Hit the Back Button to Move Fwd by Gavin Richardson

way of pilgrimage site & my acting skills

we've talked about the resource a bunch. we even mentioned the site. it's up and going now, see jonathon and myself showing off our acting skills & looking a little like kirk and that other guy.

www.wayofpilgrimage.info

homiletics festival day three: fred craddock

unfortunately for reasons getting prepared for some church stuff and the worship service on thursday i had to choose to miss the sermon by fred craddock. all words i got once i got there were that fred was awesome! i did get to take in jim wallis, who i thought was average. he stirred the crowd, but didn't say anything dynamic. what he did say was rather dynamic and got many in the crowd stirred.

thank goodness there are some folks who are putting out their notes to fred.

Craddock talked about the "reduction language" used by preachers – ‘promotional’ preaching. No surplus of meaning. Giving the impression “they walked all the way around God and took pictures.” Sermons just are not big enough, Craddock said, quoting someone (?) who said: “I’d rather be a pagan . . . just to have some size to faith.”

Craddock concluded by daring us to imagine what would happen if we actually believed all the hyperbole and exaggeration in the gospel. What if we took it all seriously? He was very facetious in his presentation here, and had us all laughing, at the same time we were soul-searching. "Go sell what you have and give to the poor." Some young foolish preacher took that seriously, Craddock said, and led his congregation to bring all their stuff to the church to sell, and they raised $2 million dollars. Didn't he know it was hyperbole? Dietrich Bonhoeffer read "Take up the cross," and he gave up his life. Didn't he know it was exaggerated speech? Craddock talked about William Sloane Coffin preaching on “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Craddock teased, "If you start saying whoever, whoever will show up!

Craddock's closing words: "Refuse to lose the hyperbole."

on our divisions

via the cartoon blog

a few signs i blog too much

via john

From Central Snark:

1. You think to yourself, “Am I spending too much time blogging?”  And then you blog about it. (done It)

2. Your wife’s lawyer serves you with divorce papers by leaving a comment on your blog. (no, but If I could Imagine that happening it could possibly go down that way)

3. Your mom finds out about your son breaking his arm by reading your blog.  (Sorry, mom). (she has found out stuff via blog.. is that so bad? it's generally stuff i wouldn't have told her anyways)

4. You find yourself thinking, “I can’t wait to blog about this,” and you’re flossing. (maybe not flossing, but bathroom is popular place for generating ideas)

5. You sometimes have nightmares about posting in front of a large group of people in a standard Blogger template. (i use typepad)

7. You’ve stopped using the terms “blogger friends” and “real-life friends” because you no longer have any of the latter. (this does get confusing)

8.  While skimming a particularly long post you find yourself thinking, “Man, will this guy ever shut up about his family?” and then you remember you’re reading Deuteronomy. (i won't name names)

10.  You’re putting off going to bed with your pretty blond wife so that you can think of number ten on this list. (she's a brunette)

 

my little buddy is going away

total bummer... jonathon is hanging up the stphransus for a while.. maybe permanently. it's cool, i know where he lives to continue to stalk him.

homiletics festival day four: jack black meets the matrix

this was a little of what you saw of myself and jonathon in the thursday worship service with brian mclaren at the festival of homiletics. you know my resemblance to jack black, well as beth quick texted me & jonathon affirmed, i put on my matrix look. thus the title of this posting

the idea behind our set up was that jonathon and i would be doing dj & vj responses to the ongoing worship as experienced from the altar... or that was the hope. it was different, something we had never done before. it seemed to be welcomed by many, but i know it wasn't by all. i know this because one lady came up to tell us how moving it was for her, but the person next to her continued on about how it was distracting for them. that is fine, it's a worship at a conference, i've been off put by worship services before. that usually comes when i am not my best self and i become a worship snob.

i used a software program called arkaos. i first heard of it a few years ago from jonny baker but never had a need to use it. what we imagined with the flowing response needed something more than powerpoint (a linear pattern image tool) so i downloaded the 21 day trial and plugged away with it for a few late evenings. it was actually easy to start using. though doing a whole program took some planning, especially for the song lyrics. it isn't set up to do large amounts of text (at least cleanly) so i wouldn't suggest this for a standard praise and worship setting. i'd encourage the worship tech person to download the trial software and play with it. it's a great tool. note: for a free powerpoint option try opensong.

update: check my small collection of pics from homiletics week

memorial day reflection

today is memorial day, a nationally recognized day for remembering the people of our armed forces. if i am completely honest with myself, this is a confusing time for me. i come from a family with a continued participation in the armed services. my father was in the army, older brother was in the marines & participated in the gulf war (though i like to joke the ship he was on got hit by a sea mine and then docked for the duration of the war and he basically played beach volleyball in kuwait. this my understanding from his pictures atleast.) my younger brother, as many of you know, is in the national guard with one tour through iraq and a possible second within the next year. me, i never felt myself called into the armed services. the closest i got to armed service work was working as a security guard on a land based navy testing site. with our family tradition i do hold those who have sacrificed and given their lives to the calling of our country. i live much of the life i do due to their sacrifice through history.

in the same breath though, i find myself conflicted by my understandings of Christ's model for our lives to live and be in an alternative type of sacrifice & giving. maybe though, this is the tension of being church & being american, which i will live with.

two stories...

