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dnow summary – at least the first summary

these are the initial thoughts on the discipleNOW that we had this past weekend:

  • our host homes and leaders were great this year. i heard very positive experiences during the weekend. i do think that next year we will use the concept of an event blog at a much earlier date to encourage even more idea swapping. this year’s blog seemed to help some in communicating with the leaders and thus doing it even earlier should help even more.
  • andy neely (the youth minister at springhill baptist church in mobile, alabama) was great. he did a wonderful job of communicating.
  • ten shekel shirt was great. they did a superb job of leading us in worship and i throughly enjoyed hanging out with them. lamont (the lead singer) and austin (the drummer) are both very passionate about social justice issues – especially modern day slavery in southeast asia and eastern europe.
  • we got rid of the polaroid scavenger hunt that we had done in the past and instead went to a wild goose chase on l.s.u’s campus. it went very well. the kids were completely worn out and we may need to shorten it just a little next year.
  • i need to work on improving the student center sound system. we had to borrow some equipment from the ring and the stuff we borrowed was junk we should have had already. in the future i will add a 31 band graphic equalizer (i’m considering the behring FBQ3102 and the dbx 231) a compressor or two (i’m looking at the behringer mdx 2600 and the dbx 266xl), and a few other sound system nic nacs.
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march madness

one of the greatest times of the calendar year arrives this wednesday – march madness. last year we setup a bracket system for anyone involved within the youth ministry to participate within. i figured i would do the same thing again. if you are interested email me and i’ll send an invite to you. you will have to register with cbs sportsline but they’re very good about not bothering you. you can view our “brackets’ at http://the-view.mayhem.sportsline.com/brackets.

of course, i’m not really sure that there is any need for anyone to fill out their brackets because last year i throughly dominated everyone else. here’s my bracket for this year:
my bracket

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this is absurd

my ticket cost me this much
about 6 weeks ago i was given a ticket by a sheriff’s deputy for not having an inspection sticker on my truck. i deserved the ticket so i don’t really have a complaint about that (though the deputy was not one of the nicer law enforcement agents i have ever met – most of whom are usually very decent people). today i went to the east baton rouge parish court house to pay the fine. i was amazed to find that the fee was only $20. of course, that’s not what i actually paid, nope by the end of the day i had paid $127.25 only $20 of which was for not having an inspection sticker. the other $107.25 was other fees that were supposed to be some how connected to the cost of my ticket, such as $77 for court costs (which if i had actually gone to court would have made a little sense), or $10 for jury compensation (i’m not real sure how they fit a jury into the very small room that the clerk was in but since i was charged for it i’m sure there must have been a jury somewhere in the room), or $2 for the supreme court (i must be more important than i realize since the supreme court sits in on my traffic tickets). my actual fine for driving without an inspection sticker was a mere 1/5 of the additional costs placed on the ticket.

something is wrong with this.

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stanley grenz

you’ve probably heard this by now from several different sources but i figured i would add my memory to the collective consciousness … stanley grenz has gone home. i loved his writing and was really impressed the one time i was able to meet him. i was in seminary when allot of grenz initial theology of community started coming out. he came to campus for a lecture series. after his message grenz came to the systematic class i was in at the time and spoke for awhile longer. after that i and tons of other people gathered around to hear still more. it was pathetic because we were all just trying to meet him. i was most impressed that he put up with it all. since that day i have continued reading his stuff and being challenged by it. he’ll be missed.

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it’s over

the dnow is over now and i just woke up from sleeping. i went to bed yesterday at 3:00 p.m. and woke up today at 11:00 a.m. quite a nap! anyhow, i just want to publicly say “thank you” to everyone who was a part of making the weekend happen. the host homes, home leaders, random support people, and jessica and alan gave up a whole lot of energy and time and i for one greatly appreciate it. we’ll soon start discussing plans for next year’s discipleNOW.

now i’ve got to start catching up with all the normal stuff of life that i missed this weekend. for one my blogliines rss reader is full of new blog entries that i have to catch up with. i started out with 350 unread entries this morning and i have finally twiddled it down to 121 unread entries. of course, these entries are from the people who typically write long entries.

if you are wanting to view the videos from the weekend again here they are:

you’ll need realplayer to view the videos.

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dNOW

dnow 2005
it’s the second day of the discipleNOW. it’s been a blast though i’m a little tired. i’m typing this during a break for loading video footage onto the computer for processing tonight. while i was at it i figured i would post a few pictures from the “amazing race” that happened this afternoon. you can see them by CLICKING HERE. if you have pictures you would like to add send me an email and i’ll send you an invite to the photo group.

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say it ain’t so

it’s 2:03 a.m. and i’ve just gotten home from the first night of our discipleNOW. overall it was quite a good night. i’ve loved spending time with the guys from ten shekel shirt, they have a real passion for social justice and it was been encouraging to hear what they are involved in. andy neely said some powerful things this evening. i was only able to visit two of the homes this evening – the boilings/ tenth grade girls and the fletcher / 12 grade co-ed. the 10th grade girls were really loud. i can’t believe they haven’t woke up the entire neighborhood. i’m so thankful i have boys for kids. 🙂

now i have to report the impossible … my linux computer has CRASHED. it’s crashed bad. the thing locked up and i had to do a cold boot up (unplug the thing and restart. now the machine locks up every time it starts loading “x” (the graphic interface). i don’t really have time to look into this right now so i can’t give any more details. i thought this wasn’t supposed to be possible. linux is supposed to be the stable platform. the one that all the others look to. why do i apparently have the only bad linux machine in the world?

anyways, have a good night or morning.

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this weekend

hello there faithful participants of this blog style conversation (basically this means my mom and dad). it’s 1:25 in the morning here in baton rouge (ignore the blog time – it’s wrong and i don’t know how to fix it) and i’m posting while doing some last minute work on the d-now that’s coming this weekend. i’m presently looking for pictures on flickr that could convey the idea of freedom. i’ve found some cool pictures but i still need more for the weekend.

anyway today was adam’s birthday. i just think it’s wierd that i have an 11 year old son. pretty soon i’m going to have to live in fear of him figuring out that he could whoop me. for now i can still take him though.

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the view – march 9, 2005

here’s what the worship stations looked like for the view, wednesday, march 9, 2005. the stations were done by rebekah (obadiah) and meagan (micah).

micah worship sationobadiah worship station

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i scream, you scream, we all scream for … hey wait!

on the way home from church this afternoon i saw the first ice cream truck of the spring. i love ice cream and i especially love ice cream on wheels. i will regularly go out of my way to get ice cream from an ice cream truck. it was this love that cause me to decide to convince the driver of the ice cream truck to pull over and let me buy some ice cream for myself and my kids. i turned after the truck, got on his bumper, and desperately started flashing my lights. i couldn’t get a response so i started lightly tapping my horn. nothing.

i followed the guy for almost two miles flashing my lights, honking my horn, and screaming wildly with my kids for the guy to pull over and sell us some ice cream. no matter how much noise i made i couldn’t even get the guy to look in his rearview mirror. he just kept on meandering at his ten to fifteen mph pace. i finally decided to pass the guy, stop in front of him, and thus force him to stop so i could get some ice cream. i sped up to pass him and pulled into the opposite side of the road. when i did this he immediately turned to the right entering another road. i don’t think he ever saw me. i could hear his music traveling all around our neighborhood but i never saw him again and i was never able to purchase any ice cream.

they really should give people a hearing and vision test before they allow them to drive an ice cream truck.