The Micahlogue

A class on Our body's PH levels

2006-07-22T09:37:00.000-04:00

This Thursday July 27 at 7pm I am teaching a class that you are all welcome to attend. It will be at our house at 1409 Sigsbee (Behind Sami's Pita in Eastown.) We are going to look at the typical American diet, and figure out why we are all so sick all the time. Everyone is welcome. Free.

Gutter Gulps

2006-07-01T22:42:00.000-04:00

Country well water, spring water, and rain water. These 3 water sources are up for review next.

Country water (well water) although generally better than city water must reviewed on an individual basis. If you have country water, have culligan test it for you. The main problem with this “well water” is that especially here in Michigan there are so many farmers who use fertilizers, herbicide, fungicides, and whatever else that end up in our well water. If you live in the middle of Canada, and don’t have a farmer within 50 miles of you, go ahead enjoy the well water. For the rest of us, have your well water tested, and buy a Brita if it isn’t too bad.

Rain water was and acceptable source of water around 20-25 years ago, and was considered very clean. Unfortunately rain water gathers and collects much of the air pollution on the way down. Today rain water isn’t considered an acceptable source for clean water. Sorry Greg, rain water is from God, but we humans screw it up even before it hits the ground.

Spring water is a debatable thing. If you buy bottled spring water, make sure you buy it from a well known national company, or a local company with specs of the water’s purity. If you buy “Spring Water” from the local 4-h sector for a fundraiser, you’re most likely just drinking tap water.

City water friend or foe?

2006-06-20T23:20:00.000-04:00

The front of the pamphlet that I received boasted of the purity of Grand Rapids City water. The pamphlet claimed that you don’t need to travel anywhere or buy any bottled water, because some of the purest stuff around is coming right out of your faucet. Let’s take a look at the purity of city water.

As I skimmed over the listings of pollutants in the “Grand Rapids Water System Quality Report for 2006,” everything looked pretty good, it seemed like the water was fresh, and mostly free from impurities. The danger in City water isn’t so much the impurities that they don’t take out, but the heavy chemicals they put back in.

For anyone who has lived in the country their whole life (like me) you have noticed the difference the first time you take a shower in the city. It smells like a pool. The chemical that is put in city water is Chloride, which basically is what’s placed in your pool. The Chloride is put in the city water to help kill bacteria (the same reason you put it in your pool.) Since the water must travel a long distance from the city water plant to your kitchen sink, Chloride (not chlorine) is put in the water. So Chloride is a pretty strong chemical that is in charge of cleaning water up.

Think of chloride as a wrapper for your water. If you went to the store and you saw a loaf of bread without a wrapper on it, you might not buy it, because you don’t know who sneezed on it right? On the other hand, once you buy a loaf of bread that is fully wrapped, you want to make sure you take off the wrapper before you eat it. Chloride is the same way; we need to remove the wrapper before we drink it.

Chloride although serving a great purpose of protecting water is dangerous to your body. A natural digestive system has healthy bacteria (or flora) located throughout it, from mouth to anus. What did we just learn that Chloride does? KILLS Bacteria. That is great in your water pipes, but not so good in your body. By killing all the bacteria, you stop your body from proper digestion, and promote the growth of unhealthy bacteria, and create a sterile system. Improper digestion leads to all sorts of health problems from ulcers to acne, to malnutrition.

Fluoride (not fluorine) is also added to many U.S. cities drinking water. It is estimated around 60% of U.S. cities are drinking fluoridated water (I actually believe GR might have been the 1st city to add fluoride. Anyone know for sure?) Fluoride has been added to the drinking water in belief that fluoride keeps teeth from decaying. The fluoride found in our water is the same fluoride that the dentist applies, and is found in our toothpastes.