the vietnam vet memorial is the lasting image in my understanding when it comes to war. why? mostly because it was created during my younger childhood. second, because when we lived in new jersey we would take friends & family on trips to washington on a regular basis & this was the only memorial created at that particular time.

one time i remember walking with my dad (now my dad was in-between wars when he served in the army, a few years before vietnam). we walked slowly looking at names. then dad stopped and started to etch a shaded name onto a piece of paper.  "what are you doing?" i ask "i went to school with this guy." he proceeded to tell me some stories about him & what he knew of his death in the war. he sent the etching to this young persons father, giving as a gift but also to say, "i remember your son." we talked about this some years later. my dad received a letter back from this man's father expressing thanks for the etching (though he already had one) but mostly for remember his son. i really think that it is only when people cease from being remembered that they truly are dead.

in more a more lighthearted story, from the category of "just wrong." my brother & i had taken my cousin clare who was visiting from the uk to washington. we were walking around the sites and were walking from the lincoln memorial over the vietnam memorial. at one of the entrances there is a statue of some soldiers. well at that particular moment in time was an elderly man dressed in his uniform. he was doing some marching drill and then saluting the statue. people were all circled around him taking pictures. as we took in the scene my brother leans over and whispers in my ear... "i out rank him, should i make him do some push ups?" to this we laughed and walked down through the memorial

homiletics festival day two: anna carter florence

day two i was introduced to someone new in anna carter florence. i am not sure if anna was somewhat dry or i was just starting to get tired. however, as i look over notes i really do enjoy her voice. these notes might be more sporadic than usual as i know i tuned out a time or two.

• "God" this is the subject of your preaching. "You" this is not. your job is to remember this. it is the hardest thing you will have to do week in and week out and you will fight to remember this.
• the real battle is not between you and the listeners, but between the draw of speaking of you & God.
• an observation: our students are more driven by fear than by faith.
• they will then change the subject of the sermon. it is the great cosmic battle of the preacher.
• all the blurriness of post-modernness makes this harder.
• end of mark: fear is not the last word. we need to acknowledge that both endings are possible.
• preaching is a narration of events and a confession of faith. it can only be believed or rejected. it demands that we go deeper into the text then we ever want to go. to keep God at the forefront.
• people are dying for a deeper engagement with the scriptures. it is about what we see, where we see God in the world..
• fear.. the fear of the preacher
• the fear that holds us captive week to week, is an invention of the system/deceiver/principalities/etc. it is intended to keep us and the word apart. when it succeeds in its aim and changes to the focus of subject, it wins.
• testimony is the opposite of fear based preaching. it tells the great advertising machine of our society to take a flying leap.
• if all the warnings of the cultural shift in some way serve the systems purpose?
• why is it the perception that, unless it is more entertaining then it is not gospel? the preacher has change the subject. separating the word and preaching
• fear twists simple questions into fearful ones. to where we become broken.
• it sets up a false dichotomy where we have to choose between our fear and our own testimony.
• how does fear take root?
• how do we teach the bible?
  • biblical literacy versus the love of reading. we are taught that biblical illiteracy is apparent part of our congregations. that people don't know much. our sermons have to make a lot of introductions and bring people up to speed.
  • meanwhile no one ever reads their bible and the fall of sunday school attendance. and people grow up never hearing the stories.
  • but is the problem we face biblical illiteracy at all? in early school there is a lot of skills taught to read. but just because a child can read does not mean they actually will. now we need to instill a love of reading into our children.
  • reading is something you do with people who care for you. books are filled with stories that you can imagine and understand. it is something to look forward too.
  • the system has distracted us from something far worse than biblical illiteracy.
  • we have been scared about sharing information about the text.
  • we haven't shown our people flight. we've shown them our fear of flying. is it a wonder that our churches lack imagination.
  • readers should not shame others for skills they have not gained for love that they have not developed.
• we have a lot to gain from biblical illiteracy. if we are the only readers in our community, then we get to call the shots. we hold the power, but not the lords power, its the system power.
• if we can instill a love for the text then we are insuring the love of text and it is then the lords power.
• the saddest things is someone afraid to go to bible study because they do not know the answers.
• we live in a culture of time restraints. we have to choose some specializations for the good of the whole. we need experts
• there is a difference between an expert that dispenses and one who engages
• the fear of failing... when any system sets itself up as rigid absolutes, we are in a lot of trouble and finds itself rising up in violence.
• religious fundamentalism is always addressed as a "they" issue. we & they....
• while fundamentalist churches are increasing and mainline are decreasing. but it is not necessarily a bad thing. their success is not our failure. we have set up an adversarial set up. competing to win.. but win what and whose terms? the system is winning. putting its own spin on our numbers.
• we will assume that worship attendance is the key statistic. the loosing church will be driven to adopt the winning church identity. the failing ones need to imitate the winning ones..
• less tolerant for ambiguity. want to be told what to believe.
• success by numbers is totally rigged. rigged by the system
• the happy listener is the one who is being told.. that is the system. the happy listener is the one who is being seen. being known and being seen is communion
• fear of fighting...
• preachers who get all worked up about illiteracy, worship.. preaching takes its cues from the entertainment industry...
• we now see institutional survival and least objectionable, which is not the gospel.
• if we can be convince that conflict in the church is what we need then we will look for ways to engage the conflict in "true speech" brueggemann
• the church will become a gathering of critics.
• our environment won't sustain us to speak the truth and a pastor who can sustain truth will die on the vine.
• welcome the struggle of this text. to see and be seen. the struggle to become miraculously human.

