Campbell

13 Best Cd's of 2008

2008-12-29T09:13:00.000-08:00

13. Anberlin--New Surrender
12. Various Artists--Juno Soundtrack
11. Children 18:3--Children 18:3
10. Family Force 5--Dance or Die
9. Capital Lights--This is an Outrage
8. The Briggs--Come all You Madmen
7. This Beautiful Republic--Perceptions
6. Jack's Mannequin--The Glass Passenger
5. Search The City--A Fire so Big the Heavens Can See It
4. Sum 41--Underclass Hero
3. Flogging Molly--Float
2. Weezer--The Red Album
1. E for Explosion--Reinventing the Heartbeat

Top 13 Movies of 2008

2008-12-27T09:07:00.000-08:00

I'm going to do a "Best of 2008" series over the next couple of days. I'll do the best movies, best cd's, and best books of 2008. Some of the movies may have been released in 2007, but I didn't see them until 2008. This is only my preferences.

13. Burn After Reading. I only put this one on there because it was one of the only movies that I saw in a theater. Brad Pitt did a great job, and the last 5 minutes were awesome. Other than that it was a disappointment. I usually like the Cohen Brothers movies. But this one had a lot of possibility, because it was a great idea, but it just didn't deliver.

12. Fireproof. Come on, it's got Kirk Cameron. Actually it was a pretty good movie. It was a feel good movie. It also made me want to be a fireman.

11. Tropic Thunder. It could have just been Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr., and it would have been worth it. They were hilarious. I just wish it hadn't been rated R.

10. Lars and The Real Woman. This was an awesome movie. It was so funny, and so happy. It was very weird though.

9. The Pirates who Don't Do Anything. We like the Veggie Tales and Parker loves them. It was a good story and had some good songs.

8. Juno. I liked this movie a lot. Jason Bateman is becoming one of my favorite actors, even though he was kinda jerky in this one. The slang from the kids got annoying in the beginning but it evened out after a while. But the story and the characters were great.

7. Kung Fu Panda. I think this was hilarious. Jack Black is funny even when you can't see his face. Plus it was a great story.

6. Iron Man. I know most people would make this number 1 or 2, and it was great, but there were a few I liked better. But it doesn't take away that I liked this movie a lot.

5. Cloverfield. I liked this movie a lot. I thought it was cool how it told the story. It was incomplete because it was from one guy's point of view, mostly. It had a lot of holes in it and it left a lot for conversation afterwards.

4. 21. This made me want to play Blackjack and go to MIT. I read the book first, which was way, way, way better than the movie. But, it was still a pretty cool movie.

3. Hancock. I thought this movie was awesome. Most super hero movies focus on the powers. This one focused more on his personality and the powers were a secondary component. Again, Jason Bateman was in it and had a cool role.

2. Dark Knight. I was skeptical of this movie at first with Heath Ledger being the Joker, but after watching it I became like everyone else who thinks he did an awesome job. This would have been a mediocre movie without him and his character.

1. My favorite movie of 2008 came out in 2007, but I didn't see it until January. It was "I am Legend." I loved this movie and could watch it over and over. I just like the idea of what would I do if I was the last person in a city and had to kill some zombies.

Runners Up: Dan in Real Life, Step-brothers
Movie I didn't like at all: Semi-Pro
Movies of 2008 that I hope I will never see: Mama Mia, Sex in the City

Catch Up

2008-12-25T13:43:00.001-08:00

A lot has happened since the last post I made over a month ago. I had been thinking about whether or not I should keep the blog going, and now have decided to go ahead, but maybe with a little different purpose. The purpose was for parents to see what was going on in Jr. High Ministry at Harvest Fellowship. Here's some update to why that needs to change.
The Thursday before Thanksgiving, I was pulled into the executive pastor's office. In there with him was the senior pastor and the high school pastor. I had a great morning, and we had a great Wed. night the night before, and I was in a great mood. I knew the church was having some financial problems, so when I was called into his office, I knew it was probably going to be bad. I was preparing myself for a 10% pay cut, which they had done to me 2 years earlier. I was in such a good mood, that I really wasn't too upset about that.
The first thing they said to me was that they were having to lay off 4 people, and that I was one of them. I couldn't believe it. The junior high ministry was basically one of the only ministries in the church that was growing and the only one doing any kind of ministry outside of the walls of the church building.
The second thing I couldn't believe is that they let me go instead of the high school pastor who had only been there 2 months, who has no experience as a youth minister. He was a volunteer, and he's great, but he has no experience in youth ministry and leading a group the size of the youth ministry at Harvest.
Needless to say, I was pretty hurt by this and angered by it. I disagreed with a lot of the things the pastor was doing, and instead of speaking up, I kept quiet and focused on youth ministry. I think that was my downfall, because many of the other people didn't know me. The men who made the decision to lay me off didn't know what I had been doing for the last 3 years. The new high school pastor had been at the church for 10 years and knew everybody, and everybody liked him.
The crappy thing is that the pastor was responsible for the financial problems due to some poor decisions on his part. The executive pastor is just as responsible because he was just a glorified "yes man" who tried to make the bad decisions work instead of fighting against them. Because of their work about 25 people have been laid off in the course of a couple of months, because they closed the school down in October.
So, now I am looking for new ministry to be a part of. I think this is actually going to be a blessing because I'm getting out of there. It's been a while since I trusted the senior pastor's leadership. And really should someone be on a church's staff when they don't trust the senior pastor. I had been struggling with that for a while. The only thing is that I can't imagine a better group of youth or of youth workers. They were amazing. I know God is still going to bless the youth ministry because of the workers that are there. I'm going to miss the kids and the volunteers a lot.
So, now I'm a stay-at-home dad looking for a new ministry to become a part of. We're praying that God will lead us back to California. We haven't heard much yet because churches are super busy this time of the year with Christmas extravaganzas, so I imagine the job search will heat up after the New Year.
I'm going to keep this blog up, mainly for myself, to give me something to do. I'll talk about the job search and the things Parker and I get ourselves into. If you are reading this, I hope that you will become a follower of the blog, just so I'll know if anybody is ever reading the stuff that I post.
Hope you guys are having a great Christmas so far.

They're Coming to Your Town!!!

2008-11-19T08:19:00.000-08:00

I read a post from the Friendly Atheist about a video from the American Family Association called "They're Coming to Your Town." Here's the description of the video:

Residents of the small Arkansas town of Eureka Springs noticed the homosexual community was growing. But they felt no threat. They went about their business as usual. Then, one day, they woke up to discover that their beloved Eureka Springs, a community which was known far and wide as a center for Christian entertainment--had changed. The City Council had been taken over by a small group of homosexual activists.

The Eureka Springs they knew is gone. It is now a national hub for homosexuals. Eureka Springs is becoming the San Francisco of Arkansas. The story of how this happened is told in the new AFA DVD “They’re Coming To Your Town.”

One of the first actions of the homosexual controlled City Council was to offer a “registry” where homosexuals could register their unofficial “marriage.” City Council member Joyce Zeller said the city will now be promoted, not as a Christian resort, but a city “selling peace, relaxation, history and sex.”

AFA’s “They’re Coming ToYour Town” documents the story of how and why this happened. And how homosexual activists plan to do the same in other towns.

Order a copy of “They’re Coming To Your Town.” Watch it. Then take the 28-minute DVD and share it with your Sunday School class and local church. This is a story the liberal media will never tell, but one you need to know.

This makes me sad in my stomach. I watched the trailer for this video and it was a scare tactic. It was like homosexuals are more dangerous than terrorists in Afghanistan. I believe the Bible. I trust what God says, but I don't see where God says we are to live in fear. Do you believe that God is bigger than any political agenda? I do. I believe also that God wants us to love people, so when we start making an "us vs. them" mentality, that separates us and shows hatred. I know it's not intended to be hatred, but I feel that's how it comes across.

And even though I don't want my son being taught some of the things in school that are against the Bible, I feel there is a right way and a wrong way to go about it. Making a video as though homosexuals are an evil group coming to overtake your city is ridiculous. It's like they are a bunch of extraterrestrials who are coming to take over the planet. I guess I've ranted long enough.

hit to Friendly Atheist

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-11-17T09:01:00.000-08:00

Yesterday morning was a good Sunday morning. It was a little weird and different, but it was good. I started with a game where kids had to come up to the front and stand behind a hook that was hanging from the ceiling. It was a big fish hook, and I covered the sharp end with gum, so they wouldn't stab their eyes out. Then we put donuts on the hook and the point was to see who could eat the most donut without having it fall off the hook. It was fun watching them try to eat it.

Nathan led worship and did a totally unplugged set. They didn't have microphones or their guitars plugged in. It was quiet, but it was really cool because you were able to hear the kids singing. Usually the music is so loud you can't hear people singing, but yesterday, you could really hear the kids singing. It was awesome.

Charles brought the message, and he talked about living as a child of the king. If God is the king, and He is our father, then that would make us princes, so we should live as princes. So often, we live outside of God's kingdom as someone who shouldn't even be in the kingdom at all. He used an example from the Lion King. Simba believed lies that his uncle told him, and he ended up leaving his kingdom. He ate grubs and bugs instead of the meals that a prince should eat. Until Rafiki (not sure how to spell that...I guess I could look it up, but whatever) the monkey came and told him to look at the reflection in the water. Simba said he saw himself, and it was nothing. Then the monkey said, "look harder," and then Simba saw his dad, Musafa, in the reflection. Then he went back to reclaim his kingdom.

So often, we believe lies about ourselves that keeps us from living how God wants us to, as His children. When we should see God's reflection when we see ourselves, many times we see nothing.

I think Charles did a good job in bringing this message, and I hope the kids caught what he was saying to them.

New Video

2008-11-13T07:29:00.000-08:00

This is an announcement video that we made last week. For some reason, when I uploaded it to youtube, the background music turned off. But just imagine it with "You're the Best" as the background music from Karate Kid.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-11-13T07:17:00.000-08:00

It's been a long time since I've posted anything. It's been one of those things where I haven't had much to say with a lot of procrastination and busyness. So, I'm planning on making this blog a priority again so that everybody can keep up with what's going on in the junior high ministry and what's going on around here.
Last night, we had Saturate, which is a time of prayer and praise. Gideon led worship and did several songs, and really did a great job. I got up for only a couple of minutes and talked about prayer, and read from Psalm 71. When you feel like you are in a pit and there is no way out, God can and will deliver. If you have a friend who you think feels like they are in a pit, pray for them.
Our student leaders got up and circled the room and made themselves available to pray for kids if they needed it. I think it's awesome when a 6th grader goes up to pray with an 8th grader. I also think it's awesome to see that these kids are going to be so comfortable praying for others at such a young age.
I got to spend some time in prayer with Samantha, who had her house burn down last weekend while we were at the lock-in at Malibu. She lost everything. But this girl is awesome and has such a cool attitude about it all. But it was cool having that prayer time with her. And if you can, please pray for her and her family during this time.

Contest

2008-10-28T12:54:00.000-07:00

Fill in the punch line: I'm going to give a sentence, and then whoever comes up with the best punch line will be the winner.

Question: What did the Oklahoman say to the New Yorker when they came across a kangaroo at the zoo?

Wed. Night Impact

2008-10-24T06:14:00.000-07:00

I was a little disappointed with this Wed. Night. Nathan led worship, and did a great job. It's been tough to find drummers for Wednesdays, but Russ stepped in. He didn't get a chance to rehearse with the band, but he still did a great job. The band was definitely not what I was disappointed with.

I spoke about Sibling Rivalry things. I used the story of Jacob and Esau. Jacob deceived Esau and stole from him and just all-around treated his brother like poop. So, Jacob ran away because he was afraid. Years and years later, Jacob is told by God that he is to come back to him home land, but Jacob is still afraid. When he gets back, Jacob is so afraid and tries to send gifts and apologies to Esau, hoping that will appease Esau. But when Esau sees him, he runs up to him and embraces him and kisses him. Esau had forgiven and forgotten everything Jacob did to him.

My points were that:
1. we need to be humble (don't think of yourselves as better than your siblings)
2. we need to ask for forgiveness
3. we need to be willing to forgive.

I talked about how God wants us to love our family and puts huge emphasis on that. And nothing that bothers us should separate us from our family. It's really a great story, but I don't feel like I did a good job communicating it. I don't think the kids were connected with me. But, they all still had a good time in dodge ball.

Contest

2008-10-21T09:00:00.001-07:00

Another contest on who can come up with the best caption for this picture:

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-10-20T10:44:00.000-07:00

We had a little different Sunday morning. It's something that we've never done since I've been here. We played a game called "Bible Baseball." The kids got to come up and choose whether they wanted a single, double, triple or home run. I would then ask them a question and if they got it right, they would get to advance the number of bases that they got. We did boys against girls, and the boys won. It was a lot of fun. The purpose was to teach the kids different things about the Bible that they may have not known while at the same time they had fun doing it. I also got to talk a little about the importance of the Bible. Now, it may not be important to know the name of the Mountain that Moses walked up when God showed him the promised land (which is Mount Nebo by the way), but it is important to have a love for the scriptures and the things that God cares about.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-10-16T07:10:00.000-07:00

I feel like we had a good Wed. Night Impact last night. My title was "When parents go weird." I gave some examples of my parents and friends parents who went weird. Then I showed why parents go weird...the kids caused them to go weird. I only have a 2 yr. old is pretty good most of the time, but there are other times when he makes us go a little crazy. I'm sure that stuff just happens more often the older they get.

I showed the story of Abraham and Issac, and when Abraham was to sacrifice his son to God. We always look at this from a view that Abraham had such great faith, and we always see it from his point of view. But I took it from Issac's point of view. This kid was carried up a mountain, knowing that they didn't have anything for the sacrifice. They had the wood and fire, but no lamb. Abraham kept telling Issac that "God will provide."

But when they get to the spot there is still no lamb, and then Abraham ties Issac to the altar. Then he raises his knife to slay his son as a sacrifice to God. Most time I've heard this sermon preached, or read about this in commentaries, they make it as though Issac was calm and did whatever his dad wanted. All of the strain and emotion is on Abraham who has to do this horrible act to his son. But I believe Issac was freaking out. I'm sure Abraham had a heck of a time getting him tied to the altar. One, Abraham was over 100 years old and Issac was 12. Two, I have a hard enough time holding Parker down to change his diaper, let alone try to tie a 12 year old up. And once he was tied up, I believe that he was screaming and crying and pleading for his dad to stop. I think he was probably begging for his life. Then a voice came and told Abraham to stop and not touch the boy.

I'm sure Issac was relieved. I'm sure that Issac knew that it was God that had told Abraham to do all of this stuff. But I also believe that it affected Issac's relationship...not to God, but to his father. Issac and Abraham have no more interactions in the Bible after this story. They don't have any conversations. Issac moved away. Abraham didn't even help Issac get a wife, he sent his servant to find him one. I believe Issac loved his father, but I also think this event hurt his relationship with his dad.

Now, when parents go weird and embarrass you or are mean to you, there are 3 things that can happen. First, you can avoid your parents and not really have any relationship with them. Second, you can harbor anger towards them so that every time you see them, it comes back up. Third, you can honor them.

One of the 10 commandments says, "Honor your father and your mother." It doesn't add "only if they treat you right and deserve it." It just ends. So how can we honor our parents.

