Gervais the Exegete

Not for the kids, but a very entertaining read of the two creation stories.

Review: A Climate for Change

I actually have a bit of a backlog on books I'm supposed to be reviewing. But when A Climate for Change: Global Warming Facts for Faith Based Decisions (Katharine HayHoe, Andrew Farley, Faith Words, 2009) arrived, I had to take a gander. In fact I had to read the whole thing. The first 3/4s, or more, of the book is an apologetic for climate change, specifically that climate change is happening and that humans are the source. This part is ok, except that the quotes that start off a chapter usually have much more depth than the chapters themselves. I chalked this up to how volatile this debate has become South of the border (in the United States), and how careful the authors wanted to be. Unfortunately, nowhere in the book does it state that we need the Earth and not the other way around. I suppose such a fact would not sit well with the intended audience of this book. But knowing that is my bias, it is not surprising that the last few chapters made me want to throw the book at the wall. If you spend that much time outlining a real problem then you would think you could at least propose a stewardship approach (even though I am convinced stewardship is not near an adequate response to the ecological crisis we are facing.) Actually, the response section begins with an affirmation of the pessimistic claim that God will yank us out of here anyway, or at least destroy the Earth and create something new. They even quote Revelation, but not the parts about the new coming down to the old or that God will return to destroy those who destroy the earth. So after discounting the possibility that anything we could ever do to respond to the ecological crisis is useless, they propose another reason. It makes a good witness??? Actually, I think if you motivation is to look good to maybe win people - is that not hypocritical? Seriously, if I got excited about Jesus through someone doing something they didn't believe in I think I'd probably not be too excited about that person's religion when I figured it out. This is what I would call a bad witness. Color me frustrated at this point.

They actually end on a good point. It is true that none of us can do it all. And the best place to start is with small steps having the goal of changing our lifestyle (especially our dependence on non-renewable sources of energy). And for all I complained about lack of depth, the chapters do cover off the majority of falsehoods I've heard from folks who deny the ecological crisis. Not sure how convincing their arguments are, I was convinced from the beginning. And the quotes, many of them are really good.

I'm not sure I could recommend this book. I really want to. This is an area that evangelicals really need to think deeply about. But I would want a response that includes faithfulness to God, particularly God's love for this whole world. I want something that challenges anthropocentrism, the arrogance of our species. And if this is part of our witness, and I believe it should be, then I want something that engages the issue on the issues terms, not as a smokescreen for evangelistic motives with no real desire to make a real difference for our planet. Bottom line is, we screwed this planet up, we can't fix it (despite a few hints in this book that there is still time to fix the problems, they waffled on this point though) but we have to do something, if for no other reason, the ones who suffer the most are the ones least able to do anything about climate change. But, I'd add, that as Christian we also need to have hope that through God we can do more than is humanly possible and maybe through God's grace give our kids a planet that will be livable.

Today it Arrived!

I have been waiting a long time for fresh + re:fresh to come. I was really excited when Len emailed me to say they had finally landed with him, and still it took over a week to arrive. Canada Post battered the spine up a bit, but not to let that squash the extreme joy of seeing my article actually in print! Wahoo! I instantly added it to LibraryThing and I'm wondering if a single chapter qualifies me for a LibraryThing author badge. Ah, but I'm gushing. I read my article sitting in the parking lot of my regular grocery store, and it is pretty good. I've spent a bit of time with the book, taking breaks from my work, and I think it is a great addition to the growing body of literature on emerging/missional church. Some of the best stuff coming out is descriptive, it is an important place to start. As Noll says, evangelicalism at its best is a blending of innovation and tradition and this book certainly represents that (Noll, American Evangelical Christianity, 15). Thanks Len for letting me contribute to this project, I hope it brings out the best in evangelicals all across this wonderful country of ours.

Back but still busy!

