Francis is the cutest...

Ok... here is a picture from the day we got Francis. Hard to believe that she is 3 now.

Peeps... One is a lonely Number.

It is really easy to ignore people what we do not know. In our culture we walk right by thousands of people each week with no intention of getting to know them. They are more like background images to our day than they are living breathing people. The same thing is true in the church; we ignore the people we do not know. They are scary... intimidating... sometimes they seem unworthy... or even unnecessary to us if we already have friends.
One really easy way to communicate value is to listen. When I listen to someone, I communicate that they are significant enough as a person to deserve my attention. If I do not listen then, it communicates that they are not important enough to merit my attention. If I care enough to listen, people will know they matter.
The Bible tells us that people really matter to God. He created them all. He wants them to be loved and accepted, especially in his Church. Even though he is God, he listens to anyone who wants to talk to him about their hopes and fears. His willingness to care and listen demonstrate his love. Likewise, our willingness to listen and care for people also communicates how much we think people are worth. Even when we don’t think about it, how we treat people tells them how valuable we think they are.

Return of the Mmmmm....

Long long ago in a Galaxy Far Far away... or maybe in Chicago...
Master Nano left China to combat evil and bring joy.
The Force was Strong with this young Nano and the Mmmm Wars began...
through its Power 1000 delightful songs were hidden in a pocket...


Then came the the Mmmmm Strikes Back...
A torrid tale about a young shiny Shuffle...
Like the Master Nano, Shuffle could bring the joyous tunes
But was much tough and smaller,
and through the mystical force was able to attach itself to objects of all sizes











Finally came the Return of the Mmmm....
Master Nano and Young Shuffle were out matched...
They could only play music
they were not strong enough in the force to handle the Evil Video Villians lurking in the far reaches of the Galaxy
Enter the New Master... Master Wii... A foreigner no doubt... but a strong friend. It was his incredible control of the force that made him strong, not raw power.
But Regardless his appearance in the middle of a sold out holiday season ensured that the Mmmm Wars would be one for all time!

Briarbrook Drive: Red Shaggie Carpet and a closet under the stairs

This is a picture of the house I lived in East Peoria until I was five. I guess they were they were getting ready to shingle the roof and had bundles of shingles on the roof when a foot of snow and ice came...

I loved that house.

We had red shag carpet in the basement and a closet under the stairs were I could hide if I wanted to... i think I remember having a black and white TV... I think we used to watch Jason of Star Command... We also used to ride out big wheels in the parking lot across the street... and Trent and I onece built a fort in the farmers field behind our house... but her got really mad because we knocked down a lot of Corn to do it... This is also down the house were I stabbed myself in the stomach on accident, burned myself with hot custard, broke my leg, fell out of a tree in the back yard and fell of the Neightbors 2nd story balcony.

All before I turned five.

I miss that house... bummer about the snow.

Oh, another interesting note is that Jason grew up about a about a quarter mile from here.

Movie Review: Stranger than Fiction

Last night I saw Stranger than Fiction with Emily. I loved it. I am still sorting out why... so I will finish this post with a full review later...

In the mean time check out the

Trailer

Or the website (Images captured from website):

Stranger than Fiction Site

The Movie is PG -13...

Music Check it out!!!

My friend Brandon Grissom (who may not actually have been informed that he is my friend) has recently released his worship cd... which I really like. (I realize the irony of this post considering I just posted... deal with it). If you go

HERE

you can check out his new CD and download two free tracks for your enjoyment.

Also, I have been taked recently with a Sarah Groves song... "Add to the Beaty." I am a hit or miss Groves fan... Sometimes her songs really are awesome to me... and some of them I think are ok. This is my favorite. It is really awesome because she wrote it after going on a tour of New Orleans and Africa and taking part in trying to make tough places more beautiful. You can check out the song, and a DVD documentary of her trips at her web site :

Sarah Groves

The Pictures of Sarah are from her site...


