Good morning, Indiana

Snow/Ice/Snow

I got into Lexington, KY, hours before the snow started to fall. By mid-morning it turned to freezing rain. Then it snowed on top of that. There were lots of downed trees and power lines because the ice got so heavy. Thank the Lord, I had power and heat the whole time.

It was certainly beautiful!

5.5hr turnaround

Because of the beautiful ice and snow in Lexington, my flight was canceled. I didn't get into JFK until after 10pm, and in order to catch my 7:31am flight to Indiana this morning I had to get up early enough that I needed to set multiple alarms. One of them is an application on my Treo in which I can punch in the wake-up time and it will start counting down. It told me, rather bluntly, that I had less than 5.5 hours to sleep. Pray for coherance and stamina at my department head meeting for the MasterWorks Festival tomorrow.

Touchdown in Lexington

I flew from Boise to Chicago to Charlotte to Lexington, and I landed early!

The Greatest of These Is Love

I got to perform "Stay Here" near Boise, ID this morning. I've been performing the sketch since college. If you were tracking http://RichDrama.com/Itinerary you may have noticed that I was scheduled to perform a different piece with the pastor of the Friends church here, Ken Redford. He and I wrote that piece in college. But late in the week Ken felt led in a different direction.

Not surprisingly, almost every song fit the new theme. I've seen this happen so many times over the years, and since I'm in so many churches across the land I've also seen similar themes play out as the Holy Spirit guides his people on a larger scale than we sometimes imagine.

In "Stay Here," Ken played Jesus and I played a fellow who had scheduled to spend some time with Him. Ken placed the sketch after his great sermon.

Here are my notes:

Ready, Set, Grow
1. The best use of life is love.
"Let love be your highest goal."
1 Corinthians 14:1

"These three remain: faith, hope and love."
1 Corinthians 13:13

Why love?
Love is what life is all about.
Love is all that is going to last.

2. The best expression of love is time.
"Let us not love with our words or tongue but with actions and in truth."
I John 3:18
Time is our most precious commodity.
The most desired expression of love is concentrated time.
To say time is money cheapens time. We can get more money, but you cannot get more time.
You can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving.

3. The best time to love is now.
"Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers."
Galatians 6:10

The Christian life isn't so much about imitating Christ, but living in intimacy with Him.

"Look carefully at how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise; redeeming the time, because the days are evil."
Ephesians 5:15-16

Super Zoe!

I'm staying with my dear friends, Ken & Tresa Redford. I've known Ken since Jr. High and Tresa since college. Ken's now a pastor, and I'll be performing at his church tomorrow: http://RichDrama.com/Itinerary

Their 8lb dog was attacking me until I gave her a treat.

More skiing shots

I've posted more skiing shots here.

Chillin' with Bonzi

From Skiing Mt. Hood 1/22/09

I've been staying with my brother and his wife...and their Weimeraners. Bonzi was chillin' with them in this shot while Uta was in the wings.

An extraordinarily happy boy

From the heights

Heading to the highest

The glorious view!

What a call to worship!

Ascending

SO glad they were wrong...

..about it raining today!

Heading for Hood

LA Times featured CITA

I just had lunch with Wayne Harrel in Portland, OR. He told me that the LA Times wrote an article on last year's Christians in Theatre Arts National Conference: Christianity playing a role in theatre.

I taught a workshop there on sociodrama and that's also where I recruited last year's stage manager for MasterWorks.

First run

After last night's performance of A Clear Leading, my play about John Woolman, who spoke against slavery 100 years before the Civil War, a friend (and Friend) from college, Steve Fawver, showed me his first run edition of Woolman's Journal, printed in 1774, two years after his death.

After reconnecting with a number of friends and Friends, including college professors and MasterWorks applicants, I closed out my visit to Newberg, OR (The 'Berg), with a descendant of Woolman, Dave Maurer and his wife Jen.

Thanks for everything everyone!