The Theology Intensive at Dominion Hill was excellent. It was great to get to meet theologians and pastors that I didn't know and hang out with a few that I did (and really like!) I was really encouraged that the Vineyard, in Canada, is wrestling with the important issues of our time. I think about four years back I got the impression that we were in a holding pattern, which I found a bit frustrating. But that is definitely not my impression after this past week. I was also really encouraged with an insight of David's about the mode of deconstruction that many people are engaging in these days - at the end of ourselves what we really need is an encounter with God. In fact the whole mystic thrust is that we stand before the unknown and are undone. The Vineyard is good at that, we have a long tradition of experiencing God. This is something we need to celebrate and look for as a way forward into the future. To that I say "Come, Holy Spirit!" David wasn't suggesting we somehow disconnect our brains. While we engage with the issues to the fullest of our capacities - there is always something more than what we can do on our own. The wonderful insight of Kingdom Theology is that the Kingdom is God's, not ours. And while we love to partner with God in the stuff of the Kingdom, it is God who leads and reigns.

I wish I had time to properly capture the rich discussions of this past week, but alas it is back to the grind for me.

Hermeneutics with Derek Morphew

I'm heading off to Dominion Hill (New Brunswick) to participate in a workshop with South African Vineyard theologian Derek Morphew. I've met Morphew in the past, he is quite an interested guy. Apparently they are video taping this workshop for Vineyard Bible Institute. I hope I don't get myself in trouble. :-) The main text is Kevin Vanhoozer's Is There Meaning In This Text? which I'm quite enjoying. Unfortunately, I have too little time to adequately prepare for this (We are supposed to read this book, a 69 page course book and watch a presentation Morphew recently did as a webinar). But on the other hand I have read the majority of the suggested other reading - some of which is really, really good material. I am hoping this will be a really in depth exploration of hermeneutics, I'll definitely blog a bit if I have internet access.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch... I am working on my OGS application, prepping an undergrad class on Early Christian Spirituality for Thursday (filling in for my director who is away) and frantically trying to work through my themes on the Kingdom of God tradition. And that is just the academic front - we also moved our oldest from French immersion to English school, survived my wife being away all weekend, took care of a few semi-surprise pastoral issues and entertained my kids. Life is pretty darn full right now.

How to Get at the Sources an Author Does Not Acknowledge

One of the tasks I'm wrestling with tonight is how to get at the sources for several biblical scholars: C H Dodds, J Jeremias and G E Ladd. Ladd I have some good leads to follow. But this is not my world. I don't know Schweitzer enough to know exactly how Dodds is interpreting him. What I have are bibliographies and a computer. So dig, dig, dig. It could be worse, my director did Thomas Berry and he didn't even use footnotes! So to figure out his sources was a huge piece of work that took several scholars. She told me it was a risky (academically) venture and I can believe it. The things I'm appreciative is that not all theologians are that evasive of who their sources and dialogue partners are. If you have any nice leads on the three I chase down tonight please pass them along (even if it is not tonight anymore).

I Write Like Jazz???

While I was doing some final edits on an article for Word in the World (Concordia) I had an insight into my writing. I realized that I write jazz. While that is kinda cool, it is not a good style academically. But at least now I know what I am doing so I can address it. Here is what I mean, let's say the next paragraph is a sample of a typical paragraph in one of my essays.

All the balloons in the world are blue. Fourteen years ago the shuttle Survivor ran into a strange space gas. It was quite upsetting for the pilots, all of whom found it hard to deal with the colour blue. The gas they ran into was blue and piercing the cloud brought it raining down on the planet. Most things were affected, even temporarily, blue became the new black. Now all that is left is the inflation effect, remnants of that strange space gas cause inflated objects to turn blue. The effect is still a puzzle to the scientific community. The blueness of balloons has led to many a sad birthday party, it is these parties that I will turn next.

There are a couple of things - I typed that quickly so it probably has many unintentional problems as well - I want to point out. Multiple ideas in one sentence, I'm working on that one. Connecting sentences at the end that are disconcerting leaps. But there is a strategy that I noticed. I call it the jazz paragraph.

Jazz introduces tension into music, then the listener follows longing for that tension to be resolved. Good jazz resolves this, but not always in the way we expect. This tension and resolution is what makes the music so interesting. (I could be completely off here in my understanding of jazz, so if I am just call it Frank's erroneous understanding of jazz and follow me to the next part.)

My paragraphs often begin right away with a clear claim. That I do well actually. So my strategy should be how I establish the validity of that claim - and there are several ways of doing that. What I tend to do is make my claim and then immediately jump several steps down the rabbit trail. Then I scramble back up to make my connection, but if you missed that this disconnect was the tension you probably are stuck trying to figure out what the first two sentences had to do with each other and completely miss my point. That is the problem with my jazz approach. I need to close the gap between sentence one and sentence two, easing myself (and hopefully my reader) into the rabbit hole.