Ephesians 6:1 says that "Children, obey your parents in the Lord."

So to honor your parents, you have to obey them. Unless they ask you to go smuggle crack into the country or to go and steal bread from orphans, you should obey what your parents say. Even if it's not something that makes sense to you at the time, you should obey your parents.

Second, honor your parents with your words. Instead of back talking, instead of grumbling about them under your breath, instead of complaining about them to your friends, instead of disrespecting them; you should honor them by encouraging them, by telling them you love them. I don't think parents need a pat on the back from their kids and to be told that they're doing a great job, but being pleasant and respectful will go a long way in encouraging parents.

Third, honor them with your actions. Do what you are told without complaining. Clean up after yourself without being asked. Give them hugs. I love getting hugs, but especially from Parker.

Some kids have bad home lives and their parents aren't very honorable. But God still wants us to honor our parents. I think God hates it when somebody hurts a kid, in any way. I think God's heart aches when a kid's heart aches. But I feel that we can't choose our parents, but we can choose to do what is right and honor them.

Sometimes parents will embarrass their kids. Sometimes they'll be mean to their kids. And God still says that we are to honor them with our lives.

Down Syndrome Girl Wins Homecoming Queen

2008-10-16T07:05:00.000-07:00

At first I thought this was a cruel joke, but actually it's really cool what happened at this high school. It's people who are putting away any kind of self-interest and doing what is right and honorable.

Contest

2008-10-15T08:57:00.000-07:00

Here is another contest for coming up a with a caption for these pictures.

Funny Videos

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-10-15T08:40:00.001-07:00

This past Sunday morning we talked about gossip, but not so much gossip as about tearing people down with our words. If you look at almost any comedian, or late night talk show host, all they do is make fun of other people. They say negative things for a laugh. It's easier to do that. It's easier to point out shortcomings than to build people up. It's easier to tear people down than to encourage them. And gossip is one of the things that is used to tear people down.
Gideon led worship and did a great job. Our game was a messy one, which we haven't done a messy one in a long time. We had kids who were seated knee to knee get blindfolded. Then they had to feed each other a cup of pudding. They couldn't see each other's mouth and it was hilarious to watch them try to feed pudding to somebody's neck.
I think it was a pretty good weekend.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-10-09T08:11:00.001-07:00

Last night, I feel we had a great night. Gideon led worship and started with Gorilla/Man/Gun, which the kids always have fun doing. He did a couple of new songs, but the energy seemed to be good during the praise time.

I finished my series on the Fruits of the Spirit by talking about faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Faithfulness means that people see you as trustworthy and when you say you are going to do something, then you are going to do it. Nobody questions you. This should be done in school, chores, sports, or whatever you do. Anything you do, you are going to be honest and you are going to finish, and you are going to give it your best.

Gentleness means that you are gentle. I gave some examples of this, like the mom who kisses a boo-boo and makes it feel better. A dad who gets down and helps his son build a birdhouse or something. People who comfort the sad. And my grandpa, who I really learned a lot about gentleness from last week, who took care of my grandma. (She passed away on Sunday morning and her funeral is going on right now as I type this. Unfortunately I wasn't able to go back for it.) When they brought the hospital bed in for her to basically die in, he told the nurse that it wasn't big enough. The nurse didn't understand since my grandma had gone down to about 85 pounds. My grandpa said to the nurse, "But we're both not going to be able to fit in it." It didn't even cross his mind that she was going to sleep alone. He had a bed in another room about 10 feet away, but instead he pulled up a recliner and slept next to her every night, holding her hand. He's 91, and has aches and pains all over his body, but whenever grandma said anything, he was up and helping her and giving her whatever she needed. He never got frustrated, he was just so gentle with her. I guess I never really saw gentleness as tangible as I did with how my grandpa treated his wife. It was awesome.

Self-Control is staying away from one's desires. Self-control is taught by practice and by discipline. My 2 year old son has no self-control. Whatever he sees he goes for. This kid runs from one thing to the next non-stop. I don't know where he gets the energy. He screams, just for the fun of it, especially when we are out to dinner or at church. He doesn't have the concept of controlling his behavior. So, we have to discipline him, usually time-out or in real bad cases a spanking. He will learn to control himself and that there are some things you can and can't do. Older kids have to discipline themselves. By staying away from something that is wrong, they are developing self-control.

I think it was a good lesson, and I feel the kids understood what I was talking about. I mentioned that living these out is not what makes somebody a Christian, it's your faith in Jesus, but if you have faith in Jesus, these should be evident in our lives.

OU vs. Texas

2008-10-09T08:09:00.001-07:00

Sam Bradford

2008-10-08T08:01:00.000-07:00

I think it can go without saying that I am a huge OU fan. Sam Bradford is the quarterback, and he's a Heisman contender as a sophomore. He's awesome. I read this article and thought I would pass it on, because it was really cool how a kid this young is stepping up to be the right kind of role model, not just for kids, but for Native Americans everywhere. Even if you hate OU (which, if you ask me, is like hating Mother Teresea) you should still read this article.

Oklahoma's Bradford serving as role model

Olin Buchanan
Rivals.com College Football Senior Writer

VIDEO: Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford

Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford completes a lot of passes. And with each one, he further entrenches himself as the most revered player in the nation.



Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford realizes he has become a role model for many.

Actually, he's most revered in several nations – the Choctaw, the Caddo, the Cherokee and many other Native American tribes in Oklahoma and around the country.

The great, great grandson of Susie Walkingstick, a full-blooded Cherokee on his father's side, Bradford, one of two Native Americans on the OU roster (long snapper Derek Shaw is the other), might give Oklahoma its fifth Heisman Trophy. He gives the Sooners a shot at another national championship. And he also gives Native Americans much more than Saturday afternoon glory: He represents hope and possibilities for tribal communities in dire need of both.

"I am aware of that and it's a great opportunity for me," Bradford says. "If I am a positive role model for younger kids, then I think that's great. But it is a little bit (overwhelming) to know so many kids look up to me."

It's not just kids. Dr. Delores Subia BigFoot, director of Indian Country Child Trauma Center on Child Abuse and Neglect in Oklahoma City, doesn't know Bradford personally, but she is among his biggest fans in a state full of them. She holds up Bradford as an example to Native Americans of what can be accomplished with proper support in a positive environment.

"We work in communities where Native youth have a lot of challenges, so seeing someone like Sam excel is incredible," says BigFoot, an enrolled member of the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma. "He's such a great role model for other Native youth. He is steady, he performs well under pressure, he's reliable, he's consistent and he's competitive. He's a great leader, and that's what our youth need."

Bradford is by no means the first Native American college football star. Jim Thorpe, perhaps the greatest college football player ever, was an Oklahoma native from the Sauk tribe. He was an All-America in 1911 and 1912 playing for Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania.

Bradford might be the best player with Native American heritage since Washington quarterback Sonny Sixkiller, who led the nation in passing in 1970 and helped revive a Huskies program that struggled in the '60s.

"I can't tell you how many people have come up to me and said, 'I couldn't get my wife to go to a football game until you played,' " Sixkiller told Rivals.com in 2006.

Bradford surely will gain a similar following. He has been a tremendous leader for the top-ranked and unbeaten Sooners. He has thrown for 1,665 yards and 18 touchdowns, with three interceptions. He's second in the nation in passing efficiency and fifth in passing yards per game.

That's a long list of impressive statistics. But BigFoot also has a list of statistics; hers are sad and depressing.

"There are a lot of things that are going on within our troubled communities that make it difficult for children to be as successful as they could be," she says.

• About 40 percent of Native American children live in poverty.

• Native American children live in single-parent families at the highest rate in the United States.

• Despite making up only 2 percent of the population in the United States, Native Americans make up an estimated 8 percent of the homeless.

• The suicide rate for Native American youths is three times greater than that of Caucasians of similar age.

• Native American children are twice as likely to become victims of child abuse than non-Hispanic Caucasian children.

• Native American youth have higher rates of mental-health and substance-abuse problems than any other ethnic group.

BigFoot says the source of the problems can be traced back more than a century to the loss of land, language and culture that created an environment of despair and cultural genocide. That started destructive cycles, which have been repeated from generation to generation.

Attempting to end that cycle, she makes presentations and provides training sessions across the country. And in those presentations and sessions, she often talks about Bradford, a business major who has a 4.0 grade-point average.

"I promote him all the time," BigFoot says. "Most of the time I'm talking to adults, and I say it would be wonderful if all our children could benefit from the same kind of concern and care that Sam Bradford had. I don't think he was raised in what you would say is a 'traditional' Native environment."

Bradford grew up in an upper-middle class part of Oklahoma City with both of his parents – Kent, a former offensive lineman at Oklahoma, and Martha. He never faced many of the obstacles and issues other Native American youth deal with on a daily basis.

He acknowledges that while growing up he rarely – if ever – thought about his Cherokee heritage.

"It was never really a huge part of my life growing up," Bradford says. "My parents didn't talk to me a lot about it when I was younger. When I got to OU, I heard it was inspirational. But I probably haven't embraced it as much as I'd like to."

That hasn't stopped Native American youth from embracing him. Sequoyah High School in Tahlequah, Okla., is a boarding school owned by the Cherokee nation that serves students in grades 7-12 who are members of Native American tribes.



Even Native Americans who don't consider themselves football fans are keeping a close eye on Bradford.

Brent Scott has been the football coach there for five years. In that time, he has witnessed first-hand many students facing the trials and tribulations BigFoot referenced.

"Everyone in our locker room has an issue, whether it's poverty, a broken home, divorce or whatever it may be," Scott says. "They all have a problem. It's amazing to sit down and listen to some of their stories. I didn't have to go through those things when I was 15 or 16."

Scott said he has 58 players on his roster and that only six have both parents in their homes. Some players' parents are in prison. Some parents are illiterate. Some abuse drugs and alcohol.

"I had a kid score a game-winning touchdown, and his mom and dad weren't there," Scott says. "After the game he told me, 'Coach, I don't know where I can stay tonight.' And you wonder why they have a hard time in school. But we don't let it be a crutch for them. We tell them there are better opportunities, and if they want better opportunities, they can change their situation."

Seeing Bradford excel has made that seem more believable.

"Regardless of whether they're athletes or non-athletes, Sam Bradford gives them something to identify with," Scott says. "They look on television at the NFL or NBA, and some of those things they can't identify with. When it became public that Sam was Cherokee, you could see it in the students that they could identify with him as a role model.

"He gave them an opportunity to see themselves and say, 'I can go to college.' "

Scott says he would like to invite Bradford to speak to the students at Sequoyah because he means so much to them and other Native Americans across Oklahoma. Until then, others such as BigFoot will be talking about him.

"A lot of Indian people, who not necessarily are involved with football, are watching him more and wanting to know more about his performance," BigFoot says. "Even the ones marginally interested in football are highly enthusiastic and ecstatic.

"There is a lot of pride."

Contest

2008-10-07T09:49:00.000-07:00

My blogging has been random. There is no rhyme or reason to my postings. So I'm going to change one thing. Every Tuesday I am going to have a contest. If you win, you will get a prize.
I'm going to start with a picture in need of a caption. Whoever comes up with the wittiest, funniest, most creative caption will win. Here's the picture:

Wed. Night Impact

2008-10-06T13:38:00.001-07:00

Last Wed. we had Saturate which is a night of praise and worship. I give about a 5 to 7 minute little talk to gain a little bit of focus for the night, but the rest is prayer and praise time. We also let some of our jr. high student leaders stand in the back to be there for kids who needed prayer. It was cool to see kids pray with kids. I think we're going to start doing that every time we have Saturate. Nathan led the music because Gideon was feeling a little under the weather. He did a fantastic job. I think this was a great Wed. I also did awesome at dodgeball this week.

Weird Weekend

2008-10-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

I had a pretty weird weekend, but it started last Wed. Last week, I called my mom to see how she was doing (she had surgery on her leg and was in the hospital) She was doing fine, but my dad got on the phone and told me that my grandma was not doing good and if we wanted to see her again, we should come up there soon. She had been on dialysis and said she wasn't going to take it anymore. So, we decided to go up there over the weekend. So, we were all ready to leave on Thursday, but on Wed. my car got broken into. And it was in the middle of the church parking lot. I just happened to see the guy so we made a police report, but he stole my iPod and a gift that I had in the car for my nephew and niece.
I had some other things go on that I really don't want to get in to that much (like I nailed a dog in my car somewhere outside of Wichita Falls). But we got up to Oklahoma City and had a pretty good tie considering what we were going up there for. We saw my grandma, but she didn't remember who I was, but she remembered Parker and Suzy. Weird! We hung out with my brother and his family a lot. He has a son who is about 6 weeks younger than Parker so they played a lot. We also took them all out to a Pumpkin patch that had a petting zoo, pony rides, hay rides, and a corn maze. They loved it.
We saw grandma again on Saturday, and she wasn't looking very good. She couldn't stay awake. We knew it was just a matter of time. She passed away on Sunday morning around 3 a.m. We had to leave around 7 to come back to Texas. It's sad, but she's been sick for years and we have been preparing for it for a while. I'm sadder about my grandpa having to be alone after being married for 60 or so years.
On the way home, we picked up Suzy's brother and sister in Dallas who decided over the weekend to come out for a visit, which added to the weirdness. I'm happy they came and think it will be a fun visit, but it was just all pretty sudden. Anyways, that's pretty much what happened over the last couple of days.

Hoops of Hope

2008-09-30T10:27:00.000-07:00

On November 30, the junior high ministry is participating in Hoops of Hope, which is an organization that helps to raise money for AIDS affected orphans in Africa. It's similar to a walk-a-thon where people go out and get donations, but instead of walking, we take free-throws. In fact, we take 1,000 free throws. I'm going to participate with the kids, and my goal is to raise $1,000. I figure I'll make around 300 free-throws of the 1000, which means I have to get enough people to get $3.33 per shot. If you would like to support me and give a quarter or dime for each shot I make, that would be wonderful. If you would like to support by giving a set amount, like $10, that would be great. I put a link on my blog that you can donate to, and I've created a first givings account that you can donate to which is www.firstgiving.com/johncampbell. Or, you can just let me know and I can write it down, whichever way is easiest for you guys. But it's a great way to help people around the world.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick's Rules

2008-09-30T09:06:00.000-07:00

I read this book in it's entirety on our plane ride to New Jersey. It was a real quick, real easy read. It still has a lot of the same characters and the same humor as the first one. It more focuses on the relationship with his older brother, Roderick, who can be tormenting to his little brother. I liked the first one better, but there were still some parts that were super funny and I would still recommend it to anybody who works with Jr. Highers or who is a junior higher, or if you're sense of humor stopped maturing around 6th grade.

Yo Gabba Gabba

2008-09-30T08:52:00.000-07:00

This is one of my favorite "kiddie" shows that I watch with Parker. It was started by a guy who is the singer of a band I listened to about 10 years ago, the Aquabats. Check them out by the way. But they get a lot of cool stuff and cool people to come and be a part of the show. Way better than Telletubbies.

Homeless Ministry Pictures

2008-09-29T14:04:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from Saturday's homeless ministry. We had a great time, and the kids did a great job. They all worked hard and were great about initiating conversations with the people who live under the bridge.

