Did you know I'm published?

I'm not much of a writer, but i did an article for Heartlight online several years ago. It is still up on the site. Here is the link:

http://www.heartlight.org/articles/200007/20000720_imitating.html

PRCC's Got Talent

This Sunday evening we are having a talent show that we are naming PRCC's got talent. It is going to be an awesome night. We will have our normal great acts that volunteer, but we have added 3 judges that impersonate 3 judges from America's Got Talent and American Idol. They will be impersonating Ryan Seacrest, Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul, and David Hasselhoff.

We have also planned some "bad" acts as well as put together a staff tryout for the show which is hysterical of our staff singing badly.

Lots of video editing to do.

We might get freezing rain tonight. Probably not, because every time they forecast it, it almost never does what is says it is going to do.

Spurt Blogger

I'm a spurt blogger. I blog in spurts. Most of my hobbies are done in spurts. I will barbershop for a while, then I'll play Warhammer for a while, then I'll play a video game a while, and then I'll rotate back to something else again.

Blogging for me is the same. I will blog for a while and then I take a break and then I'll blog again. Some times my spurts last longer than others.

I can't tell you how long this blogging spurt will last, but time will tell.

I had Friday off and I switched my day off this week from Friday to Monday and I took a personal day yesterday on my birthday. (by the way 33 is such a forgetable age. )

My children and wife also had Friday, Monday, and Tuesday off so what did our family do over this long weekend? Go on vacation? Sit around and be lazy? Go shopping? None of those. We painted and painted and painted and painted.

We've had paint for months and have only painted the kitchen, the living room, and the two girls room. Left to be painted is the hallways and stairwells (the most difficult project), the two front rooms, our bedroom, the downstairs bathrooms, and the kitchen again since Summer didn't like the color.

We finished the two front rooms and the hallways and stairwells, and all but a little trim in one of the bathrooms (we ran out of paint)

This Sunday night at our church we are having a talent show called "PRCC"S Got Talent" We will have 3 judges and some really terrible acts planted along the way. It will be a hoot.

Kids are doing well. We are trying to get Bekah to potty train to no avail. We have tried everything. Literally. When I was a new parent I heard some really wild ways of potty training that I thought were a little out there and borderline cruel. I don't know that I think that anymore as I'm rather tempted to try some of those myself.

She won't budge. She has control, she just wants to go in her diaper. She hates the potty. I think it goes back to an event of sitting on the potty in a target and the automatic flush activated while she was sitting there. She hasn't been the same since. We did have a small victory over the weekend though. We were able to get her to pee in her potty once. Yeah.

Thats all for now. Sorry about the randomness.

Quiz Time

Ok, I created a quiz, but it is extremely easy, but it was fun coming up with questions.


Click the Title Quiz time and it should take you there. If not here is the URL:

http://www.quizyourfriends.com/quizpage.php?quizname=071108113626-636586&

Toothless Wonder

Micah lost he first tooth last week. He is so proud. It is one of his bottom middle teeth. He also won 2nd place in the readathon for the 1st grade. This kid loves to read which is a great thing. We highly encourage that.

How about them Cowboys? They are looking great. The big question is can they improve enought over the next 8 weeks to take it all the way to the Superbowl and give the Patriots a run for their money? Also, don't count the Colts out. They gave the Patriots all they could handle and that is with 3-4 guys injured and not playing.

I'm getting back into Greek. I've put my greek stuff down for several years and I decided that if I don't start refreshing now, I will lose any knowlege of Greek altogether.

It is getting cold in Texas. Yipee. It got down to 46 last night and will be potentially in the high 30's tonight. High today is only 64. It feels great.

Gotta go. sorry for the total randomness of this post.

Restful Weekend-Maybe

I'm hopeful that this weekend proves to be a restful weekend. There are things on the agenda such as 2 soccer games and parties afterwards, but nothing that should be too hectic. Summer is taking the day off tomorrow and I have tomorrow off as well. We are going to volunteer in the morning in Micah's class untill aournd 11:00. Then we are kid free until 2:30. I feel a lunch at On the Boarder coming to mind.

I just figured out that my new quartet has a myspace page. It is www.myspace.com/speakeasyquartet.

It has some tracks from our 3rd rehearsal which are not the best, but imagine that we sound good and you'll have an idea of what we have the potential of sounding like. :)

3rd Place

I have a quartet I'm in called Speakeasy. We have only had 5 rehearsals and competed in a contest. We ended up in 3rd place and missed out on 2nd by only 3 points out of a total of 3600 points. In 5 rehearsals our average was a 76.5. A 76 is a qualifying score to go to international. Though we don't qualify til March, we should only get better which means we should be heading to the International Convention in July.

this year, the international convention will be in Nashville, TN. I'm excited about it being so close to home because my family will be able to come.

I took a 6:00am flight out of Corpus Christi on Sunday and was able to make it back to church for tech rehearsal and worship. Afterwards we had lunch with the whole praise team. We had a great time.

Advair

It is funny looking at all the things that a new medication might cause. I've been prescribed Advair which is for Asthma. It helps me with that, but it has potential to cause any of these side effects:

Serious side effects include:
bronchospasm (wheezing, chest tightness, trouble breathing);
fast or uneven heart beats, restless feeling, tremor;
fever, chills, cough with yellow or green mucus;
stabbing chest pain, feeling short of breath;
white patches or sores inside your mouth or on your lips; or
worsening asthma symptoms.

