As an elder at our local church, this short blog post recently struck me. Tim Challies writes about not letting seeds which can split rocs fester. About not letting tension and dissension sit in the shadows.

For a day or two it lays there, exposed to sun and rain, until a sudden gust of wind pushes it into a tiny fissure. And there the seed germinates, there it finds just enough soil to put down its first tentative roots, there it becomes a sapling, there it begins to grow into a tree. As the years pass, as the maple grows, its roots drive deeper into that crack, they push with steady and unrelenting force, until finally they break the mighty rock in two.

[Challies]

It is a compelling argument that part of what an elder does is to go around and pick out the seeds so that the rock stays put and the trees grow elsewhere.

Andy Crouch has a great section in his book, The Tech-Wise Family, about how your phone should go to sleep before you do and wake up after you. This from Seth Godin is the natural extension of that and something that will not only help our mental health but also maybe even inspire us.

What if, instead, just for a week, the last thing we did was make a list of exciting opportunities for the future? And if the first thing after waking up was doing some morning pages and jotting down what we’re looking forward to?

Seth Godin

I was just turned on to this Scott Galloway idea that the bottom is probably going to fall out of educational institutions in the future and only the top 40 or top 50 are going to survive and thrive. The whole article is interesting, and this wasn’t the crux of it but it was maybe the most intriguing part to me.

The strongest brand in the world is not Apple or Mercedes-Benz or Coca-Cola. The strongest brands are MIT, Oxford, and Stanford. Academics and administrators at the top universities have decided over the last 30 years that we’re no longer public servants; we’re luxury goods. We get a lot of ego gratification every time our deans stand up in front of the faculty and say, “This year, we didn’t reject 85 percent of applicants; we rejected 87 percent!,” and there’s a huge round of applause. That is tantamount to the head of a homeless shelter bragging about turning away nine of ten people who showed up last night. We as academics and administrators have lost the script. It’s not true of everyone. The chancellor at Berkeley is working hard to expand seats. I think the University of California and the University of Texas both see that it’s important that those seats expand as the population grows.

But the ultimate vehicle for a luxury item is to massively and almost artificially constrain supply. Birkin bags are $12,000 because they create the illusion of scarcity. I’ll have 170 kids in my brand-strategy class in the fall. We charge them $7,000 per student. That’s $1.2 million that we get for 12 nights of me in a classroom. $100,000 a night. The gross margins on that offering are somewhere between 92 and 96 points. There is no other product in the world that’s been able to sustain 90-plus points of margin for this long at this high of a price point. Ferrari can’t do it. Hermès can’t do it. Apple can’t do it. Apple’s gross margins are 38 points. Hermès and luxury goods are somewhere between 50 and 60 points. There has never been a luxury item that’s been able to garner the type of gross margins as university education.

New York Magazine

Stunning to watch and listen to. Just an absolute triumph.

I loved and have been thinking about this post from David Mathis recently on why he reads paper instead of a screen when he’s reading the Bible. Certainly not a mandate, but it’s such a good word.

Ancient texts, especially the biblical text, were not written like so much of our content is today — quickly, for quick publication, and for quick reading. Rather, as Alastair Roberts observes, “When books were rare and costly, texts tended to be much more dense with meaning, rewarding forms of attentive reading that are uncommon in our age.” The Bible is a book like that. Ancient. Slowly written, not rushed off to press. Carefully copied. Meant for slow, thoughtful, careful reading — and multiple readings. And here’s where I want to push against the grain today: I want to enjoy the rewards of “forms of attentive reading that are uncommon in our age.” Paper helps me.

Desiring God

I remember Seth Godin saying one time that he’s the same he was 20 years ago except for the people he’s met and the books he’s read. Russell Moore recently quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson with a similar line that I liked maybe even better.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said, “I cannot remember the books I’ve read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me.” 

via Russell Moore

This is really good and a helpful foundation to return to.

All of these are tremendous, but the parts about not using conversations as an opportunity to show off and using open-ended questions to find out about other people really resonated with me.

1 Thessalonians says that we are to “always seek to do good to one another and to everyone” and one of the ways we can do a better job of that is through conversation that encourages and exhorts.

I read this passage this morning, and I thought it was a sweet sliver of solace in a mad world full of noise, fear and frustration. I believe, help my unbelief.

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living!
Wait for the Lord;
be strong, and let your heart take courage;
wait for the Lord!

Psalm 27:13-14