Everybody attended meet at Golden Dragon dictate I forgot the panties free for some software that I wanted to get from a computer that is $700 limit free iPhone
What I really said was,”Hey everybody, I found a neat app called Dragon Dictate. I just can’t believe the software that I wanted to get for a computer that is several hundred dollars is free on the iPhone.”
I guess I need to speak more clearly. It entertained me nonetheless.
Truth can hurt, but it is still the best path for solving a problem that starts with dishonest acts or words. It can’t get any better delaying the truth.
It is like when I realized I was going too fast downhill (35mph) longboarding and dove off and got hurt, but didn’t die or break any bones like if I were to wait until the board got even faster (45-50mph) and flew out from under me with speed wobbles. It was a scary situation that made me feel dumb that I got into it, but it was gonna hurt either way. It just would have had worse consequences if I didn’t have control of the timing in how it was made right.
This is advice I offer to anyone who gets into a predicament caused by selfish goals that displace common sense.
My role at the youth camp that happens each summer has changed a lot since I first got involved as a sixth grader in 1989. Camp itself has also changed a lot through the years. I couldn’t say it has become better or worse, but in some ways you could make a case for both sides. Maybe it is a case of ‘the good old days’ syndrome on my part, but I can appreciate simplifying things down to the essential parts at camp so that distractions are minimized. I do not plan on describing each year one by one and the subtle differences that took place between them. I will describe past and present instead.
The past: less than 80 teens gathered at Lassen pines in open air tents shaped like covered wagons each wagon with a solo counselor and spent the majority of time outdoors eating at picnic tables, sitting on wooden bleachers near a bonfire each night and playing games in a field nearby or at night. The speaker used an overhead projector to illustrate his points and to captivate his audience.
The present: over 200 teens gather at Sky Mountain Christian Camp and stay in cabins with heaters and windows and private showers and indoor plumbing- and electricity where they can plug in their chargers etc. They have 1-2 counselors and spend about 1/2 of their time indoors in a gym or cabin and cafeteria and 1/2 outside playing competitive games and walking to and from events. There is a full band and concert setup stage and lighting projector screens and fog machine in a carpeted multi-use room and media is managed with professional state of the art equipment.
I really enjoyed the low tech approach to the camp experience, and appreciated how different it was from home life as a teen. Now that technology is integral to so many parts of my life, in some ways it is good to learn about God in that context. The only consistent concern I have is how effective people can be engaged the farther they are from the leaders of the music. How much can you connect with a person leading worship music when 199 others are there to catch in your peripheral vision? At what point does worship leading become a christian rock concert? I believe that there is a place and a reason for all of these things to exist, but have been thinking about how youth ministry may be missing the tougher to implement parts of ministry such as direct mentoring. Not just to live holy lives and strive for purity and seek God through time alone reading and praying, but to be a big brother or sister to teens. To be available is the most valueable resource to the average teen, (if an average teen ever existed). I write this because this is what I see lacking to a degree in my own ministry, the personal time spent with individuals that communicates, ‘I really like you’ and not just , ‘i am doing my job’. I like the teens I work with, and sometimes think about how much more effectively I could teach certain things with just a little more time with each one.
I also have a role as a father. I do believe that this role is above my role as a youth leader, because what a hypocrite would I be to put aside my own children and wife to pursue a role of spiritual mentor? A big one. Thankfully my wife is also very on board with youth ministry and we are likeminded in a desire to see these teens thrive in life, so here is not much disagreement on our purposes. I feel we are more and more like one person as time passes in some ways. At some point, I have to acknowledge that I can’t be around forever to lead a youth group, so I am thinking about how to prepare teens and others to not be dependent on Karyn and myself for what to do next. I want to encourage others to own the purposes they have been given and come up with ideas of their own to try out to complete those missions and goals unguided by me, but by the wisdom and discernment given to them by God. I also hope to have all of the other parts of the church working smoothly with each other with the youth group, and not as such seperate entities that seldom interface.
Right now I want to focus on having scheduled moments to connect with each of my children (and my wife) as individuals, and keep looking for more people I can trust to help with the teens and help keep me accountable for the goals I have set for myself to stay living on purpose and be the best I can be with God’s help.
I don’t feel effective at times, so I would appreciate your prayers of support, if you would put in a word for me next time you talk with our Father.
I am encouraged by recent sermons delivered to my iPhone from Arcade Wesleyan Church in Sacramento, and am really excited about what they are doing, listening attentively. Also a new podcast about living called “The Existence Project” has been fun to hear from.
I hope nobody thinks I have a problem with Christian Rock Concerts, or people making a living in ministry, but I was just speaking from my own memory of my earlier teenage perspective on things. It informs the way I approach things from time to time.