Vacation

2008-09-29T12:49:00.000-07:00

Suzy, Parker and I had a great vacation. Suzy's parents live in New Jersey, just outside of New York City, and we flew up there on a Wed. There is a lot of Asian food that Suzy misses, so the first thing we did after we got off the plane was go to this Korean community and eat some Korean food. We mostly just hung around Suzy's house that day, and saw some of her friends.
The next day, we went to New York and saw the Yankees play. That was awesome, because it was the 4th to last game ever at Yankee Stadium. We were in the same place where Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio, Babe Ruth, and Lou Gehrig had played. I don't like the Yankees, but it was cool to be there to see a game. They played the White Sox so I also got to see Ken Griffey Jr. play.
Early Friday morning Suzy and I left for Boston. I had never been up there, so we decided to take a little rode trip. Parker got to stay with the grandparents, and Suzy and I had a little getaway, so it was a win-win. We ate lunch at Cheers, and then did some of the tourist stuff. We ate with Suzy's cousin who goes to Boston College. Boston is now my 2nd favorite city of all time behind San Francisco.
Saturday we drove up to Maine. We stopped in New Hampshire for lunch in Portsmouth, which was a pretty cool little town. Maine was beautiful. We went and saw a lighthouse and hung out on the beach. I couldn't believe that they had surfers in Maine. The waves were about the size of waves in Texas, so nobody was riding them for very long, but there were a lot of them out there. I could have stayed there for a few days, I really loved it. We ate at this little seafood place that was recommended to us. Suzy had a 2.5 lb. lobster. It was humongous. And she ate it all. We stayed the night in New Hampshire and came back to Jersey that night.
The next day we spent the day in New York City. We went to the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs. Then we went to the David Letterman show. It was pretty cool, but if you ever go, just be prepared to stand in line for 3 hours. I was so tired of lines by the time we actually got into the theater. But Dave made up for it, he was hilarious. Bill Clinton and Chris Rock were the guests. Chris Rock is super-funny. Bill was pretty interesting too, but I wished Chris was on more. Bill took up so much time that Dave didn't even do a Top 10 list.
Later that night we went to Little Italy and ate with a kid who was in a church I helped out at in Novato, CA. He goes to NYU now, and that was one of the best parts of my trip, hanging out with him. He caught me up on everything going on in his world and with his family. It was great seeing him.
We got back to Jersey late that night, and we had to leave the next morning to come back to Texas. I wish it could have lasted another few weeks (not so much staying with my in-laws, but staying up in New England). The leaves were starting to change colors, the weather was awesome, and there is so much that I've never seen up there. It was a great trip.

Here are some pictures:

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-09-29T12:44:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning was an above average Sunday Morning. We had very good attendance. Nathan led worship, and did a great job. Our game was fun. We had 2 kids from each grade and gender come up. I gave them each 20 lifesavers, and one of the kids had to lick the lifesaver and stick it to the other's face. It was a lot of fun. The 6th grade girls were the winners.
We finished our series on wisdom. I told some stories off of the Darwin Awards website, and showed how important it is to have wise friends who will keep you from doing foolish things. My small group had a great time, and we talked a lot about how important it is to have wise friends and watch out for the foolish ones. And we defined wisdom as somebody who knows the difference between right and wrong and chooses to do right. I think my 7th grade boys have a pretty good grasp of this, although they think being foolish is a lot more fun.

Wed Night Impact

2008-09-29T12:34:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've kept up with my blog because of vacation and a few other things. I'm going to try to catch up on a bunch of it this afternoon. So, going back to last Wed, we are continuing our series on the Fruit of the Spirit b talking about patience, kindness and goodness.
Patience is something that I struggle with. I use to think I had a lot of patience, but that was before I was married and had a 2 year old. I was also living in a place that didn't have much traffic. When I moved into a place with a ton of traffic, and got married and had a son who cries a lot, then I started to get a more realistic idea of the fact that I have very little patience. Unfortunately, the Bible says the way you get patience is by trials. The more you go through, the more that patience grows in you. I was actually tested (at least I feel like it was a test) when I was on the airplane coming back from Newark. I had a 2 yr. old next to me, and one behind me. Parker did pretty good. He got a little grumpy towards the end of the trip, but for the most part did a great job. But the 2 yr. old behind me decided he was going to see how long and how high and how loud he could scream, and did it for most of the 3 hour ride. Fortunately, I had enough self-control that I didn't cram an apple down his throat and see how far off the wing I could bounce him. I just turned my iPod up. But, I think it's little things like that where God builds patience. I know people who don't pray for patience because they don't want to go through the process. I know people who pray for patience, Right NOW! It seems like God likes the process more than the end result, and wants to use things to build you. He could wave some sort of magic wand and give you a lot of patience, but I think He enjoys the process of building us.
Kindness: I just talked about how we are to show kindness, even to the people we don't choose to be kind too. We can be kind to total strangers when we choose to be. But we can feel validated of not showing kindness to the guy who cuts in line at a movie, or a guy who cuts us off on the road. It seems to me that kindness is something that is to flow out of us.
Goodness means consistently choosing to do good. We are going to obey God and do what He wants. We are going to try to do good for others and have other's well-being in mind too.
I think it was a good week overall.

David Letterman

2008-09-16T19:15:00.001-07:00

Suzy, Parker and I are going on vacation tomorrow. We're going up to New Jersey to visit her parents, but while we are there we're going to get to do some other cool stuff. Thursday night we're going to see the Yankees play. It's cool because it's the 4th to the last game ever played at Yankee stadium. Their building a new stadium for next year.

On Friday, we're going up to Boston to hang out. Saturday, we're going up to New Hampshire and Maine. Suzy really wants a fresh lobster. I want to go to Maine. I've never really been to New England. I've been into Connecticut and New York and New Jersey, but nothing else.

But, the best comes on Monday night. We got tickets to David Letterman. So make sure you look for us on Monday night. When I set up the DVR for it, the info said that the scheduled guest is Chris Rock. That should be pretty cool. Friday, Robin Williams is going to be there, so that would have been cool if he was there on Monday instead. Then Monday night we're going to eat with one of my old youth who goes to NYU. I think this guy is awesome, and I haven't seen him since my wedding, so it'll be cool to hang out with him for a little while and catch up.

Then we come back on Tuesday. It's going to be good getting out of Texas for a little bit and getting some rest. See you next week.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-09-16T19:10:00.000-07:00

This past Sunday was a pretty good Sunday. We're continuing our series on wisdom. Gideon led worship and did a great job. Our game was an oldie but goodie. Six kids came up and they had a bunch of "Smartees" on a plate. They had a straw and had to suck the candy on the straw and place them in a cup. The first one to finish would be the winner. The 6th grade boys won.
We talked about why we should have wisdom. The main reason is to keep us from doing stupid stuff. My small group talked a lot about consequences of stupidity, and how wisdom can keep you from making those choices. God has our best interest in mind. He loves us and doesn't want us to get hurt. He doesn't make laws so we can't have fun, but to let us have life to the fullest. If we follow his ways, and search for wisdom, we won't have to suffer the consequences of living foolishly (like a broken leg after jumping off the roof of your house).

The Shack

2008-09-12T12:38:00.001-07:00

I just finished this book. It only took me a couple of days to read it. It's the story about a man who has an encounter with God. It was a really amazing story. It helped me think about what it means to be in relationship with God. I say I have one, but when I think about it...it's broken at best. There were a couple of things that I am concerned about. The author speaks as God, and says things as though God is saying them about himself. None of it was unbiblical, however, I could sense a lot of Western, post-modern philosophy in God's words. I don't want to take anything away from the book, I think it was great, but we can't put our philosophies and cultures onto God because God is above that. But in any circumstance, whether it's a book, or a movie, or a sermon, or a conversation, we need to be careful to back truth we speak up with Scripture.
So, as far as this book, "The Shack," goes, I can only say 2 more words about it: READ IT!

America's Favorite City

2008-09-12T08:56:00.000-07:00

Travel and Leisure Magazine is having a contest to see which city is America's favorite city. They've divided the cities into brackets, and people get to vote for which city they like better. Right now San Antonio is going up against Seattle. San Antonio is going to need some help to beat them, and if they do beat Seattle, it has to go up against San Francisco. I think it's kinda fun, and if you'd like to vote for your favorite cities go here.

America's Favorite Cities 2008

Slam

2008-09-11T13:38:00.001-07:00

"Slam" is a book by Nick Hornby, who also wrote one of my favorite movies (High Fidelity). It's about a 15 yr. old boy who idolizes Tony Hawk and all he wants to do in his life is skate. He does the typical teenage things with the typical teenage friends. He's got his skater friends, and he's got his girlfriend, who he feels he couldn't live without, even for a few hours. Until a couple of weeks later, when he grows tired of her always being around. Then several weeks later, she informs him that she is pregnant and he is the father.
The rest of the book is the thoughts and actions of a kid who is trying to come to grips with the end of his childhood and, in essence, his dreams to become a father. I think it dealt with the emotions of a boy in that situation as good as it could have been done. I didn't always like what the boy did, but I understood where he was coming from.
I think this was a fun story with some great, real-life experiences. And Tony Hawk actually has a big role in this book...in a way. But I'll let you read the book to figure out what that means.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-09-11T09:11:00.000-07:00

Last night I continued speaking on the Fruits of the Spirit. I've broken it down into three sections, so I'm going to cover 3 of the fruits in each of the talks. So, last night I spoke about love, joy, and peace.
Living a life of love. Love should flow out of us onto others. That sounds nice and makes people happy. But is that really possible. What about when somebody hurts you? What about when somebody hurts your family? In October of 2006, a man went in to an Amish school, tied up the kids, and then murdered five of them, before committing suicide. The Amish community was devastated. But here's how they reacted. First, they went to the killer's family and forgave them. They comforted the family for THEIR loss. One of the Amish fathers hugged the killer's crying father for an hour. They also set up a Charitable fund for the killer's family. Yes, they were sad, but they had so much compassion and love...and they extended it out even to the family of the man who hurt them and their community so much. THAT IS LOVE. That's crazy love. But, I admire that and hope that one day I can be there. It's easy for me to love people as long as they behave and don't hurt me or my family. Honestly, right now, I can't imagine forgiving a person who could hurt and kill my son. Really, I don't even want to think about it. But I feel that this is a love that we are to strive for, a love that goes beyond ourselves.
Living a life of Joy. I Thessalonians 5:16 says "Be joyful always." How is that possible when your life begins to turn into a country song. Your dog ran away, your friends betray you, you lose your job. Joy DOES NOT equal happiness. Joy is a lifestyle. Christian joy doesn't mean that you have to go around whistling Zip-a-dee-do-da out your rear end (taken from Christmas Vacation). Christian joy is the result of the triumph of faith over the hard circumstances in our life. It comes from trust that God is going to take care of us and that He loves us. It comes from the hope that he is going to fulfill all of His promises to us. So, even though we are going through a hard time, we will still have a joyful heart.
Living a life of peace. This "peace" means a calmness with God. It comes from our faith in Jesus, and because of that faith, God doesn't have to hold any sin against us. We have peace with him. And out of that peace with God, we should pass it on to others. So, what if somebody just keeps coming up to you and keeps giving you a hard time, treating you worse than a rat. Where it would be easier to get into a fight than to continue to take abuse. We are to live peaceful.
Now, these are fruit that should be evident in Believers. They're not easy. They're way easier to read about or sing about than to live out. But God is going to give us the strength for it. God is going to take care of us. So, when we come to a trying circumstance, and we're tempted to act out of our emotion or flesh, we have to choose to live by the Spirit.
I added a lot of funny stories to make it a little lighter. I talked about people in my life who I see walk by the Spirit, so that the kids know that it is possible to live out the fruits of the Spirit even when it seems impossible. I think it was a good Wed. night.

Child Turns Mom in for Driving Drunk

2008-09-10T13:40:00.000-07:00

This is a very sad video about kids having to turn their parents in for driving drunk. It makes me sad that some kids have to be responsible for their parents' actions. I put this video up because I think it is interesting, and I pray that something happens that will help their parents see that they need to take care of their children.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-09-10T11:48:00.000-07:00

We had a pretty good Sunday morning. First, Jiggawatt started, which is a game where each small group tries to get points for their team. They can get points by bringing their Bibles, bringing friends, winning our game, and a few other things. After one day, the 7th grade girls are in first place.
Gideon led worship and did a great job. Our game was the Mummy game, where each grade had three people come up and they were given 4 rolls of toilet paper. Then they had to wrap one of the people in their group into a mummy. When they finished all 4 rolls, then they had to run to the back of the youth room and grab some plastic sunglasses and put them on their mummy. The first one to do this was the winner. The 8th grade boys won the game.
We began a new series on wisdom. Wisdom is knowing the difference between right and wrong and continually choosing to do right. Even very intelligent people can give unwise advice. I talked about some unwise things that I had done as a kid (like jumping off roofs of houses). The beginning of wisdom starts at having a fear of God. This isn't like a fear of clowns, it's like a respect and reverence at the awesomeness of God. I'm excited about this series, and we had some great discussion in my small group that morning.

Not For Sale

2008-09-04T10:19:00.001-07:00

Not for Sale is a non-profit organization that I support. This was a note that they sent out the other day, and I thought that I would pass it along. If you can't support financially, please be in prayer for these kids in Peru.

Urgent Need for Shelter in Lima for Kids

Recently, the Not For Sale team in Peru met a girl named Veronica in need of a haven from traffickers. Unable to house her, the team had to release Veronica back to the streets. One week later, her tiny body was found in a hotel room, strangled to death by one of the men she'd been forced to have sex with.

Veronica's death serves as a reminder of the real danger children face on the streets of Lima. Not for Sale is building an emergency shelter and safe house in Lima, to be named "Veronica's House" in her honor. We are determined to save Veronica's peers from a similar fate, while offering them a better life in the process. Our shelter will be a haven for twenty teens to live and thrive, safe from the threat of traffickers.

But Not for Sale needs your help to raise $50,00 in one month. Partner with us in this effort by making a donation today!

https://secure.webconnex.com/not...

Two separate donors have promised to match every gift you make up to $1000...so give today and TRIPLE THE VALUE OF YOUR GIFT.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-09-04T10:15:00.001-07:00

Last night we had Saturate, which is a time of prayer and praise. Gideon led us in an extended time of worship through songs. I gave a couple of minute talk about desiring God. I read from Psalm 63, and how the psalmist couldn't wait to see God and spend time with God. It was like when you are at the bottom of the pool and you start to run out of breath, and you have to swim up to the surface. Your lungs start hurting and you're not sure if you're going to make it, and then you do and that breath is so sweet. Our desire for God should be like our desire for that breath. I know in my own life, it's not always like that. The kids took a few minutes to focus on Jesus, and tell him how much they love him. Gideon finished the night with a few more songs. It was a very good Wed. night.

Montgomery Flea Market

2008-09-03T12:56:00.000-07:00

Here is the greatest commercial ever made. This video has gone around a lot. I saw it for the first time about 2 years ago. But I thought I should put it up because I just watched it again and fell in love all over again.

Here is a spoof my friend Ryan did.