"Add To The Beauty" (by Sara Groves and Matt Bronlewee)

We come with beautiful secrets
We come with purposes written on our hearts, written on our souls
We come to every new morning
With possibilities only we can hold, that only we can hold

Redemption comes in strange place, small spaces
Calling out the best of who we are

And I want to add to the beauty
To tell a better story
I want to shine with the light
That's burning up inside

It comes in small inspirations
It brings redemption to life and work
To our lives and our work

It comes in loving community
It comes in helping a soul find it's worth

Redemption comes in strange places, small spaces
Calling out the best of who we are

And I want to add to the beauty
To tell a better story
I want to shine with the light
That's burning up inside

This is grace, an invitation to be beautiful
This is grace, an invitation

Redemption comes in strange places, small spaces
Calling out our best

And I want to add to the beauty
To tell a better story
I want to shine with the light
That's burning up inside

Learning a new Language of Worship

I grew up in a conservative church where hymns and choruses were the normal Sunday morning fare. I can remember in Jr High and High school that often I would feel God in a special way throughout the service in the singing and later in the sermon.

As an adult I have a much harder time.

I have to admit, singing, is seldom my language of worship.

I mean think about it... I love my wife... But I do not usually express my love to her by singing... even more to the point... singing songs that were written by someone else and the arranged and chosen by yet another person...

I Think that would not be the greatest way to tell her I love her...

Admittedly it is different in corporate worship... we are all telling God together that we love him...

And yet... I wonder is if it time to reopen the issue of corporate worship... is there maybe a better way to engage our passion for God that always relying on singing....

I love singing... I love music... I love God...

yet for some reason these are not connecting very much in my life right now....

Thoughts?



Pic is from a conference where they let us draw with crayons during worship... I am a big fan

Per Your Request.

Many people have been kind enough to inquire as to how difficult it is for me to lack hair.

I am often greeted by laughter when I tell them that it doesnt feel any different because people used to make fun of the incredible amount of hair that I had...


I was made fun of in grade school and middle school and high school because I had so much hair...


SO in college I had the perfect balance...


Then by the time I was 22 it was obvious that I was going to look like my dad...

Yes... I have heard repeatedly that my hair has to come from my mother because of genetic rules...

However... my mothers side has lots of hair... my grandpa on my mom's side died at 93 with a very lovely head of hair....

Yet... not so much for me and my brothers...


HOWEVER... fear not...

I do not need special shampoo... or drugs... or plugs... or surgery... or implants... or weaves... or chia hair...

to be honest I feel fine... even without hair...

A Christmas Carol

Today Emily's family took us to see A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens at the Pabst theatre. It was really awesome. We sat in the highest section, but that only made it even better. It plays through December 24th, so you should go see it.

For me what really stood out was the journey of redemption that Scrooge goes on.

When the play starts Scrooge has gained the whole world but has lost his soul. His is wealthy but empty and lonely.

Through his encounters with the ghosts and shadows of Christmas past, present, and future, Scrouge is forced to really look at himself and the consequences of his choices in life. It is so painful for him, but the pain is his salvation.

All to often, we want to skip pain, and so we try to forget our mistakes and regrets. When we do, we suffer a greater loss than we know. Only through painful reflection on what our mistakes have truly cost, can we really understand how precious that life is.

Our pain helps us to grow in ways it alone can.

Images taken from www.milwaukeerep.com

Watch Preview?? Get Tickets??

More

All man's efforts are for his mouth, yet his appetite is never satisfied.
~ Ecclesiastes 6:7

*I always want a little more that I have...
to spend more than I make....
to eat more than I need...
to consume more than is healthy...
to do a little more than I can...
to make a little more than I do...
When I give in to the desire for more it leaves me empty....
... Leveraging all of my resources to gain more depletes my reserves and my resources...
...By not holding back, I end up worse than empty... chained by a variety of financial, relational and heath debts that must eventually be paid.

On the other hand, the Bible challenges us to live on a little less than we have.
...To save for a rainy day...
...to have margin so that we can help others...
...to have space in our life to love...

The Bible says that our fullness comes from something other than what we have...

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ,
~Colossians 2:9-10





Clay Guy images are captures from a movie called MORE. It is my favorite short film ever.

Watch MORE now?!?

A little piece of Heaven...

A little piece of Heaven is touching down in Wauwautosa.

SteakNShake!!!!