Less serious side effects include:
headache, dizziness;
nausea, vomiting, diarrhea;
dryness in your mouth, nose, or throat;
stuffy nose, sinus pain, cough, sore throat; or
hoarseness or deepened voice.

So will this medication really make me better? I guess we will find out soon enough.

Asthma

When I was a kid I had an incendent where I was breathing in and felt a sharp pain that seemed to come from my heart. I did all kinds of testing back then and it was determined that my heart was rubbing against my lung and that I would grow out of it.

Well, I never did. I've had those symptoms since then though only occasionally.

I went to the doctor today to take care of a nasty cough that is in my chest. He did a breathing test and treatment and told me that at the minimum I have allergy induced Asthma. He prescribed me a inhaler that I will be using twice a day for six months and then he will do a workup on my lungs. He did say he is not officially diagnosing me with Asthma, but it very well could be that.

After coming back to work and letting the staff know the results of my appointment, one of our admins said that she had asthma and describe those same symptoms that I described at the top of this post.

So it looks like I have Asthma. I don't know what to think about it, but it looks like I got it. At least there is treatment.

Book Recommendation

The lastest book that I've read is "The Secret Message of Jesus" by Brian D. McLaren. This is an excellent read as he dives into the gospels and looks at the message of Jesus with a fresh perspective. This book focuses on the kingdom message of Jesus that is such a focus of His teaching.

He takes you on a journey of Jesus' times and the religious and political makeup of the culture. As you begin to frame Jesus' message in this context, the message of Jesus comes alive in a way it never has before.

He was also at the Zoe conference as a keynote speaker. He was excellent as usual. He has a new book that was just put out called "Everything Must Change." I'm eager to see what he has in store as he claims this to be his pinnacle work. I'll try to let you know when I read the book.

2 CD recommendations

As I sit at my desk, I look at my iTunes and see 7500 songs. If I pushed play and played every song running 24 hours a day, it would take 19 days to listen to all of them. On top of that I've got about another 200 CDs I've yet to import into my iTunes. I'm amazed I've gotten this much of my library on there to begin with.

Out of what I have, I definately have some favorites. Two that I would recommend today are Bart Millard (Lead singer for Mercy Me) "Hymned No. 1." He takes his favoirte old hymns and has a jam session. It is very enjoyable. You get to hear new takes at good old hymns.



The second recomendation is Casting Crowns' new CD "The Altar and the Door." This CD has got some incredible songs including my favorites, "East to West" and "Slow Fade." Pick up this CD if you don't have it. It rocks.

Bekah with not so long hair

Bekah with long hair

Recent Family Picture

Cowboys

Well, one who lives in Dallas can't blog today without at least mentioning the game last night. What a game.

I admit that I had almost given up on the Cowboys after the 5th interception, though I can honestly say that there was always that glimmer of hope that they could pull it off.

There were two things that I loved about the game. The first was the kicker. Not only did he execute a great onside kick, but he kicked two 53ft fieldgoals in a row. Did I mention it was in the visiting stadium on Monday night football and he is a Rookie?

The thing that stood out the most was Tony Romo's interview after the game. After being asked about the 4 first-half interceptions, Romo starts to explain them and then stops himself and just says he played poorly. That takes humilty and a lot of class to be able to say that. Way to go Tony Romo.

Sabbath

I went to the Zoe conference this past weekend. One session I really liked was Gary Holloway's on Sabbath. I admit that my habits in the disciplines are not anywhere where I want them to be. One discipline I haven't practiced is Sabbath. I can't count the number of times I've heard people say that it is the only command of the Ten that Jesus doesn't bring into the new covenant. Yet, Jesus talked about it. In Mark 2 he talks about Sabbath being made for man, not man for the Sabbath.

The writer of Hebrews talks about the Sabbath in chapter 4

Heb 4:9-11
9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.
NIV

The difficult part of Sabbath is making time for it. We are such a culture of muititasking and busyness. To stop that for a period of time or even a whole day is no easy talk.

Oh, but to have a day when I turn the cell phone off, I don't check email, I don't think about work, and I don't worry. A day filled with family, fun, and worship.

My family will try this. If you have any experience with Sabbath, I'd love to hear your input.

Pepeprdine Session

This is our early morning session in Smother's Theatre.

Pepperdine

This is our Pepperdine group after our last session on Thursday night.

My new office

After 13 months sharing an office with 2 other ministers and once a week with an intern as well, I have my own office. Yeah. I am so happy to have a place of my own again. No hearing 2 people's phone conversations all day long. I can shut my door and listen to my music as I plan whitout bothering anyone. It is wonderful. I've been more productive this week than I've been in a while. I'm lovin it. We get new furniture in about a month and then we will get the PODS that a lot of our stuff has been on for a year.

Happy 10th Anniversary

Today is mine and Summer's 10th wedding anniverary. Wow! It hard to believe that we have been married that long, because it has flown by in a hurry. I can honetly say it has been an unbelievable 10 years.

Of course, a lot has happened in 10 years. I'm in my 3rd ministry position. We've lived in 6 different houses/apts. We have 3 children, one in kindergarten.

Summer, thanks for putting up with me this long. I hope you can make it another 50-60 years with me. It will be a fun 50-60 years to come as long as we have each other.