Game of the Week -- Office Paintball

Gotta love shooting al those smiley faces. Mindless stress relief!

OFFICE PAINTBALL

The Youth Pastor has beer in his fridge!

Scott has started a great post/ discusssion on the above topic at his blog. Slide on over and give your 2 cents HERE. Here is the original post:

Ok I have to admit that I have different standards for different people. Let me explain and then you are free to disagree if you feel so led. My father is in his sixties and will generally have a six-pack in his refrigerator. I don’t have a problem with this because that six-pack will last for most of the summer and my father has never had a problem with alcohol. On the other hand if my daughters youth Pastor, or youth sponsor had a six-pack in thier refrigerator, (even if consumed responsibly and legally) my response would be quite different. Any thoughts??

LACK OF HELP

This week at the Little League (LL) I went to the concession stand after batting practice with the thought of chili cheese nachos in my head. I was greeted by a sign that said, "NO HOT FOOD TONIGHT DUE TO LACK OF HELP" . I have several thoughts on this. First, it's a shame when people will not commit just a couple hours of their time so that the LL can provide foo and drinks as well as make a few much needed dollars for upkeep and improvements.
Second, I was glad to see that the usual people did not just give in and work, even though their kids were playing a game. It is good for people to know that if everyone does not pull their own weight things will not magically be done for them. We have become so consumer driven in our culture. We expect to have what we want, with high quality, every time, when we want it. And we are willing to be quite vocal in our complaints if it doesn't happen the way we think that it should. Unfortunately there are very few who are willing to pitch in and make this happen. Most are content to stand on the side and complain about how bad the service is, and how terrible it is that there are no hot dogs or nachos tonight.

This got me to thinking: What if a sign was posted like this in other arenas when people refused to step up. In areas where there is a volunteer fire/ rescue Dept. it would be a real bummer to find a sign on the door that said no service due to lack of help. What about the church. What if the few who always do most of the things decided that they would not do that any more and just put up the appropriate sign when someone does not do/ show up for their job? "Sorry, no nursery due to lack of help", "No worship team; due to lack of help" , "no Sunday School due to lack of help". You get the idea. I am not saying that everyone should be involved in every area. God has given us all gifts, abilities, and likes/ dislikes. We need to find a place to plug in. Maybe it's in the sound booth, maybe it's slinging hot dogs and pretzels, maybe its _______ (you fill in the blank). Many hands make the load light. All we have to do is our part.

The power of Porn

Tim Stevens from GCC posted on his blog the following statistics regarding internet porn. The numbers are scary and should serve to remind us that we should be involved in people's lives and help to lead the way out of bondage. What can be done?

- 12 percent of all Web sites are porn.
- 25 percent of all search engine requests are for porn.
- 35 percent of all Internet downloads are pornographic.
- Every second, 28,258 Internet users are viewing porn.
- 89 percent of porn is created in the U.S.
- $2.84 billion in revenue was generated from U.S. porn sites in 2006.
- 70 percent of the Internet porn traffic occurs during the nine to five workday.
- 260 new porn sites go online daily.

Fried Krispy Kreme Donuts

Only in America could we find a way to up the bar on making something even less healthy. You can go HERE and get directions to make your very own butter fried KK donut.

Bad Evangelism

to the extreme...

Game of the Week -- Pinch Hitter

It's baseball season.

PINCH HITTER

24 - In Review

Ok, like most people I didn't think that this was the best season. I really think that there are a few things that made the show lose a little luster; in no particular order:

1. They have set the bar so high that a letdown was almost inevitable
2. There are now so many sub plots running that it takes away from the focus of the show.
3. I think for the first time they put a lot of effort into setting up the next day. It doesn't seem to have been a very popular move.
4. WAY too many bad guys at once. How many factions/ nations can poor Jack handle in one trip around the sun dial?
5. I know it's TV but the unrealistic stuff got a little hokie; ie. President Palmer coming in and out of his coma sevreal times in a 2 hour period.
   

I could probably go on but there is no need. I still really like the show. I think that we all want to be like Jack, but at the same time realize how unwilling we are to make huge sacrifices in our lives. We also relate to him because he is so flawed. Even with all his special abilities he is just another average Joe. Only about 8 1/2 months until next season...

Thou Shalt Not Steal... WIFI

A Michigan man is being prosecuted for stealing WIFI access at a coffee shop from the parking lot. Story HERE . This raises lots of practical and ethical questions in my mind. What do you think?

Jesus Was Not a Christian

food for thought

Game of the week -- Speedy Bubbles

Ive been finding myself playing this one often of late. Especially while listening to baseball on the internet.

SPEEDY BUBBLES

Back in the saddle...

It's been a week since I have posted a blog entry. It was partially intentional; but not intended to be a week. I wanted to take "a couple of days" to refocus and check my bearings. The business of life this time of year added to this and here we are a week later. I have several drafts that are in progress and hope to have some regular postings over the next few days. must...maintain...discipline...

Little League first games in the book

The first games for my sons and daughter's teams are in the books. One thing that I am excited about is that the schedule has worked out so that I not only can manage my sons' team but also I will only miss about a half hour of one of my daughter's games this year. Great opportunities to spend time with some awesome kids and their families. The other cool thing is that both jerseys are red so I dont have to get a bunch of different shirts and a worry about multiple hats!
Both teams are 1-1. My daughters team, the Dolphins, (I know that strikes fear into an opponent) lost a heartbreaker the first game to an in park rival but then went on the road and beat a team that was picked to be quite good 20-8 on their field. They are really looking like a team!
The boys' team (Reds) did kind of the opposite. We went on the road for the first game and managed to scratch out 6 runs on 4 hits and sneak out with the win. The second game was a 17-15 loss on our field. We got the lumber out but too wany walks and a couple key errors did us in. I was so proud of the way they kept fighting back, three innings in a row, and almost pulled it off. They are learning and accomplished my goal that I put before them: get better as a team each game. We are young and without a major pitching ace and I'm sure be in a lot of these scraps. My prayer is that I keep a healthy balance between competeitveness and witness. I love coaching, and I love baseball. I love being at the ballpark period. Counting a trip to Wrigley on Thursday I'll be making at least 5 trips to a perk. And no one has called for an ump yet!! Good times.

Made me Laugh ... Horror Movies for Kids

THESE gave me a chuckle. I think the one below is my favorite...

Redneck Shotgun

anytime you can use the words redneck and shotgun at the same time you know youre looking at fun.