Oym Hunt

Here's a new time waster for all of you computer solitaire nerds out there - you know who you are. (Yes, you with 1000+ games of Free Cell played on your Windows machine.)

Anyway, allow me to introduce you to Oym Hunt... an addictive bit of insanity created by Frank Nestel. And, yes, this is the "Frank" in Doris & Frank, the game company that brought you Ursuppe/Primordial Soup. (My favorite older D&F game is actually Tante Tarantel.)

I found the Oym Hunt thanks to D&F's newest card game, Ark. (Which, btw, is a lot of fun. It requires one full play to understand how all the cards interact, then you get to enjoy playing the wonderful little game.) One of the cards is the Oym... and kindly includes the web address so you can find the Oym Hunt.

Of course, I thought an Oym was something like a Jewish hamster - "Mazeltov, Rabbi - how is your oym doing in his new Habitrail?". Or perhaps a Yiddish expression of frustration? - "Oym... I wish you'd stop putting the robber on 6 ore hex, you schlemiel."

Five & Dime 2005: Joining the "In" Crowd

These are games that have appeared on the Five & Dime lists before... and have risen in overall playing percentages.

Game	percentage gain from 2004
For Sale	+23.54%
Around the World in 80 Days (Kosmos)	+12.32%
Jambo	+10.91%
Fairy Tale	+10.71%
Samurai	+8.79%
Niagara	+8.18%
Schotten-Totten/Battleline	+6.97%
Blokus	+6.87%
Titan: The Arena/Colossal Arena	+4.55%
Reef Encounter	+4.14%
Boggle	+4.04%
Hamsterrolle	+4.04%
RoboRally	+3.94%
Torres	+3.54%
Settlers of Catan	+3.43%

There are two main reasons that games appear on this list:

1. They were reprinted this year (For Sale, Fairy Tale, Titan the Arena, RoboRally, Torres, Reef Encounter, Battleline)
2. They were "Essen" games... they were released late in 2003 in Germany and were only played 5+ times by a couple of folks in 2003 (Around the World in 80 Days, Jambo, Niagara, Reef Encounter)

The interesting games here are the ones that can not be explained by these reasons:

• Why the sudden interest in Samurai? (Great game, btw...)
• Settlers of Catan is just reclaiming some ground - it's been a solid contender on the Five & Dime lists since I started collecting them. It's also probably affected by the larger sample of gamers this year.)
• Blokus is growing in popularity each year - is this a "classic" in the making?
• Where in the heck did Boggle & Hamsterrolle come from?! (Again, both great games.)

Five & Dime 2005: Lo, How The Mighty Have Fallen

These are games that have appeared on the Five & Dime lists before... and have fallen in overall playing percentages.

Game	percentage loss from 2004
Attika	-36.26%
St Petersburg	-32.22%
Ticket To Ride	-29.19%
San Juan	-24.24%
Goa	-17.88%
Liar's Dice/Bluff/Perudo	-16.46%
10 Days/Europa Tour	-15.66%
King's Breakfast	-15.45%
Puerto Rico	-15.35%
Alhambra	-14.24%
Power Grid/Funkenschlag	-13.94%
Hansa	-13.54%
Tongiaki	-13.43%
Flaschenteufel/Bottle Imp	-12.02%
Santiago	-11.92%

Note that many of these games are still highly rated on the overall and/or five/dime lists... this year, with the much larger sampling group, high percentages common to the top games (60%+) completely disappeared. So, Ticket To Ride, San Juan & Puerto Rico can all take pretty big hits in number of players... and still end up in the top ten of the overall five & dime lists.

Here's what I wrote last year:

Likely to be here next year: Ticket To Ride (which will combine natural attrition plus the release of T2R: Europe to take a bit of a fall), Goa (which will succumb to the "gamer-d out" syndrome along with Saint Petersburg), and Tonigaki (which is South Sea Islander for "jumped the shark last spring".)

It's always nice when your predictions are right on the money - contributes to your ego and all that. :-)

In 2006, it'll be Ticket To Ride: Europe (what with the new version & all), Louis XIV (suffering the same fate as Goa) and For Sale (which will drop back down again following it's rerelease) that'll end up here on the "fallen" list.

I'm not sure what to predict about Ingenious, Blokus, & Memoir '44. All three have managed to hold (Memoir '44) or gain over time (Ingenious, Blokus), which confounds the normal patterns for the five & dime lists.

Five & Dime 2005: Fresh Faces

These are games that appeared on the Five & Dime lists for the first time... in some cases, they may be older games that just hadn't reached a particular play threshold.

Game	score	percentage
Diamant	420	28.79%
Ticket To Ride: Europe	355	27.78%
Shadows Over Camelot	325	27.78%
Louis XIV	195	15.15%
Pickomino	195	14.14%
That's Life	160	11.11%
Caylus	150	12.63%
Ubongo	135	9.60%
Palazzo	115	10.10%
Tower of Babel	105	10.10%
Easy Come, Easy Go	70	5.05%
Saboteur	65	4.55%
Poison	60	4.04%
Havoc: The 100 Years War	50	4.55%
Fjords	50	4.04%
Walk the Dogs	50	3.54%

Comments to come later.

OK, one comment for now... no game dominated the numbers like Ticket To Ride or Puerto Rico or Carcassonne in previous years. Is this an indication that the hobby is growing and/or is indicative of having nearly 200 people participate?

Five & Dime 2005: Nickels (5-9 Played Games)

Game	2005	2004	2003	2002
Shadows Over Camelot	22.73%	new	new	new
Ticket To Ride: Europe	19.70%	new	new	new
San Juan	18.18%	17.27%	new	new
Ticket To Ride	17.68%	21.82%	new	new
Ingenious	15.66%	11.82%	new	new
For Sale	15.66%	4.55%	7.89%	7.69%
Diamant	15.15%	new	new	new
Carcassonne	14.14%	16.36%	25.00%	10.77%
Take 6	14.14%	9.09%	15.79%	13.85%
Blokus	13.64%	10.00%	6.58%	6.15%
Lost Cities	13.64%	13.64%	17.11%	18.46%
Settlers of Catan	13.64%	6.36%	13.16%	20.00%
St Petersburg	13.64%	22.73%	new	new
Ra	12.63%	14.55%	11.84%	12.31%
Alhambra	11.62%	20.91%	11.84%	new
Power Grid	11.62%	22.73%	5.26%	10.77%
Puerto Rico	11.62%	19.09%	27.63%	26.15%
Coloretto	10.61%	12.73%	21.05%	new
Louis XIV	10.61%	new	new	new
Caylus	10.10%	new	new	new
Liar's Dice	10.10%	23.64%	10.53%	12.31%
Through the Desert	10.10%	10.00%	6.58%	9.23%

Comments to come later... for now, I just needed to get this published before I went out of town. Also, the "comparitive" lists (Fresh Faces, Joining the "In" Crowd, and Lo, How The Mighty Have Fallen) will be published next week.

