Category: personal

tropical storm cindy went by us today without a drop of rain falling. instead of getting any percipitation like our neighbors to the east we had an absolutely gorgeous day that grew quite hot, around 95 degrees fahrenheit / 35 degrees celsius with humidity around 85 percent. which made it the perfect day for our air conditioner to break down. so for our weekly wednesday night worship service we had about 80 people packed into a room watching (and feeling) the heat slowly rise. it was quite miserable except for the worship which was wonderful in spite of the heat. still some rain would have been very nice.

if you read this thing regularly you know that this is a small blog. using sitemeter and feedburner i know that i average around 50 friends a day that visit and read this stuff. that’s why why today is so strange. today my sitemeter account is telling me that 139 people have visited the blog thus far today. that’s strange enough because it is significantly larger than a normal day for this blog. the stranger thing to me is that allot of these visits apparently came from email accounts (sitemeter tells me where people are referred from but it doesn’t tell me what entry people are being referred to).

what’s up with that?

if anyone has any idea i sure would appreciate hearing it because i’m at a loss.

everyone had thought that it would be raining around here by now. in fact, i canceled the soil that was going to be brought to my house because both i and the guy at the garden store thought it would be raining and i would be stuck with a huge mud pile in my front yard. of course, it’s still dry outside right now. who knows when it will finally start raining.

i ate lunch with j.t. today (in our never ending conversation to start something new around baton rouge) and he mentioned student life bible study’s six year plan. the plan is what they want a student to know by by six years within their studies. here’s what it looks like:

CHRIST
• the life of CHIRST
• the basis of faith

covenant

• law and grace
• the foundations of ethical living

character

• old testament people
• the development of character

consecration

• the theology of paul
• discipline of a biblical worldview

community

• the new testament church
• essence of fellowship

commission

• wisdom & prophetic literature
• the frameworks for a passionate life

of course, you can also use andy stanley’s seven checkpoints of youth ministry as an example. again this is what their student ministry wants it’s teens to have experienced by the time they leave the student ministry. stanley’s seven checkpoints are:

• authentic faith
• spiritual disciplines
• moral boundaries
• healthy friendships
• wise choices
• ultimate authority
• others first

j.t.’s statement got me thinking about a study i had done four years ago. i went through the gospels looking at every time the word “disciple” occurred. what i discovered was that discipleship isn’t so much a step by step plan as it is walking along side someone else who has been walking with CHRIST longer and deeper than you have yet experienced. during that study i mapped out the basics of what i think a disciple of CHRIST would ideally look like (i.e. nobody actually looks like this because none of us are “ideal” disciples). here’s what i wrote out:

if i were to do this today i would word things a little and focus more on the “walk.” yet i guess it is still close to what i use as a guide directing my goals for what i hope our students learn concerning being a disciple of CHRIST.

over the past month we have had a growing problem of kids getting up during our worship service and going to use the restroom. the problem is that i don’t really want to tell teens “you have to sit down” because i don’t really feel like that’s true. i’m fine with people getting up, moving, leaving and coming back. i want there to be freedom. what i don’t want is things that disrupt people’s worship and i feel like some of the people getting up to use the restroom are doing that. the same people always seem to be the ones who have to use the restroom.

so here’s my joke of a response to the issue. it’s a public service announcement on the size of the human bladder and how that means you shouldn’t need to go to the restroom during the service. i guess i’ll be more forceful later if it’s still needed.

yet another quiz. i have to admit that i think all the quizes are fun. this one though is humbling. it makes a guesstimate of how much of the biologically productive space on the earth it takes for my present existence. it’s humbling (and sickening) to know that i consume so much when so many others survive on so little. once again i have to learn to want less and survive on real needs.

thankfully, i am better about this today than i was six years ago. hopefully things will continue in that direction.

i am not a very creative person. some people think that i am creative and have told me that i am but that’s just because they have never really met a truly creative person. i’m simply not creative but i have learned a good substitute for creativity … time.

jonathan, our minister of belonging, and i discussed this recently regarding the welcome tables he sets up each week. jonathan tries to establish a different and creative welcome table for each week’s youth oriennted worship gathering. two weeks ago he stated that he was running out of ideas. so i told him my ideas on time being an effective substitute for creativity. here are my thoughts.

if you plan far enough ahead you have the opportunity to have many experiences that will contribute to enhancing your plan. so i try to plan my messages and worship services out for a minimum of six months so that i have time for the messages and services to “simmer” and for the experiences around me to build up and find connections with the services and messages. the most creative messages and services i ever contribute to are always ones that have been able to “percolate” and “ruminate” for a long time. time gives me the ability to discuss the message with other people and get their input and help on it. time gives me the chance to have random experiences to suddenly become very pertinent to the worship service. time also allows me to “accidentally” wander into the resources i need to accomplish the plan that has developed. i guess you could say that my basic thought is that time gives one the chance to truly be inspired by the SPIRIT rather than just trying to winging it.

for me worst problems are when i try to “wing it”. you can always tell when i have not put enough time into something. it’s shallow, vanilla, and boring. the SPIRIT isn’t there to give it life and spice because i haven’t allowed it to simmer long enough for any real inspiration to occur.

shane yancey at confessions of an average youth minister just posted about having things “pop up” at the last second and how disturbing they are. i usually hate those last minute ideas for a different reason – for me they are usually just not that creative.

mike yaconelli memorial basic school

our mini-bus started to slow down, and i noticed (car-sick boy that i am, sitting in the front) that there were a group of women standing on the side of the road. they were all wearing brightly colored african skirts and headwraps, and white blouses. they cheered and danced as our bus slowed down next to them, and it was then that i noticed the government sign next to them:

Zambia Ministry of Education
Mike Yaconelli Memorial Basic School
Kisasa”

if you are a fan or yaconelli then you have to read marko’s description of he, tic, and karla yaconelli going to dedicate the school that has been built in yac’s honor. my wife and i both fought back tears.

i was only able to meet yaconelli twice and to spend 20 or so hours under his instruction. still i miss him.

the landscaping of my front yard has begun. i just finished spraying roundup on the lawn that we will place the flower beds on. in 24 hours all the grass in the area i have sprayed will be dead. there is no turning back now.

pam and i have decided to begin work on landscaping our front yard (the back will be later probably after the summer is over). we’ve been messing around with plans for 8 months or so but that’s about it. today everything got very serious because we reached the point of no return.

a few minutes ago i loaded some roundup into my trusty sprayer and went to kill some grass. sadly it was innocent grass. the patch of lawn i was going to kill had never really done anything seriously wrong. yes, every now and then it would grow faster than i wanted it to but i don’t know if that is really a reason worth killing it or not. no all this grass did was grow up in the wrong spot. poor grass. it never stood a chance. i’m sure the murdered patch of grass is outside right now grasping for breath and fighting to stay alive. you go little lawn … fight with all you have … you little fighter you. we’re all proud of you lawn.

anyhow, the lawn that i sprayed will be dead as a door nail tomorrow morning and thus we’ll have to start work on the flower beds. of course, we could just settle for being known as the house with the huge patch of dead grass.