an intentional interview

happy May! i pray you are healthy and full of joy. may the LORD be always at your side.


OurHouse got interviewed by Judy, a 20-something living in community in our neighborhood [Wallingford] and working WITH Tom and Christine Sine at Mustard Seed Associates [http://www.msainfo.org/] here in Seattle. OurHouse met with Tom and Christine early on in our journey together, before we ever actually moved into the house we're living in now. After we moved in, they came over for dinner in the winter to catch up with us and meet with the LORD in prayer and fellowship. They lead vibrant, beautiful lives, serving the Seattle community. Christine is an avid gardener/canner, and she and Tom have both written quite a number of books, including the Mustard Seed Conspiracy.

Judy came over for dinner on a Wednesday night [the night we have dinner with just house members and one or two special friends that want to meet with us intentionally] about three weeks ago, eager to interview us about how we all came about living together in this house. So we told her the whole story. It took about an hour and a half to tell, but it was good for us, because we hadn't told the story in awhile. It allowed us time to reflect intensively back on a year ago and where we were in our journey with the LORD and with each other. So go to the link above and you'll see our photograph and the link to the article below that. While you're there, check out the Mustard Seed Associates blog page.

ourhouse through the eyes of others

...Grand Valley State University week!

Nearly six weeks ago, 13 students came to stay at our house for five days from Grand Rapids, Michigan – the home of our dear brother, Cornelius. The students were here in Seattle for their spring break trip to explore, meet new people and serve with their hands and their hearts around the city. Those thirteen became dear friends of ours. They became our brothers and sisters. Talk is going around about there being another visit from Grand Rapids come summertime. We at OurHouse look forward to this with great joy and excitement.



two new friends from Indiana Wesleyan University – Bobby and Carrie and three GVS friends

our new GVS friends thanked us for our hospitality by painting a mural for us!

here's ourhouse, complete with Richard, Jacob and Challah

we miss our new friends from Grand Rapids! we hope they decide to come back and visit! they had beautiful hearts and loved music, which we shared often in our home by evenings of praising G-d together and other nights by reminiscing on junior high by singing DC Talk songs.

a litany of RESISTANCE

This is the Litany of Resistance, created with the help of The Potter Street House's friends Jim Loney (CPT Reservist) and Brian Walsh (activist theologian).

This cry and prayer is beautiful to me. I'd like to share it with you.
--------------------------
One: Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world
All: Have mercy on us
One: Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world
All: Free us from the bondage of sin and death
One: Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world
All: Hear our prayer. Grant us peace.

One: For the victims of war
All: Have mercy
One: Women, men and children
All: Have mercy
One: The maimed and the crippled
All: Have mercy
One: The abandoned and the homeless
All: Have mercy
One: the imprisoned and the tortured
All: Have mercy
One: The widowed and the orphaned
All: Have mercy
One: The bleeding and the dying
All: Have mercy
One: The weary and the desperate
All: Have mercy
One: The lost and the forsaken
All: Have mercy

One: O God -- Have mercy on us sinners
All: Forgive us for we know not what we do
One: For our scorched and blackened earth
All: Forgive us
One: For the scandal of billions wasted in war
All: Forgive us
One: For our arms makers and arms dealers
All: Forgive us
One: For our Caesars and Herods
All: Forgive us
One: For the violence that is rooted in our hearts
All: Forgive us


One: For the times we turn others into enemies
All: Forgive us
One: Deliver us, O God
All: Guide our feet into the way of peace
One: Hear our prayer.
All: Grant us peace.

