1. Plastic Wrap. The fact that there have been no wars or uprisings over this travesty of an invention is no excuse for there not being one now. I number Ralph Wiley among the great villains of our time.

2. Bacon Packaging. Do the people who package the stuff even like bacon? The package makes no sense and is an abomination. Maybe they are Jewish. We need the guy who came up with egg packaging to get on this.

3. Dora the Explorer. Why in the name of all that is sane, is she always yelling. My kids will listen to the Beastie Boys before I allow them to watch Dora. She is probably undocumented anyway.

4. Fax Machines. Wha…? Why are these still around? Has Mr. Fax made some deal with Western Civilization that establishes them in all business in perpetuity? They. Do. Not. Work.

5. Faith Hill/Taylor Swift/Etc. as Country Music. I don’t think Hank done it that way.

6. MTV. Ummmm, there is no music. At all. Ever. And yet someone is still watching it. If everyone stopped watching it, we might get music videos back. Or at least pop-up video. Something.

7. Hand-dryers. My kids are 9, 6, and 3 and they have already figured out that wiping their hands on their clothes works better.

8. Keira Knightly Playing Iconic Roles from Classic Novels. Why does this keep happening. Does she and her agent and all who put her in these roles hate my favorite stories? Do they hate me? If I were president she would go to Gauntanamo for her portrayal of Lizzy in P & P.

9. Ugg boots. We are laughing at you.

10. Skinny Jeans. You know, we used to stone men for less.

1. I remember when ESPN was awesome.

2. You hardly ever hear of anyone disliking C.S. Lewis, even though he had some strange views. I wanna be liked like that. Maybe I should write some children’s books, loved the world over.

3. I got a little sad when I realized that baseball season is half way over. But thinking about baseball always leads to thinking about hot dogs, and that made me feel better.

4. I’ve been listening to a lot of songs lately that are not “Call Me Maybe.”

5. I have now listened to two lectures by N.T. Wright and find myself still alive and believing.

6. For the first time since I was very young, my stuttering is becoming a hindrance and getting much worse, affecting conversation daily.

7. “…more than watchmen for the morning…”

8. Who wants to give me a job where I get paid to check baseball scores and read British novels?

9. More of Brad Pitt’s mom. Less of Brad Pitt.

10. At the risk of inadvertently creating a black hole in our den, I let both of my sons wear a Spiderman costume. At. The. Same. Time.

My plan was to post a humorous Tuesday’s 10 today. But when I read “No Super Christians” by Chaplain Mike I decided it could wait.

I watched the Francis Chan video he posted and discussed yesterday. And it haunted me. But probably not in the way you think.

A few years back, as a pastor to students, I took my students to a camp where Chan spoke. I took them there because he was speaking. And now I wish I hadn’t. Because now they’ll hear this Don’t Waste Your Life 3.0 and despise every life except the craziest ones. Platt’s Radical was 2.0.

From now on when asked about my book – coming later this year – I can just point to this.

Last thought…is everyone just parroting Piper nowadays?

1. “Sorry about accusing you of messing up my accounts, when it was really my fault.” said No One Ever

2. What if when we die and go to heaven and meet Jesus, he tells us, “For the record when I said forgive someone 70 x 7, I meant that literally – 491 times would be pushing you just a little too much.”

3. About the time I decided to take a break from blogging, my fantasy team began to crash and burn. Coincidence? I think not.

4. For all you young people out there – it’s ok to express appreciation for your country in non-ironic ways.

5. More Grapico.

6. Houses are always more expensive than you think. Even after you move in.

7. I have yet to hear one note of “Call Me Maybe.”

8. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume we are about to be taxed into oblivion if our current president gets his way.

9. The only explanation I can come up with for my wife’s dislike of Grapico is that she is a communist and hates to have fun.

10. I’m pretty convinced a heart changed by grace will not only want to forgive others but will want to forgive circumstances.

This all began and ended last summer. It starts with being contacted because someone recommended me as a good writer.  You can imagine the instant flattery. I will not pretend it is not wonderful to be complimented as a writer.

The very first conversation I had with the agent (of sorts) was about editing a book written by a Christian athlete. I was elated. I tried to play it a little cool just so I would not freak out the guy I was talking with. But this sounded like work I would enjoy and the money sounded good.

But after a few weeks of emails and paperwork, things changed. What started out as being described as an editing job was starting to look more and more like me doing a lot of writing and while someone else would be credited as the author.

I was familiar with the practice of ghostwriting. And I had heard about the scandal of it in the Christian publishing industry. I wasn’t appalled. I’m too cynical for that. But I was surprised at how widespread it had become – to the point of me being asked to do it.

