Holy Cold Front, Batman

So, I arrived back at church at 6:00 p.m to a warm, setting sun and a balmy 75 degrees. Did some farewell greeting, had a laying on of hands to send me away, and a Confirmation Vision meeting. It all lasted until just after 9:00. Got into the car to find that it was 43 degrees. That's right, more than 40 degree drop in temperature in just over three hours. Gotta love living in Wisconsin...NOT.

Speaking of the Confirmation Vision meeting, it went so well! We are looking at switching to a new Confirmation Program and it's been received really well. It's really exciting...too bad I won't be around to see it begun.

Out of chaos...more chaos

This post is more of a procrastination than anything else. My desk has been in many different stages of messiness. If you imagine a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being sparkling and uncluttered and 10 being piled to the ceiling with junk, I've been from 7 down to about 3 and now back to about 5. My days have been spent getting resources together for my year-long sabbatical. The new CD burner in my laptop has made it so that valuable hard drive space can be preserved for more important things (read: games). So, rather than getting things ready for my leaving, which has been the ultimate goal, I am taking a few steps backward and making even more for myself to do. *sigh* Better buckle down and get at it.

Tempted by the warm air wafting in through the bedroom window this morning, I laced up my running shoes and headed out for a morning run. The endorphins must have set in early because I actually enjoyed it. I was looking forward to a 20 minute jaunt, hot shower after, fresh cup of coffee and it would be a great day.

Yeah, right.

My 32 year-old, falling apart, 250 pound-carrying knees didn't quite cooperate. It's not that I'm really out of shape; most people can't believe that I weigh as much as I do. I do have a pretty muscular physique to go with my weight. Sure, if I had a flat, there'd be a spare tire available for use, but still. I think part of it is my shoes, but the bigger part is my gut. Anyway, I made it about 15 minutes and then had to make the "walk of shame" back to home.

At least the shower was hot and the coffee was good.

Why do I do it?

Well, I have survived another Wednesday night. Now that I don't have to teach as much, it's a bit better but there's still one minor bump along the way: Game Night. Tonight it was Capture the Flag...relaxed style. Same basic concept: get both flags to your side of the field. The relaxed part was things like boundaries, where to put the flag, etc. The one steadfast rule was, if you tagged someone, you had to take them to the common jail, which meant that you were out of the game. So, while kids were running over the better part of a square mile, there were many screams of "That's not fair." and "Can they do that?" Yup. They could do that until it became dangerous (chasing each other on asphalt could mean monstrous road rash). Along with that, it took a while for them to learn about "acceptable attrition."

Tonight wasn't so bad because it produced two teachable moments.

First, we were able to talk about the need for rules. At first, everyone thought that no rules was cool. But, after a while, the unpredictability and the lack of appeal process lost it's luster. That's what God's rules are all about. He's not trying to cramp our style; he's trying to keep us safe. Besides, there is plenty of room to play inside his rules.

Second, we talked about true love. Everyone was so worried about themselves getting caught that they didn't see that if they got caught, their team could win easily. With flags so far apart and with having to take people to jail, there weren't enough people to go around. To simply allow yourself to be captured so that your team could take the flag would have ended most games inside of 10 seconds. But, it's not in our society or nature to allow that to happen. It's all about us...or so we think. Jesus said, "Greater love has no man than this: that he lay down his life for for his friends." And this isn't just laying down our life to the point of death. To lay our lives, our time, our wants, our desires down to help a friend is the greatest love. To ask our spouse if we can help in any way. To not just "get out of the way" but to get into the fray of ministry. Hopefully I can learn this lesson myself.

So, to answer my own question, why do I do it? I do it in the hopes that the next generation will learn the lessons above before I did. I do it so that the next generation will be more faithful than the current one. I do it because God has made me for it.

Should married couples work together?

Ah yes, today we delve into that age-old question: Should you work with your spouse? I'm leaving for a year; Sara's filling in for me. It's good all the way around because it keeps Sara busy (and employed) while also having someone who won't mind when I come back next year and take my job back. But I digress...

So, today's Wednesday, THE busiest day of the week. I have Sara come in and learn some of the ropes for what happens on Wednesdays. To be honest, now that we don't have the 8th grade class to teach, it's not too much. Anyway, I have her lay out the news and notes, prepare the lesson for tonight, and generally get a feel for what's happening. There's just one minor flaw on my part: I forget that Sara doesn't read minds. I found myself expecting her to do things that she should have no earthly idea that she should be doing. There were expectations that I had but I hadn't communicated them to her yet. When I found myself losing it, I paused and thought about why I was mad. I realized that I had no right to be upset with her for something that I hadn't explained.