“What the commercials don’t say is that fluoride was known in the early 1900s as an excellent rat poison. According to Robert Carleton, former scientist with the EPA, fluoride is more toxic than lead, and not quite as toxic as arsenic. It’s a waste product of many heavy industries—derived from the production of pesticides, fertilizers, aluminum, iron, steel, copper, lead, uranium, brick, cement and glass, among others.

Studies over the years have pointed to fluoride as a possible carcinogen, a bone-weakening agent and even a reason for decreased fertility among women. As the Oakland Tribune writes, a few grams of the stuff is enough to kill you.” (www.naturalchoice.net)

Greg, what you need in your body is not chemically derived “fluoride,” what you need is naturally occurring “fluorine.” Fluorine is a naturally occurring element that has been found in some drinking water out west. People who live in these cities have a very low occurrence of tooth decay. Fluorine has been dubbed the “Decay resistant” element. A few foods that are naturally high in fluorine are: Avocados, Brussels sprouts, Cabbage, Garlic, Spinach, and tomatoes. Likewise “Chlorine” not “Chloride” is a naturally occurring element that has been praised as a body cleanser. Chlorine occurs in Bananas, Beans, Celery, Strawberries, pineapple, and lots of other fruits and veggies.

This is where the fluoride craze started. Either way, it is one thing to brush with fluoride; it is a completely different story to ingest it day after day. Whether fluoride helps teeth or not, it was never meant to be drunk.

Other than filtering your water (I’ll cover that later.) You can set your city water in the fridge uncovered for 24 hours and most of the chloride and fluoride will burn off. You also can squirt some lemon in your water and let it sit for 5 mins; this will burn some of it out too.
They danger may not lie in what the city doesn’t take out, but what they put in.

High quality H2O

2006-06-18T15:23:00.000-04:00

The experts tell us that we are mostly made up of water. Anywhere from 60%-75% of our body is water, depending on which study you believe. Either way, water is extremely important to the health of our body. Staying hydrated allows us to expel waste from our digestive tract, keep our blood moving efficiently and clean out cellular waste. Only 3-5 days without water and we are either extremely sick or dead.

But what’s in our water? Bottled? Tap? Well? Distilled? What’s the difference? What about water purifiers? Chlorine? Flouride?

Join me over the next 3 weeks as we sort through the topic of water, and the pros and cons of all our different options. Post some questions and I’ll do my best to answer them.

My favorite Place to Eat

2006-06-13T12:51:00.000-04:00

Curt and Karen used to go to pizza Sam's in Alma (so did Erica 5 years ago) when they were dating about 15 years ago. I visited this Pizza Sam's in Midland. Apparently Sam has franchised. My friend Aaron said "this Strawberry smoothie is amazing." He drank 2 of them.

Come see me.

2006-05-30T14:40:00.000-04:00

Everyone,

If you want an excuse to skip church this Sunday, come see me. This weekend is the Grand Rapids Festival of the Arts. I’m playing on Di Suvero Stage (Near the big tire swing, behind the calder) at 11:45 am. It will just be me and my guitar, and a bunch of songs I’ve writen over the years. Look for the guy with no hair.

Hope to see you

To own a Dragon

2006-05-21T23:13:00.000-04:00

In the spirit of John fryes blogspot, I decided a book review could help end my blogging drought. I’ve just finished reading Donald Miller’s most recent book, To own a Dragon. In case you are wondering where the title comes from, Miller, who grew up without a father relates the idea of “Owning a dragon” as just as mystical an idea as “Having a father.”

One of the concepts that Miller tackles is this idea of extended adolescence. The reality that people are going to school longer, getting married later, and all around growing up slower. He attributes much of this to a fatherless generation. Miller lets us into a private conversation at a fraternity house on a college campus. The conversation jumps between faith, girls, and money. Miller propses a question to the guys:

…”Lets say you have a friend who is forty years old, and lets say this guy played video games all night, slept around with ten different women, whoever he could get to have sex with him, drank all the time, partied it up, the whole bit. Would you respect that guy?” The group shook there heads no, some of them voicing that they would think of him as a loser.
“Why?” I asked. “Why would this guy be a loser?”
“Because he is forty,” somebody spoke up.
“What does that have to do with it? If somebody in your fraternity lives like this, he is not a loser. Apparently, he is well-esteemed…”

Obvously this is a extreme version of not growing up, but in working with high school and college age students it is easy to see the trend.