Parker...2 years later

2008-09-02T13:08:00.000-07:00

We celebrated Parker's 2 year birthday on Monday. I can't believe he's already 2. Here are the my Top 13 favorite Parker moments.

1. One day I was getting him some breakfast and he came in and closed the refrigerator and started hopping around saying "woo hoo!" It was the first time I heard him say "woo hoo." It was hilarious.

2. One day I was playing with him, and I started jumping, and he would laugh and laugh. Then he started trying to jump. Now he just jumps around all the time. Anytime he's happy he jumps around.

3. Parker was in a school program and he was supposed to stand on a step, but he got bored and started walking around the stage and dancing and smiling at everybody.

4. One day he was jumping in his little jumper, and I was putting his car seat together. He was crying a little bit, and then I looked over at him, and he had pooped down his leg and was jumping up and down in it. I had to clean the poop out of his toenails.

5. When he started learning animals sounds. It's hilarious to see him roar like a bear or a dinosaur. Parker making a sound like a horse is hysterical.

6. At his birthday party, he figured out that he could jump into the pool and his floaties would keep him up. He must have climbed out and jumped into the pool 20 times, and every time he would yell, "YEA."

7. When he was a little baby, he would crawl over to me and fart in my face and crawl away laughing.

8. When he started talking back to the t.v. He mostly does in on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Veggie Tales. And anytime the credits start coming he says, "Bye bye" and "see ya later."

9. At his first birthday party we gave him a cake. He hadn't eaten any sugar really before that. At first he wasn't sure if he was going to like it and he put just a little bit in his hand and took a bite. And it was as if he discovered some kind of extraordinary greatness. He devoured that cake.

10. The first time he said "da da." At the time he was just making sounds so I'm still not sure if it was directed towards me, but I tell Suzy that he said "da da" first.

11. Every morning he wakes up, and I say "I love you" and he tries to say it back and gives me a hug.

12. The first time he held my finger the day he was born.

13. When I first got to hold him after they cleaned him on the day he was born. He was so little, and I felt like I could have tossed him through the ceiling when I lifted him because I wasn't expecting him to be so lite.

We really do have an awesome kid, and I know that we are blessed to have Parker in our lives. I just hope we don't screw him up.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-09-02T08:57:00.000-07:00

I think this was a pretty good week. It was the first week that the new 6th graders got to go into their small groups. It was also Jerry's last day with us. His son, Josh, led worship for us.
We played a game that I made up. It was called Simon Says Extreme. Basically, it was "Simon Says" but we added a twist. I gave a couple of guys nerf balls. They soaked them in a water bucket, and then chunked them at kids. If the kid dodged the ball or caught the ball, then they would be out because Simon didn't say catch the ball or dodge. Most of the kids just took it. It ended up not going as well as I had hoped. I think next time we need to make the water balls wetter. I had the guys squish most of the water out of them before they threw them. But it was fun.
Our lesson was about speaking truth. So many times people think that there are several ways to get to heaven. No one has the right truth. So how do we talk to people about truth without putting their defensives up. Jesus spoke about difficult truths, and used everyday things that everybody knew about to explain them. We used the passage from John, where Jesus said that he was the "bread of life." I think it went pretty good. My small group seemed to understand and had a good concept of the teaching and the scripture. So overall, I think it was a good week.

Donald Miller Prayer at Democratic Party

2008-08-28T09:33:00.000-07:00

Donald Miller closed one of the nights with prayer. I think a lot of Donald Miller, and I love his books. I think it was cool that he had this opportunity. The sound cuts out for a minute though.

Here's the full prayer from his website.

"Father God,

This week, as the world looks on, help the leaders in this room create a civil dialogue about our future.

We need you, God, as individuals and also as a nation.

We need you to protect us from our enemies, but also from ourselves, because we are easily tempted toward apathy.

Give us a passion to advance opportunities for the least of these, for widows and orphans, for single moms and children whose fathers have left.

Give us the eyes to see them, and the ears to hear them, and hands willing to serve them.

Help us serve people, not just causes. And stand up to specific injustices rather than vague notions.

Give those in this room who have power, along with those who will meet next week, the courage to work together to finally provide health care to those who don’t have any, and a living wage so families can thrive rather than struggle.

Hep us figure out how to pay teachers what they deserve and give children an equal opportunity to get a college education.

Help us figure out the balance between economic opportunity and corporate gluttony.

We have tried to solve these problems ourselves but they are still there. We need your help.

Father, will you restore our moral standing in the world.

A lot of people don’t like us but that’s because they don’t know the heart of the average American.

Will you give us favor and forgiveness, along with our allies around the world.

Help us be an example of humility and strength once again.

Lastly, father, unify us.

Even in our diversity help us see how much we have in common.

And unify us not just in our ideas and in our sentiments—but in our actions, as we look around and figure out something we can do to help create an America even greater than the one we have come to cherish.

God we know that you are good.

Thank you for blessing us in so many ways as Americans.

I make these requests in the name of your son, Jesus, who gave his own life against the forces of injustice.

Let Him be our example.

Amen."

Wed. Night Impact

2008-08-28T06:52:00.000-07:00

Last night, I feel like we had a great night. It was Jerry's last Wed., and he just went around hanging out with kids. Gideon led worship. He's going to be taking over for good with Jerry leaving. He did a very good job. Michaela was his other singer, and she sounded great. It was the best I've ever heard her.
I spoke about the Fruits of the Spirit. The scripture was Galatians 5:16-26. First, the sinful nature and living by the Spirit have different goals. The sinful nature puts the self first and doesn't think about others. Living by the Spirit goes over what is best for you and what is best for others.
We went through some of the things that you do when living by the sinful nature. Some of them seem like fun. Some of them seem easier. For instance, it's easier to be jealous of somebody than to be happy for somebody. Because being happy for somebody means that you have to put the other person.
Then we went through the fruits of the Spirit. These should be evident in our lives. When we accepted Jesus as savior and made him the Lord of our lives, our sinful nature died. We are no longer slaves to that. We can't use that as an excuse, "well, I'm going to do these things because I'm a sinner." No, God will help us. It doesn't mean that we aren't going to sin. We're never going to be perfect. God knows this. If we were able to be perfect, that's what he would expect from us. If we were able to be perfect, then there was no sense in sending Jesus to die on the cross. He shows us crazy grace, but it's not a license to sin. I think we have a responsibility to try to live out the Fruits of the Spirit.
So, I ended with challenging them to see how they can make these more evident in their lives. How can they be more patient with the teacher who is driving them crazy? How can they show kindness to the kid that treats them bad? How can they show gentleness to the little brother or sister who is going to give them a brain seizure because they are bothering them so much?

Then we played a big game of dodgeball, and the new 6th graders kept getting me out. I was taking it easy on them...NOT ANYMORE!

Random Thoughts

2008-08-27T12:35:00.000-07:00

These are just some random thoughts I've been having lately based on some conversations I've been a part of.

First, why do people get so upset when somebody disagrees with them theologically (not something prime, but a secondary theology). People can think 2 separate ways on a specific outlook on God and they can be totally opposites. Both sides can back up their thoughts with Scripture. And instead of getting along, people get so mad and defensive. I know it's because they take their faith in God so seriously, but some things are spelled out word for word in the Bible. Maybe some things that we take so seriously in the Bible aren't in there because God would rather us take the things He did spell out in the Bible more seriously. For instance, that whole loving the orphans and widows thing.

Second, does my one vote really matter. More than likely, my state is going to go for McCain (I'm still not sure which way I'm going to go for this year). When I was in California, the state went for Gore and for Kerry. My vote or Bush really didn't matter. If you know already which way a state is going to go, and you disagree, does your vote really matter at all. It means more I guess in the states where it could go either way like in Ohio or Florida. This came after talking to a friend who said he didn't want to vote because he didn't like either choice.

Why do girls get perfume that smells like flowers. I've never really smelled a perfume fragrance that I liked. If they made perfume smell like rain, freshly mowed grass, or chocolate chip cookies, I think guys would like it better.

When do you get to that age when you don't get to say what you're going to be when you grow up. I have a friend who is 42 and keeps talking about what he's going to do when he grows up. I'm like, dude, you should be there.

I'm excited about college football starting this weekend. I just hope that it's as exciting as last year. Teams I want to win: OU, Cal, Michigan, Oregon, Penn State, Rutgers. Teams I want to lose: Texas, Texas Tech, USC, Missouri, Boise State, LSU, Florida, Notre Dame, Kansas.

13 Best College Team Nicknames

2008-08-26T10:01:00.000-07:00

Here is my list of the best team names for colleges. Some have great names, others have common names that are just like everybody else's. Did you know there were 74 different colleges with the nickname Eagles. There are 47 tigers. So, these are unique, funny, or just interesting team names.

13. Tulsa Golden Hurricanes. The reason this team made the list is because there hasn't been a hurricane within 1500 miles of Tulsa. But it all seems to be o.k. because they added "golden" at the front that people forget Tulsa is no where near an ocean. By the way, it's interesting how many schools will add "golden" in front of their team name to make it a little bit better. "We're the Golden Toads." Yeah that makes it a lot better than just being The Toads. ("toads" is another fun word to say)

12. New England Noreasterns. They were going for the regional name. They even used the regional dialect to come up with this team. I think it would be fun to come up with cheers for this team.

11. Presbyterian Blue Hose. I don't know what this means, but I like it.

10. Amherst Lord Jeffs. It was named after some Lord Jeffrey. I wonder what the mascot looks like. The cheers for this school's team must be great too.

9. Lincoln Memorial Railsplitters. This is a unique name, and at the same time kinda strikes the fear into the heart of the opponent. They seem mean.

8. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Stags. I think "stags" is a good name for a team. It's a fun word to say and the ideas for cheers are infinite.

7. Kent State Golden Flashes. Again with the golden. There are 2 things I think of when I think of flash. One involves a camera. The other involves something else. What are they teaching these kids over there at Kent State.

6. St. Bonaventure Bonnies. You'd have to be tough to play for a team called the Bonnies. You'd have to be pretty tough to even suggest the name Bonnies to the group who was coming up with team's name. I would have loved to have seen the football coach's face when he found out that his team's name was the Bonnies.

5. Scottsdale Artichokes. Hey, our team name is something that you put on pizza.

4. Rhode Island School of Design Nads. "Nads" was a word we used for a specific part of our bodies when I was a kid, and these design kids decided to use that as their team name...and they got away with it. Somebody is out there chuckling every time they see the logo.

3. Campbell Fighting Camels. One, this college is named after me. Second, they became the camels because it almost sounds like Campbell. Camels aren't tough, so they added "fighting" in front of it to make them sound vicious.

2. Arkansas Tech Wonder Boys. OK, any team called the Wonder Boys is ok with me. I think it's hilarious.

1. Oklahoma Sooners. This is the best team name, because they are my favorite team. You may disagree with me on this one, but I don't care, you can make up your own list on your own blog.

Runners Up: Bluefield State Big Blues, Brooklyn Bridges, Central Missouri Mules, Delaware Fighting Blue Hens, Gustavus Adolphus Golden Gusties, Lebanon Valley Flying Dutchmen, MIT Engineers,

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-08-25T12:40:00.000-07:00

We had a pretty good Sunday Morning. It was a little different though this week. We started with a game, "Toe Fencing," where two people grab hands and they have to step on the other person's toe. The first one to do that wins. When they get going it looks like a fun little dance. We keep going until everybody has been eliminated. Dane was the winner yesterday.
Nathan led worship and did a good job. He did a few new songs that were pretty cool.
Instead of having a message we had the kids who went to Mission Impact give their testimonies. They talked about the fun stuff and how they helped people. Mostly it seemed like the kids enjoyed going to the Baptist Children's Home the most. They also liked playing BINGO at the assisted living facility. It's cool to see how they saw God working through them that week. In High School the kids seemed to like the Food Bank the best, even though they were the ones who had to go through the nasty food with spiders and maggots in it. It's interesting how the kids from different ages liked different things.

I can name all the countries in Asia

2008-08-24T20:23:00.000-07:00

I admit I had to get some help with the spelling of a few, so I did it a couple of times to get it this fast because I couldn't remember how to spell kazakhstan or Kyrgyzstan.

I can name 49 Asian countries in 1m 54s

Click here to Play

13 Best Rock-n-Roll Band Names

2008-08-24T18:18:00.000-07:00

I really like music. There are a million bands out there and I think it's interesting to see how bands come up with their names. Some bands have boring names, like Dave Matthews Band (they're a great band, just a boring name). But others have super creative names, and here is my list of the Top 13.

13. Mark Needs a Chick. This was a punk band out of Dallas. I think the whole idea was to get this Mark guy a girl friend. They were Christians, and actually had a pretty cool sound. But you'd be super lucky to find any music from these guys anymore. They were around about 10 years ago.

12. Stunt Monkey. This is a punk band out of San Jose. Really, I like this name because it has "monkey" in it. They are a good band and have some great songs on their album. (The Arctic Monkeys could go here as well).

11. The Ataris. This name goes great with this band. They sing a lot about nostalgia things from when they were kids, from hooking up at the skating rink to watching Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. So naming themselves after an 80's gaming system goes along with these guys perfectly.

10. ...and they will know us by the trail of dead. I think this is a creative name, because usually you only have 2 or 3 words in a band's name, and this one has 1o. I'm not sure how they came up with it, but I think it's cool.

9. Big Head Todd. Every time I hear this band's name I get a little chuckle. I imagine a guy with an inflated head walking around saying, "Hi, I'm Todd." Todd's a funny name.

8. Weezer. Great name for a great band. These guys are the epitome of nerd rock. Rivers is the biggest nerd in rock-n-roll which makes him one of the coolest guys at the same time.

7. Me First and the Gimmie Gimmes. This is a band that only plays cover songs. All of the members are in other bands and this is their side project. I just think the name is awesome.

6. G Love and the Special Sauce. Doesn't just the name of this band make you want to go and download their album. These guys are a lot of fun, and they have a super fun name.

5. Big D and The Kids Table. Again, they just have a fun name. They have so much fun on stage too. It fits them.

4. Rage Against the Machine. Good name and it fits the band. These guys were always mad about something and tried to make music that helped make change. I didn't agree with them much of the time, but they did have a great band name. If these guys were called Bologna, I don't think anybody would have given them a chance.

3. Hoobastank. I think this is a fun word to say. They're never going to be taken as seriously as bands like U2 or even Green Day because of they're name, but still they chose a super-creative name that kinda actually fits them.

2. Scary Kids Scaring Kids. Another fun name. They're music is pretty similar to most other screamo bands out there, but their name is so great that they're doing pretty good. It makes you want to listen to them.

1. Sloppy Meateaters. This is a very forgettable band with an unforgettable name. I bought their cd just because I liked the name so much. I think this is the most creative name and that's why they get number 1.

Honorable Mentions: Guns-n-Roses, Five Iron Frenzy, Fourth Grade Nothing, Ghoti Hook, Save Ferris, Mad Caddies, Streetlight Manifesto, Nada Surf
I would like to hear from you guys who you think should be on this list. I know some of these bands are local bands many of you haven't heard of, so you can use local bands if you want.

Monday Madness Pictures

2008-08-23T09:51:00.000-07:00

Here's some pictures from Monday Madness.