The very idea of being involved put my stomach in knots.

Who was I being asked to Ghostwrite for? Let’s just say a celebrity in some circles. I had never heard of him so it’s possible you would not know him, but many might. And he’s a nice guy. We talked on the phone and exchanged some emails. He means well.

He just did not want anyone else’s name on the cover. He actually said this.

He said this even though he had not yet even thought about the book besides an overarching theme. No paradigm. No outline. No chapter ideas. Nothing. I would have been expected to be the principal writer, from beginning to end, for a book not yet thought through.

The money would have been good. While we are not poor, we were doing good if we lived paycheck to paycheck. We still tread water to keep our financial head above the waterline. We never float. Saying “no” to this kind of job was not easy if only because we need – not just want – the money. Plus, I love getting paid to write. It’s spendable flattery. And the lights stay on.

But I was not going to ghostwrite. So, as hard as it was, I said “no”.  And here is why:

1) We live in a celebrity-driven culture. Inside and outside the church this is the case. Most would rather listen to a celebrity preacher and worship leader than their own pastor and music guy…you know, the ones who pray for them weekly. And we long to leverage that celebrity like some kind of unholy alliance with a pagan fulcrum. We push and pull and hope people will listen because of the voice. It’s a baptized version of the cult of personality. If this were not the case, Ghostwriting would not exist. Unless you are trying to capitalize upon the celebrity status of a person who does have the wherewithal to pen a volume, the need would not be there.

2) There is a reason they call them “ghostwriters.” They are present in the work. Just not seen. Not outright acknowledged. If they were acknowledged on the cover by a “With…” then the writer appears. They are present and seen as collaborators. They now have flesh and blood, skin and bone. They get royalties. Why would anyone not want the principal writer seen? It can only be pride or money. Pride wants all the credit. More money can be made if the work is seen as solely that of the celebrity.

3) Writing is hard and not everyone can do it well. This is nothing to brag about. Bragging about being able to write well is…well, like bragging because you can do plumbing. Pipes and fixtures are hieroglyphic mysteries to me. I can write but I can’t fix a darn thing. So boasting is excluded. But it is not easy to write and to write a book is even more difficult. I know because I have done so. Piecing together all those words and sentences into form and function is craft. Ghostwriting at once acknowledges this and then denies it. It acknowledges it in up-front payment and then denies it in production. “We think you have the talent to do this. But you will not be acknowledged as the author. The craft of writing a book is beyond our celebrity figure but he will get the credit for the book.”

4) It is flat dishonest. If you did not write the book, you are not the author. Or you are not the principal author. This is not hard. We teach our children not to take credit for work that is not theirs. Is this not the same? Except money is involved.

5) I simply would not be able to live with myself. This would mean I could be bought at a price. Whatever they would pay me would be my thirty pieces of silver I would not enjoy having in the least bit. My insides would be a mess till hung up, I’d have to spill my guts eventually in sorrow. I’d rather this writing be a hobby and do honest hard work than take this gift and use it  in a way in which respect for my work and my character are at odds.

6) How many books by gifted writers are squeezed out by such schemes? Stop and wonder with me for a moment. How many really great sentences have we have missed out on? How many wordsmiths languish in the shadows while celebrity non-writers have book signings? It staggers the imagination. More than that, it wars with conscience. Just because you are a good athlete or an eloquent preacher does not mean you should “write” a book. Of course if you can write and be a good athlete and be an eloquent preacher, by all means.

7) Of course, celebrities have a habit of being. But what if – think about this with me – what if we cultivated a christian publishing culture in which the writer became a celebrity for a time, because she could write? Instead of the culture we have now, where you write because you are a celebrity? Or someone writes for you, as the case before us demands. Imagine the unique experience of every time you picked up a Christian book, you knew the author was listed on the front of the book.

8) Can you imagine the hand of the body saying to the eye of the body, “I have need of your particular skills but let’s not be up front about the whole thing”? Just as Paul’s concern for the church was total, ours should be too. For this is an issue of how the church sees itself. Do the stars shine brighter? Do we orbit around the spheres of influence just hoping and praying they will dance with us? Is this the world in which we live and move and breath? Or do we inhabit a Kingdom with a King around which we gladly fall? You’d think we just find substitutes till the last day. And if the Christian celebrity and the Christian publishing house cannot muster the moral inertia to cast into print the actual author of a book, then is the ground level at the cross? Maybe it’s tiered.