dog days of summer begin

currently we are in birmingham with some of the fam. crimson decided it was too hot to not be swimming. so we went. i am sure there will be more pictures to follow. have a great weekend everyone!

homiletics festival day two: barbara brown taylor

notes from thoughts on the prodigal son by barbara brown taylor

• barbara brown taylor on the prodigal son
• The problem with a really good parable is that i can become limp from too much handling. you now have a domestic pet as captive to you as you are to culture.
• what would this had sounded like in a middle eastern world to a middle eastern audience? it would have been largely agrarian. no courthouse to hold the papers on property. honesty was premium on who owned what. a premium on being neighbors was prime. if things worked out the way they were supposed too then your children married their children.
• todays parable becomes the story of a dysfunctional family. it is a reunion story, not a resurrection story. given the shape our churches are in we may need this story.
• the father does one of those things the patriarch does not do. he runs.. runs like a little girl, not like a father. "great men never run in public" aristole said. this reconciliation will cost him his honor in front of the village. a feast to restore the family honor. the reconciliation means more than being right or honorable. this salvation costs almost as much as what it cost the father when his son left. yet he asks or says nothing of it.
• reunion brings the dead back to life.
• the fathers party is for the reconcilable & anyone that will come.

homiletics festival day two: thomas long

my notes unedited from the festival of homiletics. as we explore the episodic nature of matthew by thomas long

• tells the story of a roadside shrine to a young person on his daily commute. he stops occasionaly to observe. as i stand and look at the shrine
• two things happen to me. i try to connect the dots... what kind of life could hold all these things together (speaking of the odds and ends relics a part of the shrine)? what is coherence here? even though this boy was only 19 years old it is hard to make coherence of this. what is happening to me is exactly what it means to be a human being. to take the disparate shards of our life and create an identity.
• father with alzhiemers, the great tragedy is not the normal loss of memory, but the loss of narrative memory... corsicov syndrome. he created his own narratives. but in worship he took on the narrative he was given in the eucharist.
• part of the responsibility of preaching is to give a confused culture a narrative that can begin to be absorbed.
• pastoral counselors used to assume that when people out there said, i know what i am supposed to do but i can't do it. and in this place we are fine and without judgement. and that was fine as long as the moral fray was clear. it is no longer clear.
• dykstra, jesus says "do this in remembrance of me" to remember the narrative.
• help people who have lost consciousness of their story themselves to help recover that. the book of matthew is written precisely to a community that has lost it's narrative. understand we are talking about a small fragile jewish community trying to shape it's roots with their experience with jesus.
• it puts us in conflict with the narratives of culture.
• in a funeral there are two preachers. us & "D" death. and death is a powerful story. it is our duty and delight  to preach an alternative narrative. stories in conflict.
• the temptation story of jesus is not the typical temptation story. the temptation story in the gospels is a proposal of the tempter to alternative narratives.
• in the desert. "command these stones to turn to bread" then jesus said "it is written...."   "if you are the son of God then cast yourself down" then jesus said "it is written.." reciting old creeds from deuteronomy. the tempter is proposing different identities to live by than the one given by God.
• a quote about desmond tutu "you would think he is old enough that he would hate by now".. but desmond knows the gospel.
• if jesus came down in matthew 4 he'd have a marketing plan.
• wheat and the weeds parable..
• if we lift this up out of the matthew context it becomes a demonic content. moral quietism. put it into matthew context it becomes a parable in pastoral conversation. there is good and evil thriving together "god did you cause this."
• a news paper headline "bush vows to rid world of evildoers" it's humorous but dangerous. matthew knows that our mission field is a permanently ambiguous moral landscape. will this change? no.  there is a day that these things will burn with righteousness.
• barth, "do not fear the wrath of God, fear the love of God."
• when you know the future it dethrowns the powers in the present.
• on sunday we need to recognize that the biblical story collides with another story that is out there.
• "i am a series of episodes"
• matthew gives some claims to the episodic nature of our culture, starting with the geneology. you could not have a more chancy look. the history of God's people is a combination of God's random order of chance...
• we are random in the shaping of God's hand in our problems. even Jesus's life grows out of the messiness of the geneology of God. it is the mixed church that we experience the redemptive nature of the church..
• compelling story of ash wednesday with homeless and legislators. the poor and the powerful. his church had encouraged a homeless person who had been attending to come to their ash wednesday service "i'll be cool, and we will have a lunch afterwards." as the word spread through the street community the chapel began to become packed with over 100 homeless. while across the street, at the legislative plaza, one statesman said to his cohorts "i'm going to ash wednesday service, would you like to come with me?" soon 40 statespeople showed up at the church. the way this church imposes ashes is by having a lay person, who just had ashes put on them, turn and impose ashes on you after.
• neo-nosticism in today: matthew does not dismiss. they are learning together. in mark they never learn, they are always out to lunch (haha). they are the same disciples, but they can grow and learn. it is seeing rightly the message...
• our story goes this way. "blessed are the poor in spirit, theirs is the kingdom of heaven. blessed are those that mourn, they will be comforted...."
• good stories to tell a confused culture.

