Okay, so I think today was the last mowing of the year. I've said that the last two times, but I really think this was it. I mowed north and south. Took 2 hours 5 minutes. I probably didn't really need to, but it was such a nice day, and with 2 weddings coming up I thought it would be nice to mulch the leaves and give it a nice trim. I just cannot imagine mowing it again this year. This was mowing #21.
I was recently talking with a couple of pastors who are on staff at a church together. They talked glowingly about their church, and how it is a "family church," and all the things they do to lift up "family," and they're working on making it more "family friendly" and trying to disciple the "whole family" with "family values" and family, family, family, family, family...
However, later on they said one area of concern was their inability to attract students from the college located right next to their church building. They said they wished they could figure out how to connect with them, because they basically had no college-age people in their church.
You know... I might not be real smart, but it seems fairly simple to me. I mean, for one thing, most people that age are still SINGLE. Why would a single person want to be part of a family church? For another thing, most college students are maybe just getting out on their own... Perhaps the LAST THING they want at this time is to be around more family! I dunno. Maybe that's just me though.
At any rate, I have never really liked the "family church" mentality in general. Not that I am against families being a part of the church (I am all for it), but I think when you say you are "family friendly" you automatically alienate a whole lotta people from church. What about those who are single? What about those who aren't in the same place spiritually as their spouse? What if you don't have kids? What if you are a kid? I just think it sends a wrong message. Church should be for anyone and everyone. Sometimes I think we may even need a little separation to sort of "find our own way."
And not only that, but I don't know that Jesus was a "family-church" guy either. I mean, read Matthew 12:46-50. He asks, "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers." Then points at his disciples and says it's those who do the will of God. Blood might be thicker than water, but HIS blood is thicker than ours. (Lauren Winner has a nice post: "The Gospels Don't Preach Family Values").
Ultimately I believe a church that just wants to be "family friendly" is missing the point. They make faith out to be nothing more than living a good, moral life - 'cultural drapery' - if you will. There is no interest in seeing lives transformed by the power of the gospel; they mostly just want a nice safe club to raise their family in. And, hey, it's not that I am against niceness, or safety... I just don't think that is what Jesus came to bring us. He came to bring a way out for the prisoner, a way up for the downtrodden, a way home for the lost, and a way to carry on for the weary. I believe he was much more of a revolutionary, and I'm not sure how nice, safe, or "family-friendly" revolutionaries are. To make church nothing more than keeping a set of moral values strips the gospel of its power, and denies a whole bunch of people the chance to find freedom and hope and their true home, in Christ.
So it's not that I am anti-family, but I believe Jesus wants us to look at family differently. We are all related in the human sense... we are all in need. I hope and pray that my church might become more "Jesus friendly"... and that it would be a place where ALL people can feel welcome and accepted in hopes of being a part of his family together.
So, I guess I am forty seven years old now. It was an interesting birthday this year. The actual day wasn't so bad, and the number didn't even bother me. But for several weeks prior to the day I was in one of my worst funks ever. I hadn't been quite that depressed in a long time; maybe never. And I don't really know that it had anything at all to do with my birthday. The weekend before was just really bad. The last couple Sunday mornings have been terrible (on my part). So many things going on internally. But I think I was able to hide most of them. I dunno... I suppose just the normal October stuff I go through every year...
As far as my birthday... Jane got me a sketch pad and pencil set, and some chocolate dipped pretzels. She also ordered me a Michael Card CD ('The Hidden Face of God'). It wasn't in on my birthday, but arrived a few days later. Drew Carrie got me some candy bars. A guy from church got me a bag of little Almond Joys. I got a few cards, and 2 from people at church. And I had many birthday wishes on Facebook, which surprised me.
The day was kind of a whirlwind in that I went into the office at 8; took Jane to work at 9:30 (and got myself a sausage, egg, and cheese Mcgriddle, to celebrate); took Jane to the doctor at 2:30 (and it took 2 hours); then had to go back and pick her up from work at 6 pm. Then we had dance lessons at 7 on the north side. So we went to Chili's for a late birthday supper after that. And this was THE WORST dance lesson we've had to date. It was like we took stupid pills before we went. I think we actually UN-learned stuff.
Food for the day was: the usual morning bagel (blueberry), the sausage, egg, and cheese Mcgriddle, a couple of little candy bars (left over from halloween), a small Dairy Queen vanilla shake for lunch, a small salad of lettuce, cheese and tomatoes for early supper, a couple more little candy bars, and then a turkey burger and fries for late supper.