I can't wait. I am going to start going every morning at 3:50am... just because i can.



Only problem is that Tosa is not going to let them be open 24/7... Bummer.

Politicians Win the Midterm!

I hate politics. This is wierd, because in High school I was an unoffical Jr Republican. I thought the Republicans totally rocked... especially Ronald Reagan, who was my hero. He was an awesome guy.
However, as I have grown older and more mature in my faith, I am no longer a Republican (I am not a Democrat either). I am a Christ follower, and I have learned that the Kingdom of heaven cannot be forced on people by politcal power, or any power for that matter. The Kingdom is invisible, and comes through people who choose to "elect" Christ as master, and embrace his values as their own. It advances when we life like and love like Jesus... it spreads like a contagious disease... people catch it by contact with other "infected" Christians whose supernatural love and grace is subversive.
The Onion is not a Christian, or wholesome newspaper, but this headline really connected with me.

Ordinary Heroes

The world isn't changed by "super" people. It is changed by millions of ordinary people choosing to live their lives in better ways. That is why each one of us is so important. Our choices are the fabric of our society.
Especially for Christians, although it seems like we are often struck with "hero" worship, the idea of a "Super Hero" celebrity do gooder is not the ideal. They never live up to their billings, as the news has testified to this week. Rather, good doing is best handled by a million ordinary Christians who are living filled with the extraodinary power and love of their EXTRAODINARY God.
Everywhere they go, they carry with the God Spirit, and thus all of His power and love. Ordinary heroes recognize that the "Day is Saved" not by muscles or smarts, but by a willingness to engage difficult situations through the power and love of Christ living in them.
The world needs more Ordinary Heroes.



Picture: Awesome students from Elmbrook!!! It is the front of the winter retreat brochure.

Introducing "Omnilocational Personhood 1.0" (beta)

Due to the marvels of modern technology, we are no longer bound by our location.

I can physically be in class and be texting with a friend in another part of the world and be surfing the internet and IMing another friend across the country and watching streaming video from YouTube or Google and checking sports score or stock market progress and reading world healines and listening secretly to my iPod shuffle and drawing cartoons in my journal and blogging and playing solitaire and finishing my message for the weekend and finishup a publication in photoshop.

Heck, I could even do all this, and take notes the same time, while listening to my iPod secretly. I can be all over the world all of the time... and yet, I wonder if I still have the ability to ever be in just one place at one time? Can I ever truly be fully present?
Here is the struggle I see. If I am strung out all across the world by way of the miraculous technological superhighway, where am I really? Where is my emotional center? Where is my integrity? Where is my personhood? Can I really handle being "omnipresent?" How does this "omnilocational personhood" affect me long term and in which of those locations does my soul reside?

According to Christian belief, God is already in each place I arrive at, and yet, being so distracted, I wonder if I can really be enough present in any one place to experience him...

Even though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
~Psalm 23:4

The pictures are ones that I took in Yellowstone National park. While it is incredibly cheesy, it was meaningful to me, that when I slowed down, I noticed that their was a heart shape in the rock. It occured to me that even if it is only my imagination creating it, that God knew I would see it, and he was aware that it would effect me in 2006. It is amazing to think how he worked in order for that moment to be perfect for me.

Evanescence Rocks!

A week ago I went to the Evanescence concert in the Eagle's Ballroom at the Rave. They were awesome! Amy Lee has an incredible voice, and was on pitch all night. I have heard people claim that their CD's are super overdubbed and that she can't sing, but she can. Her voice makes the band.
I first became interested in Evanescence shortly after the release of Fallen, their first cd. While there is lots of good Christian music, I often feel like it lack raw passion. Raw passion is not safe, and so the evangelical church has deleted it from everything that we do. What I find most sad about this, is that Psalms, Ecclesiastes, Job, Song of Songs, Lamentations, Jeremiah, Malachi, and many more books in the Bible are completely full of raw, unprocessed passion. What is felt in the soul is not always safe, and there must be a place for these raw feelings to escape. I am not calling Evanescence a worship band. They are not even a Christian band. Even so, the church has much to learn from them about passion.

Overload...

Life is crazy right now.

