Autism, Technology, & My Brother Mark
CE Pro magazine features an article about my brother Mark, my nephew Brody, and technology distributed by my family’s company that’s helping children with autism. Here’s the lead in:
Brody Buzzard is a playful 2-year-old with a mild case of autism. So it’s no surprise that his father Mark, principal of Liberty Bell Alarm & Home Theater in Sacramento, Calif., has taken an interest in home health technology.
As a Control4 dealer, Mark Buzzard has rigged an automation system specifically for the needs of Brody and his care takers – mom and dad.
“Autistic children are very visual,” says Buzzard. “Using a visual communication strategy really helps them understand what is happening next and what to expect. It relieves a lot of stress and creates stability for them.”
Schedule a Weekly Worry Hour
During my week at The One Institute I made a new friend, Rob Armstrong–a financial representative from Illinois. Rob told me about a habit he practices that caught my attention. This is something his father taught him to do: Schedule a Weekly Worry Hour.
For about 4 weeks I’ve been giving this worry hour thing a try, and I think I will stick with it. We’ll see how it goes over the coming months. If you want to minimize worry in your life, you might want to give this a try. Below is an explanation of HOW I do it and WHY I do it.
HOW I Do It:
I always carry a small notepad in my pocket. I carry one that Lukas Naugle designed, but any notepad will do. This notepad triples as my to-do list, my write-down-ideas-that-pop-into-my-head-list, and my Worry Hour list.
As I move throughout my week/day, whenever I notice that a worrisome thought is getting a hold on my attention, I pull out my notepad and write down what it is I’m worrying about (I summarize the worry in one sentence). I use the back page of the notepad for this.
Once I write that worry into my notepad I make the firm decision to not worry about it again until my appointed “worry hour.”
11:30am Wednesday is my worry hour. I have this scheduled on my calendar. Each Wednesday at 11:30am I pull out my notepad, look at what’s written on that back page, and then I force myself to worry about it. By this time many of my worries from the week have lost their power. So far I haven’t practiced a full worry hour, it’s been more like 20-30 minutes of ruminating on what’s written on the list: worrying and ruminating that eventually graduates into prayer.
After I’ve “worried,” I tear out and throw away that sheet of paper, write down “Worry Hour” as the heading on the new back page of my notepad, and start moving through the rest of my day/week, writing down worries if they occur.
WHY I Do It:
Because some uptight Bible college student in the Midwest is reading this and concluding that I’m condoning worry, I must give the theological, personal, and practical reasons why I’m trying out this Worry Hour habit.
The Bible is clear: worry is sin.
My experience is clear: worry is no fun.
The pragmatics are clear: worry doesn’t help.
So, I’m committed to giving worry less of a foothold in my week. I’ve come to greatly despise worry. It’s a dark sin. It’s the fruit of unbelief. It’s evidence of not valuing and trusting my Heavenly Father. Plus, as I said above, worry is just annoying and unhelpful (note that Jesus also attacks worry at this level in the Sermon on the Mount).
So, one method among many for subtracting the amount of time I worry each week is to carve out a one-hour space in my week for worrying. For how I’m wired, this method is helpful. Knowing I have that one-hour slot in my week devoted to worry has resulted in me worrying less throughout the week. It’s a way of proving my trust in God, to write down that worry and then move on with what it was I was doing.
It’s a bit of a paradox, but scheduling worry results in less worry.
And less worry glorifies God. Less worry is more fun. Less worry helps.
*Note: When I meet with God in the mornings to read Scripture and pray this involves taking time to cast my cares on the Lord, and those cares may overlap with some of what’s written on the back page of the notebook. But I do my best to not give mental space to worry during these morning sessions. I’ve grown to tell the difference between praying about something so that I truly cast it onto God’s shoulders and prayer that is merely a worry rehearsal that only makes worry worse.
R.C. Sproul: What is the Gospel?
What is the gospel? Below is R.C. Sproul’s definition. Last week I posted Claire Callaghan’s gospel definition, which summarizes R.C.’s words quite nicely.