Five & Dime 2005: Dimes (10+ Played Games)

Game	2005	2004	2003	2002
Ticket To Ride	26.26%	51.82%	new	new
San Juan	16.67%	41.82%	new	new
For Sale	15.15%	2.73%	3.95%	4.62%
Ingenious	14.65%	15.45%	new	new
Geschenkt/No Merci	14.65%	new	new	new
Diamant	13.64%	new	new	new
Lost Cities	12.63%	10.00%	13.16%	13.85%
Puerto Rico	12.12%	20.00%	35.53%	47.69%
Memoir '44	11.11%	10.00%	new	new
Carcassonne	10.61%	11.82%	19.74%	49.23%
Blokus	9.60%	6.36%	6.58%	1.54%
Ra	9.60%	13.64%	14.47%	4.62%
St Petersburg	9.60%	32.73%	new	new
Crokinole	9.09%	14.55%	25.00%	27.69%
Coloretto	8.08%	10.00%	15.79%	new
Power Grid	8.08%	10.91%	0.00%	0.00%
Ticket To Ride: Europe	8.08%	new	new	new
Transamerica/europa	7.58%	8.18%	9.21%	16.92%
10 Days/Europa Tour	7.07%	15.45%	13.16%	new
Bohnanza	7.07%	8.18%	6.58%	12.31%
Liar's Dice	7.07%	10.00%	21.05%	24.62%
Settlers of Catan	7.07%	10.91%	15.79%	23.08%
Take 6/Category 5	7.07%	9.09%	5.26%	12.31%
Zirkus Flohcati	7.07%	4.55%	13.16%	3.08%

The top three games on the Dime list are the exact same games as last year - even in the same order!

But where did For Sale come from?! It didn't even appear on this list last year. Obviously, the English release gave it a new lease on life at gaming tables around the nation.

Attika, Alhambra, Bang! & Street Soccer all dropped off the table from last year.

I'm not even going to try and predict what will happen to Take 6 or Zirkus Flohcati - the two of them have been flirting with the edge of this list for a couple of years.

I don't think Diamant or Geschenkt will hold their same level of popularity... but it would surprise me if either of them completely disappeared from the Top 20 Dimes. (Yes, if you count, you'll realize there are more than 20 listed... that's because a number of games tied for 20th place.)

Settlers is fading even more from the rabidly played status it once enjoyed... will it fall off this list?! Hmmm... I dunno. My guess is "no", but I'm a fan of Settlers.

The other big question: can Ticket To Ride hold it's position? History says "no" - take a look at the other 900 lb gorilla, Puerto Rico - but it will not drop out of the top ten.

Five & Dime 2005: Most Played Games

Game	Score	2005	2004	2003
Ticket To Ride	695	43.94%	73.64%	new
San Juan	510	34.85%	59.09%	new
For Sale	455	30.81%	7.27%	11.84%
Ingenious	445	30.30%	27.27%	new
Diamant	420	28.79%	new	new
Ticket To Ride: Europe	355	27.78%	new	new
Shadows Over Camelot	325	27.78%	new	new
Lost Cities	385	26.26%	23.64%	30.26%
Carcassonne	350	24.75%	28.18%	44.74%
Puerto Rico	355	23.74%	39.09%	63.16%
Blokus	325	23.23%	16.36%	13.16%
St Petersburg	325	23.23%	55.45%	new
Ra	315	22.22%	28.18%	26.32%
Geschenkt/No Merci	355	21.21%	new	new
Take 6/Category 5	280	21.21%	18.18%	21.05%
Settlers of Catan	275	20.71%	17.27%	28.95%
Memoir '44	310	20.20%	20.91%	new
Power Grid	275	19.70%	33.64%	5.26%
Coloretto	265	18.69%	22.73%	36.84%
Liar's Dice	240	17.17%	33.64%	31.58%
Alhambra	215	16.67%	30.91%	23.68%
Transamerica/europa	235	16.16%	16.36%	28.95%
Bohnanza	220	15.15%	15.45%	22.37%
Schotten-Totten	205	15.15%	8.18%	26.32%
Louis XIV	195	15.15%	new	new

"score" is computed by giving a game 5 points for each person playing it 5-9 times and 10 points for each person playing 10+ times

the percentage numbers for each year are the percent of respondents who reported playing the game 5+ or 10+ times

Wow.

This year, a record 198 gamers (3 groups and 195 individuals) chimed in with their five & dime lists. Of that group, there were 66 who participated last year.

Last year I predicted that Ticket to Ride would drop due to TtR:Europe... and I was paritally right. Ticket to Ride did drop... but it looks to me like a substantial percentage of that drop was the much larger sampling poll. OTOH, I think I blew it with blaming the drop on TtR:Europe - the vast majority of people who played TtR also played TtR:Europe.

I was surprised to see Ingenious (Einfach Genial) grow in popularity... this is probably due to the English release. For Sale's resurgence can also be attributed to the English release.

I'm still waiting for Carcassonne to reach a saturation point - in other words, "When will the next Carc expansion cause the whole franchise to 'jump the shark'?" (Hasn't happened yet...)

I was right in predicting that Hansa & Attika would drop out of the top 25, though Attika was still in the top 50. I was surprised by St Petersburg holding on - in some corners, it's become "cool" to diss the game.

But I was (happily) wrong about Memoir '44... it held in position, which is prety amazing. I'm guessing that the expansions and the great support from Days of Wonder helped that happen.

Shadows Over Camelot will not be here next year - I'm not saying it's a bad game, just that it won't have a lot of people playing it 5+ times. Louis XIV will drop off as well - but that's not a surprise to anyone, right?!

Five & Dime: How It All Started

The year was 1999... Prince (or, at that point, the Artist Formerly Known As Prince) was still telling to party like it was that chronological year. Y2K was the all the rage - many people were stockpiling water, food & medical supplies in preparation for The End of the World As We Know It (glancing R.E.M. reference). I, on the other hand, was stockpiling games.

And game statistics. You see, my practice of collecting "five & dime" gameplay lists began early that spring, as a post from Steve Zanini on the rec.games.board newsgroup set me off:

Anyone familiar with SUMO magazine, would also be familiar with the 5 & 10 list. This is a listing of the games you have played either 5 or more times or 10 or more times. Think this would be a good way to re-cap what you played frequently in 1998.

I found the posts that followed to be intriguing and compiled them to produce a "Most Played" list of 1998. Then I did it again the next year... and the next... and it slowly but surely took on a life of it's own.

From the miniscule number of gamers in 1998 (16) to the huge response this year (198!), the Five & Dime lists have snowballed into a very interesting way to track gaming trends, albeit only in the online community of "designer" game players & collectors.

Over the next week, I'm going to be releasing information about the 2005 Five & Dime lists here on the blog. If you want to play "catch-up" and see what the Five & Dime lists are all about, you can check them out at my gaming website, Game Central Station.

Pod People

I was down in the L.A. this weekend, spending time with Mark Johnson and the Santa Clarita Boardgamers... which was a lot of fun. I also had the rare privilege of hosting Dave Arnott back here in Fresno, which meant I had an incredible weekend all around:

• took the train down to Newhall on Friday afternoon
• gamed with SCBer's on Friday night (Tsuro, Ark, Jenseit von Thebes, Akaba)
• recorded a podcast with Mark on Saturday morning
• gamed with Mark & Dave on Saturday afternoon (Zahltag, Akaba, Reef Encounter, Trump Tricks Game!, Route 66)
• drove back to Fresno with Dave
• gamed with Dave late Saturday night (Hochst Verdachtig, Rein Damit, Louis XIV, Africa)
• had Dave visit at NewLife Sunday morning
• gamed with Dave Sunday afternoon (Fjords, Kardinal & Konig: Das Duell, Kayanak, Industrial Waste x2)

Of course, the focus of THIS post is the podcast. Mark & I talked about two main topics: the Five & Dime lists and replayability vs longevity in games. If you'd like to listen to our conversation, Mark just posted it this morning. His podcast, Boardgames To Go, is one of the longest running gaming podcasts on the web. (If you enjoy our talk, he has a great conversation with Mike Siggins last fall that's definitely worth your time.)

There's a couple of spin-off topics from the podcast that I need to write some more on:

• once-a-year games (games that aren't great but are quite enjoyable when you play them once a year)
• Son of Apples Project

So, that leaves you with something to look forward to... (grin). Last note: Mark comments on his blog (and on the podcast) about how some folks confuse the two of us in the gaming community. The picture here was taken a couple of years ago, but should prove we're actually two different people. He's the suave looking one... I'm the guy deep in thought.

