Archive - September, 2009

Book Review – Donald Miller – A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

September 29, 2009 in Books with 0 Comments

A Million Miles in a thousand years awakened something in me.  I am still figuring out exactly what that is, but the journey is kind of what the book is all about.  To say the book is inspiring would be an understatement.  It more than inspired me.  It was more like the book was digging beyond the surface who I am to find my story.  I think what makes this book different is Miller’s vulnerability.  It brought great authenticity and I found myself making a connection with Miller.  It is not often that a book will touch me in an emotional way, but this book brought me right into the story where I found myself cheering and sometimes wanting to cry.

I found myself pausing throughout this story wondering about my own story.  Miller set out to edit his life, in a way, to somehow change his story.  It is making me reflect on my own life and what kind of story it is.  Is my story boring without direction?  Do I face conflict and rise above it to accomplish great things?  Sometimes I am unsure of what my story is all about, but I am now determined to work on my story even if it makes me uncomfortable.

I would recommend this book to anyone, but be prepared to take a long hard look at yourself while you read it.  And at the end you will find yourself wondering what if.

Product information can be found here at Thomas Nelson Publishing

Amazon Page for A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life

Sabbath

September 20, 2009 in Personal Development with 1 Comment

Do you forget to take a Sabbath every week?

Right now, I am sitting in Panera with close to an hour of free time before church.  No kids, no wife, no company at all.  Just me and my thoughts and my laptop.

Thanks to my mother Suzy Sunshine, who is at home watching my kids, I was able to take my brother to the airport early this morning leaving me with this free time before church.  I want to address the issue of sabbath with all of the parents out there.  We, as in my wife and kids, set aside Sundays for our typical off day that we can do whatever we want.  Often we do stuff as a family and sometimes we hang out at home.  But I often forget that taking care of a 4 and a 3 year old is not really considered a break.  So I forget to take time for myself sometimes.

I am quite thankful for my little break this morning.  I am also looking forward to spending time at home tonight with @ragtagmama, since I spent most of our time together ripping walls down in my basement.  Soon I will be off to church and then to serve at VSU and I will step back into dad mode in just a few hours.

Remember to make time for a break and plan them.  Happy Sunday everyone.

Have You Really Plugged In Lately?

September 17, 2009 in Uncategorized with 1 Comment

I was thinking today as I drove into work about how busy this season of life can be for me.  At church, small groups get running full blast again, football is on TV, and I start preparing for Christmas.  Yes, Christmas takes a lot of time to pull off correctly and I am already thinking about lights, trees, parties, and gifts.

I was thinking about how much work it is going to be leading 2 different small groups this year and what needs to happen in order for me to keep it all in order.  I don’t want to be a dead beat leader for either of my groups.  How can I effectively serve both of my groups and make time for the other responsibilities in my life?

The answer that I got is to keep plugging into my relationship with Jesus.  There is power there that is a lot more than me.  I notice a pattern in my life when I am spending minimal time talking to God.  When I have days where I don’t make time to pray at all or I squeeze in a few prayer requests here and there, I sometimes feel a little more tired and kind of flat.  But during seasons where I am turning to God more and spending more quality time in prayer, I feel more directed and energized.

So summer is almost over and a season of chaos is about to begin for me and I am planning on being super intentional about plugging into the great power of prayer very consistently.  I am not talking about dinner time prayer or I am singing with the radio prayer.  I want quality, distraction free, focused, intentional, relationship building time with Jesus.

Have you REALLY plugged in lately?

Skillet – Monster – Video

September 10, 2009 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Here is Skillet’s Monster Video.

Family Force 5 – Keep The Party Alive

September 8, 2009 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Ok, so watch this video and hang on until the end to hear a clip of a new song from Family Force 5 called Keep The Party Alive.  Good stuff.  Weird clip, but I don’t expect anything normal from FF5.