One: From the arrogance of power
All: Deliver us
One: From the myth of redemptive violence
All: Deliver us
One: From the tyranny of greed
All: Deliver us
One: From the ugliness of racism
All: Deliver us
One: From the cancer of hatred
All: Deliver us
One: From the seduction of wealth
All: Deliver us
One: From the addiction of control
All: Deliver us
One: From the idolatry of nationalism
All: Deliver us
One: From the paralysis of cynicism
All: Deliver us
One: From the violence of apathy
All: Deliver us
One: From the ghettos of poverty
All: Deliver us
One: From the ghettos of wealth
All: Deliver us
One: From a lack of imagination
All: Deliver us
One: Deliver us, O God
All: Guide our feet into the way of peace
One: We will not conform to the patterns of this world
All: Let us be transformed by the renewing of our minds
One: With the help of God’s grace
All: Let us resist evil wherever we find it

One: With the waging of war
All: We will not comply
One: With the legalization of murder
All: We will not comply
One: With the slaughter of innocents
All: We will not comply
One: With laws that betray human life
All: We will not comply
One: With the destruction of community
All: We will not comply
One: With the pointing finger and malicious talk
All: We will not comply
One: With the idea that happiness must be purchased
All: We will not comply
One: With the ravaging of the earth
All: We will not comply
One: With principalities and powers that oppress
All: We will not comply
One: With the destruction of peoples
All: We will not comply
One: With the raping of women
All: We will not comply
One: With governments that kill
All: We will not comply
One: With the theology of empire
All: We will not comply
One: With the business of militarism
All: We will not comply
One: With the hoarding of riches
All: We will not comply
One: With the dissemination of fear
All: We will not comply

One: Today we pledge our ultimate allegiance… to the Kingdom of God
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To a peace that is not like Rome’s
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the Gospel of enemy love
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the Kingdom of the poor and broken
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To a King that loves his enemies so much he died for them

All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the least of these, with whom Christ dwells
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the transnational Church that transcends the artificial borders of nations
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the refugee of Nazareth
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the homeless rabbi who had no place to lay his head
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the cross rather than the sword
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the banner of love above any flag
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the one who rules with a towel rather than an iron fist
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the one who rides a donkey rather than a war-horse
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the revolution that sets both oppressed and oppressors free
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the Way that leads to life
All: We pledge allegiance
One: To the Slaughtered Lamb
All: We pledge allegiance
One: And together we proclaim his praises, from the margins of the empire to the centers of wealth and power
All: Long Live the Slaughtered Lamb
One: Long Live the Slaughtered Lamb
All: Long Live the Slaughtered Lamb


In Jesus for President, Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw make it clear that this is a litany ready to be shared and used in worship however you may choose. share the prayer with your friends and write a prayer of your own.

be creative. and assume love.

a new season

i greet you all in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

G-d has been faithful and generous in the last two weeks. and i'm certain He will continue to be to us all.
everyone [except Richard] was away from Wallingford for spring break for a couple weeks. Heather went to California, Ben and Cory went biking and hiking in Washington, Lindsey went to Camden, NJ and then to Minnesota, and I went to New York City.
for me, spring break was a time of spiritual growth. i stayed with my sister and brother-in-law in East Harlem and spent each evening conversing in the kitchen around a variety of important topics that are relevant to my life. we had difficult conversations that had beautiful outcomes. G-d has blessed them with the gift of counsel, and they truly blessed me with their words. praise Jesus!

as i was flying back to seattle today, i finished the book Jesus for President by Chris Haw and Shane Claiborne. I was emotionally moved by the last 100 pages. I would like to share with you some words that reminded me of the power in conversion, spiritual and physical.

"We need conversion in the best sense of the word – people who are marked by the renewing of their minds and imaginations, who no longer conform to the pattern that is destroying our world. Otherwise we have only believers, not converts. And believers are a dime a dozen nowadays. What the world needs is people who believe so much in another world that they cannot help but enact it. Then we start to see some true conversion vans that run on veggie oil instead of diesel. Then we will see some converted homes that run on renewable energy, power their laundry machines with stationary bicycles, and flush their toilets with dirty sink water. Then tears will be converted to laughter as people make their machine guns into saxophones or police officers use their clubs to play baseball."