There is no greater message to be heard than that which we call the Gospel. But as important as that is, it is often given to massive distortions or over simplifications. People think they’re preaching the Gospel to you when they tell you, ‘you can have a purpose to your life’, or that ‘you can have meaning to your life’, or that ‘you can have a personal relationship with Jesus.’ All of those things are true, and they’re all important, but they don’t get to the heart of the Gospel.
The Gospel is called the ‘good news’ because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings, and that problem is simply this: God is holy and He is just, and I’m not. And at the end of my life, I’m going to stand before a just and holy God, and I’ll be judged. And I’ll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness – or lack of it – or the righteousness of another. The good news of the Gospel is that Jesus lived a life of perfect righteousness, of perfect obedience to God, not for His own well being but for His people. He has done for me what I couldn’t possibly do for myself. But not only has He lived that life of perfect obedience, He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.
The great misconception in our day is this: that God isn’t concerned to protect His own integrity. He’s a kind of wishy-washy deity, who just waves a wand of forgiveness over everybody. No. For God to forgive you is a very costly matter. It cost the sacrifice of His own Son. So valuable was that sacrifice that God pronounced it valuable by raising Him from the dead – so that Christ died for us, He was raised for our justification. So the Gospel is something objective. It is the message of who Jesus is and what He did. And it also has a subjective dimension. How are the benefits of Jesus subjectively appropriated to us? How do I get it? The Bible makes it clear that we are justified not by our works, not by our efforts, not by our deeds, but by faith – and by faith alone. The only way you can receive the benefit of Christ’s life and death is by putting your trust in Him – and in Him alone. You do that, you’re declared just by God, you’re adopted into His family, you’re forgiven of all of your sins, and you have begun your pilgrimage for eternity.
The Ballad of Colton Harris-Moore
Outside magazine tells the tragic, fascinating story of Colton Harris-Moore.
In the Northwest’s San Juan Islands, best known for killer whales and Microsoft retirees, a teen fugitive has made a mockery of local authorities, allegedly stealing cars, taking planes for joyrides, and breaking into vacation homes. His ability to elude the police and survive in the woods has earned him folk-hero status. But some wonder if the 18-year-old will make it out of the hunt alive.
Completing 2009; Beginning 2010
Last year, on the first day of 2009, my wife and I made a “What Happened in 2008″ list. We wrote down every significant event in our lives that we could think of from 2008 (birth of our second child, trips we took, major lessons God taught us, that hilarious night we’ll never forget, etc.). After making that list, we then began to talk, pray, and dream about 2009 and set some goals for 2009.
This year, we did the same thing. Today we wrote a 3 page “What Happened in 2009″ list. We then asked ourselves some questions and did some praying and dreaming for 2010. We’re finding that this new tradition gives a great sense of cohesiveness, history, and focus to our life together. In the future I imagine it will be helpful to look back at these “what happened” lists and remind ourselves of how God was at work in our lives in the past.
I got this idea from productivity guru David Allen. If you’re wanting to do something like this, below is an excerpt from Allen’s latest newsletter that can help jump start your listing and thinking. We don’t use all of Allen’s prompts and questions, and we have added questions of our own, but we’ve found that many of Allen’s prompts and questions generate great discussion in bringing closure to the old year and focus to the new year.
…here are some questions that can guide you in your 2009 review and 2010 goal setting. When I go through these kinds of questions I like to consider my answers in several areas:
Physical
Emotional
Mental
Spiritual
Financial
Family
Community Service
Fun / creativity / recreationCOMPLETING AND REMEMBERING 2009
Review the list of all completed projects
What was your biggest triumph in 2009?
What was the smartest decision you made in 2009?
What one word best sums up and describes your 2009 experience?
What was the greatest lesson you learned in 2009?
What was the most loving service you performed in 2009?
What is your biggest piece of unfinished business in 2009?
What are you most happy about completing in 2009?
Who were the three people that had the greatest impact on your life in 2009?
What was the biggest risk you took in 2009?
What was the biggest surprise in 2009?
What important relationship improved the most in 2009?
What compliment would you liked to have received in 2009?
What compliment would you liked to have given in 2009?