What does it mean to be a man, or be mature, or grown up? Thank God for Erica, or I would still be living in my own filth. What are the effects of a generation that, isn’t growing up?

Who are the people in your neighborhood?

2006-04-27T12:02:00.000-04:00

Jesus says that the most important command is to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Then he says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (The golden rule came from Jesus.) Then someone asked Jesus, “Well who is my neighbor?” Jesus goes on to tell the story of the Good Samaritan.

The short version of the story is that a Jewish man was walking on the street, and he “falls into the hands of robbers.” The guy is pretty beat up. A priest walks by him and doesn’t help, a Levite walks by, and he doesn’t help either. Finally a Samaritan man stops, and the story says, ”He takes pity” on the man. The Samaritan cleans the man’s wounds and takes him to an inn. He pays the inn keeper and asks the inn keeper to watch over the beaten man. Jesus says that this Samaritan man was a neighbor to this fellow.

Here is question I would ask. What if the Samaritan man stayed home that night? Suppose instead of taking a stroll through the town he decides to stay home and have “family night.” His wife makes dinner, he laughs with his kids. They all play Monopoly. Would he have had the same responsibility to that man lying on the street? Of course not, since he wouldn’t have even seen him. He wouldn’t have known that man’s misfortune. He couldn’t be held responsible for what he didn’t see.

A hundred years ago, as Christians understood, “Love you neighbor as yourself” their neighbors were those people who lived in their town. It was their barber, and fellow farmer, the mason, and butcher. People in general were isolated from the depths of pain throughout the world. All they could understand, and relate to, is what they could hear and see. If they ran across someone in pain they would help. It was that simple.

What about today? I wake up and go check my email on msn. The first image I see is a mother crying because a suicide bomber has killed her 11 year old son. After I finish emailing, I go and pick up the paper, and see that a fire on the other side of town has burned a family’s home to the ground. I jump in my car and head to work. On NPR I hear of the genocide in Africa, and the thousands of families pushed out of their towns and villages. But I just listen as though it were some movie, or adventure story. I listen as if the pains and tears of foreigners are somehow less real than my own.

If I lived in 1850, or never listened to my radio, or went on the internet, perhaps I’d be exempt from doing anything. But what do I do? There is so much suffering, and I can’t help everyone. I don’t know the answers, but we have to do something, because we’ve walked on the streets, and our neighbors need our help.

Does my car smell like french fries?

2006-04-17T23:05:00.000-04:00

My roommate Derek cares deeply about taking care of our earth. He believes it is our responsibility from God. That God has entrusted us with this precious planet, and we must nurture and care for it. In the past months a lot of attention has been drawn to global warming. If you check out last months “Time” magazine, the entire thing was dedicated to global warming. Some of the statistics were amazing and almost impossible to believe. Below is an image that I found which really drilled home the reality of global warming.
Derek has been conscious about trying to limit his CO2 emissions. He chooses to walk or ride his bike, or take public transportation so he adds to the problem as little as possible. But now there is a new option for CO2 less transportation.

The grease car. Yup. A car that runs almost entirely on Vegetable oil. You can buy a diesel car or truck, and for $800 purchase a kit to alter you’re the vehicle to run on “French fry juice.” Used veggie oil.

Oil can be acquired from any restaurants that use a fryer (You know those big vats behind restaurants filled with oil!) Or, for the less mechanically inclined, you can check out eBay for cars that have already been converted.