Newberg Friends

In about 90 minutes I'll perform A Clear Leading here at Newberg Friends Church, where I attended, between internships at other churches, while I was a student at George Fox ( http://GeorgeFox.edu ).

I'm flying over the moon!

Not really, but it sure looks like it.

I composed this on the flight up from Phoenix.

No skiing today

This is a lake where I skiied in college. There's frost on the ground, so I'm taking a pass for now.

Happy Lord's Day to you!

Wish you were here, Joyce!

When ever and where ever I travel, if my bride can't go with me, I often wish I could beam her to me. Oh is this ever one of those moments!!!

The Lord is present at Twin Rocks

This retreat has been an amazing return to my Evangelical Quaker roots.

Portraying Quakers

I'm here at the Twin Rocks Friends Camp to portray, well, Quakers: RichDrama.com/Itinerary.

Reconnected

Hannah (Macy) Frankamp helped me set up for my performances tomorrow. She was an actor in an acting/singing troup I led in 1993 called Youth Challenged through Arts in Ministry: YCAM. How cool to reconnect!

I've arrived on the Oregon Coast

http://RichDrama.com/Itinerary

Enacted prayer

We did a very moving enacted prayer today at George Fox Seminary for a man who has cancer, and most specifically for a meeting with him that happened this afternoon. We're looking forward to a report on how that meeting went.

Out for a walk on the Columbia River

..well, by the Columbia River. Maybe later we'll play some football: http://RichDrama.com/NewsBlog (1/11).

I'm flying over the moon

From From the air

...or at least it looked that way.

Today was actually a great day to be flying. There was a bit of cloud cover after taking off from Newark, but there were clear skies all across the land. I posted a bunch of photos to my From the air album.

I am SO in the mood to ski!

From From the air

If all goes well, I'll be hitting the slopes of Mt. Hood some time next week.

Got a window seat!

As always, I selected a window seat for this trip ( http://RichDrama.com/Itinerary ), but I was bumped to an ailse upon check in. They said that the seat we request when we buy the ticket isn't guaranteed. Then they wanted me to pay extra for the window. I asked the fellow at the window if he preferred my aisle seat. He had no preference and was glad to switch! Just before that I was the first to have my wheelie bag checked all the way through to PDX. I guess the overhead bins were filling up. So that was a $15 gift I wouldn't have received if I was in the window boarding zone!

Thanks for your prayers for my travels.

The Lord is SO good!

Splashing Toward the End Zone

I gave this message at Westchester Chapel this morning.

If you feel yourself sinking, get your eyes on Jesus!

Where John Woolman died

In May of 2000, the days before blogs, I did a 16 city tour of England with A Clear Leading, about early American abolitionist John Woolman. I just stumbled upon a photo of the place where he died, in York, England. The owners at the time let us in. We discovered that the walls of the actual room where he died were painted bright orange, and there were posters of UK rock icons plastering the wall: not how John would have kept it, but I'm sure he'd be glad to know that a young person was there, since he spent a significant amount of his energies reaching them on his many journeys.

The Last Night of Christmas colors

Epiphany marked the last night of the Empire State Building's celebration of Christmas.

What a blessed Season this was for us!

If you haven't read our Christmas card, scroll down to December 24.

Two sources of inspiration connect on Wesley

I first saw Roger Nelson perform his play The Man from Aldersgate, about John Wesley, the summer before I moved to New York. It was at a Christians in Theatre Arts Conference in Vancouver, BC. I was inspired on a number of levels: It confirmed my leadings to move to NYC, confirmed that Christians could work in the arts professionally, and specifically inspired me to work more on one-man plays.

Not long after that, Irv Brendlinger, now a professor at my alma mater, George Fox University, hired me for one of my first performances of A Clear Leading. Irv was a great fan of the subject of my play, John Woolman, and his enthusiasm was a real catalyst for getting me to the next level in touring the show.

Now that I'm getting A Clear Leading back on its feet, I was delighted to find that Irv has come out with book about John Wesley!

