the intern

I'm an intern. That means I get to make some mistakes.

My favorite mistake so far has been misspeaking while leading the liturgy on Sunday morning. I was supposed to say that when sinners repent and believe in Jesus they can have new life. It's a bold claim and I was building up to it nicely. However, I said, "Sinners who repeat, oh (pause), um, repent..." Smooth.

My second favorite mistake was locking myself out of the office today. Pastor Doug is on study leave for the week, and I was the only person at church. When I opened the door to the office, I forgot to unlock it manually by disengaging the lock on the inside of the door, As usual, I threw my keys on my desk, and then later after going into the hall to get a drink of water, I found the handle to the office door stiff upon return. I walked around the church for a bit wondering where someone might hide an extra key, and then I walked outside and contemplated breaking a window. Finally, I opted for a more rational third alternative and walked next door to the parsonage and asked Doug's wife if she had a key to the office. Turns out, she did.

When I'm not being an intern, I've had a chance to explore the city a bit.


Above is the Washington Monument from a distance. Below is the Washington Monument up close.


Below is the Lincoln Memorial (or should I say the Lincoln temple?) and below that is a picture of me with Father Abraham. The text above the seated Lincoln reads "In this temple as in the hearts of the people for whom he saved the union, the memory of Abraham Lincoln is enshrined forever." The influence of civil religion is obvious throughout DC, yet I wonder how many of those on field trips and family vacations who parade through the tour of monuments and memorials spend any time in critical reflection on the myths and deceptions that ground so many of the design choices and language.

reunited

I met JoJo in Korea in the summer of 2008. His Korean name is actually Yosep, which is the Korean version of Joseph, and his family name is Jo. Joseph Jo. Nearly immediately I started calling him JoJo. JoJo was 15 when we met, and at the end of the summer he was bound for Nampa, Idaho, where he was going to attend high school. On his own. Living with strangers. With a very low English ability. I was recruited to make JoJo Idaho-ready, a task much bigger than we could accomplish in our three tutoring sessions a week. I knew JoJo had some rough months ahead after he would arrive in Idaho, and my real goal was just to soften the crash landing: teach him about the culture of small, Christian high schools, inform him about American family life, drill him on basic emergency phrases, boost his confidence and calm his fears.

JoJo survived.

Now, three years later, JoJo is going into his senior year in the fall. Like many high school seniors, he's thinking about college, so JoJo didn't go back to Korea this summer. Instead, he's spending the summer in an SAT-prep academy--in Maryland, just a thirty-minute drive from my place.

JoJo and I have kept in touch. Facebook makes that easy. We had dinner together once in Korea in the summer of 2009 after he had finished his freshmen year, and yesterday afternoon JoJo and I had the chance to meet up again. It was awesome. Teacher-student in the summer of 2008, now we were able to get together and just be friends, swapping stories about culture shock and the various experiences we've had in the last few years. It's a strange twist of providence: JoJo, this guy I met on the other side of the world and only because his parents wanted a private tutor to help their son, is now my closest friend for hundreds of miles.

a contrast

May was a busy month, hence the blogging hiatus. My apologies.

I’m now kicking off my summer internship in Silver Spring, Maryland—where gas and milk sell for the same price, $3.89 per gallon. I’m interning with a small Christian Reformed congregation here, just a few miles north of Washington, DC, and I’ll be sharing the preaching and other pastoral duties with the current pastor for ten weeks. I’m excited about it—though the surroundings are nearly the complete opposite of last summer, which you may remember I spent on a small farm in Ontario. The farm was tucked away down a long narrow lane, and my summer cottage was nestled even farther back in a row of trees with a pasture and Trina the Cow to keep me company.

This summer I'm living on the second floor of the only three story building in this next picture—right above Sign-A-Rama and next door to Bigg Wolf Video, and outside my window are seven lanes of nonstop busyness.