• Sorry about that

    Just a quick note to say "I’m sorry" for commenters having to go through an extra step. I was getting a few too many comments from people who wouldn’t identify themselves. (Which, through the power of IP tracking… it’s not that hard to find out who people are… ) So, from now on it’s either tell the site who you are or just can’t comment. It’s a little slower, so if you don’t see your comment post… I did get it. I just need to approve it first.

    For the record    , I’m pretty low on the curve on this one. Most of my friends blogs have required extra verification for a long time.

    Thanks for visiting! If you’ve never done it… check out my "Rules for Blogging"

  • No more Dave-ness

    Well, he’s gone. The party ended about 5:00 PM as we left Dave at the security check point. The whole way there and even seeing him start to say goodbye to a lot of people didn’t make it set in… but at the airport it started to hit us. As we said our final goodbyes and he got in line, reality hit our little group hard.

    As we sadly and silently worked our way back to the van I held Megan’s hand tightly. Whereas she had been playing and singing only a few minutes before, she walked quietly and hugged my leg as I paid for the parking. The silence continued as we left the parking lot and headed onto the highway.

    It was superficial, but I decided that we needed to break the mood a little. So we stopped at Ikea on the way home to try to chear everyone up. It worked a little and superficially.

    What an incredible experience for Dave and our little church! As we talked earlier in the day it was clear we would give him an "A" for his internship. He worked very hard. He was stretched in a lot of areas in his life. He stretched us. On and on and on. It was a great experience. Perhaps this was some of the reason we were having such a hard time leaving him? At some point along the way he stopped being an intern and starting being part of our church. Likewise, he had stopped being a guest in our home and had become a part of the family.

    Something else really hard to watch: I can’t tell a lie. Some of the pain of dropping off Dave had nothing to do with him. As he made his way through the security checkpoint (Big mistake making him take off his shoes… Nacho cheese!) there was a young soldier on his way back somewhere. Proudly wearing his uniform, this massive young man was having a very hard time leaving. He carried his 2 week old baby around and couldn’t bear letting her go. As he tried to say goodbye he started weeping. (This greatly accelerated the tears in the concourse as well! We didn’t even know the guy.) He took his baby girl into the security checkpoint with him, the tears flowing freely as the reality of leaving his wife and newborn daughter behind. He simply didn’t want to give her back. The reality of life was calling him and he couldn’t bear it. For me, it was a huge reminder of the daily sacrifices young men like him make on a daily basis. Likewise, all over this country thousands of young moms take care of babies wondering when or if daddy will be home. While I am excited of the work our troops are doing in the Middle East, it isn’t free.

  • KidsTown logo

    Kidstown3rev_nhrWe’re not 100% final here… but this is a sneak peak at what our new KidsTown logo will look like. There are a couple of things that really stick out to me as "huge" for the KidsTown logo… but I’ll keep them to myself for now.

    We’re hoping to have the graphics in hand and t-shirts ordered in the next several days.

  • Racism in the Church

    Ever read something that just leaves you in shock? I just read this and could not believe the intense racism that exists in some places. Perhaps my eyes are not open wide enough, but I’ve never experienced anything quite like this. It is a travesty.

    Two excepts from the news article (Source)

    The Rev. John Stevens says Fellowship
    Baptist Church in Saltillo voted not to approve blacks as members
    during a scheduled Sunday night business meeting Aug. 6. Because of the
    decision, Stevens stepped down from the Baptist Missionary Alliance
    congregation that has an average Sunday morning attendance of 30 people.

    According
    to Stevens, the church made race an issue after a biracial 12-year-old
    boy, Joe, began attending Fellowship Baptist with his temporary
    guardians.

    The church was "afraid Joe might come with his
    people and have blacks in the church," Stevens said. "I could not go
    along with that. There would always be a wall between us, so I resigned
    that night."

    Insert my jaw dropping face. I couldn’t believe this and I applaud John for walking away from that place. Words cannot express accurately what I’m thinking.

    After being told of the vote, Cliff Hardy,
    an officer with the Tupelo Police Department, left the church. He and
    his family had been going to Fellowship Baptist for about a year and
    had been praying about becoming members there.

    "I was asking the Lord to lead us," Hardy said.

    The police officer says there are good people at Fellowship Baptist, and the Bible was preached there.

    However,
    "You see, my best friend is a black man," he said. "I wouldn’t be
    comfortable going to a place where I couldn’t ask my best friend to go
    to church with me."

