Thanksgiving is near

The backgammon tournament ended with a thud. I lost my only match of the day. Good experience; bad luck.

Classes are closing up, and I'm in the middle of writing my final exams. I might finish this week, or it might spill over into early next week. Either way is fine. I'm starting to look at my classes for next semester. I'm teaching two classes that I haven't taught before, and one of those classes is a class I've never taken before (Numerical Analysis). I'm reading through the textbook right now, and it's all stuff that I can put together fairly easily, so I'm not too concerned about it. But I still need to make sure I stay ahead of that class. I'm also in the process of rethinking the current Math 093 curriculum. Once the semester is over, I'll have a couple weeks of uninterrupted time to work through those things and hopefully get myself in a good position before I head home for Christmas. That will kick off about 2.5 weeks of not getting much work done.

I met with pastor Rick for lunch on Tuesday. We ended up chatting for about 90 minutes before I had to leave to campus. It was a good chat, and I got a good sense of where he's coming from and what he wants to see happen at the church. I think he also got a good sense of who I am and what gifts I bring. As the meeting was coming to a close, he talked to me about a vision building on-site retreat that was going on that weekend, and that there might be room for me to participate. I kept the door open for the possibility and thought about it during the afternoon. I got a text from him saying that the invitation was officially extended, and I decided to go. It was all evening Friday, all day Saturday, and all afternoon Sunday, plus more in a couple weeks.

The church is still in the transition to the new pastor, and it's now the time when he's going to try to implement changes and a new vision for the church. Apparently, it used to be known for a decent academic perspective (whether truly academic or 'hackademic' -- to use Rick's phrase -- is unclear). The problem was that it developed a Sunday-only ethos.

Various points of humor:

• "Legalism Rules"
  
• Ironic image: Muslim virgins in heaven are nuns with rulers
  
• Old Dilbert comics
• "Newcomer" tombstone
  

The weekend was spent attempting the articulate the theology of the church, which then leads to the declaration of core values, which leads to specific plans to realize those values as church activities. There were some interesting debates and discussions that arose which gave me a better sense of who the church is and was and wants to be. I have a sense of confidence that things are moving in the right direction.

I'm flying home on Wednesday.