Greek and Hebrew classes are hard enough, but things are going full steam with the Middle school stuff as well.

Even though it is crazy, I love my job. It is so awesome to have an opportunity to influence the lives of Students. It is really cool to think of creative ways to communicate the love of God to them. This week we are doing our first "Lock-in" in a long time. I am really pumped ahout it.

I am a little nervous about how I am going to get my Hebrew paper due next week done on time. School is so demanding.

I am so ready to be done with doing school full time.

Forgiveness: Grace or Goodness?

Later, as Jesus left the town, he saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at his tax collector's booth. "Follow me and be my disciple," Jesus said to him. So Levi got up, left everything, and followed him.
Later, Levi held a banquet in his home with Jesus as the guest of honor. Many of Levi's fellow tax collectors and other guests also ate with them. But the Pharisees and their teachers of religious law complained bitterly to Jesus' disciples, "Why do you eat and drink with such scum?"
 Jesus answered them, "Healthy people don't need a doctor—sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent."
~Luke 5:27-32

It is shameful that Christians (including me) try to present themselves as better than the "sinners" of the world. Every time that we do it, we are caught in our own hypocracy. We are no better than anyone else; we are no more "good". As Jesus himself said, no one is good except God alone. This is proven over and over. Christians are not better than any other sinner in the world.

What sets us apart is that we are sinners who have found grace. As dirty and shameful as we are at times, God loves us and looks on us with grace when we come to him in faith. It is a gift that we do not deserve... ever...

"Christianity is like one beggar telling another beggar where to find Bread" ~Vance Havner (famous southern pastor)

Love & 24

I love 24... not the TV show...
-My newfound affection is focused once again on an apple product... their new 24inch iMac.
This will come as no surprise to most of you, who already know about my obsession with the world of mac... but here is the issue... I have so many computers already that I can't figure out what I would do with it. I sorta wish it came with a battery... I could call it my 500gig iPod Jumbo... then at least it would fill some new function in my life.
Here is the other thing... I am sorta afraid to buy it (which I can't do anyway because I have no money) because every time I buy an Apple product, a week later they come out with something so cool that I hate whatever obsolete worthless piece of Apple that I bought...
Ok... that is an exaggeration... I still love my iMac and powerbook... they are just so 2005.

Brandons everywhere....

I had the opportunity to be led in worship by Brandon Grissom at two conferences this summer. In addition to having a cool name, he is also an awesome songwriter. Check out his tunes.

http://www.purevolume.com/brandongrissom

Wind and Hail

A few weeks ago, while driving to Hibbing Minnesota, I was caught in the worst storm I have ever seen. We drove under a cloud that was do dark it felt like night, and I mentioned to Emily that I thought it was a tornado waiting to happen. Just after I thought we had made it out from under the dangerous cloud, it started to hail... and I mean really hail. Luckily, there was an overpass right where we were so we quickly drove under it... for a few minutes we watched in awe as the hail fell like a blizzard.

In our safe spot under the overpass I remember telling Emily to keep her seatbelt on, because we might get hit by another car trying to find safety...

It was frightening... but then it got worse... much much much worse.

No hail was hitting our car where we were parked, but then it started blowing under the overpass completely horizontal. I saw the trees bend over sideways before a wall of rain and water and wind began slamming into the front of our car.

I closed the visor that covers the sun roof... I was pretty sure that the window was going to break. As wind violently shook the car, I realized we were directly under more than a hail storm... and only an overpass was seperating us... What can you do... I just prayed that the Storm and Wind would not break completely through the window.


After about ten minutes, it slowed down. The entire freeway was covered in hail...tons of it...

A woman got out of her Suburban truck parked next to us and walked toward our car... she was shaking... I made her sit in our car... Her front window was shattered she kept saying... She said... "I just kept praying that it wouldnt suck me up..."

She sobbed in our car.

It made me think. We forget how awesome the world is. We forget how small we are. We are powerless against the fury of a tornado... or a thousand other "acts of God." and nature.

Powerless. Yet not without hope.

The power of the storm, is nothing compared to the power of the one who made all of this.
It made me glad that I would never have to face his fury because of the hope that he has provided for us.