Whatever

Yes, that is my hand. Yes, my cast is pink and blue. Yes, I did design this with three fingers on my mouse hand.  As Ali G. would say, “Respeck.”

Get the story here, and the followup here.

Oh, I forgot! Yes, I can still hold a controller.

I’m preparing my philosophy of ministry, so I’ve been reading through some old papers and my archives here.  Do you know what I’ve discovered about myself? I’m a whiny coward - a chicken, clucking loudly. I spent months posting pseudonymously to complain about what was going on at a church where I was on staff, all the while not actually doing anything.  How’s that for courage?

I don’t know what I was really afraid of.  Would I have been fired? Reprimanded? Complained about? And would I have been hurt or embarrassed to receive those consequences as a result of doing what’s right?  I don’t know.  I was young and passive-agressive. I said my piece out loud once in a while, but I guess I didn’t trust God enough to lay it all out there.

So instead I came hear and let Elmo vent - you could probably even call it gossip - about everything that was going on.  Well, at least I dropped the alias after quitting.

This will go in the “Mistakes: Do Not Repeat” file.

I loathe the 700 Club.  I’ve watched a few times and…well, you can probably guess a few reasons I don’t like it.  But tonight they had Steve McGranahan, the “World’s Strongest Redneck,” on.  He’s basically a big guy who bends stuff.  But instead of bending to be bending or to show off, he does object lessons.  It was actually a pretty good bit.  He makes some clever connections, and cracks some groaner redneck jokes (”Why don’t rednecks make good terrorists? We hate to waste a good roll of duct tape.”), and it works.

At first I thought it was embarrassing to evangelicals, playing into stereotypes - and it may be.  But he said something during his performance that made me stop thinking about it:

One day we’re gonna be standing before the Lord, and he’s gonna ask you, “What’d you do with your gifts?”

He may not be a genius, and he may not have any sleeves, but he’s using what he has to glorify Jesus.  What more can we ask? This is sort of an interesting contrast with yesterday’s post about Conteporary Christian Music.  Is this the second side of the coin?

I was just bumming around online today and I came across this article , “Is Christian Music Dying?”, in Collide magazine.  I looked at the first couple of paragraphs in print last month, but never got around to reading the whole thing.

The article is a discussion of CCM - Contemporary Christian Music - and whether or not it has a viable future. There are some great lines, a couple of which I’ll look at here, but you should take some time and read it through. McClellan does a good and fair job, in my opinion, of looking critically at Christian music and the Christian music industry.

I’ve never really been a fan of CCM.  I’ve tried it a few times, but I always felt like I was expected to like it just because it was Christian…without worrying about whether or not it was good.  I think there are a couple of fundamental things wrong with the industry that are, in the very near future, going to drain what life is left. (continue reading…)

I posted this a couple of years ago somewhere else, but I came across it today and decided to post it again, because I don’t know that I’ll ever be beyond the need for this reminder:

Everyone has their weird little pleasures. Some enjoy breezes, some watching others trip, I enjoy grammar. There’s something about a perfectly structured sentence that just makes me smile. As a result, it really bothers me when people say things that don’t make sense, as if they do. Like when somebody is trying to display indifference to something, and they say, “I could care less.” Well, if you can care less, that means you care some. What you mean to say is, “I couldn’t care less.” Usually I’m able to keep this to myself, thankfully.

My wife and I were leaving the bank the other day, and a Robinson Glass commercial came on the radio. The announcer tells us all about Robinson, and also about the competitors. At the end he asks something like, “Why would you take your car–which carries, your family, friends, and loved ones–to a place that’s added ‘and glass’ to it’s name?”

And I said, “What kind of phrase is that–friends, family, and loved ones? Aren’t your friends and family your only loved ones? Who do you love that isn’t a friend or a family member.”

“Your enemy,” she said.

Yeah.

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