December 16, 2006

  • News?!?!


    ...And I thought CNN was reputable News/Broadcasting company.

December 5, 2006

  • O
    Christmas Tree,     O Christmas Tree!

    This past weekend was great. On Friday,
    I went home and played guitar for 4 hours. That was nice, I haven't played
    in a while. Later visited some friends for about an hour then ran back
    home to be with Sondra, she had a rough day at work.

    Saturday was great: Watched some
    episodes of "The Lucy Show"
    (not "I Love Lucy") on DVD
    and then started to clean the house. Our house has been a mess because we
    have been working in our kitchen. I'd guess that around Christmas we'll be
    finished. After cleaning we went and picked up Leana and went Christmas
    tree shopping. Sondra wanted a real one and I thought that sounded like
    fun. It was very cold, but we got our tree and some movies and headed
    home. At home we decorated the tree, watched some kid movies (Little
    Mermaid 2    , One of the many Strawberry Shortcake movies, and
    Alice in Wonderland), and ate
    soup. It was a long day, but much was accomplished.

    Picture015Picture016

    Picture014

    Sunday I did the PowerPoint for church, our
    worship coordinator's father passed away this week. Keep their family in
    your prayers. I went early to make sure the PPT was working then I headed
    back to get Sondra. We got to church just on time. Andrew's message
    hit our hearts hard that day. We are so thankful for him. After
    church we ate at Bob Evans and then ran home to bake some cookies for the
    MCS Volleyball banquet. After the
    banquet we went and spend the evening with my family and a unexpected visit, for
    me at least, from my Aunt Kim. We ate there and then watched two movies;
    Nacho Libre and
    MI:III. Both were
    better than I expected. Here is by far my favorite part from Nacho Libre.

    That was my weekend. What a good
    weekend!

November 29, 2006

  • the
    voice

    Chris Seay, Pastor of
    Ecclesia, started a group of scholars, poets, writes, musicians and artist
    creatively tell the narrative of God,
    the Voice    , of the NT.  I'm currently
    reading two books from them.  First is, The Dust Off Their Feet  which
    is the retelling of the book of Acts with commentary and insight.  It's ok. 
    It doesn't draw me in as much as I hoped.  To me it is too much like The
    Message     minus the absolute poetic genius of Eugene Peterson. The second
    book,     the last eyewitness: the final week, is storytelling at it's best!  The
    premise of the book is that John, the last eyewitness of Jesus living, is
    telling you the last week of Jesus' life (John 17-21).      It is set up as if
    John is in his later of his life telling you the story of Jesus' death and
    resurrection.  It reminds me of being a child again, hanging on every word
    that my grandpa would say when telling stories from his life.      Or hearing a
    s    tory around a campfire.  I get to experience the events that unfolded the
    week my messiah's died and rose again from the disciple he loved. This book
    makes me feel like I am speaking to John, the apostle, the elder, the
    evangelist, which is invaluable and fresh voice from the past.

November 28, 2006

  • Don, say 'tradition'

    Here is a audio file of Donald Miller messing up while recording the audio book for "Through Painted Deserts". To the right is a picture of Don from someone's Flickr site.

  •  Who's Your Savior?


    Domitian was the ruler of the known world during the time when John wrote the book of Revelation. Andrew and I painted a parallel between Caesar worship (Advent - his birthday) and worship of Jesus in the book of Revelation.

  • 20HOT
    POTATOES
    CHRISTIANS ARE AFRAID TO TOUCH

    Found this book at the library the other day
    and thought I would skim through it. Tony Campolo is one of the most honest
    voices in Christian circles today.  Although I think he's not the world
    best bible scholar (a lot better than I am, I'm just saying) he is a prophetical
    voice in our stereotypical right wing Christian nation.  This book is
    rather dated book, 1988, but surprisingly many of hot topic issues remain the
    same.  Some of the issues that he address are the following; AIDS, women preachers, public
    vs. private schools, psychological counseling, homosexuality, and working
    mothers to name a few.  I'd like to talk about 2 ones that have always been
    on my radar, homosexuality & women preachers.

    Homosexuality -  Tony does
    a fascinating job here.  I would like to pull one quote "To treat
    homosexuals as anything less than a brother and sister is a sin."  He
    supports this rather well and I've felt the same way for years.

    Women preacher - First I must
    start out saying that I've grown up all my life being taught that women can't be
    in leadership roles.  Tony brings up an interesting point, how do churches
    say thinks like women should be silent in church (1Tim 2), but let them teach
    women and children.  This is a very hard issue for me, on one hand I
    believe we are made equal and G-d has made us equal (even Jew and gentile, so
    why not women), but on the other hand Paul did speak of women to be submissive. 
    Then again the bible also speaks of men being submissive to their wives. 
    Very confusing issue isn't it. I'd love to start a discussion about this if you
    have comments.  Please include scripture verses when drawing from the
    bible.