(Written a while ago, forgot to finish, publish too)
When I got home yesterday, upon entering my house, I was stunned to smell a strong gasoline odor. I asked Karyn what happened, and found out that she had mowed the lawn and that the mower leaks gas. Confused, I wondered why she would have the mower in the house. She was busy doing tasks walking from here to there and I prodded to figure why the smell was so strong in the house. She said that the mower is in the garage and that she just opened the door to get clothes from the dryer not long ago. I am guessing that she had gotten acclamated to the odor, because she did not seem bothered by it. I suggested that I take the kids outside for a while until the odor dissipated.
She agreed, and I went through the house opening windows and doors, switching our air conditioner from recirculate to ventilate. Within a minute, the atmosphere had been refreshed. The kids were all excited to go for a walk though, so I grabbed my camera and phone and walked with the kids outside.
We were going to walk just around the block, so I wanted the kids to hold each other’s hands while I led them and took a few photos. Josiah, understanding my intent, arranged Noah and Zion with himself to stand in order by height for a posed group shot in front of our van in the driveway.
They walked down the sidewalk precariously strolling, Noah and Zion veering often away from the concrete into the decorative rock landscaping and stumbling, frustrating me a bit, knowing that there would be tears when they fell. I prefer to avoid the tear management problem altogether, if possible. We stopped in front of a field of foxtails, which are a novelty to Josiah, and consequently, Noah, and to a lesser extent, Zion. They plucked a few of them and before boredom was unanimous, we continued on.
Next we saw a curious tree stump, with stakes holding caution/cuidado tape around the sight. I wondered what the warning was about, since I hadn’t thought of a tree stump being where a tree had been for years as something to catch a passerby by dangerous surprise.
After a bit more walking we saw a hydrant. I asked Noah if he knew what it was; he didn’t know. Same question to Josiah, and he was at a loss for the name of it but wanted to assure me that it’s purpose was explainable. “that’s where the firemen put their hose onto to put water on fires” he explained. Not to bypass Zion, I asked her if she knew what it was, and she did not know.
I thought the hydrant looked cool, and I always like my kids in a picture, since a still inanimate life image does not have the lasting value of any image featuring people, and my kids are great examples of people loved and almost always avialable to me.
(lost interest in finishing this, so short ending below:)
…I finished walking around the block and took a few pictures. See my images on Flickr. I am user “ezravision”
I am on the flight to Denver now. I have no Internet access, because I am at or above 10,000 feet of altitude on southwest airlines. I had two cranberry juice cups and a blueberry breakfast bar distributed by my host. I just got a whiff of what smells like nail polish. I hope there is not someone on this plane actually applying nail polish while in flight. I really have a strong dislike for the smells common in beauty salons.
I wonder what it is about a daughter that really catches my attention. She seems to really seek my attention, not that my sons don’t, but she looks for my attention to be on her. My boys usually want me to see what they can do or accomplish to impress me with their accomplishments and skills. Not Zion. She wants me to be delighted in her for her charm or smile. She is pretty good at this too, because sometimes I have difficulty focusing he camera when she suprises me with something surprisingly delightful while the camera is at my eye. Now that she is grasping language so much better, she delights me in language as well as through expressions on her face.
In this photo, I decided that it would be better cropped with a sideways orientation, but Zion, always wanting to accomodate whatever I choose to do decided that a sideways beautiful grin might better fit accordingly in the resulting image. She knew it better than I did.
I have been thinking alot about drawing and the creation of art in general recently. When I go to work and come home, eat and sleep and socialize with wife, kids and friends, I am reminded about some of the unique talent I have and have not been really using as much as I should. I have a lot of fine art supplies in the garage, but they are dried up and corroding. I need to develop my skills again in the digital realm, so that I can get back to progressing creatively and find my way back to making my business profitable. I have invested plenty in my business, and now it is time to promote it and make some money in the process.
I was sick the other week. I am glad not to be still, excepting the occasional cough. My wife, Karyn still has a ways to go before she is back feeling 100%.
Josiah feels a little sick, but he says he is feeling better.
My boss asked me yesterday what my YouTube video meant when referencing “Vegan bacon” in a short skit the youth at my church made and I published on my YouTube channel. I said, “I get the teens in the youth group to do a skit to advertise an unlikely product in a humorous manner” and did not really know what he was getting at. I wondered if he was a vegan, and happened to not find it to be humorous. He said he was just wondering.
The day after that, he said he was on facebook and wondered If I had a profile. I said I didn’t, and that I had deleted my myspace account recently (which is true). I mentioned that I use Twitter, and he seemed to have no idea what that was.
I pondered what it would be like to have my boss among the friends on a social network profile, commenting and writing on my wall, constantly wondering what insight he could get into my mind through what I may post from time to time. I don’t know exactly what to think, but I guess I don’t have anything to hide- it just seems odd when social lines get crossed suprisingly. We have photography in common, and that seems more comfortable to relate at that level.
I suppose everyone involved in a social network gets a false sense of intimacy while posting stuff to a worldwide publicly available space. It’s not just those who comment back who are reading my posts and watching my videos. That’s a meal for thinking.
Picasa for Mac: Free download from Google: “
I am gonna try this out. I hear good things about it from windows users.