Unpacking the Baggage

This article originally appeared in 1/12/06 edition of The Grapevine, the e-newsletter of NewLife Community Church.

As many of you know, we've been traveling a lot for the past couple of months. One of the great hassles of traveling for us is the unpacking. That's right - after you've played a 3-D version of Tetris trying to fit all your clothes & sundries into a suitcase (not to mention the odds & ends which traveling with a 8 month old require), you've got to take all of them out and put them where they belong. As my mom will be the first to volunteer, putting things where they belong is not one of my "gifts." (My gift is more along the line of "scattering things about in random piles of which only I truly understand the organizational structure." You can probably guess that this didn't endear me to my mother - nor does it score me any brownie points with my wife.)

So, I do not enjoy unpacking.

--

I don't know what Shari said to me on Tuesday morning... or what set me off. (Really... I've sat here trying to remember what it was. My brain can't call it back up - nothing, nada, zilch, zero.) Whatever it was, I do clearly recall standing next to our kitchen table, grumbling under my breath, then kicking one of Collin's toys across the room in an obvious bid to gain attention. (You'd think that a 41 year old man would have figured out better ways to gain his wife's attention - simple stuff like, "Honey, I need to talk about this" - but no, I have to see if I have any future as a punter and let the resounding clatter/crash act as my "signal" that she should pay attention to me.)

When she responded with a "what the heck was that about?" tone in her voice, I sort of apologized and then headed out to work through the garage, still grumbling. When the mop bucket and one of Braeden's bikes was blocking the door, I popped a gasket again, kicking them both out of the way.

Of course, Tuesday morning was the day I was supposed to go into the office and spend extended time with Aaron (our worship/youth pastor) planning & dreaming about the upcoming year in ministry here at NewLife - and about our respective roles as husbands & dads. I walked in and told him that I wasn't in spiritual shape to meet yet - "I need an hour."

Actually, God needed the hour.

--

I've been reading an excellent book, [re]Understanding Prayer (by Kyle Lake). In it, he talks about struggling with anger & prayer. And, of course, it's that book I picked up when I stormed into my office, shut the door & cranked up the stereo.

Rather than dismissing this anger episode as "an obstacle to real prayer," I listen to the rhythm of my soul. Its hard, rapid, pulsating beat. If my mind keeps going back to these things, then maybe I have some issues that need tending to - issues around forgiveness, anger, or significance. Rather than dismissing these thoughts, I open myself up to God's presence and sit with them for a few minutes. And through a combination of prayer, meditation, Scripture reading, and silence, I become compassionate toward the person I was... angry with.

Very funny, God. I'm wanting to throw a pity party in here - "My wife doesn't understand me or my needs!" or "I'm the worst husband ever... unable to control my temper - I don't deserve to be a pastor" or "See, I've blown the day. No way can anything spiritual happen now when you've choked like that" - and all You want to do is mess with my heart & make me more like You.

In fact, Jesus, you aren't looking for me to stuff my feelings... or to turtle up & go into defensive mode with Shari Jo. You aren't interested in me sulking, Ahab-like (1 Kings 21) because I didn't live the Christ-life perfectly. What you want is for me to unpack my baggage.

"Meanwhile the tax man, slumped in the shadows, his face in his hands, not daring to look up, said, "God, give mercy. Forgive me, a sinner.'"

Jesus commented, "This tax man, not the other, went home made right with God. If you walk around with your nose in the air, you're going to end up flat on your face, but if you're content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself." Luke 18:13-14 (The Message)

--

You knew I'd eventually connect the dots, right? Unpacking is no fun when it's a Samsonite... it's even less fun when it's your own soul. But as good as it feels to finally get every piece of clothing back where it belongs, it feels even better to finally let God into the middle of every part of our lives.

So, in that God-filled hour, Jesus drug my petty anger out into the open, into the light of day, into the light of Truth. And it became clear that my frustration was rooted not in Shari's tone of voice or Braeden's genetically inherited inability to put away his toys but in my personal need to get everything right - to have everyone in my world roll over & play dead at my command. It was one of those mornings that I wanted to be God.

Thank you, Jesus, for your willingness to stick in there with me even when I'm a complete knucklehead. Thank you for unpacking with me - more than I ever will, you know the perfect place for each thing in my life. And you know what I need to crumple up and toss into the trash can.

This won't be the last time I have to unpack my baggage... and it won't be the last time Jesus does it with me. In fact, there won't ever be a time I deal with the junk in my life that He isn't standing right there beside me.

This is a sure thing: If we die with him, we'll live with him; If we stick it out with him, we'll rule with him; If we turn our backs on him, he'll turn his back on us; If we give up on him, he does not give up-- for there's no way he can be false to himself. 2 Timothy 2:11-13 (The Message)

And that makes unpacking easier.

I am convinced and sure of this very thing, that He Who began a good work in you will continue until the day of Jesus Christ [right up to the time of His return], developing [that good work] and perfecting and bringing it to full completion in you. Philippians 1:6 (Amplified)

Nuns With Guns

Thanks to Kevin Hendricks at Church Marketing Sucks, I saw this wonderful postcard... I still grin every time I see the image. I love it that these guys are trying to figure out ways past the "it's a church blah blah blah" barrier that keeps people from giving authentic Biblical community a legitimate chance in their lives.

Which reminds me of a story... when I was pastoring the church @ hickory hollow in Nashville, TN, we got a lot of interesting reactions to coffeehouse worship vibe. (It's really fun to watch diehard Southern Baptists try to wrap their brains around black curtains, candles, multiple screens, a pastor in cut-off shorts carrying around a diet Coke can & prodigious amounts of coffee in a worship service.)

But the best reaction was from the teenage daughter of one of our regular attenders. She came to the church @ hickory hollow somewhat begrudgingly... her mom & dad were divorced, and this was just part of spending the weekend with dad. Getting in the car that day after the worship service, her dad asked her what she thought of the experience.

"Well, this church sucks less than any other church we've been to."

From a youth, this is high praise. We jokingly considered putting it in our advertising: "We suck less than any church in Nashville."

Cream of the Five Year Crop

I like creamed corn... take a yummy vegetable & add prodigious amounts of cream and sugar. Mmmmm.... corn.

That actually has very little to do with this post. I just didn't eat breakfast.

The real point is to recap some games with serious replayability. Since I'm a bit anal retentive when it comes to tracking my game playing, I can look up on a spreadsheet and figure out which games I've played regularly over the last five years.

Thanks go to Pat Brennan for inspiring this post with his own "cream of the 5 year crop" e-mail. As Pat said, "I always find it interesting to look at the games that continue to stand the test of time (in regards to replayability), and it may be useful for anyonewho's looking to backfill their collection with the better games of the past."

The only game I've played 5 or more times each year for the last five years is The Settlers of Catan. I'm not playing nearly as much of it as I used to... 5 times in 2005 as opposed to 24 times in 2001. That doesn't change the fact that I love the game. (In fact, we need to try the Fishers of Catan tonight at Fresno Gamers!)

Games I've played 4 or more times each year for the last five years:

• Carcassonne (a truly great tile-laying game that works better with less players... and though the expansions can be a distraction for new players, I like the variety they lend to the game)
• Pig Pile (Uno-ish, but in a good way... on the surface, this game should be an utter failure, but it manages to work like a charm)
• Web of Power (packs a huge punch into 45 minutes - it's an area control masterpiece that develops differently each time you play)

Games I've played 3 or more times each year for the last five years:

• Flowerpower (one of my favorite two-player games... a simple tile-laying game that you can play "friendly" or "cutthroat")
• Liar's Dice (bluffing at it's best - easy to teach but difficult to learn the tactics... and the people skills to read the bluffs)
• Time's Up (Peter Sarrett developed the folk game 'Celebrities' into one of the best party games on the planet)
• Zirkus Flohcati (who'd have thunk a game about making a flea circus would be so darn much fun?)