When the car first starts up, it runs on diesel, but after 5 mins. (When the oil has heated up) you just flip a switch and the oil takes over. I have read reports of cars getting around 40-50 miles per gallon on the oil. I read about a guy who drove 40,000 miles one year and only put 10 tanks of diesel in, the rest he entirely ran on vegetable oil.

Derek has been looking for and old car to convert. Do you have, or know someone who has an old diesel vehicle to donate or sell? What do you think? Is the rising price of gas or the rising water level causing you to live differently?

Excuse me, Do you know where the First Baptist Chuch is?

2006-04-06T17:40:00.000-04:00

I’ve finished reading Shane Claiborne’s book “Irresistible Revolution” and in so many ways Shane shattered paradigms of how I view the world, and the consumerism that I partake in. If you want to be challenged and really shaken up (and don’t we all) you must read this book. People may disagree with how Shane views and understands God, but I think his sacrifice proves his authenticity. I think to Judge or condemn Mother Theresa or Shane Claiborne’s theology, is hard to do in the midst of all their beauty and sacrifice.

The question I asked myself is, “Do I think the way I follow Jesus, or the way Shane follows Jesus is more pleasing to God?” The answer? Shane. My response? I better rethink and change parts of my life.

Recently I’ve learned that the polar bears are drowning. Kids in Uganda are being kidnapped and forced to fight for evil rebel armies. 30,000 people die a day from hunger. Girls are kidnapped and forced into prostitution. The list goes on and on.

We build more churches.

Heck I work for one of the biggest churches in Grand Rapids.

All the arguments can be made. It is true, Churches give a lot of money away, to help with some of these problems, but hordes of money is also spent on electricity, church staff, materials for promotion, advertising, building maitinence (this list goes on and on too.) I like in the bible when it talks about believers fasting, until everyone could have a meal together. Maybe the church in the west needs to fast for the whole world, until we can all eat together and drink together.

Holistic worship

2006-03-29T08:44:00.000-05:00

I have been frustrated leading the worship at Missio Dei lately. I feel as if all the worship songs today are the same. First, many of them are very inward focused (Not bad, see the psalms, but can be overdone.) Very few are missional. Some are sung out of a place of celebration, some lament and brokenness. I guess what I want are songs that are more like a benediction. I want a song to say,

"Isn't God so wonderful, doesn't it make you want to run out and move to Africa and stop AIDS, or go downtown and take a homeless brother or sister out to eat."

Evangelical worship has done a great job singing about admiring and loving God, about wholeheartedness and passion, about the cross. However much of the modern worship doesn't capture the ideas of forgiveness between our brothers and sisters, or giving to the poor, or taking care of the earth. In modern worship spiritual singing has been limited to a narrow view of the gospel.

Aaron Niequst, worship leader at Mars Hill, has written some great holistic worship songs. One of my favorites is "Changed." The chorus goes:

We want to show you that we're thankful
Flooding the world with hope and peace
Help us to worship more than singing
Giving redemption hands and feet

We have been blessed- now we're going to be a blessing
We have been loved - now we're going to bring love
We've Been invited- we're going to share the invitation
We have been changed- to bring change, to bring change

Where are more songs like this? This song is a beautiful invitation to join God in what he is doing in the world. It makes me want dance. The cross of Christ is stripped of its power if all we do is sing. Do you know any great resources? What do you think?

Toxins from my heart

2006-03-24T09:38:00.000-05:00

Detox update

For all four of you who consistently keep up with my blog, I thought I would update you from my March 17th post, titled “To purge our hearts, To purge our colon.” Three of my friends and I have started this all liquid (organic lemon juice, purified water, Organic grade B maple syrup, and Cayenne pepper) detox, to rid our bodies of harmful toxins we have accumulated throughout the years. Here is a little update:

Day 1:

Started the morning with a salt water flush, something didn’t work right and I didn’t get the desired “Results.” The salt water was disgusting, very hard to drink 32 ounces. Felt good all day. Really hungry, just kept drinking my juice, it helped kill the hunger pains. I went to bed with a horrible headache (I never get headaches) probably from all the junk in my system stirred up. Derek had a headache too.

