How’s your day going?

Wait.

Before you answer that question, let me tell you about my friend John.

John’s an upper-level manager at Cisco.

He makes really good money.

Yesterday, John had to fire a handful of his employees.

…Unexpectedly

…13 days before Christmas

And he couldn’t tell them why…

So, as I was asking, how’s your day going?

Budgeting Idea

This is from the ‘Friday Funnies’ at the girl talk blog….

“It’s funny because it’s true” :0)

Update on Jennifer and the Cortez Family

Last week, I posted about the awesome opportunity to reach out to my sister Jennifer and her family this Christmas season.

Again, the bullet points are

• 7 people
• 2-bedroom apartment
• 5 children under 14 living together in one bedroom
• Dad out of work right now
• Opportunity to rent large house for less rent

So far, I have heard from a few of you, mostly via email, and I’m so grateful for the awesome response!

This weekend, I spoke to Jennifer, and she gave me some better details. She says they are moving forward by faith, and they have to be out of the apt by 12/10. She said their two greatest needs (besides prayer of course), are

1. Money for the move
2. Christmas for the kids

If you are interested in helping with the move, that would be awesome! I’m going to put the expenses on my credit card, and I need you all to help me pay the bill (and I swear I will give you some evidence — ie receipt or something — that the money went to good use!

If you are interested in sending toys/clothes/games/etc for Christmas, that’s even better! And I need to correct my previous post about ages of the kids… I had them a little mixed up:

There’s:

• Sarah, age 8
• Earl, age 12
• Monique, age 12
• Mariah, age 13
• Joey, age 10
• Angie, age 7, but living in Texas right now and in less need

Please help us show the love of Christ to these kids this Christmas! Let me know if you’d be willing to help in any way!

Don’t waste your life

 

DontWasteYourLife.com — One of the best resources I’ve seen in a long time. Check it out…

 

 

Powerful Video (featuring my boy Louie :0)

Saw this on ‘Take Your Vitamin Z‘ and thought I’d pass it along…

It features snippets from the ‘How Great Is Our God’ DVD by Louie Giglio, and the song ‘Never Let Go’ from the David Crowder Band’s ‘Remedy’ album.

I wish I had more time to do stuff like this :0)

Me on Stephen on Shannon on Mark Driscoll on Joel Osteen (Pt. 1)

Having some fun with the title there :0)

For anyone visiting, this is my response to the discussion from a previous post. Read the comments there, and the title will make sense too…

So, first, I’m sure this response will be fairly long. So wait ’till you have 10 minutes to read it.

Second, I am LOVING this discussion. I really, really don’t see it as a couple of cocky 20-something theologians arguing about something they don’t understand amounting to morons… This is an amazingly important discussion right now, especially in light of the world we live in. The so called ‘prosperity gospel’ is more popular than ever. A couple days ago, Steph and I were in the gym, and there was a special on the morning news about how a US senator is trying to audit the 6 main ‘prosperity’ teachers to figure out how they spend their money. It pointed out how Creflo Dollar has TWO Rolls Royces, Joyce Meyer bought a $23,000 toilet bowl, and an $18,000 kitchen table, etc… It made christianity look like a bunch of crap. Half of me wanted to cry, and the other half wanted to throw up.

Mark Driscoll on Joel Osteen: humble but firm

This video really speaks for itself. It’s 10 minutes long, but worth the time, especially if you’ve been thinking about buying Joel’s new book, “Becoming a better you”:

Expectations…

When I heard that Caedmon’s Call would be releasing a new album with Derek Webb back in the saddle, I was very excited. I’ve been a huge fan of Caedmon’s for a long time now, and when DW went off to do his own thing, I think most people would agree that the whole dynamic of the band changed quite a bit.

I remember going to a ‘commissioning’ service for the Webb-less band several years ago at Providence Baptist Church. They were heading overseas for several weeks to dive into culture and make music with people of many other nationalities. The idea of the project would be an album that would inspire young 20-somethings and college students to go overseas and get involved in the world.

