Halloween, 1983



Q: Why do demons and ghouls hang out together?

A: Because demons are a ghouls best friend.

Pay It Forward
Over the past couple of weeks I kept hearing people mention the movie Pay It Forward. I had seen it after it came out a long time ago, but for whatever reason I just kept thinking about wanting to watch it (which ended up turning into a date with thelongbrake).

Two things I really enjoyed about the movie:

1. The impact of doing good deeds. Often times I feel as though I've been taught to do good, but not to make the deed known to many people. Sort of a humility thing I guess. But why, then, would Jesus tell us that for others to know God and praise him we must let our good deeds "shine before men"? I feel like there's a very real gap between our faith and our deeds (aka, our faith has nothing to validate it without the deeds). We somehow try to show people our faith by our faith rather than an outpouring response through doing good and expressing God's love to others.

2. Change is preceded by facing the imperfection head-on. Numerous times in the movie different characters' lives were transformed, but only after they fully admitted to their addiction or mistakes.

It's like when we helped our neighbor move into her house. She insisted over and over that we let her pay us for helping, but we didn't take any money. This doesn't make sense to a world that sits firmly on an equal reimbursement mentality (I give you X amount and you give me X amount in return). She ended up returning the favor in the form of an incredible lasagna (so for all of you who do not win Josh's photo contest, there is more than one way to get that lasagna).

What happens when we give somebody something with no expectation in return? All of the sudden they are launched into the laws of the Kingdom, where the world's natural laws simply do not amount to anything. Love is the currency, where one transaction mysteriously brings value to both the giver and the receiver.

Somebody's brain was Left Behind...

Perception

I was talking with some friends a few days ago about what kind of car we would drive if we could have any in the world. Ironically, the conversation was spurred by our observation of the great number of really nice, really new cars there were in the church parking lot as we were leaving.

I've heard of stories where someone wealthy "blesses" someone else with a good deal on a really nice car that they probably otherwise wouldn't have been able to afford. Most times I've seen this happen within a church congregation. I understand the good intentions (and am definitely not discouraging generosity), but sometimes I think we overlook the ramifications of such things.

I believe that perception is often no different than our acceptance of reality. Take the new car thing for instance. If I were given a really nice car, only a few people in my life would know that it was a gift. Everyone else would just perceive that you were attempting to acheive a certain lifestyle.

I was given a really nice black North Face jacket a few weeks ago, and wear it quite often. I would say that maybe five people know it was a gift, and everyone else assumes I spent $90 or $100 on it. Again, I am not saying there's anything wrong with trying to look nice or whatever. I'm just realizing that my life looks a certain way to other people, regardless of whether or not I know that my motives or intentions were different than they perceived them to be.

Our beliefs are validated by our lifestyle. Take Shane Claiborne for instance. People test him all the time when he's on the road speaking. "So, which hotel are you staying at?" Since he stays with families to save money and build relationships when he travels, his beliefs are validated by his actions. James 2:14-26 has a great deal to say about this.

Chipper (1991-2006)


I don't often quote any t.v. show, let alone The Office. Not sure if anyone reading this saw the episode Thursday night about the bird funeral, but the timing was uncanny. It was about grieving with death, culminating in a parking lot funeral for a bird that had committed window suicide earlier the same day.

"Death is just a part of life."

Nothing that I haven't heard before, but for some reason it stuck with me...especially when I received the e-mail from my mom that Chip hadn't made it through the previous night.

As strange as it seems, this was the first death of any life within close proximity. My grandparents are all still living and healthy. As far as I know, all of my close relatives haven't died since the last time I was home.

It was just a weird feeling. Not going to lie, a tear was shed over the passing of Chip. It's been blessing to have never lost anyone near to me, but I realized that so far death has a 100% success rate of taking humans that aren't also fully God. Well, it even took him for a brief period.

So what I realized is this: our mindset determines how we live (another obvious).

What is the majority of our existence? Before or after death?

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This is a short film by my friend Dustin Winebrenner. He asked me a while back to add some music and, after some minor hurdles (coffee on my laptop), we got it finished recently. Hope you enjoy!

How good it is...


That's right. James Taylor singing, meat on the grill, and a great opportunity for our street to become a community. There were about forty people that made their way over throughout the night and everyone had a wonderful experience. I would just encourage anyone reading this to throw a party for your own street. I guarantee that it is worth every penny and every effort.

It's set! This coming Saturday we are having our street over for a cookout. After walking around to the 48 houses and delivering flyers, Clint and I sat down on our porch swing and realized that we have absolutely no clue what we've gotten ourselves into.

This is supposedly going to be a cookout, but the only grill we have is one that we ironically found in one of our neighbor's front yard with a "FREE" sign on it. I'm pretty sure that if they already decided that the didn't want to eat off of it anymore, then they won't want to this time either.

Also, we realized that this is going to cost a fair amount of money to provide everything except for the meat (everyone is bringing their own). We are now officially accepting donations and prayers.