13 Dumbest Professional Sport Team Names

2008-08-23T07:09:00.000-07:00

I was watching Sportscenter the other day and I started thinking about how dumb some of the team names were. So I decided to compile a list of the worst names in professional sports. I chose from NFL, NBA, NHL, Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer. Here is what I came up with

13. Toronto Raptors. when I was a kid and they were teaching us about dinosaurs, we never learned about the raptors. We learned about brontosaurus, stegosaurus, triceratops, and tyrannosaurus rex, but never about raptors. Then Jurassic Park came out and suddenly everybody think the Raptor is the scariest dinosaur ever. Anyways, Toronto is not scary and they could have chosen a better name that wasn't so...Jurassic Park.

12. Nashville Predators. This is a group of animals that eat other animals. It's not specific. I think they were trying to think of something dangerous and came up with this. As far as dangerous things from Nashville, they could have come up with a better name, like the Nashville Dixie Chicks.

11. New Orleans Saints. I've been to New Orleans, and it seems to me that they took pride on being anything but saintly. Maybe they were going for ironic.

10. Philadelphia Phillies. Lets take the first few letters of our city's name and see if we can find another word that matches. If we did that with more cities, we could have the New York Newlyweds. We could have the Chicago Chinks. We could have the Seattle Searchers. I'm sure this could go on and on.

9. Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Reds. Let's just name our team after a color. I think these are the 2 least creative names in sports. "Ok, we gotta come up with a team name. What do you think we should name them?"
"Uh, uh, uh...how about Brown."
"Brilliant!"
(same conversation for Red)
Interesting that both of these teams are in Ohio.

8. LA Clippers. I don't know what a Clipper is. This team is always going to be overshadowed by the Lakers because of their name. They should come out with something like the LA Paparazzi. That's scary, and there will always be pictures.

7. Utah Jazz. What? When I think of Utah I don't think of Jazz. I think of Mormons and salt. I only know of one band that ever came out of Utah (The Used) and they weren't jazz. This would be like calling a team in Oklahoma City the Dolphins. The only dolphins in Oklahoma are made of plastic.

6. Houston Dynamo. This sounds like people were getting around and put in some words into a thesaurus and typed in power and found this word. I just think it sounds dumb. Let's just call them the Wonderboys instead.

5. Columbus Blue Jackets. This is a hockey team, and I'm not quite sure what they were going for. Well, it's hockey and it's cold out there on the ice, so people have to wear jackets. Bill has a blue one on, so let's go with Blue Jackets.

4. Ottawa Senators. This doesn't make sense to me at all. Maybe it's a Canadian thing. But why would there be senators in Ottawa. And even if that is where the government stuff happens, why would you name your team after elected officials. I just think it's a dumb name.

3. Anaheim Mighty Ducks. Why name your team after a kids movie. I know Disney owns the team and they made the movie, but I just think... "wow that's a sell-out name."

2. New York Red Bulls. It's bad enough that all the stadiums are named after corporations now, but now teams are starting to do that. I'm afraid this is going to be a rising trend. Next we'll have the Albuquerque Ex lax.

1. Houston Texans. I mean come on. This is a ridiculous name. If it was a high school team, maybe, but this is the NFL. Come up with a creative, vicious name. Especially when most of your team aren't even Texans. I like the Oilers better. Plus they had cool helmets. If this catches on, think of some of the other team names that will begin to happen. The Little Rock Arkansans. The Montgomery Alabamans. The Atlanta Georgians. The Providence Rhode Islanders. The Helena Montanans (or if Disney owns this team then it'll be the Hannah Montanans).

Runners Up: Green Bay Packers, Washington Nationals, San Antonio Spurs, Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Boston Bruins.

This Beautiful Mess

2008-08-22T15:29:00.000-07:00

This was a book by Rick McKinley. He's the pastor of Imago Dei in Portland, OR. It's a book about the Kingdom of God. It was cool to see a fresh perspective on what Jesus says about the Kingdom of God. Overall, I would just say that book was o.k. There were some very good chapters. The one about children was great. But there were also some chapters that I didn't like as much. They were still good, but they weren't as interesting. It took me a while to get through this book because I just couldn't get caught in it very easy.

Mission Impact Pictures

2008-08-22T13:52:00.001-07:00

Here are some pictures from Mission Impact.

Mission Impact Day 5

2008-08-21T13:48:00.000-07:00

I skipped Day 4 because it was a day where we went to 6 Flags. Day 5 we went downtown to help Agora Ministries with their Backpack Give-a-Way. The school district where we were has the highest drop out rate in San Antonio. We helped give away 1200 backpacks with school supplies. The kids were also able to get toiletries, some food, some books, clothes, and even a haircut.
We took the Kidz World bouncer and had a good time letting all of the kids jump around. Most of our kids went around with the families, taking them to all the different stations to get their stuff. This was the end of the week and everybody was exhausted, but this was such a great day and everybody worked hard and saw a lot of people get helped.

Mission Impact Day 3

2008-08-21T13:38:00.000-07:00

On day 3, we went back to the Baptist Children's Home and got to hang out with the international kids. We played soccer, (actually we ran around in circles chasing the ball as the kids dribbled and passed around us with such ease that you would have thought they were playing with walruses). We finally split up our teams so they had some of our kids with their kids. Then the games were a lot closer.
We also played some water baseball with them. That was a game I learned at Camp Tejas and it's basically baseball with the bases being kiddie pools. It was so hot that day that everybody liked jumping in the pools to cool down.
We ate hamburgers and hot dogs with everybody and had a fun time trying to speak Spanish to their guys. Again, all of our kids did great with talking and playing with these guys. They were so happy that we were there and gave everybody hugs as we left.
Then we went to the San Antonio Food Bank in the afternoon. Did you know that San Antonio has the largest population of people who don't know where their next meal is going to come from in the United States. The food bank feeds 25,000 people a week. It's a huge job, and it was great to be a little part of helping them out. We had some people sort food and check to make sure it was o.k. We had some others who put food in boxes to feed a family of 4 for a week. The people who sorted had a hard job. They went through boxes and cans of food that might have maggots in them. One girl picked up a box and a rat jumped out. Everybody ran around screaming. It was hilarious.
Zack and Issac took out trash. They would take the bad food and weigh it, then put it in a compactor. When they turned on the compactor it would shoot out this horrible liquid and a smell that no one would ever hope to enter their nostrils.
By the end of the day, we had boxed about 7,000 pounds of food. Issac and Zack threw away 2600 pounds of bad food. And there is no telling how much food the others went through and sorted. We basically helped feed 600 people for a week. I think this was our best day.

Mission Impact Day 2

2008-08-21T13:34:00.000-07:00

The second day of Mission Impact went really good. We started off at Brighton Gardens which is an assisted living facility in the Quarry. We played bingo with the residents. It was way fun. I was the caller. I had one heckler who kept telling me to hurry up. I had never been a bingo caller before, so I wasn't sure how long I was supposed to wait between numbers, but apparently this lady thought I was taking too long.
All of the kids had a resident partner that they would help play bingo. I think they all had a lot of fun and they got to share stories with the folks who live there. There was on particular old man that everybody liked who was in his 80's. They asked him what he did, and he told us that he chased all the women around here. He had a great personality and was super fun.
That afternoon we went to Woodlawn Park and helped clean up the lake. We pulled tires, boards, food, and a ton of trash out of the lake. It's amazing how much trash can get up along the shore. It was a hot day, but all of the kids did great and worked hard.

Mission Impact Day 1

2008-08-21T13:26:00.001-07:00

Last Tuesday (August 12) we started our week of local missions. We went to the Baptist Children's Home to hang out with the foster care kids who are there. We were going to play water games with them. But lucky us, one of the 5 days it's rained all year was last Tuesday. I didn't care, since we were going to get wet anyways, but the leaders there wanted all of us to go inside the chapel. We did get to shoot off about 300 water balloons with the launcher first. It was awesome.
In the chapel we played a couple of games, and it seemed like everybody was having fun. But everything was just off the top of my head and not planned out, but I don't think anybody minded too much. After that we had some lunch with everybody. Sharlette and Tammy made some BBQ sandwiches. We were supposed to be there until 2 p.m., but the had a scheduling mix up and everybody had to leave to go and get some immunizations for school. So around 1 p.m. all of the kids left. We shot off the last 100 water balloons with the launcher. Now, these balloons can go about 250 yards. They get going pretty fast. We had a bet that whoever was the first one to catch one with their chest would get $5. One came right at Skyler and he just took it in the chest. It knocked him over and knocked the wind out of him. It was hilarious. He has a bruise but nothing big, and he did get $5 out of the whole episode.
That afternoon we were supposed to go and fill backpacks with school supplies for the Backpack Give-a-way that we were helping with on Saturday, but they didn't get any of their school supplies in yet, so that was a bust. We were supposed to be doing stuff until 5 or so, but it ended up that we were back at the church around 2:30. It was a weird day, but I think it was still pretty good.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-08-21T08:07:00.000-07:00

Last night was the first Wed. night for the new 6th graders. It was also the first one without our former 8th graders (who were 6th graders when I started here at Harvest). Jerry led the worship and did a good job. I did a little different type of sermon. Usually my messages are topical, about serving, faith, or love. I wet through a passage of scripture that I really liked last night. It was 2 Corinthians 5. Some of my favorite verses are in that passage. 5:13 talks about being out of your mind. We talked about how we should have the same mind as Christ. Don't worry about ourselves, but be concerned about what Jesus is concerned about. 5:17 says we are a new creation. I talked about how we are no longer slaves to our sinful nature. We are a new creation. Verse 20 says that we are Christ's ambassadors. We have a huge responsibility in that verse. We represent Christ on Earth. That means we need to know what he stands for so we can stand for those things too. And the entire scripture is about reconciliation, which means to be equal. It's like when you owe a debt, and somebody cancels it, and nobody owes anything. The debt has been reconciled. Because Jesus died on the cross our sins have been reconciled. We don't owe God anything. This isn't a license to sin. It's the gift of grace, and out of that grace we have a responsibility to live as Jesus wants us to live. I think it went pretty good.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-08-20T12:56:00.000-07:00

This was promotion Sunday for us at Harvest. We have a new crop of 6th Graders coming up. I'm excited about them all being here. I think they are going to bring a lot of excitement and energy to our group. We played a couple of games with the kids. One was a get-to-know you game. The other was a game where they blew q-tips through a straw and tried to knock off another team's crown (which was a paper cup on somebody's head). I love that game.
Gideon led worship and did a great job.
I spoke to the kids about the purpose of our ministry and the things that we have going on. I talked to them about our heart for serving people around us. I talked about worship and how we strive to be like God. I talked about fellowship and how we want the Jr. high ministry to be a place where they feel safe and feel that they can bring friends. Overall, I think it was a great week to start this new year.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-08-20T12:51:00.000-07:00

Last Wed. was a special Wed. We kept everybody together. It was kinda weird because it was a super big group. It was also the last Wed. with the 8th graders. We played a big game of dodge ball in the Activity Center. Then we all went upstairs. Jerry spoke to us all. He talked about being willing to do whatever God asks us to do, and don't miss it. He then announced to everybody that he was leaving to start another church up the road and that he would no longer be the senior high pastor. Many kids were sad to hear about this. He also announced that his replacement would be Jeff Roussin, who is one of the high school volunteer leaders. We're all excited about Jeff coming on. Anyways, Jerry's last day will be August 31, and Jeff will start in September, but won't be in the office full-time until the beginning of October.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-08-20T12:46:00.000-07:00

This is from the Sunday morning a week ago, on August 10. We talked about how we should treat people with different beliefs and from different cultures and backgrounds. Our scripture was from Acts, where Peter talked about a vision he had from God. At that time, Jews thought that Jesus had come only for them. They were still doing their Jewish customs. And in this vision, Peter saw that they were able to eat anything, that nothing God made was unclean. This showed Peter that Jesus had come for everybody, not just the Jews.
It was a good week, and the kids had a grasp of this concept pretty good. Despite differences, we are to love these people and speak truth to people wo are different than us.

Camp Tejas

2008-08-19T05:37:00.000-07:00

I've been super busy the last couple of weeks, and haven't been able to keep up with the blog. I'll catch up over the next couple of days. I'm going to start with Camp Tejas. I went to the Kidz camp from August 5-9 as a counselor for some of the 5th grade boys. I only had a few of them. I do this every year to get to know some of the kids who are coming up to the 6th grade with us.
Here are my top 13 things that happened at Camp Tejas.

1. Silent Football. We played Silent Football almost every night. We had another church in our cabin who learned it with us, and it was super fun playing it with them.

2. Zack and Aaron were in my cabin. These were 2 of the youth who were helpers in my cabin. They both did a great job and were a ton of fun throughout the week.

3. The 5th Grade boys. These guys were pretty crazy, and I'm excited about them coming up. I had Logan, Josh, Jacob, Chris, Isaac, and Dusty in our cabin.

4. Logan winning the Robot competition. We had a robot dance competition, and Logan was the winner.

5. The Water Zip-Line. It was super-fun, and I made it all the way to the end, which made me pretty happy.

6. The Slide. They had an inflatable slide that went into the lake. Besides cutting my arm and hurting my knee (dang, I'm getting old) I had a great time on this slide. I was also the fastest in the cabin when we had a sliding tournament.

7. The Pool. The pool is awesome. It has a huge slide. It has a lazy river. It has a diving board. I think it's awesome when a fat guy can do a back flip, so I did those a lot. Plus I did many, many belly flops.

8. Black Light Night. One of the activities was a black light night where we played a bunch of games under some black lights. I put some sound to one of the videos, so I was glad to see that even though I wasn't super happy about the outcome. We had dancing competitions. It was a lot of fun.

9. Brian's Messages. Our Children's Pastor was the Camp Pastor and he does a great job communicating to the kids. He's a great story-teller and can put God's truth into the kids' heads by telling stories. Throughout the week, many kids accepted Christ.

10. Worship. Pastor Tim led worship, but he used Gideon and Emilio from the youth. It was awesome seeing those guys up there. Gideon even got to lead on a few songs.

11. Gideon shaved his head. He always had kinda shaggy hair. But one day something happened and he decided to shave it to the skin. It actually looks pretty good on him. His head did get sunburned though.

(While I'm writing this, Parker is pooping, and I guess he's struggling with it because his face is turning red and he's grunting. It's hilarious)

12. Canoeing and Kayaking. Aaron and Zack flipped their kayak. Chris and I went around the whole lake and it was just super fun.

13. Mud Night. This was my favorite part of the week. They have a huge dirt pit that they turned into mud. We played all kinds of games in the mud, like Simon Says. In one game I got buried. I was covered from hair to toe in mud. I love getting dirty, and this was so much fun.

Camp Tejas was a great week. We had so much fun and got to hang out with some great kids. We saw God do some great things in the kids' lives.