Games I've played 2 or more times each year for the last five years:

• Carabande (finger-flicking race game that is a delight to play)
• Ra (I hated this auction game the first time I played it... but it's grown on me over time)
• Russelbande (a children's game that works for a wide variety of people & ages... acrobactic pigs!)

Games I've played 4 or more times each year for the last five years... except for one year:

• Lost Cities (beautiful production enhances this game of card-driven "chicken")
• Tally Ho (you have to be able to accept aberrant/luck-driven games every 7-8 plays... but if you can, what you get is a very interesting little game)

30 Questions

Blame Mark Haberman who posted this idea on his blog, Habergamer. (Mark, btw, needs to do some more blogging.) :-) Anyhoo... here's a New Year's "getting to know you" post for for 2006.

1. How long have you been gaming?

I've played board & card games as long as I can remember. Over the years, I've had forays into nearly every area of gaming:

• classic American (the 1970's): Monopoly, Prize Property, King Oil, etc.
• wargames (late 70's/early 80's): Wooden Ships & Iron Men, Squad Leader Third Reich, etc.
• role-playing (early 80's): Dungeons & Dragons, Runequest, Traveller
• Games Workshop board games (mid-late 80's): Talisman, Fury of Dracula, Dungeonquest, etc.

It was finally in the late 80's that I discovered via Games Magazine that there was another world of gaming out there: Euros. (Well, at that point, "German" games.) I bought every Ravensburger game I could find that didn't look like it was for 5 year olds.

Then, in the mid-90's, two incidents changed my gaming hobby into an obsession:

1. buying a copy of Phantoms of the Ice from White Wind Games... bringing me into contact with Alan Moon & the rest of the White Wind line. That contact led to an invitation to the Gathering of Friends...
2. finding Linie 1 and Modern Art in a game store in Cinncinati, OH... I spent over $100 on the two of them (highway robbery!) but I was hooked...

Within the next few years came Settlers... then an online connection with Rob Wood - which led to a friendship with Ted "Roving Reporter" Cheatham - which led to an invitation to the second Gulf Games and becoming buddies with Greg Schloesser and yadda yadda yadda.

2. What was your first "Euro" game?

I think it was Scotland Yard... though I also have an early AH copy of Adel Verpflichtet.

3. Which game sucked you in?

Which time?! :-)

• wargames: definitely Third Reich - looking back, I'm still amazed we fought our way through the rule book
• roleplaying: D&D - a group of us read the cover article in Games Magazine and hunted down the "blue" starter box - $10. (Wish that was all I had spent on D&D... man, what I laid out for graph paper alone would finance a small 3rd world country...)
• Games Workshop games: Talisman
• Euros: Scotland Yard was good, but Midnight Party is what hooked me on Ravensburger games... and it was Settlers that shifted the whole thing into overdrive.

4. What is your favorite game?

Today, it's probably Return of the Heroes/Under the Shadow of the Dragon. Over time, it's either El Grande or Settlers of Catan.

5. What is your least favorite game?

Wow. Such a long list to choose from... Devil Bunny Needs A Ham is pretty high up there (or low down there), as is Lunch Money, Munchkin (and all it's evil spawn), Wortelboer, Krieg & Fremden, and Vox Populi.

6. Open or closed holdings?

For the uninitiated, there are a number of games (most notably Acquire) that have very important information hidden from other players that is trackable if you're a good card counter. Many people prefer to play with this information open to make the game less "mean."

I like holdings open for Acquire... but I don't particularly like Acquire, so there.

7. To gamble or not to gamble?

I don't gamble for money - but I'm happy to play Poker for chips. Or M&M's... though I'm in major danger of eating my winnings.

8. How much luck do you like in your games?

It just depends... sometimes I love the wild swings of fortune and other times I want total control. What I don't want is perfect information games.

9. Last three games played?

It's December 31st... while Shari & I may play some 2-player stuff later, we played games with Braeden tonight before he went to bed: Go Away, Monster; Buddel-Wuddel & Platsch!

10. Last three games purchased?

Hmmm... Under the Shadow of the Dragon, Wings of War: Watch Your Back!, and... wow, I can't remember.

11. Pack rat or trader?

I'll trade stuff... but only if I really don't enjoy it. Otherwise it stays in the collection.

12. What game are you thinking about right now?

I really like Ark... the first play was confusing for the first 30 minutes. Then, you could almost hear an audible "click" in the room as we finished the game at twice the speed we played the first 30 minutes. I think there's a lot there to explore (how to play cards to keep other players from using "your" spaces, etc.) but I need to play it some more to make that happen.

13. What's your favorite mechanic?

I don't know that I have one... but I like it when the mechanics mesh with the theme. (Goldland is an excellent example.)

14. What is your favorite theme?

I like exploration games a whole lot.

15. Who is your favorite designer?

It's a toss-up between Klaus Teuber (Settlers, Gnadelos, Anno 1503, Entdecker, Lowenherz) and Wolfgang Riedesser (Dschungelrennen, Ausgebremst).

16. Best gaming experience?

Gulf Games... I'm hard-pressed to choose individual games, but particular highlights include:

• Shanghai (BAD game, GREAT company) with Ted Cheatham, Greg Schloesser & Craig Berg
• Princes of Florence with Derk, Vonda, Jon Pessano & ?... wining after Derk talked major trash about me being a fluffy gamer
• Waldschattenspiel with Frank Branham in a darkened kitchen

And so many others... sigh.

17. Worst gaming experience?

Perpetual Notion with my Bible study group - we renamed it "The Fight Game".

18. Favorite game for 2 players?

Memoir '44... even when I lose, I enjoy the ride.

19. Favorite game for 3 players?

Schappchen Jagd... I can't spell the game, but I love to play it.

20. Favorite game for 5 players?

El Grande.

21. Favorite game for 6 players?

Entenrallye. Just as long as one of them isn't Dave Vander Ark. (Hi, Dave!)

22. Favorite party game?

Time's Up, followed closely by Smarty Party.

23. Do you value Theme or Mechanics more?

Like I said earlier, I value the meshing of the two... I want a theme that works and/or draws me in that lines up with the mechanics of the game.

24. What color do you want to use to play with?

I like being yellow, but I don't always get to do that. I'd rather not be "doody brown" (which is an option in some of my games.)

25. What is your favorite movie?

"The Princess Bride"... followed closely by "Raising Arizona" and "The Truman Show".

26. What is your favorite book?

• Fiction: The Silver Chair (C.S. Lewis)
• Non-Fiction: Seizing Your Divine Moment (Erwin McManus) & Blue Like Jazz (Donald Miller)

27. Last three books read?

• Faith of My Fathers (Chris Seay & family)
• Walk On: the Spiritual Journey of U2 (Steve Stockman)
• The Present Future (Reggie McNeal)

28. Last three movies watched?

• Jump Tomorrow (highly recommended indie romance with a bit of magical realism and an almost total lack of cynicism)
• King Kong 2005 (gorgeous & epic, but it's about a big ape, for crying out loud)
• Narnia: LW& W (the kids are incredible and there are great moments, but Aslan doesn't have the power he has in the books)

29. Favorite beverage?

It used to be diet Coke... more recently it's either Snapple Apple or Starbucks Caramel Apple Cider.

30. What are the three most important people in your life?

My wife, Shari, and my two boys, Braeden & Collin. (No surprise here, right?!)

The Lion & The Monkey

Short Version:

• Monkey beats Lion.

Longer Version:

• Monkey is better than it's source material.
• Lion is good, but NOT better than it's source material.