Day 2 and 3:

Stayed busy, so I wasn’t as preoccupied with the thought of food. Continued with the laxative tea. Good movements without the pain and looseness I had the last time I did this. Feeling pretty good overall both days.

Day 4:

Had a lot of down time, thought about food. I realized how disgustingly comfortable I am 98% of the time, while the rest of the world starves, has no clean drinking water, and lives in extreme poverty. How can I live with so much when 30,000 die a day from lack of food? That is a silent tsunami every week. (Claiborne, Irresistible Revolution.) I had a dream about eating food. In the dream, I knew I shouldn’t because of the detox, but did anyway. Derek, Aaron and I sat around and talked about what we would eat if we could. Derek wanted apples and cheese. Aaron said “Chips and cheese.” I decide I wanted a grilled cheese and tomato soup. I realized how good my toothpaste tastes after 4 days of nothing but lemonade. We planned out to have a victory meal next Friday, only 8 short days away.

A word about my soul: In this season of lent where we are supposed to be confronted with our Sin, Pride, and arrogance, I find God showing me all of them. As I started this fast mostly for health reasons, I find in my midst God breaking in and showing me all the abundance and selfishness I live in. I have been very discontent financially for the past 6 months, and now I see how much I have. I have so much that I am disgusted with myself for ever complaining to God. When I am confronted with the rest of the world, and what they face I realize I am that Self-righteous, greedy, self-center American that much of the rest of the world hates.

The Irresistible Revolution

2006-03-21T20:45:00.000-05:00

I have just started reading this book (Irresistible Revolution) by a guy named Shane Claiborne. Shane is a hippie from Tennessee. He quotes himself in the book as an “Ordinary Radical.” This book is thoroughly messing me up. Here is a chunk for you liking:

If you ask most people what Christians believe, they can tell you. “Christians believe that Jesus is God’s son and that Jesus rose from the dead.” But if you ask the average person how Christians live, they are struck silent. We have not shown the world another way of doing life. Few people are interested in a religion that has nothing to say to the world and offers them only life after death, when what people are really wondering is whether there is life before death.

What does an ordinary radical look like, or more importantly how does one live in Grand Rapids Michigan in 2006. If Jesus where here today, where would he be. Homeless shelter? Trailer park? Amway?

To purge our hearts,To purge our colons

2006-03-17T14:30:00.000-05:00

As some of you may or may not know, I am starting school in May. I am going to the naturopathic Institute of Therapies and Education in Mount Pleasant.

At school I hope to single-handedly (with the help of God) turn over the corrupt, price gouging over medicating pharmaceutical medical industry. I hope to bring forth the other options for healing other than dangerous synthetic drugs. At this point I would like to say that If I get into a car accident on the way home today, I would like a real surgeon to attach my arm, as opposed to some herbologist who just smears a little aloe vera on my stub of an arm and says "This is the natural way. " All this to say, medicine has its place.

On Monday, along with two of my housemates, we are starting a 10-14 day detoxification of our digestive system. This Detox we have chosen(Master Cleanse, Stanley Burroughs) has been around for almost 50 years, and has been prove, safe, effective, and less expensive than many other herbal detoxifcations.

Cleansing the digestive system is one of the 1st steps to a healthy body. We often have pounds and pounds of waste stored up inside our body, that if we never gave our body a chance to purge, would just remain dormant in the body. We may never realize it, but all this waste is stopping our body from functioning at it's peak performance. All of the pollutants, smog, and highly processed foods we eat are slowly killing our bodies.

Often people decide to change there diet and try to eat a more natural diet, with less refined flours and sugar, with more nuts, and vegies and fruit, but end up not feeling (physically) much better. It might be because they just need some good purging first.