It is actually encouraging to recognize this. One of the hardest things for me has been to become self-aware when I am writing. When you write you have a whole world of thought in your head and some of it makes its way to the page. If you leave out too much you can't be followed, or at least your arguments cannot be followed. That has been a comment I've gotten a lot from my director - that she can't follow the thinking between sentences. Now that I discovered the jazz aspect I realize why it makes sense to me (plus I'm an abstract thinker, not linear). She knows I know the material, as she once said I can always explain what I am trying to do, but it is not translating to the page.

I'll probably read this post later and laugh. I hope you find it amusing too.

Honesty is a Beautiful Thing

It warmed my heart to read an honest statement about personal ideological claims from a Creationist! Thank you Todd. That is the sort of disclosure that actually gives me hope that there can be conversations, worthwhile conversations between people with different ideological stances towards the science and religion debates.

Let me be equally as honest. I believe that evolution is compelling. I also believe that the Bible is compelling. But I don't feel obligated to believe the Bible weighs in on the science of creation any more than it tells us how a light bulb works. My ideological stance is that the Bible tells us more about the way life should be and in Christ can be than it does about why it is the way it is. The Bible isn't a textbook on socio-cultural analysis any more than it is a physics textbook. That doesn't mean it doesn't have insights that are valuable in that area - but that isn't it's primary thrust. I believe that through the Bible I meet the God who gives me a future and a hope. I also believe that this same God is the creator of all that is. And I also believe that the marvels of evolution, creation and the universe all tell of God's glory. Convoluted as that all sounds, it is where I start in the discussion.

Challenge of Evangelical Theology

The more self-designated evangelical theology I read the more issues I realize I need to contend with in constructing an evangelical political theology. Issues like a theology of scripture, that is very murky water to have to wade into. The issues of competing theologies from the Calvinist versus the Methodist traditions, the reality is that I will never solve that debate for folks and I'd be a fool to try (but I can definitely land somewhere). That debate hints at one of the issues that is most problemmatic - the evangelical obsession for boundaries. Grenz deals with this quite well in chapter 5 of Renewing the Center. The reason for boundaries is specifically to say who is in and who is out - a good example is this critique of the emerging church. The obsessive how far in or how far out of that article struck me as rather odd. The big question is who sets the boundaries. This chart really sets up a false schema, in fact I'd argue if you had to do a boundary diagramme a Venn diagramme is better suited - in my estimation Patton fails to allow for any cross over between fundamentalism and emerging church - why? What presuppositions allow him to make that claim? What allows him to define who is where, or wears what label? Such efforts really only serve one goal - a desperate attempt to define boundaries. Indeed, this might actually be one of the truest defining characteristics of evangelical theology. If that is true then I think my project is, at the very least, in for a very uphill battle!

But NO! I don't believe we should allow anyone else to define who we are for us. If evangelicalism has it's roots in coalitions (as Grenz point out) then the boundaries are not for exclusion, but for helping people choose inclusion. There are two reasons I believe this should be the case: 1) it is the most evangelistic position to take and 2) it is hopeful in a way narrowing can never be.

The real roots of evangelicalism in North America are really found in a convertive piety. This is still recognized in that one of the chief definitions of evangelicals is a strong commitment to individuals being converted to Christianity. Now certainly there are a number of ways this plays out. But if the thrust is outward in an effort to draw women and men to Jesus how can we twist that into a social club disconnected from the world God so loves? In terms of evangelical identity, are we not doing the same thing? Are we not saying who is and isn't welcome to the discussion that is evangelical theology? Would we not better serve our apologetic tendencies to have more people in the conversation than just those who agree with us? You can't save the lost if you aren't willing to go to them (and even invite them to the table like Jesus modeled!) Boundary setting is counter-productive to the gospel. It says we are seeking our comfort (not being challenged) rather than God's glory. It says we are more concerned with our club not being infiltrated than with God's Spirit leading us to shape the discussions that lead the willing into a deeper understanding of their faith and the identity of evangelical.