Yep, it was my birthday. Now it's over, and I'm just an old fart. I have a headache right between my eyes today. Other than that there does seem to be some light though.
It was a Saturday. I worked in the morning. Jane and I went to Subway for lunch and while we were eating a car ran into the light pole across the street.
After lunch we went to our first ever dog show - at the Coliseum. It was kinda neat. Lots of dogs. Big ones, little ones, fufu ones, macho ones. We saw several Corgi's like Bogie. They were all much smaller than him, and darker. It was kind of sad though.
It was nice to see the Illini actually win a football game. Too bad it was against Michigan, I guess.
I fixed the vacuum sweeper. The hose had been clogged. Got a bunch of stuff out of it.
I replaced the light bulbs on the motion light above the garage. I got 100 watt bulbs, not realizing it had had 50 watt bulbs before. All the better to see you with.
We had ZERO trick-or-treaters. Even though I'm not real into halloween, it was still kind of sad. We had a candy bowl and everything. I guess we're going to have lots of snickers and milky ways to eat now.
I think there was even a full moon for halloween night.
I put away the grill, the patio table and chairs, and the hose.
I set all the church clocks back for the end of daylight saving time in the morning; set the ones at home back in the afternoon. It will be nice to sleep an extra hour on a Sunday morning. Although I've been waking up before the alarm goes off lately anyway.
A quiet night.
Both preseason NCAA Basketball polls have now been released. I'm not much of a predictor, but I thought it would be interesting to look at these later. Some thoughts I do have...
This coming Sunday happens to be 'All Saints Day.' This is a Christian holy day observed by many Western churches on November 1 each year, and is a time to honor all the saints of the church throughout history. According to the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology:
From early times the church commemorated its great leaders and heroes, especially those who had suffered martyrdom, by observing the dates of their death. This gave rise to the sanctoral section of the liturgical calendar, and it was customary for those churches whose members had included great Christians or martyrs to gather for a Communion service at the martyr's tomb, which was sometimes used as a Communion table. At a later stage churches were built over these sites, and thus began the practice of dedicating churches in honor of specific saints.
Because there were other Christians whose faith and service (and even martyrdom) went unrecorded, and because some centers of the church gained more martyrs than could be commemorated in the days of the year, the practice of a general commemoration on All Saints Day developed. Originally celebrated on May 13, this festival was transferred in 835 to November 1, and medieval ideas of purgatory led to the following day being observed as All Souls Day, when the souls in purgatory were remembered.
At the Reformation the latter festival was dropped. Reformed churches use All Saints Day to thank God for the faithful departed.
Jane just came in and told me that she learned last night that no one has ever actually died from the H1N1 flu. The people who had it that eventually died actually died from pneumonia. So, if pneumonia is what kills us, then why aren't they telling people to get pneumonia shots? Could it be because a pneumonia shot lasts from 5 to 10 years? In other words, there is little to no money that can be made off of a big media scare with pneumonia shots, but there's lots of money being made on the H1N1 hoax (not that it's a hoax, but... IT'S THE FLU).
Sometimes I think the problem with health care in this country actually has nothing to do with health care, and much more to do with marketing and how much money is to be made or lost by the big drug companies, insurance companies, and the health care industry in general. Kinda makes me sick.
Drew Carrie's wedding website: http://www.mywedding.com/drewandcarriefeipel/index.html. Holy cow, it's in 33 days!!
I finally dug out my Simpletech 60G portable storage device and backed up my laptop. Geez, it took 4 hours and 48 minutes. 19 gig to back up. I know Jim has reminded me a few times that I need to do this. Just one of those things. I doubt anything on my 'puter is that critical anyway, but... now it's done. I suppose I could just leave the thing plugged in and have it automatically back up... but that would take all the fun out of it, wouldn't it?
Of course, had I not already had the portable storage device, I would probably just use this free online storage at www.adrive.com that Tom told me about. 50G for free!
The link for the David Bazan Living Room shows:
http://www.undertowtickets.com/product/david-bazan-living-room-show-new-haven-in-december-13-5pm
via
When we do baptisms we have two basic options. One is to use the pond of one of our families who live just down the road. The other is to borrow the portable baptistry from a neighboring church. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. At any rate, today we baptized 2 people at the end of our worship gathering, and we borrowed the portable baptistry.