I think when the Lord talks about "Having to tear things down, before rebuilding" this is what he means. We can start living differently and making better choices, we can purpose towards God, or stop lying, but underneath it all we have a bunch of junk. Here is a lyric from a newer song of mine.

All those drugs you take
they don't make you well
they might numb the pain
they might numb the hell
when you get Home you say
"I feel just fine"
But the sick still lives down deep inside

We are told to pretend nothing is wrong, or to cover it up and numb out the stuff we know that is deep down. We are so scarred from our past decisions, or past relationships, or the way our parents treated us etc.. We are wounded broken people who need to dig deep. To purge our hearts, to purge our colons.

Year in review

2006-03-16T09:48:00.000-05:00

As some of you may know, Erica and I have lived in a community house for the past year of our life. For the majority of the time there have been 2 married couples, and 4 single guys, and 2 babies in the house. We eat together, laugh together, and fight together. We believe that one of the most important things of trying to follow Jesus, is Community. It has been a great year, but a hard one at times. We were asked to write a year in review last week. Here is mine:

Micah McLaughlin’s year in review at 1409 Sigsbee

I guess in order to review something you need to start from the start. You need to start and take all of your expectations, dreams, desires, andfears that you had when you began, and hold them up to what’s really happened. I could make a long list of all the disappointments, or shortcoming that we had as a community, I thought about making a list ofeach person’s flaws, and then all the ways you could fix them. But that seemed too time consuming. I’d rather focus on what I’ve learned. In twenty years as we look back on this experience, it won’t matter how well we did, but rather what we learned as we walked together. I have been reminded in this house of something one of the great authors of our day(Donald Miller) once said, “The problem with the world is me.”

I’ve learned that “The problem with this house is me.” I’ve learned thatmy heart is fickle. I’ve learned that doing the dishes is usually more spiritual than reading your bible. I’ve learned that I can be a gossip. I’ve learned that nobody wants to listen to you unless you love them. I’ve learned how to catch bats and mice. I’ve learned more about gardening. I’ve learned more about giving people the benefit of the doubt. At times I have been pushed to the edge of what I thought I could give, and then asked to give more. I’ve started to learn how to play the piano and djembe. I’ve learned to be less focused on just me, and to ask questions. I’ve learned to listen more and talk less. I’ve been moreconvicted about taking care of the earth. I’ve learned how to confront people. I’ve learned how to pursue peace in my heart, even when my life feels overwhelming. I learned how to make butter. I’m learning how to be a dad. I’ve learned that I love to live in a neighborhood where hurting people surround me. I’ve learned to cook better, and how to texturize walls. I’ve gotten to see how different everyone is, but how human we all are.

Perhaps the most important thing I’ve learned is about God’s grace. I’ve learned that I hate fasting, and I don’t really like reading my bible, and that praying at times seems impossible, and sometimes I yell at my wife, and get angry at the world. I’ve learned that I follow a God who indespite of all those things says “I still love you.” Because of that “ I STILL LOVE YOU” sorta love, when the house is a mess, and roommates areinconsiderate, and people are selfish I can say, “I still love you.” I learned that my love is not meant to be given out like money, givengenerously or withheld depending on my good Christian judgment. My love, like God’s is meant to be poured out on everyone.

I’d like to say thank you. Thanks for being crazy enough to try something like this, and for not giving up even when giving up felt like the bestthing to do. Thanks for loving my family, and becoming our family. Thanks for embracing our son. We’ll be excited to tell Him he was born in a commune, and that’s where we started drinking raw milk. I hope that none of us no matter where we go or where we live ever fall into the category of normal. I hope that Nate always scratches at doors instead ofknocking, and that Aaron just keeps on fixing his own muffler. I hope Jonn ever realizes that you can’t save half a beer for tomorrow. I hope Derek never realizes foo man chus aren’t popular no matter what month of the year you grow them in. I hope Levi always drives a tiny car, and that someday Sharon can be Amish, if only for a day. I love you all. Micah

What are your thoughts on community living?