Author: Robert

Posted on

should CHRISTians preach against sports?

almost twenty years ago tony campolo wrote an article within his book “twenty hot potatoes CHRISTians are afraid to touch” called “should pastors preach against footbal.” if i could find a link to the article online i would link to it for all of you to read. as i remember it campolo’s point was that football within america had reached a point where it might be causing more trouble than it is worth. he discussed not just the amount of resources put into the game but also the way families are effected by an intense love of the sport.

now before i say anything else i want to say that i love the game of football (and sports in general). for a significant part of my childhood and youth playing football was very important. my family took me to practice, we went to games, and we watched games regularly. i still love football. there is little that is more inspiring than a great sports story and watching college games on saturday and pro games on sunday are both enjoyable times for me (both conscious and unconscious).

yet i’m really getting to a point where i am disturbed by almost all the “major” sports within america. this week i went to a middle school basketball parent meeting where it was said that the purpose of the middle school program was not to win middle school championships but rather to act as a feeder program for the high school basketball team. the coach said the middle school team’s purpose was to make it where the high school team could win championships. these were 6th,7th, & 8th grade kids that are now a part of a “feeder program” for high school sports. of course, this is nothing new for some middle school football programs.

there is so much more than a simple parent meeting that concerns me. parents sent home with play books and drill books so that they can practice their kids when they are at home (i’m all for dads and sons doing things together – but is it really family time when all you do is practice for a sport? – for some this might be “yes” because they are able to do this with their child and make it a bonding time). kids who are basically in year round practice that is done in ways to avoid the state regulations (practices with the coach sitting in the stands rather than being on the field). team programs that constantly sell their kids supplements to encourage a body shape that probably won’t be kept after high school. these are all things that concern me.

the catch for me is that i really love the good aspects of sports. i love seeing a team form together and strive after a common goal. i love seeing people push beyond themselves in order to achieve what others think is impossible. there is so much that is good about sports which is why i encourage my own kids to play and participate (though within the past few years i have become much more in favor of promoting the non-major sports – i.e. wrestling, running, etc). i’m just concerned at this point.

Posted on

fall retreat challenge video #2 here’s the second …

fall retreat challenge video #2

here’s the second of three challenge videos describing various challenges that will happen at the beginning of each worship gathering during our fall retreat.

Posted on

the retreat videoes


as i have posted over the past couple of entries i have mentioned some of the animations i’ve made for our fall retreat that is coming up next weekend. to goof off a little before each gathering we’re going to starteach one with a random “up front” game. to add a little most ziest to these games i’ve set up sound effects for each one and i am working on videoes to introduce each one. i finished the rough draft on the first one today. this is just the rough cut of the video. i’ll be making more changes tomorrow.

Posted on

swish #2 & other programs

yesterday i posted two of the three intros i had created for our fall retreat using swish. i just finished the third intro a few seconds ago and therefore thought i would post it here also.

here’s the intro:

as i have said earlier – i love swish. it is more than powerful enough for the things i need to do and yet simple enough that it doesn’t take me forever to create something.

since i’m talking about programs that i enjoy using i figure i’ll post a few of my favorite programs that are probably running on my desktop or laptop at this very moment:

  • swish – shockwave flash animation
  • adobe photoshop elements – photoshop lite – does most everything i need from layers to nef conversion for a 1/4 of the price of the real thing.
  • keynote – mac powerpoint – i use it on my laptop.
  • a href=”http://wbloggar.com/”>w.bloggar – blogging client – it’s free and it’s great. i just wish it was available for my mac.
  • mozilla firefox – the greatest browser around on windows or mac (though i do like safari on the mac also).
  • audacity – free mutlitrack digital recorder.
  • itunes – i was originally all about realplayer but buying an ipod swapped me over
[Listening to: Down Under – Men at Work – Contraband: The Best of Men at Work (3:41)]
Posted on

swish

i love swish. i like to use it for making intros for messages and variou other things within a worship service or experience. today i worked on a couple of intros for the three worship services that are a part of our fall retreat in a couple of weeks.

here they are:

in your browser they will loop but in mediashout they work just fine.

Posted on

haggard

i haven’t said anything about the whole ted haggard thing because of a couple of reasons; 1) it just doesn’t seem right to “hit a brother when he down” (especially when haggard was doing a good enough job on his own, 2) i’m not the biggest fan of monster/mega church pastors anyway so i’m not very unbaised about one of them “falling” (i love this quote from dan kimball concerning the difference between small and large church pastors – i’d rather be the slave than the king), and 3) there are plenty of other people who have already blogged whatever opinion you want to read and have probably done a much better job than i could possibly do. so i was going to leave the whole thing be until i read the letter that he asked to be read to his former church for their services earlier today. i was very impressed because he actually “took the fall” (or at least most of it) within his letter. he blamed nobody but himself and admitted that he lied and decieved them all. obviously, i still not thrilled about the situation but i did think the letter was a pretty good start.

