the last day of 2008

i remember the craziness of Y2K. . . do you?

people were freaking out - Christians were freaking out. . . putting away canned goods, water, batteries and basic survival gear. travel plans were cut way back. . . everyone wanted to be in their own homes when the world ended. . .

hmmmm, that didn't happen.

it seems like there is a lot of worrying and fear about what the future holds for all of us. suddenly the world is a much smaller place than it was during the Cold War. now we share a economic connectedness that is terrifying on a good day. the internet, while sometimes showcasing our cultural differences can't help but point to the truth that we all bleed red. . .

we do not know what 2009 will bring. . . but we shouldn't be afraid. . .
we know what to do ". . . to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God."

and that is enough.

Senior Adult Choir Hip Hop (Short Version)

saw this video and knew it belonged here. . i copied the notes below. . . their grandchildren should be proud!

"This was the opening video for our Student Fall Retreat called "You've Got Talent." Everyone is asking what inspired this. Here is goes... 1) We needed a great opening video that caught everyone off guard, and set the the tone for the weekend. 2) With this idea in mind, we thought we could use this video as a great object lesson about media choices (kinda creepy hearing your grandparents sing some of this), and 3) this has been a GREAT transgenerational culture experiment. It has totally bridged a gap with our Senior adults and our students. Hope you enjoy!

an alternative to new year's resolutions

when i was younger i was dumber. . . a lot dumber about some very common sense kinds of things. . . such as the idiocy of making new year resolutions that even Mother Theresa couldn't keep.

every year i would carefully write out 3 or 4 OR 5 or 10 goals for the coming year. . .

(side road - yeah, i'm a bit of a deluded overachiever. i am a bona fide type A workaholic who suffers from delusions or hallucinations - not sure which - concerning getting 29.5 hours of work crammed into the standard issue 24 hour day with a minimum of 6 hours of sleep. and yes, i know, once i type it and see it in print, the whole absurdity of it makes me question my sanity. it might be time for a reality check. . . time machines have not been invented yet. . . regardless of what EBay has to offer.)

back to the goals. . . i want you to know that i had carefully prayed over those resolutions. they were a part of the divine plan for my life. Philippians 4:13 had me covered. failure was not an option. . . but it was a certainty. one simply cannot improve one's posture and penmanship while developing a new personality, working towards world peace, writing this year's vacation bible school theme song, and memorizing the book of 2 Chronicles. there just aren't enough hours in the day.

in this case, failure was not a backdoor to success regardless of what my favorite pastor of Moody Church in Chicago had to say about it. failure was failure. i had tied this whole thing into my spirituality and so by the end of January, and sometimes sooner, i was a mess, but an optimistically determined one - as evidenced by the same scenario played out 11 months later.

but then i kinda developed a new "bring in the new year" ritual. i call it the auld lang syne binge purge. i binge on self-loathing and pity while mulling over last year's blunders until i want to vomit. and then i write it all down - every pickin' mistake and shortcoming that registered at least a 2.1 on the richter scale of failure (some years i've had to use adding machine tape). as soon as i'm done, i go out into the night and set the paper on fire, watch it burn until it is gone while singing one verse of auld lang syne. and then i go to bed ready to start the new year with hope and a sense of endless possibilities instead of premonitions of guilt and depression.

i can't say much more than this - it works for me.

if you decide to try this at home, a small suggestion. . . sing quietly while you're outside burning last year's list, especially if you're in your pj's - you'll have less explaining to do to your neighbors and the nice policeman with his breathalyzer kit.

being just a little outta tune is ok, right?

i was thinking about this the other day, if being just a little out of tune is ok. . .

we were practicing for a Sunday morning worship and then our two Christmas Eve services. i was assigned keys which basically means that i would play piano on some songs and synth on others. we were doing a lot of traditional carols so the piano would be the instrument of choice for most songs. except that we had a teenie, weenie, little problem - there were about 3 notes on the piano that were slightly out of tune. and because they were spread about evenly in the octaves, chances were good that i could conceivably play around them. so during rehearsal i made note of what notes not to play. and it was all good.

but being in the Chicagoland area with its known weather extremes, we experienced a severe cold front between that rehearsal and Sunday morning. which in turn wrecked havoc with the temperature and dryness of our church sanctuary which did bad things to not only those 3 slightly-out-of-tune notes but encouraged more of the same musical independence from a lot of the other notes. . . do you see where i am going with this?

if i were soloing on the piano, it would have been noticeable - but probably forgivable.
but playing WITH the band, it was more than noticeable, it was painful, really painful.
the other instruments being of one mind and tune only made everything i played sound gross.

i finally gave up trying to figure out what not to play and realized it was easier than i thought - forget the piano and move to the synth for everything.

while not aesthetically pleasing to Christmas carol purists, playing the synth did allow for some creativity and even some pipe organ. . .

but back to the question. . .

being a little out of tune might be ok when you are soloing. . . but it is not ok when you are part of a group.

i think it is kind of like that in life too. i can have a bad attitude, be a little selfish and a teenie, weenie judgmental in my head and not affect anybody because there is no one else in my head but me (most of the time). but when i jump into life with others, it can be painfully obvious that i am in desperate need of an attitude adjustment because i am out of tune/step with them. it may subtle enough that i didn't catch it in my solo living but community living brought it to the surface. and i need to deal with it for the benefit of others and myself.

that is why living in community can be so important for Christ followers; it helps keeps us honest and in tune.

Proverbs 27:17 "As iron sharpens iron. . ."

ok, i'm not the only one

"The Internet Addiction Support Group is sponsored by the Center for Internet Addiction Recovery (www.netaddiction.com). Founded in 2004, the group is a safe place on the web for those who feel addicted to the Internet to share their thoughts, feelings, and concerns with one another, and it is a place where loved ones of online addicts, can find support, validation, and guidance. It is focused on the healing that comes through sharing of one's difficulties in the recovery process."

i can't help it. . . this just sits wrong with me. . . it's like holding a weight watcher's group in a restaurant. . .

i'm gonna look for a face-to-face group. . .

the internet - gotta have it

well, it is official. . . i'm addicted to the internet. . . thank you Al Gore!

seriously. . . we have been having cable issues at our home since we moved in this year - phone, tv, and internet. nothing major that we could FIX - just the little, annoying electronic goblins that make their presence known at worst times. . . only to disappear or at least fade when the cable guy shows up.

this week i bought a new router thinking that this would finally put this whole thing to rest.
yeah, good idea. . . just wrong.

we had a bad modem, but we were able to switch it out for a less-bad modem that the tech left with us for such as time as this. parts of yesterday and today we didn't have tv service. and i didn't really care. and we don't have phone service at the moment. and i don't really care.

what i care/d about was no internet. . . no news, no blogging, no email, no news, no idea shopping, no after Christmas shopping (i hate in-person, real time, in-the-mall shopping - give me amazon.com!) did i mention "no news"????

anyways, i admit it. . . i need my internet more than my phone or my tv. . . and i can't believe i just wrote that.

i promise - i will go look for internet addiction self-help groups in my area as soon as i finish this post. . .

colder than ???

it is a little on the cold side here in the suburbs of Chicago. i think we have moved up to -3, with a windchill of -19.

i am not complaining. i am just wondering where in the world global warming is when you need him. . .