This narrowing shuts down possibilities for evangelicals to have a positive impact on the world. It closes doors for us to participate in ecumenical and societal events. And so it prevents us from bringing the hope that is in us to those situations. But it also corrupts our vision of what that hope looks like. In my estimation many evangelical theologies have a very weak understanding of grace. We see this most evidently in how we use decline readings of scripture to justify building theological enclaves, fortresses really, that focus on the call to be separate ignoring the equally valid call to be in the world. So we imagine God will whisk us away and hurl vengeance at the world God so loved that Jesus laid down his life for? The disconnect is painful. It is not hope that this evokes, but utter and complete fatalistic despair. And why? Again it is the itching ears that want to feel like they have it right. They have the corner on truth and everyone else has to measure up to their standards. This completely misses any historical reality of our religion (or even Judaism for that matter). The Church was birthed in plurality. Evangelicalism was birthed in plurality. Unfortunately it quickly took on the cause that has tripped up the church so often in the past - plurality is seen as the evil that threatens to destroy us. This might just be one of the best lies ever launched against the Church. Plurality is our strength. Plurality means those who need to be strengthened, encouraged, challenged - even saved, that they are in on the conversations where that will happen. I, for one, would rather be an evangelical in that fashion, opening my arms, than one who has become so blinded that they are no longer able to fulfill the command of Christ in this world. I wish we could all have a mount of transfiguration moment, the boundaries are not the point - Jesus is. God, open our eyes to see Jesus alone.

Reading...

Just an observation about reading. Way back when I was doing my masters I rejoiced in having a super high reading speed. It is still true that if I need to I can plow through books and articles at break neck speed. It is also true that doing this is actually helpful, provided I have some immediate means of massaging the data into meaning - such as a quick read before a class discussion. If I waited too long it was less useful to do this. Just as the masters was reteaching me to write, I think the doctoral work is reteaching me how to read. Reading with comprehension is hard. Reading with attention to detail is hard. Reading is not as simple a process as I would like.

Reading with comprehension, for me, requires lots of processing space. I need to step back from the text a lot, talk it through in my head (or better with people), which just adds to the time it takes to finish the reading. This does not mean I don't strategically read certain texts - it is a good skill to be able to dissect a book into which parts are most important to your purposes, read those thoroughly and skim the rest so that you don't miss something potentially important. But, at least in terms of the comps, my texts are carefully chosen to not have a lot of fat that needs trimming. So I read.

I think part of the problem is that I am quite ADHD, so it is easy for me to start in on a page and halfway through, "is that a cow over there?" Yup, I'm gone. This used to get quite frustrating for me, but really there is not much I can do about it. And the reality is that I do manage to stay on task quite effectively - I've had years to learn how to deal with my attention issues. That explains why I like working in crisis so much, give me an impending deadline and I'm all fired up. If the deadline is only sort of pending - well there is always facebook! Oh look there is a whole season of Trailer Park Boys' I've never seen before! You know the story. The problem with that is it is usually my family that suffers. So I've tried my best to not fall into those old patterns. In fact I've tried to spend time with my family as a way of making the deadlines loom larger for me. This tactic sometimes backfires when I end up pulling a late night and spending the next day with the grumpies.

Well, I've procrastinated long enough this morning, got to get back to reading.

Deep Church

The idea of "deep church" has been getting a lot of traffic lately. However, is this term really any more helpful than emerging/ent or missional? The meaning of these terms are far from self-evident. In fact these terms have insider meaning (usually positive) and outsider meaning (usually negative). I don't think the answer is ditching the effort to name things - but rather recognizing that there are two legitimate components of all these names. First there is a core common phenomenon that folks are trying to name and second these terms are artificial creations with artificial meaning(s) attached by everyone who uses them.

The common phenomenon is the attempt to deal with cultural relevance. Guder's Missonal Church is a great touchstone on this one. The reality is that the models and modes of being church are not as functional in the West as they used to be. There are complex reasons for this. And the reality is that different practitioners have different answers and see different issues as primary concerns. It is important to recognize that even entrenchment into tradition is a response to this phenomenon. Adaptation is a feature of the church that has enabled it to survive and even thrive for 2000 years now. And to be sure most of this adaptation has had faithfulness to the gospel front and centre (at least that aspect of the gospel that was dominant in that moment of history).