SIDE NOTE – c.s. lewis is the man. i started listening to mere CHRISTianity while i run. it’s been a few years since i have read it. recently i have reread more of his fiction than his non-fiction. i had forgotten how much i love his non-fiction writing style.

SIDE SIDE NOTE – american dreamz is pretty dang funny.

SIDE SIDE SIDE NOTE – i ran 12.8 miles today (twice around the 6.4 mile lakes loop. ouch my legs hurt. i was planning on running my first half-marathon december 2 at the baton rouge beach 1/2 marathon. unfortunately, that’s also the weekend my family and i were planning on going and seeing some of our friends in fort woth, texas at the beautiful feet church. the first weekend of december they set up hayrides and drive around their neighborhood passing out gifts to all the kids there. i’ve been wanting to take my kids to “the feet” for years and mike myers (the pastor of “the feet”) says this is the best weekend to do it. so we’re going. i’ll just run the first light half marathon as my first.

HAGGARD UPDATE – after watching JESUS camp i pretty much think again ted haggard is a jerk.

my run for the day
distance – 12.8 miles
total time – 1:10:00
pace – 10:09/mile

Posted on

haggard

i’ve been avoiding the whoole haggard thing but i do want to say that i like the letter that haggard wrote taking all the blame for the situation & i like mark driscoll’s post on the whole situation.

Posted on

the good and bad of my neighborhood

the family that treats together
as you know last night was halloween. i love halloween. i know some people don’t like halloween because they are scared it’s all about satanism, witchcraft, sex, rock-n-roll, and drugs. yet i say to them the word of the LORD “to the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure.” (titus 1:15). so to me halloween represents two things: 1) the day before all saint’s day, and 2) a day where kids and adults act stupid and get lots of candy.

so of course, my family and i dressed up and part took within the halloween celebrations of my neighborhood. it was great. we had families pulling kids on small hayrides with trailers and atv’s, people sitting outside to hand out candy while surrounded by fog machines and ghouls and much more. some parts of shenendoah were absolutely amazing. my only complaint is that my street was a loser of a street. there were a few of us that were “open for business” but not many on our road.

my favorite part of the evening came when i was walking around the neighborhood with noah and montana, our basset hound. while noah was “trick or treating” someone asked me “what type of dog is she?” since i was in my elvis costume i responded in my best elvis laced toe “ah, she ain’t nothing but a hound dog!” it made my night even better.

[Listening to: You Led Me to the Cross – Matt Redman – The Father’s Song (4:49)]
Posted on

salesmen are supposed to sell

until recently with his retirement my dad was a salesman. ironically the “hobby” that he has developed over the past few years to keep him busy during his retirement is selling used cars. like i said he is a salesman. though i never heard my dad say the title of the post i still learned it from him through being aroudn his business. by watching him i learned that the purpose of a sales person is to sale a product. you do it ethically. you do it because you believe in the product. you do it because you believe that your product really is better for your customer than someone else’s product. still though your purpose is to sale the product. if you can’t sale the product because you’re too worried about your image or too worried about what you might have to do to sale the product (i.e. go out and do a demonstration of the product at 10 p.m. or show the maintence personnel how to use the product, etc.) then you are not going to be a very good sales person.

the reason i say this is because i was dissappointed today. every 4 weeks or so i do the chapel for our preschool. today was one of those days. today i was supposed to talk about how GOD knows and loves us for who we really are. the problem as that i was speaking to 150 4-5 year olds. 4 & 5 year olds are not kown for their ability to understand and remember tough messages. still i figure the purpose of a preacher is to CONVEY truth, not just say true things. i’m supposed to help other people understand the good news of JESUS. if i simply speak the gospel and the people i am speaking with don’t understand what i am saying then i have failed. so if i don’t convey the truth in a manner that those listening can understand then then i have not preformed a very good job. so i decided to use the fact that most of these kids will be wearing costumes tonight to help them to understand that GOD knows who they really are on the inside. so i purchased an elvis halloween costume and did my message in it while slowing removing parts of it to show who i really am. the kids loved it. the teachers loved it. some of the leadership said it was the best chapel they had ever had.

now i will be the first to admit that having the costume was fun. it was fun to see people thrown off and confused when i walked down the hall. it was fun to see my fellow ministers laugh. when i was talking with one of my fellow ministers about the costume they said “i could never do that, i’m afraid no one would ever take me seriously anymore.” of course, this is also why the 4 & 5 year olds squirm and never remember anything when he does their chapel.

the purpose of a preacher is to convey the truth of the good news of JESUS CHRIST. nothing else matters compared to that.

[Listening to: Ants Marching – Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds – Live at Luther College (disc 2) (5:26)]