    I don’t believe in leaving churches over flippant reasoning. But this is a valid reason to go. I pray I am never at a place in my life where people exclude others from fellowship in the body over clearly non-biblical standards. Absolutely sickening. It’s my hope that I am doing the opposite in my life… widening room at the table for people of all backgrounds for a seat at the table with Christ. I hope we are united in our differences by the shed blood of Jesus.

    If this is true, how could anyone justify staying there? Where in the Bible are people getting this idea that we should not allow people of different races to worship together?

  • The Other Iraq

    KurdsThis morning I watched a commerical on FoxNews that was called, "The Other Iraq: Thank You" Essentially, it is the Kurdistan Development Corporation broadcasting to the world, "We’re done with this war, we’re ready for business, but before we do that… we want people to know we are thankful."

    This is cool on a few fronts:
    – The Kurds are alive and well. In fact, I’d say that this is a sign that they are ready to thrive in the new Iraq.
    – The Kurds are ready to become independent, at least economically. I think it’s unrealistic to think that people will be going to Iraq for tourism any time soon, but it’s not unreasonable to see American companies begin to invest there.
    – The leftist press has the wrong story on TV. Clearly, there are great things happening in Iraq but the press only likes to cover the negatives. It’s a political year… obviously there are people who want to see their team win in November.

  • YMX Fantasy Draft

    For lack of a better place to keep my draft picks… here they are.

    1. Shaun Alexander (RB, SEA)
    2. Hines Ward (WR, PIT)
    3. Ben Rothlessberger (QB, PIT)
    4. Thomas Jones (RB, CHI)
    5. Chicago (DEF)
    6. Marc Bulger (QB, STL)
    7. Andre Johnson (WR, HOU)
    8. Chris Cooley (TE, WAS)
    9. Chris Brown (RB, TEN)
    10. Brett Favre (QB, GB)
    11. Reggie Brown (WR, PHI)
    12. Byron Leftwich (QB, JAX)
    13. Joe Jurevicius (WR, CLE)

    More as the rounds go on.

  • Last Day for Dave

    Today is the last Sunday for our intern Dave. He’ll be playing in the services as well as the Bonfire tonight. I’ll have more thoughtful and complete reflections some other time… it’s just not easy to see him go when we’re really just getting used to having him here.

    As a houseguest, he doesn’t seem like a houseguest. We’ve never had someone here long term… so I have expected a Kato Kaelin experience.

    Of course… he did disappear for about 24 hours. But, unlike Violet, he came back. Some kind of crazy story about girls taking him all over. I’m just glad he didn’t elope or something!

  • Leadership Meetings

    Just like when we rolled out a lot of the transition stuff at the Parent’s Meeting, the church leadership meetings were full of great questions and positivity. That doesn’t mean that the next steps aren’t going to be a bit bumpy, but it is very good to know that the majority of people in leadership are excited about what we are doing. So, I’m pretty pumped with how the last 24 hours has gone!

  • Blimpscreen: The New Must Have

    Blimpscreen_1I saw this last night on Pimp My Ride. This is absolutely incredible.  It’s a blow-up movie or TV screen that you can put in your front yard or anywhere. I haven’t decided if we need one for Light Force or if I just need on for myself yet.

    It’s like 10 feet across and very portable.

    It’s the Blimpscreen, and you can get it at their website. This one comes with a projector and is only $4000. Feel free to just have it shipped to my house.

  • Morning Rituals

    Every morning in our house is nearly the same. About 7 o’clock my alarm goes off. The alarm is quickly snoozed… 9 more minutes please. When I finally wake up enough to be coherent, I discover that Kristen is generally off jogging somewhere. Before my first snooze alarm, Paul crawls into bed with his blanket and a stuffed animal.

    The alarm goes off again. Snoozed. The alarm goes off again. Snoozed. Paul lays quietly in Kristen’s spot while I enjoy the fleeting, alarm interrupted, sleep. This is when Megan bursts through the doors wide awake. Each morning she hits the floor sprinting downstairs. When she sees that all is quiet in mom and dads room, she just jumps in bed and pretends to sleep in the morning light.

    A few minutes later and the door opens. "Mommy!" The kids pretend to hide in our bed until Kristen opens the bedroom door. Megan gets snuggles and Paul says "Mommy, what can I eat?" We all chuckle because we know the only reason Paul doesn’t sleep all day is that the boy needs to eat.

    Before the alarm goes off the 4th time, the light usually comes on and our day begins.