Final Thoughts:

• I'm glad more people will be aware of Narnia, but the movie (Lion, Witch & The Wardrobe) was good but not great. (For an excellent analysis/argument about the film, check out this discussion.)
• OTOH, though a bit long, Kong is substantially better than the 1933 movie it is based upon... and makes the 1976 version look like a bad TV movie.

Jesus Hates It When You Smoke

from Todd Rhoades blog, Monday Morning Insight and his post "What Not To Get Todd For Christmas":

Jesus, the Prince of Peace gazes balefully upwards at your approaching cigarette... How does that make you feel? 'JESUS HATES IT WHEN YOU SMOKE' reads the print inside this provocative, righteous ashtray. Sticker on bottom reads: "use of this product may be hazardous to your health and/or eternal soul". (This'd be a great soul-winning tool for those 'turn or burn' sign holders). They're a steal at just $12.00, available here.

You've got to be kidding.

Unfortunately, they're not.

Now, not that I'm a big fan of smoking and/or secondhand smoke. But for crying out loud, people, what were you thinking?! Jesus died on the cross so he could guilt you into stopping a potentially sickness producing habit? THAT'S what the Incarnation and the Atonement were all about?!

In the words of Bill the Cat: "Accck!"

Update:
Well, I need to climb off my high horse and eat some crow and a whole lot of other animal cliches... evidently this is a gag gift. (Thanks for the heads up, Jon.)

In the words of Emily Litella (SNL): "Never mind."

If Only...

...oh, if only I could have seen this version of Titanic first. I'd have 3 hours of my life back.

Bun-O-Vision

thanks to Invisible Craig for showing me the light!

Greer Spring

On the Saturday after Thanksgiving, my sister organized an "expedition" to walk down to Greer Spring... so we left Collin with my mom & Aunt Wylma and took Braeden on an adventure. (Greer dumps into the Eleven Point River, which is a wonderful Ozark river that winds around my mom's home town of Alton.)

We had a great time hiking & throwing sticks into the white water... and even got Aunt Liz to take this great picture of the three of us.

Collin & Grandpa

My dad had a sinus infection over Thanksgiving, so he wasn't the most cheerful guy on the planet. But it's pretty obvious Collin liked hanging out with him!

Collin & Cousin

On Thanksgiving Day, we celebrated my Grandma Jenkin's 95th birthday... all of my cousins were together for the first time since 1978. Of course, this time we had a bunch of kids - our kids!

This is Collin sitting in his great-grandma's lap with his 3rd cousin (I guess, I can never keep all of that "how are we related?" stuff straight), Kammie. She is Kevin's daughter - Kevin & I were born a couple of months apart, as were Collin & Kammie.

For me, it's really cool to watch Collin & Braeden get to interact with my extended family - not just because I'm so darned proud of my boys, but because it's like watching impossible home movies of what it was like for me to do the same thing in the same places 40 years ago.

Blasts From The Past

Almost every summer, my family would take a vacation and go to Missouri - where both my mom & dad grew up. Mom grew up in a little town named Alton, and her brother & sister & mom (my grandma!) still live there.

For a child of suburbia, it was a pretty disorienting experience. (If you want to see how I grew up, watch E.T. That kinda looks like my neighborhood.) I remember having trouble sleeping the first few nights each summer, as I could hear all these different sounds (mainly bug noises). Grandma didn't have air conditioning, either - which just seemed weird to me. (Of course, I kept trying to talk my Uncle Jim into paving the gravel road from the highway down to his house... a 1/4 mile of road. I just couldn't conceive of unpaved roads as being normal.)

One of my favorite places to visit/stay in Alton was Uncle Jim & Aunt Wylma's house - not only were they fun to hang out with , but they also had a pool table & a ping pong table & a shuffleboard court in the basement!

And they had this cabinet of games left behind by my older cousins... Video Village, Broadsides, Conflict, Flintstones, The Game of Nirtz, Smack-A-Roo, Beverly Hillbillies card game, and even an Electronic Baseball. (It was kind of like Electronic Football, with the runners that moved because the game vibrated, but his was done with a magnetic ball that stuck to the outfield fence.) I spent a lot of pleasant muggy afternoons & evenings playing games with my cousins & my sister at Aunt Wylma's house.

Over Thanksgiving weekend, I brought my family back to Alton to celebrate my grandma's 95th birthday. So, Braeden & I had the opportunity on Friday & Saturday to play some games... stuff I hadn't seen for 20+ years.

Smack-A-Roo
More of a dexterity playset than an actual game, Smack-A-Roo uses a spring-loaded shooter and marbles to play a variety of games. I don't remember playing this a lot as a kid - nor would I see myself playing much of it now. You don't have that much control over what happens once you shoot the ball - and the only interactive game in the whole thing is a baseball take-off. Braeden, however, occupied himself with it for hours.

The Bobbsey Twins Go To The Farm Game
I'm pretty sure that my brain blocked any memory of this nasty piece of work. Imagine Chutes & Ladders, only with 2 pawns per player & a longer map. Blech.

The Game of Cootie
It's no wonder Americans hate games, if this is the kind of stuff they got introduced to as kids. The only fun thing to do with Cootie is build bugs - the gameplay is simply "roll & hope you get the right number."

Video Village
I'm not old enough to remember the TV game show - but I certainly remember playing this game over & over with my sister & cousins. It's got a cool dice rolling device, plus a jail & a bridge & a series of stand-up plastic storefronts on the board. The game isn't much, but it's fast & light & a bit of fun. Braeden wasn't taken by this one, but he's too young to understand the appeal. (Or maybe he's just more "gamer" than I realize.)

I pulled out Broadsides & Conflict to look through the boxes again (I'd be happy to acquire copies of either of these games), but Braeden isn't old enough for either game yet. The Flintstones game was pretty good, as I recall, but time & weather had faded the card deck so much that it was unplayable.

Why Religious People Shouldn't Design Board Games

From a patent application:

A game board apparatus having a game board horizontally divided into two sectors representing heaven and hell. The start position is at the bottom of the hell and the finish winning position is situated at the top of the heaven. The players use playing pieces to traverse spaces in the heaven and hell sectors, the amount of advancement being dictated by indicia provided on decks of question cards and answer cards.

Read farther down in the patent proposal and it becomes clear that the game is Candyland with religious overtones. Draw a Hell Card or Heaven Card (depending on where you are on the board)... then draw a "yes/no" card - and move accordingly. As Frank Branham, who pointed this silly thing out to me, said: "Apparently, there is no free will."

And just because I can, here's a few sample cards for you to ponder:

• Would you make a deal with Satan? Yes: Remain on spot. No: Advance 5 spaces.
• Do you have unclean habits? Yes: Remain on spot. No: Advance 4 spaces.
• Would you sell your country's defense secrets? Yes: Go back to start. No: Advance 6 spaces.
• Are you a self righteous person? Yes: Remain on spot. No: Advance 2 spaces.
• Do you have ulterior motives for whatever you do for someone? Yes: Go back 10 spaces.
• Do you sin constantly and ask for forgiveness? Yes: Go back to hell or satan red star. No: Advance 6 spaces.
• Do you honor your parents? Yes: Advance 2 heaven stars. No: Go back to start.
• Are you a procrastinator? Yes: Go back 7 spaces. No: Advance 7 spaces.
• Are you an atheist or communist? Yes: Go back to start. No: Advance to next heaven blue star.
• Would you give your life in the name of Christ? Yes: Advance to gold star and enter into the kingdom of heaven. No: Go back to start.
• Do you despise the poor? Yes: Go back to hell or satan red star. No: Advance 6 spaces.
• Is Christ first in your life? Yes: Advance to next heaven blue star. No: Go back to hell or satan green star.