emergent knitting

more on the festival of homiletics later. for now let me share what i think is the first emergent knitters. check out brian mclaren doing his thing.. he was great! wish i had the opportunity to take notes, but i saw lilly doing that for me.. anyways, check out the ladies in the front row. they knitted those things the whole time. and when i mean "the whole time" they showed at 8am (45min before the service) and went all the way through the lecture. emergent knitting? subversive knitting? kingdom knitting?

happy b'day honey!

hey, it's erin's b'day today! help me out in showing some love!

today we take time to wish my favorite. my wife! my girlfriend (lilly, &:~P) MY Erin! a happy b'day! luckily for me i did such a great job last year we are going low profile this year.

it's been a crazy week and a crazy time lately, so i thought this picture pretty funny. sad part, i'd be pretty happy to put together a cake like this... pathetic i know

not enough time festival!

so much has happened these last two days. i want to blog about all the festival of homiletics, but when i am not there it is church work time, or tomorrows worship service. i'll share about yesterday with breuggemann, and ann carter florence. today i only made it to jim wallis (yes, i missed fred cradock, not happy but necessary). my experiences with arkaos, and catching up with lilly, jay, lynnette, jonathon, the psalters, and brian mclaren about this worship service thing. to tease you, here's a little glimpse of tonight at hermitage umc. photo taken by emily

homiletics festival day one: thomas long & barbara brown taylor

we had our first evening worship and lecture tonight at the festival of homies homiletics. on the docket for tonight were thomas long & barbara brown taylor. first off. first baptist was packed! i was a little late getting away from the church so when i got there people were already sitting in the aisle and i am sure that the video conference in the fellowship hall were probably full too. i sat on some cozy corner where i couldn't see the pulpit.. so that might have been defeating to a preaching conference not to see the pulpit. as with most of my conference blogging i'll jot down my notes.

thomas g long speaking on john 20: 19-31

• we are in a culture that is able to not worship.. & this mans name is legion
• there are a lot of tourists in our congregations that do not know our language or code that dan brown could not even crack
• quoting: your congregation is made up of people who almost didn't come today
• told a compelling story of joshua bell performing as a street musician. no one stopped to listen except the children. they knew something special was happening
• religious spam filter
• we all have problems with worship
• we are not trying to fix worship we are trying to fix ourselves.

barbara brown taylor on "how to preach like Jesus: parables"

• too often we preach like paul. who was the church builder, not the Saviour. he was the left brain guy. the guy who gave answers. left brain language is the language of clarity, factual.
• the right brain is the language of power. impressionistic. sets in space, not in time.
• i love the way the parables of Jesus work the margins of this kind of speech. the longer ones have memorable characters and plots. long or short a parable is not an information delivery system.
• parables contain within the seeds of individual and communal transformation.
• there is little transformation without disintegration.
• the teaching of parables required something of them. as hungry they were, he would not chew their food for them. chewing and food are one.
• parables are stories, we spend a lot of time arguing whether the stories are true. these are huge issues. in parables this question does not apply. these are stories. they relieve the burden.. relax, it's a story
• parables wake us up to the fact that not only are these fitting to our lives but they connect to the divine life
• i am willing to bet that Jesus told the story of the prodigal son a dozen times with little flares.
• parables have more than one door and more than one floor.. more ways to enter and more levels to see and experience.
• as far as i could tell, Jesus never told a parable to a congregation of one
• why do you tell stories" his disciples asked. "you've been given incite into the kingdom".. i tell stories to create readiness
• parables are wisdom literature, Jesus didn't invent this. job and others used this, there are no appeals to Torah or patriarchal doctrines, literature is not interested in the dogma. wisdom means to be accessible to options. wisdom draws from the lilies of the field.
• wisdom is not all cheery. it asks the questions of hard human experience.
• wisdom is interested in real life, not piety.
• sin is not the problem in wisdom literature, foolishness is
• wisdom is not necessarily what frightened people want. they want teachings that keep them safe. maybe that was Jesus problem. he taught frightened people, but he told them stories. no matter what they asked him for the right answer he turned them around with a question. he gave them fish, but he told them how to fish.
• parables are paradoxical, parables rightly told do not aid religious certainty. they more aid religious uncertainty.
• it's often a good mistake to try and tell the good and bad guys in a Jesus parable.
• is pounding God black and blue really Christ's intentions
• parables are to stretch the mind and beyond. press bruises, push and shove.
• Jesus didn't explain his stories, so should you. he left some stories unfinished. he trusted his listeners and his words.. God's word, even if no one got it.
• trust God's word to do God's work even if you don't have the slightest idea how
• parables offer themselves, their subject is life lived, but it does not necessarily dictate behavior. parables wound listeners to live into questions like these
• parables do not tell the listener what they want. but they want to live in life.
• Jesus did not spend so much of his time on parables so that people would know good farming, party throwing, etc. but he was pointing to the moon. (zen story of reference when one points to the moon it's not to look at the finger pointing)
• he wanted them to feast on the word.
  
