Month: December 2005

  • typepad has been down… but it is coming back online

    6apartlogoTpyepad has some sort of major malfunction. So my blog is just now coming back online. It’s too bad because I had some great stuff to blog yesterday and I’ve forgotten all about it now.

  • but, but, it is so incredible!

    I can’t really go into a lot of detail but someone hooked me up with something that is "OH SO COOL" that isn’t available in stores yet. I don’t know where it came from but I am thoroughly enjoying it as a "turkish delight" like treat.

    If you come to the LF Christmas party next Wednesday, you’ll get a taste of it.

    p.s. If you have absolutely no idea what I am talking about… I am sorry.

    Dsc05279In other news I am really excited about a new marriage in our church. Beth and Shaun get married on Saturday. This is perhaps one of the coolest, smoothest couples I’ve ever been around. When God puts two people like this in such a special way… you just sit back in awe of who God is and what He has done. I know for Beth this has been an incredible 6 months. Graduating from Nursing school, passing the boards, 3 weeks of indescribable service to the King in Northern Ireland, a new job, and now a new life together with Shaun… this has been a special time in her life and I am glad to have been a small part of it.

  • light force love and bye bye nicole

    Light_force_023This was our first and last Light Force for December. Just the way it worked out with the schedule. I hope it’s a precursor to 2006… because tonight rocked. We just had a good feel from everyone. Now it wasn’t a night of uber-warm-fuzzies or anything like that, but all in all LF is just cruising along and going well.

    Tonight we said goodbye to one of my favorite students. Nicole is moving to the Chicago area next week, and tonight was her last LF. I mean… if you are going to move, Chicago is a good place to go… but it is sad nonetheless. I don’t like seeing studens go.

    In other news, we had a lot of visitors. This is a weird phenomonon as we aren’t and haven’t focused of "bring a friend" but that is just happening. The talk, I felt was pretty good. (Not to pat myself on the back.) I just felt like the story we read (Luke 7:36-50) is just stinking powerful on it’s own.  Here’s my dirty little secret from the talk tonight. I didn’t have an ending planned. I got to that point in preparation and I just said… "I need to feel this out." It was a weird bit of freedom and I think it was a good ending.

  • I couldn’t say this better

    You know… there comes a time when you sense that something you’ve created is starting to get bigger than you… bigger than you could have imagined because God has taken hold of it? Here’s an example of that.

    Less than two weeks before Christmas, a good friend of mine posted a dire prayer request on a youth ministry forum we both visit. Money’s tight this year and their van broke down. It looked like her two young daughters wouldn’t be finding any presents under their tree this Christmas. Sure, Christmas isn’t all about the presents, but try explaining no toys in shiny wrapping paper to a three and four year-old. Read the rest at Amy’s blog, Atypical Musings.

    When Derek and I swallowed hard and decided that in our "spare time" (whatever that means to full time ministry people!) we’d begin YMX just a few weeks ago… we had some idea what it could become. As I pray for this little fledgling thing… it’s stories like this that make this little hobby so cool. For a lot of hurting people out there, it’s my continued prayer that YMX will be an extension of Christ’s ministry to them.

  • Gotta love this shameless plug!

    Ymxsign1I found this on a friends blog. I am loving the free pub for the new site.

  • Christmas is Coming!

    Christmas_cryAm I the only person in the world who hasn’t done their Christmas shopping? I have to admit that I am patiently waiting for the Christmas bug to bite me so that I can even feel like shopping at all.

    I don’t even have much shopping to do. Since Kristen has pretty much taken care of it, I only have 5-6 people to buy for and I don’t know what my problem is. And I haven’t even started the annual Christmas letter. Ugh.

  • anxiety

    Maybe I hide this, or maybe it’s so evident that people don’t mention it to me… but I worry about things a lot. In fact, I worry about stupid things more than I worry about important things. I worry about things at work that are fine, I worry about how people "view me," I worry that I’ll get an e-mail and not respond fast enough, I worry that I’ve been rude to someone, I worry that I’ve missed some unknown step in "protocol" that was unspoken, and I worry that people I really care about won’t like me anymore, and I worry if people will notice if I am anxious about these things! But at the same time while I am anxious about these little things, big things don’t seem to effect me. I’m never nervous about going on a mission trip. I wasn’t nervous when we bought the house, or when interviewing for any ministry job, (haven’t done that in a while and I hope to never do it again!) or speaking in front of people, or meeting "famous" people, or things that are supposed to make you anxious!