I also realized that it may be my own anger at having to leave a place that needs me and wants me for another place that may not need me or want me at all. Oh well, it wouldn't be the first time that I was someplace where I wasn't need and/ or wanted. I'll just have to win them over with boyish good looks and charming personality. Or else just hide somewhere out of the way until it's all over.

To answer the question above, it was good to work with my wife today. I hope that she would say the same.

*blinkblink*

Okay, so maybe my exuberance of earlier was a little premature. After a straight 8 hours of configuring my new laptop, I am suffering from some serious eyestrain. It's good to look away from the screen every once in a while.

The transfer of files went pretty seamlessly. In an effort to be thorough, I synched my Palm as well as importing a .pst from my old computer's Outlook program. Got doubles of just about everything, except e-mail. Ah well, gives me an excuse to purge some of my old contacts that I don't necessarily need anymore. However, the good news about all that is that the T3 synchs up pretty well with the new machine; that is, I did it right. :-)

My good friend Ty's 8600 plays Enemy Territory pretty well, so he says. I'm having a bit of a problem with my home network staying active long enough for me to get the full version of the file. I'll try a bit later downstairs, closer to the wireless beacon.

On a "lighter" note, it's crash diet time. When I went to CHOBC almost two years ago, I dropped almost 20 pounds in 10 days. I'm trying to pull that off again. Yeah, yeah, yeah...I know, it's not too healthy. But neither is carrying around 250+ pounds on a 6'1" frame. The good news is that I should be able to keep it off, given my activities of the upcoming year. The stakes aren't as high this time around either. Last time, if I didn't do it, I would have gone home. No such luck this time. If I'm heavy, they'll take me anyway and remedy the situation.

Okay, enough staring at this screen. Time to put this thing away and get on to something completely different.

WOO HOO!

I am in hog heaven right now! Here's why:

Yesterday, I came home to find my new ATI Sapphire Radeon 9600 Video Card with 256 DDR RAM on board waiting for me. Installation was quick and painless and I was fragging at top speed in no time. It's also got a TV out so that it will be how I watch DVDs in Georgia.

Today, I met the UPS truck at church. The UPS guy had a brand new Dell Inspiron 8600 which my church purchased for me to help me to do my ministry to soldiers over the next year. While I now have the pain of transferring files over and re-install a bunch of stuff. But, for the upgrade, it's worth it. By the way, my church is WAY TOO GOOD to me. I thank God every day that I serve the people of St. Paul Lutheran Church. They are AWESOME!

Anyway, I am late for lunch with my wife. I'll write more later.

Not too shabby...

Well, I did some math today. About 18 months ago I begged my first guitar off my in-laws and started to plinking around with it. After 6 months of that, I bought an "entry level" guitar and kept going and boy, did my fingers thank me.

So, I have spent the last year or so teaching myself to play, downloading chord sheets to play music and just kind of farting around. Tonight, I sat down and flipped through the songs that I could play somewhat. My repertoire has expanded to just over a dozen praise songs and a few classic rock tunes (I've almost got "Cat's In the Cradle" by Harry Chapin down). Of course, the lessons that I have taken over the last seven weeks have helped a lot, too. Thanks, Armand and the guys at the Christian Music Center

I was zooming right along through my songs and TWANG! I busted a string. Usually I am pretty good at changing my strings before this happens, but I was surprised by it tonight. Not to worry, though, because I have some spare strings around. I'll be right back at it in no time.

I am *this close* to feeling comfortable playing in front of people. I am hoping to use this skill to enhance my ministry to young people and soldiers. Also, I am finding a lot of joy in singing praises to God in my basement...even if I do just kinda fumble along sometimes. "Make a joyful noise to the Lord" it says in the Psalms. Well, I am having fun and it certainly is noisy. Thank goodness my wife doesn't hear too much of what happens down here.

Bottom line, I am not disappointed with my current skill level. I'll never "go pro" but I'll certainly be able to lead some praise and worship in the near future.

Well, I may be breathing new life into this spot once again. The blog with my friend Jeff seems to have fizzled, in light of God changing his plans (and mine...see below). *shrug* No big whoop. I still love him.

For those of you who read this and maybe don't know, I'm headed off to active duty with the Army. I'm going east...to Ft. Benning, Georgia. Hopefully no farther east than that. :-)

With that in mind, this expedition that we call "life" is going to get a whole lot more interesting and, for the time being, I'm going to post some thoughts and feelings about that stuff here. Stay tuned.