Amazing Catch

2008-08-04T20:33:00.001-07:00

Camp Tejas

2008-08-04T20:16:00.000-07:00

Every year I go as a counselor to Camp Tejas, which is the camp our Kidz Pastor takes the third through fifth graders every year. I get to room with most of the 5th grade boys. We always have a great time, and it's a good way for me to get to know these kids before they come up to 6th grade in a few weeks. We'll play a bunch of Silent Football (the best game ever) and dunk each other in the pool. I only get to eat lunch with the girls, but I still get to know them throughout the week. Anyways, I'm leaving tomorrow morning and won't be back til Saturday. So pray for us.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-08-04T20:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a weird day for us. Harvest did a church-wide service project during the services. Pastor John let all of the adults out early to do a random act of kindness to our city, by handing out water to people in parks. It was a super-hot day, so I know that it was welcomed.
We still had an hour, so we kept everybody together instead of breaking up into small groups. Nathan led worship and did a great job. He also had a few junior highers helping him out. I think it's awesome when there are junior high students on the praise team.
We also played hand towel dodge ball. You tie up a whole bunch of dish towels into knots. The kids start throwing them. Some of the kids get super into it. Some don't. But it's fun to watch. Steven and Mason were the winners.
I had the kids break up into groups and come up with a specific need. They had to come up with a way to meet that need, and money was not an option. I wanted them to dream big. I also wanted them to meet a person's needs holistically. Don't just give a homeless person a home, but what would it take to get them to be able to take care of themselves and others. For instance, they could help them get a skill to get a job, or whatever. The kids only had a few minutes to think this through before parents started showing up to take them to do the service project. A few kids stayed the whole time because their parents were going to a different service or whatever. After the jr. high service, I took a few kids and we got a case of water to hand out. But I got lost on the way to the park in Stone Oak, so we handed out some water to the guys who sell newspapers. They were super grateful. But we didn't hand out that much water. I wish we could have, but it was still fun, and the kids who were with me had a good time.

Itunes Quiz

2008-07-31T21:20:00.000-07:00

Go to the music player of your choice and put it on shuffle. Say the following questions aloud and press play. Use the song titles as your answers.

iTunes, how does the world see me?
Song: Dumb Reminders: No Use For a Name
Comments: That makes sense.

iTunes, will I have a happy life?
Song: If I Could Just sit With You: Mercy Me
Comments: Alright, pull up a chair

iTunes, what do my friends really think of me?
Song: Me and You Vs. Them: The Movielife
Comments: I'll take you all on

iTunes, do people secretly lust after me?
Song: We Need Jesus: Jeffrey Dean
Comments: That's what I thought

iTunes, how can I make myself happy?
Song: Big City: Operation Ivy
Comments: Which one?

iTunes, what should I do with my life?
Song: Insomniatic Sleep: Finch
Comments: I need to become an oxymoron (I got the moron part down at least)

iTunes, why should life be full of so much pain?
Song: How Can You Ever Face Me?: The Movielife
Comments: I have hope in Jesus

iTunes, how can I maximize pleasure during this life?
Song: Take Me: Only Crime
Comments: To California

iTunes, will I ever have children?
Song: From Here to LA: The Early November
Comments: Oh Dear!

iTunes, will I die happy?
Song: Saturn: Skillet
Comments: I'm going to take that as a maybe

iTunes, what is some good advice for me?
Song: 3rd Man In: Dropkick Murphys
Comments: Never be the first one to do anything?

iTunes, what is happiness?
Song: O Girlfriend: Weezer
Comments: Suzy does make me pretty happy

iTunes, what is my favorite farm animal?
Song: Hypocrite: World Wide Message Tribe
Comments: yep

iTunes, how will I be remembered?
Song: Everyday: Sky Harbor
Comments: Legends never die! So I gotta do something legendary.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-07-31T13:33:00.000-07:00

Last night was a pretty good night. Josh Wyman was in town, so Jerry always lets him lead worship when he's here.
I spoke about hope. 1 Cor 13:13 lists 3 things: faith, love and hope. 2 weeks ago I taught about faith. Last week I talked about love for God (but it was a lot about worship as well. So tonight I finished the verse and spoke about hope. I had never taught about hope before. It's always been more of a word I skipped over. It's a word that doesn't mean as much to me as love and faith and grace do. But really, hope is an amazing thing.
I read about an experiment at Berkley. They put rats in a pool of water, and let them swim. They found that rats could swim for 7 hours before they drowned if they had no help. Then they put some more rats in the pool, but just before the rats gave up and drowned, a scientist would pull them out and let them rest. These rats could swim for 20 hours...and the scientists came to the conclusion that these rats would last longer because they had hope. They didn't give up as easily. Hope can motivate. Hope is what gives meaning to what we are doing now. It helps us endure the hard times, because we know God is going to make things better.
There are three things that we have hope in. 1. Jesus is coming back. 2. Jesus is taking us with him. 3. Jesus is giving us eternal life. It's pretty awesome to think about. And with that hope comes joy. With that hope, we can endure hard times. Because we know it's all going to get better. God is going to restore his kingdom and we're going to be here with him. Hope isn't just a good idea. The New Testament actually talks quite a bit about hope. And since studying about this word, it has gotten me more excited about my future with Jesus

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-07-30T08:26:00.000-07:00

Sunday was a pretty good Sunday. It was the first time that we have broken up into small groups in a long time. Unfortunately, one of our teachers, who has been with us the longest, stepped down. Tonya has been leading the 8th grade girls for years. She brings the donuts every Sunday morning as well. But she has decided to step down. We are going to miss her a lot.

Gideon led worship, and he just keeps getting better and better. Our game was "Everybody's It!" Basically it's an all against all game of tag. Christine Cavender was the winner.

Our lesson was on anger. I gave a few case studies in the opener. Think about these and what you would want to do and what you should do.

1. You have somebody stay the night at your home or they go camping with you, and they eat all of your food and drink all of your drinks without asking, what do you do?
A. Just go buy more and say nothing
B. Chunk a chair at them
C. Tell them you don't mind sharing, but just ask first.

2. You are walking through the cafeteria and somebody throws their applesauce all over you, what do you do?
A. Just keep walking and clean yourself up.
B. Tell them that makes you angry and to not do it again.
C. Shove their face in their mashed potatoes.

3. You have been standing in line for a roller coaster for 2 hours. You get to the front of the line and some kids cut in front of you. They get on the ride, and the ride operator says that the ride is now closed, what do you do?
A. Just get of line, but wish something bad happens to the people on the ride.
B. Wait for the kids at the ride exit and throw dog poo at them.
C. Tell the Ride Operator that they cut in front of you.
D. Just leave and ask God to help you forgive them.

Honestly, I don't always do a good job handling my anger. When you're stuck in the moment, sometimes you lose control. We talked about things in our small group that make us angry and what are we supposed to do. One, we're not supposed to sin out of our anger. So I guess that means shoving a guy's face in mashed potatoes might not be good (although it sure would feel good at the time). We talked about how we are to handle anger with fellow believers who have done wrong against us. You go and talk to them and give them the chance to ask for forgiveness. If they don't, then you take another believer with you. If they still don't, then you take it before the church.
The question that came up during our group that I didn't really have an answer for (well I had a churchy answer, but not an honest answer) was about this guy on a show. I guess there is a guy who dresses up like a clown and goes up to random guys and kick them in their "special area." And then he laughs and says you just got kicked on t.v. They asked what would happen if the guy came up and did that to my son. Honestly, I want to be like Jesus, and Jesus says turn the other cheek, but I think I would have to smack the smile off that clown. We talked about things that make us angry and how we should handle that based on the Bible. We talked about not taking revenge and things like that. I'm OK, but if somebody hurts my family, I think I would have a hard time turning any kind of cheek. We went through the scriptures and the kids know what the Bible says about it. Hopefully, they'll think about these thing the next time they get angry with their brother or sister. But this is a hard concept for me to really grasp, and harder to put into action. I'm interested in seeing what other people think about these things.

Last Egg Standing

2008-07-29T13:38:00.000-07:00

This is an addicting little game, and it's super fun.

Play Last Egg Standing

Crazy Love

2008-07-27T21:13:00.000-07:00

Francis Chan wrote this book, Crazy Love. He's a pastor in Southern California that I have heard speak a number of times. Every time I leave convicted to begin to make changes in my life. There are not many speakers (in fact none) that I can remember there sermons even months and years later. The first time I heard Francis was at a California Student Conference called Tsunami in 2002. I can still remember it. Yeah, he's hilarious, but his stuff is relevant and he is able to speak about things that are going on in my head but haven't been able to put into words.

So, I finished his book. There were a lot of things about this book that I didn't like. Really, I hated them. It wasn't because it was bad writing. It wasn't because it was heretical. It was because he was saying some pretty hard stuff about how I am living my life; and it was truth. And sometimes the truth hurts.

This book looks at American Christianity, and how many of us are just missing the point. We are living our lives out of comfort. We are living our lives in such a way that even if we decided in a radical way that we didn't believe in God any more, not much would change. We might start cussing and drinking more, but other than our lives would be very similar to what they are now. We don't have a crazy love for God, and we're OK with that.

I know I said I didn't like this book, but I really loved the book. Yeah, it was hard for me to read in some areas, because it requires the reader to look honestly at their life and at scripture. Then it requires us to make a choice, either we are going to start following God with everything we got and live radically for him, or we are going to choose to continue living "lukewarm" lives for our comfort rather than living for God. Don't read this book if you are content with being ordinary with your faith. But if you want to love God more, if you want to live a life more in line with what God is asking of us, I recommend this book. This book doesn't have all of the answers, but it's an awesome way to begin.

Wed. Morning Impact

2008-07-25T07:20:00.000-07:00

I think this Wed. was great. I got to speak to both groups. I haven't spoken to the high school in months, and now I've got to teach 2 times in a week.
I spoke about God. I think a lot of times, we put God in a box and think we have Him figured out. I think we take him for granted. In Deuteronomy 10, it says that the Lord asks us to fear Him, which is to have a reverence, an awe, a respect for God. I don't think we, the typical American Christian, have this fear. Every time it rains over a weekend, we know that attendance is going to be down. People don't want to get out to worship when it rains. But there are people who will go out in -10 degree weather and take their shirts off and paint a big green "G" on their belly to scream for a football team. We show up late to church. But if you go to a movie, you make sure you're on time, and get their early so you don't miss the previews. We skip quiet times because we get too busy or we forget. We choose sin; we know that God doesn't want us to do something, and yet we choose to go ahead and do it. This doesn't show that we have a fear of God; and I say "us" because I do every one of these things.
So here are some things about God.
1. God is holy, which means set apart. In Revelation 4, it talks about the glory of God. The author, John, couldn't even describe God and his glory because he is limited by language. We don't have the words to describe how beautiful and majestic God is. He says things like, he looked like jewels, and his voice sounded like a trumpet. God is so beautiful that he can't even begin to be described by the words that we use. And he has angels around him who continually say, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come." When a word is said 3 times to describe something it means it is perfect. God is perfectly holy. So perfect and so good and so beautiful that words can't even begin to express how great he truly is.
2. God is eternal. He has no beginning and no end. He just always was. This messes with my mind a lot. I can't wrap my mind around this. Everything else has a beginning where it was made on a certain day, except God. He doesn't exist in time, because he created time, and so he just was always here.
3. God is all-knowing. You can never hide from God. In Psalm 139, David talks about not being able to go anywhere to hide from the Lord, and how he knows everything. He knows every thought we've ever had, every action, every word we've said. He even knows how photosynthesis works.
4. God is all-powerful. All things were created by God, for God. Sometimes we get this backwards. We think God is there for us. He's there to make us happy, rich, and fat. He's there to help us in our troubles and when our friends and family are in trouble. But God is not a genie. He wants to help us, and loves to, but he's got a purpose that is beyond our understanding. Daniel 4:35 basically says that God doesn't have to answer to anybody. I'm glad God doesn't have to ask for a human's permission before he does something. It would be like my 22 month old son coming up to me and telling me that he thinks we should move to Turkey. I would tell him to go sit in time out. I wouldn't listen to him. Why should I, he can't even get colors right. I ask him to pick up the blue block, and he brings me a yellow one, and he says red. Why would I listen to him about where we should live. His understanding is limited. God is all-knowing, so he could tell us his purposes, and we would have no idea what he was talking about. Sure, we might nod in agreement to his plan, but our understanding is limited, God is unlimited.
God is fair and just. God alone is good. He alone sets the standards for good and bad. He sets the standard for rewards and punishment. And he absolutely hates sin. No sin goes unaccounted for or unpunished. Sometimes we go easy on sin because we don't see the consequences. It's like we got away with it. Maybe you got drunk and didn't die in a car crash, or get caught by parents. But no sin goes unpunished. God hates sin so much that he sent his Son to die for us to pay for our sins. So every time we tell that little lie and don't see the consequences, it's because Jesus suffered it.
This God who created the billions of galaxies, who created all the animals, insects, rocks and plants still loves each of us individually. So much in fact that the Bible says he knows how many hairs are on our head. And he wants to have a relationship with us and wants us to pray to Him and tell Him what's going on in our lives, and yet we take God for granted and don't fear him.
I showed this video at the beginning. It's from Francis Chan, who I admire, and a lot of this message came from his book that I've been reading and thinking about. But I want you to see this video and think about how big God is and how insane that it is that He could create all of these things and be so big, and yet still love us so much individually.

The Nintendo Historian Quiz

2008-07-22T10:53:00.000-07:00

This was a fun little quiz about the old NES game system. I did pretty good, and guessed right a lot.

The Nintendo Historian Quiz Redux

Score: 92% (23 out of 25)

Pastor Breaks wrist during Sunday Service

2008-07-22T10:30:00.000-07:00

I thought this was a funny little article from Yahoo! today. It's about a pastor who brought out a motorcycle to illustrate a point during a sermon and ended up crashing it into the front row. I bet that was hilarious. I also bet this guy is never going to live it down.

Here's the article:

KOKOMO, Ind. - A pastor brought out a dirt bike during a church service to demonstrate the concept of unity. Now he's demonstrating the concept of healing.

Jeff Harlow, the senior pastor at Crossroads Community Church, broke his wrist when he lost control of the motorcycle at the start of Sunday's second service, driving off a 5-foot platform and into the vacant first row of seats. He underwent surgery on the wrist Monday.

"Jeff has already laughed a lot, so he's OK. I think his pride was bruised," said his wife, Becky.

Becky Harlow said her husband had recently attended a motorcycle race in Buchanan, Mich.

"He had this idea that he would bring this bike out onstage and show people how the rider would become one with the bike," she told the Kokomo Tribune. "He was going to just sit on it and drive it out. He was just walking the dirt bike out onstage and somehow it got away from him. It was not intended."

No one else was hurt.

Jeff Harlow had performed the demonstration at earlier services Saturday night and Sunday morning without incident.

Evolution of Dance

2008-07-21T14:11:00.001-07:00

This is an old video, but it's still hilarious.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-07-21T11:45:00.001-07:00

It started off pretty crazy because there were all sorts of sound equipment problems. Most of the band and the guys who run sound are on the trip to Jamaica, so I think it went pretty good in spite of all of that. Gideon led worship, and I think he was harder on himself than he needed to be. I think he did a great job. He only had Andrew with him on keyboards, so no bass and no drummer. Morgan did sing with him though. I thought it was great.
Charles Vickers, our 8th grade boys teacher, led the big group. It was his first time to speak to us, and I'm glad he did. I think he did an excellent job. He spoke about holiness. He said there were 3 keys to Holy living. First, Be Different. Live your life that isn't going to go along with the rest of the crowd. For him, he didn't listen to certain music or watch Rated R movies. Second, Be Diligent. Stand your ground and find people who can help support you. Third, Be Dedicated. Dedicate yourself to God and obeying his Words.
I think he did great, and we are going to have to use him more often to speak to the kids. He had a song for us to listen to at the end to go along with his sermon on holiness by Wes King. Unfortunately, we had some more sound problems and he wasn't able to play the song. It wasn't his fault at all, it was just one of those dumb things that happens. But besides that, everything went great.
I spoke to the high school group during their service. I haven't got to speak to them in a long, long time. I basically did the same exact thing that I did on Wed. Night for the Jr. high. I think they liked it and got something out of it. It was a pretty small group since a lot of the kids were in Jamaica for the Mission Trip. But they seemed to listen and agree with the things that I said (hopefully).