9) It is possible my name could have ended up in the acknowledgements. A very good chance, I might add. So good I could guarantee it. But what would it have said? “This book could not have been written without you.” Well, yeah. But that could be said about the wife. Or a friend or an agent. Or God even. “Matt Redmond wrote the bulk of this book”? Not on your life

10) We need to push books that are well-written, not names or faces. Good, well-written books are so rare in Christian publishing. You can find them if you look hard enough. But the pragmatic desire to sermonize and monetize everything pushes out the craft. “If the message is good, the crafting of it does not matter” is the route du jour – ghostwritten or not. Or if the money is good, then we assume it is a good book – ghostwritten or not. But these things should not be so. We, Christians, of all people should care about good books and not just celebrities. The very God Whom we worship chose to use a book…a well-written one, by the way.

We’ve been visiting a new church. And I have to admit I’m not enjoying it. Not the church, the visiting. I’m enjoying the church. It’s the visiting I don’t really enjoy. I’m not used to it. We have not done much visiting of a church since I was in Seminary. Since then, each visit has been as a candidate to be a pastor on staff. Which is not like this kind of visiting. Even though we know the pastor and a number of members, it’s been weird.

But they’ve been in the Gospel of Mark.

I have to admit, going to church over the past 6 months or so has been hard. No so much because I don’t want to go. But because I’ve had to go for so long. You have to go when you are in Seminary. And when you are on staff you have to go. Even when the kids are sick, you go. It’s part of your job. It’s not that you don’t want to go. There are just no options, so you go and wanting to go is neither here nor there on one level.

But now, it is no longer part of my job. So we go because we need to go and sometimes because we want to go. The first often makes up for the last. There are some Sunday mornings when my chair is just really comfortable and another cup of coffee sounds like a mini vacation and getting the kids ready sounds horrific and the drive is extensive.

But we know we need it, so we go.

We need to be with God’s people and experience the means of grace and be prayed over. I don’t go solely to learn anymore. And I certainly don’t go to experience or feel God. God knows, I often don’t feel a whole lot. No, we go now because we need Christ. And this corporate gathering is given for that reason. We mess it up sometimes, but it’s God’s idea, this gathering as a church.

Though it feels uncomfortable to go we go and hope for a little comfort.

Back when I was single, the Singles group I was part of had a retreat and Michael Card taught the sessions. I think I fell asleep while sitting on the front row in the first meeting because I stayed up with friends the previous night (that could have happened the year before with Jerry Bridges teaching, can’t remember). So I moved to the back row for the next meeting. In one of these sessions – not the first – Mr. Card said something I have never forgotten. He said, “It is comforting that you can always go to the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) and find Jesus there when in need.”

Or something along those lines.

I don’t remember the context. But I’ve never forgotten what he said. It’s been an an anchor for me over the years and even more so now as I navigate the waters of no longer being in vocational ministry and doing work I am pretty sure I am not crafted for. In the middle of this whirlwind of change, my soul’s great need has easily been reduced down (up?) to a need for Jesus – his words and his deeds.

When I go to the Gospels I can “hear” Jesus say, “Come to me all you who are weary, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

I can “see” him loving the rich young ruler even as he rebuked him. I need to be rebuked and I need to know I’m loved.

I need to see him dealing with sinners and saints and legalists and family and followers. I need to hear him eat food and speak loud enough to be heard above the blowing winds.

I know the prevailing wisdom tells me I should feel his presence in my life when I sing worship songs and pray. But that rarely happens. They are helpful in other ways but what really helps me fellowship with Jesus is when I can see his life on earth in front of me on the page. It’s when my life can be tethered to the life and ministry and death and resurrection of Jesus regardless of how it feels.

Look, I’m no “red letter Christian.” Christ is on every page of holy writ. But I am comforted by being able to go to his life in the Gospels and in a way commune with him there.

All this landed on me in a real way as we, the visitors, sat on the 2nd row this past sunday, in front of God and everybody. It’s a little uncomfortable for me, sitting that close when you are a longtime member. Even more so when visiting. The life of Christ in the gospel of Mark pushed out much of the anxiety. He was comfort for the uncomfortable.

1. Thinking about writing a memoir of my time as a banker and titling it, “The Worst Banker in the World.”

2. A steady diet of C.S. Lewis is good for the heart.

3. I renounce Satan and his Sonic the Hedgehog cartoons on Netflix.

4. Still mad at Yoko.

5. This may go down in history as the worst fantasy baseball week ever.

6. The longer I live in the land of grace, the more I see the value of sowing and reaping.

7. I am not sure it’s possible to like anyone who is looking for a house on House Hunters.

8. Remind me to talk to our therapist about the lack of bacon in our home this week.

9. You know what’s funny? Funny stuff.

10. Wife: When are the Summer Olympics.
Me: Summer