Book review: The Count of Monte Cristo

Feeling it was time to read a classic, I just read The Count of Monte Cristo by French novelist Alexandre Dumas (who also wrote the Three Musketeers). This book is one of the most popular novels ever written and makes every “classic” book list I have seen. Written in 1844, the book is set in Marseilles, Rome and Paris in the nineteenth century, and tells the story of Edmond Dantès. Dantès is a young sailor who seems to have it all before being falsely accused of treason and imprisoned in an island dungeon for fourteen years. A fellow prisoner tells him where to find treasure buried on a Mediterranean island called Monte Cristo. Upon his escape, the book’s hero acquires the treasure, gives himself the name Count of Monte Cristo, and goes about systematically taking revenge on his enemies.

Count of Monte Cristo is a great adventure novel; just a few of the chapter titles assure you of that: “The Two Prisoners,” “The Treasure,” “The Smugglers,” “The Secret Cave,” “Roman Bandits,” etc… The way Dumas unfolds Dantès intricate scheme of revenge seems part James Bond, part Sherlock Holmes, and part Alfred Hitchcock. The surprising twists and turns in the story are as current as anything Dan Brown (DaVinci Code, Angels and Demons) has conjured up recently, and yet the story is over 150 years old.

I enjoyed the book but must admit I got a bit bogged down in the middle. There were a few chapters there that, to me, could have used a good editor. That could be the problem to begin with though. The original version of the book was some 1100 pages long. Most copies today have around 500-600 pages (the Penguin Classic version I read had 500 pages). The effect of reducing the story by almost one-half makes the story confusing in some places. In the version I read the ending is very confusing and makes practically no sense. I had to go online to find an unabridged copy of the story to figure out what really happened in the closing chapter.

One of the things that intrigued me most about the book apart from the great characters and storyline were some of the locations in which the story is set. Marseilles, where the story begins, was a favorite stop on a 2005 cruise our family took. Our ship went right by the notorious prison of Chateau d’If which sits just off the coast of Marseille. We also viewed the famed harbor of Marseille from high atop the Basilique Notre Dame de la Garde. Our home PC desktop picture is still a photo we took from this scenic spot. Several locations in Rome (the Colosseum) and Paris (Champs Elysees and Pere Lachaise cemetery) brought back fond memories when I read about them in the book as well.

Dumas' characters ranged from the very, very good, to the diabolic. On some of the characters the jury is still out in my mind. For instance I was troubled and confused by the limits and extent of both the vengeance and kindness of the story's hero, Dantès. Dumas did a good job portraying the wide range of emotion this character must have felt. I still cannot decide if Dantès is a hero or not. At times he appears to want to put himself in God’s place both in a good way and in a bad way. In fairness to him, it does appear the "Count" repents of this in the end, especially as his revenge reaches its full strength and the extent of the suffering and carnage it causes becomes evident.

Generations of readers have responded to this riveting tale and doubtless future generations will return to it as well. That’s what good literature is all about. I’m glad I finally waded in and took the time to read this novel. It was definitely worth it.

Sunday's Sermon Online

Here is Sunday's sermon in the new sermon player thingie we found!!

Perceptions

We have all heard it before – "perception is everything." It does not really matter what the reality of any given situation is, people are going to form opinions about what it was really like and oftentimes those opinions are going to be more varied than you can possibly imagine.

How many times have you seen someone listen to a recording of their own voice and then insist the voice on the recording sounds nothing like them? Why is this? It is because we are the ONLY person in the world who experiences things from our point of view. The voice we are hearing does not sound like that to us when we speak, so how could it possibly sound like that when we hear it played back? It is because we all hear and see and experience things from our own unique perspective so we cannot possibly expect others to have the same experiences we do – even given completely identical stimuli.

Look at this picture. What do you see, an old woman with a big nose, or a beautiful young maiden? Look again – look long and hard; do you still see the same thing? What do you see? Beauty? Ugliness? Young? Old?

Perception is how you see the world around you. Every time you look at something, or someone, you are forming opinions. You are observing, processing, and deducing information to form an opinion. The opinions you arrive at may be accurate, or they may be far from the truth. Since we cannot be “inside” someone else’s mind and heart we can’t possibly know what the reality is in a given situation. Truth is, sometimes we do not even know or understand our own motives. And if our motives and perceptions are unknown even to us on the "inside" of life as we experience it, how can those "outside" us have a chance to understand what the reality is in a given situation? We are constantly unconsciously running everything we experience through a set of filters we were born with, or educated into, or we picked up from our generation or from a previous generation.