What else do you need to do or say to be complete with 2009?CREATING THE NEW YEAR
What would you like to be your biggest triumph in 2010?
What advice would you like to give yourself in 2010?
What is the major effort you are planning to improve your financial results in 2010?
What would you be most happy about completing in 2010?
What major indulgence are you willing to experience in 2010?
What would you most like to change about yourself in 2010?
What are you looking forward to learning in 2010?
What do you think your biggest risk will be in 2010?
What about your work, are you most committed to changing and improving in 2010?
What is one as yet undeveloped talent you are willing to explore in 2010?
What brings you the most joy and how are you going to do or have more of that in 2010?
Who or what, other than yourself, are you most committed to loving and serving in 2010?
What one word would you like to have as your theme in 2010?
Genesis Cover?
My friend Jon Wong is working on potential covers for the study guide I’ve written on Genesis. Here are his first few designs. Which one do you like?
How Gentle God’s Commands
Last week my friend Claire sent me this email/song:
No. 17 How Gentle God’s Commands
How gentle God’s commands!
How kind His precepts are!
Come, cast thy burdens on the Lord,
And trust His constant care.
Beneath His watchful eye
His saints securely dwell;
The hand which bears creation up
Shall guard his children well.
Why should this anxious load
Press down the weary mind?
Come, seek your heavenly Father
And peace and comfort find.
His goodness stands approved,
Unchanged from day to day;
I’ll drop my burdens at His feet
And bear a song away.
Clyde Kilby’s 10 Resolutions
Today I re-read Clyde Kilby’s 10 Resolutions, especially appreciating resolutions 1, 5, 6, and 7.
1. At least once every day I shall look steadily up at the sky and
remember that I, a consciousness with a conscience, am on a planet
traveling in space with wonderfully mysterious things above and about
me.
2. Instead of the accustomed idea of a mindless and endless
evolutionary change to which we can neither add nor subtract, I shall
suppose the universe guided by an Intelligence which, as Aristotle said
of Greek drama, requires a beginning, a middle, and an end. I think
this will save me from the cynicism expressed by Bertrand Russell
before his death when he said: “There is darkness without, and when I
die there will be darkness within. There is no splendor, no vastness
anywhere, only triviality for a moment, and then nothing.”
3. I shall not fall into the falsehood that this day, or any day, is
merely another ambiguous and plodding twenty-four hours, but rather a
unique event, filled, if I so wish, with worthy potentialities. I shall
not be fool enough to suppose that trouble and pain are wholly evil
parentheses in my existence, but just as likely ladders to be climbed
toward moral and spiritual manhood.
4. I shall not turn my life into a thin, straight line which prefers
abstractions to reality. I shall know what I am doing when I abstract,
which of course I shall often have to do.
5. I shall not demean my own uniqueness by envy of others. I shall
stop boring into myself to discover what psychological or social
categories I might belong to. Mostly I shall simply forget about myself
and do my work.
6. I shall open my eyes and ears. Once every day I shall simply
stare at a tree, a flower, a cloud, or a person. I shall not then be
concerned at all to ask what they are but simply be glad that they are.
I shall joyfully allow them the mystery of what Lewis calls their
“divine, magical, terrifying and ecstatic” existence.
7. I shall sometimes look back at the freshness of vision I had in
childhood and try, at least for a little while, to be, in the words of
Lewis Carroll, the “child of the pure unclouded brow, and dreaming eyes
of wonder.”
8. I shall follow Darwin’s advice and turn frequently to imaginative
things such as good literature and good music, preferably, as Lewis
suggests, an old book and timeless music.
9. I shall not allow the devilish onrush of this century to usurp
all my energies but will instead, as Charles Williams suggested,
“fulfill the moment as the moment.” I shall try to live well just now
because the only time that exists is now.
10. Even if I turn out to be wrong, I shall bet my life on the
assumption that this world is not idiotic, neither run by an absentee
landlord, but that today, this very day, some stroke is being added to
the cosmic canvas that in due course I shall understand with joy as a
stroke made by the architect who calls himself Alpha and Omega.