  if you want to preach like Jesus here are things to try
• tell more stories and invest the time to learn to tell them well. you can even make up true stories. go to a storytellers conference. listen to those really good at telling stories.
• preach a sermon with no footnotes in it. preach from the life that you and your listeners know best. eat locally. where the gospel you share is not on the top shelf that they need help, but is with the lilies of the field
• decline to chew your listeners food for them. leave something for them to cut or chew. introduce some problems that you cannot solve. make trouble instead of moderating it for once. depending on what you feed your congregation it may not go over well at first.
• try sitting down three paragraphs before you are done. or before they are done listening.
     
  book of Matthew: you have been given incite into the kingdom. you have God blessed eyes. ears that hear.

contemplative prayer station pentecost

so i wondered.. what would one do with trying to provide some sacred space and contemplative nature to a raucous time of the church? well, i don't know.. but this is what we came up with.

opening.. we moved our youth to a single space, kinda small (for our size) and i said something of "in acts 2 we find the disciples and paul gathered wondering what to do with the church that Christ commissioned them to take care of. what happened after that is pretty remarkable."

move to video... I put together this video with black screen and stephen iverson's "surely God." then as the song closed we had some emerging text of Peter's speech to the people. i had coached the group that we would recite the text.. some of it moved kinda fast, too fast to read, so we laughed that one off. then following was the pentecost video from the work of the people. for some reason the audio wasn't jiving, so i plugged in jonathon's new song. it went over pretty well.

permission was given to move about the space.

Prayers... nothing major her, just giving the participants the opportunity in intercessory prayer. the meditation was to pray for someone to have similar blessings. lighting the candle is an obvious vigil to that prayer. found it interesting that one of the youth had moved the candles to spell "hope." this was something they experienced last week at our local relay for life.

your vision your dream... this one was very simple in giving paper and crayon. the one computer had a screensaver of images of pentecost. the projected screen was the opening video on a loop (though in pic one the video isn't running). the meditation was to take to the paper what their vision or dream of the church or kingdom is.

wow!!... this was the main focal piece of the room. mainly cause i sat down two foldable tables with a lamp with a black light bulb (though it never got dark enough in the room for the effect). the participation was painting, we picked up some cheaper canvas's and acrylic paints. the meditation was to think back to the movements of God & the Holy Spirit in their lives. then reflect those onto the canvas in an image or word.

extra... i set up a table that i thought i had planned for. then realized i had no need for it. so some cloth, candle, and a few bibles opened to our scripture readings. i am always amazed (not sure why) by the numbers of the youth that take advantage of reading the bible in this kind of setting. maybe it's an engaging the scripture in an open mystical setting.

like a strong storm... i brought out my "holy spirit" fan and picked up a box fan. we had some dry erase markers and some different translations, the message and the voice. the participation was to sit in front of the fan and feel the wind while reading over the scriptures. the meditation was to remember the movements around them. then reflect on that by writing on the fan that particular experience. then, if they wanted, they can turn on the fan to remember that movement.

fun with pentecost... for this one  set up i put the lamp with white/yellow/red covers, few bibles, & red candles. nothing more than that. the participation was to get into the pentecost sheet by cartoon church. there was enough in there to give a cool meditation and experience. plus, it's a little change up from the other things in that there is some guided learning.

closing... i think i reread our scripture of Saint Peter's speech, from the voice. then i bid them all shalom & then ran out the door for ice cream.

maybe you are looking for some prayer stations or a worship service for pentecost.. maybe not.. i'm not even sure if this hit the mark of being contemplative and still faithful to the chaotic experience of pentecost.

the migrant youth worker

i have been struggling these last few months in a tension between the administration of my job (which takes a lot of effort and energy for me) and the ministerial relationship (which is my natural and energizing part of my job). i have asked my staff parish liason to get our church thinking of how to staff our church in accordance with our numbers. ie. we are a potential 200 youth group, with their parents that could be a 400-500 person church. that makes for an ill equipped church, staff wise, to have one person trying to organize groups & events then find time to do visitations and message preparations.

so it's no surprise my buddy dixon's parallel of the treatment of migrant workers and the youth minister speaks to me a certain levels. now, i can't complain about my situation, i get paid well and treated well for our current standards, but in order to grow, we have to think differently.

Unfortunately, the parallels to Youth Ministry are all too real. Churches everywhere are waking up to the fact that they need Youth Ministry, but few are willing to make the sacrifice necessary to hire someone who is trained and compensate them appropriately such that Youth Ministry can be a sustainable career. Instead, they rustle up a couple of thousand dollars to pay a college kid, or young adult next to nothing with no benefits to do the job of caring for and spiritually forming a most precious group in our communities. Few are trained, fewer are paid adequately for the job they do and most move one within two years.

it's graduation weekend

Views of a 6thGrader

  The Grace

yesterday a couple of us met for a worship planning session for the upcoming festival of homiletics next week. we are doing an "emergent" & "traditional" worship for the thursday speakers. just call us team jv.

during our time i let grace, jay's daughter, take my camera and take some pics. this is how she sees the world, at least for that one hour.

wah-wah-waaa westboro

the fab fred phelps is crying about the way they've been picked on.. and guess what, God felt for them and that is why he "sent a message" in the virginia tech massacre. is there really nothing these folks won't pick up on as a message? reminds me of my favorite godless sodomites.. haha!