Card Trick

2008-07-18T08:12:00.000-07:00

Here is the card trick that I did for Impact on Wed. Night.
I think I did it better.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-07-18T05:33:00.000-07:00

I spoke to the Jr. Highers on Wed. night about faith, and how to get more faith. I started off with a card trick that I learned off of youtube. I think it dazzled them. The Bible talks about having faith like a child. A child believes anything blindly. Tell them about a chubby guy who flies around on a sled that is carried by magical deer and gives presents to good little boys and girls, and they believe it. It's not that we should believe in just anything anybody tells us. God tells us to beware of false prophets, but we should have that full, innocent faith without any doubt.
So when I was a kid, I believed in magic. But I also believed that UFO's were going to come and abduct me when I fell asleep. I also believed that there were little men who lived in a village in my wall who would run all night in my room between the wall and the desk and my bed, but I could never catch them.
Belief is based on imagination. Faith is based on experience; even somebody else's experience. I've never seen molecules, but I have faith that they exist. I've never looked through an electron microscope to see them, but I've read about them in books and trust that the people who have written that book has experienced seeing these molecules. The Bible is what we base our entire faith on, and the experience of the writers.
The Bible is not a "How-To" book and we can't read it as that. We can't read it when we have a problem and scan it for a quick fix. Although it does tell us how to do stuff, that's not it's primary purpose. The purpose of the Bible is to communicate God's story through history of his creation.
So we're not going to find a 10-step process to finding how to get a deeper faith.
Our passage was Luke 17:5-10.
It starts out with the disciples asking Jesus for more faith. I use to think that if I saw a miracle, that would make my faith super-strong. But the disciples were with Jesus 24/7, and Jesus was always saying that they had such little faith. They saw all his miracles. They talked face to face with him, and they had little faith. I don't think miracles build faith. People forget about them or explain them off. I think God used miracles to get people's attention, not to build faith. The burning bush with Moses, the dew on the fleece with Gideon, these were to get attention. And most of the miracles that Jesus performed were on people that already had faith. He was always saying that their faith is what made them well. These people had faith already. So I don't think seeing a miracle is the way to build our faith.
The next verse Jesus says that if we have the faith the size of a mustard seed, then we would be able to tell this bush to get up and go jump in the Ocean. I don't necessarily think that Jesus meant this passage literally. Because if I had that kind of faith where I could do that, I would be doing it to every tree and bush I passed. I think that would be awesome. I'd have trees get up and start chasing people, swinging their branches at them. It would be hilarious to me, terrifying to them.
The mustard seed is the smallest seed that they knew of. So, Jesus was saying that our faith is even smaller than that. And a lot of my life I've worried about getting my faith to this point, because if I do, then I can have all kinds of power for God. I could heal the sick, raise the dead, move trees and mountains. But I can't even heal my headaches. Sometimes I beat myself up about not having a big enough faith. But having faith doesn't make you a magician. It's not so that we can do cool little tricks to impress people. Our faith should be to glorify God.
I think God gives us faith to accomplish what he wants us to do. Right after Jesus tells us about faith the size of a mustard seed, he tells a story about a servant serving his master first, and himself second. I think it's interesting that the disciples were asking about faith, and the story Jesus tells doesn't seem to have anything to do with faith, it's about serving God. The closest I ever feel to God is when I'm serving him and loving others. I think Jesus is saying to his disciples that to build your faith, concentrate on serving God first, and then yourself second. God has a purpose for you, and He will give you faith to accomplish that. Maybe it's not your job to heal a blind man. Maybe it's your job to encourage the old man at Wal-Mart. God will help you accomplish that.
So, to build your faith I think there are 2 things we can do. First, we can ask God for it. Pray for faith. Second, serve God first. Love him, love the people around you, and then serve yourself second. If we do these two things, I think we will see our faith grow.

Beach Blast Everything skit

2008-07-16T07:18:00.001-07:00

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

2008-07-16T05:59:00.000-07:00

I'm really not sure how I came across this book, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but I'm glad I did. It's the diary of a middle school kid. Of course he calls it a journal and he's only doing it because his mom is making him, but he also figures that, when he gets rich and famous, this diary can help him answer questions about his childhood. He can just "go read the book."

I think this book did a great job at capturing middle school life. I remember going through some of the weird stuff that this kid went through (the cheese touch was brilliant). The kid also could not comprehend consequences. I see middle school kids do this all the time. They do stuff and have no idea why they are getting in trouble or why people are mad at them.

I thought this book was hilarious. It has little comic strips in it to illustrate how the kid sees things going on around him. This is a book written for middle school kids, but I think if you have middle school kids or work with them, you would like this book. If you are a middle school boy, you would probably really like this book too.

Stuart Appleby

2008-07-15T08:26:00.001-07:00

I had never heard of this guy until yesterday morning while I was watching Sportscenter. Parker was having his swimming lesson, so I was inside waiting for him to be done. (I can't watch him because he wouldn't do what Carol wants him to do because he would just want to play with me, so I watch from the couch) Anyways, I watched this segment about a golfer from Australia who's caddy was his wife. Then his wife died...and he pretty much gave up golf. He's making a come-back, and I just thought this was an awesome story. This man went through something that I don't even want to imagine...and I feel for him, and really liked his story. So here it is.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-07-15T06:02:00.001-07:00

This weekend was a great weekend. We started off with a game called "Starburst Stack." Two kids had to lay down on tables feet to feet. Two other kids had one minute to stack as many Starburst as they could on their forehead. Whoever had the highest stack would win. One group had 8 but it fell right at the end, so they only had one. The other group had 2, so they won.

Nathan led worship. He did a great job. The more times he leads worship the better he gets. I think in a few years he will be great.

We had a time for Beach Blast Testimonies where kids could come up and tell everybody what they did at Beach Blast and what God did for them or taught them at Beach Blast. I think of testimonies as stories, so I told them it was story-time. I wanted a bunch of kids to come up, so I said they could come and tell even a funny story if they wanted. That's what it became. One funny story after another. A few kids got up and talked about what God did in their life, but mainly it became funny stories. That was my fault because of the way I communicated things in the beginning. That's the one thing that I wish I would have done better for Sunday, because I know that there were kids who got up and told a story that God did big things in their lives, and they didn't communicate that part because they were talking about scaring somebody or something else. But even with that, it was a great weekend.

Hancock

2008-07-12T15:27:00.000-07:00

I went and saw Hancock today. I haven't been to a movie in forever. I never get time. There really hasn't been anything that has interested me. But I do like Will Smith and most of his movies.

This was about a guy who is a superhero and he doesn't know how he became one. He's the only one of his kind and he's lonely. The beginning of the movie he's kind of a jerk and the people don't like him. He then begins to change and tries to do a better job. People then begin to like him. I won't give anything else away, but that stuff you can pretty much get from the previews. It's got some cool special effects and some good action. I also liked how it focused more on the humanity of Hancock and the super powers were more of a secondary concept. Most superhero movies focus on the powers more and the problems of heroes as a secondary part of the story. Even in X-Men, you see Wolverines powers foremost and his amnesia and stuff as a secondary part of the plot.

I couldn't really tell you why, but I really liked the movie. I think Will Smith did a great job, and Jason Bateman is becoming one of my favorite actors.

Free the Slaves

2008-07-12T08:25:00.000-07:00

Ending slavery is something that I've become passionate about, especially among children. I hate to hear that girls are being sold into brothels and things. Some kids are being stolen from their villages and forced into militias. Others are sold by their families to do typical slave-work (working fields, cleaning, hard work). Here is a video from an expert about an idea of how to end slavery. Whether it will work or not, I don't know. If everybody got on board with it, then probably. But I think it's an interesting video and has a lot of information about modern-day slavery. It's from freetheslaves.net.

Family Tree

2008-07-12T07:34:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I started messing around a little bit on ancestry.com and start a family tree. A lot of people talk about their heritage and famous people that they are descended from. When I started, I only knew as far as my grandparents. I only remember one great grandma, and she died when I was young. I didn't know any of their names or anything about them, like where they were from. So, it was hard to get past my grandparents. Plus, a lot of the resources that they had weren't very accurate. For example, my great grandpa on my dad's side's name was Burnie. In the 1930 census, they had his name as Barbara, and my grandpa Mark's name as Maxene. I think it was just super-bad penmanship.

But eventually, after a call to my dad to confirm a couple of things, I began to find a few more. And once I got to one, that opened up a bunch more from research that other people did. So I got all the way back until about 1642. I already knew Campbell came from Scotland. My ancestors came from Scotland and Ireland somewhere in the 1720's and 30's. I haven't gotten very far on my mom's side. I need to talk to my grandma about it sometime.

So far, I haven't found any famous ancestors. It would be cool to be related to Patrick Henry or Adam Sandler. My luck it'll show that I'm somehow related to Brittany Spears. I would rather find out that somewhere in the 1800's I had a relative who was a mad scientist and he decided to try to mate his daughter with a walrus, and somehow he made it work. So in my DNA I am part walrus. In my old age, my whiskers are going to get super long and teeth are going to grow out of my nose. I would rather find out something like that rather than find out that I'm related to Brittany Spears.

Irena Sendler

2008-07-09T07:59:00.000-07:00

This is a great story about a woman I had never heard of. I truly think this is a woman who lived like God wants us to. In Isaiah 1, God says that we should seek justice, take care of the oppressed, care for the widows and the fatherless. She put other above herself, and truly had love for others. I don't know if she was a Christian or not, but she definitely lived as an example that we could follow.

More Beach Blast Pictures

2008-07-08T13:15:00.001-07:00

Here are a few more pictures from Beach Blast. I'm getting more and more of them from different sources everyday, so keep coming by to find them. Leave a comment if you download any, just so I'll know that people are looking at them.

More Pictures from Beach Blast

2008-07-07T14:18:00.001-07:00

Everyday Sunday - Wake Up! Wake Up!

2008-07-07T11:08:00.001-07:00

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-07-07T07:27:00.000-07:00

This was the first Sunday since Beach Blast. Kids were still excited from the week, and everybody seemed to be in a real good mood...and real tired. We started off with a game called Beach Ball Dodge Ball. Basically it was dodge ball with beach balls in case you didn't figure that out. Nathan and Jesse were the 2 winners.
Gideon led worship and did a great job. I know I say this every time, but he just gets better and better every time he leads worship. The kids were in to it. The band was in to it. He just did a great job leading us into worship.
I led a big group because I didn't want the leaders who have been at camp all week to have to come back and do a small group lesson. I talked about keeping the mountain top experience that they got at camp. There were three things I told them they needed to do based on Isaiah 1:11-20. First, they need to have meaningful worship. They need to make time for their personal worship. They need to come with the right focus. We can't read our Bibles and pray just to mark off some spiritual checklist. We need to make time for it and come with the right focus. We will make time for American Idol. We will make time for what we care about. So we need to make time for worship. Second, we need to be honest with God. Confess things that are in our lives. Check our hearts, and try to get rid of the sins that we can't seem to get rid of or really don't want to get rid of. Third, we need to do what is right. I know I feel closer to God when I am serving other people; when I'm helping other people. We need to become other-focused and look past our own problems to see that there are other people out there who are hurting that God is asking us to help.
Doing these 3 things may not keep the mountain top experience from camp last forever. But I think it will keep us connected with God longer and will keep the valley experiences shallower and less frequent.

Beach Blast Day Six

2008-07-05T08:00:00.000-07:00

Well, another year of Beach Blast has come and gone. I think this was the best year yet. Our team leaders were awesome. Our student leaders were awesome. Everybody had a great attitude. The band was great. Mark Matlock was great. Jared Hall was great.
We started off the last day with baptisms. 18 kids were baptized in the gulf. The waves were super big (at least for Texas waves) and a couple of times almost knocked me and Jerry over as we were baptizing the kids. That was my favorite time of the week.
We got into the morning session and had a lot of stuff to do. First, we got to give out individual awards for the kids who had a lot of spirit and had a Christ-like attitude. The Jr. highers who received the award were Jesse, Alexa, Aaron B., and Clarence. Every one of those kids really were encouraging to other kids and had a great attitude all week. There were probably about 15 other kids who deserved it, but we had to narrow it down somehow because we only had 4 of the little award trophies.
Jerry spoke a little bit. He talked about really getting focused on God, and what does that look like. Then all of the adults started to go through the crowd of kids and pray for them. I wish we would have had a little bit more time for that, because I only got to about 8 or so kids, and there were a lot more that I would have liked to have got to.
Everything from then on went by pretty fast. We had to take down all of the equipment and load it in the truck, get all the kids on the buses and then get home, and unload everything back to the youth room. But all the kids helped and it went pretty smoothly. I'm glad to be home though to see Parker and Suzy, but it was a great week.

Beach Blast Day Five

2008-07-04T08:34:00.000-07:00

The junior high had our mega-relay race today. It was awesome. We had a lot of messy games, and a lot of team games that were intertwined into a huge relay race. There is always a ton of excitement and it can get pretty intense. Again the kids were great, encouraging their team and showing great sportsmanship. In the end, Team 4 won. The reason I mention that is because the day before, in the beach line relays, they didn't place the entire day until they got 4th in the very last relay. But they still had such great attitude the entire time, and then today they ended up winning.
The Turning did a fantastic job in worship. I wish they had a worship album, because they do so good at it. I love their style. I love how they get the kids to focus in on what they are singing. Mark Matlock did a great job again. I think he connected with the kids. He talked about living in the freedom of Christ. I think that is one of the messages that God has really put on his heart. The kids really seemed to enjoy Mark. He had to leave pretty much right after the service because he had to drive back to Ft. Worth. He had a flight for California at 8 this morning. He did a great job with the kids, hanging out with them and talking to them.
After worship, we had a talent show. The kids did a big variety of talents, from Kung Fu to skits, to songs, to stand-up comedy, to clapping. It was very entertaining. I liked them all, but the clapping was very creative. We finished the night by hanging out at the beach. When we finally got back to the hotel, a bunch of guys came into my room and played silent football (the greatest game ever invented). Day Five was a great day.

