personal | Robert's Blog

April 28, 2007

JESUS camp – part deux

pam and i just finished watching “JESUS camp” with our neighbors. this was our second time to watch the documentary and it was even better than the first time because of neighbors. pam and i are obviously on the leftward side of evangelicalism and slightly right of middle of the road politically (conservative on some issues and getting more liberal on others). our neighbors are unitarian and episcopalian and would describe themselves as liberal democrats. pam and i were scared by what we saw in the movie the first time but it was even more interesting to watch the movie with someone who wasn’t as familiar with the more fundie side of evangelicalism. our neighbors are great people and it made for a wonderful night.

our neighbors also pointed out that a stray basset hound has been found by their next door neighbors. the finders of the stray basset haven’t had any luck in finding the owners of the dog but they don’t really want to keep him. the problem here is that pam, the boys, and i desperately want another basset but right now is simply not the perfect time. we were hoping to wait until we moved to wisconsin. of course, this little guy (we think he is about a 9 months old) isn’t going to wait. nobody seems to be sure what will happen to him if we don’t take him. to make matters worse (for us not for him) he is a very well behaved dog and about as cute as can be (i’ll post a photo tomorrow). this makes it all the easier to want to bring him home. we’re talking things over about possibly bringing him home and keeping him with us while we still look for his owner. first though we’ll have to see what montana says about all this.

SIDE NOTE – noah’s team won their last soccer game today. actually they thought they had lost it because the score said so (3 to 2). it turned out though that the other team had brought in a “ringer” from one of the premiere teams. that’s right a team full of 11 year olds brought in a “ringer.” the end of the story is that they were caught and had to forfeit the game, which was great because the “ringer” had score 2 of the team’s 3 goals. of course, this story wouldn’t be complete if i didn’t point out our neighbors involvement once again. kirby is noah’s soccer coach and so we all celebrated the win together.

[tags]JESUS camp, neighbors, basset hound, soccer[/tags]

April 26, 2007

sounds like a u2 song

since many of us have friends in and love the country of nicaragua i thought you would find this article interesting. it appears that managua has lived for 30 years (since a devastating earthquake) with practically no street names or numbers.

here’s the article

welcome to managua, quite possibly the only place on earth where upward of 2 million people manage to live, work, and play—not to mention find their way around—in a city where the streets have no names.

SIDE NOTE – an another excellent article on how the teen brain works and develops. ht marko

April 23, 2007

it works

just a few minutes ago i used some cilantro from the salsa garden. nothing else is ready to be harvested yet and won’t be for 50 days (the cilantro can be harvest every other week or so). the cilantro works pretty well and it was really cool to simply walk outside cut some off, wash it, and throw it in the blender.

SIDE NOTE – i think all the one square sheryl crow stuff is pretty funny. sharon (don’t go to her blog because she never updates it) said that the whole thing is meant to be a joke and she should know since her hubby, david (a swell guy), is driving one of the biodisels for the tour (from what i understand the biodisel is actually clogging the fuel filters – which stinks because i’m all for fuel that smells like french fries). the whole suggestion is stupid enough that it has to be a joke and thus i’m taking it as such. score 1 for sheryl crow. now i probably wouldn’t give her the benefit of the doubt on her and laurie david’s argument with karl rove since according to their own blog says that they walked over and started the policy discussion. i’m not the greatest fan of rove but i’m usually blaming the one who initiates the conversation rather than the one who responds. of course, if you’re going to be in politics you should have pretty tough skin and be able to handle people being rude. so i guess i’ll call that one a tie. score 1 1/2 for sheryl crow and 1/2 for whoever is against her (rove, big toilet paper, etc.).

[tags]cilantro, salsa, salsa garden, sheryl crow[/tags]

April 22, 2007

here’s what i announced in church today

as some of y’all know (because you were there) today i asked the church to pray for my family and i as we work through the process of being church planters with namb and the minnesota/wisconsin baptist convention. we know a lot of people who we love who really like JESUS but are burnt out by the churches they have experienced. we want to be a part of starting a church that will be just for such people.

we want to be a part of a church…

that is okay with people’s struggles and mistakes because we believe in a GOD of grace.
whose members walk through life together (in the successes and the messiness) because we have a SAVIOR WHO walks with us.
where the weakest people are fought for because we have a KING WHO said that when we do so we fight for HIM.
where questions are welcomed because we have a LORD WHO is not afraid of our questions.
that is not concerned with being powerful because we have a GOD WHOSE strength works through weakness.
that does not believe that it must either spread the kingdom of GOD or fight for social justice because we have a MESSIAH WHOSE plan includes both.

we’ve experienced such things within many churches because we knew what we were looking for but a lot of people have been turned off by the church and don’t see our wonderful JESUS.

after this summer we are moving up to stevens point, wisconsin were pam (my cute amazing wife) will begin a tenure track position as an assistant professor of speech language communication at the university of wisconsin – stevens point and we will work as hard as we can to be a part of GOD’s plan for a thriving community of believers.

now you may be asking yourself how are we going to do this? we’ve got the same question. we have no idea. i’ve never been a part of starting a church before and neither has pam. we’re clueless but we’re sure that it’s a part of GOD’s will. so we’ll depend upon HIM, learn everything we can, mess up a lot, and keep plodding along to accomplish HIS will.

i’ll tell you a whole lot more about this as we go along. for now the next step is for us to go to a week of assessment and training in may. we would appreciate all of your prayers and opinions (we’re open to anyone’s advice) as we start down this journey.

April 19, 2007

idea bucket

at the 2005 national youth workers’ convention i went through a seminar with rob bell. he used the phrase “idea bucket” (something i’m sure came from someone else) to describe writing down various ideas, events, objects, etc. that might connect with a ministry idea later on. he has a secretary to organize these ideas. i usually just write my ideas down within my journal. it’s a great way of saving the idea but a lousy way of finding it later on when i need it. i’ve been looking for something that would allow me to organize and search my ideas. i think i’ve finally found what i was looking for in google notebook. notebook gives me the ability to store lots of random thoughts and then search them later. it would be even better if i could tag the random thoughts (which may be possible – i’m too new to google notebook to know for sure).

[tags]google, notebook, idea bucket[/tags]

April 7, 2007

sunrise service

i know it’s just a part of church culture and i am trying more and more to differentiate between what is church culture and what is biblical CHRISTianity, but i love easter sunrise services. tomorrow i’m preaching at one in a local cemetery and i still need to work on the message a little but i felt like wasting enough time to say that i really do enjoy sunrise services.

the above photo is from good friday’s outdoor stations of the cross.

April 7, 2007

campolo on the hour

April 6, 2007

risk

One never dives into the water to save a drowning man more eagerly than when there are others present who dare not take the risk.

friedrich nietzsche

April 3, 2007

i was right and wrong

i was right
after an awful experience of waiting and being ignored for an hour and a half i was finally able to visit with the orthopedic surgeon and he told me i was right in thinking that i had a stage 2 calf tear/strain. i’m not the biggest fan of the medical industry. his advice was to keep doing what i was already doing and come back next week for another look. if i continue to have problems next week he will recommend physical therapy. i don’t really figure that i will go back for another visit. the only reason i went to the doc was because i needed a prescription to get physical therapy and hopefully heal in time for the marathon. i don’t think i’ll go and pay for another visit forr him to say “you’ve made about a week’s progress.”

i was wrong
once again (for the third or fourth time) i was second in our ncaa tournament bracket. congrats to sharron for winning the whole thing. this means i owe her lunch but since she said that she would probably give it to jon, her son, i guess i owe jon lunch.