Why am I talking about this? I am writing about perceptions because of today’s worship service at my church. Depending upon who you ask at our church and certain factors I have yet to completely sort out, today’s service was either, “exactly what a ‘win’ looks like at NewSong,” or else it was “one of the worst services we have had in a long time.”

I know. No one ever said leadership was easy. This evening I perceive it to be very difficult. I am not even sure what step to take next. As usual it brings me back to the old leadership arts of listening, measuring, clarifying and communicating. Perhaps it is even time to retool a few things. But whose perceptions to we retool towards? What do people actually perceive? And what is the correlation between what they perceive and the underlying reality? Is what people were either deliriously happy about or totally disgusted with today even the issue on the table now?

How do we deal with perceptions and whose perceptions matter most (besides God’s, of course). What do you think?

Sermon Player -

Here is a nifty sermon player I stumbled upon from another pastor today (Dennis Papp, Field Notes). We will eventually have this player on our church website. There is also a link to it on the side bar further down and to the right of this post.

The greatest best thing about it is that the audio starts immediately, no more waiting for the file to download or questions about if you want to save the file to your computer.

NewSong also has its own channel now with sermon.net where the player comes from. Check it out at: http://www.sermon.net/NewsongSermons


Enjoy!

Book Review: Tribes by Seth Godin

I actually got this book as a “freebie” at last October’s Catalyst Conference and just got around to reading it tonight. Godin is a self-described “best-selling author, entrepreneur, and change agent.” I think of him as the Leonard Sweet of the Internet era. He specializes in marketing and communication, especially Internet marketing and connecting. He is a prolific blogger, writer, and speaker who loves to challenge the status quo, dares to question the accepted order and who specializes in debunking commonly held assumptions ("myths"). He calls doing this being a heretic.

Tribes is actually the first book of Godin’s I have read (he has written a dozen), but I read his blog faithfully. In the book he defines a tribe as "any group of people, large or small, who are connected to one another, a leader, and an idea." Tribes can be religious, ethnic, economic, political, or even musical (think of the Deadheads). Godin contends to be human is to long to be a part of a tribe.

With the Internet and all its social networking opportunities (Facebook, Twitter, etc…) it is easier than ever today to form or join a tribe. With the exponential expansion of modern forces of connection anyone who wants to make a difference now has the tools at his or her fingertips to form a tribe or to locate one to be a part of. The main question this opportunity presents, Godin contends, is who is going to lead all these tribes?

Tribes has some good leadership thinking in it. Much of it is very relevant to the church too. He talks a lot about the “tightening the tribe” using all the tools available to leaders in our new more connected world. He especially touts the efficiency of blogs for doing this. “A blogger has a free, nearly effortless tool to send regular (daily? hourly?) messages to the people who want to read them. And with comments and trackbacks, the members of the tribe can talk back and to each other. Discussions take place, ideas are shared, decisions are made – quickly” (pg. 53).

I loved Godin’s important distinction between "fans" and "numbers." He writes, “A true fan brings three friends with him to a John Mayer concert…a true fan connects with other true fans and amplifies the noise the artise makes…” “Too many organizations care about numbers, not fans. They care about hits or turnstile clicks or media mentions. What they’re missing is the depth of commitment and interconnection that true fans deliver…the real win is in turning a casual fan into a true one” (pg. 33)

There is a plenty of other good leadership insight in this short 147 page book. I definitely need to go back now and reread the book with a highlighter in hand. I plan to encourage our staff at NewSong to read the book and to use its principles as they form their tribes within NewSong as well.

In conclusion, I encourage anyone interested in thinking outside the box about their church or business to read this book and to apply its principles.

Book Review: Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

This book was the winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1948. It is a collection of short stories that take place in the South Pacific during World War II. The stories are narrated by an unnamed naval officer and several characters reappear in some of the stories. The climax of the book is a fictional military offensive code named “Alligator.” The “war” parts of the book are sandwiched between captivating tales of love and loss as the bored naval men mostly sit around and wait (and consume lots of alcohol!).

Michener is a good storyteller and crafter of characters. Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical South Pacific was based on Michener’s colorful characters in this book including nurse Nellie Forbush who falls in love with French plantation owner, Emile de Becque (remember?) There is also Lt. Cable and Bloody Mary, the island souvenir dealer and her daughter Liat. I still remember seeing the play being performed at Central High School in Jackson, MS way back in the sixties when my dad was an ROTC instructor there. I also recall my parents had the old LP album of South Pacific (the movie). I can still hear Mitzi Gaynor singing, “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outta My Hair” (here it is on YouTube).

