Starbucks announced that they will give money this holiday season to the (red) campaign. Seriously, didn’t this happen already? Isn’t everybody done with the (red) campaign? Of course, it’s a good thing, as St. Arbucks will donate .05 cents from every holiday trio sold (Gingersnap Latte, Peppermint Twist Mocha, and the Eggnog Latte), but what if instead they said they will donate all procedes from the holiday trio sold on one day? I am sure more people would be on board for this. Maybe Uncle Howie should have been on board two years ago when the (red) campaign was relevant.
I was tagged by Aaron Nelson. I was supposed to put a picture up from a when I first started blogging or something like that. I used to blog over at ronpai.blogspot.com for 2-3 years, but didn’t like it the layout so I moved over here to wordpress. I don’t know what that picture was, but here is one that I took a while back that I like:
This is Paul. He is amazing. He loves movies, superheroes, pizza, and Paul Trivia. He helps out at RCC and NCC with our Children’s ministry and he loves Jesus. He loves to do impersonations and he also is filled with pop music trivia (especially filled with Elvis Presley fun facts). I love Paul. If you ever met Paul, talked with him, and actually got to know him, you would love him also.
As my tag, I choose Nicole “Nickitynangle” Raden. Nicole choose your favorite picture and tell us about it. If you ever visit her blog, you would know that this will be a very easy task for her.
I saw this on Carlos’ site at Raggamuffin Soul, and I laughed. I laughed because it made me realize who was posting complaints when I was talking about David Archuleta losing earlier this year. Soon my laughs turned to a serious halt when I realized that in a little over a month Baby Pai will be here in my house, and my life may be heading this way. Dear Lord Help Me!
As a worship leader, we are to direct people into God’s presence. This is pretty simple thinking. The thing that we have to take into consideration is what we are teaching our congregation as we lead them. Case in point: I’ve had a few people ask me when we start playing Christmas tunes at RCC. To this I reply, “at Christmas”.
Don’t get me wrong. I love the corporate season as much as the next guy, and don’t think for a second that there won’t be posts about it! My favorite CD is the Charlie Brown Christmas. My favorite Christmas movies are Die Hard and Gremlins. But when we truly begin to remember the real season of Christmas, we must remember what is happening in the Church calender. Before we can rejoice, we must reflect. Before we can celebrate, we must anticipate. Before we can recieve, we must wait in expectation.
We know how the christmas story goes. We know that Jesus comes and is born in Bethlehem, and that there are shepherds and angels and three wise men, a star, a manger, etc, etc. But we must reflect going into the season. We must look at why this savior is coming. We must reflect what this savior is doing in our lives and those around us. We must anticipate the coming of renewal.
So, as a worship leader, this is why I don’t play any “CHristmas” tunes until Christmas eve (i.e. Joy to the world, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, What Child is this, etc). I even extend it into the epiphany season, but by that time corporate Christmas has shoved it all down our throats and we are sick of it. Oh well. The Church goes on, but we must be continually teaching people the proper way to worship – why we worship and how we worship – in order for it to make sense.
Do you watch the Biggest Loser? You should. It is inspirational and awesome. You will laugh and cry (from laughing) and be angry at Heba and Vicky. I just want to know why they are so mean! I feel like i am back in middle school. The show also makes you want work out as these people are trying to lose weight for life.
For six weeks, I was involved with Bob Anderson’s boot camp in Ferndale, WA to help me lose weight. It is a 10 week program, but I was able to hop in in the the middle of everything. I’ve been trying to lose weight before the baby gets here. Here is how it is going so far:
I weighed in on 9-27-08 at 227 pounds and could do 29 push ups and 28 sit ups.
Today I weighed in at 214 pounds and I did 45 push ups and 40 sit ups.
Improvement! I love it. I will do all of the measurements (chest, arms, legs and waist) and a final weigh in at the end of 10 weeks on Dec 6th.
If you read the post below about my “After Election Hangover”, it got quite a response. A great deal of a response actually! It started out good, but suddenly we started debating over abortion. Not a bad thing really. I like that people are actually discussing stuff here (it hasn’t happened for a while).
I hope that the conversation continues as it is very respectful and backed by well thought out responses – thank you. I did also want to point you to another site who is talking about this strange division in the church over politics rather than morals. Eugene Cho, from Quest Church in Seattle, is asking us to Kiss and Make Up. Please check him out. Anybody who is a cover boy for Sojourners magazine is worth the time to read.
ps – Check out his links that he put up to other thoughts that he has had in the past! They are great.