Book Review: Fearless – Max Lucado

September 8, 2009 in Books with 0 Comments

It only took me a few days to finish reading Fearless by Max Lucado.  I have always found Lucado to be a quick and easy read because of the way that he simplifies the topic and makes it personal.  One thing that Lucado is able to do with his writing is to take the Gospel stories of Jesus and bring them to life for me as a reader.  This book helped me to get to know Jesus better personally, particuarly about his mission against fear.  I never realized how much Jesus spoke about fear.
“Fear creates a form of spiritual amnesia. It dulls our miracle memory. It makes us forget what Jesus has done and how good God is.”
This gave me a little bit of a wake up call to where fear is preying on my relationship with Jesus.  It brought light to areas of my life where I have been allowing fears to control and limit who God created me to be.  It has helped me to identify areas of unhealthy fears and take action to combat those fears.  I like the way that Max uses the scriptures to help us to face the different types of fears in our lives.  Anyone can tell you that you shouldn’t have to be afraid of something, but Lucado arms us with the Word of God and gives reason why we should not fear.
“Courage does not panic; it prays. Courage does not bemoan; it believes. Courage does not languish; it listens. It listens to the voice of God calling through Scripture, “Fear not!””
This book was very encouraging to me and has inspired me to take more risks and adventures in life.  I realized how a simple fear can trick me into lying to myself long enough that I all but forget that God is bigger than the fears and challenges that I face.  It forced me to ask myself, “What if?” and now I have the confidence to find out the answer to that question.
It only took me a few days to finish reading Fearless by Max Lucado.  I have always found Lucado to be a quick and easy read because of the way that he simplifies the topic and makes it personal.  One thing that Lucado is able to do with his writing is to take the Gospel stories of Jesus and bring them to life for me as a reader.  This book helped me to get to know Jesus better personally, particuarly about his mission against fear.  I never realized how much Jesus spoke about fear.
“Fear creates a form of spiritual amnesia. It dulls our miracle memory. It makes us forget what Jesus has done and how good God is.”
This gave me a little bit of a wake up call to where fear is preying on my relationship with Jesus.  It brought light to areas of my life where I have been allowing fears to control and limit who God created me to be.  It has helped me to identify areas of unhealthy fears and take action to combat those fears.  I like the way that Max uses the scriptures to help us to face the different types of fears in our lives.  Anyone can tell you that you shouldn’t have to be afraid of something, but Lucado arms us with the Word of God and gives reason why we should not fear.
“Courage does not panic; it prays. Courage does not bemoan; it believes. Courage does not languish; it listens. It listens to the voice of God calling through Scripture, “Fear not!””
This book was very encouraging to me and has inspired me to take more risks and adventures in life.  I realized how a simple fear can trick me into lying to myself long enough that I all but forget that God is bigger than the fears and challenges that I face.  It forced me to ask myself, “What if?” and now I have the confidence to find out the answer to that question.

Be sure to check out these links:

www.TheFearlesBook.com

www.MaxLucado.com/TownHall

www.ThomasNelson.com/Fearless

And these Fearless videos:

Q&A

General Greeting

60 sec. commercial

Adding To Our Family – Compassion

September 7, 2009 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Nobody is pregnant!!!!!  Now that is out of the way….no worries dad.

Tonight a blogger whom I follow and you may know, Carlos at Ragamuffin Soul wrote this post about a boy named Carlos who has been waiting more than 6 months to be sponsored through Compassion International.  So Faith and I jumped at the opportunity to sponsor him and we couldn’t be more excited about it.

Actually, we have been planning on sponsoring a child in the near future and wanted to have the kids help us pick someone to sponsor, but we couldn’t pass up this opportunity.  We cannot wait to start interacting with our newest long distance family member.  There are a lot of kids out there who have been waiting for a long time for sponsorship.  There is a link below with more details about sponsoring one of these kids.  If you are already sponsoring a child or are interested in getting started with us, please comment below.  I would love to hear your stories.

I just sponsored a child on Compassion’s web site.
Visit http://www.compassion.com/sponsor/default.htm?referer=33769 to
learn more about how you can sponsor a child too.
-You can view photos of children who are waiting for a sponsor. You
can also search for a child by birthday, age, gender, country, and
more, or you can select the child who has waited the longest.

-Through Compassion, a Christian child development organization, you
can be personally linked with a child in a developing country who
needs your help.
-Your support will bring a complete package of benefits to a child in
need, including learning opportunities, health care, food and medicine as
needed, social development, and even job skills, through a local network
of caring Christian adults. Most important, the child will encounter the
gospel through regular Christian training.

Home Improvement Argh Argh Argh!

September 3, 2009 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

I really liked that show by the way.  I miss tv about families with lessons like the Taylors, the Cosbys, and the Keatons.  Bonus points if you can name all of those shows.  Hint: One of the shows names is the name of the family.  If you don't get that one then you must live under a rock.

Shifting gears to what this post is really about.

I feel like I have been on my own home improvement show around the house lately.  There is a direct correlation between my home improvement projects and my lack of blogging.  I even wanted to post some pictures in this post, but I need to take some first.  You saw my earlier post complete with pictures when I ripped up the living room carpet.  On Sunday and Monday I was able to almost complete my carpet extraction project by finishing the hallway and Ephriam's room.  I have 3 closets that I need to clean out and remove the last bits of carpet yet.  Not sure when that will get done, but the rooms and hallway look great.  Again, I will have to post pictures some other time.

On Tuesday night, I brought home KC's big girl bed from IKEA and with the help of my brother, we had it assembled in 2.5 hours.  That is pretty good time considering her twin bed is a trundle bed with 3 drawers underneath.  I am quickly becoming the IKEA furniture master assembler.  I think that they should have a certification course.  BTW, if you need my IKEA specialty services, I work for food, drink, and good conversation.  Eventually I think that my house will probably look a lot like and IKEA showroom only probably a lot messier.

My next home improvement project is the basement.  If you recall, it flooded in June and we are still cleaning out.  No insurance coverage for storm drain backup means lots of work for me and money out of pocket.  My goal is to have it usable for our family Christmas gathering this year, but we will see.  I am praying as we continue to clean things out that we do not find any mold problems.  The water was not there for very long, but I am not taking any chances.  The basement will be way cooler when I am done with it even if it takes a really long time.

Posted via email from Christopher’s posterous