November 27, 2006

  • THE ILLUSIONIST
    noscript


    Good movie all
    around.  However I went thinking I was going to watch a different movie. 
    A week ago Sondra told me about a magician movie where two magicians have a
    rivalry and it ends up that one is using supernatural powers.  Found out
    that it's called The Prestige.  I hate when movie production companies put
    similar movies out to compete, it happens all the time.  Any how, I'm
    looking forward to seeing it too.   But back to the Illusionist - I'm
    a fan of Edward Norton and Paul Giamatti.  This movie is filmed in a way
    that makes you feel that you're watching a old movie except with slick special effects. 
    I think the director successfully pulled that off.  The movie centers around
    a love story and society issues.  Poor and upper class issues.  I
    enjoyed it although I could see how a lot of people would not like it.  
    Who's seen it?  What's your thoughts?

November 22, 2006

  • DA VINCI
    CODE

    Recently watch the Da Vinci Code (the movie). I enjoyed it as a Indiana Jones adventure piece. Very interesting how Dan Brown, the author, weaved the fact, myth and fiction to this story. I believe that Dan Brown gets a bad wrap. I am not an author, but if I was writing a novel I obviously would have different characters in my book with different beliefs and thoughts other than mine. If you know anything about Dan Brown he's been pretty quiet when they as him if he believes what he wrote. I believe it's because he wants the book to sell, but more importantly he wants you, the reader/viewer, to wrestle with what you belief and how willing you are to persue the truth. FYI - he attends a church in New England and sings in the choir.

    The church has basically related to it's popularity in two ways:
    1. It's just a novel/movie or story
    2. It's heretical and people will fall away if they don't hear the truth

    I was firmly in the 1st camp in which I've been re-thinking. I should of been a little more engaging on why this story is so interesting. Hindsight - 20/20

    However what I think is interesting about the Novel is that what I believe the main issue that Dan was trying to address in the book totally got overlooked. What is it you ask? Women equality and what great length the church as gone to say that women are less valuable. One thing that Dan Brown did do with amazing historical accuracy (minus the wife of Jesus and mother of his child) is the injustice of Mary Magdalene that the church has let go on for so long. The truth is that their is no recorded record anywhere that would lean towards Mary being a prostitute. Instead what the bible shows that she was a disciple of Jesus which would show how radical Jesus' teachings were. No other Jewish Rabbi discipled women (women where able to study in the synagoge, but never follow a rabbi). Jesus radically included women in his ministry and saw them as equals... Here is another interesting bible quiz for you - who found Jesus at the tomb? Women! During the time of Jesus' death guess who could not testify in court as an eye witness? You got it, women! Injustice of women has gone on for so long I can not wait until we put some of our dirty past behind us. The bible (specifically Jesus) speaks directly against injustice.

    I recently listened to a couple speakers who spoke at Mars Hill Church - Seattle on the Da Vinci Code. It was excellent. If you want to listen to it click here. They wrote a book called The DaVinci Code Adventure.

    (After
    thought - however I don't want to see injustice go the other way either
    and I see many extreme feminist who would gladly see that happen)

November 21, 2006

  • Healthy Church...

    Taught again with Andrew on Revelation 3, finishing up the last two churches, Philadelphia and Laodicea.  I've been really trying to figure out what a healthy church is.  How we, the broken people of this world, can become a healthy and how we then can become a healing agent for the rest of the world.  I shared some of my ideas at the front of the message leading into Phil-e.  Sorry for the choppiness of my thoughts.  I was all over the place that morning.

  • "Thankful" by Jonny Lang

    http://yad-vashem.org.il/remembrance/rememberance_day/remembrance_day_2006/img/Mutual_Aid/105BO4.jpg
    Someone's
    standing in a welfare line
    Or off the freeway with a hungry sign
    Someone's stressing bout to lose their mind
    I gotta be thankful, thankful

    Someone just became a single mother
    Someone just lost a sister or brother
    Its so important that we love each other
    And be

    Thankful, thankful
    I've gotta take the time to say, that I'm
    Thankful, thankful
    For every single breath that I take
    I've gotta be thankful, thankful

    Someone's
    sitting in a prison cell
    Wasting away in their own personal hell
    Everybody's got their own story to tell
    I've gotta be thankful, thankful

    Man, I used to think I didn't have a lot
    Now I realize just how much I've got
    Now every day I'm gonna take the time and stop to be

    REPEAT CHORUS

    Any one of these so easily could have been me
    But if it had not been for grace and mercy who knows where Id
    be

    I've been riding on this roller coaster ride
    Round and round I've seen the up and downside
    And I'm here to tell you that the secret of life is being thankful

    REPEAT CHORUS

    -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The situation we are born in has a lot do with who we are. We like to
    think that we pull ourselves up by our boot straps, but the truth is we are
    often born in to good situations. I am, my parents are wonderful, my
    grandparents are wonderful and now I'm blessed with wonderful in-laws.
    Remember to be thankful for the situations you are placed in.  It's only because of grace and mercy.  And those who are poor, I
    envy you for I believe that you understand the kingdom better than I.



    "Blessed are you who are poor..." - Luke:6-20:42