It's fascinating to me to see all of God's connections out there in the world!

Happy Epiphany

We were delighted to discover that our new apartment honors the Lord's birth through the Three Kings Celebration party, complete with a live band and a great meal! One more reason to praise the Lord for our miraculous home.

We're celebrating many ways that God was at work in our lives in '08. We had about 200 performances, coachings, speaking engagements or workshops in 14 states and four nations (plus a visit to a fifth nation). Thank you so much for your support throughout the year! You can read highlights in our Christmas letter.

Please continue to lift us up as we go into 2009.

Joyce is serving as interim lead pastor while our head pastor, Jim Warren, is taking his first sabbatical after founding our church (WestchesterChapel.org) 20 years ago. She preached her first sermon in this new post last Sunday, and you can hear it online: WestchesterChapel.org/Media/S010409.html. One of her illustrations tells of the miraculously successful operation her sister had to remove a brain tumor.

Rich has performances and other engagements lined up in eight states already. Plans are shaping up for performances in Asia, Australia, the UK and Africa. He's also working on a couple of writing projects.

Applications are now being received for the 2009 MasterWorks Festival, for which Rich is directing the theatre program. He'll be co-directing Thornton Wilder's Our Town with John Kirby, who is considered one of the best acting coaches in Hollywood after working on shows such as The Count of Monte Cristo, Deja Vu and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Bev Holloway, casting director for about 30 films, including Bobby Jones, Stroke of Genius and The Ultimate Gift, will return as a master class instructor along with several other quality professionals: MasterWorksFestival.org.

Wheels for the World at Views of the Manger

On December 22 I reported that I had noticed "Wheels for the World" on a wheelchair in Medford, OR, where I was visiting my family for Christmas. Since my friend, Teresa Smith, had been on trips with Wheels for the World I struck up a conversation. Turns out Brent (right) remembered Teresa from one of his six trips to Poland with Wheels for the World. After leaving the restaurant I wished that I would have invited them to my performance of Views of the Manger. I had given them my website and they found my itinerary (RichDrama.com/Itinerary) and came anyway!

Also pictured here is Brent's wife, Rachel, and their son Bryce, who inspired our connection.

Love is not an Accident

Harmony helps lead worship at La Grange Christian Assembly, just outside of Chicago. I performed there last month and Harmony gave me a copy of this CD, which is just fabulous! It's not praise and worship, but the songs are filled with Truth.

The View we grew up with

Click the photo to see a larger version.

Our Christmas view

Photo by my brother, Bob, who's won major awards for his artistic work.

What the ESB did

We stayed at home tonight to see if the Empire State Building did anything spectacular at midnight: It stayed lit. It usually goes dark at the stroke of twelve, but I happened to wake at 5:56 am (I'll be going back to sleep, Lord willing) and it's still going.

On the coldest New Year on record for NYC we were content to watch the lights flash off the buildings leading to Times Square, hear the melé from our window, watch the fireworks on the southern tip of Manhattan, and recall days gone by, when we could watch the ball drop from the roof of The Lamb's Church/Theatres, where I was on staff. It's now closed for renovations, but that was where we watched it mark the new millenium.

I did stand on the square the night it turned 1994, which was my eighth day in the city. I think that was the coldest New Year on record at that point, only a few degrees "warmer" than last night's 18. We went out on Times Square at about 2pm.

The next year (actually it was probably the next morning!) I discovered that we could pass through the parking garage next to The Lamb's and get a clear view at 11:55. A few years later a building was torn down and it opened up a clear view from the roof.

Ah, those were the days. We'd play games and drink hot cocoa while we waited. One year I performed The Revelation in front of what was then the largest fireplace in North America.

But last night was quite special in its own way as we thanked God for an amazing year ( http://RichDrama.com/NewsBlog 12/24), especially for the miraculous view that we do have: http://RichDrama.com/MP

And we prayed for the coming year: for our plans and dreams and for those of the world. Lord, give us the grace to praise You every day of 2009, no matter what comes.