read (and would put on a top list of Christian books). I think the next task is the books I still need to read both those staring at me from my bookshelf and those I don't have yet! Making the list definitely made me realize how little I've read and how much I've read that I couldn't recommend.