4th of July

The fourth of July is a celebration of several things. Historically, it is a celebration of America declaring independence from Britain in 1776. Symbolically, it is a celebration of freedom in any form; whether religious, racial or relational. Recently, it is a celebration of capitalism (everyone has a sale today to celebrate… money?), tradition and how much of a redneck lives inside everyone.

On that note, I salute the rednecks of the USA. They are the only ones who celebrate the fourth properly. Not only do they have a flag on their cars and homes and bikes and children’s clothing and underwear, they have them in place all year. They are mullet wearing flag waving patriots all the time, not just when it is socially acceptable or convenient.

The fourth is a grand culmination of the effort put in all year to show pride and gratitude for the independence and freedom granted them. Truly, no one else uses their freedom of speech as often as the redneck. They are always willing to give an opinion whether requested or not and whether intelligent or not.

If you see a redneck today, thank them for setting a great example of what patriotism is all about. Also, ask them if you can hangout during “the show” tonight. You don’ want to miss it.

The danger of distance

Yesterday night was one of the most powerful student ministry services I have ever been a part of. I am very convinced that there is going to be a lot of life change going on in a lot of people’s lives. There really are not words to describe moments like that when you know everything is going to change. I don’t ever want to miss being a part of momentd like that.

For all that amazingness, I almost missed it. It is not that I was running late like I have before. The problem was not that I was completely distracted by the student next to me. The problem was that I was in “ministry mode.”. It is that state when you stop thinking and living like God is doing the work, but I am. When there is distance between my heart and the ministry going on around me. I start doing ministry for others and don’t allow myself to be ministered to. I tell God I am busy, or worse, I am so busy I don’t tell or listen to God at all until it is over.

I have such a bad habit of analyzing or doing ministry without allowing the Word of God to penetrate my heart. That is such a prideful and callous attitude. I don’t have to pay attention to God because my time is better spent figuring out what a speaker could do better or what I should be doing next. After all, would I be a responsible staff member or volunteer if I were not paying attention to my job or students? God would just be interfering.

Wow. I was told as a kid to stay back for powerful stuff. Distance = Safety. In reality, distance = danger. When I allow myself to put a buffer between me and what God is doing around me I am in danger of getting what I want. I am in danger of being left alone and staying the same. What hypocricy! I tell students to allow God to change their hearts, yet I sit back and enjoy the show. I mistake my doing ministry as being effective instead of realizing that by God’s grace I get the chance to be involved as he changes me.

Really it deals with not wanting to confront the filth and atrocious sin in my heart. It is not convenient or socially flattering to be caught up in the spirit, bawling over conviction. Perry talked about being dangerous on Sunday in one of the coolest worldwide movements of God called “One Prayer”.

To bring it all together, I did finally let go of my pride and fear and God worked on me in spite of me. By his grace and mercy I am being changed little by little.

First post from my phone

This is pretty crazy, I’m not gonna lie. I just switched to AT&T and got a data package. The lady at the store cut me a great deal on the plan, so it works out to be cheaper that getting a regular phone plan! I guess that is something to get pretty pumped about.

Anyhow, I don’t know how this is gonna work out long term, but it seems promising so far.

I got to hang out with Davey yesterday a little bit. He is the new student ministry pastor for the Gville campus and I will be volunteering with him once things get rolling over there. I am pretty excited about the potential of the new campuses, but especially the one in Gville.

Man, my thumbs are huge. I think I may have to buy smaller ones in the future.

Job stuff

Well, we finally launched the website for my job.  It is a pretty interesting venture.  We sell excursions for cruises for less (often much less) than the cruises sell them.  The site (www.cheaperexcursions.com) is designed to make it easy to find all of your cruise stop activities all in one convenient location.  We are in the early stages of the business, but we will be adding to it in the near future.

It has been interesting to work on the project and it has definitely stretched me in some awesome ways.

On a different note, God has been blowing me up about pride and unforgiveness recently.  God has to get the junk out of me before his character can fill me.  Tough stuff, but oh-so-good.

Biltmore

I went to the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC yesterday and had a wonderful time with Syd.  Some pictures from that event are here.  It was pretty amazing.  I went when I was in the fourth grade, and nothing seems any smaller even though I have more than doubled in size since then.  Crazy.

After touring around and having fun with animals and a wine tasting, we went to a tapas bar.  The food was interesting.  Some was really, really good.  Other parts were marginal to gross.  I guess that is what you get when you try stuff from other countries.  We had a 1/2 bottle of Spanish wine (Muga Roija, 2003) that was amazing.  I think I will try to find some more of that in the near future.

Prove it.

Monday night right before I went camping, which was amazing, I was hit with some wisdom.

I was involved in a pretty intense conversation on Sunday and was feeling kind of burdened/heavy as a result felt like some sort of resolution needed to occur.  I was not going to be able to have a follow-up conversation, because of camping and another brief prior engagement, until Thursday night (tonight).  While I was supposed to be listening to a volunteer vision casting meeting, I was hit with the thought,  “If it is really important, prove it.  Let your actions confirm your recognition of importance so that later your words will have substance.”

If I just say that something matters to me right now and don’t act on it, then my word will be as good as any other statement that I have made to a person.  If I have proven myself trustworthy in certain statements, I lend credit to all of my statements.  If, however, I only speak of concern and never follow through with the appropriate actions (or worse, act contrary to them), I will then negate not only the previous related statements, but potentially others as well.

The way I see it, integrity if far too important to leave until tomorrow.  Integrity is built in the current choices that lead to actions that confirm what I said yesterday and what I will say tomorrow.

Time to change

I have had the opportunity and the pleasure of having a couple of weeks built into the time between when I left my job at NewSpring and the time when I will start working in Greenville.  This has been a great time to think, clean and ready myself for a new mindset and new task order with the new job.

I think it would have been foolish to try and rush into a new job without letting myself unwind and reset from the previous job stresses and mindsets.  I believe that not taking a break is a good way of saying “I’m not human and I don’t have to live by the rules that God has set up for creation.”  God set up a system of taking a break after completing a huge task.  I would say that a career change would be completing a huge task.  It is more than just on week or month or year long project, but a massive amount of time placing efforts and attention to one goal.  When that time ends, I think it is a good idea to break to give not only my mind a rest, but to allow it to adjust to new policies, procedures and pressures.

This new job seems like it is going to afford me the chance to explore some elements of myself that have been either held back or uncharted to date.  I am about as excited about this as any job I have had, with the exception of when I found out I was going to be scooping ice cream for Ben and Jerry’s.  That turned out to be not quite as exciting once I got into it.  I am definitely looking forward to full time work with benefits.