This tendency for adaptation means that the practitioners are having an involved and inside conversation involving their specific context(s), ecclesial background and hopes for the church. Because this often occurs with little critical reflection (it is a practical and incipient activity) the language that arises is insider language. The big problem with insider language is the ease at which it is misinterpreted by outsiders - especially outsiders who read the conversation partners in different ways. Take the knee jerk reaction of most anti-emergent books, articles and websites as a prime example. What is needed really is not polemics, but concentrated study. Especially in terms of differentiating the aspects of this phenomenon. Personally I see this an opportunity for academics to step into the conversation, not to give their opinions on how it should be, but to help define what is going on in ways that are helpful, accurate and harder to misunderstand as an outsider.

What this means is that the attempts to adapt in our generation(s) should be submitted to a high degree of examination. What this does not mean is that we should simply assume the worst. I would dare say we should expect the best - and I dare say that in the multitude of options we are bound to find it. It doesn't mean these terms will work for you, but perhaps we can get past the tendencies to simply conflate emerging, deep, missional with some fictitious attack on the church.

Moltmann and Me

In retrospect my contextless thank you to Moltmann probably conveyed more to me than to him. But it was awesome to meet my theological hero in the flesh.

Moltmann Conversation

The tweets from the conversation contain many great quotes and links. If you are looking for audio snippits, that's in there too.

Back now, I'm still tired but really glad I went. The conversation was amazing. Kudos Doug and Tony. I ran into an old friend this morning and realized that he has been studying a lot of the same stuff - Bloch, Moltmann, Pannenberg, etc. It was a great connection and a great excuse to rekindle an old friendship.

Tomorrow I'm leading worship at Greenbelt Baptist. I've never been before, but the pastor is a friend of mine. He's one of those guys who gets that unity is about diversity. I know this because we have quite different political ideas. But at the same time we know each other has a heart for God. Unity is like that. It says there is something more important that politics and even denominational distinctives. It says there is something about belonging that doesn't put any prerequisites in the way. I find that folks who listen for the heart in others are way more willing to see God leading you in different directions, and accept that it is because God is more concerned with seeking us out than God ever is with the trappings of our religious affiliations. I appreciate that in people like Steve.

Conference and Rest

Yesterday was really tiring, so I decided to leave the laptop off. So as a result no blog posts of the conversation yesterday. However, some great live blogging will fill in the blanks. My new friend Joe has links and thoughts - go check his blog out. Today is a bit of a roller coaster too, so I'm thinking that I'll not get to blog until I'm back home in Ottawa.

Eastern Depiction of the Trinity

First Day - Moltmann Conversation

I'm tweeting as pomorev if you want to see some snippets, but the first day was pretty good. John Franke spoke, trying to prime the pumps for our conversation. I felt it was more a plug for his book - Manifold Witness. He began by expressing his non-negotiables regarding biblical reliability, confidence in the promises and Spirit of God. I appreciate them, but I think to really embrace plurality in the idea of truth you need to risk your foundations. Not that you don't bring them into the conversation, but it is like only bringing yourself half to a conversation. But this is based on a short talk, I think he is probably worth reading.

Wicker Park led us in a Eucharist after, it was quite nice. I love the live artist working with chalk as we listened and worshiped. The service was quite accessible and a representation of the incipient worship of their emerging community. The vibe reminded me of EcclesiaX in Ottawa.

Things should be starting up soon.

13 Hours to the Moltmann Trip

In 13 hours I will be stirring myself awake so that I can get to the airport, wait for and board a plane first to Philadelphia and then Chicago. Yup, it will be a lot of time in the air. At my destination, O'Hare, I'll meet up with the gracious Rob Morpeth to catch a ride to the hotel. All they had left were smoking rooms, bummer, so I bought some travel incense. If I'm going to stick like a smokey room it will the smoke of my choosing! I stuffed Sharon's yoga mat in my travel bag, just in case, but I will probably do no more than some standing practices at the hotel and between sessions. And I had to decide just what Moltmann texts to bring. Theology of Hope, of course. It is well loved. Then my favourites, which just happen to be the other texts they recommend you read before coming: Trinity and the Kingdom of God and The Crucified God. When I picked up my passport this morning I had a really strong sense of relief - I really don't like deal breaking loose ends. If it hadn't gone through I would be out a lot of money. But it is nice how this trip is coming together. Now the deal is to get to bed early and simply enjoy myself as my academic interests collide in Chicago. I'll probably send the odd tweet from the conversation, my twitter handle is pomorev.

