Wednesdays Word...The Gospel According to Krispy Kreme via Louie Giglio

This has to be one of my favorite clips of Louie's and considering he has some pretty amazing talks that says something. I have had the privilege of seeing him in person several times and we have done his DVD sermon series in different church groups too and if you look at my post back in February titled Just so happened to be you'll find a little more back story on this. So prepare yourself you'll be seeing quite a bit of Mr. Giglio in this blog post series.

I'll leave you with this...I just hope and pray you've had your encounter and if you now crave Krispy Kreme I'm sorry.

Wednesday's Word featuring Andy Stanley

For those of you who haven't heard of or just haven't heard Andy speak then you've been missing out but either way you're in for a treat. I purposefully didn't put "heard Andy preach" because his speaking style combined with his ability to bring it nonstop makes for quite the easy listen and seems far from your every day preaching you might be accustomed to. Plus when you throw in the fact that he's sneaky funny and you've got yourself a winning combination of Biblical truths and every day practicality. Warning: if you are a note taker do not attempt to do so you will miss out on a lot because Andy doesn't stop or let alone pause for comedic timing...he may not even breathe during his sermons. Though I have not been able to find supporting records of that last theory so it'll have to remain a hypothesis of mine.

Where do your worries lie? Where does your trust lie?
 

80's on the 18th......Fathers Day Edition

Well with father's day this weekend and me technically starting this post yesterday (18th), I figured it was fitting to look back at father's day when I was a kid. For most people it usually means a grill out, doing something in the yard or a family get together with our aunts & uncles and cousins. But for us it was usually spent at home since both my parents lost their dads at a young age. So Mothers Day was reserved for that big extended family get together. Seriously it was big...10 kids in my mom's family.

One thing I'm proud to say is we never got my dad a tie for Fathers Day. Shoot I don't know if he's ever worn one let alone owns one. Well I take that back; I might have seen a grade school picture of him with a suit and tie of some sorts on. Oh and in his Army dress uniform but other than that my dad pretty much lives in his bibs & orange shirt. My dad didn't really have any hobbies other than collecting "stuff". It didn't matter what it was....bikes, old golf clubs, thingamajigs and a few things I didn't know the name for then and still don't now. I'm fairly certain he still has most of it too. He was always fixing something...and then fixing it again. You see he never truly fixed things...just got them working again; until they broke....again. So he was always getting parts for this and for that at various garage sales or junk yard and he was constantly tinkering on something. I tend to do the same thing. Trust me just ask my wife and take a look at our garage. I know a little about a lot of things and when you compound that with the procrastination gene my dad passed on to me and I'm a fairly dangerous man. Not necessarily dangerous in the fact that they put my life in danger because the things I attempt to fix are dangerous but in the fact that I'm sure my wife wants to strangle me in my sleep due to all the half started projects going on around our home. Though I prefer to consider them half finished.

So take a moment today and  think back to that time when you were a kid and your dad was your favorite super hero and thank them for time well spent. Hopefully you can pass on some of those things you hold special in your heart that you did with your dad and pass that on to your kids so they can pass it on to theirs.

Wednesday's Word brought to you by Tenth Avenue North

Well if you were thinking this was going to be a Sesame Street video I'm sorry to disappoint because I'm not talking about just any word...I'm talking about the Word. God's message is brought to us in many ways. Whether that's through a bible....one with pages or the You Version app on your phone or iPod, a pastor at church, music, the people we come in contact with everyday or the world around us. Sometimes we're just too busy or blind to see It waiting for us and It's been there right there in front of us the entire time.

My plan is to make this a weekly installment here on my blog. So some weeks it may be a song with some purposeful lyrics and other times it could be a speaker with a great message. But regardless it'll be a video because they'll always be able to say it or explain it much better than I can since I'm not a biblical scholar and I haven't slept at a Holiday Inn Express in years. So if you enjoy Christian music and commentary with a bit of humor mixed in (which is why I enjoy our church's new pastor); good. Then you should like these blog posts. If you're offended; good....there's a reason but you'll have to work though that.

So let me introduce you too Tenth Avenue North and their lead singer Mike Donehey (@mikedonehey for you Twitter folks). I've had the privilege of seeing them several times in concert over the last few years and they'll be performing at the Iowa State Fair this year on the free stage to close the fair down on the last night August 21st. Not only do these guys put out some pretty amazing music but Mike really has a way with delivering a message and not just when he's doing his Mickey from Rocky impression either. So enjoy this bit of wisdom not just in the intro but in the song itself because who we are is not about what we do but what's been done for us



So just remember it's not how great your faith is....but who your faith is in.

80's on the 8th....Family Vacation

Now that schools out (for most of us) and the temperature is creeping up that can mean only 1 thing....family vacation time. For kids nowadays it's a breeze. They have their iPods, Gameboys, smart phones and portable DVD players to keep them occupied. But for us 80's kids we might of had a walkman...CD version if you were lucky or else you had your tape one with the songs you recorded off the radio because generally the antennas on them were bad so you could never get the station it just right but if you did you had to stay still but being in a car that was pretty much impossible. Other than that you had a book and the radio. And depending who was driving determined if you were lucky enough to get to listen to FM versus AM....more on that to follow.

For me I never took a vacation as a kid that I got to fly. I didn't get to go the beach and see the oceans or go see Mickey at Disney World or Land for that matter. Yeah yeah I know deprived child. You see our family vacations were determined by where my aunts & uncles lived. Considering pretty much all of my relatives but 2 sets didn't live too far away that left those 2 as the lucky winners. And since they were equidistant apart it set up for an every other year rotation between Colorado and The U.P......Upper Peninsula for you non Michiganites. And from where I grew up that meant an ever so enjoyable 12 hour drive each way which makes it borderline Clark Griswold status.

But even after those trips most of my recollection of "vacation" was actually spent in the car with my grandma. Since I was the oldest grandson in town that put various duties on my shoulders. Like mowing her lawn and riding along with her to visit those 2 same sets of relatives that I normally did with my own family. Worst part of this situation though was the music. She was a country music fan. Now you're probably thinking that's not so bad but you have to remember this was PG...Pre Garth. We're not even talking George Strait or Reba here folks. We're talking AM country music in the 80's...Hank Williams Sr (not Jr), Conway Twitty, Loretta Lynn, Chet Atkins and Roy Acuff.  I could have lived with Merle Haggard, Johny Cash, George Jones and Willie Nelson but they were a little to "hard core" for my grandma's taste so she resided on the AM side of the dial.

I've admitted this to very few people but on one of the trips I learned a trick to ride in silence. I'm not proud of it but it got me through and helped me keep my sanity. I figured out that if I pushed the window button up when the window was already closed it created a bunch of static interference with the AM reception. I stumbled upon it by accident but boy when I figured it out I was all over it until she had fumbled around with the dials enough to determine she just couldn't find a station that would be suitable. I'm actually pretty surprised we never got in an accident when she was trying to scan the dials...manually; since she didn't have a digital radio with a scan or seek button.

I have taken a couple Clark Griswold adventures with my own kids that had some hilarity ensue and my wife didn't kill me and we are still married after them so I'm sure there will be more to follow.