    I know I am not alone in being anxious… and I think these things I suffer from are funny enough to talk about. And with that, I’ll remind myself of this… Phillipians 4:6, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." Interesting observation about the author of that verse… he was hunted down like an animal, imprisoned, and executed… heck, he likely wrote that verse in jail… be anxious about nothing… OK Paul… if you say so!

  • We saw Narnia

    We saw Narnia

    I suppose this post may be considered heresy by some. But, while I didn’t mind Narnia, I didn’t really see the hype.

    Today Kristen and I had the pleasure of taking Megan to see “the movie.” In my mind, the best part of the movie was sharing the time with my girls. I like that they liked the story. I liked that I got to sit by my girls and enjoy popcorn. I had a blast explaining to Megan who the lion was and that the witch was a really bad lady. I had fun seeing her joy when Aslan came back to life. I revelled in hiding her eyes from the battle scene. (OK, so my second favorite thing was seeing some LF folks and their families there… that’s wicked cool too.)

    But the movie itself? Not to my palatte. I have long been a C.S. Lewis yawner. I think he was a clever guy with a great testimony. But I really struggle to put him in my top 25 “greatest authors” list and I cringe when I hear the Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe mentioned in folks lists of best books. It is a good story, it is a nice allegory, but it is not one of the great fiction books of all time in my life. Lewis is no Dickens, Twain, Dostievski, Hemingway, or any of the other great fiction authors out there.

    Nor did the movie live up to the hype. It failed to provide a compelling impact on me or Megan. Before we got out of the parking lot Megan was singing the tune from Madagascar. Hardly a memorable event!

    What’s wrong with it? To me, it’s too plainly an allegory. Too obviously an attempt at communicating the gospel to really be compelling or thougt provoking.

    Why’s it so popular? Because the allegory is so clear, Christians love it! Afterall, they hardly have to think to see the message of Christ.  It’s wrapped up in a bow!

    Here’s my disclaimer. I’ve been a “Lewis-hater” for a long time. It’s not that I don’t care for him… in fact I think he’s a good writer. But I have always done my best to keep him in his place. For what he is, he is fine. I remember back in my Moody days I would love to mess with my fellow students by picking on their favorite books series. My first roommate proudly told his friends that he read the Chronicles of Narnia each semester. I would always tease him that this was the reason for his single status. Does this mean that  I’m some sort of hypocrite for teaching the book? Not at all! I really, really do thing that teaching the series is important. There are a lot of non-Christians who may see the movie… and being prepared for a good spiritual conversation about the series is a good investment. Probably not what I would have wanted… but LF is rarely about what I want anyway.

  • Snow has arrived for good

    Mclane_fall_045Last night we got a fair amount of snow. Practically speaking this means that Kristen and I got to do a little bonding this morning as we shoveled the snow in the driveway and the sidewalk.

    Since Romeo didn’t have school today this hardly seems like a big deal, but there is a village ordinance and we don’t want a ticket for not clearing our sidewalk!

  • the candy cane thief

    Tday_005Each you we put candy canes on the family Christmas tree. It’s a fun little treat for the kids and a great reward for them.

    Well, that is until this year. We keep finding candy canes all over the place and Paulie has been stealing them off of the tree and hoarding them all over the house. In fact, in a 2 year old kind of way, Paul announced to Kristen "look what I’m hiding" and found a whole cache of them hidden in his "secret hiding place."

    We know when our little theif is up to no good. He disappears under and table or behind the couch. When you catch him he throws his arms back and hides the candy cane behind his back! It’s cute, but naughty!

    There is a spiritual tie to this as well. Don’t we try to hide our "candy canes" from our Heavenly Father in the same way? We know God is omniscient and omnipresent… and yet we try to hide our shame behind our back.