So, evidently procrastinating is worse than being self-righteous. And sinning & asking for God's grace is a bad thing. And nothing says gaming fun like being told to "go back to hell." In addition, there is a "mercy" deck, which evidently dispenses 2nd chances as well as death (immediately getting tossed out of the game) and "rapture" (immediately win the game). The guys who wrote the Left Behind series are evidently getting a cut on the profits here. Look, although I'm having fun at the design/designers' expense, that's not my real problem with this game - or any "Christian" game, for that matter. Most "religious" game designs are not only bad designs (taking the worst element of Candyland or Monopoly and layering them with moral themes) but they're bad theology as well.

If the heart of the Gospel is the grace of God - that "while we were yet sinnners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8), then the legalistic "stick & carrot"/reward & punishment designs of so many "religious" games are seriously flawed.

Perhaps the very structure of a competitive game is antithetical to communicating Bibilical theology. I dunno - I'm gonna have to think about this one some more.

Addendum: The only "successful" (and I use that word in quotes on purpose!) religious games that I know of are retreads of good basic game designs with "bathrobe pageant" trappings:

• Ark of the Covenant (which is a Carcassonne variant)
• Settlers of Canaan (which is a Catan variant)
• Bible Outburst (which is, obviously, Outburst with Bible topics)

Anyone know of anything that actually is enjoyable & good game design? I'm all ears!

My Brain's Still at DFW

This article originally appeared in the 11/30/05 edition of The Grapevine, a publication of NewLife Community Church.

The plan was for Shari, Braeden, Collin & I to return home from Missouri Tuesday afternoon. If all went according to plan, we'd land here in Fresno at 1:11 pm, Nancy would pick us up & bring us home, I'd start work on the Grapevine & some sermon notes... and then, seeing as how it's the only free night in our schedule until next Tuesday, we'd put up our Christmas tree.

Only, as you can probably guess by now, it didn't work that way.

Springfield, MO is a nice town, but the airport isn't much larger than ours here in Fresno. So when our plane had mechanical problems, we got bumped to a later flight - so much later (nearly 4 hours) that we missed our original connecting flight & had to hang out at DFW (Dallas/Fort Worth airport) for 5+ hours.

Thankfully, DFW has lots to do. In fact, the new terminal reminds me a bit of the fake airport they built for the Tom Hanks film, "The Terminal" (one sentence review: watchable but no big deal). We ate dinner, we shopped a bit, Braeden played in a sound sculpture (which was actually pretty cool). Braeden & I even rode around the airport in the new Skyline train system, which was kind of like the Monorail at Disneyland. And, of course, we topped it all off with Ben & Jerry's ice cream.

And another delay, as the plane we were supposed to fly in came in late from Phoenix. But what's another 45 minutes to our already overly-long day? Sigh.

Thankfully, we got home in one piece last night (thanks, Neil & Nancy) and crashed. The only suitcases that are open contain essentials: toiletries, underwear, Braeden's favorite stuffed animal. Otherwise, we're just happy to be here.

Heck, I'm happy to be here - in the office, back "on the job", so to speak. But my brain is majorly fuddled - so I don't think I can squeeze a coherent article out of my misfiring synapses. Instead, I'll just do a core dump of some random thoughts about life, God, and the coolness of pastoring NewLife.

- I finished reading The Present Future (by Reggie McNeal) during my week in Missouri... and promptly started reading it again. I'm convinced that it's a key set of questions for where the church (and in particular, our church) is headed in the next 20 years. (It doesn't hurt that Reggie is a Southern Baptist... though he tries mightily to give this book multi-denominational appeal, it's easy to read between the lines and hear his excitement & pain of years as an SBC pastor & denominational consultant.)

- My grandma's 95th birthday party/Thanksgiving gathering was a huge success. We figured out that the last time all of my cousins & I had been together was in 1978 for Grandma & Grandpa's 50th wedding anniversary. Of course, we were the kids back then - now, most of us have kids. (Collin wasn't the youngest - my cousin, Kevin, has a daughter a couple of months younger than him.)

It's very cool to be reminded that my relationship with Jesus Christ was fed by parents & grandparents (and extended family) who follow Jesus themselves. It's not that their faith makes mine real - each of us get to have our own relationship with God - but it's sweet to see the pool of faith that I grew up swimming in!

- Narnia's coming! The movie (The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe) premieres a week from Friday. I have two thoughts:

1. I can't wait to see one of my favorite books by one of my favorite authors come to the big screen.
2. Oh, please, don't mess this up.

- I'm still a bit in shock from the First Fruits offering - we, with God's help, gave $43,467.00 on the first Sunday of the giving portion of Get in the Game. Wow! We serve a VERY big God.

- It's really nice to pastor a church where I can leave town for 8 days and know that things will go on without me. In other words, NewLife is not primarily about me - it's about God! (And that's a very good thing.) It doesn't hurt, of course, that we've got a great staff - thanks to Aaron & Nancy!

Well that's about all that's rattling around my head this morning. Oh, yeah, I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to get everything done today, but that's pretty much SOP (standard operating procedure) for my life. The nicest thing is that God isn't wondering - He's not surprised by delayed flights or $43,000+ offerings or my Aunt Wylma's peanut butter pie (which was, as usual, incredible).

We think we are headed toward the future. The truth is, the future is headed toward us. And it's in a hurry (we now know the universe is speeding up, not slowing down). We also generally think that the present makes sense only in light of the past. Again, we need to check our thinking. The present makes clearest sense in light of the future. We humans write history by looking at the past. God creates history ahead of time. He never forecasts. God always backcasts. He began with the end in mind. The future is always incipient in the present. Before the foundation of the world, the Lamb was slain. Calvary was anticipated in God's kiss of life into Adam. The cross gain dimension silhouetted against the empty tomb. The empty tomb confirmed the invasion of the future into the present. When Paul encountered the resurrected Jesus, he realized the future had been fast-forwarded. That changed everything.

It still does.
from The Present Future by Reggie McNeal

God is roaring back toward us from the future, not playing catch-up from Bible times. So, wherever we are, it's nice to remember that God is working in our lives in view of who we will be - who He knows we will be - and not just based on the garbage & mistakes of our past.

I'm sold on the fact that God's not going to leave you half-finished. No way. What he's doing with you is superb and he's going to have you ready for when the Liberator, Jesus, comes back.
paraphrase of Philippians 1:6 from word on the street by Rob Lacey

It's My Turn Now

Starting today... and going for the next 10-15 days, I'll be posting my "personal" Top One Hundred Games of All Time Ever. Of course, I won't be posting it here - but over at The One Hundred blogsite. Go on over & check it out!

Small Soldiers Big Battle

Movie tie-in games are usually not very good. Some of them stink. (Reference the Milton Bradley game, Congo: The Movie, which is so incredibly bad that it is actually worse than the horrible film it was based on.) Too many of them are simply re-themed classics: Madagascar Sorry, Lord of the Rings Risk, Star Wars Monopoly. There are some exceptions - I'm a big fan of four of the Star Wars games:

• The Queen's Gambit - a big box full of plastic minis & a three-tier board system that takes most of a six foot table to set up... and, amazingly, a really good game is in there with all that stuff.
• Epic Duels - a card-based multi-player combat system that is loaded with Star Wars flavor... you can choose to mix Episodes & characters!
• Clash of the Lightsabers - a two player dueling card game with nifty pewter figs and interesting gameplay.
• Attacktix - miniatures combat with not-so-minature figures... with spring-loaded guns & lightsabers!

But, I really wasn't intending to write about Star Wars... I wanted to write about one of Braeden's favorite games. (For those of you who don't pay good attention to the rest of the blog, Braeden is my 4.5 year old son.)