Beach Blast Day Four

2008-07-04T08:27:00.000-07:00

I'm a few days behind. On Wed. we had another great day. The junior high had their competition down on the beach today. We did a bunch of line relays. The kids were great. They were really encouraging to each other, even though the sand was super hot. Everybody was involved, and it seemed like everybody had fun. We did one game, bat spin, which was my favorite. They had to spin around 10 times around a wooden peg, with their head down, then run to a cone and back. Some ran to wrong cones. Some ran and fell down...several times. It was hilarious.
Jared Hall did a magic show for us during worship. I had seen him a few times, so I had seen most of his tricks, but they still amaze me. He is very funny with his act too. So since then, a lot of kids have become amateur magicians since he has been here. But he brought in a lot of spiritual illustrations with his illusions. He escaped from a straight jacket, and talked about how we need to escape from sin. He did a great job.
I forgot to mention that we had nerds night on Monday night. We had a lot of kids dress up and have a good time. Jesse Kieslich won. I got fourth. Personally, I think I was hosed. But I put up a few pictures from that night and thought I should explain those pictures a little bit. Sharlette says hey, by the way.

Bull Riding Pictures

2008-07-02T15:13:00.001-07:00

Last Wed. we had an inflatable mechanical bull. It was a lot of fun. Here are some pictures from it.

Beach Blast Day Three

2008-07-01T20:14:00.000-07:00

Today was our special day at Beach Blast, where we got to go to Schlitterbahn. So, everything was a little bit different today. We didn't have any team competitions. We ate lunch at the water park. We ate dinner at the Golden Coral. Just everything was a little different as far as the schedule went.
We still had our morning service. I haven't talked about it yet, because this was the first one I've been able to go to. Usually, I'm setting up for competitions, so I don't get to listen to the morning sessions. But this morning was great. Mark talked about our attitudes, mainly towards the Bible. We say that the Bible is the most important book that has ever been written, but we don't spend time learning about it. We don't spend time reading it, or learning it. It was a good message for me to hear at least, and I think it was good for the kids.
Schlitterbahn was awesome. I did the Boogie Board thing twice. On this ride, they shoot a wave up, and you get on a boogie board and it's like you're riding a continuous wave. It's super fun...if you ride the wave. The bad thing is that sometimes, you go down, and then right back up over the wave. You stand in line for about 30 minutes, and then your ride is 7 seconds. The first time, I stayed on for a while, and then I tried a barrel roll and flipped out. The second time I fell right over the wave. I waited for 45 minutes and I rode it for 4.5 seconds. I did the 2 wedgie rides, where you shoot down this super-steep slide and land in a foot or so of water. I then spend the next few minutes retrieving my swimsuit from my colon. I think the kids had a great time, but it wore us out.
The worship tonight was great again. The kids are getting more comfortable with the band, and the band is getting more comfortable being with our kids. Tonight, the music was great, and you could feel the Spirit moving in the kids' lives. Mark Matlock spoke about humility. I don't know, but it may have been a message more directed at me than the students. I was worried about tonight a little bit because all of the kids were so tired (as well as all of the adults), but I think everybody stayed connected for the most part. Some of his points to take home were the 4 things that keep us from being humble. 1. We have a false sense of independence. 2. We think the world revolves around us. 3. We think we know it all. 4. We have a false sense of invulnerability. I think pride destroys more believers than almost any other sin. And we don't even see it coming, because we think we have everything under control. A lot of students responded to the invitation. I know of a few who became believers tonight (really, I'm so happy about this that I could tear up). I know of a lot more who are going to follow God deeper. I think today has been the best day.
Here are some pictures from the first few days.

Beach Blast Day Two

2008-07-01T17:19:00.001-07:00

Day 2 was a super long, super good day. The junior high started with our annual Extreme Kickball Competition. It's basically like regular kickball, except for a few minor adjustments. First, you don't have to run to another base if you don't think you can make it safely. So, you can have as many people as you want on one base. Second, the kicker gets a woofle ball bat and they can knock away the ball if is thrown at them. Third, the team in the field gets a Frisbee that can be used as the ball. For instance, if a kid kicks a ball super far for a home run, the fielding team can have one chance to throw the Frisbee at them. If the Frisbee hits them, then they are out. It was pretty complicated, but super fun.
During free time, I dug a hole. I spent the whole free time digging this hole on the beach. It got to be waist deep. A few kid helped me along the way, and I felt like I really accomplished something. I did it cave-man style, which means all I used were my hands and a stick. I did use a paper cup for a minute, but it was pretty useless.
Worship was amazing. The Turning did more songs that we knew, and the kids really got into them. They really try to get us to focus on the lyrics that they are singing. Mark spoke about the Holy Spirit and living by the spirit. A lot of times we feel that living by the Bible is so limiting, but he said good things have to have limits, and that having limits isn't a bad thing. He talked about a musician, and how there are only a few keys on a piano. Does a musician get upset and frustrated because they only have a few notes that they can play. Of course not. That increases their creativity. They have freedom to created inside those limits. I mean, he did a better job of communicating this than I am, but basically, living by the Spirit isn't limiting, it's freedom. It was a message I think we needed to hear.
Then we ended the night by having a concert by The Turning. They did a lot of their original songs, which were great, but I have to admit that my favorite was a cover of "Take on Me" by Ah-Ha. But the kids really had a great time with the concert, and it was fun watching all of the dancing. I think Day 2 was an awesome day.

Beach Blast Day One

2008-06-30T16:12:00.000-07:00

So, the first day started off great. Somebody broke a window on one of the buses before we even left the parking lot. But after that things go a lot better. My bus was full of the 6th and 7th graders. They were awesome and very good and clean. We watched 3 movies, Night at the Museum, The Incredibles and Napoleon Dynamite.
The worship last night was incredible. The Turning did a great job. They did mostly songs that were unfamiliar to me, but it was still so worshipful. Mark Matlock is hilarious. He also brought his son, Dax, who is a very cool kid. He talked about Sharach, Meshach, and Abindigo (not sure about the spelling). He talked about how passionate they were for God (since our theme is Amp'd Up). Then he asked every student, on a scale from one to ten, how amp'd are you for God. It was cool for the kids to think about. Then, we had a night swim. I spent most of the time helping a kid who couldn't swim get around the pool, and some other kids do back flips. It was a great first day, except for the broken window.

Baptist Children's Home

2008-06-21T14:15:00.000-07:00

Today, several of us went out to the Baptist Children's Home to play soccer with the migrant kids. Man, those kids are good. I've been working out a lot and exercising, and thought I was getting in o.k. shape (I'm still way out of shape, but better than I was). By the end I was weezing like...well, I can't think of a good analogy. Anyways, I was weezing really bad. It was about 110 and I was about to have a heat stroke. I scored one goal. Corbin scored one. Other than that, the only goals are team scored were for the other team. Those kids are super good.

It's cool to get to go hang out with these guys. They're just sitting there waiting to be deported, and whenever somebody comes to hang out with them, they get super-excited. I just wish it was cooler so we could have stayed longer. And hopefully, when they get back to Hondurus, or Ecuador, or Venezuelar, or wherever they're from, they'll remember some white kids came and hung out with them and tried to talk Spanish to them, and that they were from a church, and they'll decide to see what church is all about, and out of that experience God.

Pancho Claus

2008-06-17T15:31:00.000-07:00

All week we've been having Sports Camp at our church. I've been leading the Bible study for the 4th and 5th graders, and they've been a ton of fun. The first night I told a fart joke and a poop story. The rest of the night, the boys were farting. So I had to declare a "No Fart Zone" last night. Anyways, tonight, I'm talking about loving people and I'm going to share the story of Pancho Claus. I wrote a blog about it a year or so ago, and just reread it. I thought it was pretty funny, so I'm going to put it up here again, since I've been thinking about it today. Let me know what you think.

Every month my church goes out for a trip to do homeless ministry. We give away a great meal, clothes, toiletries, and some other stuff to people who live under the Commerce Street bridge or in the homeless shelter near there. This past Saturday I went along with a group of junior highers. I met some interesting people, and over the next couple of days I'm going to tell about the encounters that I had with some homeless people that I met.
First, I'm going to tell you about "Pancho Claus." He was a big man with a big white beard. He also was in a wheel chair and had a patch over one of his eyes. There was a man on a bicycle who called him "Pancho Claus" because he looked like a Hispanic Santa.
Well, Pancho had been talking to a couple of the kids, so I wanted to get close to him so I could hear and make sure they were ok. He was very, very drunk. The kids were being nice, talking to him, and inviting him over to get some food. We even offered to bring the food to him, since he was, after all, in a wheelchair. So after a few minutes, I knew we had to get back, so I said that to him to try to end the conversation. Well, he looked at me and said, "You come over here to talk to me, you don't have to be scared." I wasn't scared, so I walked over to him. He gave me his empty beer can to throw away.
After I threw the empty beer can away, he asked me to come back. So I walked back and he grabbed me by my hand. (Ok, a little freaky, but I'm still not scared) He starts talking to me, and I can't hear him very well. One, because I have bad hearing, and 2 because he was slurring his speech. He asked if he could have my sunglasses. I know sunglasses is a petty thing, and I could get along in my life without them, but they were expensive, and there was not a chance I was going to give them to him, especially since he only had one eye anyways.
So, he's got me by the hand and he says for me to listen to him, so I turn my head to point my ear at him, so I can hear him. This apparently makes him mad, and he hollers, "LOOK AT ME!" So, I look at him, but I can't hear him.
He tells me, "what do you see?"
I say, "I see a man."
"What kind of a man?" (you have to imagine this in the same type of accent as El Guapo from "The Three Amigos."
I say, "a good man?"
"What?!"
I say, "a hairy man?"
"What?!"
By this time I have no idea what he wants me to say. I am very aware of his sweaty hand and that all but one kid has left the scene. So, I guess, "a hippy man?"
He says "NO! I am a Roman Pirate and I'm here to kill the demons..." and then he rambles on about something that I really didn't understand.
So I say, very enthusiastically, "yeah, you do look like a pirate."
This apparently didn't make him happy, and he tells me, "You're a bad man. You're not a real Christian."
Well, I didn't like that much, so I asked him why he would say something like that.
He then grabs my hand tighter and says, "Look at me!" He lifts the patch from his eye a little bit and I am telling you now that was one of the grossest things I have ever seen. It was like looking into a fleshy hole. And he just wants me to look at him and listen. BUT HE DOESN'T SAY ANYTHING!!! He just holds my hand and stares. So, I just look back at him, and watching his other hand to make sure he doesn't pull out a butcher knife to chop out my eye to replace his. (OK, honestly, I'm getting a little spooked by this point)
After a minute or so, he asks me, "What did I say?" HE DIDN'T SAY ANYTHING. I HAD NO IDEA WHAT HE WAS TALKING ABOUT. I said, "something about you being a Roman Pirate." That was really the only thing I could remember him saying.
Pancho Clause yells, "NO! Listen to me." Again he makes me stare at the hole in his eye and listen to him trying to speak with his mind. I really don't want to know what he was telling me with his mind thoughts. All I was really thinking was that I really want to wash my hand.
Again, after a minute of silence he said, "Did you hear what I said to you."
I said, "Nope, I didn't hear a thing."
Then he went off about this Roman Pirate thing and what it meant to be a real Christian and how we need to serve Jesus.
Then he started laughing and let go of my hand, and said he was just messing around with me. On the outside I was laughing with him, and on the inside I was screaming, "Dude, you are crazy."
Then, before I left, he asked me one more thing. "Hey man, I need some underwear, can I have yours? You can go behind that car and change for me."
I was like, "No, heck no." Then he asked Isaac. Isaac said, "No, heck no!"

I know I've been trying to think about how to love people more. Did I show love to this guy. I didn't love him, he actually freaked me out a little bit. (You look at a hole in somebody's eye while he holds your hand and tries to telepathically speak into your head by a guy who looks like a Hispanic Santa Claus in a wheelchair and tell me you're not a little freaked out too) But thinking back, did I meet his needs and show him love. We did bring him some food, and then he came over and got seconds. But then one of his friends told me that he was very lonely and wanted people to talk to him and listen to him.
I don't think I did all I could for this man, but I think this is what God had me to do for that day with this man to show him the love of God. Is it going to make a big difference in his life? Probably not, but for that moment, I feel that God was using me and the other students to show the love of God to Pancho Claus.

Sunday Morning Impact

2008-06-17T11:49:00.000-07:00

I think we had a pretty good Sunday overall. Our game was a little weak though. We had 7 students come up to the front of the stage. We gave each of them a bowl of Rice Crispees. They had to eat as much of them as they could in one minute without using their hands. Alyssa was the winner. It seems like she wins every time she plays the game. None of the kids ate very many though.
Nathan led worship, and he did a pretty good job. I didn't know a couple of the songs, which is o.k., but the kids don't sing as well as they do on the songs they do know. But, I think it's great that he's teaching us new songs, which eventually the kids will know and sing to. It's just that getting acquainted part that is hard.
Our lesson was about going to church. I did the opener. I talked about how I feel that we don't take church as serious as we should. We (and I say 'we' because I do this too) come in late, we don't pay attention, and we make excuses for not going. Church is where we come to worship God. It's not for socialization and entertainment (although that's what we've begun to make it into). It's for worship. And if we really want to worship God, then why would be late. Why would we want to miss it. I know if I was going to a movie, I make sure I get there early so I don't miss any of it, not even the previews. It's sad that we don't have the same motivation about church, which is so much more important than any movie we could ever see.

Wed. Night Impact

2008-06-16T16:57:00.001-07:00

I know this is a little late. I've been busy with some different things and just haven't kept up with the blog as good as I should have. So, I'm going to catch up over the next couple of days.
Last Wed, I spoke about unknown heroes of the Bible. This was the third sermon on this subject. The first was about John Mark. The second was about a blind man named Bartimeus. This was about the 4 friends who brought their lame friend on a mat to see Jesus. When they came to the house where Jesus was, they found that there was no room. So, they went to the top of the house, and dug a hole in the roof, and lowered him down from the roof in front of everybody. The Bible says that Jesus saw the friends' faith and then he looks at the man and says that his sins are forgiven. Some people thought it was blasphemous for Jesus to say that, so Jesus told them, "which is easier, to say get up and take your mat and walk or that your sins are forgiven, but that you might believe, get up, take your mat, and walk." And at once the man got up off his mat and began to walk, praising God.

A couple of things that I think are interesting in this encounter with Jesus. First, it wasn't the sick man's faith that healed him. It was the friends' faith in Jesus. Second, Jesus is more concerned with spiritual health than the physical health. It was more important to Jesus that this man's sins were forgiven rather than his ability to walk. Third, it doesn't seem that anybody got upset that some guys dug a hole in somebody else's roof.

I told the kids that somebody you have to carry your friends. When they are going through a hard time, you have to support them and carry them to Jesus. For the most part, Christians have decided to kick the people who are hurting, and keep them down. We need to be willing to lift these guys up and pray for them, and have faith that God is the one who can heal.

And sometimes your friends will carry you. For me, it's easier to carry somebody than to be carried. I feel like a loser if I can't help out and participate. If I see somebody doing something that I should be doing, then I feel like a little lump of poo. But sometimes, we are going to go through hard times, and we can't keep it to ourselves. It's OK to ask for help and lean on others. And I want our youth ministry to be like that; a place where kids can feel comfortable and safe. And when they are struggling, people aren't going to judge them, but are going to lift them up. And when they see somebody struggling, we don't shy away, but stand up and offer to carry them.

Jim Gaffigan--Cake

2008-06-10T09:04:00.001-07:00

I think Jim Gaffigan is hilarious. Here is a little video about him talking about cake.