the modern church has a catchy tune

i found this video to be somewhat interesting. mostly though, it has a really catch song. i'd say it does pretty good in speaking to the icons of prosperity theology. me, i am not against people making money or feeling that God blesses them. i am concerned with how people make money; manipulating, stepping on, cheating, or not taking care of others who help them. i am also concerned with how Christians, who claim the blessings from God, spend their money. this isn't highlighted in the video, i'm not exactly sure what the video highlights except maybe that prosperity is against the bible & the real reason for the "word" is sin of man... which seems to detour a bunch and simplify the bible. i'd much rather see the video come to  an end saying "feed my sheep" or "blessed are the poor."

still, it's a catchy tune. &:~)

bye bye jericho

bye bye jericho. i sorta liked you, but now you are gone and i'll never know how the apocalypse aftermath in rural kansas ended. i can't remember watching a show that was canceled before this... and to tell the truth, i am not sure why i liked this show. i picked it up when i was catching up on episodes via ondemand which was kinda cool cause you can watch a few episodes in a row and get more of a complete story. but coming off the winter break i looked forward to the show but a one hour show never really carried to the following week very well. still, i watched.

erin says i was the only one that watched... kinda like wrestling. i was the odd ball who wasn't watching heroes/24/lost or some other mystery drama that others watched. still, i find comfort there actually were others and they liked the show a whole lot more than i that they took time to analyze the show and post to the forums.

funny that this announcement comes today as i watch the final episode (dvr). as the season/show ended i am not surprised that it left you hanging with the end fight. i was surprised they killed the dad, that seemed unnecessary to me. i am not particularly upset, but if they roll some episodes over the internet. i will most likely be watching.

giving mom in law some props

so this is my mom in law jumping off some bridge, i think in new zealand. seeing this, i felt like giving her some props.

you might be surprised to know that this is part of her job. professional daredevil mother? no. she's a travel agent. she just got back a few days ago from an agents trip where the australian or new zealand tourism people were whisking them around and showing all kinds of stuff for people to get plugged into "down under."

she's actually an australian specialist, so she's been down there a bunch before. i think this is the first time someone has pushed her off a bridge though. certainly the first with pictures.

looking for a trip with some adventure? or just a regular trip without the adrenaline? give my mom in law a buzz

blogger meet up @ the festival of homies

next week is the festival of homies homiletics. it is in nashville this year so i am going. wondering who else might be making the festival for a meet up? i know that lilly, jonathon, lynnette, and myself will be there as we are part of "team jay voorhees."

what might be a cool meet up is to go over the jonathons stomping ground for a concert by the psalters to raise money for darfur. otherwise a dinner, lunch or something informal like mcdonalds which has wi-fi. &:~)

jesus vs the christians

big jim highlights this video from scott hodge. it isn't too surprising the results, but a nicely done video for illustration purposes. especially if you are reading 'they like Jesus but not the church'

toying with allpeers

jay plugged a group of us to start using a file sharing program that is a plug-in of firefox. so far it looks pretty cool. it is called allpeers. it looks pretty cool and simple to get started using. i think it will work best for thos who transfer large files that get picked up by email blocks.

on the passing of jerry

reports out today alert us to the passing of jerry falwell.

Rev. Jerry Falwell, the television evangelist who founded the Moral Majority and used it to mould the religious right into a political force, died Tuesday shortly after being found unconscious in his office at Liberty University, a school executive said. He was 73.

Ron Godwin, the university's executive vice-president, said Falwell, 73, was found unresponsive around 10:45 a.m. and taken to Lynchburg General Hospital. "CPR efforts were unsuccessful," he said.

Godwin said he was not sure what caused the collapse, but he said Falwell "has a history of heart challenges."

i got a chance to hear the rev. falwell a number of years ago. i believe it was around the presidential campaign of 2002 cause i remember him being not so fond of al gore but saying that gw gave "the proper response." after his talk half the crowd stood up and cheered while the rest (myself included) sat there on their hands dumbfounded by what he had just shared as his ministry.

there is no denying that falwell is a polarizing figure. there is no denying that he excluded many people in his ministry. there is no denying that he put his foot in mouth many times. some may deny, but i won't, that he didn't know Christ. he followed a Christ that differed from me and sought a ministry that promoted things i don't promote. luckily for us all, God is bigger than falwell, i or you. we have lost a brother in Christ today

flickr fun

i don't know if you have heard of this site, but you can make all kinds of cool little products with your flickr photos, or any pic you want to upload to a project. i am still in a sentimental mood, so mine isn't particularly funny which would be my norm. i propose a blog challenge for most creative motivational poster! tip to youthblog

my kinda christian

in catching up with what has been happening in the blog world this was pretty funny. quite true and never helpful. tip to brett & john.

home from a successful wedding

we are back from charleston. yesterday we had a wonderful day celebrating the wedding of chris & meredith. in their casual unorthodox style the ceremony was in the parking lot of the boathouse restaurant with the reception in the restaurant. it was hot.. had i thought better i would have worn a white robe.

for my first wedding, people said i did a good job, so that is encouraging (minus the face i made in the picture). a few slip ups with some longer liturgy parts, but it was very basic and i threw out my notes in giving the homily. not sure if that was good or bad, but it was mostly to what i wrote and from the heart.

the reception was a ton of fun and a lot of laughs. we capped it off with all the men folk taking a dip into the bay, suits and all.

the rest of the week was capped with a lot of hanging out, playing golf, telling stories, laughing with one another and doing the little odds and ends to make this a celebratory time for chris and meredith.

i think i will reflect on the weekend more at a later time. till then check out some of the scenes.