i've been reminded a lot lately that there are a lot of little things i can be doing that will change the way i think and act about things of this world...things like celebrating Passover with fireworks instead of the Fourth of July, making Easter my Presidents Day, praying with my brothers and sisters each night before i go to bed and each morning before we leave for school/daily duties, and remembering the lives of martyrs' Martin of Tours or Marcellus the Centurion before each community dinner or house meeting. i'm learning more each day to be creative as i live out my life for Christ. this journey is rocky most of the time and not easy. but G-d is the Father of provision and grace. remembering this helps me along the way, and i hope it helps you too.

grace be to you as well this week.

remember to always love.

a favorite professor comes to dinner

After a quarter and a half of trying to schedule dinner with Dr. Braden, we all finally agreed on this past Wednesday evening, and Dr. Braden came over with her husband, Zhenya.
Kathleen and I had met a couple days before to discuss what to make for dinner. Zhenya is Russian [he and Kathleen have a very cool story of how they met], so we thought we should make something authentically Russian. we decided to make Piroshki, because it would require all of us to sit at our table and prepare it together. it's a bit labor-intensive, but delicious!

Zhenya and Kathleen

Piroshki is made by forming dough around a filling. Dr. Braden prepared a cabbage, boiled eggs and onion combination for our Piroshki. so we each took a section of the dough, stretched it out with our fingers while forming it in a circle shape, filled it with a spoonful of the mixture and then pinched it shut by bringing the sides of the dough up over the filling. we arranged about 15 little piroshkis on a greased baking pan and brushed the tops with butter for a golden finish.


Zhenya and Kathleen also brought over some Russian chocolates and Russian soda. Dr. Braden even wore her Russian apron!



after dinner, we had coffee, made in our french press from beans that Ben's cousin gave us (thanks again, Jess!), and triple-chocolate cake. it was a really fun and relaxing evening.
we want to host more people who are important to us but and don't usually have the opportunity or time to visit.

celebration of Richard's birth

Richard's birthday was February 12th, so we decided it would be fun to tour Fremont with him. We walked from our house to the Troll on top of Troll Avenue.



Richard thought it was "a waste" for the statue to be crushing a VW Bug.

Then we walked to the Lenin Statue and then to the DINOSAURS! [if you haven't seen the dinosaurs, you must a.s.a.p.!] They're located on Canal Street, near where Richard is interning during his stay here in Seattle. Sadly, he had already seen the AWEsome dinosaurs and wasn't that impressed, because he rides his bike past them each morning. haha. Our final destination was Coldstone Creamery for some ice cream. Lucky for him, it's free on birthdays!

heather, lindsey, richard


cory congratulates richard on his birth


this is our house


cory, ben, abby

When we returned home, Cory iced a cupcake, Ben added a birthday candle, and Lindsey wrapped Richard's gift. We walked into the dining room, sang "Happy Birthday," and had Richard make a wish [another "American tradition"]. He unwrapped Heather's gift of some Dove chocolate bars that were wrapped in a Anime portrait of Richard. classic. then he unwrapped his early Valentines Day gift, big chocolate LIPS! he thought they were really funny, thankfully. :)

french toast feast!

tonight OurHouse had many wonderful people in its body.
they came, with eggs and friends to make and eat french toast together. sweet! and savory!
we ate together, played music and danced. ben, josh and i took some photos, and challah [jake's puppy] danced around our feet, hoping for a piece of challah french toast to fall to the floor.


jake's playing banjo while alex sews a filsons patch onto his jeans.


this couch = becca.challah.ben.greg.rachel.


aaron is playing the metal dust pan with a spoon.


richard is teaching my brother, josh Japanese.


lindsey is wrapping gifts for her Urban Involvement team at SPU. this one is a giraffe.


andrew is holding our new rabbit, Nora. heather paid $15 for her on craigslist. she's our new beauty.

we'd love it if you came to our next feast.
we always dumpster Challah bread on Sundays at Essential Bread Company and eggs from Trader Joes.

the first and third Thursdays are Community Dinners at our house. come! and bring a nice edible something.