Undersea Adventure

Today I'm gonna try and find some small plastic sharks. Yeah, sharks! Other than short stints through water I've not run a real undersea adventure - until now. The next leg of my Rathbone campaign takes them to the dread pirates cove with its undersea treasure repository. They are looking for something specific, but much danger awaits. The location is the Sea of Persistence, known for its teeming shark population - of course that is because sharks are not the top of the food chain down there! I'm also thinking of procuring a second aboleth mini, the dread salt-water aboleth might make its presence known. Minis aren't the challenge, what I need to figure out are the niggly things like movement and 3 dimensional combat. Also I'm wondering about the effect of brine on equipment? Thoughts, suggestions, favourite web resources on the subject? Bring it on.

BTW this campaign is D&D 3.5E with some house rules. The party is from 12-14th level so I'm apt to throw lots of big stuff at them. And pirates, there definitely has to be pirates with ship-to-ship combat! The more epic the better. Love to hear your thoughts.

How Committed to the Text ?

I'm reading George Eldon Ladd's the Presence of the Future, it is very good, but it is definitely the work of a Biblical theologian. That is someone whose primary commitment is to the text. He is convinced of his understanding of Kingdom of God theology based on what he sees in the scriptures. His concerns are about the correct interpretation of those scriptures. And I suspect that if he found the scriptures to paint a different picture of the Kingdom of God then he'd not be willing to challenge those scriptures. What I'm wrestling with is how committed I am to the text.

I think this is why I am not a Biblical theologian. If I found an unhelpful understanding of the Kingdom in scripture I would definitely challenge that. But it is not so simple. The reason I don't find such a reading has to do with the bias I bring to the scripture. I know that Ladd, like all Biblical theologians, also brings a bias to the scriptures. Actually I'm impressed when Ladd lays out his assumptions and his thesis, I wish more general evangelical writers would take this lead. But one of the biases I bring to my reading of scripture is that our interpretation changes over time. So my commitment is primarily to a specific reading of the text, but always to a particular understanding that I find supported by the text but also by tradition and experience.

So I am not uncommitted to the text. In fact I have a high value for the text. It disturbs me greatly when scriptural texts seem to counter my values, such as Wednesday's lectional reading about Simon's mother-in-law being healed and then serving. But my response is not to say the scripture is to be rejected or chastised, rather I love to wrestle with it. And in this case I had to conclude that it is equally plausible that Simon's mother-in-law found serving fulfilling (indeed it is a value of the Kingdom) and so was enabled to do something that was deeply rewarding and meaningful even if it could be construed as supporting a patriarchal view of society. The reason I would wrestle at all is that Jesus, in most cases, treats women in ways that are quite radical for his social context. And when this isn't the case usually there is something quite profound going on. Maybe it is best to say that I don't give up on the text - but is this real commitment to the text?

I think it is good for me to reflect on this, the text is important but I'm not animated primarily by the text. Although it is undeniable that 20+ years of reading the bible has influenced my theology, it is how these ideas work themselves out in the context of community, life and politics that really drives my faith to seek understanding. This is a big reason why I don't even pretend to be a Biblical theologian. It also is the reason that I avoid backing up my ideas with proof texts (a practice I abhor). So I end up at a place of both-and. I have a commitment to the text, but it is not primary. My commitment is to well thought out theology that understands and exposes its presuppositions (as much as possible) and seeks to work for a better world for everyone.

Moltmann, Emerging Church, Passport!

OK so I'm heading to Chicago to take in the Moltmann Conversation. I know, no brainer, I write extensively on the emerging church and my favourite theologian of all time is coming to address them. This month is super busy, but first my wife and then my director convinced me that I can't miss this. So I spent the last 48hours setting it all up. Unfortunately I'm staying in a smoking room at the hotel, all they had left, so hopefully that will get changed. But I think it is worth it. I wish I could take my family, but that isn't practical even if it was affordable. So away I go.

I think Moltmann has something profound to say to evangelicals in general. I just hope that what he says is actually reflected on. I also know that the hope theology movement is very concerned with the slip into apocalyptic language that is so popular in evangelical circles. I wonder if Moltmann will clearly address that issue. I think that this will be important for those engaged in re-imagining church, especially the evangelical church.

I'll probably tweet the conference, it will give me something to reflect on later. I'll definitely take lots of notes.