When “Share the Well” finally hit the stores about a year later, I couldn’t afford to go get it, but I was anxious to hear it. Within a couple of months, I had two different friends just give me their copy. I don’t remember the details, but the conversation was something like,

me: Oh really, you don’t like it?

them (akward look on the face): It’s just… not what I was expecting.

To this day, I’m not sure whether I ever listened to the album all the way through.

So here it is, 2007, and a new project with my favorite song writer in the world is back at it, and let me tell you, this album more than exceeds my expectations.

Musically, it’s great, which is to be expected. I appreciate that it’s a little bit raw and leans towards the acoustic end of the spectrum.

But lyrically, there are a couple of real gems, which gets me to the title of this post: expectations.

When I sat down to write this post, I was planning to pick appart the language of the song and make some observations about where I think it comes from. I think it launches a really worthwhile discussion about the Church. But while googling for the lyrics, I found an interview where the band beat me to the punch. I’ll copy some of it here, but the whole interview with Trevin Wax at trevinwax.wordpress.com is good stuff….

‘Expectations’ really threw me for a loop when I first heard it. I’m sitting there in my car, listening through the album for the first time, and this really folksy kind of rhythm comes on, and then I hear Derek’s voice (always a good thing):

That boy had the highest of expectations
And he heard that Jesus would fill him up

And I’m thinking, “Interesting… another song left over from Share The Well… must be talking about some kid in Africa hearing the Gospel.”

I was wrong.

Song continues:

But maybe something was lost in the language
If this was full, then why bother?

This was not the way it looked on the billboard
Smiling family beaming down on the interstate

So at this point, I’m pretty struck, and wondering where they’re going with this song. It continues:

You know that we all try to blame someone
But our dreams won’t rise up from their sleep
And the reaching of the steeple felt like one more
Expensive ad for something cheap

To be honest, sitting there after a first listen, I was pretty bummed. I was thinking, “What the heck? Are they saying the Gospel is cheap?”

But then I started really thinking about it…

They could be writing about my Dad. They could be writing about guys I shared the Gospel with overseas. They could be writing about 85% of the homeless people I’ve spent time talking to. Maybe they’re on to something after all…

Which brings me back to the interview. Here’s what Guarett Buell of the band has to say about it, and I think I agree (emphasis mine):

This is to me the main observation on modern Christianity. It, to me, really sums up in words how that observation looks through the microscope. Failed expectations of a Savior in the light of “Christ gone corporate” modern church. It seems as if the aim of our church in this day is to be better than Six Flags with a bigger IMax screen. With salvation quotas and razzle dazzle services and the well seen perfect poise of a smiling family in a perfect world of a photography studio with no problems in life at all.

The focus is off of the real Jesus and how He works in our hearts, knowing full well what lies beneath the “show” of our finest threads. Christianity has got to become more about loving the unlovable and feeding the hungry than entertaining the kids with video games and multi million dollar gyms.

Churches need to let their members live amongst the real world, be involved in society but not sheltered from it. How else are we to be salt and light if we don’t ever wander into it and don’t know anyone there if we did? Churches should support their members not limit them, realizing we are all fallen and will fall again. But when times are tough the church should hold their members when they are down, truly listen to their cries and above all, have empathy because chances are, they are just like you.

What do you think?

Interesting post about Joel Osteen

Have a look here.

What do you think?

2 Questions for pastor mark driscoll

Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Washington is taking questions (see the video below) that he’ll use as topics for 9 sermons and a book, beginning in January, 2008.

You can go to askanything.marshillchurch.org to view, submit, and vote on questions.

I asked the following questions (there’s a really short length limit, so I didn’t get to word them exactly the way I wanted):

What are your thoughts about the level of criticism between believers, and particularly church leaders? What’s the balance between a desire for Truth and a bad picture of Jesus we paint to the world?

What do you think about the term ‘christian’? Do you think that it has become too stigmatized, and if so, is it worth redeeming or should we change our language?