The Lower Echelon of Society

“All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.” – Ecclesiastes 3:20

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.” – 2 Corinthians 1:3-4

Do you know what the Nintendo Wii, a Canon camera, a portable DVD player, a box of jewelry and two pillow cases have in common? Answer: They are all things that can no longer be found in our house.

Yep, we’re now a statistic. Our house was broken into and they made off with the aforementioned items along with a couple of other things. One thing they stole was my son’s little keepsake box that he kept his gold dollars, saved b-day money and little things that are precious to him. Well, were precious… The stuff we lost was just that – stuff. “You can’t take it with you” seems to be the thing to say in circumstances like these, but it still doesn’t stop my blood from boiling. It doesn’t take away the sting of being victimized. It doesn’t untie the knots in my stomach as I lie awake at night.

The worst part of the whole thing was having to tell our son. My wife broke the news to him and he cried for so long. I could hear him sniffling in his room even after I said his prayers and tucked him in. I can deal with the loss of material possessions, but when you make my kid cry…watch your back and sleep with one eye open because if I find you…you better be right with God because that will be all she wrote. This doesn’t exactly help with anger management, ya know?

What really sucks is the realization of what’s gone. Silly little things like my LOST Season 2 Disk 2 that was in the portable DVD player. That sucks. I had film in the camera with pictures from our last trip to the mountains and my youngest son’s third b-day.  They left the Gamecube games and controllers (which were right beside the Wii stuff), but they took the freakin’ memory card!!

The most important thing they stole that money can’t buy…a sense of security. Things will never be the same. I just thank God that no one was home at the time. I hate to sound X-Files-ish, but “trust no one”. Of course I say this in reference to home security.

The bad guys won this time…

“As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass, he flourishes like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more. But from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children– with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts.” – Psalms 103:13-18

Cannibals

Its easy to stand at a distance and criticize. Steven Furtick and Elevation Church are apparently prime targets for this. I must admit that I’ve had moments when I’ve felt Elevation Church might not be what a church should be, but then I realized that I can always find something to complain about. In fact, I still do. But that doesn’t keep me from abandoning the church. If everyone was looking for the perfect church, then everyone would have one-member churches. You just can’t satisfy everyone’s preferences. In the end you have to decide what you will and will not budge on.

There is a cancer in the Body of Christ. A malignant force that threatens to destroy the cells. I wish I didn’t have to write this blog. I guess I don’t have to, but I’m going to give in and spit this out while I can. Christians like Ken Silva of Apprising Ministries are cannibals. They’ve given in to devouring their own kind to keep themselves alive. I’ve written a brief email to Silva to express some disgust at his view of Elevation Church and Steven Furtick. It wasn’t a long email and it was of course dismissed as an angry email and nothing more. I’ve decided that after this email I will try my hardest to avoid reading anything that supports Ken Silva’s ministries.

But since I’m not done with this blog entry yet, I’m going to keep on. Its hard enough to win people to Christ without people like Silva spreading slander without regard to who it affects. What do you tell non-Christians? “Hey, come follow Christ! See how we tear each other down as much as we can!! Don’t you want to be a part of this??!!” That won’t exactly bring in the lost. So we have differences within the body of Christ…so what? As long as the gospel is the heart of it, why do we have to fight over pipe organs or guitars? Contemporary or traditional? Its so sad to think of what we could accomplish if we didn’t fight amongst ourselves.

Like Steven Furtick, I deal with anger issues. Its hard for me to let stuff slide without getting ticked off. I don’t know exactly what his anger does to him, but mine keeps me awake at night.

O Banyan, Where Art Thou?

“Everything that happens, happens for a reason.” – John Locke (from LOST, not the philosopher)

When the Banyan was dissolved at Calvary Church, it felt like a punch to the gut, or to quote Michael Scott – “My soul is being kicked in the groin”. Everything about the termination of Banyan just felt wrong. When John Munro came on at Calvary, I was happy that the church was finally going to have some stability. Of course I had no idea he was going to clean house. Of course I know that it wasn’t just him that decided to abolish Banyan, it was also the elders of the church. A group of men who really didn’t know what was going on in Banyan, they just saw a sect of their church that they did not like. What really bothers me more than anything else is that they actually got up in front of Banyan one Sunday night and told us that Banyan was not going away. That was a lie…they abrogated us within the next few months. I was really upset at first and a part of me is still resentful, but what are you going to do? There wasn’t anything we could do. Calvary would rather keep their average age at 55 because young adults just don’t tithe enough. Its just not good business.

The terminus of Banyan felt a little like graduating high school. You spend four years making friends, learning new things, experiencing life, etc. and then its all over. How many people from high school do you actually keep in touch with? I can count them on one hand. Of course we’re a little older and more stable and so its easier to keep in touch with ex-Banyanites. Most of us are married with kids and so we have more in common with each other than we did with our old schoolmates. But its still not the same as seeing them once a week and having time to chat about life. To do that now requires more work and it is totally worth it if you have the time, but like I said, we’re all married with kids and we’re also parts of new church bodies where we’ve made more friends.