:: my short wedding flickr set ::
   

charleston is nice

we are ending out friday. we have had some good times telling stories and meeting other parts of the friends and family. i have played more golf in the last two days than i have in years. i realized that i need to start practicing again. charleston is way nice. not nearly as hot as i usually experience it, july or early fall. tomorrow is the ceremony where we will marry two people. so that will be something to celebrate

green mac

crack me up, greenpeace is putting some pressure on apple to become "green." i'd affirm that in many ways they should as their stereotype clientel is sensitive (or claims sensitive) to green issues.

If Apple doesn't drop the toxics from its products, it doesn't matter how good a recycling program they have. Because toxics make recycling more hazardous. And eventually, the toxic chemicals will be released. Dropping toxics makes reuse and recycling of products simplier, safer and cheaper.

if you don't read into it, at least check out the site. it's pretty funny the copy of the apple.com site.

tip: youthblog

things on draft

so i have a number of things that i have started but never filled out the thought to make up a "post." so i decided to just delete them, but before that, i figure i'll give you some rambling thoughts.

• tim is throwing out a free ebook for youth ministry peeps. it's a ideas thing with some 120 tips and tricks. pretty cool, check it out
• did you notice that there wasn't a two hour greys anatomy like they advertised (last thursday)? i don't know the names of the characters but i was confused with the idea of snaking a new show into an established show. i think someone is getting a new spin-off.

• in my husband duties of fetching comfort and pharmacy goods for the dear wife who is not feeling well i get a phone call from her. not initially abnormal. the conversation was though.

  sick wife: guess who is on tv?
  me: uh.. not me..
  sick wife: it's dr. nye.
  me: really?
  sick wife: yeah, apparently she's got convicted of fraud.
  me: wow

• revabi nominated me for a thinking blogger award... i'm gonna have to think about who i nominate as my turn.

heading to the chapel this weekend

by the time you are reading this erin & i are on the road, or if it is still early i am finishing mowing then lawn, then we are on the road to charleston south carolina. we are heading there for one of my best buddies wedding. this is the same buddy who you might remember asked me to officiate their wedding and caused a bit of a stir.

so how did and will this breakdown? i asked my pastor about it, he just said to be comfortable with your decisions (i think that was his way of saying yes with reservations that i have a pretty good conscience). i talked with my buddy about no misrepresenting myself or my role. we talked about doing the justice thing but they really wanted to do this one time, so did i.

we checked with the county clerk to see what requirements are for marrying in the state of south carolina. as it turns out, the requirements are pretty loose, or blurry for like me with a conscience. all one needs to be (other than a notary, probate lawyer, judge) is a "preacher of the gospel" & a rabbi of jewish faith. no lie, that is it. so do i consider myself to be a "preacher of the gospel" the particular clerk asked me? "uh, in the spirit of things i am." technically someone along the lines might have issue with that. from the clerk "if it becomes illegitimate at some point our common law marriage will kick in within 6 weeks. that is actually stronger than some marriage laws." ... me, "really?"

the decision..

i'll be officiating the service giving up responsibilities for the scripture reading and vows to chris's (my buddy) not technically "aunt" (best buddy of mom he's known forever). she happens to be a pastor of some denom, we think it might be umc. she was going to do the scripture reading anyways, so we decided to transition into vows right after and the flow is right and the awkwardness of bringing someone up randomly isn't there.

it's my first wedding. which is okay, i did my first funeral this year, though that wasn't really planned to happen the way it did. a year of firsts.

my first wedding homily will stem off of some words framed by dallas willard on love and kingdom. the best i could do not knowing the scripture. it's also better than the other idea (as erin tells me) of telling a story of saint benedict and saint scholastica. i thought i could make that work really well, erin thought it was gross to tell a story of brother and sister during a marriage ceremony... i won't do it, but i still think i could have made it work.

you won't find Jesus on myspace

okay, so you might actually find Jesus on myspace, just like we found joel osteen (so "jesus" is the big Jesus on myspace, but the other ones have some funny write ups). i like this poem that put up on rejesus by jude simpson. tip to youthblog.

You won't find Jesus on Myspace

Jesus doesn’t have a Myspace page.
He doesn’t sit at his personal computer
for hours making lists
of his favourite lists.

Jesus doesn’t have a Myspace page.
He hasn’t composed a profile
which sums him up in fifty excruciatingly well-chosen words,
making him sound like God’s gift.

Jesus doesn’t have a Myspace page.
and he doesn’t get worked up
at how both Mel Gibson and Tom Cruise
both list him as their number one friend
in the world ever,
or that they schmooze him daily
by email
to try and get him to make them his
number one friend in the world ever
in return. 

Jesus isn’t even particularly bothered
that both Madonna and Michael Jackson
have already appropriated “the Messiah” as their MySpace i.d.

Jesus doesn’t have to prove himself electronically.
He doesn’t have a funky alias.
like sinforgiver or waterwalkingdude.
He hasn’t listed his interests
as home brewing,
complementary medicine, and extreme fishing.        

Jesus won’t email you every week
with a “hilarious” new photo
of him wearing a funny outfit,
or a video of his pet goldfish doing synchronised swimming across the sea of Galilee.