I like doing baptisms as part of the Sunday gathering, because more people come and it is more of a group celebration. When we go to the pond not everyone goes. Too bad we didn't have a pond on the church property. At any rate, I always forget how long it takes to fill this tub, so I thought I better write it down.
I always fill the baptistry part way on Saturday with hot water (about 4" above the seat). Then Sunday morning I fill it the rest of the way with warm water (about 8" from the top). It probably takes about half an hour each day. I use a garden hose from the back restroom sink. First I have to take the hose attachment from the sink in the storage room and screw it onto the bottom part of the faucet (after first removing the thing that's on there). When it is full I also need to remember not to drain the water out of the hose. This way, when I go to drain the tub I can just stick the hose back in, and take the end from the sink and stick it out the north door. Usually - if there's enough water left in it - once I get it to the bottom of the outside steps it starts draining out by itself.
We didn't even spill too much water out today!
Yesterday we had the roof re-shingled over the middle part of the church building. They tore off a single layer (H-lock, I believe), and put on new "regular" shingles. It wasn't a very nice day - rainy, windy and cool - but at least it's done now. Since I have been here we have now re-shingled the roof over the hallway and bathroom (lower section), and now the middle section. Those shingles all match now. Before that we had three different kinds of shingles. The only part that hasn't been re-done is the tall part over the sanctuary - which has the Sheriff-Goslin "A-lock" shingles. I don't even want to think about re-doing that. I would guess the parsonage will need it next. I don't really want to think about that either.
We went to our first 'dance party' last night at the dance-lesson place. Uh... it did not go so well. It started out ok. They always have a 1/2-hour group lesson before and then follow it with an open dance party so you can practice all the stuff you've learned (supposedly). The group lesson was for Foxtrot, and I thought I did ok. I already knew the basics of it. But, geez, there were A BUNCH of people there. The room was full all the way across. There must have been at least 35 people just for the lesson. Then, as soon as it was done, they turned out the lights, turned up the music, and the place was suddenly just crawling with people. There were young and old, hip and nerdy, it was a wild conglomeration of people. Which was kinda fun, and funny, to be honest. The problem was... this was when we went from the practice field to a real live game... and I was outta my league. We danced a Foxtrot, and tried a Swing and a Waltz - and Jane danced a Rumba with Chad - but... there were so many dances they did that I didn't even know existed, let alone know how to do them. And even the ones we did know... we soon found out we don't know very much. And the floor was so crowded that I felt like we were in everyone's way (even though I'm sure we weren't).
What they do is, they put on a song and usually announce what kind of dance it is. Then you pick a partner and people hit the floor. And let me tell you... the best dancers are the old folks. Especially the men. So mostly we stood along the wall like a couple of kids at a Jr. High dance until I finally talked Jane into leaving around 9:30. Another thing I was surprised by - we seemed to be one of the few couples there. It definitely seems to be a singles hotspot. Which I think is good. I was just a little surprised. And it's not that everyone else was good, but it was just a bit overwhelming. So, anyway, we have 5 more of these dance parties to attend by the end of the year. I imagine we'll do it again, but... the first time was very humbling, and not just a little discouraging. I am no dancer, I know that.
Afterward we swung over to get our tour of Drew Carrie's new place. It is only a few minutes from the dance place. A very nice little apartment they have. They had friends there so we didn't stick around too long, but I think it will be a nice place for them. I forgot to see how long it took us to get home from there though.
It was a mixed day. I need to find something to do, or someplace to go, on my day off. The lack of social interaction is killing me. I need to find a place to volunteer, or a place where I can go and make some friends or something. Someplace where I'm not necessarily "the pastor," but not that I don't want to be "a Christian." But what's new...
I have had this beard for a year and a week. This post from October 24, 2008 has the one-week photo. Yesterday I got a wild hair and trimmed it back though (shorter than week one). I don't know why, because now I wish I hadn't. I wish I had never trimmed it at all. I gave up letting it grow out completely a long time ago, but I had hoped to let it grow under my chin at least. One time I spaced out while trimming and trimmed it under my chin a little, and lately I've been trimming more and more. I hate when I do spur-of-the-moment things like this. But... such is life... can't even grow a beard right.
I really don't know what I'll do now. I don't foresee ever shaving completely again, because I just really hate to shave. But... who knows. Who cares.
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