My family is now a part of Elevation Church. I’ve seen several Banyan refugees come and go from Elevation, so I know the people of ”the young adult group formally known as Banyan” are still out there searching or have already found a church. I see several people on a monthly basis because we still have that strong tie that binds us – XBox and Halo 3. I see some people on a weekly basis because we play softball together. I’ve seen people sporadically here and there at weddings and what-not. We even went to D.C. to see the Allens who moved before Banyan dissolved.

I miss getting to play in the worship band. I felt like a staple in Banyan because of it. Not many people play bass and so I was always there. I know band members came and went, but I was there even when I knew Banyan was on life-support. I miss everyone that played up there. I miss goofing off with Zach Joyce when he was playing percussion. I miss the stairwell prayers and having Andy Guthe give us all a “good game” as we filed past him to go play. I miss Arin Guthe’s soft singing voice. I miss the brilliant skills of John Bryan and Nathaniel Bryan. I miss the Red Sox/Yankees rivalry with Joe Pascarelli (sorry if I misspelled, dude). I miss David Arrington setting up sound. I miss Andy Cherry and watching him mature into an awesome worship leader. I miss Briggette (dang it, I can’t remember her last name) and her beautiful voice and mad piano skills. I miss Rob Kelly and his krazy-glue fingers (he knows what I’m talking about). I miss Clint Echols coming in during practice and talking about how horrible the Panthers looked that Sunday. I miss David McSween and his awesome off-the-wall personality. I miss Charity Helms’ incredible singing voice. I miss Mike Cruser forgetting to put on his capo and actually stopping the song to restart it…twice! I miss Todd Sloan being there and encouraging me in my bass playing. I miss Jon Wise and his atypical style (and his Sideshow Bob hair). I miss everything about it.

Minimal Brain Dysfunction

My wife and I are reading a book together right now called “Driven to Distraction” by Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey in hopes of better understanding my A.D.D. I never imagined that A.D.D. in adults could be the cause of so many symptoms. I’ve had A.D.D. for I don’t know how long. I didn’t get diagnosed with it until a few years ago. I don’t really remember having it as a child. I’m sure if I thought about it enough I could recall situations that would indicate otherwise. I thought A.D.D. was only causing my inability to focus. Little did I know that A.D.D. can cause so many other things. This book has really opened my eyes to how A.D.D. is affecting my life. My A.D.D. could also be called “Foot-in-Mouth” Disorder because my mouth often fires before my brain is loaded. It seems rash behavior is one of many symptoms associated with A.D.D.

I’m glad they’ve changed the name to Attention Deficit Disorder. It was originally known as Minimal Brain Dysfunction…that sounds about right.

There’s this scene in The Simpsons episode “The Joy of Sect” where a cult (the Movementarians) is attempting to brainwash Homer and the town of Springfield with a video. After the video is over Homer says “Let me get this straight, they knew internal affairs was setting them up the whole time?” One of the cult leaders says “There wasn’t anything like that in the video!!” Homer responds, “You see, I get bored and so I make up my own story.” The other cult leader says “It’s quite simple, our plan is to…” Homer interrupts her by jumping up and shouting “Ooh, look, a bird!” and proceeds to chase after the bird. Sometimes I feel just like that…”Ooh, look, a bird!!”

Of course Homer is later brainwashed by the two cult members singing the Batman theme with the word “Batman” replaced with “Leader”. Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-nah, Leader!!!

2008 Cactus Softball League Jerseys

Here are couple of my latest designs for Cactus Softball League jerseys. I designed the ones we are currently using. It is unclear whether or not these are going to be used for the league.

  

Osprey at Clear Creek

I’ve seen an osprey at my work twice before today. All the sightings have been around this time of year. We have a couple of ponds here and that’s where I always see them. I took this photo with my boss’ digital SLR. This one was flying around the pond when I spotted it.

Cactus Softball League banner

I was asked to make a banner for the Cactus Softball League website and here’s what I came up with. I designed the original logo for the league and have come up with a new logo that I incorporated into this banner and the one previously used for the CSL website.

Its hard to see the detail on the CSL website that is in the banner. The background looks kind of muddled and so here’s a larger view of it. The banner took a while because I had to make the background in Photoshop and the banner in Illustrator. The background is supposed to be infield dirt with a chalk line on it. Its not the best in my opinion, but considering I’m using an older version of Photoshop, I did what I could.

birds of prey

My favorite animals are birds of prey. Hawks, falcons, eagles, owls, kites, etc. Well, except maybe vultures, though they have a certain macabre quality to them. Well I probably will be less likely to draw a vulture than a hawk or a falcon. I started drawing pictures of birds of prey in colored pencil within the past year or so. Alas, I cannot draw from memory and so I use pictures to draw from. This is one of the first raptors I did in color pencil. It’s an American Kestrel. Most people that pass one on a powerline wouldn’t give it a second glance because of its size. But they are wonderfully colored birds.