I am sorry it took me so long to read this book. It really is good. I think Michener’s characters are well-developed. I liked the pace of the book and how he wove the stories together. I thought the climax of the book, the landing at the island of Kuralei, was especially moving. As Michener’s narrator surveys the littered beaches littered with the dead and the detritus of battle the full horror of war is revealed. It is really a shame that this book has been omitted from most “best read” lists in academic circles. One can only speculate why. Perhaps because the musical followed so closely upon the book’s release. It definitely deserved better. I am glad I finally found it.

Elder/Staff Retreat Part Two

Our Elder/Staff retreat held this past weekend was about as good as it could possibly be. I could definitely sense the prayers people were praying for the weekend. When I got home Saturday night I told Donna (my wife) that I honestly could not imagine a single thing about the retreat that could have been better. Everyone came. Everyone participated. No one held anything back. We all shared our life stories, including our personal testimony. Everyone had read the Simple Church book and done their homework in advance. Our staff was prepared with exciting well-done reports on their ministries and plans for the future. There was plenty of laughter, tears, good food, great worship, and amazing fellowship (including a few odd bed-partners, but that's another post for another day).

Things we accomplished:

- We thoroughly went over Clarity - Movement - Alignment - and Focus from the Simple Church book. We know our work is cut out for us; mainly in properly communicating the "why" we need to do this to our congregation. As Vicki Eitel reminded us, Jesus never said anyone "had" to do anything. But "if" one wants certain things to happen then he or she "must" make certain changes or do certain things. We need to make our process crystal clear to everyone and in time, hopefully it will become a part of our church's DNA.

- Our staff leaders gave overviews of their respective areas including their mission, lens, target audience, and what constitutes a "win" for them.

- We raised the commitment level for leadership at NewSong by agreeing on what is expected of a "Level One Leader."

- We simplified our organizational structure so everything we do fits under the "Five Things We Do at NewSong" These five are: Weekend Worship, Small Groups, Missions, Youth, and Children. Existing ministries that do not "fit" will be phased out as an act of stewardship of our resources and faithfulness to God and His mission through us.

- We reduced our number of leaders from over 50 this year (2008-09) to less than half that number for the upcoming ministry year (2009/10). We also came up with a concensus list of leader candidates to fill those positions.

- We decided we will handle our ministry sign-ups differently this year (in August). We will still have sign-ups but we will try to have many people already recruited and signed up by ministry team leaders relationally.

- During the chapter reviews from Simple Church and the staff reports we kept a running list of significant changes we have recently made (or will make soon). These include:

1) Worship (Love) as our "Front Door" at NewSong. This is part of our new evangelistic focus, which is our number one strategic ministry priority in 2009. Our services are now being designed and targeted more towards non-believers so when our members invite their unbelieving friends, relatives and neighbors they will be able to more easily connect to God. We believe we can do this and still satisfy existing believers' needs for engaging worship and relevant, biblical teaching. What believers miss out on in "depth" in worship they will now get in their small groups.

2) Small Groups will become our main discipleship (Grow) vehicle, rather than traditional Sunday School. True life change happens best in small groups which will hopefully all eventually meet in the more intimate setting of a home rather than in sterile classrooms. Besides, we have many more homes available to us at NewSong than we do classrooms. We are planning a church-wide small group emphasis in the fall built around Saddleback's "40 Days of Love" campaign where we hope to launch 10-12 small groups.

3) In Missions (Share) our focus going forward will be "to serve Christ so others see him." We we will no longer artificially divide this area between "ministry" (inside the church) and "missions" (outside the church) but instead will focus on doing everything for Christ so that those we are serving will see Him in our service. We believe you can hand someone a worship guide, or prepare refreshments, or operate a sound board as though you are doing it for Christ Himself. Doing so would constitute a "win" for us in this area.

4) In our Children's Ministry our focus will be on developing a parent-church partnership to help our children come to know God instead of parents simply taking their children to church for the church to teach them "about" God. A win in this area would be when the families in our church are intentional about teaching biblical truths in their home on a daily basis.

5) One final noticeable difference will be an emphasis on being intentionally relational in our worship, grow groups and recruiting for our share ministries. This is a shift from our former "warm body" method where we were just looking at numbers, having multiple ministries, filling slots and always having impersonal sign-up sheets in the back. Strong churches are built on solid, godly, peer relationships. We plan to take full advantage of the strong relational ties that already exist at NewSong and to strengthen them further.