Currently, that's Small Soldiers Big Battle, which ties in (of course) with the film, Small Soldiers. (Note: I haven't seen Small Soldiers - any capsule reviews in the comments section of the blog would be highly appreciated.) We played 7 times this weekend - and Braeden won five of them. Any surprise that this is his favorite game?

Anyway, it's a simple "capture the flag" game using plastic minatures (about 3-4 inches tall). The pieces are copies of the characters from the film - meaning you have one player using army men and another player using monsters. On your turn you spin the spinner, which can result in:

• moving a character 1-4 hexes (in the 'advanced' rules, you can split your move between pieces)
• drawing a card (most of which are power-ups... which add speed or strength to a character)
• recruit a character from the toy store (the toy store backdrop is where "killed" characters go)
• If you are adjacent to an enemy figure, you can fight. Both players roll a die, apply modifiers, and the highest number wins. Repeat this process until one player manages to land on the opposing flag.

There are some wrinkles:

• recruited characters MUST appear on a certain space - if that space is blocked by another piece (friendly or otherwise), you can't recruit
• one of the cards (well, there are two of them) is a Globotech Recall - I'm not sure where it fits thematically, but it means you get to throw one opposing figure into the toy store
• a number of cards in the deck allow you to use the catapult - which is a skateboard with a flyswatter that throws a golf ball with bolts in it... any figures which are knocked over are put in the toy store
• powerups are good only until the next battle you're in - once you fight (win or lose), the powerup goes on the discard pile

And that's pretty much it. The box says it's for 5 years & up, but Braeden has no problem handling the game, and he's only four. (Granted, Braeden has been playing games since he was 2, so your mileage may vary.)

So why would I write about this game, instead of jumping on the "Gosh, isn't Caylus the coolest thing since sliced bread?" bandwagon?

• It's actually fun to play - it's not going to eclipse Memoir '44 as my favorite battle game any time soon, but I don't hate playing it (as opposed to Candyland or Adopt a Dog)
• there is some room for intelligent decisions - who do I give powerups to? should I rush foward or wait for the other player to come to me? how do I use what I've got to win?
• it's great training for other games - as far as I can remember, this is Braeden's first hex-based game. It's also doing a great job of teaching him die roll modifiers and tactical movement. (Since there aren't any ZOC's, we don't have to worry about that quite yet. Of course, since he's unlikely to ever play 70's/80's AH and SPI games, he may NEVER figure out that ZOC means Zone of Control.)
• I haven't played Caylus, which makes lavishing praise on it difficult

A final note: whoever wrote the description on the Geek doesn't have children and/or has some major extra time on his hands - why in the world would you PAINT these figures? In the words of Pepe the King Prawn, "Un-bee-leev-able."

The Far Side of Evangelism

What We Say To Dogs
"Okay, Ginger! I've had it! You stay out of the garbage! Understand, Ginger? Stay out of the garbage, or else!"
What They Hear
"blah blah GINGER blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah GINGER blah blah blah blah blah..."
from The Far Side by Gary Larson (

http://www.bakbone.com/newsletter/images/ginger_large.gif) I love The Far Side. Gary Larson was/is a genius - ok, maybe a bit warped, but still a genius. And the classic "what we say to dogs" cartoon is one of my favorites. It wasn't even difficult to find: type "far side" and "ginger" to Google, and there it was.

Sadly, though, what caused me to hunt down the cartoon was the decidedly uncartoon-like reality of doing church. I'm beginning to believe that much of what we do in order to reach people for Jesus communicates about as clearly as Ginger's owner communicates with her. To use another pop culture reference, we sound a lot like Miss Othmar, Charlie Brown's teacher. (Weird bit of trivia: originally, Miss Othmar's voice was played by a trombone.)

Why is that?! I mean, we've got the most incredible message in the world...

God's so passionate about the planet that he donates his one and only Son. Whoever invests their life in his Son doesn't die, but gets given this limitless life. D'you think God sends his Son to slam people down? No! He sends his Son to liberate people. No one's written off if they're convinced about Jesus.
paraphrase of John 3:16-18 from word on the street by Rob Lacey

So, why does it come out sounding like "Get right or get left" or "Where will you spend eternity: smoking or non-smoking?" (Yes, I've actually seen these on church signs.)

I'm starting to think that we may have reduced evangelism to a clean-up project - a spiritual "extreme makeover" that is more interested in making people acceptable to us rather than seeing them transformed into radical followers of Jesus Christ.

Evangelism in this worldview is about churching the unchurched, not connecting people to Jesus. It focuses on cleaning people up, changing their behavior so Christians (translation: church people) can be more comfortable around them.
from The Present Future by Reggie McNeal

Frankly, unchurched people don't care about being made in our image... because we've spent way too much time shaving off the rough corners of our lives & drenching ourselves in the cheap perfume of self-righteousness. We haven't shown them anything worth giving up their Sunday mornings for, let alone their lives.

Occasionally when I do consulting for congregations I insist that the church leaders meet off-campus in a restaurant during Sunday church time. I ask the group to look around and then pose the question to them: "Do you think these people struggled with a decision this morning of whether to attend church or to go out for a sausage biscuit?" Are you kidding? The church is not even on their screen.
from The Present Future by Reggie McNeal

So, how do we change this? How do we cut out the "blah blah blah SINNER blah blah" and really make an impact on this community?

Honestly, that's a bigger question than I can answer in a single e-mail article... so, for today, I'm just going to give you a personal starting point, a jumping off place for a journey with God into the great adventure He has planned for us. Here's the four-step plan:

1. Write down your 10 closest friends/acquaintances. They can be co-workers, guys you golf with, people you get together with each weekend, whatever. Just write their names down on a piece of paper. (See, easy so far, right? As long as you can hold a pencil and write semi-legibly, you're good to go on this one.)
2. Beside each name, make a note of what you know about their spiritual condition. In other words, do they go to church? Are they a follower of Christ? (BTW, "go to church" and "follower of Christ" are NOT the same thing.) What evidence of God's grace do you see in their lives?
3. Think about the list you just made. Hey, too often in church we do these kind of exercises like homework and don't actually take time to think through the implications for our life. (There's a reason for that: it's called "avoiding pain." Sigh.) You may find that you don't know very much about the spiritual lives of your friends... or that all of your friends are churched believers. Or maybe you've got a lot of friends who are connected with churches but wouldn't recognize Jesus if He showed wearing a T-shirt with "Messiah" in hot pink Day-Glo lettering on the front. Whatever you find, ask yourself the tough questions: Do I really spend relational time with people who need Jesus, or is my life lived out in the rose-colored bubble of "churchianity"? Why don't I talk more about spiritual issues with my friends? (Note: I didn't say "why don't I witness more?" - so much of what we've been trained/guilted into witnessing-wise is Miss Othmar-ish "dump the Gospel & run" instead of living out our belief in Jesus 24-7. We don't need more drive-by Gospel sharing, we need more people whose love for Jesus bubbles up in their everyday lives & conversations.)
4. Ask God for wisdom & direction. The temptation is to go into "Mr. Fix-It" mode when you're confronted with stuff like this... don't. Start right now, today, wherever you're reading this, by going to God and asking, "What now? How do I share the truth that changed my life with people who need to see it lived out and hear it spoken?"

There's nothing magic about this process - but there's something amazing & supernatural about our God. He is on a mission to redeem the world... and He wants us to join Him. Hopefully, with a bit more clarity... less "blah blah", more:

You live and breathe to profile and celebrate the one who picked you up out of your dark grovelings and stood you up in his brilliant light... Let your lifestyle be like a magnet for the locals. Let them charge you, try and sue you, but in court the jury will see a rare thing - a prosecution lawyer lost for words. And the papers'll write the headlines: "God turns up to take the credit."
paraphrase of 1 Peter 2:9, 11-12 from word on the street by Rob Lacey

This article originally appeared in 11/8/05 edition of The Grapevine, the e-newsletter of NewLife Community Church.