Jesus is not the sort of friend who instant-messages you
twice a year to say, “hey we should meet up some time!”

read more visit rejesus to download an audio version

 

gross a battle of christians and atheists

becky garrison highlights on the god's politics blog that abc will be showing in their first episode of a series called "face off" will be the Christians and the Atheists. in the right corner of representing the Christians is non other than my favorite (& cole's) voices & practitioners the fellas from way of the master. in the left corner representing the atheist community comes the folks from the rational response squad. both have their claims to fame, the process for saving souls in a cold conversation & deductive logic or the blasphemy challenge. so how did it go?

Watching these teams of non-scientists try to explain evolution versus intelligent design proved to be laughable at best. My favorite bit had to be when Kirk Cameron disputed evolution by showing pictures of a "crock-a-duck" and other nonexistent creatures that he claims prove evolution is a fallacy.

Even though the atheists failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that God could not have been the spark that set all of creation, they seem to have nailed this debate when Cameron pulled out the get-out-of-hell card. Simply put, this was “what you believe about God will determine where you spend eternity.” At this point, if I wasn’t covering this event, I would have crawled out of the church in shame. While this is supposed to be an ABC news program, I felt like I had entered a rather lame taping of Saturday Night Live instead. I honestly felt that at any moment Cameron was going to demonstrate the Church Lady’s Superiority Dance.

read more

greasing palms

i have gotten some response (mostly email) from people seeing my name listed for vote as a general conference delegate. art throws out my write up and people started talking about "greasing palms."

this makes me think, what does one do to "grease" a palm in this circumstance? i decided to look it up.

n. 

1. Soft or melted animal fat, especially after rendering.
2. A thick oil or viscous substance, especially when used as a lubricant.
3. 1. The oily substance present in raw wool; suint.
   2. Raw wool that has not been cleansed of this oily substance.
4. Slang  Something, such as money or influence, that facilitates the attainment of an object or a desire: accepted some grease to fix the outcome of the race.

tr.v.  (grēs, grēz) greased, greas·ing, greas·es

1. To coat, smear, or soil with grease: greased the pie pan.
2. To lubricate with grease.
3. To facilitate the progress of.
4. Slang  To kill.

we methodists like to eat, so they could be referencing the use of fats. maybe art thinks i should start changing the oil of cars in the annual conference parking lot. that could win points. i don't think it has anything to do with money, i am a youth minister, i have no money. not sure people would like me to put grease on them. i doubt my chances to get elected would be hindered if i started killing. maybe i'll just make some buttons

emo is in

so for some reason my most popular image reference for this blog is this emo image... it was originally posted way back here. is emo back in? was it ever in? do people just have some curiosity for emo?

i know i didn't particularly like my emo look.

save methodist youthwork

there is a petition out now that is need of some signatures to help salvage capable numbers to provide sufficient youthwork for the uk.

At Methodist Conference in July 2007, a number of proposals are being tabled that will seriously reduce the level of staffing dedicated to national-level support of work with 0-19 year old children and young people to a cripplingly low level - two full-time permanent members of staff, leaving 0-19s under-resourced and 19-25s feeling excluded.

tip: turbulent cleric

youth minister prayer stations

last night jonathon and i put together a prayer stations worship for some fellow youth workers. i'll try and give a synopsis of what we did. much of what we did we took inspiration from various worship settings on the smallfire collection.

opening: we started off with a little chat on the worship. kicked in with the breathe episode of nooma videos. then followed with some liturgical prayers & response. jonathon played some brian eno ambient music.

postcards2God: this was pretty simple and straightforward. this group had spent a year together in learning, small groups, mentorship, and fellowship. not to mention the year they spent doing their youth ministry work. we equated that to a "road trip" type spiritual pilgrimage. so we asked them to write God a postcard chronicling their experience. if i had to do this one again i'd probably make some postcards with various pictures.

steps: this wasn't as fabulous as we imagined. in a functional sense. the concept is that we all walk a journey and our steps weave together. the idea is that they step in the pans of dirt, get some good dirt on the shoes and then tread it across the pathway. well, the dirt didn't really stick, even when we watered it down a bit and the paper didn't show too much tread. i'd probably use some fabric next time and some peat-moss or something that sticks more next time. i like the concept though, so i'm sure we'll try it again.

the shredder: this one we took a slant of claiming how in ministry you can get over run with expectations. expectations from every single congregation member, staff, and the greater church. we took a little bit of my paper recycle (something us youth mins get a ton of) mixed in with some actual job descriptions and then topped with an exaggerated job description we embellished of this list. i'll update this post with the document later (on the church server).

how many?: this one was pretty simple. just give the ym's a chance to reflect on how they use their time (something we've done a couple of different ways before). each block represents a unit of time. you stack blocks, in no particular way, according to how many units of time you take up in; time with God, family time, in meetings, planning, etc.

the wall of importance: this one, i don't seem to have a picture of. oh, i know why. i had to go to the bathroom when i was taking pictures so i handed the camera off to jonathon and this is what he did.

the wall was pretty simple, some large paper taped to a folding table that we leaned against the wall. the meditation was about answering questions of what is important to you in your life & what you want to commit to giving more importance too.

updated: for a listing of prayer station ideas within this blog. click here for our prayer stations index page.