I Feel This Way On Mondays...

...thankfully, not every Monday. Now, here's hoping our new worship & youth pastor doesn't take this wrong. (He he he... hi, Aaron!)

The Not-So-Amazing Race

Shari & I became hooked on The Amazing Race a couple of years ago... couples racing around the world, traveling, running, doing crazy stuff. So we were intrigued when they announced the Family edition this summer.

Unfortunately, the newest season hasn't been nearly as enjoyable as previous seasons... lots of the tasks seem pointless and there's a greater reliance on completely random elements to determine who wins a particular leg of the race. Sigh.

In addition, one of the families is very forward about their Christianity. Now, normally, I'd think that was a good thing - I'm kind of partial to people who love Jesus enough to talk about Him and live their life according to His principles - but the Weaver family? Double sigh. (In all fairness, you need to know that this family is made up of a mom & three teenage kids - Dad was killed in a racing accident a couple of years back.)

What follows are quotes from one of my favorite websites, Television Without Pity. Let's listen to someone who isn't "inside the Christian bubble" and see how they perceive these Christians.

In maybe the creepiest off-the-mat talk ever, one of the girls explains, "We've been raised since we were born not to trust other people, but to trust your family and to trust God." Wow. Not to trust other people? I mean, I would have gotten it if she said they were raised not to worry about what other people think, but to have a girl that age saying she's been raised not to trust anyone outside the family is really...an unhappy thing. It explains why they relate to other people in a manner reminiscent of the Coneheads, but it feels sad. Anyway, there is more talk about how they can't control other teams talking about them, and then the other daughter, I think, adds, "We're all Christians, and we're above that." Well, I can't argue with that. Jesus did speak extensively about the importance of crowing and placing oneself above others. I think that's what all the stuff about how you're more important than the birds of the air and the lilies of the field was about. It's like I finally understand the Book of Matthew...

Oh, and then Rachel prays, adding at the end, "And let us beat the other people if it's your will." My sense is that she wants to pray for God to make her win money, but some part of her is conscious of how cheap it sounds. She sort of wants to hedge her bets because maybe God and anyone watching might be offended by her asking for straight-up monetary gain at other people's expense, but she holds out hope that maybe God will make her win if she asks and won't make her win if she doesn't ask. Just in case it's an order-fulfillment system like getting books off Amazon, she doesn't want to miss her shot. So you get that (ironically) a**-covering prayer where we ask to win, but only if God wants us to win. Ick...

Back at the Yield, the Weavers are still b***ing. Mama explains that they're "responsible to a higher authority." (God: "[Looking around.] Me? Oh, don't bring me into this....")

The Yield sand runs out in the Weaver hourglass, so they are into the coffee bean Roadblock, where Tammy still has no bean. Boo! Rachel goes, starts into her pile of beans, and is ordered by her mother to begin praying. Gross. I'm sure they only want their bean if it's God's will. Boo, boo!...

My two cents: you can read this snark-y recap as an attack on Christianity & Christians - you know, "Look how persecuted we are." But I think you'd be missing the point.

We are our own worst enemy. When we casually toss God-language and God-behavior around without following it up with authentic Christ-lives, the stink causes people to recoil in horror. If we're supposed to "let our light shine before all men" (Matthew 5:16), then we could certainly do with a little more shining & a little less pointing at how nifty our light is.

And it's not just about the Weavers - as if them being eliminated from the race would somehow advance the cause of Christ. It's about each one of us - where are we "the ugly Christians"?

Look, I'm not talking about perfection. None of us, follower of Christ or not, can stand up to 24-7 scrutiny without breaking down. But there is a graciousness & contentment that bubbles up in people who've genuinely experienced the grace of God that echoes throughout their lives - both through the good behavior and the "I wish I could take that back" kind of stuff.

So, what's bubbling up out of you?

The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.

Luke 6:45 (NIV)

Far Away But Weirdly Close

I didn't know Kyle well... I met him when Shari & I visited UBC in Waco, TX back in 1997. I'd talked to him a couple of times at emergent church leader gatherings. But that doesn't change that it was freaky to hear that he'd died as a result of being electrocuted in the baptistry of the church during a worship service Sunday morning. (You can read the basic story at Baptist Press. For the church's reaction/response, you can see their website.) A flurry of reactions have gone through my head/heart over the last few days:

• Man, I hurt for his wife & kids.
• What in the world are the folks in the church thinking? They just watched their pastor die.
• Note to self: Don't EVER touch anything electrical while you're baptizing.
• I wish I had an easy answer for the question "Why does God allow stuff like this to happen?"
• Remember to pray for the rest of the staff - you've been through the loss of a pastor (due to his adulterous affair, in my case) and you know how traumatic it can be for those left behind.
• I've been to that church - it feels weirdly close to me.
• Ditto because I graduated from Baylor - and this was Homecoming Weekend.

For another take on this story, check out Dan Kimball's blog, Vintage Faith.

The One Hundred

Nearly a year ago, my friend, Stephen Glenn, came up with this wild-eyed idea. He'd poll a private mailing list of rabid game players that he & I both belong to about their favorite games... and come up with a Rolling Stone-like list of The Top 100 Games of All Time.

I volunteered to put the list up on my website - and the work began. After much starting & stopping (Stephen opened a game store, Shari & I had Collin, etc.), we finally were ready to go in early August.

And then something went horribly wrong with the software (Freeway Express) and computer (aging iMac) that I use to upload to Game Central Station. Insert immense sigh of frustration here - I have this huge update (which includes much more than just The One Hundred) that I have been unable to upload.

Anyway, after much futzing around, I suggested we create a blog to publish the material. Stephen agreed, and that blog just went live this morning (Thursday, November 3rd). It may or may not be of interest to you - some of you don't read this blog for the games - others of you are pretty ambivalent about the 'spiritual' part of this monster - but if you are interested, you can find it at

The One Hundred

Over the next three weeks, we'll be counting down the games from #100 to #1. Might make a nice Christmas list for someone in your family. :-)

BTW, Stephen is not just a nice guy, he's also the designer of the Spiel des Jahres nominated game, Balloon Cup, which you need to play at some point!

A. Vacation: Reply

I'm confused. This person, who is not a believer, attends a Christian worship service. Despite being an admitted liberal who listens to popular music (such as Van Halen), she criticizes the music of a Christian choir for not being conservative enough? I don't follow the logic of her statement.

You got all the details right but didn't listen to what she said.

• Yes, Sarah Vowell is profoundly liberal.
• Yes, she's not a believer (in fact, she's essentially turned her back on church/God, which she does get into at other places in the book).
• Yes, she thinks the CCM mid-tempo pop ballad is insipid (she's not alone on that one).
• Yes, she wants music that feels root-sy & authentic...

...which is her point (and mine). We in the church often assume that we KNOW what seekers want - but we don't actually listen to seekers to find out. Much of what the emerging church has done right is because they've tapped into the authentic desires of folks seeking a real & vibrant faith, rather than simply creating our own Christian subculture hermtically sealed against corruption.

But I've gone off-topic - you questioned the logic of her statement. Being a political liberal does not define your musical tastes, any more than being a theological conservative does. What she expressed is a desire for gospel music - that to her, like many of the senior adults in my congregation, there's a particular sound that rings true to them as "professing Christ".

I'm not saying that every church should do Johnny Cash's "Man in Black" each Sunday (though it wouldn't hurt if we played One Bad Pig's cover of it every once in a while). :-) But I think we must listen carefully to those in the culture around us to hear how our attempts at communicating the most important message ever is coming across. Not so we can change the message (cue dope slap) but so we can make sure the way we're communicating doesn't speak louder than the truth of Jesus Christ.